4 ms·

Well, that's interesting, because there's no good scientific definition of consciousness.

stiff 13y ago
There is no philosophical definition of consciousness, but there is none of gravity either, in the sense of "what gravity really is". Science doesn't examine what things "really are", but tries to make useful predictions and the definitions employed are only means to this end. In fact there are operational definitions of consciousness and I think they certainly deserve to be called "scientific", see for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consciousness#Neural_correlates https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consciousness#Neural_correlate... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consciousness#Defining_consciousness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consciousness#Defining_conscio...
- ciex 13y ago
  No they are not. Omitting qualia disqualifies almost all existing models of consciousness. One of the only ones I know that attempt an explanation of this phenomenon may be Tononi's IIT [1], but it is of course criticised for being too broad a definition. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_Information_Theory http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_Information_Theory
- smosher 13y ago
  The problem is without any philosophical backup the neural correlate is entirely uncompelling—it's merely a clinical definition of a measure of... nothing meaningful. One that can be just as easily applied to a recording device, modulo the explicit mention of neurons. It gets worse. When you look at it closely there's no useful reason to restrict any of these measures with arbitrary criteria to the things we consider candidates for consciousness, other than to reaffirm our prejudices. In other words, there's no such thing as a good scientific definition without the philosophical context. You can have as accurate an arbitrary measure as you like, but that doesn't imbue it equally arbitrarily with your desired meaning.
  - stiff 13y ago
    The problem is that multiple times in the history of science the search for somehow philosophically sound underpinnings led to stagnation and not to progress, that was in fact what Aristotle did to a large extent and was the main obstacle to development of science altogether. The recent example of this is the search of aether. In the end the way that science has progressed is by dropping too much "whys" and sticking to "hows". There might never be a philosophically satisfactory definition of consciousness. Our subjective experience that we call consciousness might be an amalgamate of very different things happening at the brain level and a single definition might just not do. Meanwhile the operational definitions like the ones I mentioned allow us to make useful predictions and draw conclusions, for example that the brain activity that happens when we experience states most people would describe as consciousness also happens in certain animals. It is not perfect philosophically, but again, you could also have a long philosophical debate about what gravity is and you would never go anywhere scientifically - that's precisely what people did before the scientific revolution.
    - smosher 13y ago
      I think you're confused. I'm not asking for philosophical proofs end-to-end, I'm asking for the framing. If you look at the formulation it starts out as a magical-seeming property, yet the definitions and processes do nothing to demystify that property. If you look at that process carefully you'll find the deceit: this is not an answer to the question of consciousness as asked. With the right philosophical treatment there might be hope of reconciliation, but without it the concept is just going to remain magical, without meaningful conclusions. Aether is a great example, one I had in mind. Consciousness is very much like aether in some ways. It may well be that the only useful scientific thing to say about it at the end of the day is: it is not a useful concept to science. Much better than the contrivances offered up with no compelling connection to the subject. The last word in TFA is 'qualia'. This is the problem. Canonical definitions of that term describe it as impossible to measure, or simply ineffable, which effectively puts it off the table for a scientific treatment. Regardless of what you think of what should constitute a scientific concept, the implication that these measurements alone elucidate an ineffable phenomenon is exactly the kind of thing that stinks of bullshit.
- RivieraKid 13y ago
  There's no definition of consciousness that is 1) not subjective (= is scientific) 2) matches our intuitive understanding of consciousness 3) doesn't contain logical inconsistencies or circular reasoning. And there are good argumnts suggesting that there'll never be such definition (summary: consciousness is inherently subjective).
- pessimizer 13y ago
  There aren't any scientific definitions of consciousness that don't derive completely from the empirical study of people who have been declared conscious (philosophically.)

stiff 13y ago

There is no philosophical definition of consciousness, but there is none of gravity either, in the sense of "what gravity really is". Science doesn't examine what things "really are", but tries to make useful predictions and the definitions employed are only means to this end. In fact there are operational definitions of consciousness and I think they certainly deserve to be called "scientific", see for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consciousness#Neural_correlates https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consciousness#Neural_correlate... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consciousness#Defining_consciousness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consciousness#Defining_conscio...

ciex 13y ago
No they are not. Omitting qualia disqualifies almost all existing models of consciousness. One of the only ones I know that attempt an explanation of this phenomenon may be Tononi's IIT [1], but it is of course criticised for being too broad a definition. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_Information_Theory http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_Information_Theory
smosher 13y ago
The problem is without any philosophical backup the neural correlate is entirely uncompelling—it's merely a clinical definition of a measure of... nothing meaningful. One that can be just as easily applied to a recording device, modulo the explicit mention of neurons. It gets worse. When you look at it closely there's no useful reason to restrict any of these measures with arbitrary criteria to the things we consider candidates for consciousness, other than to reaffirm our prejudices. In other words, there's no such thing as a good scientific definition without the philosophical context. You can have as accurate an arbitrary measure as you like, but that doesn't imbue it equally arbitrarily with your desired meaning.
- stiff 13y ago
  The problem is that multiple times in the history of science the search for somehow philosophically sound underpinnings led to stagnation and not to progress, that was in fact what Aristotle did to a large extent and was the main obstacle to development of science altogether. The recent example of this is the search of aether. In the end the way that science has progressed is by dropping too much "whys" and sticking to "hows". There might never be a philosophically satisfactory definition of consciousness. Our subjective experience that we call consciousness might be an amalgamate of very different things happening at the brain level and a single definition might just not do. Meanwhile the operational definitions like the ones I mentioned allow us to make useful predictions and draw conclusions, for example that the brain activity that happens when we experience states most people would describe as consciousness also happens in certain animals. It is not perfect philosophically, but again, you could also have a long philosophical debate about what gravity is and you would never go anywhere scientifically - that's precisely what people did before the scientific revolution.
  - smosher 13y ago
    I think you're confused. I'm not asking for philosophical proofs end-to-end, I'm asking for the framing. If you look at the formulation it starts out as a magical-seeming property, yet the definitions and processes do nothing to demystify that property. If you look at that process carefully you'll find the deceit: this is not an answer to the question of consciousness as asked. With the right philosophical treatment there might be hope of reconciliation, but without it the concept is just going to remain magical, without meaningful conclusions. Aether is a great example, one I had in mind. Consciousness is very much like aether in some ways. It may well be that the only useful scientific thing to say about it at the end of the day is: it is not a useful concept to science. Much better than the contrivances offered up with no compelling connection to the subject. The last word in TFA is 'qualia'. This is the problem. Canonical definitions of that term describe it as impossible to measure, or simply ineffable, which effectively puts it off the table for a scientific treatment. Regardless of what you think of what should constitute a scientific concept, the implication that these measurements alone elucidate an ineffable phenomenon is exactly the kind of thing that stinks of bullshit.
RivieraKid 13y ago
There's no definition of consciousness that is 1) not subjective (= is scientific) 2) matches our intuitive understanding of consciousness 3) doesn't contain logical inconsistencies or circular reasoning. And there are good argumnts suggesting that there'll never be such definition (summary: consciousness is inherently subjective).
pessimizer 13y ago
There aren't any scientific definitions of consciousness that don't derive completely from the empirical study of people who have been declared conscious (philosophically.)