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naasking, as I see it, Dennett (in Consciouness Explained) engages in a sleight of hand. He redefines consciouness as "a bunch of distinct phenomena that get

naasking, as I see it, Dennett (in Consciouness Explained) engages in a sleight of hand. He redefines consciouness as "a bunch of distinct phenomena that gets muddle together", but that doesn't touch the mystery of qualia, it tries to just deny that there is anything to explain, owing to the fact (Dennett claims) that the problem is mischaracterized from the start.

naasking 6y ago
And your mind plays sleight of hand all the time, which Dennett clearly establishes in his work. Or do you actually see the physical blind spot that's a fundamental feature of your eyeball? So why would you trust your direct perception over the mountains of evidence that clearly demonstrates that we can't trust our perceptions?
- david_w 6y ago
  No literate scientifically minded person disputes your point, but it doesn't address my point. My point is this- qualia as a phenomena exists. Even if I think a red thing is blue, I am still experiencing some color and the experiencing itself- aside from its accuracy- is what needs explaining. So experience, aka qualia as a phenomena unto itself is in need of explaining, not any particular qualia and not the presence of absence of any correlation between the qualia and objective reality, i.e. the "truthfullness" or "accuracy" of the qualia.
  - naasking 6y ago
    > My point is this- qualia as a phenomena exists. Even if I think a red thing is blue, I am still experiencing some color and the experiencing itself- aside from its accuracy- is what needs explaining Dennett wouldn't deny that either. He would simply say that we have no reason to think the qualitative experience of our perceptions are anything other than a cognitive trick with a functional purpose. Certainly how this trick works should absolutely be explained, and I don't think any materialist would deny that.
    - david_w 6y ago
      It is what Dennett thinks. Actually, it's what Dennett thinks he thinks, because that idea of Dennett's is inherently non-sensical; it is self-contradictory. Here's why. To explain qualia as a "trick" is to void the onotological status of qualia itself. He can't do that. It doesn't matter if it's all an illusion or a trick, it doesn't matter what its ultimate epistemological status is. Qualia is experienced and it's the experience itself, whatever its biological underpinning turns out to be (you can't have sight without eyes), which is relevant. Yes, all experience could be fallible and illusory but the fact of experience itself cannnot be an illusion. Experience qua experience is the thing no scientific theory of perception and cognition needs. So why does it exist? In other words, why are we not as not-conscious as rocks and chemical processes and planets and electrical activity, doing all we do, saying all the things we say? It's certainly possible. Dennett, and I am inferring this I haven't heard him say it, is an ontological positivist. Only those things which the methods of science reveal to exist are "real" and everything else is, as you say, some kind of illusion. Sonunds good. But an illusion (which is some experience whose epistemology we have misconstrued) is not itself an illusion. Its ontgological status as "a thing which does exist" is secure.
      - naasking 6y ago
        > Yes, all experience could be fallible and illusory but the fact of experience itself cannnot be an illusion. Sure it can, and it remains only to explain how and why this illusion works to fool us into making erroneous statements, like "the fact of experience itself cannnot be an illusion". > Experience qua experience is the thing no scientific theory of perception and cognition needs. So why does it exist? It probably doesn't! Although I'm not as convinced as you that qualia are entirely non-functional. > But an illusion (which is some experience whose epistemology we have misconstrued) is not itself an illusion. What is an illusion? To my mind, an illusion is a perception or inference thereof that, taken at face value, entails a falsehood. So to call phenomenal consciousness an illusion is to say that the claims inferred from our direct perceptions are false, eg. "I have subjective awareness". There's nothing problematic about this that I can see.
        6y ago
- goatlover 6y ago
  If we can't trust our perceptions, then there is no mountain of evidence to say the mind is playing a trick on us regarding consciousness. That's because the scientific evidence is empirical, which is knowledge based on perception. Dennett's argument risks undermining the foundation for scientific knowledge.
  - naasking 6y ago
    The question of knowledge is indeed tricky. Your specific objection has kind of already been answered by science: you can't trust your senses, so you build instruments to extend your senses into domains you can't sense, you translate that data into sensory data you know is somewhat reliable, and you adhere to a rigourous process of review, replication and integration of all observations into a coherent body knowledge. Eventually, you converge on a reliable, replicable body of knowledge. And so far, this body of knowledge suggests strongly that we can't trust our perception of consciousness.
    - contrapunter 6y ago
      Science is a set of evolving traditions about how to fix errors and it relies on the consciousness/perception of individual scientists. Consciousness/perception is error-prone but it does seem intimately connected with the correction of error, too, as we strive towards better understanding. Aren't we compelled to trust it in this regard? That things will seem to be more like they really are, including consciousness itself?
    - goatlover 6y ago
      > And so far, this body of knowledge suggests strongly that we can't trust our perception of consciousness. But perception is a part of conscious experience. We don't perceive consciousness independent of things in the world. They go hand in hand. So we know about the world because we have conscious experiences of perceiving the world. What Dennett and others are trying to argue is that only the qualities of perception which are objective exist, even though those qualities are accompanied by the subjective qualities. So we know the shape of an object by color and feel. If you abstract the shape out and argue the colors and feels aren't real, then what status does our knowledge of the abstract shape have?

naasking 6y ago

And your mind plays sleight of hand all the time, which Dennett clearly establishes in his work. Or do you actually see the physical blind spot that's a fundamental feature of your eyeball? So why would you trust your direct perception over the mountains of evidence that clearly demonstrates that we can't trust our perceptions?

david_w 6y ago
No literate scientifically minded person disputes your point, but it doesn't address my point. My point is this- qualia as a phenomena exists. Even if I think a red thing is blue, I am still experiencing some color and the experiencing itself- aside from its accuracy- is what needs explaining. So experience, aka qualia as a phenomena unto itself is in need of explaining, not any particular qualia and not the presence of absence of any correlation between the qualia and objective reality, i.e. the "truthfullness" or "accuracy" of the qualia.
- naasking 6y ago
  > My point is this- qualia as a phenomena exists. Even if I think a red thing is blue, I am still experiencing some color and the experiencing itself- aside from its accuracy- is what needs explaining Dennett wouldn't deny that either. He would simply say that we have no reason to think the qualitative experience of our perceptions are anything other than a cognitive trick with a functional purpose. Certainly how this trick works should absolutely be explained, and I don't think any materialist would deny that.
  - david_w 6y ago
    It is what Dennett thinks. Actually, it's what Dennett thinks he thinks, because that idea of Dennett's is inherently non-sensical; it is self-contradictory. Here's why. To explain qualia as a "trick" is to void the onotological status of qualia itself. He can't do that. It doesn't matter if it's all an illusion or a trick, it doesn't matter what its ultimate epistemological status is. Qualia is experienced and it's the experience itself, whatever its biological underpinning turns out to be (you can't have sight without eyes), which is relevant. Yes, all experience could be fallible and illusory but the fact of experience itself cannnot be an illusion. Experience qua experience is the thing no scientific theory of perception and cognition needs. So why does it exist? In other words, why are we not as not-conscious as rocks and chemical processes and planets and electrical activity, doing all we do, saying all the things we say? It's certainly possible. Dennett, and I am inferring this I haven't heard him say it, is an ontological positivist. Only those things which the methods of science reveal to exist are "real" and everything else is, as you say, some kind of illusion. Sonunds good. But an illusion (which is some experience whose epistemology we have misconstrued) is not itself an illusion. Its ontgological status as "a thing which does exist" is secure.
    - naasking 6y ago
      > Yes, all experience could be fallible and illusory but the fact of experience itself cannnot be an illusion. Sure it can, and it remains only to explain how and why this illusion works to fool us into making erroneous statements, like "the fact of experience itself cannnot be an illusion". > Experience qua experience is the thing no scientific theory of perception and cognition needs. So why does it exist? It probably doesn't! Although I'm not as convinced as you that qualia are entirely non-functional. > But an illusion (which is some experience whose epistemology we have misconstrued) is not itself an illusion. What is an illusion? To my mind, an illusion is a perception or inference thereof that, taken at face value, entails a falsehood. So to call phenomenal consciousness an illusion is to say that the claims inferred from our direct perceptions are false, eg. "I have subjective awareness". There's nothing problematic about this that I can see.
      - 6y ago
goatlover 6y ago
If we can't trust our perceptions, then there is no mountain of evidence to say the mind is playing a trick on us regarding consciousness. That's because the scientific evidence is empirical, which is knowledge based on perception. Dennett's argument risks undermining the foundation for scientific knowledge.
- naasking 6y ago
  The question of knowledge is indeed tricky. Your specific objection has kind of already been answered by science: you can't trust your senses, so you build instruments to extend your senses into domains you can't sense, you translate that data into sensory data you know is somewhat reliable, and you adhere to a rigourous process of review, replication and integration of all observations into a coherent body knowledge. Eventually, you converge on a reliable, replicable body of knowledge. And so far, this body of knowledge suggests strongly that we can't trust our perception of consciousness.
  - contrapunter 6y ago
    Science is a set of evolving traditions about how to fix errors and it relies on the consciousness/perception of individual scientists. Consciousness/perception is error-prone but it does seem intimately connected with the correction of error, too, as we strive towards better understanding. Aren't we compelled to trust it in this regard? That things will seem to be more like they really are, including consciousness itself?
  - goatlover 6y ago
    > And so far, this body of knowledge suggests strongly that we can't trust our perception of consciousness. But perception is a part of conscious experience. We don't perceive consciousness independent of things in the world. They go hand in hand. So we know about the world because we have conscious experiences of perceiving the world. What Dennett and others are trying to argue is that only the qualities of perception which are objective exist, even though those qualities are accompanied by the subjective qualities. So we know the shape of an object by color and feel. If you abstract the shape out and argue the colors and feels aren't real, then what status does our knowledge of the abstract shape have?