A physicalists view of panprotoexperientialism

[Pineal]

How do you know this is true?

Well, the part about them being creations of experiencers is generally accepted. Not that this is proof, but I see no reason to question it until someone else does. I have had no reason to doubt it and my belief in it hasn't caused me any problems as far as I know.
as far as the first part, I am going by my experience. Words elicit meanings in me, some conscious and it seems others less conscious because if I focus carefully I can them notice these. I actually did experiments in college on the phenomenology of language and this seemed to be what was happening for others. Words elicited experiences. They were not what they referred to and the meanings were thus things that could be mentalized.

It is possible my sample was too small, clearly. And I may be unlike others. But so far I have no reason to change this belief and it has helped me understand things.

I also think it is deductively clear. Words are not for perspecitiveless objective beings. They are descriptions for subjective beings with perspectives to connect with experiences.

How could we test it?

Off hand, I don't know. I will probably wait until the idea is seriously challenged either by someone else or by my experiences.

 

[Pineal]

Nevertheless, I feel I can legitimately draw a distinction between my conception of an electron with mental properties, and my conception of an electron without mental properties.

Nicely worded. I would agree. But then now we are talking about distinguishing your conceptions (and for yourself) and not the Ding an sich.

 

[Pineal]

How do you know this is true?
How could we test it?

I think the real question is, how could we test an alternative idea of language, and the idea of testing becomes more relevent to ones that are claiming objectivity. IOW that is what the Ding an Sich is, my language is devoid of subjetive properties but rather is descriptive of what is.


That an immanent being would assert this seems to demand testing and I have no idea how they would do it.

 

[Rav]

Nicely worded. I would agree. But then now we are talking about distinguishing your conceptions (and for yourself) and not the Ding an sich.

Well, that's exactly where you were nudging the discussion. The truth is that I base my philosophy on the idea that there is indeed a world external to and independent of my own consciousness, and that in this world things like electrons actually exist. Further, I believe that things in this world have properties, and that those properties are what they are regardless of the accuracy of my own conception of them.

I'm happy to explore the validity of this foundational premise (to a point), but ultimately you can't get to other considerations unless you move past it.

 

[Rav]

For me, physicality obviously has the ability to form itself into systems that display 'mental' or 'conscious' behavior. (We're proof of that.) It might be able to do lots of other things as well, things that human beings know absolutely nothing about.

But I don't think that's because there is some fundamental quality of mentality or consciousness already lurking inside all of matter. It's like Legos -- kids can make all kinds of things out of Legos, but that doesn't mean that everything that they make is already present in embryo form inside each Lego piece.

I formulated a rough outline for several Lego analogies after reading that (in the spirit of picking up the theme), and what I eventually ended up with was not really an analogy at all, but rather something of an illustration. Imagine that the fundamental quanta of physical reality are blocks of Lego with different properties. These properties determine the sorts of interactions that can occur with other blocks. Further imagine that these blocks organize themselves into an architecture that rivals the dynamic complexity of a human brain. So what we essentially have is a scenario where some blocks have bonded to form mechanisms and interconnected pathways, and other blocks are continually zipping around within this system. I'm sure you can see where I am going with this. Could consciousness really emerge from a bunch of dynamic, interactive plastic?

To me, the suggestion that consciousness could emerge from particle interaction is exactly the same. If the fundamental essence of it isn't there to begin with, where does it come from? Like I said in a previous post, it just seems like an incantation to me; an elaborate wave of a magic wand.

Having said all that however (as well as everything I've said previously on the matter), I am aware that I am working with an incomplete picture of physical reality, and no doubt an incomplete comprehension. Even so, I struggle to imagine what new information could possibly come to light about the nature of interaction that could resolve the problem.

In any case (as in, right or wrong), this has been, and still is, a brain stretching line of philosophical inquiry. You've gotta love those moments of obsession with trying desperately to grasp the elusive conceptual components

 

[Captain Kremmen]

The difference between neutral-monist and double-aspect, in turn, may or many not revolve around idea that 'neutral-monist' suggests kind of a phenomenalism, describing all the various contents of experience as a single class. While 'double-aspect' is more realist, talking about the contents of nature itself having both physical and mental properies.

Best thread ever

Don't stand in the wings admiring, Gustav.
What's your viewpoint on this question?
Are you neutral or double-aspect with regard to monism?

Or perhaps you have a good case against all forms of monism.
Speak up man. Don't be shy.

 

[Gustav]

i would love to but brain locks up in these matters

 

[Cyperium]

Hi Rav. I've read your posts and you have a point, I also wonder where the line is drawn between what is conscious and what is not. When have complexity reached a point where consciousness have emerged? I think, and I think you do too, that it fades with less complexity, until it finally vanishes at some point (at some complexity).

I don't think that it only has to do with complexity though, I think it has to do also with harmonics...kind of like music, in fact I think that a system in harmony with itself are self-experiencing in some way. What it takes for a system to be "in harmony" with itself is another question though, and there might be many flavours of harmony working together in yet a "higher" harmony to form a complete identity as in human consciousness, as such it does have to do with complexity but it isn't the complexity that should be emphasized, but the harmonics within that complexity.

The relevant part though (in this case), and the part where we disagree, is if consciousness is physical or not. You suggest that consciousness is entirely physical. I suggest that it is entirely non-physical. I will, of course, argue for my view here;

Even though all the conscious phenomena (thoughts, sights, sounds, etc.) has a physical counterpart in the brain, it doesn't mean that consciousness is itself physical. You say that consciousness is emergent from complex structures. But what is it that emerges? Is it something measurable that emerges from these structures that aren't a part of those structures themselves?

Emerging phenomena means that the whole is more than the sum of the parts. That the parts work together in such a complex way that the effect can't be described by only taking into account the individual parts that make it up. Usually emerging phenomena can be measured though, and the effects are in every way physical, it is simply too complex to give a good solution to them using only the individual parts. The brain, in respect to consciousness, doesn't give rise to any measureable phenomena though, in fact the only thing we can measure in respect to the brain are the individual parts, no emerging phenomena can be measured. We only know that there is a emerging phenomena because we are the phenomena, we feel it and we think it, yet the only evidence we have for it are the activities in the brain and our own word that we are, in fact, conscious beings. Science couldn't tell you that your neighbor are though, or that I am, for that matter.

I liked this;
"The ability to reduce everything to simple fundamental laws does not imply the ability to start from those laws and reconstruct the universe.The constructionist hypothesis breaks down when confronted with the twin difficulties of scale and complexity. At each level of complexity entirely new properties appear. Psychology is not applied biology, nor is biology applied chemistry. We can now see that the whole becomes not merely more, but very different from the sum of its parts." (Anderson 1972) Emergence - Wikipedia

Perhaps we are a higher form of physics? Or perhaps even higher than physics?

Supervenience - Wikipedia - This was a good read, I recommend it!

 

[Rav]

You say that consciousness is emergent from complex structures. But what is it that emerges? Is it something measurable that emerges from these structures that aren't a part of those structures themselves?

I believe that things like cognition and conscious awareness are, in a sense, emergent, yes. That's a given. But what I have been suggesting in this thread is that such things are ultimately a more complex and interactive manifestation of base elements that are themselves already the fundamental essence of such an emergence.

Even though all the conscious phenomena (thoughts, sights, sounds, etc.) has a physical counterpart in the brain, it doesn't mean that consciousness is itself physical.

Then you have to address the interaction problem.

 

[Cyperium]

I believe that things like cognition and conscious awareness are, in a sense, emergent, yes. That's a given. But what I have been suggesting in this thread is that such things are ultimately a more complex and interactive manifestation of base elements that are themselves already the fundamental essence of such an emergence.

Then I have to say that this fundamental essence is not physical the way we normally think of it, since it can't be detected unless it interact with our consciousness, which is itself not physical, since that can't be detected either. In some way what is physical needs some kind of objective detection I think.

Then you have to address the interaction problem.

In my view the action to remove your finger from the burning plate because you feel pain is the conscious meaning of why you removed your finger from the plate. Physical things can't describe real meaning and as such consciousness fundamentally needs to exist to describe that. When I move across a room with the determination to get to the other end, the physical reactions are responsible for that, I only experience what it means consciously to move. Free will must also have a physical component which I am conscious of, if there is a interaction between the conscious and the physical then we have to be "higher" in physics, where what is "higher" can control what is lower, and what is lower builds what it higher. This is mostly speculation, but consciousness doesn't have to control the physical in order to be completely non-physical. There is no scientific need that consciousness controls the physical, not if the consciousness is merely a representation of what the physical activities mean and ultimately also why they appear.

 

[Captain Kremmen]

Monism seems to be splitting off like the hottest period of Protestant fission.

I've never seen such pans and protos and isms.

Don't you people feel even slightly embarrassed at such tongue twisting thread titles?
Doesn't the extravagance of them give you a clue that something is amiss?

 

[Yazata]

Monism seems to be splitting off like the hottest period of Protestant fission.

I've never seen such pans and protos and isms.

Don't you people feel even slightly embarrassed at such tongue twisting thread titles?

Doesn't the extravagance of them give you a clue that something is amiss?

It's true. But check out physics some time.

Quarks, spins, strong forces, weak forces, potentials, wave equations, Lagrangians, Hamiltonians... how could physics be anything but pretentious bullshit?

I've ignored physics ever since I realized that it was difficult and had a large technical vocabulary.

At least philosophy doesn't have all those crazy mathematical hieroglyphs.

 

[Rav]

Doesn't the extravagance of them give you a clue that something is amiss?

This is a philosophy sub forum. It's the one place where people who are interested in the subject matter should be free to embrace as much of the vocabulary as they are able to, especially in cases where it is more efficient to do so.

 

[C C]

Don't you people feel even slightly embarrassed at such tongue twisting thread titles?

Yes, it is quite surprising and outrageous to see such systemic gobbledygook in an overarching forum devoted to science, philosophy, etc. A silly place that should instead be spending more time extolling the skills of pop-stars like Lady Gaga or the inspiring craft of "tell it like it is" homespun folks like Peter J. Peters, for whatever passing groupies.

Doesn't the extravagance of them give you a clue that something is amiss?

Indeed, a technical nomenclature equals scam! Shut down all educational institutions and vocational schools immediately until remedied. Henceforth, "a condition in which oxygen supply to the spleen is interrupted, leading to partial complete death of tissue due to oxygen shortage" will no longer be condensed under the term splenic infarction. We can use George W. Bush as the evaluative standard. If he still doesn't understand a particular concept after the first stage of analysis, then break it down further and make those several paragraphs into the official employment of what the practice or discipline actually intended with its former lazy and potentially bogus synoptic expression.

 

[wynn]

It's true. But check out physics some time.

Quarks, spins, strong forces, weak forces, potentials, wave equations, Lagrangians, Hamiltonians... how could physics be anything but pretentious bullshit?

I've ignored physics ever since I realized that it was difficult and had a large technical vocabulary.

At least philosophy doesn't have all those crazy mathematical hieroglyphs.

Ha!

I don't believe you that.

 

[wynn]

Monism seems to be splitting off like the hottest period of Protestant fission.

I've never seen such pans and protos and isms.

Don't you people feel even slightly embarrassed at such tongue twisting thread titles?

Doesn't the extravagance of them give you a clue that something is amiss?

Yes: that philosophers have too much tolerance for wannabes.

The traditional method of shooing off wannabes was to show them one knows one's business. But that apparently doesn't work anymore nowadays!

 

[Rav]

Then I have to say that this fundamental essence is not physical the way we normally think of it, since it can't be detected unless it interact with our consciousness, which is itself not physical, since that can't be detected either. In some way what is physical needs some kind of objective detection I think.

I'm not suggesting that there is any sort of dualism inherent in a physical entity; that an electron, for example, has some sort of unphysical essence attached to it. If I was saying that I'd simply be recreating the very problem I am trying to address, albeit at a much smaller scale.

In Techne's most recent thread on Matter, Intentionality, Epiphenomenalism and the Interaction Problem, I mused:

We can say that different particles have different properties, but to what, exactly, are we assigning these properties? To the particle? Sure. But what is the particle exactly? Surely it is something more than just the sum of the properties that we assign to it, since when we are talking about properties we are talking about the properties of something rather than the properties themselves being entities in their own right.

String theory tells us that what a particle might actually be is a tiny string (or filament) of energy and that it's particular mode of oscillation in multiple dimensions is what gives a particle it's particular properties. So now we have a possible answer for what a particle actually is. But then we might inquire about the string itself. What is a quanta of energy, exactly? We could theoretically distinguish it from another quanta of energy by observing it's mode of oscillation, but merely knowing that it can behave in different ways doesn't tell us what it essentially is.

What I was essentially driving at there is the distinction between a collection of properties we assign to a physical entity, and the physical entity itself. If the properties that we assign to a physical entity are all that exist, then there would be no difference between something like an electron that exists in nature and an electron that exists in a computer simulation of nature. No, I believe that the entities that we assign properties to have substance, and what I am suggesting is that that substance is not only a precursor to physical manifestations such as stars and planets, but that it is also the precursor to things such as cognition and conscious awareness.

But remember that I am not assigning features such as cognition and conscious awareness to a quanta of physicality, much as I am not assigning the features of a star or a planet to such.

In my view the action to remove your finger from the burning plate because you feel pain is the conscious meaning of why you removed your finger from the plate. Physical things can't describe real meaning and as such consciousness fundamentally needs to exist to describe that. When I move across a room with the determination to get to the other end, the physical reactions are responsible for that, I only experience what it means consciously to move. Free will must also have a physical component which I am conscious of, if there is a interaction between the conscious and the physical then we have to be "higher" in physics, where what is "higher" can control what is lower, and what is lower builds what it higher. This is mostly speculation, but consciousness doesn't have to control the physical in order to be completely non-physical. There is no scientific need that consciousness controls the physical, not if the consciousness is merely a representation of what the physical activities mean and ultimately also why they appear.

What you seem to be getting at is something much like epiphenomenalism. But you still have the problem of explaining how physical activity in the brain can cause mental states. In other words, how does the release of certain chemicals in the brain translate into the 'experience' of an emotion. There still has to be a chain of cause an effect, therefore you still have an interaction problem.

 

[Pineal]

Well, that's exactly where you were nudging the discussion. The truth is that I base my philosophy on the idea that there is indeed a world external to and independent of my own consciousness, and that in this world things like electrons actually exist.

Me too. I am not simply taking an idealist, solipsist, radical skeptic stance. I am more focused on language and what it means. I think we get into situations
where we cannot speak about what is out there- if we are empiricists.
My intuition is that one cannot be a pure empiricist, that there must be ratinalist elements. If not, then one is focusing, as an empiricist, on experiences and describing them in embodied language - a la Lakoff - and now this relates to whatever is 'out there' if it is, is something whereof we must remain silent.

So I am role playing, here, being a purist empiricist checking on his less pure peers. In fact I assume there are rationalist elements to knowledge.

I am a pantheist, but I think I can juggle all my balls.

Further, I believe that things in this world have properties, and that those properties are what they are regardless of the accuracy of my own conception of them.

That could be the case AND yet you could not speak of them in any accurate way, given how language is built up.

I'm happy to explore the validity of this foundational premise (to a point), but ultimately you can't get to other considerations unless you move past it.

As I said, it's not so much that foundational - rationalist? - premise, but rather issues of language and empiricism. So 1) the problem of language being about experiences (where I think it is very tricky to label things subjective or objective - but also 2) given the empiricist model, how can we draw conclusions about where mental ends?

 

[Rav]

Me too. I am not simply taking an idealist, solipsist, radical skeptic stance. I am more focused on language and what it means. I think we get into situations
where we cannot speak about what is out there- if we are empiricists.
My intuition is that one cannot be a pure empiricist, that there must be ratinalist elements. If not, then one is focusing, as an empiricist, on experiences and describing them in embodied language - a la Lakoff - and now this relates to whatever is 'out there' if it is, is something whereof we must remain silent.

Words are not the native language of the mind. Imagery is. So when I conceptualize some physical entity or interaction between entities I am not writing out a description on some virtual white board (although I could do that), I am forming virtual visual representations. It is only when I try to convey what I've constructed that I have to deal with the challenge of accurately translating it all into words.

As for your point about empiricism, I'm not sure I understand precisely what you're getting at. I will say however, that even though I believe that electrons actually do exist, the visual representation I have of an electron in my mind is very fuzzy and as such probably does not correspond very well to reality. I mean, you could visualize an electron as a tiny sphere orbiting the nucleus of an atom in much the same way a planet orbits a star (as one might see in some basic physics textbook) but that's not at all accurate. In fact at such scales, where quantum effects dominate, it would be a critical mistake to imagine things operating in anything even resembling a classical manner. It is, rather, a seething foam of probability, entanglement, non-locality and indeterminacy, and as such any picture I form in my mind is bound to be terribly inaccurate. Thankfully, however, we've been able to use an array of useful tools to make better sense of what we can't directly see, or imagine very well.

I am a pantheist, but I think I can juggle all my balls.

I'm something of a pantheist myself (of the naturalistic, or monist physicalist variety, for the most part).

As I said, it's not so much that foundational - rationalist? - premise, but rather issues of language and empiricism. So 1) the problem of language being about experiences (where I think it is very tricky to label things subjective or objective -

You and I both know what the basic properties of a tennis ball are. In a very short time we could easily establish what it is that we are talking about without referencing it by name (or even without speaking at all, assuming we had some paper and a box of crayons, or were particularly good at charades). This is in spite of the fact that neither of us would have a perfect conception of it in our minds, and that any conception we did have would necessarily be tainted somewhat by our own subjectivity.

but also 2) given the empiricist model, how can we draw conclusions about where mental ends?

Again, I'm not sure what you're getting at with this. Again, ultimately I believe that an entity is what it is regardless of the accuracy of our conception of it. I don't think that the problem is establishing where a conception ends and reality begins, but rather with establishing the accuracy of a particular conception of the real nature of other entities. Such considerations follow the establishment of a foundational premise such as 'an external world exists independently of my own mind'.

 

[Captain Kremmen]

Words are the native language of my mind.
I can hardly visualise at all.
I think in words.