Is unconsciousness during sleep something that a person should realistically fear? — AJ88

I have been losing consciousness nightly for 75 years, and yet my Self is still living. That's because Consciousness is not the same thing as Self or Life. All of those are ongoing processes, not material substances that evaporate. I was also non-conscious for billions of years before my birth, and suffered no serious complications from that prolonged non-life. Death is merely the end of the process of Living, and incidentally the end of all other related processes such a Consciousness. After death you are not likely to be conscious of anything. So why lose sleep over it?

The philosophical cartoon raises a hypothetical question, that has no effect on the real world -- only on the minds of those who take them too seriously. :joke:

Consciousness : Conscious-ness is an immaterial quality like red-ness : it doesn't exist in the molecular or atomic level of neurons, but on the metaphysical level of whole systems.
http://bothandblog2.enformationism.info/page32.html

Self/Soul :
The brain can create the image of a fictional person (the Self) to represent its own perspective in dealings with other things and persons.
1. This imaginary Me is a low-resolution construct abstracted from the complex web of inter-relationships that actually form the human body, brain, mind, DNA, and social networks in the context of a vast universe.
2. In the Enformationism worldview, only G*D could know yourself objectively in complete detail as the mathematical definition of You. That formula is equivalent to your Self/Soul.
3. Because of the fanciful & magical connotations of the traditional definition for "Soul" (e.g. ghosts), Enformationism prefers the more practical term "Self".
http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page18.html

Great question! :)

My view is the exact inverse of Gnomon's (if I have read them correctly). Our identity is constituted by all those processes, and when they stop, we no longer have a unitary identity, or at least much less of one. Consciousness, a bit like the total quantity of matter, is unaffected. I think this is a more coherent fit with the concepts of identity (vague and mutable) with consciousness (sharp and unchanging).

Our identity is constituted by all those processes, and when they stop, we no longer have a unitary identity, or at least much less of one. — bert1

The OP was asking if, when Consciousness stops during sleep, we are in-effect dead for the duration. But that notion is based on a poor understanding of Consciousness. By far, the majority of brain functions are Sub-Conscious, and awareness is a small percentage of our total mental operations.

Long before our modern neuroscience could detect brain processes during sleep, some people were afraid that sleep or any other form of un-consciousness was a step toward the totality of death. But Sleep and Death are related only by analogy. The Little Death myth was due to taking a metaphor literally. To the contrary, sleep is an essential aspect of living. Cheers! :smile:

The Little Death : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_petite_mort

After having read it, I have some very rough nights, with the concept that if a person falls asleep they die in the most intimate way possible, what ever happens to the body, making it hard to fall asleep. — AJ88

Does it help to say that even in deepest sleep we have a dim ruminating sort of consciousness?

The brain can't actually shut down. Every neuron has to keep firing all through sleep. So it is the state of consciousness that is altered. Sensory input and motor output are suppressed. The result in slow wave (or non-dreaming) sleep is a desultory and instantly forgotten nonsense thread of thought.

It is difficult to catch because it is so unremembered and washed away by waking. But with practice you can notice it.

So in general, our personal identity is all about a structure of habit and experience that is our living brain. That doesn't change as we go to bed at night and wake up in the morning. Indeed, there is evidence that sleep allows growth processes that help cement new memories and habits. So you are becoming more "you" in a sense.

All our body is falling apart and rebuilding constantly. Proteins like microtubules - the internal skeleton of a cell - have a half-life of about 10 minutes. So there is constant molecular turnover all day and all night as a basic fact of biology. This dynamism is what we are.

Even the act of remembering produces changes in those very memories. Everything shifts around a bit at the neural level in a way that consolidates what is frequently used so that it becomes more efficient.
The effects are slight but real. And again essential to the way that minds are.

So the teleporter thought experiment is interesting. Even if it is a physical impossibility to "replace every atom exactly", it seems logically true that it should make no difference to "us" as we are the current structure of our brain and body.

But also, we are "us" in terms of recent experience. And so our beliefs at the point of entering the teleporter, or falling asleep, are part of this remembered or habitual sense of self.

If enter the teleporter believing we are being transported, then that is the belief state which should be rebuilt at the other end.

Likewise if we go in believing we are about to die, then that death of ourselves will be the memory state recreated.

So you are becoming more "you" in a sense. — apokrisis

Practices like Zen allow one to understand that one's "I" is an artifice. And the experiences of the Art of Dreaming (Castaneda) allow one to experience that "I" as an isolated and powerful sense of pure will.

But the strangest experience I had was to awaken in the dream state as another person entirely, with the feelings and gestalt of that person, in an old house in Ireland. It was quickly over, but the sensation of being another remains. It's indescribable.

When we engage in a demanding physical and/or mental activity we can momentarily lose the sense of self and become immersed in the flow. I've had this happen when working on a math theorem or doing gymnastics or rock climbing. Or simply driving along an empty highway, letting "George" react.

Identity is indeed strange.

My view is the exact inverse of Gnomon's (if I have read them correctly). Our identity is constituted by all those processes, and when they stop, we no longer have a unitary identity, or at least much less of one. Consciousness, a bit like the total quantity of matter, is unaffected. I think this is a more coherent fit with the concepts of identity (vague and mutable) with consciousness (sharp and unchanging). — bert1

The problem with this panpsychism is that the weight of neurobiological evidence suggests that the processes are everything.

Imagine you had a brain cancer tumour that is huge. A big mass. Maybe even dwarfing the brain itself. Would that add anything to your "consciousness".

And then the "processes" themselves are best understood as processes in which the heterogeneity is part of the unity in just the same way a single body is formed by a collection of organs. The brain both differentiates and integrates so as to be a multiplicity of parts functioning as a cohesive whole.

So the claim that the brain is "constituted" of processes is actually the much larger claim that the process itself has a holistic unity of its parts.

That is what makes any panpsychic talk flawed. Panpsychism is an argument that piggybacks on conventional materialistic reductionism. And neurobiology has already moved on from that with its holistic notions of "process".

Imagine you had a brain cancer tumour that is huge. A big mass. Maybe even dwarfing the brain itself. Would that add anything to your "consciousness". — apokrisis

Indeed no. You are right to point out this problem with my analogy which is so in-apt I wish I hadn't used it. Matter of course admits of quantity, whereas consciousness does not, I suggest.

Panpsychism is an argument that piggybacks on conventional materialistic reductionism. — apokrisis

Is it? Could you elaborate?

The problem with this panpsychism is that the weight of neurobiological evidence suggests that the processes are everything. — apokrisis

Do you identify consciousness with processes?

What does it matter?

Do you identify consciousness with processes? — bert1

My position is that consciousness is the result of nervous systems being in a modelling relation with the world. So I am talking specifically about that kind of process. One where there is mental modelling going on.

So the claim that the brain is "constituted" of processes is actually the much larger claim that the process itself has a holistic unity of its parts. — apokrisis

The current dominant model of the brain says that it consists of an array of "modules" with specialized functions. But no-one has come up with a plausible theory of how those independent modules work together to produce the unique singular perspective we call the Self. Perhaps the best hypothesis comes from Holism, that integrated collections of parts naturally unite into a whole system with new functions & properties that are not found in the components. One physical example of that phenomenon is Phase Transition. Another hypothetical example, that is not accepted by reductionist scientists, is the notion of Panpsychism, in which all minds in the universe work together as a Global Mind. Unfortunately, there is currently no means to communicate with such a god-like mind, other than those of Mysticism. :smile:

Modular Mind : One example of modularity in the mind is 'binding.' When one perceives an object, they take in not only the features of an object, but the integrated features that create a whole.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modularity_of_mind

Holism : the theory that parts of a whole are in intimate interconnection, such that they cannot exist independently of the whole, or cannot be understood without reference to the whole, which is thus regarded as greater than the sum of its parts. Holism is often applied to mental states, language, and ecology. ___Wiki

That is what makes any panpsychic talk flawed. Panpsychism is an argument that piggybacks on conventional materialistic reductionism. And neurobiology has already moved on from that with its holistic notions of "process". — apokrisis

I agree that most notions of Panpsychism are Mystical rather than Empirical. Yet, modern concepts of Process Philosophy, sound panpsychic, but try to incorporate the latest findings of Neuro-Science into a realistic theory. Ironically, their blend of Physical and Meta-physical (mental, rational) evidence typically concludes with some notions of Panpsychism and a god-like Mind. :nerd:

Process Philosophy : Process philosophy is characterized by an attempt to reconcile the diverse intuitions found in human experience (such as religious, scientific, and aesthetic) into a coherent holistic scheme. Process philosophy seeks a return to a neo-classical realism that avoids subjectivism. . . . . Most process philosophers speculate that God is also an actual entity
https://iep.utm.edu/processp/

But no-one has come up with a plausible theory of how those independent modules work together to produce the unique singular perspective we call the Self. — Gnomon

So you say. But I wouldn’t agree. It seems pretty straightforward that the whole of the brain is simply embedded in the business of constructing a self vs world relation. You can eat your food without chewing off your tongue because every “module” has to make the same fundamental distinction. A self in the world is what the brain is modelling from the get-go.

Consider how vision relies on micro saccades made by the eyes. We have to wobble our eyeballs constantly so we can tell where the “stable” world starts. We know the world is “out there” as we create enough of our own motion to see that there is this difference between an “us” and an “it”.

The frontline of perception starts by introducing a division which speaks to a self in interaction with a world.

One physical example of that phenomenon is Phase Transition. Another hypothetical example, that is not accepted by reductionist scientists, is the notion of Panpsychism, in which all minds in the universe work together as a Global Mind. Unfortunately, there is currently no means to communicate with such a god-like mind, other than those of Mysticism. — Gnomon

Phase transitions are well understood. And they have their place in neurobiological models.

Panpsychism simply apes the failings of material reductionism. So it is a failure to in fact understand the holism of nature. It accepts the Cartesian division of nature into physical stuff and mental stuff. Then doubles down by simply claiming the two are one if you reduce your material to the simplest and smallest scale of being.

The actual scientific problem that holism confronts is instead swept under the rug and pretended to be solved.

I agree that most notions of Panpsychism are Mystical rather than Empirical. Yet, modern concepts of Process Philosophy, sound panpsychic, but try to incorporate the latest findings of Neuro-Science into a realistic theory. Ironically, their blend of Physical and Meta-physical (mental, rational) evidence typically concludes with some notions of Panpsychism and a god-like Mind. :nerd: — Gnomon

I agree it might sound like that. But it ain’t. Or at least not in my approach - the one taken by systems science.

Instead of Panpsychism, the general philosophical stance here would be Pansemiotic. That is, a pragmatic physicalist account in the tradition of Peircean semiosis.

Mind in this view becomes the general thing of a self-world pragmatic relation. A system of signs. And that is what neurobiology confirms.

So you say. But I wouldn’t agree. It seems pretty straightforward that the whole of the brain is simply embedded in the business of constructing a self vs world relation. . . . Phase transitions are well understood. — apokrisis

That's merely a superficial observation of a mystery, not a theory of "how it works". Scientists know a lot about Phase Change, but still can't say for sure what "embedded" intermediate steps transform one physical state into another, with novel physical properties. Likewise, it's obvious that there is some connection between neural substrates and mental consciousness, but they can't say exactly what the physical-to-metaphysical link is. I have my own personal layman's hypothesis, and it seems pretty straightforward, but I'm not about to submit it to a Neuroscience Journal.

Mysterious Phase Change : https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/03/180308143153.htm

Panpsychism simply apes the failings of material reductionism. So it is a failure to in fact understand the holism of nature. — apokrisis

That assertion seems rather harsh, but I too have reservations about the traditional notions of Panpsychism. Something similar is going-on in the world, but I have a different concept of how the process works. And that worldview is based in part on Natural Holism, as described by Jan Smuts in Holism and Evolution.

Holism : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holism

Instead of Panpsychism, the general philosophical stance here would be Pansemiotic. That is, a pragmatic physicalist account in the tradition of Peircean semiosis. — apokrisis

I'm not familiar with Pansemiosis. But, if it's like most of Peirce's writing, it would go right over my pointy little head anyway. However, as I get time, I'll look into it. Peirce's "signs" may be similar to my own "Enformation". But I wouldn't say that its "primary mission is to communicate divine glory". :smile:

Pansemiotics : The term provides a means of describing the theological view that “the whole universe became [in the Middle Ages] signs of divine revelation”, as in the Old Testament statement, “The heavens declare the glory of God” (Psalm 19:1), as if everything in the universe is united in this primary mission to communicate divine glory.
https://richardcoyne.com/2018/03/10/pansemiotics/

Systems Theory :
A system can be more than the sum of its parts if it expresses synergy or emergent behavior. Changing one part of the system usually affects other parts and the whole system, with predictable patterns of behavior. More parts, means more interrelationships, and more complex properties & activities, including mental functions.
http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page18.html

On level of intuition, for me survival of both the body, brain, and memories seems important — AJ88

You're doomed to heart-wrenching disappointment, friend but wait...there's nothing left after death that could feel anything let alone heart-wrenching disappointment. :smile: The fear of nonexistence is something only the living experience but by way of a consolation I suggest, if you're really bothered by death, you download your memories on a memory stick and save up enough money to buy yourself a cryogenic container. That way you'll have ensured the continued existence of your memories, your brain and your body. I'm serious.

Alot about this helps for sure. Such as the knowledge that the brain cant shut down. It also seems fairly reassuring that while consciousness is suppressed, the potential for consciousness is there constantly, re-emerging after the brain stops jamming itself. It is hard to catch the moment you fall asleep for sure. I tend to forget the 10-15 minutes before I fall asleep as a matter of course. My understandings on sleep testing and monitoring is that this kind of memory loss in the final minutes of consciousness is common place.

Also the realization that sleep helps maintain personal identity by keeping you from spiraling out of control is a comforting thought. That instead of being death, it is one of the things that keeps you very much alive, and yourself.

:up:

My position is that consciousness is the result of nervous systems being in a modelling relation with the world. So I am talking specifically about that kind of process. One where there is mental modelling going on. — apokrisis

I'm going to rudely put words in your mouth as I am more likely to understand them that way. How do you feel about the following recasting:

Your position is that a nervous system (any other kind of system?) is conscious if and only if it models the world it is in. Is that right?

This allows for degree, perhaps. A nervous system that models the world in a very useful and detailed way so that it can respond effectively to a wide variety of circumstances is, perhaps, more conscious than a nervous system that models the world in a much simpler (but still useful) way. Perhaps simpler systems are more specialised to certain environments. Is that what you think? I'm not laying any traps here, I just want to understand your view without reading a bunch of books first.

This allows for degree, perhaps. A nervous system that models the world in a very useful and detailed way so that it can respond effectively to a wide variety of circumstances is, perhaps, more conscious than a nervous system that models the world in a much simpler (but still useful) way. — bert1

Sure. So a cockroach has a nervous system. But it’s “consciousness” would be different not just in degree but in kind as its nervous system is more about a collection of fixed habits and thus a lack of specific memories.

Large brained animals have attentional processes layered on top of acquired habits. So you could think of our habits as like a state of being aware that is stretched out over the weeks, months, even the lifetimes, it takes to acquire those habits. A habit is a model used to regulate our world that is a sort of extended smear of adaptive neural change or state update.

And then that habit is also something which results in an appropriate action being unthinkingly emitted - fire and forget - when triggered by the right environmental circumstances.

So a cockroach - to the degree it lacks attentional processes - might be regarded as having an attenuated form of that unthinking, emitted habit level of “consciousness”. That would seem a fair extrapolation.

Then attention is a new ballgame. That is about the nervous system forming a novel and specific state of response in about half a second. And the action that follows is voluntary and deliberative. Thought and working memory are involved.

So the nervous system is working on two levels of world modelling.

Habit is like an appreciation of a single moment of neural adjustment fixed over long periods of space and time. It is a generalisation constructed from multiple similar instances and capable of handling an envelope of similar situations.

Attention is then more a snapshot of the here and now - a fitting of a bespoke model to a time and place that spans about half a second of processing. So it feels like what it is like to be rooted in some spot in the world, faced with that exact sensory situation, once only. While any consciousness in terms of habit is what it feels like to be facing much the same situation at any time or anywhere.

So yes, we can imagine differences in degree. But also differences in kind.

I should add that smart invertebrates do have some degree of attentional processing. A jumping spider will stop and scan the world to sum up a plan of how to approach its prey. It builds up a mental picture of how the world actually is from a place and time so it can figure out how to creep around behind and get close enough to pounce.

This is remarkable given how little brain matter a jumping spider has. But it shows the evolutionary values of first having a solid general base of unthinking habit, and then also a more plastic “here and now” neural modelling response.

This is important if we are making the case against Panpsychism. Consciousness is not merely just the fact that a nervous system is modelling the world. We can see that there is a logical organisation to that modelling.

It is all about constructing contrast. And being “intensely aware” is already a contrast between two kinds of processing - habit and attention. The more that we can experience the world in general terms, the more we can also do the contrasting thing of modelling it as something highly “here and now”. The switch between the voluntary and the automatic is something that is also noticeable as part of the overall “flow of awareness”.

Sorry to hear that you are stuck in an existential crisis of sorts. That's a rotten place to be.

An interesting comic! It highlights one of the more startling realizations about our consciousness: we are hopelessly dependent on our memory to tell us who we are. If I were a clone walking out of a transporter, I would feel completely normal; unless I spotted an inconsistency in my memory ("Wait a minute ... how did I get here?").

I don't completely understand why sleep would pose a threat to your identity. Unconsciousness seems more like a suspended state of mind to me. Not so much about starting/stopping your existence, but more like pressing the pause button instead.

as I cannot imagine anyone surviving the transporter, I suddenly find myself unsure if we can survive periods of unconsciousness — AJ88

It might be helpful to consider that the cells in your body are always dying and being replaced. So your physical body is constantly encountering the end of its existence. But your mind effortlessly survives the transition, doesn't it? Your mind has never really needed to have the exact same body in order to continue its existence. Your consciousness came pre-equipped with ways to circumvent the physical limitations of matter. It is a pro at consistently replicating itself from one day to the next.

... unless you have Alzheimer's disease. :(

This also helps alot. I suppose I saw sleep more as the death of on conciousness and the rebirth of another, not so much the suspencion of another, which is probobly more accurate. Certainly experts on sleep and conciousness dont seem to be sounding the alarm that we "die" when we sleep, and those I have corresponded with in email seemed perfectly confident we survive it.

The only one I have had an email exchange with about this that was less then certain was Chalmers Who answered my question of us surviving sleep with "I think we do. I hope we do. But I cant be sure."

Out of curiosity what are the competing thoeries on conciousness now?

i ment regarding surviving sleep. To use a computer as a metaphore, I see myself as a whole comprised of hardware and software and the survival of both is important for my survival. Through sleep or otherwise.

Out of curiosity what are the competing thoeries on conciousness now? — AJ88

It is probably safer to say that if you are asking the question of “what is consciousness?”, you are already making a rookie mistake. Most of the “theories” are chasing the explanatory phantoms left by Cartesian dualism.

But studying neurobiology and psychology gives you a good sense of how brains actually model worlds. And the logic of that can be found in systems theories.

Allowing for a purely materialistic naturalism based answer that does away with conciousness completely as well as any dualism?

Yes. I mean dualism can't be completely eliminated as culturally that is just how we talk about things. It is a myth we live by. We learn to regards ourselves as individual "minds". And that is essential to living in a modern society where it is the basis of the collective game.

We take personal responsibility for our actions - whether we act out of attention or habit. We behave as if freewill is a thing and not just the skill of balancing the personal against the communal in our choices of actions.

So once you build a culture around dualism - as Christianity did in the Western tradition - then you are stuck with that as the way people are expected to frame their understandings of how it works.

It really gets in the way of the science. That's a reason why, within neurobiology, it was pretty much banned as a term to be using. You talked instead of voluntary vs involuntary behaviour, or other terms that targeted something clearly functional, such as attentional and habit levels of processing.

Glad to hear I said something useful. Unfortunately, it sounds like you are still wrestling with the problem.

The only one I have had an email exchange with about this that was less then certain was Chalmers Who answered my question of us surviving sleep with "I think we do. I hope we do. But I cant be sure." — AJ88

You make it sound like you got to have a personal chat with David Chalmers or something; that would be awesome! Whoever it was, their response of "can't be sure ... hope so" seems to resonate with me. One can perceive an infinite number of possible threats to their existence. But the fact that something is possible isn't the same as having a reason to suspect that it is true. I guess that's the part where you lose me. What was the specific piece of information that pushed the issue from "possible" to "plausible"?

For example, it is possible that we could all be living inside a computer simulation without realizing it. There's nothing I can say to refute that possibility. But at the same time, I don't have a specific reason to suspect that the computer-simulation scenario is more likely than anything else. So what would be my justification for worrying about being trapped inside "The Matrix"? What I don't know can't hurt me. As long as the evidence doesn't compel me to chose one scenario over another, I will choose to believe the scenario that serves me best. Nothing wrong with that, right?

I ment David Chalmers yes. I sent him a couple of email and like a Saint he sparked some time for me by replying. I did not want to take up more of his time by pestering for clarifications, but the gist of the communication was "Id not be too worried. I think we survive, I hope we do, but I cant be sure."

Your take on it if accurate clear some things up for me. Should I in your view take the whole matter to be possible theoretical, like us living in a simulation, but not terrible plausible or likely, and as a result not wlrthy of too much attention. If you open a pm with me I can share the full communication with you if you think it would make a differance?

As for why this has resonated so stronglt with me might be a life long uneasr with being unconcious, and simply having it as a possibility, one I cant disprove struck a deep and powerful cord with me. Its almost like If i cant prove its not the case, then it is the case.

It is indeed an unfortunate situation.

Somewhat amusingly preeminent modern Christian thinkers like Bently Hart see Descartesian dualism as a post Christian concept that had very little to do with how Christians for most of their history have seen the soul/mind. So if there is frustration about Descartes its on both sides.

That true. Platonic duality was the original theory welded on to Christianity. Descartes was trying to make things work while allowing for a post-Aristotelean materialism that had made even animals a flesh and blood machinery.

i ment regarding surviving sleep. To use a computer as a metaphore, I see myself as a whole comprised of hardware and software and the survival of both is important for my survival. Through sleep or otherwise. — AJ88

What's missing when we sleep? Consciousness. Is consciousness a necessary aspect of "the self"? Or is consciousness just an "on-state", the only possible state in which you can access your "self". If one believes that our experiences etched into memory defines our "self" then the difference between awake and asleep is only in terms of the ability to access our self.

Thats oddly reassuring. Seeing conciousness as whats lets the self/personal identity exist/experience itself but not self/personal identity itself means that gaps in conciousness is not a problem anymore.