3 ms·

It is a thing. We know how to study correlations between brain activity and conscious experience. The hard problem involves figuring out how brain activity ca

It is a thing. We know how to study correlations between brain activity and conscious experience. The hard problem involves figuring out how brain activity causes conscious experience. Once we explain it (or, as in physics, have a convincing theory) it won't be a problem at all anymore. Saying that something that everyone experiences all the time "doesn't exist" is not a convincing theory.

rspeer 10y ago
You are the first one in this thread to say "doesn't exist", yet you put it in quotes. No one is trying to tell you that consciousness doesn't exist. The question is whether the "hard problem of consciousness" is a thing: that is, a well-formed topic of scientific inquiry.
- TaupeRanger 10y ago
  "Isn't a thing" is synonymous with "doesn't exist". Pedantry aside, the existence of the hard problem and the existence of consciousness entail the same questions. The general question is simply this: how can we explain our subjective conscious experiences in terms of physical processes?
simonh 10y ago
You are implicitly drawing a distinction between brain activity and conciousness. But if the brain activity is the conciousness, then there is no distinction. I'm not saying that our experience of things isn't a thing. I'm saying that it's not a distinct thing that's separable from the brain activity.
- TaupeRanger 10y ago
  You said that you don't think the hard problem is a thing. The "hard problem" is simply a general question: how can we explain our subjective conscious experiences in terms of physical processes? That's a question which is well formed, interesting, and probably has an answer which we simply haven't been clever enough to find yet.
  - simonh 10y ago
    There's more to it than that though. David Chalmers who formulated the Hard Problem does not believe that subjective experience can arise from physical processes. Really. He calls it the Hard Problem because he thinks it's distinct from the Easy Problem of explaining how physical processes can constitute a thinking being. We haven't solved either problem yet, but Chalmers is distinguishing between them before we know what the answer even looks like. It his position that you can solve one (the Easy Problem) but that won't and can't lead to a solution to the Hard Problem. I think it will.
naasking 10y ago
> It is a thing. We know how to study correlations between brain activity and conscious experience. The hard problem involves figuring out how brain activity causes conscious experience. Actually the hard problem is figuring out how anything can cause conscious experience/qualia. The insurmountable difficulty is explaining how first-hand knowledge can be explained with only third-hand knowledge. The only resolution for something like scientific materialism is to deny that first-hand knowledge actually exists, and consciousness is a fully third-hand knowledge system giving the illusion of first-hand knowledge [1] [1] http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00500/full http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00...
- TaupeRanger 10y ago
  Sure...brain activity is included within "anything". Since brains are the only thing we know of that do this successfully, it's where people start. Graziano has thought about this a lot, but his view is one of many that all have about equal explanatory power. Why would materialism/physicalism require that first hand knowledge not exist? If consciousness is explainable in terms of physical processes, then first hand knowledge would exist and be part of that process. Can first and third hand knowledge not coexist?
  - naasking 10y ago
    > Why would materialism/physicalism require that first hand knowledge not exist? If consciousness is explainable in terms of physical processes, then first hand knowledge would exist and be part of that process. You cannot describe first-hand facts using only third-hand facts. This is the core philosophical dilemma in the hard problem of consciousness. Consider something like Mary's Room. What sort of third-hand description of "what it is like to see red" would describe the first-hand experience of seeing red? How can you actually capture data describing "what it is like"? The only solution seems to be to deny that "what it is like" is first-hand knowledge at all, and that it is actually a set of third-hand facts that merely yields the illusion of first-hand knowledge, and so the hard problem reduces to explaining how this illusion comes about.

rspeer 10y ago

You are the first one in this thread to say "doesn't exist", yet you put it in quotes. No one is trying to tell you that consciousness doesn't exist. The question is whether the "hard problem of consciousness" is a thing: that is, a well-formed topic of scientific inquiry.

TaupeRanger 10y ago
"Isn't a thing" is synonymous with "doesn't exist". Pedantry aside, the existence of the hard problem and the existence of consciousness entail the same questions. The general question is simply this: how can we explain our subjective conscious experiences in terms of physical processes?

simonh 10y ago

You are implicitly drawing a distinction between brain activity and conciousness. But if the brain activity is the conciousness, then there is no distinction. I'm not saying that our experience of things isn't a thing. I'm saying that it's not a distinct thing that's separable from the brain activity.

TaupeRanger 10y ago
You said that you don't think the hard problem is a thing. The "hard problem" is simply a general question: how can we explain our subjective conscious experiences in terms of physical processes? That's a question which is well formed, interesting, and probably has an answer which we simply haven't been clever enough to find yet.
- simonh 10y ago
  There's more to it than that though. David Chalmers who formulated the Hard Problem does not believe that subjective experience can arise from physical processes. Really. He calls it the Hard Problem because he thinks it's distinct from the Easy Problem of explaining how physical processes can constitute a thinking being. We haven't solved either problem yet, but Chalmers is distinguishing between them before we know what the answer even looks like. It his position that you can solve one (the Easy Problem) but that won't and can't lead to a solution to the Hard Problem. I think it will.

naasking 10y ago

> It is a thing. We know how to study correlations between brain activity and conscious experience. The hard problem involves figuring out how brain activity causes conscious experience. Actually the hard problem is figuring out how anything can cause conscious experience/qualia. The insurmountable difficulty is explaining how first-hand knowledge can be explained with only third-hand knowledge. The only resolution for something like scientific materialism is to deny that first-hand knowledge actually exists, and consciousness is a fully third-hand knowledge system giving the illusion of first-hand knowledge [1] [1] http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00500/full http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00...

TaupeRanger 10y ago
Sure...brain activity is included within "anything". Since brains are the only thing we know of that do this successfully, it's where people start. Graziano has thought about this a lot, but his view is one of many that all have about equal explanatory power. Why would materialism/physicalism require that first hand knowledge not exist? If consciousness is explainable in terms of physical processes, then first hand knowledge would exist and be part of that process. Can first and third hand knowledge not coexist?
- naasking 10y ago
  > Why would materialism/physicalism require that first hand knowledge not exist? If consciousness is explainable in terms of physical processes, then first hand knowledge would exist and be part of that process. You cannot describe first-hand facts using only third-hand facts. This is the core philosophical dilemma in the hard problem of consciousness. Consider something like Mary's Room. What sort of third-hand description of "what it is like to see red" would describe the first-hand experience of seeing red? How can you actually capture data describing "what it is like"? The only solution seems to be to deny that "what it is like" is first-hand knowledge at all, and that it is actually a set of third-hand facts that merely yields the illusion of first-hand knowledge, and so the hard problem reduces to explaining how this illusion comes about.