Is Consciousness Beyond Physical Explanation?

[Maui]

Not if they have NEVER seen a cake.

But they are the 'cake'. You can't reduce everything to brainwaves. There is an Origin for these brainwaves, they don't happen randomly, they follow a logical pattern and have predictive abilities and make possible awareness and perception. That Origin is you. And every observation so far confirms that it acts in top-down fashion.

 

[Phrak]

Dualaities show up everywhere. Everywhere. They've become boring.

Where are my fellow Tertalists, in search of terital symmetries?--even Pentists and such, as long as they're generally Primalists.

 

[arkajad]

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duality_%28projective_geometry%29"

In the geometry of the projective plane, duality refers to geometric transformations that replace points by lines and lines by points while preserving incidence properties among the transformed objects. The existence of such transformations leads to a general principle, that any theorem about incidences between points and lines in the projective plane may be transformed into another theorem about lines and points, by a substitution of the appropriate words.

 

[Upisoft]

You have to use your brain, that goes without saying. Cakes and recipes for cakes are perfectly described by textbook physics. On the other hand - thoughts, logic, perception and awareness are not.

Imagine brilliant physicist, who however doesn't know anything about cooking and food. Someone gives him a cake. The physicist will not be able to make another cake.

Many people, including me, don't know how to cook. I know how to make very few things, but I don't know how to make a cake. I don't know QFT. Suppose I decide to learn QFT. Will that make me more capable to make a cake? I don't think so. Even if I read and learn every other physics book, I'll still be unaware how to make a cake. My wife, however knows how to make a cake. She doesn't know as much physics as I do. How do you explain that?

 

[DaveC426913]

Imagine brilliant physicist, who however doesn't know anything about cooking and food. Someone gives him a cake. The physicist will not be able to make another cake.

But we're not talking about practice here, we're talking principle. A physicist (with enough knowledge of his own subject field and enough time) has everything he needs to make a cake.

Does the brain, in principle, break down to chemistry and electrical impulses? Yes.

 

[Upisoft]

But we're not talking about practice here, we're talking principle. A physicist (with enough knowledge of his own subject field and enough time) has everything he needs to make a cake.

May I have an example how this will happen? What will the physicist do to make another cake?

 

[Hurkyl]

I think the point of the cake analogy has been lost. You want to know how to bake a cake, you look in cookbooks not a physics texts. You want to know how much energy is released burning gasoline, you look in chemistry texts, not physics texts. You want to know about thinking, you similarly wouldn't look in a physics text.

 

[Q_Goest]

Dualaities show up everywhere. Everywhere. They've become boring.

What other dualities are there? We might suggest there are other phenomena that are not objectively measurable, such as spaghetti monsters in the clouds that experience astral projections (AP) on a geologic time scale. Perhaps these AP correspond 1 to 1 with the physical state of the clouds in Earth's atmosphere, so one might say there is a purely material explanation for these AP phenomena. Should we assume AP phenomena exist and they are being reported by the spaghetti monsters in the clouds but we simply haven't figured out the language yet?

Qualia are difficult to explain because they can't be explained by explaining the material interactions, whereas making a cake for example, can be explained by explaining chemical reactions. A cake is a purely physical phenomena. I don't see dualities in any other material phenomena.

 

[Upisoft]

Qualia are difficult to explain because they can't be explained by explaining the material interactions

Qualia are unique, because the material interactions are unique. Isn't that an explanation?

whereas making a cake for example, can be explained by explaining chemical reactions. A cake is a purely physical phenomena. I don't see dualities in any other material phenomena.

Say, an alien visits us and leaves something that he calls "cake". Can we reproduce it without destroying the original? Understanding the brain is limited by our destructive interactions with it.

 

[Q_Goest]

Qualia are unique, because the material interactions are unique. Isn't that an explanation?

No. Suppose an alien visits us that has 4 or more different types of cone cells in their eyes and they explain that the flowers we are looking have different colors than the ones we see. Or say he has tiny pressure sensors and electrical sensors in every pore on his skin and he experiences the world through these. Do material interactions tell us anything about the qualia he experiences (ie: other than the material interactions)?

 

[Upisoft]

No. Suppose an alien visits us that has 4 or more different types of cone cells in their eyes and they explain that the flowers we are looking have different colors than the ones we see. Or say he has tiny pressure sensors and electrical sensors in every pore on his skin and he experiences the world through these. Do material interactions tell us anything about the qualia he experiences (ie: other than the material interactions)?

Why do you put a limit for the material interactions only to the senses? Clearly the alien will have different brain than you that will react in different way. It will react differently even if the best surgeons are able to transplant your eyes to the alien. The qualia is property of the brain, not the sensors. If you ever had a color dream you would know what I mean.

 

[Q_Goest]

Why do you put a limit for the material interactions only to the senses?

I don't. See the spaghetti monster above for another example without discussing sensory organs.

 

[Upisoft]

I don't. See the spaghetti monster above for another example without discussing sensory organs.

Ah, you want to discuss "language". OK. Let's look at the problem from this point of view.

I'll use classical (set based) information theory.

Alice has a set of experiences that she is able to experience. Let's call it A. After some period of learning she associates a subset of it A' (seeing red) to another subset A''(hearing the word "red"). After a while the person will try to associate an activity (saying the word "red") with A'' and A'.
The same is valid for Bob and he ends up with B, B' and B''. Also he has his own activity to say the word "red".

Let's assume that the activities of Alice and Bob trigger one of the experiences in A'' and B''. That means they can understand each other. They now can share limited information about "red". Smaller the sets are more exact will be the information. "Brick red" for example.

Yet the sets A and B have unique members, so they do not intersect. The language is just an association between unique subsets of unique sets.

 

[Pythagorean]

I think the point of the cake analogy has been lost. You want to know how to bake a cake, you look in cookbooks not a physics texts. You want to know how much energy is released burning gasoline, you look in chemistry texts, not physics texts. You want to know about thinking, you similarly wouldn't look in a physics text.

Woah, wait a minute. There's a lot of physics and chemistry that is essential to cooking (see Alton Brown. In almost every show, he comments on the physics an chemistry of his cooking approach.)

 

[Upisoft]

Woah, wait a minute. There's a lot of physics and chemistry that is essential to cooking (see Alton Brown. In almost every show, he comments on the physics an chemistry of his cooking approach.)

You can study some aspects of cooking by using physics, but you cannot learn to cook by studying physics. That was the point.

 

[Q_Goest]

I think the point of the cake analogy has been lost. You want to know how to bake a cake, you look in cookbooks not a physics texts. You want to know how much energy is released burning gasoline, you look in chemistry texts, not physics texts.

I got to go with Hurkyl on this one. A recipe is all it takes to make a cake.

To explain how the cake TASTES however...

 

[Upisoft]

To explain how the cake TASTES however...

It is impossible, yes. It is also impossible to measure the spin of the electron along x and y-axis simultaneously. Will you evoke another -ism for that?

 

[Pythagorean]

You can study some aspects of cooking by using physics, but you cannot learn to cook by studying physics. That was the point.

That's what I disagree with though. You can learn how to cook studying physics. It's just not a terribly efficient way to do it, just like you don't want to model a cannon ball as an ensemble of quantum particles.

In other words, I find reductionism perfectly valid in principle. In practice, of course, it's filled with technical difficulties.

Anyway... once a discovery has been made, it's easy for anybody to follow a "recipe" to repeat the discovery for themselves (whether it's cooking, hydroponics, or physics experiments) but to be the one to make the discovery requires some understanding of the mechanisms behind observations and some curiosity about the physical mechanisms driving the observation: that is physics!

 

[Hurkyl]

Woah, wait a minute. There's a lot of physics and chemistry that is essential to cooking (see Alton Brown. In almost every show, he comments on the physics an chemistry of his cooking approach.)

The use of physics to do cooking is called... cooking! A book on this topic is more likely to be appropriate in the baking section of the bookstore than the physics section of the bookstore.

Remember that this whole subthread started with:

I never denied that we think. I claim the thinking is a physical process that we experience.

Where exactly in physics textbooks did you see any mention of properties of matter related to the process of thinking?

Try Neuroscience texts, who's principles are found on physics.

My question was about "thinking". Point me to a source from physics that says that properties of matter are responsible for the process of thinking.

 

[Upisoft]

That's what I disagree with though. You can learn how to cook studying physics. It's just not a terribly efficient way to do it, just like you don't want to model a cannon ball as an ensemble of quantum particles.

And I can see that you did not understand my argument. It is not about what you can do by using your knowledge. You can model a cannon ball as much as you wish. My point is about what you can learn by studying it. A hypothetical case to show the difference. An alien physicist on a world as much advanced as ours, except they never had war and never have invented the cannon and the cannon ball. Now, if that alien physicist finds a cannon ball, he may do what you suggest by using his knowledge. But suppose he didn't find any cannon balls. Instead he gets the next physics book and starts learning. Will that bring in his mind the idea of cannon ball? No.

The same is valid for cooking. Suppose that the aliens are photosynthesizing race and they never had the need to prepare food. Will studying physics make them any closer to the idea of making pizza? No. They don't even know what pizza is nor they know what preparing food is.

 

[Pythagorean]

The use of physics to do cooking is called... cooking! A book on this topic is more likely to be appropriate in the baking section of the bookstore than the physics section of the bookstore.

Remember that this whole subthread started with:

I don't disagree with you, but I guess my point is that there's no need to snob our nose at Maui's request because we really do have plenty of examples, such as "Cognition, Brain, and Consciousness" (put together by Baars and Gage) or to see it in practice, Kalina Christoff's "Cognitive Neuroscience of Thought Laboratory".

(see "The Science of Cooking" to really know how to cook, as opposed to following recipes.)Ah yes, but this... Maui moved the goal post a bit:

My question was about "thinking". Point me to a source from physics that says that properties of matter are responsible for the process of thinking.

I think I see where Hurkyl is coming from, but we can go straight to physics itself referring back to Hurkyl's post #37 (the complaint about the loaded term "explain").

I can't satisfy Maui's request in the same way I can't say why matter gives rise to mass or charge. I don't know how matter gives rise to mass and charge, and I don't think I'd ever really get a satisfactory answer from anyone else (I can't even imagine what a satisfactory answer would look like).

Despite this, I am certain that matter does possesses properties that we've come to call "mass" and "charge" and I think we've done well to prove that in physics without stating how it is that mass and charge arise from matter.

So in that way, Maui's challenge is unfair.

 

[Upisoft]

I don't disagree with you, but I guess my point is that there's no need to snob our nose at Maui's request because we really do have plenty of examples, such as "Cognition, Brain, and Consciousness" (put together by Baars and Gage) or to see it in practice, Kalina Christoff's "Cognitive Neuroscience of Thought Laboratory".

(see "The Science of Cooking" to really know how to cook, as opposed to following recipes.)

It seems it will be never enough for him, unless there is a book that describes the process of thinking in every detail. It is part of the human nature. People like to fill the gaps of our knowledge with mysticism just to be comfortable that they "know" something that otherwise has no exact explanation yet. It is nice though that there are still people that will try to fill the gaps with hard work and new knowledge.

I think I see where Hurkyl is coming from, but we can go straight to physics itself referring back to Hurkyl's post #37 (the complaint about the loaded term "explain").

I can't satisfy Maui's request in the same way I can't say why matter gives rise to mass or charge. I don't know how matter gives rise to mass and charge, and I don't think I'd ever really get a satisfactory answer from anyone else (I can't even imagine what a satisfactory answer would look like).

Despite this, I am certain that matter does possesses properties that we've come to call "mass" and "charge" and I think we've done well to prove that in physics without stating how it is that mass and charge arise from matter.

So in that way, Maui's challenge is unfair.

Well, there are people that try to answer the question about mass. The experiments in CERN are trying to find the hypothetical Higgs boson that is supposed to explain it.

We tend to split science in different areas. That is because there are certain effects that cannot be explained by taking the system apart, emergent properties of matter interaction with itself. You cannot explain the quantum entanglement by studying single particles. Nor you can explain the superconductivity by the properties of a singe electron. However even if you cannot explain the whole as sum of its parts, you can study it and predict its behavior.

 

[Pythagorean]

Well, there are people that try to answer the question about mass. The experiments in CERN are trying to find the hypothetical Higgs boson that is supposed to explain it.

I don't think it's quite the same question. The Higg's boson would ideally tell us a lot more about the mechanisms of gravity but understanding the nature of something is more about familiarity and acceptance. It's inevitably an emotional and/or philosophical question. The only reason new information should be "weird" to us is because we have some preconceived notions about how it should be based on our experience. So understanding the nature of something really has emotional acceptance as a first step, then it's only a matter of exposure and experience to gain intuition of said thing. It's not something you see outlined in a science textbook, it's something you infer, something gained from experience.

We tend to split science in different areas. That is because there are certain effects that cannot be explained by taking the system apart, emergent properties of matter interaction with itself. You cannot explain the quantum entanglement by studying single particles. Nor you can explain the superconductivity by the properties of a singe electron. However even if you cannot explain the whole as sum of its parts, you can study it and predict its behavior.

Of course, I agree. I am particularly fond of emergent properties, and I don't mean to imply that everything should be broken down into single particles and isolated from other particles.

What I am interested in, in terms of research, is how emergent properties arise from the interactions between the reduced units. In particular, what kind of emergent properties arise from single neuron models (not artificial ones, biophysical ones like the Hodgkins-Huxley model) when you couple several (hundred) of them together? Their individual properties are still present and still influential on the group dynamics.

I'm not studying cognition or thought yet in this context, I still feel like there's a lot of groundwork to do from the reduced side of the gap. I do hope to work with people on the other side of the gap someday (maybe a decade or two) and be one of those contributing to the closing of it.

 

[Maui]

It seems it will be never enough for him, unless there is a book that describes the process of thinking in every detail. It is part of the human nature. People like to fill the gaps of our knowledge with mysticism just to be comfortable that they "know" something that otherwise has no exact explanation yet.

Perhaps, that's why science has been progressing. If Einstein was content with the level of knowledge of physics of the 19th century, there'd be substantially less knowledge now. Perhaps it's much more productive to recognize the paradoxes and work towards finding solutions than sitting back and neglecting obvious phenomena like consciousness. Because that is what current neuroscience is doing - ignoring that consciousness exists. It has been fairly successful without including conscious experience in the scientific story so far. And it's a kind of embarassment for the theory that such a faculty should exist at all. If your standards for accepting theories are that low, you should also embrace the other speculative proposals - the MWI, the Pilot Wave theory or the hologram model. After all, there are no knowledge gaps, once you fill them with speculation for your own comfort.

And if your conscious experience is such a masterfully created deception, may i suggest that you ask someone to throw a chair at your head and see if YOU experience pain.

For the purpose of this thread i will make a categorical statement(obvious to some, false to others) - it doesn't matter what current neuroscience theories say, there is a BIG fundamental behavioral difference between a conscious person and an unconscious one(but still alive). Any theory that posits otherwise(or simply neglects conscious experience as if it didn't exist) should be considered an embarassment to science.

 

[Upisoft]

Perhaps, that's why science has been progressing. If Einstein was content with the level of knowledge of physics of the 19th century, there'd be substantially less knowledge now. Perhaps it's much more productive to recognize the paradoxes and work towards finding solutions than sitting back and neglecting obvious phenomena like consciousness.

Here you are wrong. People are working in the area and that's why they do experiments that show the decision precedes the conscious awareness of it. People that dismiss the observed data, because they feel it's not right, are those who stop the progress. Also, we don't need paradoxes to progress. The inability to make correct prediction is enough.

Because that is what current neuroscience is doing - ignoring that consciousness exists.

I don't think they dismiss it. I think they say our feeling about it is incorrect.

It has been fairly successful without including conscious experience in the scientific story so far. And it's a kind of embarassment for the theory that such a faculty should exist at all. If your standards for accepting theories are that low, you should also embrace the other speculative proposals - the MWI, the Pilot Wave theory or the hologram model. After all, there are no knowledge gaps, once you fill them with speculation for your own comfort.

I'm not working in that area, so I don't have enough knowledge to weigh the proposals. But I think they are still proposals, not theories. Until we have some predictability we have no theory. And what about your theory? How we can predict something that we cannot observe?

And if your conscious experience is such a masterfully created deception, may i suggest that you ask someone to throw a chair at your head and see if YOU experience pain.

For the purpose of this thread i will make a categorical statement(obvious to some, false to others) - it doesn't matter what current neuroscience theories say, there is a BIG fundamental behavioral difference between a conscious person and an unconscious one(but still alive). Any theory that posits otherwise(or simply neglects conscious experience as if it didn't exist) should be considered an embarassment to science.

There is fundamental difference between computer switched on and one switched off. Do you insist there is something mystical and unexplainable about that fact?

 

[Pythagorean]

Maui, you're mischaracterizing neuroscience. It doesn't say that there's not a difference between a conscious and unconscious person and it doesn't ignore that consciousness exists. Feel free to look into any of the authors I mention before making such statements. Also, add Ramachandran, Friston, Izhikevich.

For the purpose of this thread i will make a categorical statement(obvious to some, false to others) - it doesn't matter what current neuroscience theories say, there is a BIG fundamental behavioral difference between a conscious person and an unconscious one(but still alive). Any theory that posits otherwise(or simply neglects conscious experience as if it didn't exist) should be considered an embarassment to science.

It depends on what you mean by unconscious. The thalamus, which is in the forebrain, seems to have a lot to do with consciousness. It is involved in the transition between wake and sleep states and lesions of the thalamus are said to significantly diminish consciousness.
http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~lka/conz3a2.htm

Laureys et al (2002) investigated recovery from 'persistent vegetative state' (wakefulness without awareness). They found that overall cortical metabolism remained almost constant during recovery but that the metabolism in the prefrontal and association cortices became correlated with thalamic ILN and precuneus activity. Again confirming that thalamo-cortico-thalamic activity is required for consciousness and that cortical activity by itself is not conscious.

Perhaps you are talking about brain death? When everything but the hind-brain dies? Our hind-brain is on a separate set of resources from the body than the rest of our brain. When somebody has brain death, their is no activity in the brain except for that hind section that manages mundane survival apparatus (breathing, heart, circulation, etc). Because it's on a different set of resources, it can often happen that people lose blood supply to the forebrain and/or midbrain, but not the hindbrain. In this case, they are technically alive, but most neuroscientists would agree that any resemblance of a "person" in terms of character and personality... is gone. Neuroscience doesn't disagree with anything you've said. It only finds a physical basis for it instead of a mystical one.

But we can examine unconscious vs conscious processes even in a conscious person (that's Christof Koch's approach). Neural correlates of consciousness he calls them.

 

[Q_Goest]

For the purpose of this thread i will make a categorical statement(obvious to some, false to others) - it doesn't matter what current neuroscience theories say, there is a BIG fundamental behavioral difference between a conscious person and an unconscious one(but still alive). Any theory that posits otherwise(or simply neglects conscious experience as if it didn't exist) should be considered an embarassment to science.

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I think what you mean to say is that there is a difference between a person that experiences phenomenal consciousness and one that does not (ie: a http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/zombies/" or p-zombie or just zombie for short). Per SEP:

Zombies are exactly like us in all physical respects but have no conscious experiences: by definition there is ‘nothing it is like’ to be a zombie. Yet zombies behave like us, and some even spend a lot of time discussing consciousness. This disconcerting fantasy helps to make the problem of phenomenal consciousness vivid, especially as a problem for physicalism.

Although a zombie is defined as being identical in all physical respects, one can also extend this to being functionally identical to us in all respects. In other words, there is a 1 to 1 correlation in behavior. Computationalism is based on http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/functionalism/" . From SEP:

Functionalism is the doctrine that what makes something a thought, desire, pain (or any other type of mental state) depends not on its internal constitution, but solely on its function, or the role it plays, in the cognitive system of which it is a part. More precisely, functionalist theories take the identity of a mental state to be determined by its causal relations to sensory stimulations, other mental states, and behavior.

Functionalism purports that we can 'measure' phenomenal experience indirectly by measuring behavior, something like a Turing test. Therefore, if a computer can be made to be functionally identical to a human, then functionalism (and thus computationalism) says that the computer must also experience phenomenal consciousness.

 

[Maui]

Maui, you're mischaracterizing neuroscience. It doesn't say that there's not a difference between a conscious and unconscious person and it doesn't ignore that consciousness exists. Feel free to look into any of the authors I mention before making such statements. Also, add Ramachandran, Friston, Izhikevich.

I read 2 essays that those authors wrote and they are hopeful that consciousness(the Self) will be revealed to be a certain configuration of neurons. They cite cases of mental disorders as evidence but don't mention any word of cognition, thinking, comprehension or self-awareness. While they don't specifically say in those essay that they are illusions, their collegues(the ones I've read) all held this opinion. Again, i have nothing against the idea that neurons in the brain influence the thought process, but i dismiss the idea that qualia, thinking and awareness are JUST deterministic, physical processes inside the brain.

It depends on what you mean by unconscious. The thalamus, which is in the forebrain, seems to have a lot to do with consciousness. It is involved in the transition between wake and sleep states and lesions of the thalamus are said to significantly diminish consciousness.
http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~lka/conz3a2.htm

A unconscious person will register brain activity on a EEG machine. A conscious person will as well, but their physical behavior is not even similar while one of them is unconscious.

Neuroscience doesn't disagree with anything you've said. It only finds a physical basis for it instead of a mystical one.

It doesn't disagree because it shies away from the topic of awareness, thinking and free-will. When it does, it usually revolves around atatements like - "conscious experience and self are illusory", "free-will is an illusion", etc.

But we can examine unconscious vs conscious processes even in a conscious person (that's Christof Koch's approach). Neural correlates of consciousness he calls them.

Great, this stuff is fascinating and I love reading about it. But there is no physical reason in my brain why i disagree with its conclusions. Instead, the reason lies in logic. A theory has 2 basic requirements:

1. It has to make sense
2. It must match observations

The theory that consciousness(self-awareness) is a deterministic physical process fails on both points. If the world of conscious experience is truly illusory, it is because of an entirely different set of reasons that have little to do with brains.

 

[Upisoft]

I read 2 essays that those authors wrote and they are hopeful that consciousness(the Self) will be revealed to be a certain configuration of neurons. They cite cases of mental disorders as evidence but don't mention any word of cognition, thinking, comprehension or self-awareness. While they don't specifically say in those essay that they are illusions, their collegues(the ones I've read) all held this opinion. Again, i have nothing against the idea that neurons in the brain influence the thought process, but i dismiss the idea that qualia, thinking and awareness are JUST deterministic, physical processes inside the brain.

They are not deterministic processes of the brain. The brain is a system that interacts with the environment. If you analyze any such system you may find that they are not deterministic. The combination environment + system is deterministic, but the parts are not.

It doesn't disagree because it shies away from the topic of awareness, thinking and free-will. When it does, it usually revolves around atatements like - "conscious experience and self are illusory", "free-will is an illusion", etc.

Ah, the old question about "free-will", the self destroying idea. If something is willful then it is not free. And if something is free, then it cannot be willful.

2. It must match observations

Then you have to embrace every religion as a true religion. After all you will hear a lot of people claiming observations that support their religion.

 

[Maui]

Here you are wrong. People are working in the area and that's why they do experiments that show the decision precedes the conscious awareness of it.

Decision? How is a decision registered on a machine? Or did they just register brain activity that they interpreted to be a decision?

People that dismiss the observed data, because they feel it's not right, are those who stop the progress. Also, we don't need paradoxes to progress. The inability to make correct prediction is enough.

You are stuffing a quadrant through a round hole and because it will obviously not go in, you are ready to dismiss the existence of the hole(there is no hole, there is no problem).

I don't think they dismiss it. I think they say our feeling about it is incorrect.

Could it be that their neurons are just out of order and firing a non-sensical sequence? After all, there is no reason why neurons should fire in logical order and produce meaning or knowledge.

And what about your theory? How we can predict something that we cannot observe?

You have over-stayed and over-bought at the "Humans could explain everything" counter.

There is fundamental difference between computer switched on and one switched off. Do you insist there is something mystical and unexplainable about that fact?

A computer has nothing to do with conscious experience or self-awareness.