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As a good example of how clueless we are, look up 'blindsight' where people are blind (i.e they cannot see anything or observe what they see), and yet they can

As a good example of how clueless we are, look up 'blindsight' where people are blind (i.e they cannot see anything or observe what they see), and yet they can actually see by all quantifiable metrics (ie, when asked to point to the blue ball, they correctly do so; they avoid obstacles, etc). The eyes and visual system works but they have no conscious experience of it. Why? No one knows

taneq 3y ago
Obligatory mention of the novel Blindsight by Peter Watts: https://rifters.com/real/Blindsight.htm https://rifters.com/real/Blindsight.htm Personally I have yet to see any compelling evidence that 'conscious experience' as some privileged special thing actually exists at all.
- mistermann 3y ago
  Fitting, imho: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streetlight_effect https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streetlight_effect
- crazygringo 3y ago
  It's not just you personally, there is no evidence. And yet literally everything we know as human beings, we acquire through conscious experience. Conscious experience is the bedrock upon which we build all our sophisticated ideas of reality and, eventually, science. The very concept of "evidence" is nothing but a conscious idea. You don't need evidence of conscious experience, because conscious experience precedes the very concept of evidence. It's one of the great paradoxes of philosophy, and specifically metaphysics. Which nobody has solved yet. How do we reconcile the truth of idealism on the one hand -- that all we can ever be 100% sure of existing are our conscious ideas (both awake and while dreaming at night) -- with the empirical truth of realism on the other hand -- that there is a scientifically consistent "reality" out there which our ideas attempt to map onto and correlate with?
  - 2snakes 3y ago
    "Yes, it is true, as Albert Einstein said, you can live your life as if everything is a miracle, or as if everything is ordinary. It is also true, as Niels Bohr said, that the opposite of an ordinary truth is a falsity, but the opposite of a profound truth may also be another profound truth! Now, recall that in Hamlet, William Shakespeare said: “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” From these three quotes from three famously wise people, I have to conclude that I may choose to experience reality as very common and ordinary, or as divinely miraculous, and this choice can yield one of two profoundly different results: either the experience of misery and boredom, or joy and ecstasy!" -ER Close
- anon291 3y ago
  And yet if consciousness doesn't exist than why are all the automatons searching for it
  - h0l0cube 3y ago
    It’s the human equivalent of rolling wooden balls or something
h0l0cube 3y ago
> The eyes and visual system works but they have no conscious experience of it. Why? No one knows There's some parallels with epilepsy patients that have split brain surgery, essentially isolating both hemispheres. I can't remember the precise details, but in one experiment, the left (language) side of the brain is able to post-hoc rationalize picking up a glass of water, after the right side of the brain was asked to do so (presumably in the left ear). When asked in the right ear, "Why did you pick up the glass", the left brain simply replies to the researcher that they wanted to pick up the glass. This experiment implies 'dual consciousness', but why stop at two? But certainly dual consciousness could also explain blindsightedness. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_consciousness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_consciousness

taneq 3y ago

Obligatory mention of the novel Blindsight by Peter Watts: https://rifters.com/real/Blindsight.htm https://rifters.com/real/Blindsight.htm Personally I have yet to see any compelling evidence that 'conscious experience' as some privileged special thing actually exists at all.

mistermann 3y ago
Fitting, imho: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streetlight_effect https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streetlight_effect
crazygringo 3y ago
It's not just you personally, there is no evidence. And yet literally everything we know as human beings, we acquire through conscious experience. Conscious experience is the bedrock upon which we build all our sophisticated ideas of reality and, eventually, science. The very concept of "evidence" is nothing but a conscious idea. You don't need evidence of conscious experience, because conscious experience precedes the very concept of evidence. It's one of the great paradoxes of philosophy, and specifically metaphysics. Which nobody has solved yet. How do we reconcile the truth of idealism on the one hand -- that all we can ever be 100% sure of existing are our conscious ideas (both awake and while dreaming at night) -- with the empirical truth of realism on the other hand -- that there is a scientifically consistent "reality" out there which our ideas attempt to map onto and correlate with?
- 2snakes 3y ago
  "Yes, it is true, as Albert Einstein said, you can live your life as if everything is a miracle, or as if everything is ordinary. It is also true, as Niels Bohr said, that the opposite of an ordinary truth is a falsity, but the opposite of a profound truth may also be another profound truth! Now, recall that in Hamlet, William Shakespeare said: “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” From these three quotes from three famously wise people, I have to conclude that I may choose to experience reality as very common and ordinary, or as divinely miraculous, and this choice can yield one of two profoundly different results: either the experience of misery and boredom, or joy and ecstasy!" -ER Close
anon291 3y ago
And yet if consciousness doesn't exist than why are all the automatons searching for it
- h0l0cube 3y ago
  It’s the human equivalent of rolling wooden balls or something

h0l0cube 3y ago

> The eyes and visual system works but they have no conscious experience of it. Why? No one knows There's some parallels with epilepsy patients that have split brain surgery, essentially isolating both hemispheres. I can't remember the precise details, but in one experiment, the left (language) side of the brain is able to post-hoc rationalize picking up a glass of water, after the right side of the brain was asked to do so (presumably in the left ear). When asked in the right ear, "Why did you pick up the glass", the left brain simply replies to the researcher that they wanted to pick up the glass. This experiment implies 'dual consciousness', but why stop at two? But certainly dual consciousness could also explain blindsightedness. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_consciousness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_consciousness