Materialists on suicide watch

>>8303703
kek, fuck off, shitter.

You and your memycist.

>>8303703
Saying that something is insanely complicated is not saying that the giant jew in the sky did it.

>>8303703

>World's Smartest Physicst

That's not Max Tegmark.

>>8303703

>calling someone the "smartest" scientist

oh yeah, and how will you measure that? can you quantify intelligence?

if you say through IQ testing I've got land on Mars to sell you...

>>8303703
>be me, urtuhk, master of the scribes school of thanak
>2016 before christ
>one day a bunch of people arrive
>they call themselves masters of the shadows
>they ask to speak with me about philosophy
>urtuhk, do you think shadows are real?
>no, they are just an illusion
>but you can see them, how do you deny their existence?
>they exist but they are not real. If you remove the sun or the object that cast the shadow they disappear. And they cannot influence the object they are casted upon
>urtuhk this is madness you refuse to acknowledge what your eyes see
>I'm tired of this
>at least tell me if you think that studying shadows is important
>it's more important to study the sun the and flames, not it's their projections
>thanak is a nest of pigs

>>8303703

He needs to be more specific. What processes under the umbrella of "consciousness" does he think we either haven't already "cracked" or never will "crack?"

>muh hard problem

Hard problem isn't real. "Qualia" is properly explained in terms of reportability / reporting behaviors. There isn't a magical floating pain phantasm that haunts you when you stub your toe. Your physical body reacts in part to the toe stubbing by causing you to behave in a manner we call "in pain" (e.g. saying "ow," tensing muscles, associating this event with other past "pain" events to form a new impetus for future speaking behavior, etc.) and we abstract a thing behind this behavior so we can speak in terms of it, "the pain," instead of in terms of behavior. This is much like how there isn't a magical floating 4 behind every instance of an object and a similar object and a similar object and a similar object. We abstract something in common between "4" apples, "4" rocks, and "4" seasons and speak in terms of it instead of in terms of just the physical things in themselves.

So in that sense I agree people like him will never accept any amount of explanation on how consciousness works as enough to qualify as "cracking" it. This is a limitation with their minds though, not a limitation of science. They're waiting for an answer to an incoherent question premised in a faulty conviction about reality.

>>8303703

>Physics
>Not inferior to Math

>Physicists
>Knowing what they are saying

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>>8303703
As if this wasn't obvious.

And Witten "World's smartest physicist"? Please, string theorists just love to suck his cock.

>>8303754
well at least someone has everything figured out.... i think he needs to read more derrida tbqh.

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>>8303703
>He also reaffirmed his belief that string theory will turn out to be “right.”

>World's Smartest Physicist Thinks Science Can't Crack Consciousness


So, what quantifies "Smartness"?

>>8303754
hello zombo

>>8303824
>It's interesting to contrast Witten's thoughts with John Horgan's End of Science thesis…
>author mentions himself in the third person

This article is cancerous on so many levels.

>Physicist Edward Witten: “I think consciousness will remain a mystery… I have a much easier time imagining how we understand the Big Bang than I have imagining how we can understand consciousness.” Credit: Institute for Advanced Study.

>"I THINK..."

He thinks that? Whoa, I think otherwise.

>>8303754
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_zombie

>>8303703
There's literally no inconsistency in being both a materialist and a mysterian, you dumb faggot cuck.

sage

>>8303836
>>8303845

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

>>8303845
it's useless to link him to that, p-zombies can't understand what p-zombie means

>>8303852

>>8303850

>>8303855
>>8303850

autists confirmed without consciousness

what would be the alternative to physicalism?

>Physicalism is the idea that all aspects of human nature can be explained by physical means: specifically, all aspects of human nature and perception can be explained from a neurobiological standpoint.

this seems about right.

>>8303865

You've impressively discovered a way to take the already wrong philosophical zombie argument and make it even more wrong. The whole point of the p-zombie argument is that you wouldn't be able to notice any difference between a p-zombie and a normal person.

>>8303871
You can, if you take into account the ability to collapse quantum mechanical wave functions.

>>8303871
The fact that that is possible automatically means that physicalism loses its explanatory power of the phenomenon of subjective perception.

>inb4 but you're assuming it exists therefore you're being circular

Yeah no fucking shit

>>8303834
>So, what quantifies "Smartness"?

Willingness to opine about subjects that one hasn't studied and knows nothing about.

>>8303876

So Cartesian dualism wasn't bad enough for you, you had to add quantum mysticism flapdoodle to the mix.

>>8303703
>consciousness
>physicist

welp I guess #imwithdescartes now

>>8303879

>The fact that that is possible

It isn't possible. Go read some Daniel Dennett, he sorted this bullshit out for you years ago.

>>8303871
false, a p-zombie is exposed to the same information as a real person, except it lacks ability for introspection. What "consciousness" really mean evades him because he can't experience it. He can only grasp the behaviourist and functionalist aspect of it, and therefore reduce everything to that, failing to see the point

>>8303888
Dennett is a joke. He actually managed to convince me of dualism.

>he thinks
Ok.

>>8303892

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/zombies/

>Yet zombies behave just like us, and some even spend a lot of time discussing consciousness.
>behave just like us

You don't even understand the shitty argument you're trying to appeal to.

>>8303888
His arguments are ridiculous and trivial I already read them.

The "yo dude I'm going to copy this physical state from a robot that experiences seeing red and map into my brain so that I get the same brain state and I will now know how seeing red is like" is the exact argument a peenor zombie would make.

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>>8303884
brainlet pls

You can't even grasp von Neumann's IQ.

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>>8303893

>literally admitting to being a dualist

>>8303896
>and some even spend a lot of time discussing consciousness.
here you are boy

>>8303899

Do you believe Von Neumann was as smart as the great Ancient Egyptian mathematicians

honestly?

>>8303900
I don't like it either, but Dennett's arguments in favor of dualism are so convincing.

>>8303754
I encourage you to read Christoph Kochs book, he provides a somewhat more plausible argument that allows for qualia to exist without going to this extreme, essentially he describes qualia as the 'internal' aspect of consciousness and the physical manifestation (the information of pain reception, biological processes etc) to be the 'external' aspect. I can't do it justice in one paragraph but he provides at least a consistent argument that classifies qualia as an 'aspect' of the phenomenon instead of separating it into immaterialness.

>>8303908

No, I appreciate it. You've brought the level of discourse down so low that I now feel OK about leaving this thread and doing something else.

>>8303892
>failing to see the point

why would he fail to see the point if he lacks the ability for introspection?

>>8303754
Oh look, it's the "qualia have to be immaterial ontological entities" strawman. Qualia is just a word for subjective experience, goofball.

You appealed to authority, and kept crying "circular argument." You have no one else to blame but yourself.

>>8303731

Underrated. This is exactly what people talking about "consciousness" and "qualia" today are like.

>>8303917
well it's phisical being fails to behave like some real individual who sees the point, I admit I got sloppy with the phrasing

>>8303911
If you actually read Dennett, you'll have no choice but to become a dualist. After seeing all his arguments and thought experiments AGAINST his own position, it is simply impossible to take reductionism seriously anymore. Dennett is unique in his own way, as he is the only philosopher I know of who rigorously destroys his own stance and successfully convinces the reader of the opposite.

>>8303919
If I may, you haven't explained away the existence of a subjective experience just by saying it exists. What are the mechanisms behind it? For example, how could you make a computer experience qualia? At best we know that mammals all experience to some level, so we can correlate something in the mammalian brain to it, for example the neocortex, but what does a qualia even look like in terms of atoms, energy, etc. It isn't as easy a problem as you say.

Leibniz

It must be confessed, moreover, that perception, and that which depends on it, are inexplicable by mechanical causes, that is, by figures and motions, And, supposing that there were a mechanism so constructed as to think, feel and have perception, we might enter it as into a mill. And this granted, we should only find on visiting it, pieces which push one against another, but never anything by which to explain a perception. This must be sought, therefore, in the simple substance, and not in the composite or in the machine.

>>8303937
>What are the mechanisms behind it?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_function_collapse

>>8303934
Accepting Dualism lets you quite easily then accept a ghostly free will which can impose an extra-natural force on the laws of physics, which has never been shown to occur and is probably hogwash. Dualism solves one problem and creates umpteen more.

>>8303954
Quantum wave functions are an explanation behind physics in very very small space. What has that to do with getting a subjective experience out of a bunch of neurons firing?

>>8303962
>Accepting Dualism lets you quite easily then accept a ghostly free will which can impose an extra-natural force on the laws of physics
Your ignorance is showing. I wasn't talking about substance dualism.

>>8303962
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_mind

>>8303975
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_mind
>Penrose determined wave function collapse was the only possible physical basis for a non-computable process.

>human thinking is non-computable

ok so its a theory built on a fallacy that has been proven wrong decades ago. Thanks for clearing that up.

>>8303972
You accept Dualism but not free will then?

>>8303983
>built on a fallacy that has been proven wrong decades ago
Source: Your ass?
Sorry brainlet, but just because you lack the abstract reasoning to understand theoretical models, this doesn't invalidate said models.

>>8303983
Free will is a logical impossibility. Not even dualism can fix that.

>>8303975

Debunked a thousand times over. Here's one straightforward kill shot:

http://arxiv.org/pdf/quant-ph/9907009.pdf

>We find that the decoherence timescales ~10^{-13}-10^{-20} seconds are typically much shorter than the relevant dynamical timescales (~0.001-0.1 seconds), both for regular neuron firing and for kink-like polarization excitations in microtubules. This conclusion disagrees with suggestions by Penrose and others that the brain acts as a quantum computer, and that quantum coherence is related to consciousness in a fundamental way.

You have two choices:

1) Neuron firing is not involved in consciousness
2) Quantum computation is not involved in consciousness

Note that we have an incredibly massive wealth of evidence for neuron firing's involvement in consciousness.

>>8303991
Bringsjord, S. and Xiao, H. 2000. A Refutation of Penrose's Gödelian Case Against Artificial Intelligence. Journal of Experimental and Theoretical Artificial Intelligence


Also see Wolfram's computational equivalence theory.

>>8304001
That interpretation does not follow from the data.

>>8304002
Thanks, I'll check this out.

>>8304024
>That interpretation does not follow from the data.

I'm afraid it does, have you ever studied probabilities? On the macro scale they average out and can be summarized with a basic average rate. if quantum effects are on a time scale 10^-13 shorter than neuron effects, in dynamical systems for example we would treat the former as a constant and get no error in our result. See oscillation relaxation if you want to understand this more.

>>8303731
kek

>>8304024

>That interpretation does not follow from the data.

It unambiguously does follow from the data.

>>8303731
fucking 10/10 my man

>>8303729
IQ TESTS INTELLIGENCE GET OVER IT YOU BRAINLET

>>8304031
>>8304036
You don't understand the model.

>>8304045

I'm not even saying anything Max Tegmark didn't write himself in that paper. His words:

>This conclusion disagrees with suggestions by Penrose and others that the brain acts as a quantum computer, and that quantum coherence is related to consciousness in a fundamental way.

Ok then, please refute this >>8304031 and enlighten me on how it is misinterpreting the model. You are at least willing to do that, are you not?

>>8304045
I'm still waiting for an answer.

>>8303703
even the smartest people are often wrong, especially when they comment on the subject they dont specialize in

>>8304596
What would you classify consciousness as a problem of? Philosophy? Neuroscience? Systems Biology? Chemistry?

>>8304612
Would you classify consciousness as a problem of theoretical physics?

>>8304637
I would say it depends on who you ask. Penrose has weighed in on it after all. Note how you avoided my question, not that easy to answer, is it?

>>8304596

Very true. They get cocky because they did well in one discipline which leads them to start believing they must be capable of solving the big problems of every other discipline.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linus_Pauling#Medical_research_and_vitamin_C_advocacy
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Crick#Neuroscience_and_other_interests

>>8304642

>Penrose has weighed in on it

Unfortunately.

>>8304642
>Penrose has weighed in on it after all
did he use theoretical physics to do it?
was his impact useful in any way?

>not that easy to answer, is it
or maybe i think your question was formulated wrong, or was irrelevant and intentionally misleading

>>8304659
Yes, he started the Quantum Theory of Mind. Whatever your opinion about that theory itself it started a lot of interesting conversations.

You still haven't answered which field you think consciousness should be the sole possession of. My intentions in asking the question would be irrelevant if you were confident in your answer.

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>>8304677
>My intentions in asking the question would be irrelevant if you were confident in your answer.

>>8303703
Lol

>>8303703
>string theory

This is a board avout science. Take that pseudoscience bullshit to >>>/x/

>>8303869
It would be bullshit and pseudoscience.

>>8303876
lol what?
Human beings don't cause wave functions to collapse. Interaction with other systems does.

>>8303991
You are the faghot that is flailing around magical thinking. I think you should just shut up.

why exactly should we care what a physicist thinks about biology?

>>8303703
Philosophically, he's 100% correct. We will never have evidence nor explanation that isn't self referential and circular reasoning.

Functionally, the world has accepted and moved on from the dilemmas of Descartes et al, there is no other approach but faith in the utilities of the mind, and the existence of the material.

And it's all quite fine. Both sides tend to be deficient in this. One denies the logical and epistemological reality, the other denies we just have to work with how it all is. Very maddening tribal state of affairs.

>>8306237
because biology is applied physics

>>8306237
Also this.

Physicists like to think they understand every single machine the universe is capable of producing. In reality, when it comes to biological systems, they usually don't know shit, and what they think they know is all arrogant presuppositions.

>physicists commenting on other fields
Uuuugh
>string theorist commenting on consciousness
Listen, I'm not a string theorist, but the field interests me and I could talk about it at some length. I would not, however, share my armchair views with press or (worse) put them down in book form to be immortalized for all eternity. I am looking at you, celebrity physicists. It would be like I (neuroscience) providing armchair opinions on applied mathematics (P DOES equal NP!)

>>8306243
dumbest comic ever

t. mathematician

hey, i'm a biologist. if physicists can comment on my field then i can comment on theirs

i don't think string theory is ever going to be more than mental masturbation

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>>8306245
>Physicists understand every single machine the universe
correct

>>8306254
see
>arrogant presuppositions
calculus is straight-up not necessary for many fields of biology. if you ever need to touch math, you're using basic descriptive statistics

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This physicist has already cracked it (my big toe.com )

>>8306250
no serious physicist entertains string theory, so what's your point anyway?

>>8306261
No wonder biology doesn't make any progress, while physics does constant progress

The day we are done explaining the universe, we'll go and explain your kid's field too. Just wait.

>>8306254
I really wish I could optimize that png right now.

>>8303731
/threaduk

>>8306301
like what?

>>8306321
Its file size.

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>implying the self isn't an illusion

>>8306575
doesn't solve consciousness. What you meant to say was:
>implying matter is real

>>8306619
>doesn't solve consciousness
Indeed it doesn't, but dropping the unfounded hypothesis of the existence of a completely separate watcher sitting between every pair of eyes, that's simultaneously the thinker of thoughts and maker of decisions, cuts short a lot of mental onanism (free will vs. determinism, consciousness of animals or AI, the whole shebang of split-brain patients behaving sometimes like one mind and sometimes like two) without denying the reality of "one's own" experience here and now.

>>8303703
>Materialists on suicide watch
try to be moar hyperbolic,
sensationalist attentionfag

>>8303703
>(((Edward Witten)))

>>8303995
I'm not him, can you expand on that?

>>8303703
Why do we let physicists opine on non-physics topics again?

>>8308141
Why do I want to be a conic section?

>>8306264
>physics does constant progress
Woah don't get ahead of yourself. Modern physics is useless, you guys discovered everything we needed almost a century ago. Useful physics is what engineers do, sorry.

>>8308537
>he has no authority, he can't be right

>>8308551
It's actually more that they expect they -do- have authority, since they're good at physics.

I mean it's like the pope expecting a physicist to take his opinions on QM seriously because he's the pope.

>>8308554
What would you do in his stead to avoid that issue?
Since you're a physicist by profession you only get to have a saying in physics?

>>8308566
>Since you're a physicist by profession you only get to have a saying in physics?
Of course not. But I just don't see (sane) neuroscientists doing press releases on their grand unified field theories and suchlike. Physicists have a notable propensity to this sort of shit, and it's quite frankly embarrassing.

>>8308568
So if he were to just publish his rubbish on his website & just talk about them when questioned it would have fine?

>>8308583
No he'd still be a crackpot.

Look, I'm not saying that you have to be a physicist to understand physics, but the vast, vast majority people who aren't physicists don't understand physics - and certainly don't have such a grasp of the subject that they're able to contribute original valuable work to the field. The same applies to other fields.

I mean I have opinions about shit that I'm not qualified to speak to on numerous topics but when I share these I couch it with an acknowledgement that it's little more than idle speculation.

>>8303731
By that logic everything that we define as real cannot have its existence proved through the effects that it projects.

What is the wind, for example? You are setting up your epistemological framework way differently that it is widely accepted.