To have a true understanding of the human condition. — Metaphysician Undercover

Having a true understanding of the human condition would come first and from that extrapolate whether our actions are free or determined. I don't want to steer to far off-topic but what is meant by "free" in "free will"? It seems to me that the more options you have the more free your will appears to be, but it would be illogical to believe that you would have made a different choice given the options (information) you had at that moment - as if the same causes (options and circumstances) would produce a different effect (decision).

A true understanding does not simply consist of "things are as they are". — Metaphysician Undercover

What else would a true understanding consist of if not an understanding of how things actually are?

I could argue that the display of the peacock's tail says something about the Big Bang, as there would not be a peacocks if there wasn't a Big Bang.
— Harry Hindu

You could read that into a peacock tail. But two peacocks just have their one instinctual understanding.

You have actual language and that makes a huge difference. Peacocks only have their genes and neurology informing their behaviour. No virtual social level of communication.

It's really just a difference in degrees. More complex brains can use more complex representations and get at more complex causal relations.
— Harry Hindu

Your own argument says it isn’t if humans have language and a virtual mentality that comes with that. — apokrisis

Language evolved from a theory of other minds. Animals have learned to anticipate other animals intentions by observing their behavior and learned to communicate their intentions by behaving in certain ways. Drawing scribbles and making sounds with your mouth are just more complex forms of communicating your intentions and reading into others intentions.

Words refer to things that are not words. It would be better to show you what I'm talking about than to just tell you. If words only referred to things in our heads, how would we ever be able to communicate that to others? Words refer to things that we can see and feel in the world and are only necessary to communicate to others what they were not present for.

We see colours "directly", just as we feel pain "directly".
— Michael

:lol:

We see our color percepts? — creativesoul

It all reeks of a misuse of language. Where is the "we" relative to our colors? What use is the word, "directly" here? How does it help us understand the process?

There is no color in light. Color is in the perceiver, not the physical stimulus. This distinction is critical for understanding neural representations, which must transition from a representation of a physical retinal image to a mental construct for what we see. Here, we dissociated the physical stimulus from the color seen by using an approach that causes changes in color without altering the light stimulus. We found a transition from a neural representation for retinal light stimulation, in early stages of the visual pathway (V1 and V2), to a representation corresponding to the color experienced at higher levels (V4 and VO1). The distinction between these two different neural representations advances our understanding of visual neural coding.

Why do you enjoy running into the hard wall of the hard problem?

You keep posting scientific studies while ignoring the science of quantum physics with the observer effect and state "collapse". Maybe neurobiologists and quantum physicists should start sharing notes.

:grin: I wasn't offended - just asking for your reasoning for saying what you did. I don't understand why we would need to escape determinism, or why free will is necessary. In a deterministic universe, we all do what we naturally do. All acts feel natural and intended.

I said that the tomato does not have the property that it appears to have. The property that it appears to have is in fact a subjective quality, and so is a percept, not a mind-independent property of material surfaces. — Michael

What if I said that the tomato appears ripe? Do we really need to make it clear whether we are talking about the appearance or the tomato when talking about the tomato to others?

The next step, I believe, after freeing oneself from naive realism, is to free oneself from materialism altogether, and understand that the so-called "effects of the stone upon himself" are not properly called "effects" at all. The percept is a freely constructed creation of the living being, rather than the effects of a causal chain. This understanding enables the reality of the concept of free will. The living being's motivational aspects, which are very much involved in all neurological activity, and appear to allow the being to act with a view toward the future, (understood in its most simple form as the will to survive), cannot be understood as the product of causal chains. This is what science reveals to us, through its inability to understand such aspects in determinist terms. — Metaphysician Undercover

What makes causality and determinism necessarily materialistic? My thoughts naturally lead to other thoughts. Certain experiences are prerequisites for certain thoughts. It seems to me that my thoughts can "bump into" other thoughts and create novel thoughts. New thoughts are an amalgam of prior thoughts and experiences. It seems to me that causality and determinism could be just as immaterial as material.

And hallucinations are what? A type of mental phenomenon, not a mind-independent property of tomatoes. Therefore colours are a type of mental phenomenon, not a mind-independent property of tomatoes. — Michael

So now provide the link to the study in which some neurobiologist looked at someone's mental phenomenon while the subject was looking at a ripe tomato as observed red mental phenomenon.

If red cannot be a property of tomatoes the how are they the property of neurons?

Yes, the hard problem has not been solved yet your explanations assume that it has. That's the issue.

Colors are a type of information.

It seems to me that the distinction between direct and indirect realism is useless. Would you say that you have direct or indirect access to your mental phenomenon?
— Harry Hindu

Direct - there is nothing between my mind and itself. That's the nature of the distinction. I have direct access to my experiences. Not their causes.
It might not 'mean much' out there in the world, but in terms of the discussion we're having its the central, crucial thing to be understood. So, I reject your opener on those grounds. But i acknowledge that for a certain kind of philosopher, this is going to look like a couple of guys around a pub table arguing over the blue/white black/gold dress. I disagree is all :) — AmadeusD

I would assume that you know your mind to be real. Then which is the case - direct realism, indirect realism, both, or neither? If you can talk about the contents of your mind like you can talk about the contents of your pants pocket, then what is the difference if you're telling me the truth in both cases?

Not quite, no. I've addressed this apparent hypocrisy recently and wont rehash because I'll make a pigs ear of it. — AmadeusD

You couldn't at least link it in your reply considering that we are 38 pages into this discussion?

Yes, correct. This, despite not having any direct access, or certitude about our sensory apprehensions. Its a best-guess, and if that's the best we have, it's the best we have. — AmadeusD

If you were able to accomplish your task using your senses then was it really a best guess or an accurate perception?

If these problems only arise in philosophical discussions and not in everyday life, then maybe there's an issue with philosophy. Most philosophical problems are the result of a misuse of language. Our survival in a hostile environment is evidence enough that we have more than a best guess about the state of our environment. I would argue that instinctive behaviors that evolved as general responses to a static environment are best guesses whereas humans have evolved to allow us to be more adaptable to changing environments to the point where we no longer need to adapt to our environment. We mold the environment for ourselves.

I am arguing that despite the "indirect" nature of perception we can get a "direct" sense of what the case is by understanding that determinism is the case (which is why time can seem to have no direction as effects are as much about their causes as causes are about their effects) and that effects carry information about their causes. "Direct" and "Indirect" are in quotes because I find that they unnecessarily complicate the discussion. I find it very difficult to believe that humans have been able to shape their environment to such a degree simply based on "best guessing". Are we having an effect on our environment or not?

Where is the pain? If it is in the limb, you can show me.
But you cannot show me pain.
You can show me potential stimulus for pain.
That's all. I need not take this much further to be quite comfortable that your position is not right (yet..) — AmadeusD

What would be the point in showing you pain? The pain is for me, not for you. I am the one injured, not you. The pain is about the state of my body, not yours. If I hit my thumb with a hammer, I could bash your same thumb with the same hammer and you'd have a good idea of what I was feeling, but that would not be the point of me informing you that I am in pain. The point would be to seek assistance. This is what I mean that philosophical language use tends to muddy the waters here.

Besides, if pain is only in the mind, then the stimulus is only in the mind. When I ask you to show me the stimulus, you are referencing your own visual experience - the visual location of the injury, which is in your mind. As we already discussed a while back visual depth is in your mind so you run into the same problem with any sensory experience you have. Based on what you have said in that we cannot show you pain it does not follow that we can show you the stimulus.

Let's say I have a severe injury on my back. I cannot see the injury but I can feel it. Adrenaline may be masking the severity of the injury by masking the pain. You, however, have a clear view of the injury. Who has more accurate information about my injury? If you can have more information about my injury because of the level of detail human vision provides over the sensation of pain, then what does that say about the direct vs. indirect distinction when it comes to knowing what is the case?

To be clear, yes of course information storage as genes or words has some entropic cost. To scratch a mark on a rock is an effort. Heat is produced. Making DNA bases or pushing out the air to say a word are all physical acts.

But the trick of a code is that it zeroes this physical cost to make it always the same and as least costly as possible. I can say raven or I can say cosmos or god. The vocal act is physical. But the degree of meaning involved is not tied to that. I can speak nonsense or wisdom and from an entropic point of view it amounts to the same thing,

As they say, infinite variety from finite means. A virtual reality can be conjured up that physical reality can no longer get at with its constraints. But then of course, whether the encoded information is nonsense or wisdom starts to matter when it is used to regulate the physics of the world. It has to cover its small running cost by its effectiveness in keeping the organism alive and intact. — apokrisis

The entropic cost in creating the sound or scribble isn't the only part of the equation. Don't forget about the mind that is observing the mark or hearing the sound and the mental effort involved with decoding the message. It takes more mental power to get at the meaning of "philosophy" than "photograph" even though both words contain the same amount of letters. The question then becomes does the discussion about philosophy provide any survival or reproductive benefit (wisdom), or are we just playing symbol games (speaking nonsense)? For humans at least it could be argued that entering a virtual reality world can relieve stress and provide unique social interactions with others sharing the same virtual reality that strengthen social bonds in the physical world.

The speaker or writer must have some sense of empathy for the listener and reader. They have to put things in a way that they know they will understand with the least amount of mental effort (efficiently) if they actually want to be understood without having to re-phrase or repeat themselves.

This is why, for me at least, I get irritated at people that waste my time with word salad, mental gymnastics and intellectual dishonesty, which ends with me not putting much weight into what they write or say in the future.

There are grades of semiosis. Indexes, icons and then symbols. So I was talking about symbols when I talk about codes. Marks that bear no physical resemblance to what they are meant to represent.

Animals communicate with signs that are genetically fixed. A peacock has a tail it can raise. But that one sign doesn’t become a complex language for talking about anything a peacock wants.

A language is a system of symbolic gestures. Articulate and syntactically structured. A machinery for producing an unlimited variety of mark combinations. Quite different in its ability to generate endless novelty. — apokrisis

I would argue that when a peacock raises its tail it wants to mate. It also communicates to female peacocks the fitness of the male. There is complexity there in the causes that lead to some effect, like a male peacock showing off its tail. I could argue that the display of the peacock's tail says something about the Big Bang, as there would not be a peacocks if there wasn't a Big Bang. Of course the immediate effects say more about their immediate causes than some effect billions of years later, but my point is that all effects carry information about their causes.

In reading your words I can get at what you intended to say, the idea you intend to convey, but can get at your level of understanding of English as well. The information is there whether we look or not. Where we look, or what information we attend to, at any given moment is dependent upon the goal in the mind.

It's really just a difference in degrees. More complex brains can use more complex representations and get at more complex causal relations. The question then becomes at what point does the complexity cease to be useful? Are we overcomplicating things with our language, especially in philosophical discussions?

I was addressing the quoted text from Perl. I haven't read his work but have received the impression that "apprehending form via the rational intellect" was the thought in play there. I guess it depends on whether you think "apprehending form" means recognizing it or reflecting on it. I would agree with you that the latter requires symbolic language and I don't think that is at all controversial. — Janus

How does one even learn a language without apprehending the scribbles and sounds in the present and reflecting on how those same scribbles and sounds were used before? I could argue that language use is just more complex learned behavior. Animals communicate with each other using sounds, smells and visual markings. Animals understand that there is more to the markings than just the form the marking takes. It informs them of some state of affairs, like this is another's territory, not mine and in essence has some form of self-model.

I often link this story in discussions like this:
https://vimeo.com/72072873

This man made it to an adult without having learned a language. How he eventually learned language was by reflecting on what others were doing over time to come to understand that those scribbles mean things or are about things?

We did not evolve in an environment full of mad scientists that directly stimulate our brain. We evolved in an environment filled with electromagnetic energy, an atmosphere as a medium in which sound waves can travel and carry odors, etc. Our brains evolved to interpret the stimuli coming from our environment in ways that give us a very good idea of the state of the environment. So good in fact that humans are no longer just a "figure in the landscape but a shaper of the landscape (Jacob Bronowski, The Ascent of Man)".

If we were to evolve in an environment full of mad scientists that directly stimulate our brains, over millions of years our brains would have evolved to use the scientists as a means of knowing about the rest of the environment in the way that we currently use light in the environment to inform us about things that are not light, like pens and brains.

:up:

I agree, but you are the confused one. Hanover is exactly right. This is how the body/brain works. — AmadeusD

Yet you keep falling into the same trap of asserting you know how the body/brain works while at the same time asserting that we cannot trust our senses. How do I know that you read what you read about the body/brain accurately when you depend on your eyes to see the words? How do we know that some mad scientist didn't plant these ideas in your head, or that you didn't hallucinate the experience of reading "facts" about bodies and brains?

Just because someone can change the time on the clock to report the wrong time does not mean that clocks are useless in telling time. We eventually come to know that the clock is wrong by observing other clocks. In other words, we can determine the validity of what one sense is informing us by using other senses, observing over time and using reason.

So reality is like this. There are always further distinctions to be had. Even two electrons might be identical in every way, except they are in different places. But equally, the differences can cease to matter from a higher level that sees instead the sameness of a statistical regularity. Sameness and difference are connected by the third thing of where in scale we choose to stand in measuring the properties of a system. — apokrisis

Sure. Information is everywhere causes leave effects. What information is relevant, or attended to, depends on the goal in the mind.

So numbers and information are part of a new way of speaking about the world that is very useful in proportion to the degree that it is also unreal. It is a language of atomised reductionism that places itself outside even space, time and energy as those are the physical generalities it now aspires to take algorithmic control over. — apokrisis

I don't know if I agree with what you're saying here. What does it mean for something to be useful but not real? What does it mean for something to be useful if not having some element of being real? It seems to me that survival is the best incentive for getting things right. The environment selects traits that benefit the survival and reproductive fitness of organisms. Our highly evolved brain must have been selected for a reason and there must be a reason why humans have been so successful in spreading across the planet and out into space. Are those reasons unreal? Do your many words point to real states of reality? Am I to gain some advantage by reading your words? If not, then why read them?

It seems to me that a rational process takes time and mental space.

If I were to talk about marijuana legalization in this thread, would that be a real state of affairs of being off-topic? It seems to me that the way we perceive the world has a real effect on the world by means of our behaviors. Is Santa Claus real? As an idea Santa Claus is very real as you merely need to look at the effect the idea has had on the world.

In your example of the variety of birds we currently observe, we can point to evolution as the cause. Their differences evolved to fill different environmental niches. The variety of birds informs us of how they evolved and what their common ancestor would be like. The differences and similarities in birds indicate that they started with one common ancestor and evolved over time in different environments. We could potentially point to one common ancestor for all life with space and time being the medium in which the differences accumulate to the current state of affairs with the variety of life that we observe today.

So a string of bits or the numberline exist in the happy world where we can just take this paradoxical division between the continuous and the discrete for granted. Continuums are constructible. Don't ask further questions. Get on with counting your numbers and bits. — apokrisis

This makes me think about the distinction, particularly in quantum mechanics, between the unmeasured and the measured.

Numbers are just scribbles (2 and two refer to the same thing. it's just easier to do math with the condensed version using numbers instead of words) that refer to certain quantities. They are causally connected - the scribble and the quantity of objects within a category, whether it be cows or photons.

Information is the relationship between the scribble (the effect) and the quantity (the cause).

It is easy to assume things are just what they are. But that depends on them being in fact not what they are not. — apokrisis

Maybe I'm misunderstanding but this seems counter-intuitive considering that we must categorize objects by their similarities, not their differences or what they are not. Objects that are similar fall into some category and it is only then that we can assert that there is a quantity of similar objects. If everything was unique and there are no categories of similar objects then what use are quantities? If there is only one of everything what use is math?

Why does 2+2=4? Some may say that this is logically sound statement, but why? What makes some string of scribbles true? It seems to me that you have to have made some observation, and categorizing your observations, prior to making this statement. Are they just scribbles on this page or are they about something that I can experience and make predictions from?

Similarly, numbers in themselves are not information, because they do not encode any message - they are just there. — SophistiCat

Where are the numbers and how did they get there?

I'm finding it hard to tell whether you're partial to an indirect, or a direct conception of perception. But, given my own position i'll respond to what I see:

The first part: Fully agree. Understanding that C fibres fire, travel to the brain, and hte brain creates an illusion of "pain in the toe" rather than "signals from the toe being translated to pain to ensure I address the injured toe" has nothing to do with whether there is pain "in the toe". There plainly is not.

However, these are scientific explanations: The way pain works shuts down the option of direct perception of it. Hanover has made a similar point, and also noted that it just goes ignored - hand-waved away instead of confronted.

The science of perception, optical physiology, psychology and (in this context) the mechanics of pain fly in the face of a 'direct perception' account. It isn't even coherent, which has been shown several times. I personally find it helpful to continue the discussion, because it helps to streamline and economize responses to clearly inapt descriptions of experience. Intuitive, yes, but as helpful as folk psychology in understanding what's 'really' going on.

BUT, even with ALL of that said, if the point is that perception is necessarily indirect, then science can only get us so far. Observations are all we have - and I think Michael and I hit a bit of a curvy dead end with this issue. But, personally, I'm happy to just say science is the best use of our perception in understanding regularities of nature. Not much more could be said, unless we're just going to take the socially-apt chats about it at face value for practical reasons. In that case "science is objective" makes sense - but is just not true. — AmadeusD

It seems to me that the distinction between direct and indirect realism is useless. Would you say that you have direct or indirect access to your mental phenomenon?

How did scientists come to realize how pain works and that our experience of it is incorrect if all they have to go by is their own observations which you are calling into question? Somehow we were able to still get at how pain works for you to make these assertions so confidently.

The location of the pain in my foot is brute. I interpret the pain as being located in my foot because most, if not all, of the other times the pain was located in my foot I had an injury on my foot. Now, there could be a time that I am mistaken that my foot hurts with no injury. Instead the injury is in my lower back where inflamed tissue, or a herniated disk is pressing on a nerve and causing sciatica. So, by using more than one sense, and logic, I can still get at the truth. As I said before, we have more than one sense for fault tolerance - to check what one sense is telling us, and we have the ability to reason, to compare past experiences with current ones, and to predict what experiences we can have.

If you're conceding our perceptions might just be a pragmatic stimulus to navigate the world, which may or may not bear any resemblance to the object, then we're agreeing. If the pen is not red, but just appears red, then you're not asserting a direct realism. — Hanover

I never was asserting direct realism. What I was asserting is that we can still get at what objects are by using only our experiences of them. Indirect realism coupled with determinism is how you do it. Causes necessarily determine their effects. Effect carry information about their causes. Only by interpreting the correct causal pattern can we get at the way things are.

Asking how things are independent of looking at them is a silly question. You are assuming that there is something lost in translation when there it is just as likely that there isn't anything lost. How do you know that anything is lost in translation if you can't experience it? It's only an assumption. You have to know the truth to be able to lie. You have to know that something is missing to say that something is missing. How do you know that something is lost in translation?

Everything that is real has a causal power. We can get at the existence things we can't see by observing the things they interact with and the effects they leave behind. If the information you get allows you to solve some problem, or accomplish some goal, then that is all you need. Nothing was lost in translation.

Just think of all the trivial things you do throughout the day that you accomplish and never wonder about what was "lost in translation". Are you able to drink a glass of water. Does the water make it from the pitcher to the glass and then from the glass to your mouth? Do you get to and from work without any issues? Are you able to recognize your loved ones? Are you able to use your smart phone to accomplish tasks? How is it that you are able to make it to this website every day? All of these things you do and do them successfully day in and day out. So how can you say that there is something lost in translation?

Information is everywhere causes leave effects. Most information is irrelevant to what your current goal is, but relevant to some other goal. It's not that something is lost in translation. It's that something is lost in misinterpretation. When we misinterpret what we are experiencing, we are not getting at the true causes. It is more likely that we will fail. Maybe not the first or second time, but eventually we will realize that our interpretation does not work all the time and we will try to come up with a better interpretation. This is basically what science does. There is nothing lost in translation because every cause leaves some effects that we can experience. It is only the interpretation that can be wrong and make it appear that what our senses tell us is wrong. But by making more observations and incorporating logic do we overcome what we believe to be an illusion produced by one of our senses. The distinction between empiricism and rationalism is a false dichotomy. Both are used in together to get at the truth, or to acquire knowledge.

You seem to misunderstand my point. Dreams can be about things but dreams are still mental phenomena, caused by neural activity in the brain.

So your claim that distal objects are the intentional objects of waking experience and so therefore colours are mind-independent properties of these distal objects is a non sequitur.

Intentionality simply has no relevance to the dispute between colour eliminativism and colour realism. — Michael

Well, we still have the hard problem to contend with here. If colors are not parts of pens, then how can they be parts of neurons, or neural processes?

How were you able to determine that your dreams are dreams and not the same as your waking experiences? How did you determine that a mirage is not a pool of water but bent wavelengths of light? The same goes for a bent stick in a glass of water. How were you able to determine what is what and what is not? Was it using ONLY one sense? Did it involve ONLY using your senses?

I don't understand the reasoning behind this question. You're asking why speak at all if our speech isn't 100% accurate and complete in terms of what it conveys? My response would be because knowing something is better than knowing nothing. Why did we have black and white photography before color photography came out? Because something is better than nothing. And, I'd say, I don't labor with the belief that current color photography is 100% accurate in what it depicts. It's 2 dimensional, for example.

As in my example earlier of the air traffic controller looking at blips on his radar screen. No one believes that airplanes are blips, but we can all see the value in having him look at those blips. — Hanover

Which accomplishes the task of having planes land and take-off in a safer way. The blips accomplished the task they were designed for - nothing lost in translation.

In saying that no one believes the airplanes are blips, you are implying that we aren't expecting more than what the blips are telling us to accomplish some goal. We don't need to know the color of the plane to prevent it from crashing into another one while landing.

Will the real Genesis 1:2 please stand up? That is, the one where nothing gets lost in translation. — Hanover

How about they all stand up together?

The same way you don't confuse the car on your left from the car on your right: the direction of stimulation is extremely influential on how we perceive the stimulus. Throwing one's voice is a good example of where this is writ large - despite there being no voice coming from the direction one perceives (when on the receiving end!) - that is what one perceives. We can even be tricked about hte direction stimulus is coming from. Not being able to locate an itch is another perfect example. "I can't put my finger on it" has developed out of this experiential norm.

On-point to your comment, your internal depth perception is what creates the experience of distance - not the distance itself. It is your mind interpreting it which is why perspective can get really fucked up really quickly in the right physical circumstances. The mind does what it thinks it should be doing. It is not veridical in the philosophical sense.

I should say, if your argument is in line with Banno's hand-waving idea that we can somehow magically see things veridically, despite that being in direct contradiction of hte science of perception, I'm unsure we'll get far - which si fine, just want to avoid you wasting your time here if so. — AmadeusD

That's a cool trick the nervous system does. Pain is handled by a special neuron called a nociceptor. People who have chronic pain develop nervous superhighways so that any pain stimulus in the area jumps onto the same path. In other words, they lose the ability to correctly locate the pain. That problem can eventually progress until they have what's call "generalization" where they can't locate pain at all. It's just everywhere. — frank

I don't see how any of this contradicts or contrast with what I have been saying, including the part where I mentioned the distinctions between direct and indirect realism.

You feel the pain in your mind. — AmadeusD

Which is to say that the mind interprets the pain (information) as located in your toe. Information has to be interpreted. When we get at the actual cause is when we have interpreted something correctly. We still experience mirages even though we know the actual cause of the experience. Understanding the correct cause doesn't dispel the illusion. It becomes predictable. We can now predict when we will experience a mirage based on certain environmental conditions.

What I find so odd is when someone makes these scientific explanations, like frank did above, as if that somehow makes what we experience questionable, when science is based on empirical observations. Why should I trust frank's explanation to be veridical? Why should I trust your post as possessing any type of veridicality? Either what you and frank said is true, or it isn't. Which is it? You only pull the rug out from under your own statements when you call into question what your statements are based on. It's like the silly saying, "We don't know anything" when that is a statement of knowledge. It sounds like you are the one on Banno's side with your word games.

I'm not sure what "aboutness" has to do with anything being discussed here. This history textbook is about Hitler, but it isn't Hitler; it's bound pieces of paper with ink writing. — Michael

So you've never heard of Franz Brentano and intentionality of mental states? If you don't want to continue the conversation just say so. It's much more becoming than playing dumb.

What does that mean for some bound pieces of paper to be about something else? If all humans disappeared but our books were left behind, would the bound pieces of paper still be about Hitler? In other words, is aboutness mind-dependent?

I would argue that aboutness is everywhere causes leave effects. The book is about Hitler because of the existence of Hitler and someone's intent to write a book about him. The book would not exist if neither of those events happened. The crime scene is about the criminal because of the evidence the criminal left behind. The tree rings are about the age of the tree as a result of how the tree grows throughout the year. The color red is about the wavelength of light entering your eye. Of course I've simplified the causal processes significantly, but my point is that effects carry information about their causes. As such, information is everywhere. The world is not physical or mental. It is informational. Relational.

May I suggest the following book: https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691144955/aboutness

Then how do you not confuse a stubbed toe with a headache? There is an feeling of a location that the pain resides. What I am saying is that the relative location is information the same way that your visual depth is information that informs you of the distance of objects relative to your eyes. Our senses even provide a level of fault tolerance where I can feel the pen where I see it.

If the information about the damage comes from tactile sensors rather than reflected light in its camera eyes, does that qualify as pain? — Harry Hindu

What do you mean by "information"? Are you referring to the chemical neurotransmitters like glutomate that are released and sent to the brain? They, themselves, are not pain. The experience of pain occurs when there is the appropriate neural activity in the insular and secondary somatosensory cortexes, which usually occurs in response to these neurotransmitters, but direct electrical stimulation of these cortexes without any preceding tactile sensor involvement also causes pain. — Michael

What I mean by information is the form pain takes and the form colors take and the form smells and tastes and sounds take in your consciousness. What I mean by information is the aboutness that your sensory impressions take in that your sensory impressions are not the pen or the injury, but ABOUT the pen and the injury. When you feel pain are you not informed that you have an injury? When you see the red of the apple are you not informed that the apple is ripe? You can be informed about being injured in other ways by sight as you pointed out, but the sensory impression you experience is dependent upon the type of sense that is being used - your nerve endings in your skin vs your eyes.

I should point out that when I stub my toe, I feel the pain in my toe, not my head. I don't confuse a stubbed toe with a headache. That is another point in that our senses also provide information about location relative the brain. The world appears located relative to the eyes, but we know that the world is not located relative to the eyes. The way the visual field is displayed - the form the visual information takes - as the world located relative to the eyes is what gives it the "first-person" feel.

Straw man. If the information about the damage comes from tactile sensors rather than reflected light in its camera eyes, does that qualify as pain? If the robot sees its injury does it experience colors? Your mental gymnastics isn't helping the discussion progress.

Heavy emphasis of "partially." Words aren't useless. They are massively important to communicate with one another. Words are an interpretation of mental states into symbols. The mental states stay behind and the symbols do the best they can to project one's thoughts to another. Much is lost in translation. — Hanover

You keep confusing what is lost in translation with what is irrelevant to the situation. I don't need to know about how you feel about your loss to know where to find where they are buried. I don't need to know where they are buried to know how you are feeling about losing someone you love because I have lost loved ones too, so I understand what you are feeling. Why do we even have words the refer to mental states if something is lost when using them? How do you even know what is lost, if anything, without knowing the contents of another's mind when telling them about your feelings?

If I made it to the grave sight after telling me how to get there nothing was lost in translation. If I say "I understand how you feel" when you tell me how you feel nothing was lost in translation.

Because you keep asking the hard question. We don't have an answer to it.

All I am explaining is what the science shows; that pain and colour are percepts that occur when there is the appropriate brain activity; they are not mind-independent properties of knives and pens. — Michael

I ask the hard question because he keep stating that pain and color occur with appropriate brain activity. If the hard problem isn't solved then it is a logical possibility that color and pain doesnt necessarily occur with brain activity. It might occur with any type of computational process, like in a robot.

I asked if a robot can experience pain if it is informed it is damaged. You avoided the question.

If another human experiences something completely different than you when they are injured, can you say they feel pain? This is why I ask the question about what pain and color are. If someone can experience a different feeling when injured and you still qualify that as pain then why not a robot with a working memory that stores information temporarily to work out a response. What FORM does that information take in its working memory? Conciousness is a type of working memory.

So the ultimate question you need to answer is does it really matter what FORM the percep takes if it is caused by an injury and the percept is not the injury but information ABOUT the injury? Does that qualify as pain?

Does it matter what FORM the percept takes if it is caused by an interaction of reflected light with a lens and a sensory information processor?

The case you are making implies that humans and their brains are special in that they have this special power to create colors and pain when science has also shown that humans are not so special in the grand scheme of things.

Do you never try to convey how you feel to others? If you do then you must have some degree of certainty that they will at least partially understand what you are saying because they can experience the same feelings but in different but similar contexts (they have lost a love one too, just not your loved one).

A percept that occurs when there is the appropriate neurological activity, often in response to electrical signals sent from nociceptors.

See for example Role of the Prefrontal Cortex in Pain Processing:

The main brain areas that are most consistently activated under painful conditions are the insular cortex and secondary somatosensory cortex, bilaterally. Electrical stimulation of these areas, but not in other candidate brain areas, is able to elicit a painful sensation. — Michael

This doesn't answer my question. It just bumps against the hard problem again and we are back where we started.

What is a percept?

You have given a visual model of the brain and its processes, yet have explained that colors and shapes are only in our head. If our visual experience is that inaccurate in that we are seeing things that are not there, then how can we trust the visual explanations scientists and neurologists provide us. When a neurologist says "the mind (color) is an illusion", they are pulling the rug out from under their own visual models and explanations.

How does a colorless process create color?

But it seems to me that you can describe to me where your loved one is buried so that I may find it and pay my respects without knowing any of that other stuff you spoke about, and would actually be irrelevant to that goal anyway. It seems that it's difficult to translate mental states, but not so difficult to translate other states of the world that we share. How can we be so good at describing "external" states when all we have to go by is our "internal" states which you seem to think is so difficult to translate? How can I make it to your loved one's grave with a high chance of success (much more than random) when you are describing your internal states of what it is like being in that location and what it was like to get there yourself?

So in other words it isn't known whether pain requires the appropriate neurological activity, and so it is possible that pain just ain't in the head? — Michael

What is pain?

Isn't pain information in that it informs you of some injury in/on your body? Can a robot be informed of damage to its body? If so, does it experience pain?

I agree that metaphysics/philosophy isn't a word game. In using language we are informing others of some state of the world which can include mental states, but not necessarily. Our perceptions inform us of what is there whether it be a pen or the scribble, "pen". I wonder does Banno think he is playing a word game when discussing religion or politics?

In other words, it isn't known whether color experiences require the appropriate neurological activity..., In other words it is possible that colors ain't just in the head.

No it doesn't. That colour experiences require the appropriate neurological activity, which requires neural connections ordinarily formed in response to electrical information from the eyes, does not entail that colours are mind-independent properties of light or a material surface that reflects such light. — Michael

What's so special about neurological activity that causes color? How does a colorless process cause color? How do we know that a robot with cameras for eyes connected to a computer brain that can distinguish between different wavelengths of light isn't experiencing different colors as those distinctions in its working memory? How do we know that any object isn't experiencing color (panpsychism)? What's so special about organisms when they are just another kind of physical object?

It seems to me that colors take certain shapes which is why it might be difficult to see a red pen on a red table and why camouflage works and is a useful survival trait.

It's true that I assume the listener understands me, but I don't think he fully understands me. This thread is evidence of that.

You seem to be trying to build an argument with these questions, so I'll keep answering you, but maybe move closer to the point because it's not apparent to me.

It may be the other person doesn't see what I see or know what I know. My expectation is that much of what I do experience I do not fully convey in words and that much of what the listener hears isn't accurate of what I meant. Maybe we have shared experience, maybe not. I'd find it hard to believe that two people would fully share an experience down to the last emotion or perception. — Hanover

You sure are making a lot of knowledge statements about what you know about others' experiences for someone that says

The noumena isn't known. — Hanover

Why is it hard to believe that two people wouldn't fully share an experience down the the last emotion or perception if you don't have some knowledge about other people? Does it have to do with how others are shaped and behave in different ways than you? But then there are many similar ways that others are shaped and behave similar to you, too. So, wouldn't it be more likely that while they may not fully share an experience they do share some experiences, and those reasons for those similarities and differences can be pointed out as similarities and differences in our physiology and prior experiences? It doesn't seem as complex as some people here are making it out to be.

I want to take this a step further. I suspect we will agree that you can be sure, at least sometimes, that we can be confident the colour people see is the same. Like when we both choose the red pen. But when we prefix the word "subjective", that colour becomes uncertain.

Why not avoid using the word "subjective", and keep your confidence?

That is, perhaps the notion of a subjective colour is a misapplication, and colours are not subjective. — Banno

Exactly. Subjective experiences are only useful to talk about when wanting to know about the state of other minds, not other pens.

Even if others don't experience red the same as I do, it is irrelevant to the goal at hand, which is drawing one's attention to a specific pen. As long as their experience is consistent (they always experience the same color when viewing certain wavelengths of light), then they will know which pen I am referring to.

This is no different than language in that as long as each user of language is consistent in the way they use certain words, we can understand what they say. Colors, shapes, sounds, feelings, smells, etc. are all words in a (private) language that you translate into your native language of scribbles and sounds that others know the rules for deciphering.

When viewing the words on this page, does it matter what color others see the letters as, or does it only matter that they see the same scribbles and use the same rules for deciphering the meaning of the scribbles? People that do not speak English will see scribbles on this page. English speakers see words.

What is the purpose of saying "The pen is red"? Why is that useful to say?
— Harry Hindu

You are reporting upon what you see. Maybe you want to be provided the red pen — Hanover

Why is it useful to report what you see?

The noumena isn't known. — Hanover

In reporting what you see, you seem to know there are other people with other minds that can perceive what you do, in the way that you do, or else what is the point of reporting what you see? Why use language at all?

The constitution of the pen is disputed, not the appearance. — Hanover

What is the purpose of saying "The pen is red"? Why is that useful to say?

Does a red apple and red pen have the same constitution? Could we mean more than one thing in saying "the apple is red" vs. "the pen is red"?

Nature = self-governed
Supernatural = over nature

supernatural is only meaningful in the light of the natural, then it would seem that everything is fundamentally natural including God and the domain God resides in.
— Harry Hindu

…supernatural is only meaningful in the light of the natural, then it would seem that everything is fundamentally natural including God and the domain God resides in.

The conclusion’s soundness seems to depend on the prefix “super-”, which of course means ‘over’. However, ‘over’ covers up two distinct concepts. Does it mean ‘above’ (over and not touching) or ‘on’ (over and touching)? If it means ‘on/connected to’ then supernatural just means artificial. Humans trick nature into doing things beyond their natural ends all the time. But at the same time, it is just human nature to do artificial things. Therefore, the difference is just direct and indirect. So, in this sense, we have a mutually arising relationship like the one you described.

On the other hand, Platonic monotheists have actively pushed the unconnected sense. Their God creates ex nihilo and is the unmoved mover. It is the radical other that by definition can not be embraced. It always sits outside any harmonization project like non-dualism.

In short, above all else it rests on ‘over’. — Keith

The only relationship between supernatural and natural I'm interested in is causal. It doesn't matter where God is relative to it's creation. God is the cause, the universe is the effect. Our actions in the natural determine where we end up in the supernatural after we die. It's all causal and temporal. Whether it be indirect or direct, it's all part of the same reality.

I (mostly) agree but, since the relevent context of this thread discussion implicitly concerns "religion" (and explicity and more broadly concerns metaphysics), I think anti-supernatural is more precise and specific than "anti-delusional" (or, as you said earlier, "rational/logical"). — 180 Proof

Don't limit yourself.

Is it not relevant in a thread discussing religion and metaphysics to assert that religion is a type of delusion? And does this assertion provide a non-dual "bridging" between theism and atheism in showing that applying logic to all beliefs, not just religious ones, is a monistic solution to the duality of faith vs. reason, and an attempt to get at the inconsistent (dual) application of logic/reason to some beliefs and not others (faith)?

Would the answer to the thread's question not provide some useful implications for other types of beliefs, like in unicorns, dragons, aliens, mutants, dark matter and energy, etc.?