Emergence of self

[nonenone]

Dear All

First, please forgive me for any grammatical errors. I am not native English speaker.

Actually I am not professionally related to philosophy or anything near it. But I have always been attracted to the philosophy of mind and concept of "self". I have been thinking about it some times but since there is no one around that I can talk to about it, I thought I can share my thoughts in a forum to be evaluated.

What I have been thinking about is how "self" could emerge from brain activities (say material). I have reached a hypothesis but I want to know if it makes any sense to anyone else.

The scheme is roughly like this:

Let's assume that we have a network which can "categorize" inputs and also is able to operate in form of "p => q" logic. This network is not self aware. Actually it has no "self".

Let's assume that a premise has been defined in this network which implies: "every object which is categorized as A (= let's say thought) must have been initiated by an object which is categorized as B (= let's say thinker)"

Let's see what "species" of this network can survive:

1- There is an input. Network categorizes it as an "A" (let say A1, a thought). Then it searches for a "B" (lets say B1, a thinker) which has initiated A1. As a result it "concludes" that "B1 has initiated A1".

2- If that "conclusion" has a format which makes the network to categorize it as an A object too (actually conclusion is a thought itself), then immediately A2 is generated and so again some B object is required.

3- As you can see it is a loop.

4- If the network goes into this loop, then all the survival energy of the network is wasted. So it is appropriate to guess that some "species" of this network which can bypass this loop will survive.

I guess there is only one way to by-pass this loop. As you may have noticed, the problem is initiated because conclusion is in the view of a 3rd person. We have "network", "thoughts (Category A)" and "thinkers (category B)". If the logical principles of the network can be arranged in a way that network and thinker are considered as one object, loop is by-passed.

In this case 1st person has emerged.

[Blaggard]

The hard problem, Gnomework help questions though are best left to the professionals, who can dig that hole.

That question cannot be answered....

The best I can say is only religion knows, pretty sure science and philosophy is in the dark.

The only thing I can genuinely suggest is read more philosophers, more scientists and more in general as time goes by, especially Harry Potter because atm that philosophy major is all the rage, even if it is not in a cage like science.

You can subscribe to Philosophy Wow, or you can ask eternal questions, either way is mete for the soul. That's a dulaism joke by the way, it flew over my "head" though too...

[nonenone]

Thanks Blaggard, but i guess it could be answered scientifically.

[roydop]

Read Ramana Maharshi.

[nonenone]

Thank roydop, i checked his wikipedia entry for a quick introduction. Although his teachings sounds interesting, but you know, it seems to me that they are, like all the ancient wisdom teachings, somehow vague. Actually ancient wisdom teachings do not represent a complete philosophical system based on which one can logically reach to a conclusion, based on a set of premises. I guess it is somehow specific to the western philosophy.

But definitely it was interesting. So again thank you for your help.

[HexHammer]

I remember some (at that time) huge mailservers was brought down, due to auto answers, some office clerk had send a mail to all partners and 1 of the partner has put auto answer on his e-mail too, so they constantly send replies to each other, resulting in a crash.

[Bill Wiltrack]

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...love this kid...




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Real attainment is to be fully conscious, to be aware of surroundings and the people around, to move among them all, but not to merge consciousness in the environment. One should remain in inner independent awareness.
~ Ramana Maharshi ~






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[Arising_uk]

Real attainment is to be fully conscious, to be aware of surroundings and the people around, to move among them all, but not to merge consciousness in the environment. One should remain in inner independent awareness.
~ Ramana Maharshi ~.

What a liar eh! Bill.

[roydop]

Actually ancient wisdom teachings do not represent a complete philosophical system based on which one can logically reach to a conclusion, based on a set of premises.

I submit:

1. If there is a fundamental desire, it is to be free of vexation and suffering.

Consider all of humanity's endeavours to lessen vexation and suffering: Religion, philosophy, science, psychology, the legal system, medicine. Given the vast expanse of human knowledge contained within the above systems of thought:

Looking at the current condition of the human species, does it appear as though there is less physical and mental suffering than there ever has been, at any given point throughout the entire history of humanity?

2. Despite all of the above mentioned systems of thought, the level of vexation and suffering experienced by humanity has remained unaffected.

3. Systems of thought do nothing to decrease the level of vexation and suffering experienced by humanity.

The following suppositions must be verified by/as one's own experience.

4. Conceptualization is the source of vexation and suffering.

5. Therefore, the path to liberation from vexation and suffering is:

Upon awareness of thought, the immediate shifting of that awareness into Being (non-thought)

[nonenone]

I understand what to mean roydop. But regardless of whether what you say is correct or not, i think our goals are different. My goal is not to reduce the suffering, it is simply(!) to find an executable way to make a machine conscious. So what i need is, more or less, a systematic explanation of how "self" emerges from the matter.

[Ginkgo]

Dear All

First, please forgive me for any grammatical errors. I am not native English speaker.

Actually I am not professionally related to philosophy or anything near it. But I have always been attracted to the philosophy of mind and concept of "self". I have been thinking about it some times but since there is no one around that I can talk to about it, I thought I can share my thoughts in a forum to be evaluated.

What I have been thinking about is how "self" could emerge from brain activities (say material). I have reached a hypothesis but I want to know if it makes any sense to anyone else.

The scheme is roughly like this:

Let's assume that we have a network which can "categorize" inputs and also is able to operate in form of "p => q" logic. This network is not self aware. Actually it has no "self".

Let's assume that a premise has been defined in this network which implies: "every object which is categorized as A (= let's say thought) must have been initiated by an object which is categorized as B (= let's say thinker)"

Let's see what "species" of this network can survive:

1- There is an input. Network categorizes it as an "A" (let say A1, a thought). Then it searches for a "B" (lets say B1, a thinker) which has initiated A1. As a result it "concludes" that "B1 has initiated A1".

2- If that "conclusion" has a format which makes the network to categorize it as an A object too (actually conclusion is a thought itself), then immediately A2 is generated and so again some B object is required.

3- As you can see it is a loop.

4- If the network goes into this loop, then all the survival energy of the network is wasted. So it is appropriate to guess that some "species" of this network which can bypass this loop will survive.

I guess there is only one way to by-pass this loop. As you may have noticed, the problem is initiated because conclusion is in the view of a 3rd person. We have "network", "thoughts (Category A)" and "thinkers (category B)". If the logical principles of the network can be arranged in a way that network and thinker are considered as one object, loop is by-passed.

In this case 1st person has emerged.

If you are saying there are two separate entities with ALL their properties in common then this might be a problem.

[roydop]

I understand what to mean roydop. But regardless of whether what you say is correct or not, i think our goals are different. My goal is not to reduce the suffering, it is simply(!) to find an executable way to make a machine conscious. So what i need is, more or less, a systematic explanation of how "self" emerges from the matter.

Ah, I see. Well that's a tough one because matter emerges from self, not the other way around.

A machine (or human) that is aware of itself only in relation to when it is thinking or operating is not fully self-aware. How can one design a machine that is aware of itself when it is not operating? This to me is a more comprehensive definition of consciousness.

[nonenone]

@Ginkgo

"If you are saying there are two separate entities with ALL their properties in common then this might be a problem."

the hypothesis has some tricky aspects. one of them is that

Note that "thinkers" are not direct objects from the outer world. they are "representations of them in the network."
for example we see a boy, Network also sees him, but necessarily not exactly as we see him. so "thinkers" are "representations".

when self emerges, "Network" and "representation of Network" (which is observed by the Network itself) become united.

[Ginkgo]

@Ginkgo

"If you are saying there are two separate entities with ALL their properties in common then this might be a problem."

the hypothesis has some tricky aspects. one of them is that

Note that "thinkers" are not direct objects from the outer world. they are "representations of them in the network."
for example we see a boy, Network also sees him, but necessarily not exactly as we see him. so "thinkers" are "representations".

Are you saying that "thinkers get their information from the external world and turn it into data structures and thus use this data as a representation of something in the external world? Furthermore, are you saying the more this data is stored and allocated within the network the more likely it is to represent objects in the external world? Are you making an analogy with the brain by saying that in a similar fashion brain consciousness is just efficient manipulation of data based on our senses?

Perhaps we could also add that consciousness is a recreation of an internal world derived from the external world.

In a similar fashion

when self emerges, "Network" and "representation of Network" (which is observed by the Network itself) become united.

I guess Dennett would call this observation by the network a place where order of arrival equals order of appearance. Also know as the observing self.

[Wyman]

@Ginkgo

"If you are saying there are two separate entities with ALL their properties in common then this might be a problem."

the hypothesis has some tricky aspects. one of them is that

Note that "thinkers" are not direct objects from the outer world. they are "representations of them in the network."
for example we see a boy, Network also sees him, but necessarily not exactly as we see him. so "thinkers" are "representations".

when self emerges, "Network" and "representation of Network" (which is observed by the Network itself) become united.

Look up 'Leibnitz' Law'