They believe that the Neural Activity is sufficient for us to move around in the world without bumping into things. — SteveKlinko
We don't know just how similar to our own brains something has to be before consciousness arises. — Terrapin Station
↪SteveKlinko Your opening statement is wrong. There is clear documented evidence that shows as clear as can be that consciousness is not required to navigate around a room. This is so because there are numerous people who are consciously blind yet they are able to cross a room and avoid all the furniture without any problem.
You could argue that this is still ‘conscious’ but I have a feeling you meant ‘awareness’ when you said ‘conscious’? The term ‘consciousness’ has several applications. Technically speaking when we’re asleep and dreaming we are ‘conscious’ - this being a certain state of neural arousal (excuse my nomenclature!)
I’d also add that various simple organisms sense light yet they’re not conscious. We can create machines that process ‘visual’ information and they are not conscious.
So what do you mean? A brain isn’t necessary in some cases - at least nothing on par with human brains. — I like sushi
This is so because there are numerous people who are consciously blind yet they are able to cross a room and avoid all the furniture without any problem. — I like sushi
↪SteveKlinko Your reply makes no sense. Clean up the differentiation between ‘consciousness’ and ‘conscious awareness’ otherwise you’ve just said I am wrong AND right.
Split brain patients also shine a curious light on such instances. It goes without saying that there is a level of consciousness that allows consciously blind people to navigate around obstacles. To claim that they are ‘consciously aware’ is plainly false and/or something far more complex is going on. — I like sushi
If I talk about the Conscious Experience of the Color Red, for example, I am of course assuming you are Aware of the Experience of the Redness. I don't deal with Subconscious or Unconscious Brain functions. Those are other distinct topics which are interesting but are not what I am talking about..↪SteveKlinko So are you differentiating conscious awareness from consciousness or not. I posed that question in my first post. — I like sushi
Let's try this:↪SteveKlinko I’m sorry, I don’t understand your point. Perhaps someone else can address it. — I like sushi
Consciousness is definitely helpful for survival purposes, though, especially when you get to organisms like us, who are relatively complex and who aren't adapted to easily survive to reproduction age without a lot of assistance and without the benefits of being able to learn things (such as things in our environment that are dangerous). — Terrapin Station
Organisms need to respond to the environment and have ways to learn, and we are used to being conscious while doing this. But is it necessary, or could a zombie do the same things. Or are plants conscious? We know now that plants communicate, share water with trees in trouble even across species, make choices based on information from the environment, though much slower than we do, react proactively to threats...iow they do a lot of things for survival purposes. Are they conscious? (there is a growing group of botanists who think it makes sense to speak of plant intelligence, but I guess I am not going there quite yet, but seeing if those who perhaps think plants are doing all this merely mechanically might then consider that life forms can do things that mirror intelligence without being conscious)Consciousness is definitely helpful for survival purposes, though, especially when you get to organisms like us, who are relatively complex and who aren't adapted to easily survive to reproduction age without a lot of assistance and without the benefits of being able to learn things (such as things in our environment that are dangerous). — Terrapin Station
Consciousness is definitely helpful for survival purposes, though, especially when you get to organisms like us, who are relatively complex and who aren't adapted to easily survive to reproduction age without a lot of assistance and without the benefits of being able to learn things (such as things in our environment that are dangerous). — Terrapin Station
This is an extremely interesting claim, and if we could make it precise, it would be very helpful in the debate on Consciousness. I am not well versed in these issues in philosophy of mind and cognitive science generally, but it seems to be a contentious issue whether or not consciousness would be something on which natural selection could operate.
It seems to me that I could picture the entire history of human/ape evolution, without the corresponding emergence of consciousness. Why would consciousness be of assistance to our survival? What type of actions and or responses would a conscious being be able to perform that an unconscious being would not be able to (or would not be able to with the same success)?
This is a genuine question. I have no idea at all. — Kornelius
They believe that the Neural Activity is sufficient for us to move around in the world without bumping into things. This is insane denial of the obvious purpose for Visual Consciousness. The Conscious Visual experience is the thing that allows us to move around in the world. Neural Activity is not enough. We would be blind without the Conscious Visual experience. The Conscious Visual experience contains vast amounts of information about the external world all packed up into a single thing. — SteveKlinko
If I did not have the Conscious Visual experience I would not be able to pick up my coffee mug, or at least it would be much more difficult with just Neural Activity. — SteveKlinko
If you study the Visual Areas of the Brain you will discover several things. It does not appear that the Visual Areas are processing the Light information with the goal of creating the integrated Visual Scene that we experience. Rather the Brain seems to deconstruct the image with the goal of detecting elementary properties of the image like lines, edges, motion, and color. There do not seem to be any downstream Visual Areas that are involved with reconstructing the Visual Scene that we experience from all the deconstructed properties that the Brain detects. The only place where there is a good undistorted image is on the Retina of the Eye. The other various stages of processing are highly warped and distorted maps of the retina. The highest stages don't really even map at all. The highest stages seem to be involved in image recognition and the lower stages seem to be for mechanical control of focus and eye convergence. The process of combining the processing results of the various Areas of the Visual system to create the integrated Visual Scene is called Binding. The fact that no one knows how this is accomplished is called the Binding Problem.They believe that the Neural Activity is sufficient for us to move around in the world without bumping into things. This is insane denial of the obvious purpose for Visual Consciousness. The Conscious Visual experience is the thing that allows us to move around in the world. Neural Activity is not enough. We would be blind without the Conscious Visual experience. The Conscious Visual experience contains vast amounts of information about the external world all packed up into a single thing. — SteveKlinko
If I did not have the Conscious Visual experience I would not be able to pick up my coffee mug, or at least it would be much more difficult with just Neural Activity. — SteveKlinko
I guess I pressed for more explanation on these claims. I am not sure that they simply don't amount to the mere assertion that there is a difference between a conscious being, and one with "mere neural activity".
So: why would it be more difficult for an unconscious being (neural facts being equal otherwise) to pick up a cup? The response system you suggest is due to consciousness is actually due to our neural, optic, etc., system. We could get the same response output, without the subjective "inner movie" so to speak.
I want to be clear: I take the conscious experience at face-value and I think an explanation is needed. I certainly disagree with more radical naturalists who explain it away as an "illusion". That being said, the conscious experience might just be complex information processing (owed to complex neural systems/activity). — Kornelius
Get involved in philosophical discussions about knowledge, truth, language, consciousness, science, politics, religion, logic and mathematics, art, history, and lots more. No ads, no clutter, and very little agreement — just fascinating conversations.