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Each time someone tries to explain in a scientific way what they think is consciousness, you see this analysis phase, breaking it down in steps to the bare mini
by nuancebydefault 2y ago
Each time someone tries to explain in a scientific way what they think is consciousness, you see this analysis phase, breaking it down in steps to the bare minimum. From a scientific point of view, this makes perfect sense.
This leads to two pounts of view - scientific, leading to reduction and more philosophic - there's no way to describe it since it is _super-natural_.
I lean to the more scientific approach, we are not more and not less than the sum of our parts and, each of our parts, at any sub-scale, has some resemblance to a thermostat: some object that reacts on its environment.
- tananan 2y agoThe whole thing with Chalmer's hard problem is pointing out that reduction doesn't get you very far. But here he formulates a reductive panpsychist proposal (though only "in theory"). What part this piece plays within his broader thought - I am not sure. Nonetheless, it is far from compelling even as a "weak-problem" hypothesis and is an abstract angels-on-hairpin musing that truly puts experience outside of the bounds of investigation. Because, after all, if experience is an empty epiphenomenon which exists for any, anyhow-delineated physical system out there, where does that get us? We've made an assumption we cannot prod scientifically, yet it hides behind the scientific veneer of reductivism.
- robwwilliams 2y agoYou might enjoy anything written by Humberto Maturana. There are some sharp lines he draws in defining a living system—what he refers to as autopoietic (self-building) systems. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humberto_Maturana https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humberto_Maturana For Hofstadter consciousness requires some form of recursion—what he calls strange loops. Our brains are recursion machines “we” can partly control “ourselves”.