A question for the materialists on consciousness

[Yazata]

I see a deeper issue than just repetitive mental activity causing changes in the brain. I see it along the lines of the mind/body problem. How is it, if consciousness and the self are mere illusions springing from the synaptic firings of the brain, is it possible for them to exert causal influences on that activity itself?

I think that the illusion isn't that consciousness exists, but rather that it is a substance, a kind of stuff with its own aseity (to steal the technical term that you introduced the other day). Imagine moving a stone. It's one thing to talk about putting the stone in a cardboard box, but does it make equal sense to speak of putting the movement in a drawer?

Some people imagine (along with Descartes perhaps) that consciousness is a separate kind of non-physical and spiritual substance, a peculiar kind of stuff that one can't put into drawers. That generates the problem of how two fundamentally different kinds of stuff influence and interact with each other.

Other people (including me) imagine that consciousness (analogous to the stone's movement) is an event, a behavior, something that a physical object is doing. It's basically what neurophysiology addresses.

When things are imagined this way, the mind/body causation problem doesn't seem to arise. If consciousness is imagined as consisting of a class of causally-conditioned events, there doesn't seem to be any problem in thinking of those events being causally influenced by, and in turn influencing, other causal events in the surrounding physical environment.

 

[PhysBang]

If the thought of a chair isn't a conceptualized abstraction, what is it then?

The thought might be about an abstraction, but the thought itself might be a collection of neurons and their processes. A computer game might be about chairs, but the game itself is, in at least one sense, going to be a collection of processes on a specific physical system.

 

[Aqueous Id]

The Huffington Post is not a reputable site for science information. They regularly publish false information, sometimes even dangerous information.

Dang. There goes one of my favorite sources to attack reactionaries, duly swatted down by one of our least sensationalist, and yet positively sensational, posters.

A question directed at the "consciousness as an emergent phenomena" and "consciousness as an illusion" believers.

How do you explain this?


From: http://themindunleashed.org/2014/04/neuroscientist-explains-meditation-changes-brain.html

I would begin at the formation of synaptic junctions. It seems rather uncanny that a piece of meat grows in a certain direction according to some experience, but this is is seen not only in humans but in all vertebrates -- stimulus delivered via afferent pathways, some additional processing, and then cellular growth takes place.

Consciousness in the clinical sense incorporates this, but without the higher systemic functions (you can be conscious but not able to connect ideas).

The idea that meditation reshapes the brain is contrived. The more basic statement is that all experience in general reshapes the brain. Vast connections are made during the "terrible twos" which seems to be an evolved solution to the unusually small ratio of birth canal size to cranial size -- unusual as compared to other viviparous animals.

Meditation is something I have practiced, with the ability to induce a trance like state, and sometimes to clear my mind of distressing ideas. All of my meditating,(except for my introduction to it under the hypnotic suggestions of a graduate psych student who asked me to volunteer) has been focused on trying to imagine how electrons (as I suppose this happens) associate with the virtual world of the mind, esp by running racetracks in the brain. After becoming successful at learning how to self-induce the hypnotic state, I went through a series of dream-like explanations, which are nothing more than a connection of all the random information and preconceptions already assembled in my memory. However, in order to arrive at any conclusions, I had to adopt superstitious ideas to fill the gaps between facts known to be true.

I think my own superstitious dream about how the mind works is far more interesting than anything I've read, although I understand it's just a permutation on those readings, assembled quasi-heuristically through application of a vivid imagination. But I also think this would strike readers as boring superstitious nonsense so I avoid talking about it too much. It's better suited for a thread on fiction and creative imagination.

But because of this experience I rarely find writings about meditation that seem to have any merit. I do agree with the ideas discussed in your cite, particularly the PET scans that illustrate brain activity during meditation. Better, I think, are the studies that compare all kinds of experiences with patterns in the PET scans. For example, I'm thinking of the study that compared the PET scans of a Buddhist monk to those of a Catholic nun when both were asked to meditate. The monk's PET scan resembles sleep and the nun's scan resembles active speech.

One more thing: there has been at least one study which planted ideas in the minds of test subjects by exposing them to energetic magnetic fields. As I recall, they all reported a sense of "the other", which is easily conflated with "God". But the scientific explanation is that this activated an area of the brain which evolved to make higher vertebrates aware of the constant threat of predation. I have searched for this study several times and not yet found it. As a corollary, I think this may give biological evidence for the tendency for people to entertain religious beliefs.

 

[iceaura]

How consciousness, as an entirely mental phenomenon, has any physical effects at all. How iow are physical and mental able to interact, and what is the interface of such interaction?

Mental phenomena are firing patterns of neurons (or in the case of "mind" level, apparently patterns of firing patterns of neurons) They are in that sense not "material", as they have no defined mass or shape or volume or even duration of existence, but like all patterns they involve a substrate - patterns are patterns of or in something, at least at all levels above quantum. So there's no mystery about their having an effect on said substrate. That's their nature.

The usual muddle seems to arise when the nature of "material" or "physical" reality is taken simplistically.

 

[PhysBang]

Dang. There goes one of my favorite sources to attack reactionaries, duly swatted down by one of our least sensationalist, and yet positively sensational, posters.

Thanks... I think.

Nothing makes me more frustrated than some of the science and "health" information from HuffPo. I wanted to like it, but its pursuit of click bait has lead it to some bad places.

 

[Magical Realist]

The thought might be about an abstraction, but the thought itself might be a collection of neurons and their processes. A computer game might be about chairs, but the game itself is, in at least one sense, going to be a collection of processes on a specific physical system.

Well, the collection of neurons and their processes, down to their utmost physical constituents as atoms, are already one thing. They are already neurons and electrochemical processes. How is this supposed to be another thing in addition to this? Can something be two things at once? Furthermore, in what sense do the qualities of the thought of chair derive from or even logically approximate the neurons' properties? We'd expect, if we are going to posit an identity between two things, that they'd at least share come common qualities. And yet I can hardly think of anything LESS different from my thought of a chair than some electrical discharges going on inside of some warm meat.

 

[Aqueous Id]

Thanks... I think.

Nothing makes me more frustrated than some of the science and "health" information from HuffPo. I wanted to like it, but its pursuit of click bait has lead it to some bad places.

Aha. Then they've fallen from grace a bit from my idealized image as sort of Devil's Advocate against the evils of power. But to be clear: you are a great poster, you should know that readers appreciate you. I just saw an opening for the chance to say that, and took it. The "Like" button went away, but I'd much prefer one that says "Rules (all others drool)", so there's my virtual click on that button, for what it's worth.

 

[spidergoat]

Well, the collection of neurons and their processes, down to their utmost physical constituents as atoms, are already one thing. They are already neurons and electrochemical processes. How is this supposed to be another thing in addition to this? Can something be two things at once? Furthermore, in what sense do the qualities of the thought of chair derive from or even logically approximate the neurons' properties? We'd expect, if we are going to posit an identity between two things, that they'd at least share come common qualities. And yet I can hardly think of anything LESS different from my thought of a chair than some electrical discharges going on inside of some warm meat.

The matter and energy that constitute the brain and it's functions are indeed material. Electricity is the movement of electrons. What isn't material and thus not completely real is the meaning of these patterns in relation to the mind and the outside world, and the experience of a being that understands meaning. An analogy would be the words on this page, which mean nothing to my cat, but are interpreted by our brains as meaning because they have some relation to our memory of language and experience.

 

[Aqueous Id]

Mental phenomena are firing patterns of neurons (or in the case of "mind" level, apparently patterns of firing patterns of neurons) They are in that sense not "material", as they have no defined mass or shape or volume or even duration of existence, but like all patterns they involve a substrate - patterns are patterns of or in something, at least at all levels above quantum. So there's no mystery about their having an effect on said substrate. That's their nature.

The usual muddle seems to arise when the nature of "material" or "physical" reality is taken simplistically.

That sentence struck me as the idea that hones in on this. The synapse itself is the release of the chemical neurotransmitter which ultimately fires the action potential at the hillock of the receiving neuron. And then the electrical impulse that travels down the axon is due to the field induced by the physical pivoting of dipoles in the ions along the axon which were excited. Not only that, but these pathways are set up in a manner of oscillating loops. For some reason beyond human comprehension, these loops create awareness, memory, perception, cognition, etc. And then, all the more uncanny, some experience causes a set of synaptic junctions to form. That's really quite bizarre. It boggles the mind to try to grasp the relationship between cause and effect. If I weren't so wary of superstition, I would feel compelled to speculate that this is native to reality, that it decomposes no further. But that requires me to imagine the universe as a state of consciousness which I think is absurd. There seems to be some intrinsic property of nature that supports awareness and perception, but I feel like if I push that any further I fall into the abyss of fantasy and nonsense.

Another point, probably irrelevant, but it pops up in my mind anyway: these pulses are quite energy-efficient. A state of awareness or perception can be "kept alive" at a minimal expenditure of resources (the pulse width is narrow and the repetition rate is fairly slow).

 

[spidergoat]

We already have awareness, that much is born in us as a being with senses. But we don't make sense of this awareness immediately. All the brain does is condition itself to associate certain sensations and perceptions with certain other ones, and we call that meaning. A smell becomes associated with lack of hunger as we eat a food, a color and shape becomes distinguished from the background and we call that mom. After a while we build up a large set of relationships between sensory experience and memory. People on LSD can experience these meanings removed like an infant, sensory experience alone without association.

 

[Magical Realist]

Mental phenomena are firing patterns of neurons (or in the case of "mind" level, apparently patterns of firing patterns of neurons) They are in that sense not "material", as they have no defined mass or shape or volume or even duration of existence, but like all patterns they involve a substrate - patterns are patterns of or in something, at least at all levels above quantum. So there's no mystery about their having an effect on said substrate. That's their nature.

The usual muddle seems to arise when the nature of "material" or "physical" reality is taken simplistically.

There are firing patterns in my running car engine, in my computer's circuitry, and in my string of christmas tree lights. Does that mean these patterns are mental phenomena too? Are they self-aware? Do we attribute causal agency to the pattern itself having some sort of "top down" control over the operation the components?

 

[PhysBang]

Well, the collection of neurons and their processes, down to their utmost physical constituents as atoms, are already one thing. They are already neurons and electrochemical processes. How is this supposed to be another thing in addition to this?

How is a collection of circuitry and electricity a video game? I suspect that a materialist would argue that the answer in the two cases is somewhat similar. That is, for some collections, a collection of neurons and their processes are one thing and consciousness is that same thing.

Furthermore, in what sense do the qualities of the thought of chair derive from or even logically approximate the neurons' properties? We'd expect, if we are going to posit an identity between two things, that they'd at least share come common qualities. And yet I can hardly think of anything LESS different from my thought of a chair than some electrical discharges going on inside of some warm meat.

I am willing to let the world be wonderful in itself. That being said, it is clearly not easy to do neuroscience in itself, let alone to tie neuroscience to specific theories of mind that are themselves difficult to formulate and difficult to tie to evidence. These challenges may yet be overcome, they may not be. I don't think that they are in principle barriers to the idea that consciousness is something that can be part of biological processes.

 

[Magical Realist]

How is a collection of circuitry and electricity a video game?

So the circuitry and the electricity is the video game too? Or is the video game in fact the dynamic interaction of a conscious player with a succession of video images/sounds? I'm thinking the latter...The circuitry merely responds to the actions performed/not performed by the conscious player. It is not the game itself, anymore than the chessboard is the chess game.

 

[Raithere]

What is illusory about meditating? Aren't people really meditating? It seems a real experience to those who experience it. And what is "manifest" about that experience if it is "illusory"?

Nothing, you still have it the wrong way around. It would be the conscious experience of meditation that is illusory or manifest.

Personally I reject both sides of this argument as I reject the premise of mind/body dualism.
I find them weak attempts to hold on to an untenable concept of complete free will.
This is what causes the dilemma, a false premise.

 

[Magical Realist]

Nothing, you still have it the wrong way around. It would be the conscious experience of meditation that is illusory or manifest.

What is the difference between meditating and a conscious experience of meditating? If someone is meditating, but their consciousness of meditating is an illusion, how do we know they're meditating? Is meditating an unconscious experience?

 

[Raithere]

What is the difference between meditating and a conscious experience of meditating? If someone is meditating, but their consciousness of meditating is an illusion, how do we know they're meditating? Is meditating an unconscious experience?

From a materialist position meditation is an activity you perform with your brain, just as lifting a weight is an activity you perform with your arm.

 

[Magical Realist]

Other people (including me) imagine that consciousness (analogous to the stone's movement) is an event, a behavior, something that a physical object is doing. It's basically what neurophysiology addresses.

But the brain does alot of things that don't involve consciousness. It makes our body breathe and move and digest and stay warm and feel and so on. In fact, you can black out or be entirely asleep and still talk, walk, reach orgasm, attack someone (rage blackout) and, from what I've heard of Ambien takers, even drive. Others can even have their brain hypnotized to do all sorts of amazing things without consciousness. So consciousness can't just be what the brain is doing. Whatever it is, it is something entirely separate from brain activities, involved in some of them but certainly not all of them.

 

[Sarkus]

But the brain does alot of things that don't involve consciousness. It makes our body breathe and move and digest and stay warm and feel and so on. In fact, you can black out or be entirely asleep and still talk, walk, reach orgasm, attack someone (rage blackout) and, from what I've heard of Ambien takers, even drive. Others can even have their brain hypnotized to do all sorts of amazing things without consciousness. So consciousness can't just be what the brain is doing. Whatever it is, it is something entirely separate from brain activities, involved in some of them but certainly not all of them.

So you think that because our brain activity does things that don't involve consciousness, that this must mean there is something additional where consciousness is involved rather than just brain activity? This line of argument is wonderfully fallacious (argument from ignorance): it jumps from an admission of not yet understanding how, to concluding that it can't...
"I don't know how X does Y... therefore X doesn't do Y".

Unfortunately materialists would disagree with you, and say that even if we do not know how X does Y, there is no rational alternative to X being the cause of Y... nothing that has ever been proven to exist to suggest that X might not do Y. Just because X also does A, B, C and many other things that are not part of Y, does not mean that A, B, and C show that Y must come from more than just X.

 

[fogpipe]

Meditation is something I have practiced, with the ability to induce a trance like state, and sometimes to clear my mind of distressing ideas. All of my meditating,(except for my introduction to it under the hypnotic suggestions of a graduate psych student who asked me to volunteer) has been focused on trying to imagine how electrons (as I suppose this happens) associate with the virtual world of the mind, esp by running racetracks in the brain. After becoming successful at learning how to self-induce the hypnotic state, I went through a series of dream-like explanations, which are nothing more than a connection of all the random information and preconceptions already assembled in my memory. However, in order to arrive at any conclusions, I had to adopt superstitious ideas to fill the gaps between facts known to be true.

Meditation is not hypnosis or a dream like state. If you are going to practice meditation its best to use one of the time proven techniques.
If you use one of the known and widely practiced techniques and get stuck or have some kind of crisis, you have literally thousands of years of experience to draw upon for help.
If you make up something as you go along (i.e. "trying to imagine how electrons ... I went through a series of dream-like explanations") and you get stuck or experience some kind of crisis, its a lot less likely that someone will be able to help, because no one will know where you are or how you got there.

 

[fogpipe]

but you sound as though you have other fish to fry, here.

No not really. I was curious as to the thinking of the board members on the nature of consciousness and thought my question might shed some light.