No, there's no 'we'. That too is just something inside our minds. — Isaac

There's no "we," but there's an "our"?

I quite specifically said I imagine a heterogeneous sea of stuff, not a uniform one. I imagine variations in many possible fields, — Isaac

Ah, sorry, I was thinking you said homogeneous. So the "lumpiness" is a way it is, no?

I can convince your mind that the table is a part of your body in less than two minutes. — Isaac

I'd definitely make a wager on that.

I can convince your mind that the table is a part of your body in less than two minutes. — Isaac

By the way:

There's no "we," but there's an "our"? — Terrapin Station

Not sure what you mean here.

So the "lumpiness" is a way it is, no? — Terrapin Station

Yes, I think I'd grant that. I can see where you might be going - to say that at least something has at least one property. I think I might well agree with that (with the proviso that such would only constitute a description of my model in your terminology, accepting that my model is definitely flawed by pretending to exclude me from it).

By the way: — Terrapin Station

Not sure what that post is trying to say (although he sounds pretty damn convinced he's the table!)

I'd definitely make a wager on that. — Terrapin Station

Oh, and I'm just referencing here Ramachandran's (slightly) famous experiments with rubber hands, and tables. I have to go out now so can't explain the whole thing. Will do so when I get back, presuming you don't already know.

Not sure what you mean here. — Isaac

How can there be an "our" if there's no "we"?

Yes, I think I'd grant that. I can see where you might be going - to say that at least something has at least one property. — Isaac

Yeah, that's a property. In fact, even a homogeneous soup that's indeterminate would be properties. Since properties are simply ways that things are.

The table thing--that was just a perfect opportunity for that. That's from the album that Lou Reed and Metallica did together a handful of years ago, Lulu. In one of the tunes, "The View", James Hetfield periodically sings "I am the table." The album was largely castigated, and people saw lines like that as indicative of its many problems. So someone made a video looping all of the "I am the tables" from that tune.

I actually like the album quite a bit, but it's still conventionally considered a bomb/a big mistake, especially by Metallica fans.

The purpose is to underscore that if bats have conscious experiences--and presumably they do have some sorts of conscious experiences, then (a) those experiences are probably quite different from human conscious experiences (if for no other reason than they have some very different faculties than we do, such as an ability to employ echolocation with high precision during high-speed flight), and (b) it's not possible from a third-person perspective, a perspective which is the only one from which we can talk about bat consciousness (and bat brains if we're physicalists or "reductionists" as Nagel puts it in his paper), to know the properties of the conscious experiences of bats, from the bat's perspective, as the bat knows the same. — Terrapin Station

Right, but what is useful in knowing what form the bat's consciousness takes? Are we trying to get at what the bat knows, or the form its knowledge takes, or what, and why?

Right, but what is useful in knowing what form the bat's consciousness takes? Are we trying to get at what the bat knows, or the form its knowledge takes, or what, and why? — Harry Hindu

It's underscoring a problem with developing a scientific account of mind.

It's underscoring a problem with developing a scientific account of mind. — Terrapin Station

Science is asking what the problem is. Again, what is what is useful in knowing what form the bat's consciousness takes? Are we trying to get at what the bat knows, or the form its knowledge takes, or what, and why?

Science is asking what the problem is. Again, what is what is useful in knowing what form the bat's consciousness takes? Are we trying to get at what the bat knows, or the form its knowledge takes, or what, and why? — Harry Hindu

Presumably an important part of consciousness is what things are like experientially to the bearer of the consciousness in question. So if we can't tackle that scientifically, we have a problem with devising scientific accounts of consciousness. We can just ignore it and not care about it, but then we're ignoring a big part of what we we're supposedly addressing. An alternate track--one that many have taken--is to try to deny that there is such a thing in the first place, or at least deny that it's any different than what things are like outside of consciousness.

Right, it's a property of that object reflect[ing] that wavelength of EMR, and it's also a property of your experience per se (which is what qualia are). — Terrapin Station

Ok. One more thing, for now. This property... is it meaningful to ask: what is it? E.g., I want to ask: is it a disposition or ability to reflect the certain wavelength?

I want to ask: is it a disposition or ability to reflect the certain wavelength? — bongo fury

With respect to the object (the objective stuff), it's the fact that it reflects that wavelength of EMR, sure. That's not what it is with respect to our experience, though--our mental phenomena don't reflect that wavelength of EMR. In terms of our experience, it's a particular dynamic state of synapses, neurons, etc.

That's not what it is with respect to our experience, though--our mental phenomena don't reflect that wavelength of EMR. — Terrapin Station

but one is extensional relations and the other is an electromagnetic frequency. — Terrapin Station

So the colour quales and shape quales are distinguished in our experience by something which is not reflected in our experience.

So the colour quales and shape quales are distinguished in our experience by something which is not reflected in our experience. — fdrake

I have no idea what you're saying there in context (particularly re "by something which is not reflected in our experience" )

How can there be an "our" if there's no "we"? — Terrapin Station

There's a difference, which is really difficult to maintain, between talk that identifies objects we're all used to distinguishing and talk about the non-constructed basis for those things. When I say "inside our minds" I mean to refer to what we culturally (probably even biologically) distinguish as "our minds". When I say "there is no 'we'", I'm trying to talk about what there is that is not thus constructed, that's 'out there' as the stuff we construct objects from.

Yeah, that's a property. In fact, even a homogeneous soup that's indeterminate would be properties. Since properties are simply ways that things are. — Terrapin Station

Yes, but my caveat is important. We couldn't say, that anything was a property of 'it' because even the idea variation, 'lumpiness' as you put it, is suffused with our way of life.

James Hetfield periodically sings "I am the table." — Terrapin Station

Periodically? Thanks to you I spent the entire afternoon with "I am the table" on a loop in my head!

So - the actual 'I am the table'. If I place your hand behind a screen on a table, I stroke both the table in front of you and your hand with the same pattern, I then approach the table in front of you threatening to hit it with a hammer, you have a galvanic skin response exactly as you would if I threatened your real hand. The same parts of the brain fire, and most people report a genuine fear.

Two minutes of deception and your brain is happy to think of the table as part of your body.

In terms of our experience, it's a particular dynamic state of synapses, neurons, etc. — Terrapin Station

Particular in the sense of general but awaiting a clear physical definition (which would decide if a particular brain state was an instance of it)?

In terms of our experience, it's a particular dynamic state of synapses, neurons, etc. — Terrapin Station

Right, but this now starts to sound physicalist about properties of experience. "Particular dynamic state of synapses, neurons, etc" is definitely something accessible to a third party (at least in theory). I thought you were saying it's something more than that.

I want to focus on this first because I think it's more important:

Yes, but my caveat is important. We couldn't say, that anything was a property of 'it' because even the idea variation, 'lumpiness' as you put it, is suffused with our way of life. — Isaac

Again, properties don't depend on us, our ideas, etc. Whatever the world is like sans us is a matter of the world having whatever properties it has. There's no way for there to be something without properties. That claim would be incoherent.

Particular in the sense of general but awaiting a clear physical definition (which would decide if a particular brain state was an instance of it)? — bongo fury

Say what?

No, particular as in particular. And it has nothing to do with definitions, etc.

the amount of cultural conditioning it takes to get someone to think that this is their 'spontaneous' self-report is incredible — StreetlightX

Very much this. Though I take a pretty cynical view of it. The kind of description of experience going on here is reflection upon it with a certain priming; we're in a philosophical discussion, people will necessarily bring their philosophical background to bear upon how the experience is parsed.

@Terrapin Station is having difficulty imagining that our experience isn't parsed into properties (with properties of those properties distinguishing things like colour properties and shape properties), and that it's either a philosophical or folk-theoretic means of interpretation to parse it that way. "This is just how my experience is".

What I've been attacking with @Terrapin Station is where the distinctions between these properties come from, whether it's a conceptual distinction imposed reflectively (and thus retrospectively) upon experience (between colour quales and shape quales), or our (visual) experience really is (or must be) parsed into distinctive property types. Where do these distinctions come from? is the central question I've been asking here.

When people use qualia language, they perform precisely these conceptual distinctions and then impute those conceptual distinctions into their experience; as if there are grounds for distinguishing colour qualia and shape qualia (of a table) within the phenomenal character of experience. The perception isn't furnishing the distinction, the conception of experience is.

A lot of philosophical framing devices have to be unproblematically assumed to even parse experience in that way, to have it 'read off the world (phenomenal character)' misses an extremely crucial point; when we reflect on our experiences, we apprehend them with a loose knit interpretive framework that was not necessarily present during the experience reflected upon. That presumptions are read into the phenomena is the sort of stuff faith is made of, not analysis (even though we all have 'faith' in this sense).

It is difficult to highlight an intellectual commitment which is enacted rather than articulated; a performative presumption, rather than a declared one. Exposing these presumptions is the goal.

Well this is where we differ. I don't think it's incoherent at all. I think quite the opposite in fact. I can't think of what a 'property' might be without someone to define it.

Right, but this now starts to sound physicalist about properties of experience. — Isaac

Yeah, I'm a physicalist and I was giving my personal explanation there.

"Particular dynamic state of synapses, neurons, etc" is definitely something accessible to a third party — Isaac

Not from the perspective of being those states.

I don't think it's incoherent at all. I think quite the opposite in fact. I can't think of what a 'property' might be without someone to define it. — Isaac

Properties are how something happens to be, characteristics it has, even if that amounts to being indefinite.

Not from tye perspective of being those states. — Terrapin Station

Right, but if "Particular dynamic state of synapses, neurons, etc" is what 'properties' of experience are - in their entirety, then what is missing from the third party account? More importantly for a physicalist, where is that missing thing expressed physically?

Terrapin Station is having difficulty imagining that our experience isn't parsed into properties — fdrake

I'm not saying something about concepts in that. I'm saying that your experience has to be some way or other, has to have some characteristics or other, etc.

Properties are how something happens to be, characteristics it has, even if that amounts to being indefinite. — Terrapin Station

But what be would the answer to "what properties does this object have" without anyone to identify them as such?

I'm not saying something about concepts in that. I'm saying that your experience has to be some way or other, has to have some characteristics or other, etc. — Terrapin Station

That you think you're providing a theory neutral description of phenomenal character is part of the problem.

what is missing from the third party account? — Isaac

I just answered this: the perspective of being those states.

Everything is different from different perspectives or frames/points of reference.

where is that missing thing expressed physically? — Isaac

At various reference points, including the reference point of being the thing in question.

But what would the answer to "what properties does this object have" without anyone to identify them as such? — Isaac

What? I'm not saying anything about language. What the answer to a question would be is irrelevant.