Dispute my claim: consciousness, a definition

[The Voice of Time]

I want to make a claim about consciousness. So many people seem not to be able to define it in worldly terms, when to me it seems obvious that consciousness is an informatic system's acquisition of information, and that non-consciousness is the absence of having information. In this sense, every storage for information is a conscious system, and the flow of consciousness that we observe in ourselves is the rapid loading and offloading of information, notably to a reflective machinery that is able to notice and acquire information about the acquisition of information, this is what makes us aware of our own consciousness.

In pure physical terms, since informatic sounds a bit obscure, you could say the physical function of information storage systems is that they are a pattern for which matter is formed by that works as a preadjustment facility for the allowing of a larger physical entity to carry out reactionarity.

The anthropocentric consciousness derives from the harmonized and synchronized behaviour that follows of human interaction that makes one human informatic system (read: brain/mind) equate parts or wholes of itself to another human informatic system: treat it as itself in other words, because of the similarities. This gives rise to the plurality of minds and the belief in consciousness of others.

Criticize and dispute me, my claim is made...

[tillingborn]

... consciousness is an informatic system's acquisition of information,

What is an informatic system?

... the flow of consciousness that we observe in ourselves is the rapid loading and offloading of information,

That's one way of putting it, I can see that what we experience as the flow of consciousness is related, presumably caused by, the flow of information. But I don't see that it addresses what David Chalmers has called the hard problem. How does the flow of information give rise to experience? If you are claiming that somehow the flow of information IS consciousness, I think that could be a very promising idea.

notably to a reflective machinery that is able to notice and acquire information about the acquisition of information, this is what makes us aware of our own consciousness.

As I understand it, you are saying we are aware of our consciousness, because we are reflective (i.e. conscious) machines.

In pure physical terms, since informatic sounds a bit obscure, you could say the physical function of information storage systems is that they are a pattern for which matter is formed by that works as a preadjustment facility for the allowing of a larger physical entity to carry out reactionarity.

Ah! I see. Actually, no I don't; sorry.

Criticize and dispute me, my claim is made...

For all I know, what you have said is correct, some of it sounds good. The trouble is, I don't understand a lot of it.

[The Voice of Time]

Certainly the flow of information is consciousness at the moment it is experienced as such, to say it's not consciousness would be like saying that just because you look at an apple with darkened glasses it's not the same apple (because it has changed to a darkened colour, or think about looking at the apple in the reflection of a circus-mirror that distorts its appearance).

The look of the apple does not determine what it is, so whether we know about information as bytes or as seeing consciousness itself as it flows by (presumably in our minds) doesn't change what consciousness is as it's the same thing seen from two different perspectives. What gives rise to it? The question can be answered as whatever serves as the condition for consciousness to be. There is of course one such thing as unconsciousness, so certainly there must be a mechanism somewhere in the brain that decides when consciousness is on or off, and that mechanism, which is the topic of neurophysiology (and not philosophy) would be what gave rise to it.

Besides that, consciousness just is. If something is as raw as it can get, it has no suffix or prefix, one could say, it just is, and from just being we make complicated extensions that ends up being the world at large (like a set of colours, smells and physical qualities makes out what we call iron).

We are notably not reflective conscious machines. A machinery is not the same as a machine (machinery is a set of parts making out a productive function, a machine is a worldly object we know by experience and not so much by definition), we have a machinery function somewhere in us, but we are not equal to that same machinery, we are more than that. It's like saying we are our arms, which of course is not true, the arms are part of us serving a function in us (and to some they are not even a part anymore!).

The physical description is an attempt at showing how information systems actually work in the realm of physics, what their function is in physics. They are a preadjustment facility that serves as a crucial function for the allowing of a larger facility to carry out a reaction. Think of the brain as a preadjustment facility for the arms to move. While you can force through a movement in the arm, normally the brain is required to preadjust so that the arm can do its work.

[Dimebag]

The problem I have with this definition is, if all information flow were conscious, we would be conscious of everything in our brains, however what is conscious is just the very tip of the iceberg.

[The Voice of Time]

The problem I have with this definition is, if all information flow were conscious, we would be conscious of everything in our brains, however what is conscious is just the very tip of the iceberg.

Answer:

Certainly the flow of information is consciousness at the moment it is experienced as such

So when it is offloaded (outside the reach of the various machinery that produces the conscious experience) it is not conscious.

However, it will be conscious to another entity of our mind, that will use the information for its own purpose. Relative to the concious, these things are unconscious, they are outside the domain and reach of the concious heap of information, which makes the conscious incapable of telling about these unconscious things, however, in those unconscious facilities the unconscious information can still go on working its preadjustment function to, for instance, give us a sudden pop of ideas later on, or suddenly give us an emotional awareness in ourselves about something.

Unless those functions in our body that regulates to produce such outcomes like emotions are conscious of the information, they don't have it, and can not work by it. In other words, there must exist multiple consciousness' in us for us to function they way we do. If one wants to talk about things like qualia when talking about consciousness it's important to remember that qualia is only the function it serves, so qualia by itself and talk about it meaning anything is like saying an apple, stripped of all other information about it except itself, means anything. Unless you know apples are for eating, apple does not mean food. In the same way, qualia's only meaning is the functions it serve, like making distinctions and mapping things and providing sets of recognizable features to make a meaning (a meaning is after all that which you react to when you recognize something, like a symbol or an event or colour, it means to you the way you react to it, and talks about right meanings of things is a talk about standardizing in some way or another the reaction to the reference (also called symbo)).

[Ginkgo]

The problem I have with this definition is, if all information flow were conscious, we would be conscious of everything in our brains, however what is conscious is just the very tip of the iceberg.

Answer:

Certainly the flow of information is consciousness at the moment it is experienced as such

So when it is offloaded (outside the reach of the various machinery that produces the conscious experience) it is not conscious.

However, it will be conscious to another entity of our mind, that will use the information for its own purpose. Relative to the concious, these things are unconscious, they are outside the domain and reach of the concious heap of information, which makes the conscious incapable of telling about these unconscious things, however, in those unconscious facilities the unconscious information can still go on working its preadjustment function to, for instance, give us a sudden pop of ideas later on, or suddenly give us an emotional awareness in ourselves about something.

Unless those functions in our body that regulates to produce such outcomes like emotions are conscious of the information, they don't have it, and can not work by it. In other words, there must exist multiple consciousness' in us for us to function they way we do. If one wants to talk about things like qualia when talking about consciousness it's important to remember that qualia is only the function it serves, so qualia by itself and talk about it meaning anything is like saying an apple, stripped of all other information about it except itself, means anything. Unless you know apples are for eating, apple does not mean food. In the same way, qualia's only meaning is the functions it serve, like making distinctions and mapping things and providing sets of recognizable features to make a meaning (a meaning is after all that which you react to when you recognize something, like a symbol or an event or colour, it means to you the way you react to it, and talks about right meanings of things is a talk about standardizing in some way or another the reaction to the reference (also called symbo)).

I think you are pretty much on track here. I seem to be able to recognize some of your ideas.

I guess another way of stating your response is to consider why consciousness appears to be unified in some instances and dis unified at other times. The short answer may well be attention, unity and synchrony.

If we experience, the taste of a lemon then the unity thesis says that the separate instates of look, taste and smell are subsumed into a new experience that we called lemon tasting. Another way of saying this would be that the relevant sense data are 'downloaded' to form the lemon experience. The unity thesis calls for the idea that the separate constituents of the experience are no longer relevant. These various lemon experiences are subsumed into a single new experience.

The "offloaded" conscious stuff that is out of reach of our attention is still there but we can say that it is not synchronised with the other relevant sense data we are attending to at the moment. Namely, the tasting of the lemon. Using neural synchrony as a basis for the argument we can now say that when ideas 'pop' into our head later on this is the result of a shifting of our attention and the resultant new state of synchroneity

[SpheresOfBalance]

The problem I have with this definition is, if all information flow were conscious, we would be conscious of everything in our brains, however what is conscious is just the very tip of the iceberg.

Answer:

Certainly the flow of information is consciousness at the moment it is experienced as such

So when it is offloaded (outside the reach of the various machinery that produces the conscious experience) it is not conscious.

However, it will be conscious to another entity of our mind, that will use the information for its own purpose. Relative to the concious, these things are unconscious, they are outside the domain and reach of the concious heap of information, which makes the conscious incapable of telling about these unconscious things, however, in those unconscious facilities the unconscious information can still go on working its preadjustment function to, for instance, give us a sudden pop of ideas later on, or suddenly give us an emotional awareness in ourselves about something.

Unless those functions in our body that regulates to produce such outcomes like emotions are conscious of the information, they don't have it, and can not work by it. In other words, there must exist multiple consciousness' in us for us to function they way we do. If one wants to talk about things like qualia when talking about consciousness it's important to remember that qualia is only the function it serves, so qualia by itself and talk about it meaning anything is like saying an apple, stripped of all other information about it except itself, means anything. Unless you know apples are for eating, apple does not mean food. In the same way, qualia's only meaning is the functions it serve, like making distinctions and mapping things and providing sets of recognizable features to make a meaning (a meaning is after all that which you react to when you recognize something, like a symbol or an event or colour, it means to you the way you react to it, and talks about right meanings of things is a talk about standardizing in some way or another the reaction to the reference (also called symbo)).

I think you are pretty much on track here. I seem to be able to recognize some of your ideas.

I guess another way of stating your response is to consider why consciousness appears to be unified in some instances and dis unified at other times. The short answer may well be attention, unity and synchrony.

If we experience, the taste of a lemon then the unity thesis says that the separate instates of look, taste and smell are subsumed into a new experience that we called lemon tasting. Another way of saying this would be that the relevant sense data are 'downloaded' to form the lemon experience. The unity thesis calls for the idea that the separate constituents of the experience are no longer relevant. These various lemon experiences are subsumed into a single new experience.

The "offloaded" conscious stuff that is out of reach of our attention is still there but we can say that it is not synchronised with the other relevant sense data we are attending to at the moment. Namely, the tasting of the lemon. Using neural synchrony as a basis for the argument we can now say that when ideas 'pop' into our head later on this is the result of a shifting of our attention and the resultant new state of synchroneity

Or it could be your body telling you that you require the nutrients that were, and are to be found, in a lemon.

[Ginkgo]

Or it could be your body telling you that you require the nutrients that were, and are to be found, in a lemon.

That aspect would be worth consideration as well.