I occasionally say that one can know things independent of one's own mind. — Punshhh

That is interesting, please elaborate.

Barrett’s theory is constructionist - she successfully refutes essentialist assumptions made in classical emotion theory, which claim from intuitive and unconscious relational behaviour and historically misappropriated information that all ‘emotions’ must therefore be instinctual, and that each ‘emotion’, from pain to happiness, comes from an essence or fingerprint that is universal and identifiable across all human experience. Yet no such fingerprint can be found. — Possibility

If you believe DNA is biased to be, then this would be the fingerprint to refute Barrett's argument.
A bias is emotional information. If DNA is biased, then all life is biased. Emotion is the essential element that all thought bounces off to create self organization. Without it there is no impetus to self organize, as per a P.Zombie. This argument applies to all life.

Pain is an emotion, slightly different for everybody, there are gradations of pain, the absence of pain has a quality different to pain. It is an emotional gradient. Some people hardly feel it, others feel it intensely and choose death in preference to a life of pain.

Well, we’re in disagreement there. Your thoughts have a greater impact on your biochemical state than you realise — Possibility

Come on, you know what I'm talking about - what role do you play in protein synthesis, or immune response, or all the other biological processes which we are not even aware of? Extracellular consciousness is all about extracellular self organization, whilst intracellular consciousness takes care of intracellular self organisation. They agree on the PPS.

just as you can quantify and construct a probabilistic experience of ‘red’. — Possibility

Please quantify and construct a probabilistic experience of red for me. I think you will find it is impossible with reason alone.

I have read over our long and interesting conversation, and I think it really boils down to whether or not you accept DNA is biased to be. I think it is logical to say that it is, and from this understanding I construct an algorithm for consciousness / self organization that works like a self loading mouse trap.
This unifies extracellular, and intracellular consciousness. I don't think this is a possibility from brain centric conceptions of consciousness, and ideas that emotions are created in the brain. Of course brain function integrates information and translates it to emotion, it is multifunctional, but emotions themselves are something fundamental, and exist in some form in all of life, including brainless life. This is the logic of it, and it is an impossible assertion to make for a materialistic academic, as it is so problematic for the western lifestyle in so many different ways. But, I believe, If you are not entirely self interested then it is something worth considering, as it instills a respect and responsibility for all other life that is not generally found in the materialistic paradigm.

I disagree - If you read what I wrote, I mentioned that Barrett uses the term ‘affect’ to distinguish between ‘emotions’ of everyday language, as concepts constructed in the brain, and your idea of ‘emotion-information’ - what Denton confusingly refers to as ‘emotion’ (not to be confused with ‘emotions’) - as a relational structure consisting of qualitative information at a bio-chemical level. — Possibility

I think the strongest insight of my theory is that emotions orient us in our personally constructed reality relative to the information surrounding us - as per the instance of consciousness in the OP. Do you agree with this, and how dose it square with Barrett's view?

You’re effectively trying to isolate some arbitrary concept of ‘brain consciousness’ not only from any relation to cellular structures, but also from our integrated multi-cellular system, and then claiming it isn’t as complex as cellular-level consciousness. It’s a whole other level of complexity. — Possibility

My thoughts have very little control of my biology. I am not involved in that aspect of self organization at all. Extracellular consciousness is distinct and separate but linked to the whole via the PPS, in my view. Each of our organs are specialized, but linked to the whole via consciousness - each performing a specialist role. I think if we could visualize human self organization it would not be a perfect sphere, but a lumpy whole similar to a protein - unified in a best effort evolutionary manner. I think you have overstated my claims. However, simulating the basic pancreatic trypsin inhibitor over the course of a millisecond took a supercomputer about 100 days. This sort of complexity was already in existence a billion years ago when animal life first arose. An evolving brain, initially a weak system, would have to evolve on top of this superior underlying system of self organization.

I think what you refer to as ‘an emotionally charged setting’ IS that qualitative information: the relational structure of reality. Qualitative information manifests as this relational structure (matter); quantitative information manifests as energy. Not charge AND information (again with the dualism?). It isn’t just a matter of unentangling - it’s about understanding how all information interrelates. To ‘unentangle’ is to ignore, isolate or exclude the relations that give the information its structure, tipping the bias. The more ‘unentangled’ the information appears, the more biased/affected. — Possibility

Have you mixed up your qualitative and quantitative here? The way I see it, incoming information has two aspects to it , the quantitative ( reasonable / facts ) and qualitative ( emotional ) aspects to it. Reason can distinguish between the two to some extent, but can in no way dissect and reasonably interact with the emotional aspect - you can not describe red. You must feel it! The emotional aspect of consciousness belongs to the cellular consciousness, I believe.

To unentangle is to analyze, not ignore or exclude.

I don’t believe emotion-information is limited by logical possibility. — Possibility

Neither do I. This is the fascinating thing about cellular consciousness - that such complexity evolved without a reasonable brain.

Well, I dispute that all self-organisation is self-interested — Possibility

Self organization is, by definition, self interested. It is organization relative to self. This dose not exclude collaboration, awareness and connection, nor self sacrifice for the greater good. We self organize relative to external information, through a belief system, that exists and has evolved in a collective system of self organization,

This doesn’t conflict with Denton’s interpretation, that I can see, except that what he refers to as a ‘force’ is, in Barrett’s theory, inseparable from information, as you say. — Possibility

She states that emotions are created in the brain. This would be incompatible with Denton's view and your statement : " I’m certainly not denying its complexity, nor the influence of qualitative relations at that level".
Cellular complexity reveals a very sophisticated process of self organization ( consciousness ). I would reckon it rivals, and in some respects exceeds, extracellular brain consciousness, particularly in relation to protein synthesis. Acknowledging this and acknowledging that emotions play a role, I believe, is key to understanding consciousness

Either everything is information (in which case qualia IS information), — Possibility

Yes, that is how I understand it. Information has qualitative and quantitative aspects packaged into one unit. It is created in an emotionally charged setting, or a biased setting, both for animate and inanimate matter, and so reflects this charge, but the charge and information is not miscible, rather it exists as an emulsion, and we can unentangle some of the charge rationally, but only in an emotionally charged setting of our own mind / belief system / sanity. So this process can unentangle some of the charge, but also adds extra charge to the information. So it is always biased or affected information. It is an exceedingly difficult process to articulate and account for all the complexity - it almost requires its own theory.
In the end you get this emotional-information construction which can be negatable, by providing an instance of organic unemotional information - which I believe is logically impossible, since everything is in a process of self interested self organization, so any information it creates will reflect this.
I then applied this to the big bang theory and, as previously explained, concluded emotional - information causes the universe to collapse in on itself and self organize, and all of its components likewise are self organizing, and we are the most self organized. So, according to my model, self organization = consciousness, and emotional-information creates it. The P.Zombie argument would supports this, but I have other logical arguments.
Expressions of consciousness may be able to indirectly create unemotional information - I'm undecided, and still working on this.

The binary I’m referring to, by the way, is your ‘bias to be’. You’re suggesting it is fundamentally a bias (towards one bit of information rather than another), which suddenly and without explanation becomes a set of instructions in DNA to construct an emotion gradient within a four-dimensional system. I have suggested an elegant structure of evolution in complexity from quantum physics to consciousness that enables this, but it seems you won’t consider it either because it, too, appears biased towards a materialist argument, and challenges idealist assumptions. — Possibility

A bias to be is not binary. A bias is an aversion to something and an attraction to its opposite. It has two extreme points and then all the points in between. It is analogue. We share 50% of our DNA with a banana. All life shares common DNA, and the bias to be must be among this genetic information. When I have an attraction or an aversion to someone - a bias - I'm feeling an emotion. No reason is necessary other then they have attractive or repulsive qualities, relative to my self organization. This provides impetus to behavior, and all behavior must have impetus, whether it be on cellular or human scale. Emotion is the force that creates any process of self organization or consciousness, so emotion must be present in cellular organization. If a cell has a bias to be, then it has emotion. This is the logic of it. How it actually manifests itself physically I don't know, If that is what you are asking. I imagine it is not a singular thing but belongs to all the component parts in some way.

When I affirm my theory I do not necessarily dismiss yours. I also suspect there is quantum complexity contributing to all this, however I'm trying to put the logic together from things that we already know.

‘it’s relations all the way down’, relational structure is ontologically subsistent, and individual ‘objects’ are merely heuristic devices used by agents to orient themselves in regions of spacetime, and to construct approximate representations of the world. — Possibility

I don't entirely disagree with this. As an idealist though, ultimately there are systems of self organization that experience reality through those systems of self organization. It seems, you try to build a relational big picture of reality that everybody and everything is subsumed by. Whilst I say there is no reality other then personal interpretations of reality, which we must communicate in order to agree on, as we do now, but I agree with your relational interpretation of it.

Fornicating is still the most pleasurable activity... not idea creation. Hence the overpopulating of the planet. Which in turn causes all our global ecological troubles. — god must be atheist

It is hard to disagree with this. But some people believe there is an even greater pleasure. The first 5mins of the below video would explain.

I have never liked the term affect. It is ambiguous in common usage and it is conflated, it seems, in scientific usage with different interpretations by different groups. Emotion is much simpler and unambiguous.
Wikipedia: "Affect, in psychology, refers to the underlying experience of feeling, emotion or mood."
This is the way I understand it. In the time I worked in Drug and alcohol rehab, we referred to clients as having an affect, that referred to their demeanor as a result of underlying emotions or feelings, but sometimes it was a contrived affect, and in this case it was a communication.
The way you and Barrett understand it is atypical in my neck of the woods, so I am happy to stay away from it.

I don’t know why you choose Barrett, a relatively minor materialist academic, over other monistic theories of emotion. Of course, some of the other researchers are older and they don't promote themselves all over the place, but you know, we are no closer to understanding emotions in science today then we were in their day. I have not provided citations in my theory, but of course I have them. Very little of it is actual original thought, it is mostly an integration of the work of others. I rely on Derek Denton's interpretation that emotion is the underlying force that gives impetus to instinctual behavior. I go one step further , I say emotion is inseparable from information - this is a testable construction - It can be negated by providing one instance of information that is unemotional in some way. I cannot find such an instance.

I distinguish information and qualia to highlight that they are both present in information, not as you have interpreted it.

You do understand, don't you, that if emotion is present in DNA code then emotion is present fundamentally in all of life as the force providing impetus to it? DNA is emotional-information - it provides the instruction set of how to construct an emotional gradient that is analogue, not binary as you assume. Binary would be meaningless.

Gradients in the brain, and in biology in general, have been well documented. Some are minor, but others are major. If they turn out to be emotional my theory would be validated.

I present a complete theory, which is in parts testable, and it fits - both in the big picture, and in explaining why we have consciousness, so it explains the hard problem. As we come to understand molecular biology better, we are seeing enormous complexity. My theory accounts for this. How does Barrett and yourself account for the below? It is at this level that you have to construct a picture, because the story of this will be the story of us.

Firstly, I just wanted to thank you for your engagement, valuable suggestions, the pointing out of flaws, and alternative perspective. Whilst I don't always comment on everything you state I do make notes and plan on implementing some of your suggestions. "We are monists - ‘mental states’ needn’t feature in this discussion." - my bad - slip of the tongue.

We incur pain for our children, and groups we identify with.

"Self-interest is NOT central to consciousness." disagrees with "The problem with this method is that it assumes our bias only comes into play when we interpret the results. But quantum physics shows that our bias affects every step, and is most significant in how we select and test probable explanations from imaginable possibilities".

I strongly agree with the second point. Living things share common DNA, and they also have a bias to be. The Bias to be, would be the first bit of DNA information shared by all life, as without a bias to be there would be no need to be. This bias is the central thing preserved in all DNA. It is immortal, and life is it's vehicle. My bias to be has existed, in my lineage, since the beginning of life, and it is the deepest most reason for all my decisions. The bias to be, being a bias, is emotional information, and emotion is what drives us. A bias to be is the central consideration in all instances of self organization relative to internal and external information. Instances of consciousness vary. One instance of consciousness effects the bias to be strongly, whilst another instance effects the bias to be weakly.
Where the bias to be is effected strongly, might the Affect be a pleasure? And where it is effected weakly, might the Affect be a neutral or moderate feeling? If so, can you see how a spectrum might form? In considering this you may notice Affect can be further resolved.

To explore this requires the ability to introspect, and I have noticed you posses this ability in regards to your comments on pain, but what is central to consciousness might be different. It took me a long time to get in, but I posses this do or die dogged stubbornness. For two months I tried without success, it was like gnawing away at a billiard ball, and then finally I managed to get a purchase and have been inching away ever since. At its core is a simple self interested algorithm, but you need to discover this for yourself - to prove it for yourself. Eventually I will develop the theory along these lines, once I learn a bit more and test some of my expectations.

The way you have put it together is a good description that is not entirely in conflict with how I see it. From my perspective, you say the introspective network is the base and can not be resolved any further, so you can not make any further connections and leave it at that. I say the network resolves to feelings which resolve further to points on an emotional gradient. I further link this gradient to the first information in DNA, and note it is biased, or emotional information. It being fundamental information, I make the connection that all subsequent information is emotional.
The way I see it:
Biased / emotional information in DNA informs life, which possesses consciousness, and only expresses and propagates consciousness, in the form of emotional information - through DNA ( offspring ) and expressions of consciousness. Expressions of consciousness are all formed in an emotionally charged setting, as they preserve the bias to be, so are emotional information. All incoming information is emotional information ( information and qualia ), which is processed by a reasonable brain system, but in an emotional setting of a biased consciousness. Hence have consequences that are either painful, neutral, or pleasurable. The output is a self preserving response, hence emotional information. As you say, it is arbitrary to separated emotion from information.

May the best interpretation win :smile:

An idea that fits well into a mind induces senses of pleasure in the organism, and thus the idea is accepted and incorporated into existing ideas, and thus it combines with other ideas and becomes part of the a chain of reasoning that propogates. — Roy Davies

What you are describing is a mental algorithm. I have gone as far as to say consciousness works something like this. It is a great way for biological systems to self organize, but in a world of eight billion people and growing, I feel, it is not going to work. One person's pleasurable idea is another person's or something's painful idea. How this plays out on the world stage is going to be mostly painful, as a few powerful people enact pleasurable ideas that are ultimately painful for the great many.

Yes, the fitness for survival of an idea would be largely determined by it being painful or pleasurable, and this would be the underlying algorithm underpinning the ideas that have created the world as we know it. Unfortunately we also know the world to be in a precarious state, and I feel it can not take much more of the same.

The brain is, if you recall your high school biology, the organ that coordinates all the other organs - far removed from a chaotic system. — TheMadFool

A lot of that high school stuff is now very dated. When an organ is transplanted, the nerve supply can not be rejoined, but the organ nevertheless is able to function. So it can not be said that the brain is controlling it. The organ seems to know what to do and how.

No different I must admit but so what? I chose conjoined twins to make my case because they're the closest we can get to two brains being physically identical and having similar experiences which, according to the physicalism and nature-nurture theory, should've caused conjoined twins to have similar, if not identical, minds. — TheMadFool

I was very excited by your post, as what you posit would be a way to prove bodily feeling experienced by one is also felt by the other, but reliable information is scant. I can only find unreliable information.
The twins are conjoined in various different ways, and this results in various different outcomes. There are just not enough of them to come to any conclusions, I feel.

Excellent topic.

Theoretically their consciousness should be composed of DNA, experience, and point in space, so you wouldn't think there would be much difference. Suppose their names were Jack and Joe.
Jack would have the experience of living next to Joe, whilst Joe would have the experience of living next to Jack.
Its probably not the same experience, and they would probably want to differentiate.

So, is this “attraction to life” an impetus to consolidate - to ignore, isolate and exclude - or is it to increase awareness, connection and collaboration, despite the risks? — Possibility

The bias to be, is the fundamental information that creates consciousness.Without it there could not be consciousness or life. It is the essential element that creates a self interested process of self organisation. It remains central to consciousness / self organisation, and is present in every instance of self organization as the primal consideration relative to all other information. What are the consequences of this information to me? How do I self organize in relation to this information? These are the fundamentals of consciousness. In this setting a response is formed. These responses are all expressions of consciousness, and can be lumped together and considered singularly as such. They are endlessly variable and open ended. They all work so long as the organism survives. They are the branches of the trees, or they are the cultural differences, or different philosophical beliefs. You have characterized these expressions as - " awareness, connection and collaboration, despite the risks" - these are valid expressions of consciousness, but equally valid is the response to ignore, isolate, and exclude. It just depends on the organism and the information surrounding it, and the resources the organism has for dealing with the situation.

We can divide consciousness into two components. The fundamental component is a self preserving ( biased ) process of self organization relative to external and internal information. And then it's expression. Which are ideas and action. Expressions of consciousness are not the same as consciousness itself. They give some insight into the consciousness that created them, but only if you understand the self interested process underlying them. Fundamentally the task of brain consciousness is very simple - firstly provide a solution that allows me to survive, secondly make it as pleasant as possible.

Philosophical Zombies lack the bias to be, so they can not be conscious or alive. They are indifferent to the effect of the information surrounding them. They are not Affected. It is all the same to them whether they live or die, or experience pain or pleasure. But nothing is all the same to living creatures because everything has an Affect on them. Thus Affected they are spurned to thought and action. The base all thought bounces off is the emotional gradient I call the PPS, but you would better understand it as an Affected mental state. I would call it an emotional whole body state.

All of life is informed by RNA and DNA, and this bias to be, being a fundamental necessity of consciousness and life, would be fundamental code shared by all of life. So all of life, including brainless life, would posses a bias to be as an emotional body state. This creates consciousness and life. There would be no need to self organize without a bias to be. There would be no emotional impetus to do so.

The evidence for this is not conclusive, but the evidence against is non existent.

I have previously defined philosophy as information about the philosopher’s consciousness or mind activity. And I have recently defined consciousness as an evolving process of self organisation. These definitions satisfy scientific standards as they can be negated by providing an instance of philosophy that is not information about the philosophers mind activity, and likewise an instance of consciousness that is not a process of self organistion. I believe this is logically impossible.

The two definitions put together would suggest:
Philosophy is the expression of mind activity related to self organisation.

Why should we need to express it?

I think, so much of the information that surrounds humanity is anthropocentric. It is to do with concepts of value, meaning, love, connection and interrelatedness to friends, family, culture, etc.
It only exists in relation to other humans, and in the absence of other humans would largely not exist. So any resolution to these concepts involves validation from other humans.

This anthropocentric information is entangled in our belief systems and forms much of what we consider to be our life purpose. Much of this information is carried over from past generations. Amongst it are some truths, but a lot of it is beliefs, so half truths, and still a lot else is pure fantasy. Nevertheless it is all entangled into what we call culture or the collective consciousness, and we grow up surrounded by it, so we breathe it in and it becomes a part of who we are.

Philosophy gives us a chance to unentangle some of this information - to see what can be relied upon and what can not – to self organize in a more realistic way. Perhaps this is its purpose.

I’m certainly no Guru myself. I’ve found that there are many ways to approach the same meaning from a limited and flawed perspective. I think discussions such as these help both of us reach a broader understanding, even if we never see eye to eye. — Possibility

Yes, and consciousness unlike simpler topics , like free will, is complicated and multifactorial. You and me, are like trees, we agree largely on the fundamentals - the trunk, but we branch out in different ways. This is not a flaw, as there isn't one solution, and ultimately any solution is viable so long as the tree survives.

When I first seriously started studying consciousness, I started with microbial life. It seemed DNA information created an amoeba, and an amoeba subsequently expressed this DNA information, by being alive and through its self organization, in relation to internal information and external information. Why would it bother was the immediate and overwhelming question - what a waste of energy! Of course it has no choice. It is not self aware and it is biased to continue to live. So it seems RNA and DNA insert this bias, into life, and hence when it comes to the question of to be or not to be, the answer is not rational, but biased to be.

So I concluded life is biased to be, and a bias is not rational information, but emotional information - an aversion to death and an attraction to life. It is a fundamental force present in all living creatures, including the ones without brains. So emotion occurs fundamentally ( emotional - information ), it is the essential ingredient of self organization as it provides impetus to organize, and is present long before the ability to branch out and create complicated expressions of consciousness. However , being fundamental, it is present in all subsequent expressions of consciousness, as the force providing impetus to self organization.

The base consistency of reality is in its relational structure: All living systems consist of a four-dimensional integrated system of information, and evolve according to the sustainability of their self-organization process to transform information/energy from their interaction with the world into a fulfilment of ongoing effort and attention requirements for the integrated system. — Possibility

What is missing from this, in my opinion, is the force providing impetus to the self organization. Why bother? To say survival is insufficient. Why should something want to survive? Particularly something that can not even consider the question? I again apologize for altering your original statement.

It is easy to get tangled up in the higher order expressions of consciousness. I think if I tried I would be there long after the cows came home. It seems much simpler to call them expressions of self organization and lump them all together, and then get on with the task of WHY they occur. From my paradigm I can do that, but I imagine this would be an impossibility for other dualist / materialistic paradigms.

You seem to have a good system of dealing with the complexity by dividing it up into different dimensions. I have always tried to understand things from first principles as far as is possible. I deal with the complex by simplifying it, resolving it in simple form, and then growing the solution in complexity. These are two different expressions of consciousness, one is not necessarily better then another, and together they are better then on their own.

I was thinking more of a 2D structure rather then linear, such that similar degrees of pain could be differentiated laterally. It is a gradient, but I don't know its structure absolutely.
— Pop

Differentiated how? Would the 2D structure of affect - as valence (pleasant-unpleasant) and arousal (high-low) - suffice? — Possibility

The PPS is not set in stone as I have conceived it. Pain / pleasure as an emotional gradient would work for my consciousness, but for yours it may be constructed in a more complicated way. It is an emotional, or affective, gradient - If that better suits you. What is set in stone is that life chooses to live, and this suggests an emotional / affective gradient at play.

Here’s the interesting thing: I never suggested that a forest could be contained or described — Possibility

- my bad, sorry.

Hi.

I think , the truth initially exists as information that is interpreted and then put into words.

The question is whether DNA is biased? I suppose you would ask in relation to what? It doesn't really matter what, proof of any sort of bias would do, but I was particularly wondering in relation to the questing of live or die?

Looking at the world around me, It seems DNA is overwhelmingly biased to live.
A counter argument would be that it dose not have this choice, It was entirely determined due to external forces, in which case it is still biased, but due to external forces.

Either way it seems biased. What do you think?

A bias is not objective or reasonable information, it is affective or emotional information. Or it could be argued that it is objective and reasonable to make DNA biased to strengthen its fitness for survival.

All roads seem to lead to biased, or am I missing something?

Your first explanation is circular. You’ve been arguing that the pain-pleasure spectrum is the impetus for behaviour, and yet here you’re saying that our behaviour determines the position of such an experience on the spectrum. So which is it? — Possibility

Hi. I'm arguing that the combination of pleasure and pain may be a pleasure to some, and not to others.
And then there is the stoic thing where you hate that which you desire in equal proportion, in order to annihilate them both. The PPS is personally malleable, if not entirely controllable.

What you’re referring to is a linear structure, with positive values on one side, negative values on the other, and an infinite value (zero) in the centre. But that ignores the complexity of the relation between pain and pleasure, doesn’t it? — Possibility

I was thinking more of a 2D structure rather then linear, such that similar degrees of pain could be differentiated laterally. It is a gradient, but I don't know its structure absolutely.

Most humans would agree with the logic of your theory, but it has no practical value. You can’t apply it to improve your interactions with reality. — Possibility

The idea of pain / pleasure was well established by Jeremy Bentham, some 200 years ago. Barrett also had a theory along similar lines which she later abandoned - I don't know why. The difference with mine is that I'm saying the emotions belong to the cellular consciousness, and this is the way the whole body articulates as all mind. I have mentioned you in another part of the forum to answer a question related to this.

Knowledge of a pain pleasure spectrum allows one to manipulate it to some extent. this sounds crazy in the west, but in the east it is a common practice of meditation, and yogic logic. I have had some success with it, although I am not a meditator in the usual sense. It allows for a very simple understanding of consciousness - simple but valid, I believe. And an awful lot can be done with this.

My difficulty with you using the term ‘emotion’ is that it generally refers to a particular feeling, whereas the term ‘affect’ refers to feeling in general, whether or not it is apperceived as ‘emotion’. We don’t always identify affect as emotion, but emotion is always identified from affect, whether in self-reflection, or in rationalising behaviour — Possibility

Yeah, that is funny - I would have said the opposite. Perhaps it is cultural. I will have to take more care with my expression next draft. Thank you, the entire paragraph is valuable and valid information.

This becomes our best approximation of reality. Am I close? — Possibility

Yes that paragraph is largely true, but not the emotion - information bit. However yes, I clumsily cut to the chase leaving out all the important detail which you find wanting, understandably.

But it’s because the information we receive is limited and skewed by the structure of the information system that receives and processes it, not because something different exists in reality. — Possibility

Yes I agree entirely, I would have said we color reality with our belief system.

The base consistency of reality is in its relational structure: All living systems consist of a four-dimensional integrated system of information, and evolve according to the sustainability of their self-organisation process to transform information/energy in order to transform themselves from their current emotional state to a more pleasurable one. :razz: . — Possibility

I hope you don't take offense with my altering the last part of your paragraph, it was meant in jest. No disrespect intended, I just thought it would be funny to skew it to my understanding.

Are you suggesting that we have an infinite capacity for both pleasure and pain? Or that consciousness exists beyond pleasure? You’ve said before that nothing dies in the universe, it just falls to a lower level of consciousness - I imagine that’s what you believe occurs when pain is unavoidably maximised? So, would that mean maximal pleasure may lead to a higher level of consciousness? — Possibility

Consciousness has no boundary. It is endlessly variable and open ended, so what you suggest is not theoretically impossible, in my opinion. It was not what I was referring to. I was referring to your suggestion that it could be contained and described like a forest. We could catalogue and take account of it theoretically up until today, but tomorrow it will be something different. It will have grown beyond our conception of it. We can characterize it, as I have done with the PPS, but upon doing that, it then has the opportunity of transcending that, whether it will, and how, I don't know. This is all highly speculative stuff, and I love to speculate, but I am no Guru. I have a theory that I call a sketch, but I have so much more to learn.

I would be interested to hear your understanding of consciousness?

@Possibility

Good topic, You are saying that if a fundamental truth exists, it must be objective. lets test this.

RNA and DNA is the fundamental information creating life.
It is a fundamental truth. Probably not what you were expecting, but relevant to the topic as this fundamental information effects all subsequent information following it.

Is it objective, or is it biased?

A bias is an aversion to be one way, and an attraction to be the opposite way. It is a very basic emotion.
In science a bias is a systemic error.

you cannot account for experiences that are simultaneously both painful and pleasurable in your methodology. — Possibility

That is a good one. I think If one seeks to avoid the experience then it is more painful then pleasurable, and visa versa. If they are equal then it is a neutral experience.

Looking at what is common to every tree will not give you an understanding of the forest — Possibility

By studying expressions of consciousness, I've come to understand that consciousness is endlessly variable and open ended ( an evolving process of self organization with no upper limit :starstruck: ). So I look to its base for consistent elements. The trees are all different in their expression, but for a common reason.

How do you figure that? Firstly, Barrett never aimed to answer the hard problem, but to provide a more accurate theory of emotion that reconciles psychology with current neuroscience. Secondly, if according to idealism, everything exists in mind, then surely there can be no hard problem to begin with? — Possibility

I've been there and found it to be a dead end. Emotion is the difference between a human being and a P.Zombie. Solving emotion, solves consciousness, in my opinion. Who would not want to do that?

My point is, Pop cannot make a statement to the effect that all things experience consciousness and assume it to be self evident. They either must state that they take it as an assumption/opinion (and thus make it explicit that they will not attempt to prove it), or they must offer some rationale. — Malcolm Lett

I think you need to define consciousness, as we all posses a different conception.

I have defined it as a process of self organization. I think, unless there is a god, everything in the universe is undergoing a process of self organization. Including us right here, right now!

Everything in the universe is in motion. Everything is either mutating or consolidating - change is the only constant. Consciousness allows us to navigate this constant change - through a process of self organization. This process of self organization has an emotional bias at its base - the fear of death. This emotional gradient provides impetus to this process of self organization, through a fear of death, an aversion to pain, and an attraction to pleasure. We need to self organize relative to constantly changing external information, and an inbuilt bias to continue to live rather then die. Consciousness facilitates this.

Abiogenesis theories, from the perspective of biology, chemistry, geophysics, astrobiology, biochemistry, biophysics, geochemistry, molecular biology, oceanography and paleontology, agree that self organization led to life. Theories of God and aliens, do not. This is where I get my definition of consciousness.

If self organization led to life, then life is an expression of self organization.

If A leads to B, then B is an expression of A.

As previously stated with supporting videos: All living creatures are self learning and programming - all living creatures are involved in a process of self organisation - always! For this to occur there must be an information processing system to facilitates this, and It must have always been present - otherwise how could they self learn, program, and self organise in the first place?

I think you need to provide a definition of consciousness so we can know exactly what it is that you are talking about. You also need to draw a line separating conscious creatures, and non conscious creatures, for your statement to be meaningful.

Steady on - my point is that our affective state is NOT reducible to ‘a feeling’ or resolved to a point on a pain-pleasure spectrum, except through ignorance, isolation or exclusion of information. Subsuming an affective state under a singular value-concept of ‘pleasure-pain’ ignores the complexity of that state, and ultimately the complexity of consciousness itself. — Possibility

I think you mostly object to my reductionist approach. You interpret what I am saying literally and definitively. But I characterize the theory as a sketch. And in the instance of consciousness I state it works something like this.

Our affective state has to be reducible to something - note that it is always either painful, or pleasurable, or something in between. There is great complexity going on , as you state, and I doubt that such a thing as an instance of consciousness can exist, however this complex state has to be characterized in some way and I think the OP dose a fair job. It is not ignoring the complexity of the state, but trying to pin it to a simple, and widely understood expression.

If every instance of consciousness is unique, then why get caught up in the inaccuracy of defining consciousness from our own limited experience? Our understanding of consciousness will come not from the content, but from the structure. Not from the trees, but from the forest. Not from quanta or qualia, but from a tested and refined relational structure that renders this complexity of information reliable for every interaction. — Possibility

This is where our philosophies diverge. From an idealists perspective all the things you mention are variable concepts in our mind. So it is not possible for me to construct a theory from the paradigm that you pose. I have to look to the trees, and find the elements that are common to every tree, and proceed from there. I think I have characterized a reliable emotional mechanism of consciousness, but you find it too simplistic for your paradigm.

If you do not agree that affective states are feelings that ultimately resolve to a pain / pleasure spectrum, then you are left in an affective limbo, with no possibility of answering the hard problem, as is the case with Barrett, I imagine.

While I agree that we rely for the most part on a personal construction of the world (inside and out), I disagree that we have no access to reality at all. Rather, our access is limited by the construction of the system and by its available energy - the attention and effort we can spare in the moment - and our efficiency in this has been developing at a rapid rate. How do you think we constructed our view of reality in the first place?

That you refer to ‘an outside physical world with real people’ is telling. The reality of the world beyond the ‘self’ does not really consist of ‘things’ and ‘people’, but of interrelated possibility or existence-information, which we organise into ideas, subsume under concepts, render as objects and reduce to physics for our various purposes. And it’s the same inside our skin - we are inseparable from this existence-information, except in our own ‘mind’ or socio-cultural construction through ignorance, isolation and exclusion. — Possibility

I didn't say we have no access to reality. We have access to the physical world via information, which sadly is incomplete and often flawed or false. We must nevertheless join the dots, and there lies the problem - we fill in the blanks with our hopes, and create a belief.
I too state in my theory that we are inseparable from the information surrounding us - we breath it in like air, our consciousness integrates it and turns it into emotion, via the PPS, affecting our entire body, providing impetus to behavior.

At least we are in the same ball park. :smile:

I see no reason why consciousness should be exclusive to organic lifeforms — Merkwurdichliebe

Neither do I, and I intend to expand the theory in that direction in the future sometime.

Hi Pop, I've read through your full article. — Malcolm Lett

Hi, well you must be the first to have read it fully. :smile: My web sit stats say the average stay is 3 mins.

I was very interested as you suggested in your OP that it tackles the hard problem of consciousness. However, I don't think you actually touch on that question. — Malcolm Lett

Yes, I think because we all have different conceptions of consciousness, we also have different hard problems. I was trying to characterize how emotions create a mechanism that drives consciousness.
This was what i considered as being hard . Yes my theory is panpsychist with a slight twist.

You don't offer any basis for this claim. It sounds like you are assuming panpsychism, which is not generally accepted. Perhaps you could offer a more detailed account of why you think everything living is conscious.


Thanks for pointing that out. I would have thought this was self evident - .All living creatures are self learning and programming. All living creatures are involved in a process of self organisation - always!
But several people have mentioned this, so perhaps I will have to strengthen my case in this regard.

Overall, I'd say that you've conflated self-organisation and consciousness without providing an explanation. — Malcolm Lett

I couldn't get over the fact that even the simplest of creatures are involved in a process of self organization, and I asked myself am I always involved in a process of self organization, and concluded yes. So I arrived at a definition, and tested if the definition works for the universe and concluded that it did.

I don't believe there is agreement as to what consciousness is so a definition was necessary, of course it only works within the theory, and not for immaterial consciousness, etc.

Also, take a look at the Free Energy Principle (from Karl Friston), I think you'll find it's very similar to your theory of the Emotional Gradient, but is more general. I'd also suggest it's a better characterisation than using the word 'emotion'. — Malcolm Lett

Yes, but it is a difficult concept to understand and also relies on assumptions. I have stated zero point energy, but this also is not the ideal term. I like emotion, but admit this may be my personal bias creeping in. Emotions would have evolved like everything else, but there is no reason to believe all living creatures do not posses them in some form, and a bias to be just so, and no other way is what the laws of classical physics describe of the universe.

Thanks for your input.

Sort of. Our self-organisation process from intentionality to action will always be subject to affect: every thought, word and movement contains at least some reference to our affective state, no matter how ‘rational’ we think we are. As far as I can see it’s only a ‘bias’ if it’s excluding or unfairly dismissive of information, though. — Possibility

Hooray! I think we agree! It seems to me that this is what I'm characterizing in the OP instance of consciousness. In my estimation, and yours, consciousness at all times has an affective state, and the affective state reduces to a feeling, which is ultimately resolved to a point on a pain / pleasure spectrum. Affect / feelings are ultimately painful or pleasurable, that they have this affect on us that orients us in our personal reality, and provides impetus to behavior. The affect creates an emotional bias - it colors the subsequent thinking / response with emotion. Hard to see when the affect is mild, but easy when it is severe. It is the element P.Zombies lack, that we posses, so this is the element that creates consciousness. In my thinking, the PPS is the base, thinking ultimately bounces off this base, to create more thinking and action.

The way I see it, reductionism seeks accurate methodologies to render the world into more efficient forms of information. The problem is that the methodologies we currently rely on and have built into our language and logic are based on old assumptions and anthropocentrism that no longer stand up to scrutiny. — Possibility

Yes I agree, I often find myself thinking there's got to be a better way. Pining complex concepts to simple expressions is not ideal, but as you say that is where we are. Or at least that is where I am, not so yourself.

As a reductionist-idealist, it appears that you view consciousness as the base existence, with the ‘pleasure/pain spectrum’ and ‘zero point energy’ as upper and lower limitations in relation to an assumption of ‘mind’. Your notion of ‘emotion-information’ seems to me just another form of anthropocentric logic - albeit one with a bias towards qualitative information, dismissing quantitative information as ‘irrelevant’. That’s how I understand it, at this stage, anyway. — Possibility

No not at all. I think you would characterize our position as being relative to the different dimensions of reality effecting us. I would simply say we poses a sanity that orients us in our world. Yes it is anthropocentric, as from an idealists point of view reality is personally constructed and only exists in an end user consciousness. There is an outside physical world with real people, but we have no access to it. We only have access to our personal construction of it, which is slightly different for everyone. Hence every instance of consciousness is unique.

At some point, like every other theory of consciousness, you’re going to have to reconcile your theory with quantum physics (the home of reductionist-materialists) - just like any quantum physics interpretation is going to have to reconcile with general relativity, gravity, the measurement problem and, of course, qualia. — Possibility

This would be outside my skillset, and area of interest. I am really more interested in the psychology, belief, and sanity aspects of consciousness. I think you are correct, that it needs more information to be
more credible. I see this information coming from research in biology. Proving cellular complexity to be a consciousness would seal the deal, I think, and there are good strides being made with cellular imaging and animation - at some point the penny must drop that this is too complex to be explained by chance

Sorry, this got a little heavy. — Possibility

No, that's ok, I'm glad you explained it. My problem is, as I do not think as you, I can not not always evaluate what you are saying, but I'm glad to get your alternative view, and perspective. I'm a plain old reductionist - too old to change now.

I'm still trying to articulate how emotional information works. I'll run it by you when I'm finished.

a negative value affect perceived in the organism, attributed to the affecting area/object/event, that gives impetus to repellent action. — Possibility

- I'll take this, as you are describing a process of self organization with an affective bias.

So we call it ‘painful’ because the behavior response is generally repellent. I’m not suggesting it’s something other than pain, I’m just making sure you understand that there is no awareness that something particular is ‘painful’ as such. — Possibility

We can not know this for sure with other humans either. I doubt vey much that it would be exactly the same pain that I, or you, would feel, but it is an emotion that gives impetus to behavior. There is information processing going on, and a decision is made, however limited it may be.

So the separation of qualitative and quantitative information is an arbitrary differentiation of possible map alignment instructions (ie. reductionist methodology), that is incompatible with the way we actually interact with reality. — Possibility

I'm having trouble understanding you as I don't think in terms of dimensions, but I think you are confirming that emotion cannot be separated from information. That would be how I understand it, from a reductionist point of view. I would say, from an idealists perspective, everything can be reduced to information, and everything has qualia, including information. How it is formed and processed is the question. I need to consider this, as you have instilled some doubt.

As I understand it, it is a philosophy, introduced first by either Adiyogi, or Buddha ( dates are unreliable ), then branched off into religions - Hinduism, Buddhism, etc Yogic logic is secular. Western Idealism is one of the branches.
Bhutan is the only Buddhist country in the world. They measure gross national happiness, 75% of the country is wildlife reserves. They are carbon negative. No doubt there would be negatives also.

It would be difficult to apply Popper's standard to philosophy.

How do you feel about panpsychism. A panpsychist world would be similar to a Buddhist world, I believe.

:up:

So, how can we ensure a fitness function that evolves ideas in a positive direction? — Roy Davies

A good idea also has to be refutable in its design. — Roy Davies

Please elaborate, with solutions.

The rise of the middle class was also a big factor, I believe.

Welcome to the forum.

The video below shows a microorganism being poked with a hair. It reacts initially by contracting. After some time of this it decides to move elsewhere. I can not know what pain means to a microorganism precisely. I have no reason to believe it is something different to them then it is to other animals. What do you think?

Reality exist only as we perceive it, surely? — Roy Davies

You can direct your questions by hovering over the comment near the time indicator and clicking the arrow.

I’m curious about this statement. Does a simple cellular organism experience pain or pleasure? It certainly would try to avoid existential threats - which seems to match your idea of what consciousness is for. So, is that organism conscious? — Roy Davies

We all have different conceptions as to what consciousness is. I have defined it as a system of self organization. But yes microorganisms do react to painful stimuli, so I would assume the absence of pain would be pleasure.

That ideas adapt to fit their environment - good one :smile:

The raven evolved as a result of a biological process of self organization ( a consciousness ). Whilst the desk evolved as a result of human consciousness. Also a process of self organization. Am I in the ball park?

:up:

I think that "or" should be an "and". — dussias

Maybe and / or.

What do you mean by "self-interest?" — dussias

Of benefit to them, and not harm them.

I think we are fundamentally wired to avoid pain and seek pleasure. Although we often incur pain for a higher good - kids being a prime example. :angry:

Unfortunately, your website does not lend itself to being studied at length. Breaking your theory up into bite-size chunks addressing particular questions or areas of inquiry would be my suggestion (from a strictly marketing/communication standpoint). — Possibility

Yes I agree, I'm a total novice at this, but I think I can find a better way to do it. I'm glad you replied, I value your input as one of the deepest thinkers here, and you have found some flaws with the theory for which I am grateful. You come at this from a different angle to me, which is really valuable as you will see things that I cannot, but I think we are roughly in the same ball park.

From the perspectives that you have characterized, the hard problem of consciousness can not be solved. For this reason the paradigm is likely false.
— Pop

That’s a rapid jump to a dismissive conclusion. There’s much more to my position than what I’ve outlined here in response to your theory. The hard problem of consciousness assumes that inanimate matter is unable to ‘experience’. — Possibility

I did not mean this in the way it was taken. But it is funny that this becomes a valid argument with a complete theory, which you subsequently use on me for not presenting one. :smile:

The role of emotion has not been pinned down by science, and it is not a topic materialism can easily deal with. The way I see it, the biological system already understood emotion - why would it need a second emotional processor? I don't think it did, It needed a triangulation processor. Something to strip away the emotion from the information. A P.zombie can do all the things that a person can mentally,
but it has no impetus to do them - it lacks the impetus that emotion provides as it has no Pain / Pleasure spectrum. Emotion seems to be the force providing impetus to consciousness. In science a bias is a systemic error, so there can be no advantage in possessing a systemic error in your computation. The best computation will be hard cold reason / logic , an emotional force can only hinder this, in my view. But this all takes time to integrate, so in the meantime I will look forward to your objections.

I agree with all of paragraph 1 and 2: we are all in the same boat trying to make the most of what little information there is in our possession.

but you have to recognise the anthropocentric lens this interpretation has, and account for it in relation to physics — Possibility

As an idealist this is not such a big problem for me as ultimately, I believe, reality only exists in mind, so minds that rely on physical proof might be unreachable, but there are plenty left over. All I can hope for realistically is to plant a seed or two.

I will have to brush up on structural realism.

So, do you believe that the universe is conscious but not self aware - a process of self organization with a bias to resist zero point energy? creating order from chaos? It seems this is what consciousness is - the order from what otherwise would be chaos? It is a different order in everybody, and everything.

I am consciousness, I believe, is the form of what you are looking for.

Nothing seems to be permanent, not the cells of the body, certainly not consciousness or the I.

The only thing constant seems to be that when you ask the question it will be consciousness that you use to do it with. So If the I is the consciousness, this would be constant, but the I and the consciousness you use to ask the question with would be different every time - in the absolute sense.
My I, and my consciousness, have been very different things over the course of my life, when I think back to the age of 10, 20, 40, 50, etc. Which I is the true I?


Being no one - Thomas Metzinger

Edit. On further reflection, a counter argument is possible.
DNA would contribute much of the information that goes into creating consciousness and the I.
This indeed is constant throughout a life time. And the very first instruction in DNA would relate to the essence of what keeps a biological organism going, and this very first instruction would be common to all living creatures and would be immoral - being passed along the lineage of life to perpetuity.

Yes I would agree. Self interest is key, and you can look at it conversely - who would agree with something that is of no benefit to them, or that causes them pain?

So, my heatpump can sense and control its environment (temperature) and appears to be trying to communicate with me through beeps and the remote control. — Roy Davies

Your heat pump performs many of the functions that sentient creatures perform. What it lacks is feeling.
This makes it indifferent to whether it performs these functions or no, as you will find out when it breaks down. :smile: