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I think you are confusing science with philosophy. In science, solving a problem amounts to building a (quantitative) theory that allows us to predict phenomena

by berndi 5y ago

I think you are confusing science with philosophy. In science, solving a problem amounts to building a (quantitative) theory that allows us to predict phenomena and outcomes in the real world. We say that we have understood a phenomenon when we have a self-consistent theory that makes predictions validated in experiments. The ultimate question of "why" reality behaves in a way that is congruent with a given theory is left to philosophers. Your claim that a theory of consciousness would simply "shift the problem" is only true with respect to these philosophic (arguably unscientific) types of questions. Consider the problem of gravity. Very coarsely, we have moved from Aristotle's theory of gravity: the natural place of things is on the ground and things like to stay in their natural place, to Newtonian gravity: objects are attracted with a force that is proportional to the product of their masses, to general relativity: objects follow geodesics in curved spacetime, with the curvature determined by the energy content of space. Our grasp on gravity has certainly improved greatly, but the "why" questions have simply been shifted. Consciousness is a natural phenomenon and as such can be subject to scientific study. The ultimate question of why the laws of nature are as they are is not part of this project and is best entertained after closing time.

malka 5y ago
Consciousness is not observable. Gravity is.
- bsenftner 5y ago
  We observe our own consciousness all the time. It's just that your consciousness is closed to all but you.
  - zepto 5y ago
    That’s not what we call an ‘observation’ in science.
    - collyw 5y ago
      Experience is a more accurate word. Meditation asks you to observe the experience.
      - zepto 5y ago
        Yes, but that ‘observing’ is not the same as what science calls ‘observing’.
- berndi 5y ago
  Any reasonable definition of "observing" presupposes a conscious observer and it is possible for you to observe yourself being conscious (I assume). Indeed, consciousness is observable in a much more direct sense than gravity.
  - goatlover 5y ago
    Yes, but you can't observer other people's consciousness, only infer it. This is a problem when it comes to animals, infants, intelligent machines and coma patients. Or aliens if we ever made contact.
    - Isinlor 5y ago
      You can observe, in principle, other people consciousness. Brain conjoined-twins can do it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craniopagus_twins https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craniopagus_twins For example, there are twins that can see with each other eyes or feel each other body. You could try, in principle, to create a chimera from your brain and a brain of some other animal.
      - lisper 5y ago
        > there are twins that can see with each other eyes or feel each other body That's not the same as directly observing someone else's consciousness. That's just two people sharing some I/O devices. In fact, one could argue that the inability to directly observe another consciousness is a necessary condition for being an individual: the limits of your direct observation is the definition of where "you" stop and the rest of the universe (including other people) begins.
        Isinlor 5y ago
        It is not just sharing I/O devices. Brain conjoined twins can also share their mental states. They do experience each other qualia [0]. > Though Krista and Tatiana Hogan share a brain, the two girls showed distinct personalities and behavior. One example was when Krista started drinking her juice Tatiana felt it physically going through her body. In any other set of twins the natural conclusion about the two events would be that Krista's drinking and Tatiana's reaction would be coincidental. But because Krista and Tatiana are connected at their heads, whatever the girls do they do it together. I also recall examples where one girl does not like eating something and so the other girl can not eat it because the other can feel it. Concept of an individual is not a fundamental property of the universe. It is an emergent, fluid and complex concept. There are people with multiple personality disorders. There are brain conjoined twins. There are people with severed corpus callosum. E.g. here is report about one person [1]: > After the right and left brain are separated, each hemisphere will have its own separate perception, concepts, and impulses to act. Having two "brains" in one body can create some interesting dilemmas. When one split-brain patient dressed himself, he sometimes pulled his pants up with one hand (that side of his brain wanted to get dressed) and down with the other (this side did not). He also reported to have grabbed his wife with his left hand and shaken her violently, at which point his right hand came to her aid and grabbed the aggressive left hand. However, such conflicts are very rare. If a conflict arises, one hemisphere usually overrides the other. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craniopagus_twins#Media https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craniopagus_twins#Media [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Split-brain https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Split-brain
- collyw 5y ago
  You can observe your own consciousness.
antonvs 5y ago
Science answers "why" questions all the time. We know the answer to why uniform radiation propagates due to an inverse square law. We know when and why conservation laws exist. The are many, many examples of this. Examples like these refute your claim about the limits of science. Claims like yours are common, though - you're probably just repeating what someone else has told you, perhaps without thinking very deeply about it. This position seems to have arisen as a result of some of the limits of science that were encountered last century. The "shut up and calculate" mentality was a kind of reaction to the philosophical problems with quantum mechanics. But the defensive reaction that "science is just about theories that make predictions" is incoherent. If it were really true, then science would be utterly dependent on philosophy to come up with new theories, because a prediction-generating machine isn't going to help you with that. Ironically, the very people who make these claims would be the last to accept that progress in science is utterly dependent on philosophy - but that's the consequence of their own attempt to make a sharp delineation between, essentially, thinking and just crunching numbers.
- berndi 5y ago
  I'm having a hard time understanding your post -- my depth of thinking may well not be on par with yours. Its obvious that science as a whole explains a hierarchy of phenomenona, with a given phenomenon (like radiation propagation) often being explained ("why does it happen in this specific way") by a more fundamental theory that provides an overarching account of a set of phenomena. The point is that every update of a scientific theory shifts old "why" questions to new ones. Science will not ever and does not aim to provide an answer to the ultimate question of why anything exists at all or why a given theory of everything applies rather than another (indeed, string theory for example posits a possible, if not actual theory of everything). In this sense, in the scientific study of consciousness, we do not aim for an ultimate account of why the laws of nature give rise to consciousness. Instead, it is about explaining a natural phenomenon within a theoretical framework that allows us to make predictions with respect to experimental outcomes.
  - ganzuul 5y ago
    There is a logical answer to the question of why there is something rather than nothing, but interpretations of it are varied. If you accept that consciousness (hard) is a natural phenomena then it is much less of a leap. However, you do lose the ability to conclude with certainty that your individual consciuosness did _not_ instantiate the entire universe, which tends to lead to a very self-centered path of inquiry which often only skirts around the main issue. If you are further attached to the logic of the Law of the Excluded Middle, then megalomania is always close at hand and probably the reason why this knowledge isn't shouted from the rooftops. This idea has been around for thousands of years and is similar to the central teaching of Advaita Vedanta. Indeed, we are continuing a truly great tradition of inquiry in our natural philosophy of science.

by berndi 5y ago

malka 5y ago

Consciousness is not observable. Gravity is.

bsenftner 5y ago
We observe our own consciousness all the time. It's just that your consciousness is closed to all but you.
- zepto 5y ago
  That’s not what we call an ‘observation’ in science.
  - collyw 5y ago
    Experience is a more accurate word. Meditation asks you to observe the experience.
    - zepto 5y ago
      Yes, but that ‘observing’ is not the same as what science calls ‘observing’.
berndi 5y ago
Any reasonable definition of "observing" presupposes a conscious observer and it is possible for you to observe yourself being conscious (I assume). Indeed, consciousness is observable in a much more direct sense than gravity.
- goatlover 5y ago
  Yes, but you can't observer other people's consciousness, only infer it. This is a problem when it comes to animals, infants, intelligent machines and coma patients. Or aliens if we ever made contact.
  - Isinlor 5y ago
    You can observe, in principle, other people consciousness. Brain conjoined-twins can do it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craniopagus_twins https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craniopagus_twins For example, there are twins that can see with each other eyes or feel each other body. You could try, in principle, to create a chimera from your brain and a brain of some other animal.
    - lisper 5y ago
      > there are twins that can see with each other eyes or feel each other body That's not the same as directly observing someone else's consciousness. That's just two people sharing some I/O devices. In fact, one could argue that the inability to directly observe another consciousness is a necessary condition for being an individual: the limits of your direct observation is the definition of where "you" stop and the rest of the universe (including other people) begins.
      - Isinlor 5y ago
        It is not just sharing I/O devices. Brain conjoined twins can also share their mental states. They do experience each other qualia [0]. > Though Krista and Tatiana Hogan share a brain, the two girls showed distinct personalities and behavior. One example was when Krista started drinking her juice Tatiana felt it physically going through her body. In any other set of twins the natural conclusion about the two events would be that Krista's drinking and Tatiana's reaction would be coincidental. But because Krista and Tatiana are connected at their heads, whatever the girls do they do it together. I also recall examples where one girl does not like eating something and so the other girl can not eat it because the other can feel it. Concept of an individual is not a fundamental property of the universe. It is an emergent, fluid and complex concept. There are people with multiple personality disorders. There are brain conjoined twins. There are people with severed corpus callosum. E.g. here is report about one person [1]: > After the right and left brain are separated, each hemisphere will have its own separate perception, concepts, and impulses to act. Having two "brains" in one body can create some interesting dilemmas. When one split-brain patient dressed himself, he sometimes pulled his pants up with one hand (that side of his brain wanted to get dressed) and down with the other (this side did not). He also reported to have grabbed his wife with his left hand and shaken her violently, at which point his right hand came to her aid and grabbed the aggressive left hand. However, such conflicts are very rare. If a conflict arises, one hemisphere usually overrides the other. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craniopagus_twins#Media https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craniopagus_twins#Media [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Split-brain https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Split-brain
collyw 5y ago
You can observe your own consciousness.

antonvs 5y ago

Science answers "why" questions all the time. We know the answer to why uniform radiation propagates due to an inverse square law. We know when and why conservation laws exist. The are many, many examples of this. Examples like these refute your claim about the limits of science. Claims like yours are common, though - you're probably just repeating what someone else has told you, perhaps without thinking very deeply about it. This position seems to have arisen as a result of some of the limits of science that were encountered last century. The "shut up and calculate" mentality was a kind of reaction to the philosophical problems with quantum mechanics. But the defensive reaction that "science is just about theories that make predictions" is incoherent. If it were really true, then science would be utterly dependent on philosophy to come up with new theories, because a prediction-generating machine isn't going to help you with that. Ironically, the very people who make these claims would be the last to accept that progress in science is utterly dependent on philosophy - but that's the consequence of their own attempt to make a sharp delineation between, essentially, thinking and just crunching numbers.

berndi 5y ago
I'm having a hard time understanding your post -- my depth of thinking may well not be on par with yours. Its obvious that science as a whole explains a hierarchy of phenomenona, with a given phenomenon (like radiation propagation) often being explained ("why does it happen in this specific way") by a more fundamental theory that provides an overarching account of a set of phenomena. The point is that every update of a scientific theory shifts old "why" questions to new ones. Science will not ever and does not aim to provide an answer to the ultimate question of why anything exists at all or why a given theory of everything applies rather than another (indeed, string theory for example posits a possible, if not actual theory of everything). In this sense, in the scientific study of consciousness, we do not aim for an ultimate account of why the laws of nature give rise to consciousness. Instead, it is about explaining a natural phenomenon within a theoretical framework that allows us to make predictions with respect to experimental outcomes.
- ganzuul 5y ago
  There is a logical answer to the question of why there is something rather than nothing, but interpretations of it are varied. If you accept that consciousness (hard) is a natural phenomena then it is much less of a leap. However, you do lose the ability to conclude with certainty that your individual consciuosness did _not_ instantiate the entire universe, which tends to lead to a very self-centered path of inquiry which often only skirts around the main issue. If you are further attached to the logic of the Law of the Excluded Middle, then megalomania is always close at hand and probably the reason why this knowledge isn't shouted from the rooftops. This idea has been around for thousands of years and is similar to the central teaching of Advaita Vedanta. Indeed, we are continuing a truly great tradition of inquiry in our natural philosophy of science.