3 ms·

> In other words, even if it were possible to map out the exact pattern of brain waves that give rise to a person’s momentary complex of awareness, that mapping

> In other words, even if it were possible to map out the exact pattern of brain waves that give rise to a person’s momentary complex of awareness, that mapping would only explain the physical correlate of these experiences, but it wouldn’t be them. This is where Nagel is wrong. Mental activities don't map directly to brain functions, but this doesn't at all mean that they are not part of the physical world. https://www.quantamagazine.org/mental-phenomena-dont-map-into-the-brain-as-expected-20210824/ https://www.quantamagazine.org/mental-phenomena-dont-map-int... Computers have mental activities too, simple ones, but we are not tapping into a different realm to make that happen. Would be cool though, because both computers and brains are constrained by that pesky thermodynamics. Scratch that. They are defined by it. In fact you don't even need computers or brains for lifelike behavior. Any system responding to a stochastic driving signal can be interpreted as computing. Making a predictive model of the environment equals to using available energy efficiently. https://www.quantamagazine.org/how-life-and-death-spring-from-disorder-20170126/ https://www.quantamagazine.org/how-life-and-death-spring-fro... https://arxiv.org/abs/1203.3271 https://arxiv.org/abs/1203.3271

throwdecro 5y ago
> Computers have mental activities too, simple ones That's begging the question as to whether awareness arises out of the physical world. You're assuming mental activities arise out of computations occurring in the physical world, when whether or not this is the case is in fact the question.
- Comevius 5y ago
  The mental activities are the computations, it doesn't matter what you call it. It's the same predictive model of the environment thing, which is thermodynamics. Of course we think that humans are special, but a gerbil, a cauliflower plant, even a metal spring does this. Granted a cauliflower can do much more than a spring, but then a gerbil can do more than a cauliflower. https://nautil.us/issue/104/harmony/plants-feel-pain-and-might-even-see https://nautil.us/issue/104/harmony/plants-feel-pain-and-mig...
- nextaccountic 5y ago
  If and when we upload a mind to a computer and/or create true AI, this question will be settled for all practical purposes. Why? Because the person in the computer, being a faithful simulation of a human mind (or some AI analogue), will say they feel exactly the same mental things as real humans, down to the most minor detail. You then see they are just software, and say it's impossible to prove they feel the subjective experience they claim to feel. Then they say you're just a dude and it's impossible for you to prove you feel this subjective experience you claim to feel. There's no way out. If it's possible _at all_ to have self-aware software, they will have exactly the same claim to consciousness as yourself. Which is: I can't show my mental state to anyone and you need to take my word for granted.
  - throwdecro 5y ago
    It's true that it's impossible for an outside observer to tell whether a claim to consciousness, by a faithful simulation of a human mind, is genuine. That may mean that the question cannot be settled. It doesn't actually settle the question though.
    - rixed 5y ago
      It does settle the question whether a human mind is any different than a software wrt consciousness. The only question that remains is are all things pretending to be conscious actually are?
      - throwdecro 5y ago
        How can it be settled when no one and nothing can show it's mental state to others?
slibhb 5y ago
As far as I can tell, neither you nor that article are responding to the sentence you quoted. The argument made in that sentence is something like: if we come up with a description of how a bunch of photons interact with an eye to trigger a series of chemical reactions that lights up a bunch of neurons in a way that is proven to represent some mental image then, per Nagel, even if we achieved this, our explanation of sight would be missing something. The thing it would be missing is the subjective experience of seeing, something most of us are familiar with. Nagel isn't saying that this subjective experience is something other than physical or material. He's saying that the brand of materialism currently in vogue cannot account for this subjective experience and so needs to be revised.
- yokljo 5y ago
  What I find most interesting about your comment is the words "something most of us are familiar with", because it implies that consciousness is a two-way communication. It affects the physical world: If it didn't, then you wouldn't be typing those words. This is important if true, because it means you could absolutely scientifically prove its existence by measuring it. I'm not taking any sides here, but just making a point.
- Comevius 5y ago
  Subjective experiences seem mystical to us, because how could physics could cause something like this. One way to understand it is that we as experiencing subjects are made of nodes that can make things up and we have no choice but to believe them. Our nodes happen to produce useful, reliable things for us (except maybe when we are dreaming or on drugs) but the nature of the things they produce is different than what we believe, and have no choice but to believe. Like when we experience fear we are basically acting like we do driven by these signals, but it's all theatre. Useful theatre might I add, but it's just signals and how we interpret them. Vision is also just signals, there is just a lot of processing at the nodes so we get increasingly useful signals. We don't get a bunch of pixels, we get shapes, or better yet faces, intentions, predictions, stories. The different parts of us do their jobs and a coherent picture is created. The most coherent picture is the first person view, but it is a fabrication. It's like a news report. The perceived self is a part of a stitched together story, not a central agent. The whole brain is the agent, however we only remember the story. The story is what ends up as a memory. The perceived self exist because I is an important context needed later for prediction, like the dimensions of your body and a lot more in a social environment. But your perceived self is not the actual you, just as your perceived world is not the actual world. The general idea is that the signals from the nodes are processed and fed to the hippocampus to create an episodic memory engram, which reactivates the nodes that contributed the signals. This is when subjective experience happens, after all the work is done. Granted the next time the nodes can rely on what happened before, so we are not philosophical zombies, we don't passively experience it all, but the central agent is only a useful theatre, we are multitudes under the veneer.

throwdecro 5y ago

> Computers have mental activities too, simple ones That's begging the question as to whether awareness arises out of the physical world. You're assuming mental activities arise out of computations occurring in the physical world, when whether or not this is the case is in fact the question.

Comevius 5y ago
The mental activities are the computations, it doesn't matter what you call it. It's the same predictive model of the environment thing, which is thermodynamics. Of course we think that humans are special, but a gerbil, a cauliflower plant, even a metal spring does this. Granted a cauliflower can do much more than a spring, but then a gerbil can do more than a cauliflower. https://nautil.us/issue/104/harmony/plants-feel-pain-and-might-even-see https://nautil.us/issue/104/harmony/plants-feel-pain-and-mig...
nextaccountic 5y ago
If and when we upload a mind to a computer and/or create true AI, this question will be settled for all practical purposes. Why? Because the person in the computer, being a faithful simulation of a human mind (or some AI analogue), will say they feel exactly the same mental things as real humans, down to the most minor detail. You then see they are just software, and say it's impossible to prove they feel the subjective experience they claim to feel. Then they say you're just a dude and it's impossible for you to prove you feel this subjective experience you claim to feel. There's no way out. If it's possible _at all_ to have self-aware software, they will have exactly the same claim to consciousness as yourself. Which is: I can't show my mental state to anyone and you need to take my word for granted.
- throwdecro 5y ago
  It's true that it's impossible for an outside observer to tell whether a claim to consciousness, by a faithful simulation of a human mind, is genuine. That may mean that the question cannot be settled. It doesn't actually settle the question though.
  - rixed 5y ago
    It does settle the question whether a human mind is any different than a software wrt consciousness. The only question that remains is are all things pretending to be conscious actually are?
    - throwdecro 5y ago
      How can it be settled when no one and nothing can show it's mental state to others?

slibhb 5y ago

As far as I can tell, neither you nor that article are responding to the sentence you quoted. The argument made in that sentence is something like: if we come up with a description of how a bunch of photons interact with an eye to trigger a series of chemical reactions that lights up a bunch of neurons in a way that is proven to represent some mental image then, per Nagel, even if we achieved this, our explanation of sight would be missing something. The thing it would be missing is the subjective experience of seeing, something most of us are familiar with. Nagel isn't saying that this subjective experience is something other than physical or material. He's saying that the brand of materialism currently in vogue cannot account for this subjective experience and so needs to be revised.

yokljo 5y ago
What I find most interesting about your comment is the words "something most of us are familiar with", because it implies that consciousness is a two-way communication. It affects the physical world: If it didn't, then you wouldn't be typing those words. This is important if true, because it means you could absolutely scientifically prove its existence by measuring it. I'm not taking any sides here, but just making a point.
Comevius 5y ago
Subjective experiences seem mystical to us, because how could physics could cause something like this. One way to understand it is that we as experiencing subjects are made of nodes that can make things up and we have no choice but to believe them. Our nodes happen to produce useful, reliable things for us (except maybe when we are dreaming or on drugs) but the nature of the things they produce is different than what we believe, and have no choice but to believe. Like when we experience fear we are basically acting like we do driven by these signals, but it's all theatre. Useful theatre might I add, but it's just signals and how we interpret them. Vision is also just signals, there is just a lot of processing at the nodes so we get increasingly useful signals. We don't get a bunch of pixels, we get shapes, or better yet faces, intentions, predictions, stories. The different parts of us do their jobs and a coherent picture is created. The most coherent picture is the first person view, but it is a fabrication. It's like a news report. The perceived self is a part of a stitched together story, not a central agent. The whole brain is the agent, however we only remember the story. The story is what ends up as a memory. The perceived self exist because I is an important context needed later for prediction, like the dimensions of your body and a lot more in a social environment. But your perceived self is not the actual you, just as your perceived world is not the actual world. The general idea is that the signals from the nodes are processed and fed to the hippocampus to create an episodic memory engram, which reactivates the nodes that contributed the signals. This is when subjective experience happens, after all the work is done. Granted the next time the nodes can rely on what happened before, so we are not philosophical zombies, we don't passively experience it all, but the central agent is only a useful theatre, we are multitudes under the veneer.