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> How are you certain? Has someone published a paper that I'm not aware of that settles this? That's kinda the point. I'm not certain at all, but given the av

by kaibee 3y ago

> How are you certain? Has someone published a paper that I'm not aware of that settles this? That's kinda the point. I'm not certain at all, but given the available information, it is the simplest explanation. > How can it be possible to experience being a brain, being a brain itself? I'm not really sure what you're asking here. A clock can tell time, but if it was _like something_ to be a clock, it would feel like knowing what time it is, it would not (and pretty much couldn't) involve awareness of all that goes into producing that feeling (because then you'd need a mechanism for awareness of that, and then a mechanism for awareness of that mechanism, and etc). The difference with the brain is that we're pretty sure it is _like something_ to be a brain in a body, and we also know it doesn't include perfect awareness of what goes into producing that feeling. So when you ask 'how can it be possible to experience being a brain, being a brain itself' I would say that it isn't? because your awareness is limited to the qualia that bubbles up out of the mechanics in the brain, and your experience of being a brain is similar in fidelity to the clock's experience of being able to tell the time. > Experience and consciousness are axiomatic and precede theory about the physical world. You started with sensory experience and perception, and built models of how your brain works on top of that, not the other way around. This is just solipsism. Sure, it is entirely possible all of the experiences and perceptions I've experienced have misled me into thinking that the brain is all there is, but that seems kind of contrived? I'm just as confused as you about why we aren't all p-zombies, but, well... the history of all knowledge has basically been "yeah it turns out to just be physics", so my guess is that qualia is also just physics.

colordrops 3y ago
It's not solipsism. The idea that "you" exist is just as conceptual as physics - there is no solipsism without "you". And the idea that it "turns out to just be physics" is a concept rather than reality. It's a thought of yours, not ground truth. And labeling this "solipsism" is just falling into that trap once again. It's really a miasma of perception in the form light and shadow and color and sound and pressure and heat (which are crude conceptual labels themselves for actual experience), and thoughts emerge in this cloud of sensation, also as independent phenomena in themselves. This subjective experience is first and primary. Any structure you build on top of it is conceptual and not ground truth. It's not solipsism or contrived, quite the opposite. It's profound. Whether we like the fact or not, or that it's not convenient to your desire to have a mathematical formulation of the world, doesn't make it any less true. To downgrade the most direct experience of reality and give primacy to the conceptual is to confuse the map with the territory.

by kaibee 3y ago

colordrops 3y ago

It's not solipsism. The idea that "you" exist is just as conceptual as physics - there is no solipsism without "you". And the idea that it "turns out to just be physics" is a concept rather than reality. It's a thought of yours, not ground truth. And labeling this "solipsism" is just falling into that trap once again. It's really a miasma of perception in the form light and shadow and color and sound and pressure and heat (which are crude conceptual labels themselves for actual experience), and thoughts emerge in this cloud of sensation, also as independent phenomena in themselves. This subjective experience is first and primary. Any structure you build on top of it is conceptual and not ground truth. It's not solipsism or contrived, quite the opposite. It's profound. Whether we like the fact or not, or that it's not convenient to your desire to have a mathematical formulation of the world, doesn't make it any less true. To downgrade the most direct experience of reality and give primacy to the conceptual is to confuse the map with the territory.