Perception

Is the mind the same as the body? What is consciousness? Can machines have it?

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SteveKlinko
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Re: Perception

Post by SteveKlinko »

RCSaunders wrote: Mon Jul 15, 2019 7:27 pm
SteveKlinko wrote: Mon Jul 15, 2019 5:13 pm The reason you think you are Directly Seeing the external World is that the Conscious Visual Scene that you Experience that is embedded in the front of your face is the only way you have ever Seen the World. You only See the Surrogate Conscious Visual Experience not the Real World. Your Surrogate Conscious Visual Experience is Correlated with the external World and works pretty good for letting you move around in the World without bumping into things. It's not a Fraud or a Delusion it is just one of the ways we Detect the external World. The Surrogate Conscious Visual Experience is not explainable by anything known to Science at this time. There is an Explanatory Gap. There is also a huge Explanatory Gap with your Direct Realist view that we Directly See things as they are. How can that possibly be true given all that we know about the Brain?
Since I first heard that nonsense spouted by Plato I have found every attempt to repudiate direct consciousness of the physical world spurious. They are all versions of the same thing, like the protests of the women caught by her husband naked in bed with another man, "are you going to believe your eyes, or the explanation of your loving wife?"

I do not believe you or anyone else who tries to convince me that what I see is a some kind of, "stand-in" for existence as it actually is, but not existence itself. There is only an "explanatory gap," if you are trying to explain consciousness as something produced by the brain and not the direct perception of what the neurological system makes available to consciousness.

Your question, "How can that possibly be true given all that we know about the Brain?" is based on the assumption that the brain somehow produces consciousness. I have no idea who, "we," is, but neuroscientists do not know as much about the brain as you apparently think they do. They know a lot more than they did just a few years ago, but how the brain really functions is still not understood. Memory really is a function of the physical brain. Much of memory can be described, but how it actually works cannot be explained at all. There is nothing known about the brain that casts any doubt on the validity of conscious perception.

If what you see, hear, feel, smell, and taste is not existence as it is, but only something produced in the brain, you cannot possibly know, "Your Surrogate Conscious Visual Experience is Correlated with the external World and works pretty good for letting you move around in the World without bumping into things. It's not a Fraud or a Delusion ..." because all you have is your ersatz representation of what actually is to go by. You may be bumping into things all the time and what actually is may be nothing like your brain-created existence, but since your made-up experience is all you have to go by, a fraud and delusion may be exactly what it is. You would have no way to know.

Thank you very much for your sincere explanation, but I think I'll continue to go by what I consciously experience, rather than your, or anyone else's, word.
When you are in a completely Dark room you will be Blind. You will not be seeing the world of that room as it really is. You need Electromagnetic Energy in the room in order to See the room. You don't in fact ever See the room you only See Electromagnetic Energy reflections. But the situation is even worse because the instant the Electromagnetic Energy reflections hit your Retina they are converted into Neural Activity that ultimately fires Neurons in the Visual Areas in the back of your head. You don't actually See anything until the later stages of Neural Processing. So if you Directly See anything you are Seeing Neural Activity. The Neural Activity performs functions such as Contrast Enhancement that will overlay certain shading effects that are not in the Scene of the Room but will be found in your Perception of the Room. The thing you See that you think is the world as it really is, always is a processed version of the World with artifacts of that Processing always present in any Scene you might be looking at. It is clear from Brain Physiology that you never Directly See the World as it really is. You merely Detect the World with the Visual mechanism you were born with.
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RCSaunders
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Re: Perception

Post by RCSaunders »

SteveKlinko wrote: Thu Aug 08, 2019 12:38 pm When you are in a completely Dark room you will be Blind. You will not be seeing the world of that room as it really is. You need Electromagnetic Energy in the room in order to See the room. You don't in fact ever See the room you only See Electromagnetic Energy reflections. But the situation is even worse because the instant the Electromagnetic Energy reflections hit your Retina they are converted into Neural Activity that ultimately fires Neurons in the Visual Areas in the back of your head. You don't actually See anything until the later stages of Neural Processing. So if you Directly See anything you are Seeing Neural Activity. The Neural Activity performs functions such as Contrast Enhancement that will overlay certain shading effects that are not in the Scene of the Room but will be found in your Perception of the Room. The thing you See that you think is the world as it really is, always is a processed version of the World with artifacts of that Processing always present in any Scene you might be looking at. It is clear from Brain Physiology that you never Directly See the World as it really is. You merely Detect the World with the Visual mechanism you were born with.
Thanks Steve for the explanation. Of course it's one I've read and heard all my life, and admit is just plausible enough to be considered, but, if it is meant to convince me that my conscious perception of the world is not valid or that reality is different from the way I perceive it, than I cannot buy it.

I am quite familiar with the neurological aspects of perception. You regard the description of the neurological functions as a problem of perception, I regard it as a description of how it makes our direct perception of reality possible. If perception were described as some kind of magic thing without the need of some, "way," of perceiving, that I could not believe, but that seems to be exactly what those who object to our perceiving reality as it is expect, objecting to the fact that the physiology actually provides a means of perceiving the world.

I do not deny or object in any way to the description of how the neurological system works, but I think to assume that what it makes available to consciousness is something other than what reality actually is, assumes what there is no basis for assuming. Of course there is a process for there to be perception, why assume the process is inadequate for doing what it does? You admit one has a perception of a room, but assume the perception is different from the actual room. If the neurological system is able to produce a perception of a room at all, why would you assume it could only produce a mistaken one.

The other main reason I cannot accept arguments to doubt the validity of perception is because the perceived world is all we have to go by. If our perception is deceptive, than everything we think we know about the perceived world is deceptive, because it is the perceived world that the sciences study. No one would ever discover there were electromagnetic waves if no one had ever seen colors, and certainly would not know that light was electromagnetic waves (except when it is photons). When a physicist describes the colors of the spectrum as different wavelengths of light, if colors are only something produced by the brain, he is describing what does not exist. You can believe that if you want to, I cannot.

I do not think that Plato's assault on the validity of perception was always as thoroughly pervasive as it is today, in endless various forms, but that view, like yours, is the most widely accepted today. I think it is a terrible mistake, but am fully aware that very few others would agree with what I think. So, we don't have to agree, so long as we remain agreeable.
SteveKlinko
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Re: Perception

Post by SteveKlinko »

RCSaunders wrote: Thu Aug 08, 2019 2:01 pm
SteveKlinko wrote: Thu Aug 08, 2019 12:38 pm When you are in a completely Dark room you will be Blind. You will not be seeing the world of that room as it really is. You need Electromagnetic Energy in the room in order to See the room. You don't in fact ever See the room you only See Electromagnetic Energy reflections. But the situation is even worse because the instant the Electromagnetic Energy reflections hit your Retina they are converted into Neural Activity that ultimately fires Neurons in the Visual Areas in the back of your head. You don't actually See anything until the later stages of Neural Processing. So if you Directly See anything you are Seeing Neural Activity. The Neural Activity performs functions such as Contrast Enhancement that will overlay certain shading effects that are not in the Scene of the Room but will be found in your Perception of the Room. The thing you See that you think is the world as it really is, always is a processed version of the World with artifacts of that Processing always present in any Scene you might be looking at. It is clear from Brain Physiology that you never Directly See the World as it really is. You merely Detect the World with the Visual mechanism you were born with.
Thanks Steve for the explanation. Of course it's one I've read and heard all my life, and admit is just plausible enough to be considered, but, if it is meant to convince me that my conscious perception of the world is not valid or that reality is different from the way I perceive it, than I cannot buy it.

I am quite familiar with the neurological aspects of perception. You regard the description of the neurological functions as a problem of perception, I regard it as a description of how it makes our direct perception of reality possible. If perception were described as some kind of magic thing without the need of some, "way," of perceiving, that I could not believe, but that seems to be exactly what those who object to our perceiving reality as it is expect, objecting to the fact that the physiology actually provides a means of perceiving the world.

I do not deny or object in any way to the description of how the neurological system works, but I think to assume that what it makes available to consciousness is something other than what reality actually is, assumes what there is no basis for assuming. Of course there is a process for there to be perception, why assume the process is inadequate for doing what it does? You admit one has a perception of a room, but assume the perception is different from the actual room. If the neurological system is able to produce a perception of a room at all, why would you assume it could only produce a mistaken one.

The other main reason I cannot accept arguments to doubt the validity of perception is because the perceived world is all we have to go by. If our perception is deceptive, than everything we think we know about the perceived world is deceptive, because it is the perceived world that the sciences study. No one would ever discover there were electromagnetic waves if no one had ever seen colors, and certainly would not know that light was electromagnetic waves (except when it is photons). When a physicist describes the colors of the spectrum as different wavelengths of light, if colors are only something produced by the brain, he is describing what does not exist. You can believe that if you want to, I cannot.

I do not think that Plato's assault on the validity of perception was always as thoroughly pervasive as it is today, in endless various forms, but that view, like yours, is the most widely accepted today. I think it is a terrible mistake, but am fully aware that very few others would agree with what I think. So, we don't have to agree, so long as we remain agreeable.
I gave it my best shot and I know that I won't be able say anything further that will sway you. I agree to remain agreeable.
Walker
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Re: Perception

Post by Walker »

I Am is true, all else is inference.

"All else" includes the mind's interpretation of sensory perception.
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Lacewing
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Re: Perception

Post by Lacewing »

Walker wrote: Thu Aug 08, 2019 9:39 pm I Am is true, all else is inference.

"All else" includes the mind's interpretation of sensory perception.
The concept of "I Am" is belief. The concept of "All else" is belief too. What is the purpose of believing such division?
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Dontaskme
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Re: Perception

Post by Dontaskme »

RCSaunders wrote: Sun Jul 14, 2019 6:57 pm Knowledge begins with consciousness. I do not mean that consciousness is itself knowledge, but that if we are to know anything we must first be conscious of it. It is not enough just to be conscious, however, if it is to be capable of providing us knowledge. If what we are conscious of is not totally reliable and valid, no knowledge is possible.
Being conscious of knowledge means there is an awareness of being aware via the knowledge. Although knowledge is KNOWN in this awareness...the ''known'' cannot know anything of itself, which means knowledge is a fiction. So HERE you are not the knowledge you are conscious of; rather, you are the consciousness itself the only knowing there is.

And that's all there is to understand about SELF. . aka ''I AM''

Everything else is just a belief...aka a fictional imagined story...aka knowledge.

.
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RCSaunders
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Re: Perception

Post by RCSaunders »

Dontaskme wrote: Fri Aug 09, 2019 8:06 am Being conscious of knowledge means there is an awareness of being aware via the knowledge.
You don't think cats and dogs are conscious?

One can be conscious without knowing it, but there cannot be knowledge without consciousness. You have made an epistemological mistake, but it's a common one.
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Lacewing
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Re: Perception

Post by Lacewing »

Dontaskme wrote: Fri Aug 09, 2019 8:06 am And that's all there is to understand about SELF. . aka ''I AM''

Everything else is just a belief...aka a fictional imagined story...aka knowledge.
Why do you NOT think the concept of SELF and I AM are beliefs? Are those not the biggest beliefs of all?

Consciousness and awareness...and how we define/imagine them...are STILL ideas based on our understanding/perception/imagination.

Do we seek to play gods (on this stage) by "knowing the infinite" which we define/create to suit/entertain us?
Ramu
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Re: Perception

Post by Ramu »

Lacewing wrote: Fri Aug 09, 2019 3:56 pm
Dontaskme wrote: Fri Aug 09, 2019 8:06 am And that's all there is to understand about SELF. . aka ''I AM''

Everything else is just a belief...aka a fictional imagined story...aka knowledge.
Why do you NOT think the concept of SELF and I AM are beliefs? Are those not the biggest beliefs of all?

Consciousness and awareness...and how we define/imagine them...are STILL ideas based on our understanding/perception/imagination.

Do we seek to play gods (on this stage) by "knowing the infinite" which we define/create to suit/entertain us?
Lacewing: it's not a belief system because it's based on first person subjective experience.
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Lacewing
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Re: Perception

Post by Lacewing »

Ramu wrote: Fri Aug 09, 2019 4:13 pm Lacewing: it's not a belief system because it's based on first person subjective experience.
:lol:

Experience of what?
Ramu
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Re: Perception

Post by Ramu »

Lacewing wrote: Fri Aug 09, 2019 4:15 pm
Ramu wrote: Fri Aug 09, 2019 4:13 pm Lacewing: it's not a belief system because it's based on first person subjective experience.
:lol:

Experience of what?
Of Divinity (the Absolute) in a non theistic fashion. Using meditation, contemplation and self-inquiry. Non dualism in effect. The ancient non dualists knew the true nature of Consciousness over 5000 years ago. Consciousness has nothing to do with neuroscience or brains.
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Lacewing
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Re: Perception

Post by Lacewing »

Ramu wrote: Fri Aug 09, 2019 4:19 pm
Lacewing wrote: Fri Aug 09, 2019 4:15 pm
Ramu wrote: Fri Aug 09, 2019 4:13 pm Lacewing: it's not a belief system because it's based on first person subjective experience.
:lol:

Experience of what?
Of Divinity (the Absolute) in a non theistic fashion. Using meditation, contemplation and self-inquiry. Non dualism in effect. The ancient non dualists knew the true nature of Consciousness over 5000 years ago. Consciousness has nothing to do with neuroscience or brains.
5,000 years is a drop in the bucket. WHO is this that presumes to know the extent of divinity?
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Dontaskme
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Re: Perception

Post by Dontaskme »

RCSaunders wrote: Fri Aug 09, 2019 2:01 pm
Dontaskme wrote: Fri Aug 09, 2019 8:06 am Being conscious of knowledge means there is an awareness of being aware via the knowledge.
You don't think cats and dogs are conscious?
Your statement is conceptual knowledge known by consciousness the only knowing there is.

Knowledge is ''known'' and the known knows nothing of it's reality because knowledge does not exist in any way shape or form separate from the consciousness in which it is known.
Consciousness is the only reality. Consciousness is everything, consciousness is conscious of every concept and knows every concept instantly as and when it arises in the only knowing there is. Human knowledge is a fictional story arising in consciousness, it's a unique expression of consciousness itself manifesting as and through the human mind/brain body mechanism which are all concepts, aka a fictional story within consciousness, the only real reality.
RCSaunders wrote: Fri Aug 09, 2019 2:01 pmOne can be conscious without knowing it, but there cannot be knowledge without consciousness. You have made an epistemological mistake, but it's a common one.
One cannot know one knows, but paradoxically, one has to BE to know one cannot know. So all that can be known in consciousness is a fictional knowledge. This is the dual nature of conceptual language. That which is known conceptually by consciousness knows nothing.

Consciousness is the not-knowing known in the instantaneous NOW
Everything happens in the NOW. All previous Now's and all the future Now's have contributed and or caused the very event happening in the present Now. All the infinite probabilities have collapsed in the present to make the events that happened.


One can be conscious of some thing but one is not the thing one is conscious of because a thing is a known fictional creation of unknown uncreated consciousness. A thing is known by no thing the only knowing there is which is consciousness. Things know nothing and nothing is everything. I AM

One is not a concept, a concept is known by one, and what is known knows nothing.

If one can understand that they're even in a prison of linguistic constructs that's a good springboard to enlightenment.

.
surreptitious57
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Re: Perception

Post by surreptitious57 »

Ramu wrote:
it is not a belief system because it isbased on first person subjective experience
First person subjective experience is very unreliable as a means of determining any truth never mind a profound one
Without independent and rigorous examination there is no way to know the truth value of absolutely any experience
surreptitious57
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Re: Perception

Post by surreptitious57 »

Ramu wrote:
The ancient non dualists knew the true nature of Consciousness over 5000 years ago
Existence is infinite and 5000 years is absolutely no time at all from a relative perspective
Indeed no amount of time no matter how great could compare to the infinity of Existence
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