The answer to consciousness

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David Handeye
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by David Handeye »

Ok, but your dog will never be able to know if killing is a sin or isn't, because he doesn't have the concept of "sin". While you have, so you can compare and recognize if in a certain situation it is or not. So why is it that your dog can compare emotions but not ideas?
Jaded Sage
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by Jaded Sage »

Interesting. It seems then to make more comparisons is to be more conscious then, yes? Would you say that computers are conscious? I would say that the capacity to make comparisons requires consciousness and more sophisticated comparisons require more consciousness. It seems comparisons require cognition and I have heard that some proponents of meditation say it is meditation is sometimes the pausing of cognition. That means they are awake and conscious, but do not think, and therefore do not make comparisons. Thoughts?
Dalek Prime
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by Dalek Prime »

nazra7 wrote:
Dalek Prime wrote:Computers compare all the time. Does this equate to consciousness? How about an old-fashioned weight scale? That's a comparison machine. Fire cannot exist without at least 13% oxygen. What consciousness is comparing the oxygen content, before and after it ignites? I could go on with a very long list, and probably die before I finished it.
Please remember what I wrote. I've said that consciousness comes in levels,Yes. And then you went on to say, basically, that consciousness and comparison were inextricable, and I pointed that anomaly to you.something as insignificant as an electron being on the lowest end of the spectrum, while something as significant as human mind being on the higher end of the spectrum. What determines what goes where on this spectrum? The number of comparisons being made and the number of things being compared. Our brains interpret the comparisons it makes into
thoughts and emotions, a lot like how computers interpret electrical transistors being on or off as binary code and software. Computer's still aren't as powerful as our own minds, and I think we have a ways to go, but as long as Moore's law continues to be correct, we should be getting to the point where artificial intelligence is just as good, if not better than, human intelligence sometime in the future.
Obvious Leo wrote:Once again you're using non-standard language to make your point.
Once again, because standard definitions of consciousness are not clear, even circular at best, and that vagueness creates the mysteries we have such a hard time figuring out. My definition for consciousness explains it for what it is on every single level of existence. Even George Berkeley uses a non-traditional definition of existence. I don't think he's right, but no one says that because his definition of existence is different, his argument is therefore wrong. So I fail to see why this would be a valid objection. At least my definition is clear and demonstrably true.
Obvious Leo wrote:Assuming that consciousness is solely a brain function is regarded in modern neuroscience as utterly wrong-headed.
My definition agrees with this. Our minds are capable of much higher levels of consciousness than, perhaps, anything we've ever seen before. That's why we've been so successful dominating the planet. But the only reason why this is the case for us is because our minds are able to make countless comparisons about countless number of things. Usually, for most matter in the universe, there is only a very small amount of comparisons that something can make, and very few number of things that it can compare. An electron only looks for the particles it interacts with, nothing more and nothing less. For electrons, I'd say they are somewhere within the single digits when it comes to making comparisons, and it only can make comparisons about the few things it interacts with. But our minds, we make over millions upon millions, billions even perhaps, of comparisons about millions upon millions of different things, all stored in our memories. And that's just our minds, not counting the countless comparisons our bodies make to keep us alive and thinking. Thus human minds are much higher on the spectrum, perhaps higher than anything we've ever seen before.

And if there ever come a time when we meet advanced alien civilizations, if they would be light years ahead of us in technology and science, it will be because they are able to make a higher number of comparisons about higher number of things in any given single moment. Thus being on an even higher level of consciousness.
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HexHammer
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by HexHammer »

What a bunch of complete nonsense and babble!!! ..go read some scientific articles about consciousness, instead of pulling garbage straight out of your ass!!
Obvious Leo
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by Obvious Leo »

I don't think it's garbage, Hex, I just think it's not very original and downright confusing. All he's talking about is neurally networked computation which is a mature science with both a rigorous methodology and a precise lexicon of terms. To a neuroscientist there is nothing in the least bit mysterious about consciousness even though the precise mechanisms by which it operates are only vaguely understood. In many ways neuroscience is a science in its infancy because human minds are so fiendishly complex but new technology is opening up vast new horizons for future research and the science of non-linear algorithmic computation is slowly but surely providing the theoretical underpinning for such new directions.

I don't agree that nazra's ideas are garbage but he's certainly doing his best to present them in a form of language which makes them appear that way. His familiarity with the current literature on the subject also seems to be wanting.
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FlashDangerpants
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by FlashDangerpants »

nazra7 wrote: But this is not my argument. My argument is simple modus ponens. If consciousness cannot exist without making comparisons, and making comparisons is only done done by conscious beings, (if A) then consciousness and comparisons are the exact same. (then B). A is true, therefore B. B is not dependent on A, there are simply equal.
No. If every property of A and every property of B, THAT is when A and B are the same thing because 'A' and 'B' clearly reference the same object. If I became acutely conscious of the that I am not wearing trousers, there may be elements of comparison involved; in my comparing my present predicament with a counterfactual where I am betrousered for instance. But my conscious experience goes beyond comparing, and the phrase 'I became acutely comparisonininigninging that I was not wearing trousers' is meaningless in a way that goes beyond my not knowing how to conjugate 'comparison' in that malformed sentence.

Your modus ponens is illegitimate even if consciousness cannot exist without making comparisons. And even if the act of 'true' comparing can only be performed by a conscious being. We can accept both these premises and still reject the conclusion that comparison == consciousness. You lack an additional component to the effect that consciousness cannot be different in any way from comparison. Without that, consciousness can be > comparison without any conflict with the premises.

If you had that in the bag as you boast, the rest of your argument is redundant. So I think you are mistaken there too, and you can spare us the book length proof.
nazra7 wrote: All of these are comparisons being made. I can go into great detail and explain why consciousness is nothing more and nothing less than making comparisons. But that would be a whole book of its own. And I shouldn't need to do this. It should be obvious already. I think you're just failing to grasp the wide range of implications of my argument. Comparisons and consciousness cannot exist without each other. They're indistinguishable.
The only implications of your argument are that it is a bad argument. What is obvious is that you should stop congratulating yourself and start paying attention when people show you errors in your method.
David Handeye
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by David Handeye »

He's not saying nonsense, in my opinion, he's only making confusion as he writes that comparison and consciousness cannot exist without each other, but I'd say comparison cannot exist outside a consciousness. Comparison is a proof of having a consciousness.
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FlashDangerpants
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by FlashDangerpants »

A computer program which assigns a number to each of two variables and then compares those numbers to a true or false statement performs an unconscious comparison. Are you accidentally referring only to conscious comparison?
David Handeye
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by David Handeye »

Computers only execute programs written by programmers who compared within their consciousness.
nazra7
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by nazra7 »

Hello again, thanks for all the replies. I'm noticing the confusion among you, so I'm going to try to explain this from a different point of view. I think this helped the last forum get what I'm trying to say. Please read it all. I'm trying to be as short and concise as I can. (Caps are only for emphasis)

Right now, we cannot go on to answer the "hard" problem of consciousness because we assume that consciousness CANNOT be accounted for by any mechanical processes. It doesn't make any sense that such immaterial experiences come from material things. It is THIS definition we have of consciousness that PREVENTS us from even being able to ATTEMPT to answer the hard problem. The way we go forward, the way we CAN ATTEMPT at answering the hard problem, exactly as Chalmers said, is to show how consciousness can be reduced to a fundamental force in the universe. Otherwise, you just have to say that consciousness doesn't exist at all.

I see the horns of this dilemma. Really what the hard problem is saying is that our current definition of consciousness doesn't make any sense at all. That is why it is important for us FIRST to redefine consciousness as being PART of an observable, mechanical thing. BEFORE you say "You can't do that because that's not what consciousness is!" We cannot prove what consciousness is, material or not. What we CAN do is find the inseparable and INDISTINGUISHABLE fundamental quality of what we normally call consciousness is. That is as close as you can get to identity with anything. And that inseparable and INDISTINGUISHABLE quality IS the "ACT" of making comparisons. (I'm sure some of you might object to this, but please understand that I am using the broadest sense of the word "compare". For example, computers compare, and so does the human mind. There's nothing different in the comparison as a THING, the only difference is what is being compared. So what I mean by compare is the "act" of comparing. I hope that clarifies. Everything in existences makes "acts" of comparisons all the time. It is this "act" that we should call consciousness)

IF you still have a hard time understanding why I say everything in existence is making comparisons all the time with its environment, look at it this way. Every action has a condition. And every time an action takes place, its because the actor compares its condition for action to the condition it is currently in. If the condition is met, then reaction takes place. When this condition was met, and assuming that is the only action happening, it is displaying the lowest possible level of consciousness in my definition. Does that make sense?

The wide range of implications ALLOWS us to TRY and tackle the hard problem. If that's not a reason to give up the obsolete definition of consciousness, which prevents us from even trying to tackle the hard problem, then I don't know what is.

NOTE: I am not trying to change the substance of the subject, I only wish to see the SEMANTICS change, because current semantics are vague and cause all these problems. Under my definition, the word "consciousness" doesn't hold any special status. Its like the word "technology" or "intelligence" and comes in levels ranging from the very low to the very high. Something like an Electron being one of the lowest, and something like our minds being one of the highest. What determines what goes where on this spectrum? The number of "acts" of comparisons, and the number of "things" being compared at any given moment in time. But human minds will still be just as special as before.

Our current definition of consciousness has a lot of spirituality attached to it. It might look like my definition removes this spirituality, but it doesn't. For under my definition, those on the highest end of the spectrum deserve to be called something more than just conscious. Super conscious beings perhaps? I kind of like Highly Conscious, or even Advanced Consciousness more. All the spirituality linked to the human mind remains intact and undisturbed. It just makes use the word consciousness in a different way, like George Berkeley did with his definition of existence.

I hope this answers your questions. Please let me know if something doesn't look right
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HexHammer
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by HexHammer »

Obvious Leo wrote:I don't think it's garbage, Hex, I just think it's not very original and downright confusing. All he's talking about is neurally networked computation which is a mature science with both a rigorous methodology and a precise lexicon of terms. To a neuroscientist there is nothing in the least bit mysterious about consciousness even though the precise mechanisms by which it operates are only vaguely understood. In many ways neuroscience is a science in its infancy because human minds are so fiendishly complex but new technology is opening up vast new horizons for future research and the science of non-linear algorithmic computation is slowly but surely providing the theoretical underpinning for such new directions.

I don't agree that nazra's ideas are garbage but he's certainly doing his best to present them in a form of language which makes them appear that way. His familiarity with the current literature on the subject also seems to be wanting.
Then please show me some usable points he made, that is sound and scientific.
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HexHammer
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by HexHammer »

David Handeye wrote:He's not saying nonsense, in my opinion, he's only making confusion as he writes that comparison and consciousness cannot exist without each other, but I'd say comparison cannot exist outside a consciousness. Comparison is a proof of having a consciousness.
The quote is pure nonsense and babble, something he pulled out of his ass, and it's only because you think it's sound science, that it seems sound to you, when it's not.

It should be very obvious to reasonable intelligent people, that it's pure garbage! Incoherent babble!
nazra7
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by nazra7 »

HexHammer wrote:
David Handeye wrote:He's not saying nonsense, in my opinion, he's only making confusion as he writes that comparison and consciousness cannot exist without each other, but I'd say comparison cannot exist outside a consciousness. Comparison is a proof of having a consciousness.
The quote is pure nonsense and babble, something he pulled out of his ass, and it's only because you think it's sound science, that it seems sound to you, when it's not.

It should be very obvious to reasonable intelligent people, that it's pure garbage! Incoherent babble!
This isn't the place for trolls. Do you even know what scientific means? Why would you be asking for something purely scientific on a philosophy forum?
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HexHammer
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by HexHammer »

nazra7 wrote:This isn't the place for trolls. Do you even know what scientific means? Why would you be asking for something purely scientific on a philosophy forum?
:roll:
If philosophers didn't base all their thinking on something solid, we would end back in the medieval times, where people are superstitious and utterly stupid.
nazra7
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Re: The answer to consciousness

Post by nazra7 »

HexHammer wrote:
nazra7 wrote:This isn't the place for trolls. Do you even know what scientific means? Why would you be asking for something purely scientific on a philosophy forum?
:roll:
If philosophers didn't base all their thinking on something solid, we would end back in the medieval times, where people are superstitious and utterly stupid.
My suspicions are correct, you do not even know what scientific means. Also, electricity isn't solid, but its perfectly scientific.
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