3 ms·

Jesus christ this is such pure pseudoscientific wankery.

eureka-belief 3y ago
Thanks for the helpful post. I especially liked the part where you called it “pseudoscience” without engaging points they listed. Helped me to really be convinced.
Valgrim 3y ago
I've got the same vibe, starting at "consciousness collapses under the reductionist process currently employed in the scientific method." Uuuhh yeah, like most abstract things, consciousness is an emergent property of simpler processes, so naturally if you look at it the other way and decompose the world to understand it, at some point it will collapse. The next part about the scientific framework being a data structure used by our consciousness blabla quantum particles...seems like just a complicated way to say: we are conscious, even if we don't know everything. Then, language being necessarily insufficient? Boy you like using lots of complicated words so much, you must be an expert at communicating things. Basically what I get here is: words represent concepts. (Wanking represents wanking insofar it doesn't represent anything else besides a wank. Except when I use the word 'wanking' as a metaphor for mental ejaculation). Then we start again making dubious links between particle physics and humanities (and of course declaring that one is impossible because of the other, for some reason.) This is the signature move of pseudo-science: using scientific words to appear as an authority to an audience, but then dismissing the pursuit of truth for reasons unrelated to the actual challenges of scientific research.
- gchamonlive 3y ago
  You will definitely be better served with A Case Against Reality, much more than a single hn comment
gchamonlive 3y ago
I'm sorry it came out this way to you. I guess when we risk talking about things we don't understand we risk making a fool out of ourselves, but in any case how else can we evolve? What I tried to convey what I understood from the ideas Donald Hoffman expressed in a couple of podcasts I listened to (currently in the process of reading his book). All this debate is more in the realm of philosophy in my opinion, which of course doesn't exempt anyone the burden of proof and consistency, but I don't think the scientific method itself is useful here, since we are talking about fundamentals that precede the scientific method itself (for instance, the question "can apply the scientific method to everything we perceive, including our subjective experience?"). It might pass as mysticism or pseudoscience, hell even Hoffman sounds like that a lot, but I don't think I am qualified to question his insights and dismiss them as academic wankery.

Thanks for the helpful post. I especially liked the part where you called it “pseudoscience” without engaging points they listed. Helped me to really be convinced.

Valgrim 3y ago

I've got the same vibe, starting at "consciousness collapses under the reductionist process currently employed in the scientific method." Uuuhh yeah, like most abstract things, consciousness is an emergent property of simpler processes, so naturally if you look at it the other way and decompose the world to understand it, at some point it will collapse. The next part about the scientific framework being a data structure used by our consciousness blabla quantum particles...seems like just a complicated way to say: we are conscious, even if we don't know everything. Then, language being necessarily insufficient? Boy you like using lots of complicated words so much, you must be an expert at communicating things. Basically what I get here is: words represent concepts. (Wanking represents wanking insofar it doesn't represent anything else besides a wank. Except when I use the word 'wanking' as a metaphor for mental ejaculation). Then we start again making dubious links between particle physics and humanities (and of course declaring that one is impossible because of the other, for some reason.) This is the signature move of pseudo-science: using scientific words to appear as an authority to an audience, but then dismissing the pursuit of truth for reasons unrelated to the actual challenges of scientific research.

gchamonlive 3y ago
You will definitely be better served with A Case Against Reality, much more than a single hn comment

gchamonlive 3y ago

I'm sorry it came out this way to you. I guess when we risk talking about things we don't understand we risk making a fool out of ourselves, but in any case how else can we evolve? What I tried to convey what I understood from the ideas Donald Hoffman expressed in a couple of podcasts I listened to (currently in the process of reading his book). All this debate is more in the realm of philosophy in my opinion, which of course doesn't exempt anyone the burden of proof and consistency, but I don't think the scientific method itself is useful here, since we are talking about fundamentals that precede the scientific method itself (for instance, the question "can apply the scientific method to everything we perceive, including our subjective experience?"). It might pass as mysticism or pseudoscience, hell even Hoffman sounds like that a lot, but I don't think I am qualified to question his insights and dismiss them as academic wankery.