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Consciousness Doesn’t Depend on Language
- palad1n 7y agoBut then, just mammals?
- ffwacom 7y agoDon’t see a reason for it to be limited to just life either.
- WilliamEdward 7y agoHow so? Is it because you believe computers can be conscious? I think life is necessary for consciousness personally.
- bscphil 7y ago> I think life is necessary for consciousness personally. I suspect you would need to define life in a fairly leading fashion for this to be the case. Can you say what you mean by "life" here?
- WilliamEdward 7y agoUnfortunately i'm not knowledgable on biology at all :P but i will at least say i think you'd need biological processes for life and not just electricity.
- charlesism 7y agoIs consciousness a binary state? There are many examples that suggest it is not: toddlers, the dream state, computer programs, communal endeavors (such as a scientific inquiry), not to mention animals. If consciousness is something that is a question of degree, it makes sense to think of the entire universe being conscious to some degree or another. I’m not a very spiritual person, but I find this train of thought hard to avoid.
- 9wzYQbTYsAIc 7y agosome Hindu historically (maybe presently?) considered there to be to something like 20+ levels of consciousness.
- 9wzYQbTYsAIc 7y agoSome argue that consciousness is rooted in an unknown or misunderstood physical property of matter.
- narag 7y agoThat for some reason disregard Ockham's wise words...
- 9wzYQbTYsAIc 7y ago_shrug_ I have no skin in the game, so to speak, but I can almost imagine a scenario where it might be simpler to accept that consciousness is a physical property of matter than to accept that consciousness doesn’t exist.
- narag 7y agoIIRC the enuntiation of famous Razor, you must not introduce extra entities in a gratuitous and unnecessary way. And this is exactly what I find extrange: we don't know enough about how natural minds work yet, computers are still far from approximating the minds of simplest organism and yet there's people that says it's an impossible task. Come on! Observe first, start small, see where problems arise. What's the point in making up unknown physics for a problem that we don't have yet?
- 9wzYQbTYsAIc 7y agohttps://neurosphere.wordpress.com/2011/09/23/physical-consciousness/ https://neurosphere.wordpress.com/2011/09/23/physical-consci...
- narag 7y agoMy opinion was formed after reading more like that and realizing that it's a lot of circular reasoning: cursory observation of reality, assigning labels and, when labels doesn't fit reality, blaming reality instead of their own ability to use labels.
- nabla9 7y agoHere is first person account: Thinking the Way Animals Do: Unique insights from a person with a singular understanding. By Temple Grandin https://www.grandin.com/references/thinking.animals.html https://www.grandin.com/references/thinking.animals.html
- pbhjpbhj 7y agoThat's interesting. He says: "I have no language-based thoughts at all." And he creates that idea converting it into external language using various thought processes. Surely he's wrong about his own introspection (as so often we are as people); how could he spell a word of he can't fix any linguistic thoughts? [fwiw, I fit into the middle of his range, I think in language sometimes, picture often, feeling, smell, imagery, and occasionally in a non-linguistic way that doesn't relate to any other senses (a sort of weird feeling of connectedness)]
- DFHippie 7y agoI assume by "he" you mean Temple Grandin. Temple Grandin is a woman. Not that this is obvious. I know a man named Temple.
- pbhjpbhj 7y agoThanks, it doesn't really interest me who the writer is, nor their sex, so I don't normally check unless it appears to have a bearing on the piece.
- nabla9 7y agoUsing language to communicate and thinking in language are different uses of language. English is not my native language and I don't think in English, but I can us it to communicate. It's slower and involves more mechanical translation process from one representation to another.
- avinium 7y agoI find the stroke anecdote fairly unconvincing. The man clearly still had the capacity for language - he was miming the action of a tennis racquet. Sign language is still language. Just because something went haywire between his brain and his mouth doesn't mean he lacked language. I also don't think you can easily dismiss the conscious of animals by saying they lack language. Most animals (dogs, whales, birds, etc) seem to engage in limited communication via audible signals. As with most philosophical questions, though, it all hangs on the definition of "consciousness". It may not even be a concept worth defining.
- kace91 7y agoIs mimicry always sign language though? It is certainly communication, but I think there's a difference between communication and language. The latter requires more structure: perhaps grammar, a finite fixed set of predetermined words, etc. You don't really need consciousness to communicate, since it's just transfer of information between different entities - for example, an organism could secrete chemicals that are detected by neighboring members of the species, as I think it's the case for some plants. Structured communication might be different, as I think there has to be a something that composes the particular "phrase".
- INGELRII 7y agoSign language has linguistic structure. Vocalizations or signs that are composed of simple symbols are not language.
- BlueTemplar 7y agoSigh, it's a bit like reading obsolete scientific papers : "abrahamic exceptionalism" - no shit, Sherlock ? (At least, the later given examples are still interesting...)
- philip142au 7y agoNo one can define consciousness... so what is it we are taking about?
- codeulike 7y agoIts quite hard to define 'chair' too, if you want to define it absolutely precisely. But we can still talk about chairs.
- subroutine 7y agoIt's actually not that hard if you have a dictionary... consciousness: the state of being conscious chair: a person who presides over a meeting or committee
- joycian 7y agoI love how this immediately stumbles upon difficulties: this is a different 'chair' than I was thinking of and the first definition just invokes a recursion into the definition of 'conscious'. I'm not sure whether that was the purpose of the comment, but it brilliantly succeeded.
- throwaway413 7y agoDidn’t see that one coming!
- subroutine 7y agoIndeed, humor is largely based on the subversion of expectations.
- philip142au 7y agoThis is not true, I can make a clear definition of a chair which allows someone to recognize it, for the concept of conscience I cannot
- 7y ago
- techas 7y agoBlindsight by Peter Watts is a fiction novel with pretty interesting ideas on consciousness. In the book, consciousness is presented as a error during evolution, with no added value for species to survive. I find that idea quite disturbing and extremely interesting!
- Baeocystin 7y agoI second the recommendation. So many little morsels of thought on the nature of the Mind's I. https://www.rifters.com/real/Blindsight.htm https://www.rifters.com/real/Blindsight.htm for those who wish to read it.
- codeulike 7y agoHe has a book that seems to take some sort of dualist or perhaps squishy-life-forms-only approach to consciousness The Feeling of Life Itself: Why Consciousness Is Widespread but Can't Be Computed (The MIT Press) Christof Koch Koch describes how the theory explains many facts about the neurology of consciousness and how it has been used to build a clinically useful consciousness meter. The theory predicts that many, and perhaps all, animals experience the sights and sounds of life; consciousness is much more widespread than conventionally assumed. Contrary to received wisdom, however, Koch argues that programmable computers will not have consciousness. Even a perfect software model of the brain is not conscious. Its simulation is fake consciousness. Consciousness is not a special type of computation―it is not a clever hack. Consciousness is about being I might have to read that to see what his take is exactly.
- INGELRII 7y agoWhy you can't program computers to "be" requires explanation. Maybe someone who has read the book can comment. I'm sympathetic towards "consciousness is about being" idea. I don't see why consciousness requires conscious thinking, much less language. When you sip coffee in the morning looking trough window, you are just experiencing while staying alert. All decisions and cognition is unconscious, yet the level of consciousness is not diminished. When we are just "being" we are still doing active cognitive processing and reacting, but the process is not conscious, yet the conscious awareness of being is still there. (concepts like being, awareness, consciousness, experiencing would require better definition in this context)
- denton-scratch 7y ago"All decisions and cognition is unconscious" I'm deeply troubled by the idea of an "unconscious". This is an idea created a century ago by Sigmund Freud; all modern psychotherapy schools seem to have inherited it, many psychologists (I mean experimental scientists) seem fine with the idea, and for the general public it's commonplace that we have "unconscious thoughts". But how can you have an unconscious cognition? A cognition is an elementary moment of knowledge; how can such a thing be unconscious? And how do people who treat consciousness as an emergent phenomenon deal with this "unconscious"? Is it an emergent phenomenon that is waiting to emerge? Seriously, I don't know, and I'd like to know.
- hexxiiiz 7y agoI'm surprised that this is coming from leading neuroscientists Christoff Koch, arguing through anecdotes and facts well known by every writer who has explicated a position against this claim. The position he takes is really not one that attempts to substantiate the claim that consciousness doesn't depend on language scientifically, philosophically, mathematically, etc... Instead, this reads more like a vague reflection on some of the thoughts Koch has that give him pause about the question. His answer, that consciousness doesn't depend on language, appears here as little more than a belief he holds. Pehaps the article should have been titled "Why I Feel Like Consciousness Doesn't Depend on Language". That could indeed be the case, but the great why that makes it so will have to be more than a feeling you get about your dachshund.
- hexxiiiz 7y agoI would add, as an aside, that the article does go well with the photo of Koch showing his slide deck to the Dalai Lama, as though to pay some kind of metaphysical penance for being a scientist. I feel like the encounter with the Dalai Lama has become a bit of a trope among the darlings of American academia. I remember seeing a lecture with Paul Eckman in which he seemed to brag about the number of hours he had logged with the Dalai Lama, not to be outdone in the breadth of his perspectives.
- nabla9 7y agoWriter must choose the level of detail and style for the audience. This is written for layman audience in popular science site. You can't find articles in nautil.us that go deep into subjects.
- ramblerman 7y agoHaven’t there been cases of feral children who grew up in the wild? Was the common assumption that they lacked consciousness?
- buboard 7y agoConsciousness is not so much a scientific problem than a political one. As far as science is concerned, "consciousness" is a word, and is vaguely defined. Therefore this discussion is more relevant about its implications in legal and political matters such as animal rights and abortion.
- nihilismislove 7y agoIn this case, the ability to experience positive and negative mental states, can be used in place of consciousness. Especially the ability to experience suffering might offer reasonable basis for approaching ethical questions. In terms of animal rights this is as simple as assuming that at least most vertebrae experience mental states, incl. suffering, from at least shortly after birth (which we can safely do) In terms of abortion, this still leaves us with the additional question of weighing contrary interests of 2 individuals. This is trivial when weighing the interests of pregnant person vs sth like a 10-week fetus (obviously incapable of experiencing mental states) but maybe not sufficient for arguments about 30+ weeks fetuses, depending on personal values
- buboard 7y agoThat is a better definition than the elusive conscious
- pbhjpbhj 7y agoA 10-week fetus, ie 20 weeks of gestation, can hear [1], suck, swallow. I would not say it's obvious they can't experience "mental states"; especially not as you appear to be arguing almost all animalkind can experience those states. [1] https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/002398.htm https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/002398.htm
- nihilismislove 7y agoWell, that wasn't my main point and I did mean 10 weeks of gestation (just as an example). Still, physiological responses are not the best indicator of mental states - plants and primitive animals (from sponges to bivalves) have them too, despite lacking the neurological development necessary for (or evolutionary need for) "consciousness".
- blobs 7y agoIs that surprising? As if a just born baby cannot have consciousness because it doesn't know a language yet. Makes me think of mindfulness, the practice of putting consciousness first by trying to disallow thoughts while experiencing the present, proves it all to me. We think too much.
- andrepd 7y agoIt's not obvious to me that a baby has consciousness. I don't remember anything from before I was 2 or 3. Isn't a newborn almost an automaton? Or rather, how can you prove that it is not?
- me_me_me 7y agoThere are people with brain damage, that loose short- or long-term memory. Are they conscious? This whole debate is very grey area and one could argue from either position and never prove anything (which is one of the reasons I like to read and think about what make us 'us').
- ohduran 7y agoGood point! Language can express consciousness, which means that consciousness imply the ability to use language. As in, "we don't know what's inside, so the ability to puke sounds is enough for us to say there's a mind in there". For now, we can't separate one from the other...but that doesn't mean that that separation doesn't exist.
- wrnr 7y agoThere was a paper on HN some years ago that in my mind settled the old question whether humans share a universal grammer to process language. The gist was that a visual image is parsed the same way as language is, with noun phrases and verb phrases combined into complex structures. It is convenient for linguists to claim that consciousness requires language. I suspect consciousness is a form of seeing and visualising oneself. Maybe a way of planning ahead by trying different solutions in the mind without doing them in the physical world.
- Roark66 7y agoWell, I'm wondering if consciousness is even a real state that can be defined precisely, or is it simply a made up construct so we humans can feel better about ourselves. For example, if there was AI sufficiently complex to pass Turing test by emulating self-awareness how can we determine where emulation ends and real self-awareness begins? What if the AI is not even created by emulating neurological processes like we do now with neural nets, but some new fairly transparent mechanism of self-coding is invented like massive collection of if-then-else conditions covering everything the AI can experience and updated in real time? If we knew exactly how that AI operates could we then state definitely that it is or isn't conscious?
- everlastingfan 7y agoSomeone wil inevitably end up fucking the AI and proceed to base far-reaching conclusions about consciousness on that. As Adam knew Eve, wil we all "know" AI?
- namelosw 7y agoExactly, in video games NPCs do panic when bad thing happens. However it's coded . And what they feel could also be coded according to the purpose of the simulation.
- codeulike 7y agoI wonder if in a few decades the use of AIs in computer games might start to become an ethical issue. As in, when the simulation of NPCs starts becoming _really_ good, won't it all begin to be a bit unsettling?
- codeulike 7y agoI think the Turing Test, done properly, would actually be a pretty good yardstick. People often forget how complex the conversation could be when talking about Turing Tests. Daniel Dennett gives an 'example' Turing Test in one of his books to emphasise the point: Judge: Did you hear about the Irishman who found a magic lamp? When he rubbed it a genie appeared and granted him three wishes. “I’ll have a pint of Guiness!” the Irishman replied and immediately it appeared. The Irishman eagerly set to sipping and then gulping, but the level of Guiness in the glass was always magically restored. After a while the genie became impatient. “Well, what about your second wish?” he asked. Replied the Irishman between gulps, “Oh well, I guess I’ll have another one of these.” CHINESE ROOM: Very funny. No, I hadn’t heard it– but you know I find ethnic jokes in bad taste. I laughed in spite of myself, but really, I think you should find other topics for us to discuss. J: Fair enough but I told you the joke because I want you to explain it to me. CR: Boring! You should never explain jokes. J: Nevertheless, this is my test question. Can you explain to me how and why the joke “works”? CR: If you insist. You see, it depends on the assumption that the magically refilling glass will go on refilling forever, so the Irishman has all the stout he can ever drink. So he hardly has a reason for wanting a duplicate but he is so stupid (that’s the part I object to) or so besotted by the alcohol that he doesn’t recognize this, and so, unthinkingly endorsing his delight with his first wish come true, he asks for seconds. These background assumptions aren’t true, of course, but just part of the ambient lore of joke-telling, in which we suspend our disbelief in magic and so forth. By the way we could imagine a somewhat labored continuation in which the Irishman turned out to be “right” in his second wish after all, perhaps he’s planning to throw a big party and one glass won’t refill fast enough to satisfy all his thirsty guests (and it’s no use saving it up in advance– we all know how stale stout loses its taste). We tend not to think of such complications which is part of the explanation of why jokes work. Is that enough? Dennett: “The fact is that any program that could actually hold up its end in the conversation depicted would have to be an extraordinary supple, sophisticated, and multilayered system, brimming with “world knowledge” and meta-knowledge and meta-meta-knowledge about its own responses, the likely responses of its interlocutor, and much, much more…. Maybe the billions of actions of all those highly structured parts produce genuine understanding in the system after all.”
- 317070 7y agoI mean, you are basically saying that this man did not have a consciousness: https://neuroanthropology.net/2010/07/21/life-without-language/ https://neuroanthropology.net/2010/07/21/life-without-langua... I mean, there are plenty of language-less people. But they are clearly conscious. So why is this even a discussion? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Man_Without_Words https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Man_Without_Words
- pbhjpbhj 7y ago>her work with Ildefonso, who had grown up without learning sign language or any other form of communication. // It sounds like she's limiting her definition of language to "ability to communicate". Which I think it's wrong. One example is how babies can communicate with sign long before they can talk. When I learnt some BSL I was essentially in a situation like Ildenfonso (sp?) in your link. But, I certainly had language, it just wouldn't let me communicate in that situation, it essentially became a private language only for me. Now, Ildenfonso may not have developed a sophisticated language, but once the penny dropped and he began to communicate in sign with his tutor it seems like he already had a working language to match the signs to, that better explains - IMO - the rush to identify signs for the physical items around him, rather than waiting to learn as things came up.
- simonh 7y agoWhen I am at rest, looking around myself, taking in sensations, observing others runaround me, and aware of myself and my place in the world, I consider myself consciously aware. I don't see what any of that experience has to do with language. Furthermore, I don't see any reason why that state of conscious awareness would need to have been significantly different in my pre-human ancestors. Would a Homo Erectus have had a significantly different sense of experience? An Australopithecus? Our common ancestor with other apes? If so, why? It seems to me the parts of the brain active in that state correspond closely to those in other mammals. Yes when I'm solving maths problems, writing a HN post, playing a board game or solving a crossword puzzle I'm using higher brain functions that other mammals don't have. Sure. But what has that got to do with conscious awareness? I have that when I'm doing things very much along the same lines as activities of other mammals. Running a race, climbing a tree, walking through woodland, stalking prey, experiencing love, or loss or panic. I don't see why I would expect their experience of those things to be much different from mine. There's no 'animal mode' state of awareness that we have when doing 'animal' things that's a vestige of our pre-conscious past. Conscious awareness isn't something that only kicks in when actively engaging higher brain functions. So surely that is evidence it's a foundational part of our mental heritage, not a modern addition? It seems to me that arguing that a higher mammal's experience must be dramatically different from mine when doing common activities, to the point that it's impossible for us to even imagine what that experience is like, is the extraordinary claim.
- collyw 7y agoHave you ever tried meditating? The first time you do you probably think your mind isn't wandering, it actually takes a bit of practice to even notice quite how much internal dialogue you actually have. It's non stop for most of us.
- DennisP 7y agoYes, but part of the point, at least in the Buddhist tradition, is that those thoughts are just another phenomenon you're experiencing. Do a lot of the right kind of practice, and you can get it to stop, while still maintaining a high level of conscious awareness. E.g. see the book The Mind Illuminated.
- msiyer 7y agoLanguage is a poor way to comprehend the cosmos. It is very limiting. Words are not enough to explain what happens when rain drops fall on my skin or the wet smell of sand intoxicates me or wind ruffles my hair... I have seen cows chewing cud and they seem more in touch with the cosmos than 99.99 percent humans.
- jonathanstrange 7y agoI have only published two (unimportant) articles in the Philosophy of Mind about computationalism, so I'm certainly not an expert on this, but from what I gather from colleagues in philosophy who work in this area, the problem with "consciousness" is that everybody defines the notion differently. Maybe there is some convergence on some soft criteria, but these are loose and in the end there is no unified, agreed upon definition or way to measure consciousness. IMHO, that makes a meaningful discussion difficult. Probably most ways of looking at consciousness don't depend on language - consciousness does not even imply self-consciousness, so it's not easy to see why it should. However, it shouldn't be hard to make a philosophical case for a dependence, too. In the end, it's questionable whether any of those theories are empirically testable. That's my impression, though admittedly I'm not really working in that area.
- denton-scratch 7y ago"everybody defines the notion differently" As I see it, the problem is that everyone knows what consciousness is - in a sense, it's the only thing they can know, it's direct experience. But it's impossible to inspect the consciousness of someone else; so scientists have trouble with the word, because verifiability. So "scientists" (I mean those who advocate a scientific approach) tend to prefer the idea that consciousness is an "emergent phenomenon", rather than something fundamental; and that acts of will really follow an action, rather than causing it. The article touches on Buddhist philosophy. Some Buddhists do indeed take the view that consciousness is something fundamental, that really exists. I find it really hard to talk about this subject. I have a very strong conviction that consciousness is real and fundamental, because, well, it's all I've got, at the end of the day. But if consciousness is fundamental, then all that other stuff is secondary. There are schools of Buddhist philosophy that claim that all that secondary stuff is literally created by consciousness. But my very consciousness constantly provides me with very convincing evidence that all that secondary stuff is in fact fundamental. So who's kidding who? One reason it's good to play with this kind of stuff is that it makes you less certain of anything!
- mercer 7y agoMy impression is that the Buddhist view, at least from a zen perspective, is not so much telling you that all that secondary stuff is 'literally' created by consciousness, but rather that attachment to this idea is part of the problem. Being too attached to the idea that there is an objective reality outside of yourself is just as problematic as being attached to the idea that there is nothing outside of you subjective consciousness/experience. The truth, possibly impossible to find out, probably lies somewhere in between. The zen approach, as I understand it, is to focus on your own awareness of these two extremes, and to keep yourself from reifying either one. Instead, focus on your direct experience, on 'wu-wei', and consider these two extremes interesting perspectives that can help you on your path to 'naturalness'. Personally I find this philosophy maddeningly unclear and subjective, but it's been the most helpful in my life when it comes to 'happiness', or perhaps 'contentment'.
- snapey 7y agoThe idea that we are not all that dissimilar from our animal counterparts is one of the central arguments put forward by John Gray in Straw Dogs. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Straw-Dogs-Thoughts-Humans-Animals/dp/1862075964 https://www.amazon.co.uk/Straw-Dogs-Thoughts-Humans-Animals/...
- Hoasi 7y agoOf course it doesn't. Come on.
- aiscapehumanity 7y agoIt makes sense. You dont need language as a drive in the ambient medium of the wild and natural selection, you need just a bit of sentience as the bare minimum, granted by neurons(cog. thresholds is another topic). Language is a special emergence not universal.
- rafaelvasco 7y agoMakes me remember of: "The day science begins to study non-physical phenomena, it will make more progress in one decade than in all the previous centuries of its existence." and "If you want to find the secrets of the universe, think in terms of energy, frequency and vibration." - Nikola Tesla
- koonsolo 7y agoIt's always funny how people try to make the distinction between "people" and everything else. Other animals don't have feelings. Oh wait, other animals cannot think. Oh wait, other animals don't use language. Oh wait, other animals don't use 'true' language. Same with computers. Computers can never defeat humans in chess. Go is too complex for computers, and so humans are better. Sometimes we even have to change the definition a bit to still keep the distinction between 'us' and the rest of the animals and objects. Very strange. And if you think humans are the only animals that can be deliberately cruel, you should watch some chimp documentaries.
- Merrill 7y agoThe thing that higher animals and humans can do is imagine alternative futures, predict consequences, and choose to act accordingly. This would probably meet some definition of consciousness. Classification, abstraction, language and logic are probably not common features except in very limited ways. So animals likely live in a world of continuous special cases.
- m0llusk 7y agoAnimals communicate using not only sound but color and pattern and such. That may not be full language, but it is a reasonable approximation. The same goes for animal consciousness. It may not be full consciousness with awareness of history and planning for the future, but it is close enough to function more or less the same way. The only examples given of consciousness functioning without were people with major damage to their neurology. If anything that is evidence that the link between consciousness and language is strong enough to only be broken by severe incapacitating injury.
- mikelyons 7y agoConsciousness is a fundamental property of reality. So fundamental that it is actually the substrate from which all reality is possible.