That's a scientific mystery, not a philosophical one. Life reduces to chemistry, so the idea that chemicals sloshing around could give rise to a self-replicating molecule in some vanishingly remote chain of events isn't hard to swallow. There's no Hard Problem associated with it. — RogueAI

Hmm. So you're saying that a "self-replicating molecule" is much less mysterious than a "conscious entity"? If we're invoking a "vanishingly remote chain of events" here, why can't we do so for consciousness as well?

I have a feeling that the abiogenesis problem only looks different and more scientific because we've made better progress on it. There certainly used to be a Hard Problem associated with it, and it's still no picnic. I expect the same will prove true for consciousness. Chalmers didn't mean the Hard Problem of consciousness was intractable, or a sign that we necessarily weren't thinking about it correctly. He just meant that, at the moment, we don't have a good research program for answering it.

But in any case, I do have a better sense of why the whole "consciousness as emergent property" claim could seem extraordinary to you, thanks.

Hmm. So you're saying that a "self-replicating molecule" is much less mysterious than a "conscious entity"? — J

Within the framework of materialism, I think it is. I think the materialist story of life is just a story of chemistry, so there's no fundamental incoherencies. The materialist story of consciousness, otoh, goes down some pretty weird rabbit holes: eliminative materialism and mind-brain identity theory.

If we're invoking a "vanishingly remote chain of events" here, why can't we do so for consciousness as well? — J

You can, and you get Boltzmann Brains. But the issue I have with Boltzmann Brains isn't that they're fantastically unlikely. It's the story materialism tries to tell about how consciousness emerges from any kind of brain, and we're back to the issues I raised earlier: a seeming category error, no agreed upon explanation for how consciousness emerges from matter, and it seems to lead to absurdities.

"I have a feeling that the abiogenesis problem only looks different and more scientific because we've made better progress on it. There certainly used to be a Hard Problem associated with it, and it's still no picnic. I expect the same will prove true for consciousness. Chalmers didn't mean the Hard Problem of consciousness was intractable, or a sign that we necessarily weren't thinking about it correctly. He just meant that, at the moment, we don't have a good research program for answering it."

That's possible. We used to think there was some mysterious elan vital associated with life. It seems to me, that at this point in our scientific development, there should be some explanation for consciousness, some agreed upon definition for what it is, some kind of test to see if x is conscious. The consciousness theories should not be all over the place, like they are. You have panpsychists in one camp and eliminative materialists in the other and they're both taken seriously. One of those camps should have been completely disproven by now. It suggests to me that traditional scientific enquiry won't ever solve the Hard Problem. The lack of progress makes me think science won't figure out consciousness.

"But in any case, I do have a better sense of why the whole "consciousness as emergent property" claim could seem extraordinary to you, thanks."

Awesome! Good discussion.

The lack of progress makes me think science won't figure out consciousness. — RogueAI

I sympathize. But I'm a huge fan of science and it constantly surprises me. Going way out on a limb here . . . In the year 3025, humans will look back on us and say, "Wow, they really thought their concepts of 'physical' and 'conscious' and 'causality' could produce results! How far we've come."

Yes, appreciate the talk very much.