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So he says that he doesn’t think consciousness is computational, but in the rest of the article pretty much everything he says about it is in terms of processin
by simonh 3y ago
So he says that he doesn’t think consciousness is computational, but in the rest of the article pretty much everything he says about it is in terms of processing information.
“ In fact, the brain is always making predictions about what’s out there in the world or in the body. And using sensory signals to update those predictions. What we consciously experience is not a readout of the sensory data in a kind of outside-in direction. It’s the predictions themselves. It’s the brain’s best guess of what’s going on.”
So, processing information, then.
“ I argue that this entails that the brain is or has a predictive model of its own body, because prediction is very good for regulation.”
Sounds like information processing to me.
“ A conscious experience, typically for us humans, brings together a large amount of information about the world, from many different modalities at once—sight, sound, touch, taste, smell—in a single unified scene that immediately makes apparent what the organism should do next. That’s the primary function of consciousness—to guide the motivated behavior of the organism that maximizes its chances of staying alive.”
Do I have to say it again? Every single function he ascribes to consciousness consists or receiving and processing information, and making decisions.
We know the answer to this. Any Turing complete system is capable in principle of any information processing task. Whatever else brains are, we know they are information processing systems. Perceptions go in, and decisions come out. All of our conscious experience is of information. Feelings, sensations, emotions, decisions, they’re all information. What else is there?
Edit: On the weather. When I imagine a rain storm, nothing actually gets wet. So is that activity of imagination more like the weather, or more like a computer simulation of the weather?
- furyofantares 3y agoHis book referenced in the article is excellent. I listened to the audiobook. I think you might actually be satisfied by his treatment of everything you just brought up in the book, but it's too difficult for me to attempt in an internet comment.
- mysecretaccount 3y ago> What else is there? This is why I am extremely skeptical of "anti-materialists" or whatever you want to call people like Seth: if conscious is not mere computation, what is your theory? Do you even have a theory? Why did I read a several hundred word interview with you about this topic and come away without any understanding of your alternative theory? I am open to alternative theories on this topic but none seem to be clear or grounded enough to describe in a few clear paragraphs. To me, that is damning.
- xmonkee 3y agoI have not read the article but I would love to have a real debate with a materialist. All anti-meterial models will skew sightly mystical so if you have zero appetite for that I won’t bother. But I’d like to try to change your mind if you’re interested. I’ll start: Consciousness has nothing to do with any sort of processing. Processing is “dead” in the sense of a desktop calculator. Consciousness is the “living” part of your experience - that which experiences. Any process is the content of experience, not the subject. I’ll stop here for now. EDIT: currently this comment is at a 0 score. If you disagree with me, please leave a reply and I will try to get to you, but don't blindly downvote me cause I'd like to talk to more people, that's all. I'm not some religious zealot, you can check my post history etc.
- mysecretaccount 3y agoI have some appetite for it. Either conscious is mere computation or it is not, and either branch should be explored. I think assuming that either branch is correct beyond a reasonable doubt is wrong. Is there any material (!) you can link me to to explore further?
- xmonkee 3y agoLook, there is more material about this stuff that perhaps any other subject explored by man, but it frequently comes in ecclesiastic garb and that may or may not be to your taste. I'll can link both spiritual and secular starting points. The spiritual ones are far more delicious. What's your stand on religion in general? I'll link sources appropriately.
- visarga 3y ago> Consciousness is the “living” part of your experience - that which experiences. That's circular, what is experience, what is "that which"? I propose a simple definition - consciousness is what informs actions, and optimises actions to benefit the agent. That's a concrete definition, without subjective elements.
- 3y ago
- erehweb 3y agoA feeling can certainly be represented as information, but it's a leap to say it is information.
- mysecretaccount 3y agoIf his theory boils down to an acceptance of qualia as evidence of non-physical (extra-physical, super-natural, dualist, whatever) basis for consciousness, then a) I am open to it but b) he has done a terrible job conveying this idea clearly.
- PixyMisa 3y agoAnd we have no reason to believe that qualia, defined in that way, exist at all. Or that the notion is even logically consistent.
- simonh 3y agoHe seems to be saying that it is a physical process, but that it is not computational. My critique was that he does do while describing it entirely in terms of processing information.
- mysecretaccount 3y ago> He seems to be saying that it is a physical process, but that it is not computational This is a contradiction in terms, is it not?
- simonh 3y agoI have a perception. Light stimulates my optic nerve, that sends a signal to my brain, and I experience seeing a red Apple. The signal is information. There’s nothing inherently red about it, if you looked in the nerve it wouldn’t turn red, it’s nerve impulse data being transmitted to my brain. Let’s suppose seeing red is not a process on information, it’s something else. What? Some other kind of process? In order for my experience of seeing red to not be an a process on information, that data would need to be transformed into something that is not data and participate in this other activity. What is that? After whatever that is happens, I have seen red. I have a memory of it, and can make a decision based in that experience. So now we’re back to storing and processing information again. Whatever happened in between, it took information in and sent information out.
- ZeroFries 3y agoSensations are not just information. A number is information. There's something that it's like to experience a sensation. There's nothing that it's like to be a number.
- mysecretaccount 3y agoSensation could come from computation. It also might not come from computation. We don't know.
- tbalsam 3y agoA number is a symbol, sensations are a continuous symbol....it technical is information.
- taneq 3y agoHow do you know? You aren’t a number. :P More seriously, I know how much philosophers love their “what is it like to be …” phrasing but there are a host of embedded assumptions which are seldom even acknowledged, let alone examined or defended.
- simonh 3y agoOf course, there’s nothing it’s like to be data. Un-recalled memories are data, they only become experiences again when we recall them into our active minds. I don’t think consciousness is data, I think it’s a highly sophisticated process on data. It’s an activity, it’s something we do. Anil Seth described this process very well in the interview. It’s the third and last quote from him in my top level comment. Also I described my full account of consciousness in a reply to tekni5.
- tbalsam 3y agoThere are some interesting lines of discussion around near death experiences (NDEs) where the individual at hand supposedly did not have brain activity but was conscious. I can't speak to the veracity of claims, but that and the surrounding area do have some people who seemed to be pretty woo-resistant go through this transformative experience, then spend time and energy trying to convince people of its existence. It is intriguing on that level alone and I've certainly thought some about it.
- simonh 3y agoThis report of EEG activity in a dying patient contradicts that assertion about near death experiences and brain activity. https://www.healthline.com/health-news/researchers-scan-brain-of-dying-patient-heres-what-they-found https://www.healthline.com/health-news/researchers-scan-brai... I know people have these experiences, the question is what do they mean. We know humans can hallucinate in various neurological states. It seems to me reasonable to suppose they are hallucinatory, unless we see evidence otherwise.
- tbalsam 3y agoYou might find this link very interesting if you're in the mood to explore some of the interesting corners of this topic a bit more: https://med.virginia.edu/perceptual-studies/our-research/near-death-experiences-ndes/ https://med.virginia.edu/perceptual-studies/our-research/nea...
- simonh 3y agoThat is just a statement of what they hope to study and what they think they might find. It’s not an actual study and they have no evidence for the speculative goals. Conversely I linked to a case of an actual EEG recording of a dying patient and what it shows.
- tbalsam 3y agoI linked to the main homepage. My goal isn't to debate, but to foster conversation. Building a case in either direction is going to take more than a single patient study discussed on a healthline page or even a metastudy of studies with large cohorts (somehow). It's a hard topic. Hence the encouragement towards exploration. It's a very fun topic. If you're interested in some further rabbitholing, that department has a very interesting and storied history if you have the interest and take your time to do a bit of homework on it...
- crdrost 3y ago> Whatever else brains are, we know they are information processing systems. Perceptions go in, and decisions come out. All of our conscious experience is of information. Feelings, sensations, emotions, decisions, they’re all information. What else is there? Whatever else your brain is, I know that it is a processing system for what I know about it. What I know about your perceptions goes in, what I know about your decisions comes out. All of your conscious experience is of my information. Your feelings, your emotions, your sensations, your decisions, they're all things that I can know about and understand in relation to the things I can know about. What else is there? So, there is no point in you being so outraged at the article you have read: your "actual" outrage, if there is such a thing, is in fact superfluous to my information that you appear to be outraged by it, which is functionally equivalent. And therefore we can dispense with the illusion that you actually exist. After all, when I imagine a you, nothing actually flaps its mouth, so is your activity more like the weather, or more like a simulation of the weather? (Sorry, I had to.)
- simonh 3y agoThat’s fine. Yes, you read my post, which consists of information, and formed a mental model of me and my opinions. That mental model is fundamentally informational. You're conflating me and your model of me though. The model isn’t me, it doesn’t have thoughts or feelings because… and this us the crucial part… the model of me in your head doesn’t process information the way a conscious being does, whereas I do. Therefore I have experiences, whereas it does not. Do you see where you misstepped?
- crdrost 3y agoYou don't see where you missed it so I don't see why I should admit where I did. I couldn't possibly have conflated you with my model with you, you don't exist and my model of you does. There is nothing beyond the model according to you, so it's all nicely tied with a bow, no?
- simonh 3y agoOf course there is a reality beyond the model. Our sense data comes from somewhere, it’s a model of something. I’m not sure quite what you’re talking about.
- goatlover 3y agoPerceptions don’t go in. Perceptions are created by the nerves in the sensory organs and corresponding brain regions in response to stimuli. One can think of the brain as an information generator, making sense of the environmental noise that bombards the body. Seth claims that perception is a sort of predictive hallucination based on the kind of bodies we have. Moreover, We don’t perceive the world as it is. He’s an indirect or embodied realist.
- akomtu 3y agoIn the brain there's a region surrounded by a layer of filter-neurons: they choose what signals to admit, using the rule of thumb that a repeating signal is worth attention. When they block all signals, the subject is said to be unconscious. When they tune in to a particular signal, the subject is doing something consciously. In this regard consciousnesses can be defined as simple attention.
- goatlover 3y agoNo, because that doesn’t get you to color, sound, pain, etc since the signal is just electrical. Something more has to turn attention into experience. Also because simple attention can happen without us being consciously aware, such as day dreaming while driving down a highway.
- simonh 3y agoOk, stimuli go in. The rest I’m on board with, more or less.
- User23 3y agoWe know that almost all functions aren’t computable. What makes you think that life is restricted to that tiny minority of functions?
- waselighis 3y agoI would state it as: The content of your conscious experience is the result of information processing in the brain. Information processing alone does not create consciousness, but the output of this information processing defines what we experience. An analogy - The information processing in your computer defines what is displayed on your monitor, but the information processing alone does not physically power on your monitor and control the individual pixels.
- PixyMisa 3y agoSo if the information processing is output to another information process, that overall system is conscious?
- simonh 3y agoI described my model of consciousness to tekni5 so won’t repeat it here.
- waselighis 3y ago... k? If you have nothing to contribute, then please don't comment.
- simonh 3y agoI did contribute it here in the comments, I just didn’t feel it appropriate to repeat it in multiple places.
- stoniejohnson 3y agoI don't think it is accurate to think of it as the "output" of information processing, rather I think it is the actual act of diverse, yet integrated information processing. Simply put, different parts of the brain do different things; there is some level of isolation of function, e.g. Broca's area for speech, the visual cortex for sight, etc. Conscious experience clearly relies on several disparate parts of the brain (e.g. sight, sound, touch and smell can form a cohesive experience). The integration of these parts is the act of consciousness, or put in another way, when the brain is highly integrated in a waking state of perception, it is conscious. That's what the "P Zombie" thought experiment misses, imo. We are not some Rube Goldberg machine of pulleys and levers, as the analogy would lead us to believe. We are also not a series of pulleys and levers with some qualia painted on top. We are, instead, the global process that arises when a biological agent's neural system is highly integrated with the goal of providing the organism a sense of self and direction. It sounds pretty grandiose, but it is still fundamentally empty, much like the a system of pulleys and levers. Where do your thoughts come from? What do you actually do? Not much.