The hard problem of consciousness is not a question of what consciousness

>>1797184
>The problem isn't "where are these feelings from?"
>The problem is "why these feels!"

But in your own statement you provide a means of refutation.

The "living, feeling presence" is merely an "emergent biological phenomenon". The human mind is a creative imagining tool to aid in survival, turned self-aware.

>>1797207
There's no "merely", merely is a meaningless word, my joy or anger is not "merely" this is that mechanistic process, because A) my brain chemistry is simultaneous with my emotions and B) my feeling of joy is irreducible, there is no objective network of processes that is actually "really" my joy, my joy is found only in itself, nowhere else.

There's no why question being posed, only a distinction posited between the objective, mechanistic ground and the qualitative, subjective product, both equally real, neither reducible to the other

consciousness is infinity. infinity is the empty set. moral nihilism is true

>>1797233
Are you suggesting the experience of joy is not reducible to a chemical reaction?

I think I get it: the chemical is the chemical, the feeling is the feeling... but the concentration of chemicals (dopamine, endorphins, serotonin) is directly proportional to the 'feeling' experienced. So I must not be getting what you're saying?

>>1797233
>happiness isn't reducible
Hell if it isn't. It'ls literally a chemical reaction. Why do you think people do drugs?

>>1797273
He's saying that the experience of joy cannot be reduced to chemical changes in the same way that a nation can be reduced to a group of people and their land.

It's not possible to conceptualize how the experience joy can be the same thing as chemicals.

>>1797289
>>1797233
so if I understand this right, it's asking the connection between the expression and feeling to the chemical processes.It like asking what is it that we experience, the joy in itself, correct?

>>1797305
Basically

>>1797289
Right, I'm saying "joy is JUST chemical reaction x" says absolutely nothing besides A=A, any more than trying to reduce a symphony or a poem to the notes/words used can be substituted for the full qualitative effect of actually hearing them performed.

Of course subjectivity is rooted in the brain, but that does not and should not marginalize subjectivity.

>>1797184
>(as an emergent biological phenomenon reducible to this or that understanding of the brain)

Go ahead and tell me which emergent biological phenomena it is? This one or that one?

>>1797184

>Refute this.

Done:

http://s-f-walker.org.uk/pubsebooks/pdfs/Gilbert_Ryle_The_Concept_of_Mind.pdf

>>1797491
Summarize please.

>>1797184
How is that a problem? if processes give rise to feelings what profound implications does that have?

This is only a problem if you assume that processes should not be able to give rise to emotions.

>>1797844
It's just a reminder physical theories of the mind cannot fully explain consciousness

>>1797914
So a fully physical human is the same as a normal human, but is different. Humans alone violate the rules of logic that everything else follows, gotcha.

>>1797914
Perhaps there are elements that are unexplained as of yet, though I dont see how the problem highlights them.

But even so there are many things we could not explain physically and now can, so that we dont have an explanation now does not mean much

>>1797928
Your physical human is not distinguishable from a real live human. A human being "just" being physical says nothing, since the source of subjectivity we are trying to explain becomes shifted onto matter.

>>1797939
The whole point is "explaining consciousness physically" explains nothing because perspectival subjectivities are in and of themselves non-physical, as in my felt experience of me typing this right now is not in anyway translatable to some noumenal "chemical cascade" off somewhere that is what I "really" am. My "I" is my "I" and nothing else, it is self-positing. I receive and must contend with the neurological hardware of my body, but the very experience of that neurological processing is not reducible to that processing.

>>1797945
>subjectivity
The information we currently lack pertains the operation of human biology, not nonexistent metaphysical qualities.

>>1797843

The "hard problem" is really just a language problem.

>It is convenient to say something here about our everyday use of the phrase ‘in my head’. When I do mental arithmetic, I am likely to say that I have had the numbers with which I have been working ‘in my head’ and not on paper; and if I have been listening to a catchy air or a verbal jingle, I am likely to describe myself later on as still having the tune or jingle ‘running in my head’. It is ‘in my head’ that I go over the Kings of England, solve anagrams and compose limericks. Why is this felt to be an appropriate and expressive metaphor? For a metaphor it certainly is. No one thinks that when a tune is running in my head, a surgeon could unearth a little orchestra buried inside my skull or that a doctor by applying a stethoscope to my cranium could hear a muffled tune, in the way in which I hear the muffled whistling of my neighbour when I put my ear to the wall between our rooms.

>>1797977
Well that is a big assumption, and I think an erroneous one.

Its like saying we cant break down the picture of your monitor to 1's and 0's. Of course we can. the human brain is of course much more complex and does not work on a digital system but there is no reason to believe you could not express its processes as math with enough time and information on the brain's internal workings.

Now that raises the question of whether numbers of physical.

>>1797978
Once again, human biological functioning does not in and of itself explain the subjective experience of such functioning.

>>1797982
Sorry but this I just autistic.

>>1797977
If something has measurable qualities, it can be explained physically, and the existence of your post is contingent on those measurable qualities existing.

>>1797977

>perspectival subjectivities are in and of themselves non-physical
>the very experience of that neurological processing is not reducible to that processing

You're making a lot of assumptions and not many arguments.

>>1798008

The real explanation for most things is pretty autistic. It's the non-autistic aspects of your beliefs and behavior that tend to distract you from technical realities.

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>>1797977
The fact that there is someone experiencing the effects of those processes requires the presense of a non-physical observer

>>1798011
>>1798012

The "physical" has a qualitative dimension that is not explained by constant appeals to "brain processes".

>>1798018

>The belief that there is someone experiencing the effects of those processes requires the pretense of a non-physical observer

FYP

>>1798020

>The "physical" has a qualitative dimension

Nope. Every single possible example you can give of this alleged "qualitative dimension" I will correct for you as a *report* of a "qualitative dimension." And there is nothing mysterious or extra-physical about reporting behavior.

>>1798018
>The "fact"

>>1798030
Who is doing the reporting? Who is being fooled?

>>1798031
Someone typed that message

>>1798033
>>1798041

The word "sunrise" implies geocentrism is true. That doesn't make it evidence for geocentrism. It makes it evidence for an influence of the invalid concept of geocentrism on language. You're using implications of words as evidence for your argument in the same way, when really these implications of words are evidence for the influence of the invalid concept of cartesian dualism on language.

>>1798068
What? This is stupid

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>>1798079

>>1798086
My experience of myself, right now, is pre-linguistic. What are you on about?

>>1798093

>My experience of myself, right now, is pre-linguistic.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question

>>1798095
Does your fallacy mean I'm not somehow here right now then? Come on bruh

>>1798093

Your fallacy means you're assuming the conclusion without having an argument for it.

>>1798116
We're in the realm of what presupposes such things as "arguments" and "conclusions".

>>1798117

Then what you believe in has no argument and you shouldn't bother writing about it because in your mistaken opinion it exists in a magical realm above and beyond reason.

>>1798122
"My subjective experience is pre-linguistic" is a perfectly valid argument. This doesn't require proof or demonstration, it is the condition of my even being able to make judgments in the first place.

>>1798128

>"My subjective experience is pre-linguistic" is a perfectly valid argument.
>This doesn't require proof or demonstration

No, those aren't arguments, they're admissions that you aren't willing to even begin arguing.

>>1798147
I've explained it 3 times and you still don't get it

>>1798168

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question

>>1798249
You're autistic or trolling

>>1798257

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question

Start arguing any time.

>>1798261
1. Concepts are not equivalent to the systems they signify
2. My phenomenal experience cannot be reduced to merely a description of properties
3. Therefore, my first-person experience of the world is prior to language, and so cannot be handwaved away as a problem of language

>>1798008
You have to be pretty autistic to be applying philosophical rigor to anything. Getting hung up on seemingly trivial details is hardly out of character for the field.

>>1798399

Problem with 2: You're assuming you really do have a phenomenological "experience" to begin with, but have no evidence for that being the case. An alternative explanation that has the benefit of not requiring the belief in extra-physical flapdoodle is that there are instead organisms being compelled to behave and report things like "I have phenomenological experiences." And the behavior and reports are all there really is even though the reports make claims of something extra-physical, in much the same way organisms will cite their own "will" / "desire" as the reason for their behavior when in actuality what their bodies do is as much the product of cause and effect physics as a rock rolling down a hill is.

Doesn't matter how intensely, vividly real you *report* your "experiences" to be, none of that is evidence that you're really having "experiences." Each time what you're actually submitting as evidence is a *report* of having "experiences."

>autists using big words
Reeeeee

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>>1798437

>non-autists are posting on 4chan

>>1798429
If my experience is illusory, whose being fooled?

>>1798454

Well first of all, let's define "illusion." I'm going to show two different definitions to help get across a point here (both from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/illusion):

1)
> something that looks or seems different from what it is : something that is false or not real but that seems to be true or real
2)
: an incorrect idea : an idea that is based on something that is not true

Now if you use definition 1 for "illusion," it's going to arguably imply that "experience" is real by referencing looking / seeming. But if you use definition 2, that one isn't tainted by the influence of dualism on language in the same way. There is no "experience"-having party required in order for an idea to be incorrect or based on something that is not true. A simple machine can have "illusion" of that definition e.g. a cash register can report that a customer owes the store $1 more than they do in reality because this report is based on the information inferred from a misprinted barcode i.e. based on something that is not true.

We have to be careful not to interpret the influence of untrue beliefs on language as evidence for these untrue beliefs. This goes back to the "sunrise" example. Just because the word "sunrise" implies the sun revolves around the Earth doesn't make it good evidence for the sun revolving around the Earth. What it's really evidence for is that *belief* in the sun revolving around the Earth having had an influence on language. And certainly, the *belief* in "experience" as an actual, extra-physical thing has had a major influence on language.

"Pfft, isn't it obvious?" is not evidence of anything.

>>1798439
Lol

>>1798475
So we're just going to make a hard solipsism an axiom (unless you yourself think your consciousness is somehow not real lmao) and ask me to argue my way out of that autism, okay chief

>>1798497
You're the one arguing for hard solipsism. You're the one claiming that something cannot be known.

>>1798505
What a spoot

>>1798497

>solipsism

No anon, I'm not arguing I have "experience" and nobody else does. I'm arguing exactly what I'm arguing, which is that we have no evidence of "experience" as a real thing. All we have are reports and behavior. It doesn't matter how strongly you report having them, we still don't have evidence of them, only your reports. It's the same for me. It doesn't matter how strongly one collection of neurons in my brain might fire to another collection in communicating the message "YOU'RE SEEING A PAINTING," the report is the only thing we have evidence for. A more insistent / stronger report only tells us the report was more insistent and stronger, not that the abstract idea of "experience" it's insisting is there really is there.

>ask me to argue my way out of that autism

You're welcome to just assume you're right and not argue, which is what you've wanted to do from the beginning anyway.

>>1798542
I can't believe your proof of like fucking existing isn't good enough, that's literally what you're saying, holy lol I always knew this was board was shit Jesus Mary and Joseph

>>1798564

If it's that obvious and beyond argument then why are you starting an argument over this in the first place? If I were hypothetically compelled to believe with absolute certainty what you apparently believe with absolute certainty I would recognize that I have no way to argue for it or prove it and wouldn't bring it up for discussion.

>>1798592
I don't understand your logic it's like you're denying you even exist

How do you even know about behaviour and behaviour being reported if you aren't experiencing witnessing that behaviour or hearing the reports?


It's like you're saying all that exists is noumena, and there is no phenomenal world. But that is just retarded it should be undeniably self evident to you that in fact all we really have evidence for is phenomena

>>1800424
Welcome to /his/, where someone needs PROOF? EVIDENCE? they're even self-aware

>>1800424
Just imagine that he is a P zombie. Since there is an evident difference between his behavior and yours, it can be concluded that it's possible to have evidence of consciousness and that solipsism is false. So you're wrong either way.

>>1800424

>How do you even know about behaviour and behaviour being reported if you aren't experiencing witnessing that behaviour or hearing the reports?

How does your computer know which keys you pressed if it isn't even experiencing witnessing that typing?

>>1802409
Except a computer isn't reporting its experience to me.

>>1802428

Neither is a person.

>>1802436
So if all accounts of experience are deterministically derived and nothing more than a glorified calculator pumping out outputs according to specific inputs, then you're telling this programming has a "procedure" or a ruleset for how one responds to a poem, or a musical work. So this deterministic bag of flesh can receive the informationless auditory input of a poem, and then responds to it in such a way as if it was a living being that had just heard a poem being performed instead of a string of noises, and you're telling me it's ridiculous to assume there is an experiencer of sensory data.

lol come on brother

>>1802512
>lol, a pile of meat can't do anything complicated, it needs a magical black box to function
Look out guys, this man just disproved all sciences relating to human physiology.

>>1802512

>We must be beyond the realms of physics and causality because of how special we are!

You are bluepilled as fuck, senpai.

>>1802595
>dude consciousness don't real lmao

Give me a break with this shit. You're so out of touch with reality you think you're not actually here experiencing anything, lol. And the worst part is you take this as axiomatic and ask me to prove such crazy premises as "I know that I exist".

>>1802633
Le physics does not in and of itself disprove a conscious observer in the body, come on you're on the spectrum aren't you?

>>>1802656
>Le physics does not in and of itself disprove a conscious observer in the body

But that isn't> the issue at hand. That question is whether that model is sufficient, not whether it disproves other models.

>come on you're on the spectrum aren't you?

And now we know you have lost the debate.

>>1802639

>ask me to prove such crazy premises as "I know that I exist".

Nobody asked you to do that. You're conflating existence with the spook of "experience" / "qualia." A toaster exists, that doesn't mean it has non-physical "experiences" that need explaining.

>>1802656

Nobody said physics disproved your bad idea. The post you're responding to said:

>We must be beyond the realms of physics and causality because of how special we are!

Which is an accurate depiction of your views. You don't believe physics is enough.

>>1802710
No, physics is enough, but a physics that encapsulates the subjective dimension of objective processes, as far as they are discernible in higher animals such as humans.

No, "everything is actually objective and you're just imagining your qualia" is a ridiculous assertion and one you must prove, not one I have to disprove. I never said a toaster, that's the other guy trying to equate a computer's functioning with my consciousness.

There is the content of experience (which is deterministic) and that which receives/experiences/is present for those experiences (the self, the "I", consciousness).

>>1802756

>No, "everything is actually objective and you're just imagining your qualia"

You're revealing that you're still falling for the "qualia" spook by using the word "imagining." You're not imagining it. That would just be more "qualia." You simply don't have it and are instead an organism being made to believe and behave and report in reference to a convenient fiction that has no actual embodiment in the physical reality that does exist. Just like the number five doesn't exist in physical reality. It's a convenient fiction that we can reference to behave and communicate in ways that would be more difficult to replicate if we were limited to only acting in terms of the strictly physical and real.

>>1802791
>dude you're not actually like, conscious right now lmao

why should I believe a word out of a convenient fiction's mouth? Man, thanks for reminding me why I stopped coming here. Lol I'm not actually here right now, I exist in some nominal half-limbo where I perceive my self so I can refer to my self more conveniently. Absolute, terminal, mind-boggling autism.

I don't understand why there is this much drama over conciosuness and qualia, where it either doesn't exist or is magic. Seems like certain brains are flexible enough to think about thought and extrapolate from there, others aren't. Why is that such a big issue?

Exactly, OP.

The question isn't how something exits or is, but rather, that it is.

>>1802892

>a convenient fiction's mouth

Nobody said people were convenient fictions. You're for whatever reason now conflating people with the "experiences" / "qualia" you believe people have.

>>1802931
You're saying my experience of me typing this post now is somehow illusory. And the onus is on me to prove it isn't, which is absurd

>>1802949

>You're saying my experience of me typing this post now is somehow illusory.

Your belief in there being a non-physical "experience" is a false but useful belief. You could call it an "illusion," but you'd have to be careful not to use the definition of "illusion" where you still have "qualia" and it's just appearing to you in a different way.

>>1802976
It is not a belief, it's the very fact of my being here, living breathing, aware of myself as myself. It is non-physical because my "presence" is not locateable in any physical organ, nor does it have spatial dimensions.

>>1803001
>It is non-physical because my "presence" is not locateable in any physical organ, nor does it have spatial dimensions.
Not him, but if you cut off an arm, you still have a "presence." If you cut out the brain, you don't. The brain is the only part that cannot be replaced and still have a "you."

Though here you might ask where specifically in the brain "you" are. This is where a lot of people get tripped up. For a second, let's think about memory. A memory isn't stored in any one particular neuron. A memory is a combination of many neurons firing in a specific pattern, distributed over almost the entire brain. Its in the shape of the entire activation network, and the strength/reinforcement of every connection. So too is the "I" not in any one specific part of the brain, but is a combination of multiple parts in multiple locations working together in a system. That's why you can lose some brainmass and retain most of your function, (though if you lose other more specific parts you suffer quite a bit), because it is distributed, though not evenly, over the entire network.

>>1803001

>It is not a belief

It is a belief.

>the very fact of my being here,
Sure.
>living
Yes.
>breathing,
Also true.
>aware of myself as myself
Depends on your definition of "aware." If you mean "aware" in the same physically explicable way a scale is "aware" of weight pressed upon it or a thermostat is "aware" of increasing room temperature, then yes. If you mean "aware" in the sense of there being non-physical "qualia" requiring new sciences beyond physics to explain, then no.

>It is non-physical because my "presence" is not locateable in any physical organ, nor does it have spatial dimensions.

Your "presence" is your body. What you're really describing are the properties you believe your "qualia" / "experiences" have. Note that non-physicality and lack of location are exactly the qualities we would expect from a non-real abstract reference point used by the brain to substitute for messier physical realities. There are many examples like this of the brain substituting non-real abstract reference points for messier physical realities to give us easier ways to communicate about and act in the real world.

>>1803045
>>1803047

Do you understand that I addressed all these points in the OP, that it doesn't matter what neurological gymnastics the brain is performing. there is nevertheless an undeniable presence in my body? My brain is not my "I", it is where the "I" is consolidated and given the neurological hardware for its cognition. It's like saying digestion is in the stomach, no, it's where digestion as a PHENOMENON takes place. In the same way, my brain is not the "I", it is where self-awareness is rooted but is not equivalent to the phenomenon self-awareness as such (the "that it is" of the OP)

>>1803070

>an undeniable presence

If you want to call it "undeniable," that's fine. But don't try to have an argument about it then because you're admitting from the beginning you aren't willing to question it.

>>1803070
>it is where the "I" is consolidated and given the neurological hardware for its cognition.
Opposite of this. The neurological hardware that existed long prior to the "I" increased in complexity within the context of a social system until the "I" emerged.
>It's like saying digestion is in the stomach, no, it's where digestion as a PHENOMENON takes place
Digestion is in the mouth, stomach and gut, yes. It is a physical process that can only occur because of the specific properties of those organs and the specific properties of food interacting. "Digestion" as a concept cannot really exist independant of this context (or an equivalent one, like an insect vomiting onto its food to digest it). Likewise, the "I", conciousness and qualia cannot really exist outside the specific context of the brain. You can't separate "digestion" from its context any more than you can separate "conciousness", but for some reason people do try to separate the latter.

>>1803098
If you don't think your perception of these words on the screen is not undeniable, or if you don't think an "I" is prequisite for any discussion to even be possible, Idk what to tell you. You're lost. You think the begging the question fallacy trumps my indisputable awareness of my self. Nigga please.

>>1803105

The "I" was always commensurate with the complexity of the nervous system in question.

And once again, missing the point. Whether or not consciousness is separable from the brain is not the problem, the issue is that there are such a thing as brains that give rise to such a thing that is a biological system's awareness of itself. That is the crux of the hard problem: it's saying no model of nature is satisfactory until it can explain the observational capacity that made that model possible in the first place. The strictly physical does not explain the experiential all by itself, there must be an expanding of the concept of then physical to include a qualitative dimension that is opaque to the methods of analysis reserved for mere descriptions of inert quantities and there relations.

>>1803168
>the issue is that there are such a thing as brains that give rise to such a thing that is a biological system's awareness of itself.
Why shouldn't it? If we're accepting that brains are for the awareness of a biological system, then meta-cognition and self-awareness are logical components of an overall complex social system. Understanding/predicting one'a own actions in coordination with understanding/predecting the actions of others, knowing they are doing the same. It's adaptive. Why the hubub?

>>1803168

>If you don't think your perception of these words on the screen is not undeniable

What do you think about blindsight, anon? People who are proven objectively to have information about their surroundings that they got from their eyes but who sincerely believe they are blind? We already know from them that it's possible for people to have sight behavior without reporting an "experience" of sight. So what remains in question is just what you think the people who do report this "experience" are really doing. Do you think they have visual "qualia" and people with blindsight don't? That "blindsight" is a disease of "qualia?" I would instead argue people with blindsight aren't that different from us, it's just that they don't have access to that fictional reference point that we do have access to.

>>1803219
Because materialists would claim the brain "explains" consciousness, which it does not. It's all a ploy to denigrate and reduce subjectivity to some illusion of material interactions, to make anything other than what it obviously, undeniably is: a presence, a here-ness, that is the foundation of everything worth even living for in this reality.

>>1803234
Who is being mistaken about their experience? You're getting hung up on deviations in brain functioning; there is nevertheless a self that is erroneously reporting its sensory inputs. I am not typing this with full awareness of myself and simultaneously not actually aware, this is absurd. You can just as easily say my consciousness is the epiphenomenon of some entity taking a shit in the 5th dimension, and everything I took to be myself is "merely" just 5th dimension fecal particles interacting somewhere. I can say that, why would I believe it? My Self is my Self and nothing else.

>>1803245
>Because materialists would claim the brain "explains" consciousness, which it does not.
Sure it does. Consciousness, as it is perceived, is the set of aware cognitions which occur when a given thought is passes into working memory. Nothing spooky about it.
>obviously, undeniably
There are lots of things that are obvious and undeniable, but wrong. For example, the gamblers fallacy.

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While we're on the topic, considering that I can only ever be aware of my own consciousness, does that mean that I'm immortal?

I don't remember the infinite amount of time before my birth. It was instantaneous as I had no consciousness with which to experience it. I won't be able to experience death. Considering consciousness is the only state of existance I can experience, it is impossible for me to actually "die", at least from my own perspective.

What would it be like, to die and then wake up an uncertain amount of time later? Where would you wake up and why?

>>1803279
Explanation is not a reduction. to say the brain produces consciousness, is true. To say the brain produces consciousness, and so consciousness/subjectivity does not matter/can't attain to truth in its own way/is subjective so it is "wrong", "illusory", "baseless", "just feels" is an error.

>>1803285
A number of dank but obscure philosophers believe you effectively can will yourself into immortality by becoming a consciousness that does not recognize its birth, and so will not recognize its death. In other words, existing in such a way that your "I" is prior to and beyond your biological life.

>>1803306
>and so consciousness/subjectivity does not matter
Depends on what you mean by "matter." If you take it to mean that the universe was created for the benefit of human conciouness, then no. But if you take a humble view of what "matter" means, the actual mechanics of conciouness doesn't interfere with it at all.
>can't attain to truth in its own way/is subjective so it is "wrong", "illusory", "baseless", "just feels" is an error.
Most of these objections are against the elevation of conciousness beyond its actual reality.

>>1803264

>Who is being mistaken about their experience?

Well first, you're assuming "experience" is a real thing, which I don't agree with. Secondly, they're not "mistaken." They have access to information obtained via stimuli to their eyes. They also don't have access to the reference point of "visuals." They don't have access to speak about a tennis ball in the way of their path, but their brain records the tennis ball's existence and they move away to avoid it even though they can't speak about why they moved away.

To me anon, it sounds pretty crazy to claim these people have a disease of "qualia." I think the more likely explanation is they're really just losing access to an abstract reference point that would let them have second order reporting and behavior in response to visual stimuli, not that they're losing some non-physical "experience" spook.

>You're getting hung up on deviations in brain functioning

Throw out all modern medicine if you don't want to consider deviations in normal bodily functions. That's where all the great discoveries come from. You can learn a lot about a mechanism by studying how it breaks down.

>>1803285
>considering that I can only ever be aware of my own consciousness
Since when were you under the impression that there was more than one consciousness?

>>1803351
Look, either you're claiming everyone is a p-zombie except you or you're claiming you're a p-zombie yourself, which is just so autistic I don't even know anymore

>>1803394

>except you

We already went over this. I don't know why you keep on trying to make it sound like solipsism. I have never once claimed there is anything about me different from anything about you.

>you're claiming you're a p-zombie yourself

Sort of. Everyone is a p-zombie, except that the whole thought experiment of p-zombies is invalid because "experience" isn't a real / physical thing to begin with. So nobody has "it," but there isn't anything to have. It's like how people who believe in an afterlife claim atheists believe everything just goes dark when they die. In saying that, they reveal their belief that something still happens after you die (everything going dark).

>>1803431
By what metric is an experience distinguished from one that is real and one that just appears real? You're splitting hairs

>>1803469

>By what metric is an experience distinguished from one that is real and one that just appears real?

A) There is no such thing as "experience" in the real / physical world.
B) There is a fictional reference point of "experience" that gets used in language and behavior even though "experience" is not some object like a rock

Now you used the word "appears real," which is misleading. Nothing "appears" in reality, that's the point. We can contrast blindsight with normal sight and identify differences there between people who have access to the fictional reference point and people who don't. They behave differently without that access. They avoid obstacles in a way that suggest their eyes work, but they can't speak to why they're moving their body out of the way or what they're moving away from.

>>1803496
My experience is real, maybe it's not "real enough" by your argument, but there is indisputably someone typing this. I'm here. I'm awake. I am an experiencer of my body's inputs. Do you really have this much trouble distinguishing between stimuli and the self that feels those stimuli?

>>1803528

>My experience is real, maybe it's not "real enough" by your argument

No, I'm not saying it isn't "real enough." I'm saying it isn't real.

>there is indisputably someone typing this
Yes.
> I'm here.
Sure.
>I'm awake.
I agree.
>I am an experiencer of my body's inputs.
Nope. "Experience" is a linguistic spook. You don't have non-physical "experiences" in reality.

>Do you really have this much trouble distinguishing between stimuli and the self that feels those stimuli?

You're assuming I'm failing to realize the reality of what I'm arguing doesn't exist. The alternative is it doesn't exist and you're failing to realize it.

The hard problem of consciousness is that your brain deliberately denies you the answer. What you feel and experience is a very small, narrow view of what your brain is actually thinking/doing.

>>1803582
Word games. You can agree I'm here but you can't concede that "here-ness" is real? Just babble, and you guys call religious language woo woo.

>>1803596

>Word games

Exactly, you're falling victim to language, which is why you believe in "experiences" as some real / physical thing that needs explaining. Wittgenstein and Gilbert Ryle both explained this issue as a language problem.

>>1803596

>You can agree I'm here

Yes. You are a living organism and you take up space.

>you can't concede that "here-ness" is real

What is "here-ness?" I don't deny objects have space they take up if that's what "here-ness" is. I deny that there's such a thing as "experience" / "qualia" in physical reality if that's what you're trying to make "here-ness" means.

>>1797184
> hard problem of consciousness is not a question of what consciousness is (as an emergent biological phenomenon reducible to this or that understanding of the brain), but that it is

>Refute this

If it has nothing to do with what consciousness is, why not talk about the Hard Problem of Magnets instead?

>>1803754
Wittgenstein disowned his Tractatus, not to mention even in the Tractatus he says there are some things that transcend what can be communicated.

>>1803772

>there are some things that transcend what can be communicated

He basically said where you can't talk about it, don't. He would say if you believe in some pre-lingual phenomena that exists beyond understanding or argument then you shouldn't bother talking about it.

>>1803763
My conscious presence in the world.

>>1803767
Because subjectivity is not the objective by its very nature, and so attempting to reduce it to the objective does not resolve the problem of the true relationship between perspectival consciousness and and the acentered universe that obviously gives rise to it

>>1803788

>My conscious presence in the world.

Your body has presence in the world. Your "consciousness" does not.

>>1803787
Uh, no, as in, if it can't be spoken, stay silent, not "if you don't agree with me about everything reducing to language, shut up"

>>1803794
I am present in the world. I am the awareness of my body, or rather I am my body's awareness, period. That awareness is here. I mean "presence" as a being-here not a literal three-dimensional body ya git

>>1803800

I never claimed everything can be reduced to language. I claimed the "qualia" issue is a language problem. As in if you believe "qualia" simply "is" in some immediate and unspeakable way then you probably shouldn't try arguing about it. Regardless of if you're right or wrong, if you believe it's something that can't be questioned then arguing about it isn't going to make much sense.

>>1803836
The qualia issue is debatable, nevertheless my consciousness "is" in an immediate and unspeakable way, and it is perfectly appropriate to bring this up when it's such a snag for autists who can't into the hard problem

>>1803842

>The qualia issue is debatable, nevertheless my consciousness "is" in an immediate and unspeakable way

You literally cannot believe both of those things at the same time and be correct. The second premise makes the first premise not debatable. If your "consciousness" definitely "is," that's another way of saying your "qualia" definitely "are." And if you're of that belief without doubting it then you are not allowing the issue to be debatable.

>>1803849
No, even in a sensory deprivation tank I undoubtedly "am"

>>1803865

That's fine. I don't even have to call you wrong to point out that you can't have an argument from that position though. You're assuming the thing you're trying to argue about. Getting rid of the specific sensory aspects of "qualia" with a sensory deprivation tank doesn't change how you can't have an argument about that if you're "undoubtedly" certain from the beginning it is that way.

>>1803875
A consciousness is presupposes in the very act of discussion. This consciousness is non-linguistic. I don't understand how you can possibly contest this. This is the last time I'm repeating myself.

>>1803886

>A consciousness is presupposes in the very act of discussion. This consciousness is non-linguistic. I don't understand how you can possibly contest this.

That's fine. But don't bother trying to argue about it then. It's really very simple, anon. Choose one:

A) Believe "consciousness" is incontestably a real thing that can't be questioned and don't have arguments about it because it can't be contested

B) Believe "consciousness" is a real thing that can be questioned and do have arguments about it

I can argue with you if you choose B. I can't if you choose A.

>>1803901
I'm tired of this. You can't question the existence of your consciousness if you want to have a discussion, we didn't spring up ex nihilo to have this argument before we sink back into the eternal void, you have to grant the existence of a consciousness to say or argue anything. I'm done.

the hard problem of consciousness is the same as the hard problem of anything existing at all

>>1803911

>You can't question the existence of your consciousness if you want to have a discussion

It's the opposite. You can't *not* question it if you want to argue about it. Even if we assume for the sake of argument that is the way things are, you still can't have an argument about it if it's something you "undoubtedly" believe in.

> we didn't spring up ex nihilo to have this argument before we sink back into the eternal void

No, there are organisms who have symbols that get transmitted through a computer network and that's how this conversation takes place. None of that requires the belief in "consciousness" / "qualia" as literal objects existing in the real world.

>you have to grant the existence of a consciousness to say or argue anything

It's the opposite. You can't insist we have to grant that or else you have nothing to argue about. If I say "you undoubtedly must believe Jesus Christ is our Lord and Savior if you want to argue with me about whether or not Christianity is valid," you would have no real way of arguing with me about it because I'm admitting from the beginning I've made up my mind.

>>1803984
Do you really not see the difference between positing consciousness as the necessary ground for a discussion and a Jehovah's witness spiel? You're autistic my man. It's not up for discussion.

>>1797184
consciousness is a real phenomenon, but agency is an illusion. everything happens according to the laws of physics, even the illusion of human will.

>>1804000

>Do you really not see the difference between positing consciousness as the necessary ground for a discussion and a Jehovah's witness spiel?

There are difference like with any analogy, but the two examples are definitely analogous. Why are you trying to have an argument about an idea you're admitting you accept as "undoubtedly" true? Even if were hypothetically true, you wouldn't be able to have a meaningful argument about it if you're unable to doubt it.

>>1804032
Your argument would stand if I was arguing for the self-evidence of anything that isn't necessary for the very act of arguing in the first place.

>>1804050

Even if I assume for the sake of argument that what you're assuming is true is in fact:

>necessary for the very act of arguing in the first place

That would still mean it wouldn't make sense for you to try arguing about it. If you believe something isn't up for argument, you of course can't have a sane argument about it. I don't even have to say whether or not the thing you're assuming is false to point this out.

>>1797207

>it's an evolutionary psychology episode

>>1797184
>that these processes give rise to living, feeling presence
Why wouldn't they?

>>1804121

Yes, and that argument is the problem.

>I believe this thing and it's not up for debate.
>Now pls debate me.

>>1797273

g = 9.8m/s^2 is not the same as the phenomenal experience of free fall. likewise dopamine is not the same as joy.

>>1804137

It's an assertion, not an argument.

>>1804140
No, but the constant 9.8m/s^2 acting upon a body near the earth's surface not supported by another body and only acted upon potentially by air resistence is. Things are situated within systems. Dopamine is not joy, dopamine (and othet chemcals) acting within the context of a brain is joy.

>>1798006

No, it's nothing like saying that. It's more like saying no matter how much we know about subjectivity and its production, we will never be able to experience reality without it, ever.

>>1804152
>the physical cannot explain the fact of its being
How so?

>>1798030

Reporting by and for whom?

>>1804155
>A formula for free fall is not the experience of free fall itself
And I very explicitly said it wasn't. The formula is a way of describing one comoonent of an observable behaviour, contextualized by the other components. Like I said.

>>1797184
>it's a "useless sophistry to disguise some ideology" thread

&Humanities was a mistake

>>1804152

>consciousness is "just" atoms

Who is calling "consciousness" atoms?

>the physical cannot explain the fact of its being

That's exactly why you don't have an argument. You wrote:

>fact of its being

And then you're asking people to debate you at the same time as you're insisting it can't be debated because it just "is." Even if what you believe were true, you should probably understand it makes no sense to try have an argument about it. You're starting from the position of assuming it can't be anything other than true. You're free to have a belief like that, you could even be right, but one thing you can't reasonably do is have a belief like that and then expect to be able to have a coherent argument about it. All you're able to do with a belief like that is repeatedly assert that it's true.

>>1798147

funny, i'm not seeing arguments from your camp, save for unargued assertions about what does and does not count as an argue.

>>1804174
>WHAT the mechanism that brought this universe into being is irrelevant, THAT there is a such a thing as being is entirely another and not explainable by beings themselves.
Yes it is. If we know how it came to be, that explains that it came to be right there.

>>1798475

this is a really juvenile attempt to turn the linguistic turn against humanism. it's been done before and better.

>>1804196
Right, because those are two different questions. It's like asking someone what time it is, they answer, and you reject their answer because it doesn't explain relativity. That wasn't the context of your original question. We can know about conciousness, the reason it exists and how it came to be, without knowing what happened at t=0 because we have a relatively good idea of everything after that.

>>1804161

>Reporting by

Organisms, for one. An organism engages in pain behavior when it steps on some broken glass and grabs communicates their "pain" to another organism. Another sort of reporting is from one layer of nodes in the brain to another. Impulses are fired from one part of the brain to another. These signals / patterns carry over long term beliefs, memories, habits, etc. related to stimuli as well as second order beliefs / memories / habits about first order beliefs / memories / habits. None of this requires the existence of "qualia" as a real thing. They work just fine with an abstract referent that doesn't ever exist in physical reality. If the signals and the organism himself have something to communicate about / behave around, then that's sufficient.

>for whom

When organisms do it, it's mostly communication that goes out to other organisms. It isn't intentionally done this way since an organism will engage in some pain behavior even when getting injured in private, but "for other organisms" is generally the answer to that question. And while you can talk about an organism or a brain as though these are singular objects, these are really composite objects with many separate, varyingly autonomous parts working together. So part of the answer is for itself, though "itself" is misleading since it sounds like a singular thing. The brain isn't really just sending messages to itself as one thing; it's a network and messages are sent from one layer of nodes to another. Information is communicated in different ways throughout different parts of this network to carry over bundles of potential behavior over time.

>>1804201

>the fact of existence

You're conflating existence with "qualia" / "experience" / "consciousness." Just because we exist doesn't mean we really have non-physical "am-ness" or "redness" or "pain" or "anger" phantasms floating around. We exist, and those things are really just abstract fictions that stand in for messier cause and effect stimuli / reaction relationships and conditioned behavior.

>>1804239
There is nothing about conciousness that presents any issue to a "physicalist" model of the universe, though. And what is self evident to a brain in isolation is largely irrelevant, because brains are easy to fool. Now, you might say that that particular statement betrays the fact that there is even something to fool. But of course there is, because brains exist.

>>1804263
>"just atoms maaaan" is bankrupt
It's not just atoms, correct. It is also molecules, cells, electric charges, self-referencing networks, etc. Saying that conciousness is "just physical" refers to the fact that it is "non-mystical" like everything else in the universe. >>1804226 is a pretty good summary of how it actually works, though obviously simplified because brains are actually extremely complex. Why you would reject it is strange if you're acknowledging it is physical.

>>1804284
I don't see anyone saying conciousness is just atoms. I've seen many people say it is a complex physical system, like many others in the universe.

>>1804291
It doesn't matter what you actually say, he will just be back tomorrow with an almost-identical OP whining to himself about "fedora physicalists".

>>1804375
>how dare you call me out when I shitpost my agenda endlessly every day for months

Why would someone kill themselves if they weren't conscious? Like why would a perfectly healthy human try to escape their experience of life if they weren't actually feeling that experience?

File: albanian-map.gif (16KB, 350x300px) Image search: [Google]

16KB, 350x300px

The Albanian language.

OK, let us consider that any mass migration of peoples to the region after 1 BC or even much earlier would be noted by the surrounding people, that had come well on their way in advancement regarding writing.

Does it not then only remain that, Albanian, with its unique linguistic stucture, must be the remnants or the continuation of tongue spoken by native (non-Slavic) peoples of the Balkans?

>>1797184
>as an emergent biological phenomenon reducible to this or that understanding of the brain

[citation needed]