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The closest we will ever come to describing consciousness is simply describing the correlates of consciousness. The "ultimate cause" of it will forever be a mys

The closest we will ever come to describing consciousness is simply describing the correlates of consciousness. The "ultimate cause" of it will forever be a mystery, behind the veil. Consciousness appears to exist outside of the physical world, in that we can describe a physical process entirely without invoking consciousness. Because of this, consciousness is beyond the scientific method and our fundamental understanding in principle, not just in practice. This is why it is called the "hard problem" of consciousness. In principle, there is no framework of deduction or reasoning by which we can explain the emergence of qualia. It is beyond us.

jhrmnn 7y ago
I tend to think the same. But then I always question whether I just lack imagination in how to formulate the problem scientifically. Because it does feel a bit like an excuse.
noiv 7y ago
I'll bite. I'd take a body running a simulation of the environment to compare possible outcomes of its actions. At some point along the path driven by evolution the body manages to put himself into the simulation provoking a whole spectrum of interesting effects keeping this in sync. Et voilà, it became conscious.
abnry 7y ago
See, this seems entirely obvious to me but so many people are stuck with a 100% materialism worldview that they expect their to be some scientific "explanation" for consciousness. And that truly baffles me.
- toasterlovin 7y ago
  A materialistic approach to explaining consciousness is necessary, since consciousness can be affected by physical changes to the brain, which implies that consciousness is fundamentally a physical process.
  - JamOnItMahn 7y ago
    I'm of two minds about this (ha). One nods and says "yup, 'nuff said". The other thinks about a radio. A sufficiently complex radio can do amazing things... provided it has a signal. It can make music sounds boring and flat, or it can bring it to life (via an equalizer function). But if you mess with the antenna in any way, or, for that matter, disconnect it fully, the entire experience can be altered in significant ways. So, yeah, part of the physical matter was changed. But the original signal, already produced by some other process, "somewhere else", was never changed. I'm not necessarily advocating that our consciousness is generated somewhere else. It just makes me wonder (ha).
    - JamOnItMahn 7y ago
      After having read my own comment again I felt like some clarification is necessary, even if just for myself. In my little thought experiment the radio itself was never physically changed, just the antenna. The antenna, another physical component, is just a sensing peripheral. But what does the radio process if its front end is dead? Think about Helen Keller for a minute. What kinds of sensing signals did she process? Vastly different than most of us. Yet she was still able to arrive at a roughly equivalent understanding of our overall shared experience. I say roughly equivalent because I have no idea what her internal state looks, or functions, like. I think about this often. I myself have a drive to try to electronically capture, and share, knowledge. But I play a little thought experiment in my head often... what if all your senses were cut off and you were locked in. Just you inside your head, nothing else. Forgetting important factors like if you were just born or right now in your current state... what if a dry, textual, fact were somehow delivered straight to your consciousness. Something you know nothing about, nor have ever experienced before in any setting. Let's say you've never experienced snow, you don't even know what it is. Maybe you've only ever lived in a hot desert your whole life and have never experienced freezing cold, in any form (no AC, ice, etc...). So a textual description of snow is made available to your (locked-in) consciousness. You have no idea how to process that fact into an experience. I like to think of it like IBM's Watson. It has access to a wealth of facts. But it has nearly zero experience with any of them. You can not experience that dry textual fact without previous experience. In this case precipitation and/or freezing cold. I don't even think it's about context so much. Let's say you are provided with context about precipitation and freezing cold. It still doesn't provide the experience, memory, of either. You're consciousness is missing the essential primitives necessary for understanding the experience. I guess for me it's always come back to the experience. Watson can provide information. But it can't truly communicate a shared experience with that information to another consciousness, regardless of whether or not that other consciousness has experienced those primitives or not. More simply, think about the first Matrix movie (insert groan here). Trinity downloads how to fly a helicopter. Let's say I want to invent that type of technology. My first attempt may be to create a system where you simply attach a cell phone to your head and have a way of conveying textual facts to your eyes. Dry facts about flying a helicopter. One field test is done with someone who has zero experience with flying at all. It will likely fail to produce the intended result. Sure it may provide a liftoff. But you will not be an instant stunt flyer. So iteration number two involves simple non-interactive, non-motion graphics. Another field test is done, on a new subject with no experience. Maybe somewhat better results, but still not the intended outcome. Next iteration involves videos. Another field test, again only somewhat improved results. You can iterate all the way through a short interactive simulation. The results will be better, for sure. But until you've had actual time in the field before-hand, i.e., experience, you just don't know the experience. Read the definition of gravity. Huh!? Drop an apple, oh! So what would it take here? Implanted memories? Along with all the necessary primitives??? I don't have the answer.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 7y ago
I wouldn't say that it is 'beyond us' so much as it is simply unexplainable by empirical models of reality. Empiricism is a bit like Newtonian gravitation, it isn't wrong but it isn't complete either. It's currently the predominant philosophical model human society as a whole, but it wasn't always so and there's no reason to expect it always will be.
Tenoke 7y ago
>Consciousness appears to exist outside of the physical world, in that we can describe a physical process entirely without invoking consciousness. Only in the same ways that e.g. emotions exist 'outside of the physical world' and we are doing some work with those (e.g. we know more about the effects of hormones on them now). I completely disagree that this is unstudiable or 'behind the veil'. We can create beings with consciousness (babies) using a purely physical process, of course there is some way to learn more. Personally, I assume the main problem is (as it so often happens) that 'consciousness' is too loosely defined and explaining it will be easier with more strict definitions and a deeper understanding of the brain and body.
- corporate_shi11 7y ago
  So what is qualia, or the experience of conscious beings?
  - Tenoke 7y ago
    I'm not saying we have an answer today, just that an answer is reachable. I can give you my currently favourite theories of course, but they are beside the point.
  - protonfish 7y ago
    Qualia is not a scientific concept and really needs to be dismissed. (By definition it cannot be measured or observed.) I doubt you agree, but any study of consciousness that has a chance of succeeding will need to be extremely rigorous. I believe that an explanation of consciousness - much like the theory of evolution - will be both very simple and very unpopular.
    - Jedi72 7y ago
      "Consciousness is god experiencing their creation, through themself" Let the downvotes rolll.....
      - JamOnItMahn 7y ago
yohsii 7y ago
consume some 5meo-dmt and it's suddenly not beyond us anymore
JamOnItMahn 7y ago
I don't know how to quote your post, so forgive me if I'm doing it wrong... > The closest we will ever come to describing consciousness is simply describing the correlates of consciousness. The "ultimate cause" of it will forever be a mystery, behind the veil. I don't agree about it being forever a mystery. > Consciousness appears to exist outside of the physical world, in that we can describe a physical process entirely without invoking consciousness. Because of this, consciousness is beyond the scientific method and our fundamental understanding in principle, not just in practice. I do like to think about this. A lot. I compare it to the experience of using a computer. Turn it on and supply it with an operating system and all of the sudden there is a "there" there, even thI don't know how to quote your post, so forgive me if I'm doing it wrong... > The closest we will ever come to describing consciousness is simply describing the correlates of consciousness. The "ultimate cause" of it will forever be a mystery, behind the veil. I don't agree about it being forever a mystery. > Consciousness appears to exist outside of the physical world, in that we can describe a physical process entirely without invoking consciousness. Because of this, consciousness is beyond the scientific method and our fundamental understanding in principle, not just in practice. I do like to think about this. A lot. I compare it to the experience of using a computer. Turn it on and supply it with an operating system and all of the sudden there is a "there" there, even though physically there is not. I'm not an OS person, kernel-wise, and I've not had any conversations with them on this topic. But I imagine them to be too close to the topic... unable to see the forest through the trees. Take a step back and look at it. Amazing things can happen in a place that is not physically there. Maybe looking at the 80x25 isn't so spectacular (although I am a CLI guy at heart), but think about VR. There is certainly a there there. Simulated, sure, but it exists nowhere in the physical world. To me, that scenario is something akin to, but certainly not the equivalent of, consciousness. That scenario is caused by electronics... chips and electricity. Physically damage the chips or turn off the electricity and it certainly changes, or even disappears. Yet, that simulation isn't physically extant. ough physically there is not. I'm not an OS person, kernel-wise, and I've not had any conversations with them on this topic. But I imagine them to be too close to the topic... unable to see the forest through the trees. Take a step back and look at it. Amazing things can happen in a place that is not physically there. Maybe looking at the 80x25 isn't so spectacular (although I am a CLI guy at heart), but think about VR. There is certainly a there there. Simulated, sure, but it exists nowhere in the physical world. To me, that scenario is something akin to, but certainly not the equivalent of, consciousness. That scenario is caused by electronics... chips and electricity. Physically damage the chips or turn off the electricity and it certainly changes, or even disappears. Yet, that simulation isn't physically extant.
ghjyui 7y ago
Calling it something that's beyond us is a lazy argument that merely hides unwillingness to put an effort to understand this.

jhrmnn 7y ago

I tend to think the same. But then I always question whether I just lack imagination in how to formulate the problem scientifically. Because it does feel a bit like an excuse.

noiv 7y ago

I'll bite. I'd take a body running a simulation of the environment to compare possible outcomes of its actions. At some point along the path driven by evolution the body manages to put himself into the simulation provoking a whole spectrum of interesting effects keeping this in sync. Et voilà, it became conscious.

abnry 7y ago

See, this seems entirely obvious to me but so many people are stuck with a 100% materialism worldview that they expect their to be some scientific "explanation" for consciousness. And that truly baffles me.

toasterlovin 7y ago
A materialistic approach to explaining consciousness is necessary, since consciousness can be affected by physical changes to the brain, which implies that consciousness is fundamentally a physical process.
- JamOnItMahn 7y ago
  I'm of two minds about this (ha). One nods and says "yup, 'nuff said". The other thinks about a radio. A sufficiently complex radio can do amazing things... provided it has a signal. It can make music sounds boring and flat, or it can bring it to life (via an equalizer function). But if you mess with the antenna in any way, or, for that matter, disconnect it fully, the entire experience can be altered in significant ways. So, yeah, part of the physical matter was changed. But the original signal, already produced by some other process, "somewhere else", was never changed. I'm not necessarily advocating that our consciousness is generated somewhere else. It just makes me wonder (ha).
  - JamOnItMahn 7y ago
    After having read my own comment again I felt like some clarification is necessary, even if just for myself. In my little thought experiment the radio itself was never physically changed, just the antenna. The antenna, another physical component, is just a sensing peripheral. But what does the radio process if its front end is dead? Think about Helen Keller for a minute. What kinds of sensing signals did she process? Vastly different than most of us. Yet she was still able to arrive at a roughly equivalent understanding of our overall shared experience. I say roughly equivalent because I have no idea what her internal state looks, or functions, like. I think about this often. I myself have a drive to try to electronically capture, and share, knowledge. But I play a little thought experiment in my head often... what if all your senses were cut off and you were locked in. Just you inside your head, nothing else. Forgetting important factors like if you were just born or right now in your current state... what if a dry, textual, fact were somehow delivered straight to your consciousness. Something you know nothing about, nor have ever experienced before in any setting. Let's say you've never experienced snow, you don't even know what it is. Maybe you've only ever lived in a hot desert your whole life and have never experienced freezing cold, in any form (no AC, ice, etc...). So a textual description of snow is made available to your (locked-in) consciousness. You have no idea how to process that fact into an experience. I like to think of it like IBM's Watson. It has access to a wealth of facts. But it has nearly zero experience with any of them. You can not experience that dry textual fact without previous experience. In this case precipitation and/or freezing cold. I don't even think it's about context so much. Let's say you are provided with context about precipitation and freezing cold. It still doesn't provide the experience, memory, of either. You're consciousness is missing the essential primitives necessary for understanding the experience. I guess for me it's always come back to the experience. Watson can provide information. But it can't truly communicate a shared experience with that information to another consciousness, regardless of whether or not that other consciousness has experienced those primitives or not. More simply, think about the first Matrix movie (insert groan here). Trinity downloads how to fly a helicopter. Let's say I want to invent that type of technology. My first attempt may be to create a system where you simply attach a cell phone to your head and have a way of conveying textual facts to your eyes. Dry facts about flying a helicopter. One field test is done with someone who has zero experience with flying at all. It will likely fail to produce the intended result. Sure it may provide a liftoff. But you will not be an instant stunt flyer. So iteration number two involves simple non-interactive, non-motion graphics. Another field test is done, on a new subject with no experience. Maybe somewhat better results, but still not the intended outcome. Next iteration involves videos. Another field test, again only somewhat improved results. You can iterate all the way through a short interactive simulation. The results will be better, for sure. But until you've had actual time in the field before-hand, i.e., experience, you just don't know the experience. Read the definition of gravity. Huh!? Drop an apple, oh! So what would it take here? Implanted memories? Along with all the necessary primitives??? I don't have the answer.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 7y ago

I wouldn't say that it is 'beyond us' so much as it is simply unexplainable by empirical models of reality. Empiricism is a bit like Newtonian gravitation, it isn't wrong but it isn't complete either. It's currently the predominant philosophical model human society as a whole, but it wasn't always so and there's no reason to expect it always will be.

Tenoke 7y ago

>Consciousness appears to exist outside of the physical world, in that we can describe a physical process entirely without invoking consciousness. Only in the same ways that e.g. emotions exist 'outside of the physical world' and we are doing some work with those (e.g. we know more about the effects of hormones on them now). I completely disagree that this is unstudiable or 'behind the veil'. We can create beings with consciousness (babies) using a purely physical process, of course there is some way to learn more. Personally, I assume the main problem is (as it so often happens) that 'consciousness' is too loosely defined and explaining it will be easier with more strict definitions and a deeper understanding of the brain and body.

corporate_shi11 7y ago
So what is qualia, or the experience of conscious beings?
- Tenoke 7y ago
  I'm not saying we have an answer today, just that an answer is reachable. I can give you my currently favourite theories of course, but they are beside the point.
- protonfish 7y ago
  Qualia is not a scientific concept and really needs to be dismissed. (By definition it cannot be measured or observed.) I doubt you agree, but any study of consciousness that has a chance of succeeding will need to be extremely rigorous. I believe that an explanation of consciousness - much like the theory of evolution - will be both very simple and very unpopular.
  - Jedi72 7y ago
    "Consciousness is god experiencing their creation, through themself" Let the downvotes rolll.....
    - JamOnItMahn 7y ago

yohsii 7y ago

consume some 5meo-dmt and it's suddenly not beyond us anymore

JamOnItMahn 7y ago

I don't know how to quote your post, so forgive me if I'm doing it wrong... > The closest we will ever come to describing consciousness is simply describing the correlates of consciousness. The "ultimate cause" of it will forever be a mystery, behind the veil. I don't agree about it being forever a mystery. > Consciousness appears to exist outside of the physical world, in that we can describe a physical process entirely without invoking consciousness. Because of this, consciousness is beyond the scientific method and our fundamental understanding in principle, not just in practice. I do like to think about this. A lot. I compare it to the experience of using a computer. Turn it on and supply it with an operating system and all of the sudden there is a "there" there, even thI don't know how to quote your post, so forgive me if I'm doing it wrong... > The closest we will ever come to describing consciousness is simply describing the correlates of consciousness. The "ultimate cause" of it will forever be a mystery, behind the veil. I don't agree about it being forever a mystery. > Consciousness appears to exist outside of the physical world, in that we can describe a physical process entirely without invoking consciousness. Because of this, consciousness is beyond the scientific method and our fundamental understanding in principle, not just in practice. I do like to think about this. A lot. I compare it to the experience of using a computer. Turn it on and supply it with an operating system and all of the sudden there is a "there" there, even though physically there is not. I'm not an OS person, kernel-wise, and I've not had any conversations with them on this topic. But I imagine them to be too close to the topic... unable to see the forest through the trees. Take a step back and look at it. Amazing things can happen in a place that is not physically there. Maybe looking at the 80x25 isn't so spectacular (although I am a CLI guy at heart), but think about VR. There is certainly a there there. Simulated, sure, but it exists nowhere in the physical world. To me, that scenario is something akin to, but certainly not the equivalent of, consciousness. That scenario is caused by electronics... chips and electricity. Physically damage the chips or turn off the electricity and it certainly changes, or even disappears. Yet, that simulation isn't physically extant. ough physically there is not. I'm not an OS person, kernel-wise, and I've not had any conversations with them on this topic. But I imagine them to be too close to the topic... unable to see the forest through the trees. Take a step back and look at it. Amazing things can happen in a place that is not physically there. Maybe looking at the 80x25 isn't so spectacular (although I am a CLI guy at heart), but think about VR. There is certainly a there there. Simulated, sure, but it exists nowhere in the physical world. To me, that scenario is something akin to, but certainly not the equivalent of, consciousness. That scenario is caused by electronics... chips and electricity. Physically damage the chips or turn off the electricity and it certainly changes, or even disappears. Yet, that simulation isn't physically extant.

ghjyui 7y ago

Calling it something that's beyond us is a lazy argument that merely hides unwillingness to put an effort to understand this.