Why Physicalism is Wrong

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TimeSeeker
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Re: Why Physicalism is Wrong

Post by TimeSeeker »

Belinda wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 1:19 pm Would they be synchronised as fast as biological feedback loops?
You don't have to process the data in real time. Only record it in real time.

Your cellphone has time-precision of 1 microsecond ( https://www.endruntechnologies.com/faq. ... ccurate_is )
Neuron signals travel at 120 meters per second ( https://hypertextbook.com/facts/2002/DavidParizh.shtml ).
That means a message from your optical nerve to your brain (2cm) arrives at about 16 nanoseconds.

So that is a yes :) Our technology has lower latency than the human nervous system. Synchronization should not be a problem.
seeds
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Re: Why Physicalism is Wrong

Post by seeds »

seeds wrote: Fri Jun 22, 2018 1:41 am In other words, the observance of the firing of neurons in your brain will in no way reveal the precise nature and makeup of that island paradise you may have visited last night while drooling on your pillow...
TimeSeeker wrote: Tue Oct 16, 2018 9:08 pm Uhhh. Nothing makes it impossible. All we need to understand is how brains (in general) or YOUR BRAIN (in particular) encodes information...
To repeat what I stated to uwot:

“...there is absolutely nothing that the researchers in those links are doing that even remotely suggests that they could ever reach into the dream island depicted in my little drawing...

Image

...and literally measure the height and girth of the palm trees, or the distance between the trees and the water, etc., etc...”

Now of course I could be wrong, however, I personally believe that each human mind represents a closed and sovereign dimension of reality unto itself - (like a parallel universe) - wherein none of the contents within one mind can literally co-mingle with the contents of another mind.

And that also means that the inner contents of a human mind can never co-mingle with the outer contents of the universe - and vice versa.

In other words, in the same way that you could never project the palm fronds of a Hawaiian palm tree into the inner-dimension of a human mind, likewise, you could never project the palm fronds in the dream depicted in the illustration - outward into the universe.

The point is that any form of measuring device that scientists could create could never be extended into the closed dimension of our mind in order to experience and measure...

(as in see, touch, hear, smell, and taste)

...the contents and features of our dreams as they are being perceived (in real time) from the first-person perspective of the dreamer - at least not in any literal sense.

And lastly, none of the above is taking into account the impossibility of accessing and analyzing the ontological structure and status of the “dreamer” of the dream. That’s a whole ‘nother issue.
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TimeSeeker
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Re: Why Physicalism is Wrong

Post by TimeSeeker »

seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm “...there is absolutely nothing that the researchers in those links are doing that even remotely suggests that they could ever reach into the dream island depicted in my little drawing...
There is nothing that suggests that is impossible in due time either.
seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm ...and literally measure the height and girth of the palm trees, or the distance between the trees and the water, etc., etc...”

Yeah, but neither can you! Your dreams are not that vivid and precise.
seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm Now of course I could be wrong, however, I personally believe that each human mind represents a closed and sovereign dimension of reality unto itself - (like a parallel universe)
Based on... what evidence ? :)
seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm - wherein none of the contents within one mind can literally co-mingle with the contents of another mind.

And that also means that the inner contents of a human mind can never co-mingle with the outer contents of the universe - and vice versa.
We do that all the time. Here are the inner contents of my mind co-mingling with the universe. In the form of words.
Your brain processes information from the outer world and responds to it all the time!
seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm The point is that any form of measuring device that scientists could create could never be extended into the closed dimension of our mind in order to experience and measure...

(as in see, touch, hear, smell, and taste)
It is all just electrical impulses interpreted by your brain.

That is why we have bionic eyes:
https://www.allaboutvision.com/conditio ... c-eyes.htm
https://theconversation.com/artificial- ... -see-79758

And cochlear implants: https://www.cochlear.com/au/home/unders ... ar-implant
Belinda
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Re: Why Physicalism is Wrong

Post by Belinda »

TimeSeeker wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 1:29 pm
Belinda wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 1:19 pm Would they be synchronised as fast as biological feedback loops?
You don't have to process the data in real time. Only record it in real time.

Your cellphone has time-precision of 1 microsecond ( https://www.endruntechnologies.com/faq. ... ccurate_is )
Neuron signals travel at 120 meters per second ( https://hypertextbook.com/facts/2002/DavidParizh.shtml ).
That means a message from your optical nerve to your brain (2cm) arrives at about 16 nanoseconds.

So that is a yes :) Our technology has lower latency than the human nervous system. Synchronization should not be a problem.
I don't understand 'process', 'record, and 'data' in the context of the biology. Do data exist for the receiver before they are committed to at least short term memory? By 'record' do you mean committing to memory?

I don't know what 'latency' is.
TimeSeeker
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Re: Why Physicalism is Wrong

Post by TimeSeeker »

Belinda wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 7:58 pm I don't understand 'process', 'record, and 'data' in the context of the biology.
Do data exist for the receiver before they are committed to at least short term memory? By 'record' do you mean committing to memory?
Suppose w have a neuromiaging device on your head - a helmet or something which records your brain's activity.
We can then make you watch a video the content of which we control. And so we can correlate the images you are seeing with the patterns in the neuroimaging.

Suppose that you are also wearing a Google Glass device (eyeglasses with a camera) and it is recording exactly what you see. Then we can send you out into the real world and try to pick up any correlations between visual experience and neural patterns.
Belinda wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 7:58 pm I don't know what 'latency' is.
It's the time delay between two events. Say you push the remote control on your TV and it takes 7 seconds for an actual image to appear on the screen. 7 seconds latency between you pushing the button and the TV actually working.
seeds
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Re: Why Physicalism is Wrong

Post by seeds »

seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm “...there is absolutely nothing that the researchers in those links are doing that even remotely suggests that they could ever reach into the dream island depicted in my little drawing...
TimeSeeker wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:42 pm There is nothing that suggests that is impossible in due time either.
Ah yes, the materialist’s own unique version of the “God of the gaps” fallacy, except in this situation the gap-filling God is “future scientific breakthroughs.” :wink:
seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm Now of course I could be wrong, however, I personally believe that each human mind represents a closed and sovereign dimension of reality unto itself - (like a parallel universe)
TimeSeeker wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:42 pm Based on... what evidence ?
My trick knee told me :D (and did you miss the part where I admitted that “I could be wrong”?)
seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm - wherein none of the contents within one mind can literally co-mingle with the contents of another mind.

And that also means that the inner contents of a human mind can never co-mingle with the outer contents of the universe - and vice versa.
TimeSeeker wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:42 pm We do that all the time. Here are the inner contents of my mind co-mingling with the universe. In the form of words.
No!

Words are just symbolic representations of the content of your mind – something of which the receiver can use to manipulate the subjective fabric of their own mind into (hopefully) resembling what you are referring to.

Furthermore, the inner contents of your mind are not co-mingling with the universe.

The truth is that you (as in the subjectively-based “agent” of your mind) are simply using a feature of the universe in the form of your body...

(which, btw, is not a part of your mind)

...to act as a medium (vocalizations/fingered keystrokes) for the transfer of the representative information.

And lastly, you completely ignored my qualifying statement:
seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm In other words, in the same way that you could never project the palm fronds of a Hawaiian palm tree into the inner-dimension of a human mind, likewise, you could never project the palm fronds in the dream depicted in the illustration - outward into the universe.
Now I am pretty certain that you have a whole slew of vivid images of a loved one in your mind (perhaps a specific image of your mom, for example).

In which case, if you can literally – that’s LITERALLY - project that image of your mom outward into the universe to where we could all see it and take a swat at it...

(note: not a description of your mom, but the literal image you are viewing before your mind’s eye)

...then your rebuttal might carry some weight.
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TimeSeeker
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Re: Why Physicalism is Wrong

Post by TimeSeeker »

seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 8:57 pm Ah yes, the materialist’s own unique version of the “God of the gaps” fallacy, except in this situation the gap-filling God is “future scientific breakthroughs.” :wink:
Uh no? It's just inference. In past futures science filled gaps in knowledge/understanding, why would future futures be different?
seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm My trick knee told me :D (and did you miss the part where I admitted that “I could be wrong”?)
That's not an answer.

You have reached a conclusion that it is 'impossible' therefore you must have done some mental calculation that some law of physics is being violated? Or some other obstacle cannot be conquered? Yes, your calculation could be wrong, but I still want to see your work. 'impossible' is a big word.
seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm Words are just symbolic representations of the content of your mind – something of which the receiver can use to manipulate the subjective fabric of their own mind into (hopefully) resembling what you are referring to.
What about video and audio?
seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm Furthermore, the inner contents of your mind are not co-mingling with the universe.
Oh really, how do you think information from your senses gets to your brain if your mind is isolated fro the outside world?
How do you think Neuroimaging works if we can't peek into the brain's activity?
seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm The truth is that you (as in the subjectively-based “agent” of your mind) are simply using a feature of the universe in the form of your body...

(which, btw, is not a part of your mind)
Uhhhhhh, ok. Where does body stop and the mind start then? Draw me a line.

seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm In which case, if you can literally – that’s LITERALLY - project that image of your mom outward into the universe to where we could all see it and take a swat at it...

(note: not a description of your mom, but the literal image you are viewing before your mind’s eye)

...then your rebuttal might carry some weigh.
Well, my rebuttal is only theoretical since the technology doesn't exist yet in practice, but there are no actual barriers to it eventually becoming reality.

And so my rebuttal is only this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital-t ... _converter
Belinda
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Re: Why Physicalism is Wrong

Post by Belinda »

TimeSeeker wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 8:05 pm
Belinda wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 7:58 pm I don't understand 'process', 'record, and 'data' in the context of the biology.
Do data exist for the receiver before they are committed to at least short term memory? By 'record' do you mean committing to memory?
Suppose w have a neuromiaging device on your head - a helmet or something which records your brain's activity.
We can then make you watch a video the content of which we control. And so we can correlate the images you are seeing with the patterns in the neuroimaging.

Suppose that you are also wearing a Google Glass device (eyeglasses with a camera) and it is recording exactly what you see. Then we can send you out into the real world and try to pick up any correlations between visual experience and neural patterns.
Belinda wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 7:58 pm I don't know what 'latency' is.
It's the time delay between two events. Say you push the remote control on your TV and it takes 7 seconds for an actual image to appear on the screen. 7 seconds latency between you pushing the button and the TV actually working.
Thank you, I understand your explanation, and how synchronisation should not be a problem .In particular I find that latency is a useful term and this is because I am busy puzzling about voluntary movements of the musculo -skeleton, about involuntary spinal reflexes and the memory of them in consciousness, and about the feedback loop for instance when I 'decide' to think of a paradise island.I guess that all of those involve feedback loops, and 'mind'.

I am interested in AI correlates of all the above and would like to see diagrams that are simple enough for me to understand.No doubt I ought to draw those myself but would rather some help here.

If it's true that some feedback arrangement (the helmet or something)can maybe hypothetically link synaptic event with synaptic event I cannot envisage the system thus revealed unless there is a hierarchy of control so that some top synaptic event(s) are the most incisive ones.I know that I can control my thoughts so what, for the AI expert, is the I which does the controlling?
seeds
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Re: Why Physicalism is Wrong

Post by seeds »

seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm My trick knee told me :D (and did you miss the part where I admitted that “I could be wrong”?)
TimeSeeker wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 9:07 pm That's not an answer.

You have reached a conclusion that it is 'impossible' therefore you must have done some mental calculation that some law of physics is being violated? Or some other obstacle cannot be conquered? Yes, your calculation could be wrong, but I still want to see your work. 'impossible' is a big word.
My direct “work” toward attempting to understand these issues spans approximately 50 years of my almost 70 years of life. I cannot condense it into the short post format of a philosophy forum.

Furthermore, I am certain that it is far more metaphysical (abstract/theoretical) in nature than you are willing to deal with. However, you are certainly welcome to peruse my website – http://www.theultimateseeds.com/.
seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm Words are just symbolic representations of the content of your mind – something of which the receiver can use to manipulate the subjective fabric of their own mind into (hopefully) resembling what you are referring to.
TimeSeeker wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 9:07 pm What about video and audio?
What about it?

(Continued in next post)
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seeds
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Re: Why Physicalism is Wrong

Post by seeds »

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(Continued from prior post)
seeds wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:26 pm Furthermore, the inner contents of your mind are not co-mingling with the universe.
TimeSeeker wrote: Wed Oct 17, 2018 9:07 pm Oh really, how do you think information from your senses gets to your brain if your mind is isolated fro the outside world?
Not that you are obliged to do so (considering how crazy it must sound), but you’re just not understanding the theory.

For you see, your brain is the outside world (relative to the inside world of your mind).

To set this into the context of my Panentheistic/Berkeleyanish belief system...

...speculatively speaking, your brain and body are in fact a multi-sensory (multi-windowed) “interface” between the inner-dimension of your mind and that of the inner-dimension of God’s mind (the universe) - as is loosely depicted in one of my illustrations...

Image

...(remember, I’m speaking of something resembling the idea of “parallel universes” here).

Make no mistake about it, your five senses are not an aspect of your body, they are an inherent aspect of your central consciousness - hence your ability to experience the multi-sensory features of your dreams.

When you are awake on earth, the ethereal (almost liquid-like) essence of your consciousness - flows into your body via the ubiquitous network of the body’s nervous system, wherein you not only gain control over the body’s musculature, but also gain access to the body’s “windows” into this alternate universe of God’s mind.

In so doing, your consciousness then merges with the inner fabric of God’s mind in such a way that causes coded fields of “holographic-like” information to be transformed into three-dimensional explications of that which the information encodes – (beginning with the body itself).

As I have mentioned elsewhere, the mental mechanism that allows you to transform (decode) fields of information into displaying the three-dimensional phenomena of your dreams when you direct your consciousness inward...

...is surely the same mechanism that allows you to transform fields of information into displaying the three-dimensional phenomena of God’s mind when you direct your consciousness outward.

And it is no doubt associated with the vexing issue of what it is that causes the so-called “collapse of the quantum wave function” of which I had suggested to you in an alternate thread as being something that is loosely similar to the workings of a laser hologram:

Image

The bottom line is, as your consciousness decodes and experiences the phenomenal features of the universe, you are, in truth, interacting with the unfathomably advanced mental holography of a higher mind – a mind of which you momentarily have a “fetal-like” relationship with until death.

For a very simplistic series of fanciful illustrations (3 in all) that loosely depict what I am getting at, click on the following link and scroll down – http://theultimateseeds.com/the3stagesofourbeing.htm

Needless to say, this is all speculation.

However, the ultimate point is that “you”...

(meaning the self-aware entity that sits at the throne of the sovereign and subjective dimension of your own personal universe - again, your mind)

...are not “isolated from the outside world” as per your initial complaint at the top of this post.

No, you are, in fact, an embryonic (“seed-like”) replication of the outside world.

In other words, you are a familial copy of the Ultimate Lifeform (God), momentarily existing “in utero” of said Lifeform, wherein information with respect to the universe (God’s mind) is conveyed to you via the windows of a “placental-like” interface between your mind and the mind of God...

...an interface that will be discarded at the moment of your second and final birth into a higher context of reality...

Image
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TimeSeeker
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Re: Why Physicalism is Wrong

Post by TimeSeeker »

seeds wrote: Sat Oct 20, 2018 5:05 am For you see, your brain is the outside world (relative to the inside world of your mind).
Yeah. That is a dualistic conception. And I am not a dualist. I don't even know how to move forward.

I can't conceptualise my mind separate from my brain. No matter how hard I try.
chanupedia
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Re: Why Physicalism is Wrong

Post by chanupedia »

Hi everyone. I've written a piece for a philosophy and science blog I write for, adressing Bartley's arguments.
You can read it here: http://nulliusinverbasite.com/texto-arg ... -is-wrong/

(The page is in Spanish, but my article is in English).
Brent.Allsop
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Re: Why Physicalism is Wrong

Post by Brent.Allsop »

Try the "Are you quaqia blind" test here, to see if that helps understand what qualia are.
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henry quirk
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Re: Why Physicalism is Wrong

Post by henry quirk »

Brent.Allsop wrote: Thu May 07, 2020 8:57 pm Try the "Are you quaqia blind" test here, to see if that helps understand what qualia are.
Brent,

If you had posted about your test link once, in one thread, I mighta gave it shot, but you've entered the land of overkill with multiple links in multiple threads, so (purely out of spite, mind you) I wouldn't take your test if you paid me.
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