Abstract: Is the mind just a part of the world? Or is the world all in the mind? Neither, argues philosopher, physcian and poet Raymond Tallis as he puts forward his take onhow we make sense of experience. When neuroscience and Darwinism trespass into the humanities, they become, he says, "neuromania" and"Darwinitis" – unhealthy, mad and malign.

We are ourselves. Why would we not consider ourselves important?

...how some of us make sense of reality.

There are far too many people that are willfully ignorant, and cling to their false beliefs even in the face of undeniable evidence.

Wouldn't how we make sense of experience be determined precisely by our brains and biology?? Good vid though

Just the headline of this hurts (I tried to read the article but it wants my email and stuff so no). I’m just wondering what large organ do we use to make sense of our experience?

Waste of time. Use your preferred organ to experience sapience, last time I checked there were no rules about organ predilection.

Ah yeah, the dreadful Neuromania and Darwinitis. Keep safe kids!

'Determined by' and 'can be reduced to' are not the same.

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There's an external world that we experience with our brains. A brain that is unique to each person, but approximates the world relatively similarly. Oh no, am I a neuromaniac?

It’s a phenomenon arising out of biology, it cannot be fully explained by biology, at least not yet

What is the difference in your opinion?

One can write a dissertation on emergent properties IMO, and I am not a PhD, but allegorically speaking, a wave on the liquid surface is determined by the physical properties of the molecules of the liquid, but cannot be reduced to the properties of a molecule.

There’s something intuitive in the evolutionary process. Michael Levin points out how Plenarians, these one-inch words, can be cut up to 200 individual pieces and each one will grow to a regular Plenarian. He postulates the question of what tells the Plenarian to stop growing at one inch and why so symmetrical when it can be cut so much. Some would say “DNA” but he is a biologist who understands the answer is not so simple. Each piece develops it’s own cognition as if it’s an individual once it is separate, but such conflict of growth doesn’t exist once the creature reaches its full state. There’s an underlying executive condition that we don’t understand that guides the genetic information to achieve certain goals. Frog skin cells left in suspension eventually develop their own form and become xenobots and have the capability of developing its own methods of travel and communication, enough so that they can solve basic mazes. Something guides the genetic information we have to experience the world as it is. It’s not so simple as pressure and environment as anything can be scaled, just like how we know there were bigger insects before on earth. Why doesn’t evolution adapt an insect of the past to maintain its giant form despite the pressure from the environment? Couldn’t it have figured out a way to maintain itself? The executive element is the question and how it guides our genetics to adapt.

I think language acquisition can very much be explained by biology.

By our tongues, our teeth, our soft palette, Broca's and Wernicke's area in our brain.

Philosophers who don't understand science love complaining about science being "too reductive."

And language acquisition is one of the most distinctively "human" characteristics we have.

Some would argue that it is. That all of our experiences, sensations, decisions are all just chemical reactions enticing us to benefit ourselves in some way or form.

It goes beyond just language acquisition. How do you sum up the consciousness and awareness of humans through science? It’s a largely subjective experience. You can start from science and we’re still learning more about the brain from biology and neuroscience but I don’t agree that we can fully explain human psychology through hard science as of yet.

And orca is the apes predator in the ocean. But it goes after a few fish or a single seal at a time.

Humans can lay out 2 miles of net and bring up a whole school of fish.

So, there is a thesis, reduction to Brian

And antithesis. Reduction to body

And what we need is a synthesis of these two to extract higher order solutions to the problems that arise.

If you can steelman someone who hold an antithesis to your thesis. And I mean really steelman to the point where the other person says, dude, 100% you nailed it. and they can do that for your position. Then you have a team that can synthesize higher order principals.

>One can write a dissertation on emergent properties IMO, and I am not a PhD, but allegorically speaking, a wave on the liquid surface is determined by the physical properties of the molecules of the liquid, but cannot be reduced to the properties of a molecule.

Of course it can. The phenomenon of periodic motion that we call a wave is merely the result of individual molecules reacting to applied forces according to their properties. The wave has no existence outside of the molecules. Any properties that we attribute to it (e.g. amplitude, phase, frequency) are properties which exist only because of, and in principle can be computed from, the properties of each individual molecule. Conveniently for us, those properties are such that we can describe the motion of a large enough chunk of molecules using simple equations to a good approximation. But that's all it is, an approximation.

Yes wave is result of interactions of individual molecules, no one argued that, but wave is not just any result of interactions of individual molecules, it is a certain pattern, and the pattern is not a property of single molecule in the wave, it is a property of a whole.

That is why a wave cannot be reduced to "interactions of individual molecules, phase, frequency" etc. Because just random interactions do not produce wave, you need a certain pattern which does not belong to any single molecule.

The final definition of a wave then will be a pattern of interactions of single molecules in a form that makes a wave. So "a wave is... a wave".

"human experience" lol. Call me when they could talk to my dog to see what his experience is like to even compare. This is like Actors awarding themselves Best Actor. Sure.

The size of our frontal cortex is unique. Also we have taught multiple primate species sign language, and they are incapable of asking a question. There is also speculation about cooking being the most advanced digestion on the planet to fuel our minds.

It's our culture that makes us unique - social structure, language, psychology - to what extent these are reducible to brains and biology is the key question.

You've misunderstood Levin a bit. His claim is that environment guides cellular development. Specifically, intercellular electrical gradients.

That sounds like a brain thing

I get where you're coming from, but that's really just word games and doesn't support "is not reducible to our brains and biology".

> [Waves] but cannot be reduced to the properties of a molecule.

If you studied how water molecules interacted with each other, ie the fluid behaviour that really does come from their physical properties (as dictates by their nuclear properties) then you'd be able to extrapolate how the wave pattern form. The potential for making waves is certainly because of the molecules and we can point to the exact part which dictate it. (It's a phase diagram).

It's for sure a lot easier to see at the macro scale and simply observing a puddle, but saying that emergent properties aren't reducible to their base components is disingenuous.

Here in this context, it amounts to "humans are unique not because of our biology, but because of how our biology is out together." Both of those are within the set of "because of our biology".

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True. Not to mentions the sad reality that physics as we understand now, and possibly forever (though hopefully not!), does not possess the faculty of explainings the underlying (or if you prefer fundamental) properties of reality upon which it manifests.

> Why doesn’t evolution adapt an insect of the past to maintain its giant form despite the pressure from the environment? Couldn’t it have figured out a way to maintain itself?

What? That's well known. The O2 content of the atmosphere.

This whole post is just bollocks appealing the to mysticism of the unknown. But bro, other people know more than you and have answers.

Sorry. So far we've only done it for cats.

I love how you think about things, and I’m probably going to read about frog skin cells for hours. Thanks for the rabbit hole.

A few points I’d like to make however: for the insect example in particular (and speaking of evolution and executive choice in general) it doesn’t seem to be guided by anything except fitness on an individual and species level.

All of this is, as far as we can tell, guided by emergent properties of the fundamental laws of physics (and speaking generally, the ability to both better use chemical and electromagnetic energy, and ensure offspring survive to reproduce.)

Insects aren’t as large today as they were at one time because atmospheric oxygen levels are much lower.

Insects largely absorb oxygen through their skin, and volume increases much faster than surface area as objects get larger.

This means that large insects were selected against for millions of years, as they couldn’t support their metabolic needs as efficiently as smaller insects due to reduced oxygen in the atmosphere.

There is no “it” to “figure out how to maintain itself”, anymore than the speed of light or an asteroid is an “it” with a sense of self that seeks to preserve itself.

It’s just deceptively simple rules on the smallest scales leading to larger and larger emergent properties and systems that give rise to self perpetuating systems like life.

Just like Conway’s game of life or pareidolia, it’s easy to ascribe an identity to something that has none, simply because some of its properties are reminiscent of systems we are familiar with that have some level of agency and awareness.

Huh?

We don't have to talk to a dog to know it has differing experiences from us, though granted I would say dogs are probably one of the closer animals to humans as far as that goes. That's beside the point though, because we can easily derive that the eyesight and scent dogs have create a different sensory experience than we have.

Science has allowed us to begin to understand the experience of other animals, we don't have to "talk to them".

Bats clearly experience reality differently than we do, Bugs as well, etc... It's all essentially the function of an output determined by chemical/sensory inputs. That's basically what op was getting at.

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Religious anti-science in sheep's clothing.

When philosophers, humanities, religion, or witch doctor step into the realm of science they're usually pushing some malignant agenda to the detriment of all. Science provides you the truth, as best we can, in the least wrong way possible. It's the witchdoctos and preachers and humanitarians' job to accept that and keep all the guys from trying to cannibalize each other with that knowledge or whatever. If they reject the science, I assume they're just sharpening their own cannibal fork.

I hate you organ supremacists. I prefer to experience reality through the use of minerals and the occasional alpha particle emission, and your organ-based propaganda isn’t going to win me over

If you watch his podcast with Lex Friedman he doesn’t really make this claim. I would have to listen back but he doesn’t come to a complete conclusion as he is asked about the nature va nurture debate in it as well. Unless he’s updated the way he explains it in more recent talks since.

The world is pretty unequivocally not all in the mind. Arguments like that seek to make up a majority of the reason a lot of people look down on philosophy

>It's our culture that makes us unique

>- social structure,

Uh, wolves are highly social. Bees and ants are eusocial. That is, MORE social than humans. We don't have a monopoly on social structures at all.

>language

Bees dance location data to each other. Birds sing and communicate. We've taught English to apes. Yeah, this one is bollocks too.

> psychology

Any psychology? I mean, anything with a brain has some psychology to it.

NONE of that makes us unique. What, you going to try and say "tool use" next? You're about 70-100 years behind on this debate. Humans are just another animal. It's just egocentrism telling you otherwise.

EDIT:

WOW.

You abuse the moderation system to just censor posts you don't like? That's low man. Real low. It's the rules here to actually argue your position. If you just can't stand someone disagreeing with you, then this sub isn't for you.

A pattern can't be a property of a single molecule because patterns, by definition, involve repetition in space or time or both.

But so what?

In what sense is the wave not reducible to the physical motion of the molecules? Every molecule that you conceive of is being part of the wave is simply bouncing around in its environment and responding to the forces to which it is subjected. As it happens, if you have a bunch of molecules in a fluid and you provide a particular external intervention, you can make the molecules move in a repetitive way. Are you saying that somehow creates a new entity that can't be explained by looking at its parts? If so, how many particles do I need to create a wave? Actually, even a single particle can oscillate in a wave. If you trace the time history of a single molecule in the ocean as a wave passes over it, you will see the wave in the motion of that molecule. So what is new when you have a bunch of them doing it at the same time?

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Ah yeah, the old straight-edge mineralist. What's next? Are you going to force feed us the ol' panpsychism propaganda?

>I hate you organ supremacists

Indeed. A piano is just as good, if not better.

>In what sense is the wave not reducible to the physical motion of the molecules?

Generalized enough everything can be described as a transfer of energy. If you accept that 'transfer of energy' can serve as the definition of any process (wave, fire, typing comments on Reddit), then we are on the same page, and we now have universal and useless theory of everything.

But if you insist that we cannot generalize like that because it omits important differences, then I repeat again: physical motion of the molecules is not a wave. Wave is a physical motion of the molecules in a pattern of wave.

Yeah pal: Our culture makes art, has serial killers, mass war, fetishes, professions, shite novels, good novels, podiatry, deep sea diving, biscuits, deliberate genocide, manufactured sausages, algorithms, dutchness, the wheel, touching your toe as a measure of fitness, shame, regret, football teams. Engineering. Not the same.

I am so frustrated with my own family being so politically committed to viciously attack everything and anything our president does, to a point in which they cannot accept evidence, out of their ideological hate for a politician. Sheer gut. I am very sensible, and it stresses me so much feeling their hate, it makes me literally sick.
So much irrationality. They are all women, it is weird tho.

Lol exactly. “Ah finally an answer to a question no one asked”

>Wave is a physical motion of the molecules in a pattern of wave.

Yeah. If I wave my arms in the air, it's just a blip. If I'm in a stadium and raise my arms in sync with others so that we create a wave around the arena, that's a wave. The wave is not any one of us, but a collective effort of individual parts orchestrated in a particular way.

Can we reduce the wave to a single, immutable part? No. But we can't even do that for atoms. The whole being the sum of its parts does not mean that the whole has features that are mysterious or inexplicable in parts.

>Can we reduce the wave to a single, immutable part? No

I'm glad we ended on the same page.

>The whole being the sum of its parts does not mean that the whole has features that are ... inexplicable in parts.

It can have features that are inexplicable in parts. Subatomic particles are a great example of that.

> When philosophers, humanities, religion, or witch doctor step into the realm of science

Uhh you know that the scientific method came from philosophy right?

..... which is reduced to our brains and biology

>It can have features that are inexplicable in parts. Subatomic particles are a great example of that.

Potentially. But before recent times, entire sun was inexplicable. The human heart was inexplicable. The motion of the wind and waves was inexplicable.

You're putting forth a modified God of the gaps arguement.

I mean... there is plenty unique enough about the human brain. You can demarcate humans from the rest of the animal kingdom at multiple levels.

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The picture: Sainte-Geneviève Library in Quartier Latin, Paris

Can you clarify what you mean "sum up the consciousness and awareness"?

I use my butt!

The brain is always telling itself it's important... what an egotistical ass.

This guy writes for Philosophy Now magazine.

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Sentience basically, just what it means to be human and all the faculties we have access to that other animals don’t (potential for introspection and high level thought and investigation, curiosity, etc) there’s a sort of wonder and joy to being alive that goes beyond hard science.

Philosophically, the distinction between "determined by" and "can be reduced to" is related to the idea of determinism versus reductionism.

Determinism is the philosophical belief that all events, including human actions, are determined by previous causes and conditions, and thus are inevitable. In this context, "determined by" refers to the idea that the outcome of a certain event is fixed based on certain conditions or causes.

Reductionism, on the other hand, is the idea that complex phenomena can be explained in terms of simpler, more fundamental components. In this context, "can be reduced to" refers to the idea that a complex problem or concept can be simplified and understood in terms of its basic building blocks.

Semantically, the difference between "determined by" and "can be reduced to" is that "determined by" implies a fixed outcome, while "can be reduced to" implies a potential for simplification.

In conclusion, "determined by" and "can be reduced to" represent different philosophical and semantic perspectives on the nature of causality and the relationship between complexity and simplicity in the world. /ChatGPT

>>In what sense is the wave not reducible to the physical motion of the molecules? > >Generalized enough everything can be described as a transfer of energy. If you accept that 'transfer of energy' can serve as the definition of any process (wave, fire, typing comments on Reddit), then we are on the same page, and we now have universal and useless theory of everything. > >But if you insist that we cannot generalize like that because it omits important differences, then I repeat again: physical motion of the molecules is not a wave. Wave is a physical motion of the molecules in a pattern of wave.

What about "wave" is not reducible to the motion of the fluid particles?

Are you just saying that we have an abstract concept of a wave? Because that's true but pointless in the sense that we can't interact with abstract concepts, only physical realizations. There is no real wave which can be described exactly using abstract parameters associated with a general wave.

How did you determined other animals don't have those things? Most animals I can think of are curious, and investigation arises from curiosity...

Very biased opinion here

Let’s not forget this was from a human and well that would be considered bias

This contains lots of details...https://youtu.be/RwEKg5cjkKQ

He's basically on the same page as Friston with Active Inference and the Free Energy Principle...I can't quite tell what that means in terms of philosophical claims.

Hey hey, please leave string theory out of this.

We were lucky to have been birthed into intelligent primates, to be able to peer into the vast universe and are slowly figure out it's mysteries. We could've been born a cow or insect, never being able to realize that.

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Billiard balls smashing across the table isn’t the same as a game of pool, although the smashing of the balls determines the game, the game doesn’t reduce to it.

Absolutely

Curiosity is very much an animal instinct ; human consciousness and animals' consciousness are very much different in how they differentiate through acting upon their instincts. As animals do, humans are a slave to their instincts (their unconscious) and as Nietzsche put it : before sacrificing God as what is most sacred to us, we had to sacrifice our instincts, meaning we had to repress our instincts to become "sophisticated". You cannot threaten an animal with the burden of death in the future ; you cannot give it an existential crisis by showing him the bones of his mate. They surely do mourn others but do not seem to understand that this also will happen to them. I do agree that some examples are very interesting ; for example, the elephants cemeteries where they go when they are old to die and the relationship they have with the concept of death. It would still seem to me as an instinct insofar as it looks very much like a biological clock. The idea of differenciation in consciousness in our species is also a very interesting one to explore ; people from very old tribes seem to have a different kind of consciousness than we do. Two types have been observed : a consciousness of events and a Collective consciousness . The first one seems to be the oldest one in terms of evolution ; it is simply not an individual consciousness nor a collective one ; the individual acts as if it isn't a person but merely one with the events around him. The second one came after : it is simply like the individual consciousness but shared by a group ; what is felt by one is also felt by the others. So the oldest one would very much look like an animal's type of consciousness. Now the question that arises is what's next ? Why does it goes from the events towards the individual and why has this particular order been selected ? What's the step after the individual, the hyper-individual ? This, too me, seem like the most interesting discussion to have with the discussion on the development of consciousness in humans and why does it seem different than the rest. Let me know what you think.

Never heard of the so called "Reduction to Brian". Would like to know more. Can you cite said logical fallacy? Thanks ad nihilo!

You’re really pushing my temper.

So what's the answer to the plenarian and the frog developing its own cognition. I would like to know.

This is getting suspiciously close to the old Rationalism versus Empiricism dispute. There is substance, and then there is form. What we might call reality-in-itself is both and neither of these simultaneously; rather, they are two opposing means of comprehension. They are contradicting yet interdependent aspects of our consciousness. They could also be phrased as perception and conception.

I would say if there is one thing that makes humans unique it's our arrogance. The kind of arrogance that leads us to believe we're unique or that it's important anyway.

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How we as a species are ideally capable of making sense of reality.

Ok, but in regard to brains an biology, is this just a modified hard problem of consciousness or something else?

Not just cooking, but fermentation, pickling, curing, aging… in fact you could even describe cultivating more edible organisms as a part of digestion, although that is certainly stretching the definition.

Sorry, that doesn't help me understand the difference in case of brain, biology, and experience.

It's the worm's DNA. A blueprint for what the thing is supposed to built.

The dude's post saying "Nuh-Uh!" does not a legitimate argument make.

The frog skin isn't cognitive like a brain, it's reacting as it ought as if it were on a frog. Which, hey, could be useful.

EDIT: GEEEEEZE, if you ask for an answer TAKE IT when it's given to you instead of saying "NUH UH!" over and over.

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Big words so it’s philosophy… cogito, ergo sum.

Insofar that we're the only species on the planet who doesn't learn from experience and therefore continue to do the same stupid, destructive things over and over again?

This is the correct answer. Even an idiot like me understood that to really try to differentiate the two you would be making shit up, they’re basically the same thing, although maybe the reason why someone would wanna try to explain the difference is so that others who don’t understand what the persons point is can learn the point.

Lol chat gpt

Are you paying for it? It says the servers are busy when I try to use it.

We’re not that unique.

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Im not sure if you're being serious or playing devil's advocate. Could you reduce Bethoven to motions of atoms in the void, or Newtons equations to ink molecules on paper molecules? All of the internet is just various states of transistors?

It's Daniel Schmatenberger's idea. Check him out for the straight dope.

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Will do, appreciate the time taken to respond.

Or it's a veiled attempt to put the figurative foot in the door for an argument that leads into a discussion about the soul. In my experience this is usually the case. By making distinct the biology of consciousness from the experience of consciousness it allows for arguments to speculate the nature of incorporal things. Eventually leading to arguments justifying a belief in the supernatural and eventually religion.

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no fucking shit

I’ve heard about 20 different reasons from different walks of life how humans differ from animals.

Humans are not unique. Problem solved.

My head went to the exact same place. Though, most shit these days ends up getting framed in "how would I defend this from my religious family/friends/etc?" To me, consciousness and free will are illusions, emergent neural pathways or something we use to describe our experience of observing our memories. The more detailed those memories, the "more" conscious.

Reminds me of Sagan's quote,

"The beauty of a living thing is not the atoms that go into it, but the way those atoms are put together. " It's not too say that the sum of the whole is reducible but those interactions can be understood as a system regardless.

That was my instant response, “but don’t we use our brains to make sense of experiences???”

I call horse hockey. Many animals benefit from their experiences and learn from them changing behaviors that don't get them what they want and adopting behaviors that do get them what they want.

"What makes humans unique is not reducible to our brains or biology"

Does not Brains and Biology encapsulate everything that lets us make sense of experience?
So you're not reducing anything by making that statement, imho.

Sounds a bit like OP is saying you cant reduce earths existence to the observable and unobservable universe.

Yes, this. As I’ve often said, the brain is a hermeneutic engine. It’s primary function, like that of a heart to blood flow, is to interpret, whether of the ongoings of the senses or of the comings and goings of the biochemistry in the body.

Let me know what you think of it. Me brains are always in flux 🤔

Also, upon reflection. This idea was specific to the Lex fridman talk.

Feel free to link said conversation. Have my upvote in advance as a token of gratitude.

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Are We Ourselves?

Can't you say the exact same thing about the brain of every species? they are all unique enough to differentiate from the rest of the animal kingdom.

I am not an article author, all I said was that two things are not the same, but article argument does make sense to me, since even an executable file on a computer cannot be reduced to the states of bits on hard drive despite hard drive encapsulating it entirely.

Ortega y Gasset would have said that he's on the right path, but needs to go a step further. What makes humans unique is not reducible to our brains or biology, but why we try to make sense of things. In a sense the how is not very interesting, after all when you try to do something all the time, you're bound to get good at it. But what was the motivation from the start?

you're not very spiritual for a philosopher

I can think of at least one

What does "fully explained" mean? By definition, an explanation is less accurate than the thing itself. An explanation that was without simplification or omission would simply be the thing being explained itself. Put another way, "all models are wrong, but some models are useful." An explanation is just a model.

Another problem with your formulation is that it takes a lack of knowledge, and just asserts that there must be something more than spacetime at play. But every phenomenon ever explained sufficiently has turned out to be "merely" spacetime. It would be foolish in the extreme to take an unexplained phenomenon and say "I know that everything else has turned out to be not magic, but this time, maybe it's magic!" Every single thing that keeps you alive and able to participate in our society - farming, medicine, the internet, cell phones, cars, airplanes, manufacturing, just to name a few - only work if the assumption is that the world works only via the cause and effect of physical processes. Every one of these fields requires millions of tests of that hypothesis a day. And every single one of those tests has come back as a success. Not once has anyone documented an instance where the cause and effect of the physical world didn't work. Out of, collectively billions of instances a day, not once.

So why would we, even for a second, take seriously the possibility that human cognition is the one exception to that rule? Especially when all of neuroscience increasingly can make accurate and dependable predictions that rely on the physical nature of cognition. To assume that we are special in that way, contrary to all evidence, would be the height of arrogance.

I'm not trained in philosophy, so excuse the dumb question, but it seems to me to be obvious that rationality and empiricism are not in opposition. They answer different questions. Empiricism tells us what is. Rationality lets us make predictions about what might be. They are two unrelated tools, and it is only by using them together that we best acquire something we might call knowledge.

It’s not dumb at all. “Opposition” isn’t an accurate way to put it. I think your description is pretty good. I might summarise it as Empiricism, or sense, informs us of data or experience, while Rationalism, or reason, consists of the principles by which we order that experience. Judgement, interpretation, speculation, and others, are associated with and tend towards Rationalism; observation, experience, and so on are associated with Empiricism.

Which, I think, is the point of this article. Lower animals might be thought of as purely experience, appetite, and impulse-driven. In contrast, humans are far more capable of interpreting information from a limited set of experience.

It's our thumbs.

I think the soul is a very useful concept, as is the sort of material/immaterial dualism that tend to come with it, when it comes to describing and understanding the human experience, which is ultimately a subjective experience above all. Wouldn't dream to claim anyone should believe in this literally though.

I think this whole conversation is reducible to the existentialism branch of philosophy. Yes, human experience of reality is very subjective, which means that a subjective view of what consciousness is exactly is appropriate, considering it is the only view we will have. If we've no choice but to live accordingly, as though our minds are something more than biology, then it really can't be disingenuous to do so. We are trapped by subjectivity and our experience of consciousness does feel like and could be described by the concept of a soul (subjectively, not literally). If the universe and its laws actually cared and would prefer that we perceive ourselves as meat machines rather than as persons, then it shouldn't have made us to perceive ourselves as persons.

The phrasing was little off, I think. What humans can do, experience, make sense of reality, is not shared by animals. I doubt animals can know truth or falsity, or concepts of freedom, but good or bad through their experience, animals, I think, can learn.

Yep.

Unique compared to what, exactly?

No, it's down every now and then but most often I can access it with no problem! If you're in an American time zone, maybe there's more pressure.

agreed!

https://youtu.be/hGRNUw559SE

A wild claim to make when we have no idea how anything else experiences reality

Bingo. IAI.TV is full of bullshit like this.

I think the article may have oversimplifed. Maybe they meant is referring to the more psychologically aspect. Aka the mind. Or the virtualization of your brain. Think like a hard drive on a computer, your hard drive doesn’t actually have a cabinet with files in it. The hard drive is a disk that spins and records data in blocks that can be read from or wrote to. Simulating the concept of pulling a file from a sorted file cabinet. An experience is multiple things to your brain and body, but conceptual it is the sum and recollection of stimuli at the time.

So in theory maybe the article title implies that besides the raw recollection of stimuli, how we subjectively view the experience plays a role.

So the worm's DNA has the information required to build itself fully from a few cells. So the question is why any other animal's DNA (except the hydra) doesn't do the same when it's cut. You have the example of the lizard's tail right, but it doesn't quite satisfy the issue which is that why hasn't this particular regenerating factor been selected. Which then leads us on the question ; why hasn't sissiparity been selected ? Why would natural selection "choose" reproduction with a partner over this one is simply not known. I agree the first post wasn't exactly right, but this doesn't mean the question isn't interesting.

Why would you assume we are distinct from the universe? All of what we are is just a fraction of it in every sense

Well, I don't assume that we are distinct from the universe. I understand that what you said is true. However, for those without that knowledge, it is natural for the human mind to assume that it is distinct from other things. And even those who understand that still don't or can't act according to that information*,* because their biological and psychological programming is such that they act in contrast to reality: like persons, distinct from the rest of the universe, as though determinism doesn't exist, etc*.* It's a funny thing that humans necessarily act against reality, except that it still the reality of our existence and doesn't ever really contradict reality.

It's a whole thing in Albert Camus' concept of the Absurd, which he talks about in The Myth of Sisyphus.

> So the question is why any other animal's DNA (except the hydra) doesn't do the same when it's cut.

Because that's not part of the design in the DNA, except for hydras. (And some lizards tails, salamander legs, starfish... Here we go

>why hasn't this particular regenerating factor been selected [in other animals, like humans. I want to regrow a limb!]

Evolution. It's not selecting what's best or what's coolest, it's just whatever works. Like how it's be really nice we didn't get cancer as often, like whales. But the species gets on just fine without that. Or polarized vision of the mantis shrimp. Or the echolocation of bats. Just on and on and on and on. Species envy is real. For every neat trait though, there's typically some drawback. Did you know cat vision is blurry? They sent the light through their sensors twice, and have great lowlight vision, but it makes things blurry. Humans having to work out for their muscles is actually a FEATURE to survive lean times. Ugh.

No, this is only interesting to people who don't know how evolution works. Which, admittedly, is a depressingly high number even among "educated" people. If talking about it helps people get some learning in them, then all the better. But posing it as "haha, humans are magical creatures with souls and special purposes instilled by God because we're so special" is just plain bollocks. The post is literally anti-science. It's questioning the well known and obvious answers that science hass provided. Hey, this is r/philosophy, the place for question. But it's like questioning if the Holocaust happened. Some people are going to take offense. Please mind your lane and keep the philosophical drivel out of the science's territory. Or you will be told how wrong you are.

Proving or disproving consciousness is a near futile argument to attempt because we've yet clearly defined consciousness to begin with. Don't get me wrong. Proving or disproving consciousness is important, but so far the best answers are speculative interpretations of life experiences, and neuroscience. It's hard to accept consciousness doesn't exist when you think about your life (memories as you put it), and it is undeniable the ability to think can be altered quite predictably by affecting brain chemistry or matter (drugs, hormones, tumors, and other brain injuries). Neither of which proves nor disproves the existence of consciousness because the nature of it has no acceptable definition.

I think the conversation would be best progressed by taking the existence of consciousness as an axiomatic statement. Proving the existence of consciousness would then be irrelevant to describing what consciousness is and is not. I believe that is vastly more relevant and useful to current affairs regarding topics such as how to treat AI capable of passing the Turing Test.

>... It's a funny thing that humans necessarily act against reality, except that it still the reality of our existence and doesn't ever really contradict reality.... >

If determinism is true (which there is a very strong chance it is) how could one who believes in determinism ever judge someone as acting against it without assuming one has the choice to do so?

I know, right? It's such a funny paradox because of that. It's THE Absurd. We attempt to resist against reality as a function of our very nature. There's no choice but to act as though there is one when there isn't.

I've spent too much time studying existentialism lmao

Existentialism is important. Faith (non religious) is a necessity for moving forward when your heros die, your dreams are broken, and your truths are invalidated. Existentialism provides the dialogue to help one come to terms with a universe that doesn't provide one with true certainty.

Indeed, but sissiparity definitely works better than reproduction with a partner, so why has it not been selected. The primary factor ; natural selection, selects the traits that are most likely to get you reproduced ; so to say it's just what works doesn't quite satisfy the definition. I ask you again the question about sissiparity. Whales don't have less cancer, but more, their large bodies making their cancer having cancer a probability to why they don't die as much as we do for it. I'm not saying there should be perfect animals because it's always selecting the best trait, there's always the intraspecific and interspecific relations that results in much of what we see. I agree with what you say but keep the arguments with the traits of animals, and not the cancer one because that would relate only to mutations and genome errors unlike the selected mutations of the traits. I don't know if that's clear.

> but sissiparity definitely works better than reproduction with a partner

Bollocks. Asexual reproduction depends on mutation to bring in new genetic material. Sexual reproduction reaps a geometrically increasing history of tests. You really need to read up on this more.

>their large bodies making their cancer having cancer a probability to why they don't die as much as we do for it.

. . . what?

>but keep the arguments with the traits of animals, and not the cancer one because that would relate only to mutations and genome errors unlike the selected mutations of the traits.

oooooooh. Dude. Whales (and all larger animals) have a better system of screening and checking for "mutations and genome errors". This is literally one of their "selected traits". They don't suffer from cancer as much as they ought given they have so many cells.

You REALLY have to learn more about these things before you start trying to stir up philosophical questions about the nature of man.

> because we've yet clearly defined consciousness to begin with.

We've yet to agree upon a definition. Plenty of people have proposed their own personal pet definitions. Some are even clearly defined.

The hold-up isn't technical in nature, it's getting all the religious nuts to accept an answer.

Could you provide me with a reasonable definition of consciousness that encompasses both real and imagined experiences, as well as their interpretations, while also being falsifiable?

Here's the second phrase of the Wikipedia page you sent : "Currently the adaptive advantage of sexual reproduction is widely regarded as a major unsolved problem in biology". Please don't say it's "bollocks" when it's clearly not clear, and stop with the passive-agressive statements. Now that we know that question of sissiparity is not solved ; the philosophical question can take place. About the whales and the other argument, I was referring to that kurzgesagt video on cancer and whales ; where they do posit the screening system argument and the other which was "more cells, more cancer, but cancerous cells can also get cancer" but now that the research has been made clear on that recently, I understand my lack of knowledge in the whale's cancer departement.

> imagined experiences

I dunno how to explain this to you, but you're unconscious when you're dreaming. That's not an experience you're consciously having. I'm not going to be able to give you definition that includes something it ought not. But you don't like that do you? You're imagining some high-brow phenomenological consciousness which really means "soul", but in like, a fancy way. But there's no such thing. There's just consciousness that's the opposite of sleep. It's a disagreement on the definition.

>consciousness which really means "soul",

I don't think bringing up the concept of the soul is very productive in the conversation about consciousness (as i hinted at in my above comments).

>There's just consciousness that's the opposite of sleep.

How do you explain the phenomenon of lucid dreaming? It is true that current medical use of the terms conscious and unconscious do mean sleep and awake, it's not universally true in every medical context. It would be more accurate to say it means aware and unaware. You can be awake yet unconscious (there are drugs that prove this) and asleep yet conscious (just ask anyone who's suffers from sleep paralysis).

>There's just consciousness that's the opposite of sleep. It's a disagreement on the definition.

Correct me if I'm wrong here but you're defining consciousness as the opposite of asleep and asleep as the opposite of consciousness?.. Given that you're in a philosophy subreddit do you see why that is a poor answer for a definition? Assuming sleep is also a well defined phenomenon when it most certainly is not. Of course we have a practical definition of both what being awake is and what being asleep is that works very well in typical scenarios. But those definitions fall short when you ask what it means to be conscious. Normally I wouldn't care about it, and move on to something more interesting but the near potential of Turing Test passing AI has me pondering this question again. If can AI simulate a person requesting human rights, can simulate what a human response of being abused, can simulate being aware of its surroundings, can simulate episodic memory, can simulate being aware of being conscious and unconscious (powered on versus off), then is it not conscious and deserving of rights in which all conscious beings are? Or is human consciousness special? Or is our definition of consciousness incorrect?

>I dunno how to explain this to you

I can tell you're fun at parties... But seriously if you disrespect me again I'm leaving the conversation.

Well I apologize. A lot of people bring a whole lot of baggage that really makes a mess of the conversation. NOT getting it out the way leads to a whole lot of very unproductive conversation.

>How do you explain the phenomenon of lucid dreaming?

What explanation? You're not conscious. That's not an example of consciousness. It is not an example of, nor explained by consciousness.

How does the 1996 movie Space Jam explain lucid dreaming? It's unrelated.

>It would be more accurate to say it means aware and unaware. You can be awake yet unconscious (there are drugs that prove this) and asleep yet conscious (just ask anyone who's suffers from sleep paralysis).

mmm. No it wouldn't. You're off base here. You're very specifically conscious during sleep paralysis by definition. It happens after sleep. If you are aware, you're awake, and you're conscious. What drugs makes someone "awake and unconscious"? What you are correct about is that it's not an immediate on/off thing. There are stages in between as your brain boots up. You can be "minimally aware". Likewise, dope and alcohol reduce consciousness because they literally impede your senses and your mental functions. Caffeine and cocaine increase it, briefly. But any amount of consciousness would be, by definition, no longer unconscious.

>Correct me if I'm wrong here but you're defining consciousness as

Can do.

Consciousness is any system of active sensors feeding data to memory (of any sort) with any amount of intelligence that can/could act upon it. Remember that ants have some amount of intelligence. Amoeba hunt down their prey.

>Assuming sleep is also a well defined phenomenon when it most certainly is not. Of course we have a practical definition of both what being awake is and what being asleep is that works very well in typical scenarios. But those definitions fall short when you ask what it means to be conscious.

Wow dude you are working REAL hard at arguing with yourself here.

>then is it not conscious and deserving of rights in which all conscious beings are?

No. Just as ants and amoeba are conscious and don't have the rights that people have. Like the concept of "life", it's not all that special. No one in their right mind argues that your gut bacteria aren't alive and yet we don't blink an eye at killing thousands of them routinely. Does AI deserve rights? Maybe. But don't hinge the whole thing on consciousness, even if we could all use the word the same way.

>Or is human consciousness special?

Not very.

>Or is our definition of consciousness incorrect?

Yes. Almost everyone pretends they're special because of ego or ordained by god, but I repeat myself.

>But seriously if you disrespect me again I'm leaving the conversation.

Pft, we're on reddit.

>Consciousness is any system of active sensors feeding data to memory (of any sort) with any amount of intelligence that can/could act upon it. Remember that ants have some amount of intelligence. Amoeba hunt down their prey.

Depending on how intelligence is defined by that definition of consciousness all of the animal kingdom (and most of the other kingdoms of life) is conscious. As well as any self teaching AI.

Yes.

Show me how your consciousness is fundamentally different than that of a cow.

We're probably smarter than most cows, but then again you and I are probably smarter than most people. That's not really a road anyone wants to go down.

You still owe me What drugs makes someone "awake and unconscious"?

C'mon man, I said consciousness is being awake. The obvious rebuttal is explaining how they're two different things. If you're just going to skip over the hard questions, you've already left the conversation even if you're still here.

>You still owe me What drugs makes someone "awake and unconscious"?

This is an example of one but there are many others in the vein of date-rape drugs that have the effect I'm referencing. At the right dosage people can be awake yet very little to none of their experience during intoxication is stored into memory. That's essentially being unconscious and awake at the same time. Another example? Alcohol when people "black out" while drinking.

>C'mon man, I said consciousness is being awake. The obvious rebuttal is explaining how they're two different things. If you're just going to skip over the hard questions, you've already left the conversation even if you're still here.

I have a clearer idea of what it means to be awake and asleep than I do conscious and unconscious. I believe both are biomechanistically determined. Awake and asleep are actively adapting cyclical states regulated by the circadian rhythm (which I'll assume you're familiar with).

Consciousness seems to be an emergent property of episodic memory and linguistic (or perhaps symbolic?) activation thereof. We can talk ourselves into accessing our memories as well as talk ourselves into explaining them. I guess if I were to take a stab at a precise definition of consciousness, it is the act of using symbols (language and representation of language) to engage memory processes.

Unconscious is the state of a being capable of consciousness who is temporarily unable to do so.

Not conscious is the state of a being that lacks the ability to be conscious.

>Show me how your consciousness is fundamentally different than that of a cow.

We have episodic memory and symbolic language to access it, which emerges as consciousness. That would be my best answer to that question at this time.

>At the right dosage people can be awake yet very little to none of their experience during intoxication is stored into memory.

Now that's something. Yeah, similar to "black-out drunk", where they simply don't form any lasting memories of their actions.

KEY FACTOR: They do not RETAIN any memory of events. Hand someone wacked out of their gourd a banana phone and say "ring ring" and they'll answer it. For that to happen they have to have at least some persistence of state between "that's a phone" and "what do I do when I answer a phone". And that state is stored in memory. They're not brain-dead. GHB impairs memory. It doesn't just stop memory all together. ...Yeah, this has been studied. The booze stops the transfer from short-term to long-term memory. Remember what I said about memory being "of any sort"? Even if you later forget, it doesn't mean you weren't conscious when it happened.

I mean, that's a real good try. But the science doesn't back it up.

>How are they different? > both are biomechanistically determined?

...movement? wtf does the mechanical properties of biology have to do with sleeping? We lay still when we sleep? Surely you're trying to talk about something else. Bruh, don't attempt to pull wool with dem dar big'ol words. You're chatting with someone who can call bullshit on it.

>Consciousness seems to be an emergent property of episodic memory

(And sensory input going in otherwise it's all just solipsism. And something to make sense of it. YEAH! Isn't it GREAT when we find out we're all on the same page and agree with each other? )

>and linguistic (or perhaps symbolic?) activation thereof.

I'm willing to posit that whatever you think "symbolic activation of memory" entails, it might as well be called "intelligence". Consider, an image of a snake. If a cows sees a snake, there's a jumble of electrochemical signals which the cow has been trained to know SYMBOLIZES a danger.

Language though? My first blush is to call that out as just plain silly. What's special about language? Humans (and most social animals) have portions of our brains dedicated to language, sure. But this is a weird thing to hinge consciousness on. Social sharks are conscious, while solitary polar bears are not?

>We can talk ourselves into accessing our memories

I mean, so can smells. Sounds. Being in the dark. We've taught children raised by wolves language later in life and they confirm there's still memory even without language. I mean, how else would anything ever learn. I'm really not following this marriage between language and memory that you've made.

>> Show me how your consciousness is fundamentally different than that of a cow.

>We have episodic memory

Why on earth would you believe cows don't? (You understand "episodic" just means long-term memory that we can review, like an episode, right?) This is real silly for anyone who's ever put a cow inside an electric fence. They certainly learn how the fence works. Likewise, smart cows are a problem in feedlots and such. When one learns how to get a latch open, the others all learn it. And, you know, retain that knowledge. In long-term memory. Which can be handy for the later when they try to open a latch.

>and symbolic language to access it

Animals have language. ...no promises about cows specifically though. I mean, they're pretty dumb. But moving the discussion to crows doesn't change much here.

> The world is pretty unequivocally not all in the mind.

Not looking to argue.

Read some Kastrup. Catch up on science. ie. non-local universe Nobel Price.

I think you're misunderstanding what non-locally real means