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"Asserting that consciousness is fundamental and ubiquitous does nothing to shed light on the way an experience of blueness is the way it is, and not some other

"Asserting that consciousness is fundamental and ubiquitous does nothing to shed light on the way an experience of blueness is the way it is, and not some other way. Nor does it explain anything about the possible functions of consciousness, nor why consciousness is lost in states such as dreamless sleep, general anaesthesia, and coma." -- Anil Seth, from the article This bit -- "nor why consciousness is lost in states such as dreamless sleep, general anaesthesia, and coma" -- begs the question. We don't actually know that consciousness is lost in these states, just that people report no memory of consciousness when emerging from these states. This is a fact about memory, not consciousness. And this comes back to the basic problem of consciousness: we have no test of it other than personal report. If you assume that anything that does not tell you it is conscious is not conscious, then you're left with consciousness being an emergent property. Somehow Bob was without consciousness and now he has it again! What changed? But you don't actually have proof of this, it's just an assumption. And a reason to be suspicious of it is that it is a flattering and convenient assumption. It means many things and beings have no moral valence. You can leave them out of your ethics. Arguably it isn't consciousness but suffering or pleasure that is relevant here, but consciousness is a necessary ingredient. "That lobster looks like it suffers when it is plunged into boiling water, but it isn't conscious, just a zombie. I can do what I want with it." It seems to me the Occam's razor solution is not that consciousness is an emergent behavior. The modeling of the world in neurons is a physical thing that we can measure, and replicate in software. But with this we haven't gotten any closer to explaining why sensation is associated with some such models and not others, that there are two states: consciousness and unconsciousness. The added bit that Occam's razor trims away is the assertion that there are two states, not just the one observed state: consciousness. Panpsychism -- or cosmopsychism or whatever -- is the Occam's razor solution.

mannykannot 3y ago
> Panpsychism -- or cosmopsychism or whatever -- is the Occam's razor solution. Occam's razor (the choice of the most parsimonious explanation) does not apply until you have candidate explanations, and at this point we don't have any. Simply supposing that consciousness is fundamental in some way is no more of an explanation than, say, simply supposing it to be an emergent phenomenon in certain complex physical systems.
- DFHippie 3y ago
  The point is that that in one hypothesis you have two conditions and you must determine the boundary between them. In the other you have only one. You have no evidence to prove that there are two conditions that need to be distinguished; some boundary between them needs to be defined. The emergent phenomenon hypothesis requires this. Panpsychism doesn't.
  - mannykannot 3y ago
    Panpsychism only superficially looks as if it does not have boundaries because it literally says next to nothing about consciousness. Once one gets into the combination problem, or even the difference between how consciousness presents itself a living brain and the same brain dead, we can confidently expect there will be boundaries. This is entirely moot, however, until you have a hypothesis that offers something in the way of an explanation. Panpsychism does not offer anything in the way of an explanation; it merely takes as axiomatic that all is consciousness, much like Thales' assertion that all is water. I doubt Occam's razor has ever been relevant in choosing between worked-out hypotheses about natural phenomena, as it would require them to be indistinguishable except in the number of premises. If you can think of an exception, I would be happy to discuss it.
    - DFHippie 3y ago
      I am not a philosopher of consciousness. I am simply a consciousness. I have a stake, but I have not made a study of this. Nevertheless, I will address your points. > Panpsychism only superficially looks as if it does not have boundaries because it literally says next to nothing about consciousness. But what does the theory of emergent consciousness say? It is a theory about how consciousness comes to be presupposing there is an opposite state. But we have no evidence of the opposite state. We have evidence of consciousness. We posit the existence of unconsciousness (not the state of anesthesia or immobility, but the state of existing absent qualia). The whole problem is that we can't get grips on what it is we are explaining. We can't even start. How do other theories improve on this? They posit a difference to explain without having observed this difference. > I doubt Occam's razor has ever been relevant in choosing between worked-out hypotheses about natural phenomena, as it would require them to be indistinguishable except in the number of premises. If you can think of an exception, I would be happy to discuss it. Occam's Razor says this: only seek an explanation for things for which have evidence. Does this rock exist, or does this rock and a ghost exist? I have evidence for the rock. I have no evidence for the ghost. The ghost is unnecessary. I will assume it does not exist. The simpler model is one which contains only the rock. In the absence of evidence otherwise we prefer the simpler model. Here is a point completely separate from anything I said before, but which I wish I had said before. In olden times -- the 19th century, say -- we didn't speak of consciousness; we spoke of souls. Some things had souls. Other things lacked souls. You could do what you wished with things that lacked souls. They were zombies. They could not suffer, however much they simulated suffering. This was like how a poster of someone being tortured simulating suffering, or a splat of mud which by some mad, impossible chance looked like a depiction of someone being tortured. There was no actual suffering. No soul: no suffering. Then we became scientists. This talk of souls was religious dogma! What evidence is there for souls? Science requires evidence! But we recreated this scenario by positing the opposite of a soul: unconsciousness. This is scientific! Instead of asking why some things have souls and others don't we ask why some things have consciousness and others don't. We recreate exactly the same ethical results, but now we sound scientific! We have no evidence for souls. By the same logic, we have no evidence for the absence of souls. We do have evidence for consciousness. We have no evidence for unconsciousness.
wafer_thin 3y ago
very astute and interesting point about memory. It occurs that memory is a fundamental component of the consciousness we all know and love. There would be no ability to even register "blue" without memory, there would just be moments in time where there was stimulus, each packet of info having no bearing on the last, and thus completely new and novel
AllegedAlec 3y ago
> It seems to me the Occam's razor solution is not that consciousness is an emergent behavior. The modeling of the world in neurons is a physical thing that we can measure, and replicate in software. But with this we haven't gotten any closer to explaining why sensation is associated with some such models and not others, that there are two states: consciousness and unconsciousness. The added bit that Occam's razor trims away is the assertion that there are two states, not just the one observed state: consciousness. Panpsychism -- or cosmopsychism or whatever -- is the Occam's razor solution. We have a brain we can cut in and alter someone's consciousness. Obviously consciousness lies outside his body, Occam's Razor!

mannykannot 3y ago

> Panpsychism -- or cosmopsychism or whatever -- is the Occam's razor solution. Occam's razor (the choice of the most parsimonious explanation) does not apply until you have candidate explanations, and at this point we don't have any. Simply supposing that consciousness is fundamental in some way is no more of an explanation than, say, simply supposing it to be an emergent phenomenon in certain complex physical systems.

DFHippie 3y ago
The point is that that in one hypothesis you have two conditions and you must determine the boundary between them. In the other you have only one. You have no evidence to prove that there are two conditions that need to be distinguished; some boundary between them needs to be defined. The emergent phenomenon hypothesis requires this. Panpsychism doesn't.
- mannykannot 3y ago
  Panpsychism only superficially looks as if it does not have boundaries because it literally says next to nothing about consciousness. Once one gets into the combination problem, or even the difference between how consciousness presents itself a living brain and the same brain dead, we can confidently expect there will be boundaries. This is entirely moot, however, until you have a hypothesis that offers something in the way of an explanation. Panpsychism does not offer anything in the way of an explanation; it merely takes as axiomatic that all is consciousness, much like Thales' assertion that all is water. I doubt Occam's razor has ever been relevant in choosing between worked-out hypotheses about natural phenomena, as it would require them to be indistinguishable except in the number of premises. If you can think of an exception, I would be happy to discuss it.
  - DFHippie 3y ago
    I am not a philosopher of consciousness. I am simply a consciousness. I have a stake, but I have not made a study of this. Nevertheless, I will address your points. > Panpsychism only superficially looks as if it does not have boundaries because it literally says next to nothing about consciousness. But what does the theory of emergent consciousness say? It is a theory about how consciousness comes to be presupposing there is an opposite state. But we have no evidence of the opposite state. We have evidence of consciousness. We posit the existence of unconsciousness (not the state of anesthesia or immobility, but the state of existing absent qualia). The whole problem is that we can't get grips on what it is we are explaining. We can't even start. How do other theories improve on this? They posit a difference to explain without having observed this difference. > I doubt Occam's razor has ever been relevant in choosing between worked-out hypotheses about natural phenomena, as it would require them to be indistinguishable except in the number of premises. If you can think of an exception, I would be happy to discuss it. Occam's Razor says this: only seek an explanation for things for which have evidence. Does this rock exist, or does this rock and a ghost exist? I have evidence for the rock. I have no evidence for the ghost. The ghost is unnecessary. I will assume it does not exist. The simpler model is one which contains only the rock. In the absence of evidence otherwise we prefer the simpler model. Here is a point completely separate from anything I said before, but which I wish I had said before. In olden times -- the 19th century, say -- we didn't speak of consciousness; we spoke of souls. Some things had souls. Other things lacked souls. You could do what you wished with things that lacked souls. They were zombies. They could not suffer, however much they simulated suffering. This was like how a poster of someone being tortured simulating suffering, or a splat of mud which by some mad, impossible chance looked like a depiction of someone being tortured. There was no actual suffering. No soul: no suffering. Then we became scientists. This talk of souls was religious dogma! What evidence is there for souls? Science requires evidence! But we recreated this scenario by positing the opposite of a soul: unconsciousness. This is scientific! Instead of asking why some things have souls and others don't we ask why some things have consciousness and others don't. We recreate exactly the same ethical results, but now we sound scientific! We have no evidence for souls. By the same logic, we have no evidence for the absence of souls. We do have evidence for consciousness. We have no evidence for unconsciousness.

wafer_thin 3y ago

very astute and interesting point about memory. It occurs that memory is a fundamental component of the consciousness we all know and love. There would be no ability to even register "blue" without memory, there would just be moments in time where there was stimulus, each packet of info having no bearing on the last, and thus completely new and novel

AllegedAlec 3y ago

> It seems to me the Occam's razor solution is not that consciousness is an emergent behavior. The modeling of the world in neurons is a physical thing that we can measure, and replicate in software. But with this we haven't gotten any closer to explaining why sensation is associated with some such models and not others, that there are two states: consciousness and unconsciousness. The added bit that Occam's razor trims away is the assertion that there are two states, not just the one observed state: consciousness. Panpsychism -- or cosmopsychism or whatever -- is the Occam's razor solution. We have a brain we can cut in and alter someone's consciousness. Obviously consciousness lies outside his body, Occam's Razor!