Yes DNA is alive as part of a system. It is probably not the dominant brain of the system, it is capable of creating messenger RNA, and they, in their many guises, are seeming to be the epigenetics of the system. They can transcribe from DNA, but also reverse transcribe, to alter DNA. — Pop
I concentrate on the fundamentals of a system to try and unentangle the qualitative ( emotional ) and quantitative information. There are only tiny little straws on offer to do this with. Thus far microbes respond to painful stimuli, the selfish gene, the bias to be, and gradient tracking - all suggest emotions at the fundamental level. We know information, energy and matter are present at this level, we know there is life, but for consciousness we need emotion to be present at this level, and I think there is a strong case. I am convinced , at least. — Pop
Relational aspects of life are well established. Once emotion at the fundamental level is established, then we start to get an understanding of how consolidation or a nucleus to relational self organization forms. That qualia cause self organization is a good bet. Dose qualia = emotion? If so, and this is my understanding, then it is consciousness that emerges as self organization, not life. Life is a concept that obscures this understanding, and I wish I could erase it from common usage, as it is redundant and makes my case difficult to explain. Consciousness arises as a system of self organization - this is what you are seeing in those cellular animations. An extremely sophisticated system of self organization. This system of self organization is common to all of life, and as we come to understand it better, we must attribute its spectacular complexity, to either god, or a consciousness. — Pop
Yes, DNA can only exist in a living system, and is biased to be. Fundamentally it is biased to be, as the universe is biased to be, so all of the component parts of the universe in turn are biased to be. So it would seem emotion is fundamental as well as information. This is how I understand Panpsychism. — Pop
Saying DNA is the dominant brain would be like saying the bible is the ‘dominant brain’ of Christianity, so to speak. — Possibility
Do you include your own consciousness within that consciousness, or in external relation to it? — Possibility
Emotion IS information - there is no ‘as well as’ and we need to stop making this distinction. It isn’t helpful. — Possibility
However that there is mind at the cellular level is without doubt. You have described it as "molecular-level information". So we have information, and there is a good argument for emotion, and they are the two ingredients of consciousness - of course it is entangled into matter. Specifically, entangled into DNA, which is a symbolic representation of information, much like the sentence I'm writing. So we have abstract thought at the cellular level. — Pop
There would be an underlying quantum layer, but I don't want to go there for now, as it is too theoretical.
The biological data - that information, and emotion, and abstract thought are present, is not theoretical. That we are blind to it is a hangover from materialism, I believe. — Pop
If emotion is information, then you should be able to inform me exactly how you feel, such that I could feel it also, but you cannot for the same reason you couldn't describe red. Information and emotion exist in consciousness, emotion entangles information, but it is only information that exists in transit from one consciousness to another. Perhaps it is better described as biased information, and we can to some extent discern the bias. It is biased because it is entangled by emotion.
Emotion is a subjective quality that arises in relation to integrated information. Every thought has a corresponding quale, that orients us in our personally constructed reality. The whole conscious experience gets reduced to an emotional symbol representing the experience. Once we are in possession of the emotional symbol ( quale ), we understand the implications of the information we have integrated. My quale would be located on a point on the PPS, but yours would perhaps be a multidimensional PPS. Regardless, it is at this point that we have an experience, that we take to be reality. — Pop
Your first and last sentences here are examples of confusing dimensional levels. I recognise that you don’t see the world this way, but this is where you fail to see that your theory is an over-simplification, so it’s worth getting your head around it. — Possibility
You keep constructing the result of DNA information in your mind as if it already exists. — Possibility
There seems to be a contradiction here. You have been arguing:
1. Everything is information. (Monism)
2. Emotion is not information. (Dualism) — Possibility
Dimensionality is a great way to contemplate relational structures of information, but at the end of the day you still have to reduce your deliberations to a symbiology of some kind. — Pop
Consciousness integrates information and reduces it to an emotional symbol. This creates , from your perspective, affect. — Pop
But I have a more detailed understanding where each instance of consciousness results in a corresponding emotional symbol - each instance of consciousness has its quale. From another part of the forum, If each quale were a note, then when strung together they would cause a tune. This tune describes how you feel about your reality. It is an emotional understanding. If it is unpleasant, you act to make it more pleasant, If it is pleasant you enjoy the ride. This is what causes behavior. — Pop
Reducing complexity is what happens at the cellular level also. Complexity is reduced to a symbiology that is DNA. Likewise consciousness is a reduction of complexity, an integration of information, a sort of biological black hole that integrates information to a symbol that is ultimately understood as an emotion. Each instance has its own emotion. That is how we know it is unique. — Pop
Are you saying it doesn't exist. Are you saying that molecules are not formed from amino acids. That information processing is not going on? That there is no mind making choices and decisions at the cellular level? It is a difficult conclusion to make - I admit, but not because of the facts of the matter, but because of the paradigm we inhabit. — Pop
Emotion is information in consciousness. But it is not something reducible to information absolutely. Information can hint at it, but not dissect and describe and convey it absolutely. The emotional charge at one consciousness can not be reduced to information absolutely such that it ca be felt equally at another consciousness, in the same way that a concept can be described and understood. Emotion is information that has an affect on a consciousness, so it acts more like a force. — Pop
No, that’s not quite how I see it. Consciousness is the result of a continual correlation between interoceptive and conceptual predictions of reality, as four-dimensional relational structures. Affect is the relative difference interpreted by our interoceptive network (a purely relational system) which manifests as a distribution of effort and attention; emotion is how our conceptual systems - particularly in relation to language and culture - make sense of that difference in a prediction. This continual interplay and adjustment is the process of integration in a conscious organism. But we are not conscious of it all - only what required our carefully distributed attention at the time. — Possibility
Consolidating information reduces volume by discarding information deemed irrelevant — Possibility
In the same manner, the relational structure of consciousness can be understood - not by reducing it to an essential geometric pattern, but by recognising that there is an existing conceptual structure, unique to the experiencing subject, upon which any instance of emotion is constructed. And that conceptual structure is a result of millions of ‘emotional instances’, each manifest according to their relative conditions at the moment of construction. — Possibility
Barrett shows that ‘emotional instances’ are formed from a relation between the prediction generated by conceptual structure, and the prediction generated by interoception (ie. the relative conditions). Part of that instance is relational behaviour, as affect, and part of it is restructuring the conceptual system (including the predictive pattern of emotion) to enable a ‘reasonable’ justification of that affect, so that the result is an ongoing alignment of conceptual structure and interoception. — Possibility
I am saying, however, that there is no mind making choices and decisions at the cellular level. These ‘choices and decisions’ are determined and initiated by the relation of potentiality in this DNA structure to relative conditions. You can probably argue that there is will at the cellular level, but not mind, and not with any degree of freedom. — Possibility
the structure of human logic or reason is as variable and subject to criticism as our own value systems. — Possibility
It seems you are saying here that emotion is relevant information only at the level of consciousness, and has a complexity that renders it irreducible to consolidated information. I agree with this. All emotion is relational information - but not all relational information is emotion. — Possibility
And all of this has to be reduced to a specific emotional symbol - a pin point - on the pain pleasure spectrum, for you to orient yourself in it. You have to know where you stand in regard to the reality you create for yourself. Each moment of consciousness creates a note. The notes in sequence create a tune - this is what we dance to. — Pop
That is not so. A cellular protein is reduced to a pattern of genes - no information is lost. — Pop
These are expressions of consciousness - these are the branches of the trees you are talking about, these are not consciousness itself. Consciousness is something common to everything in monism. — Pop
There has been a quantum leap in cellular biology in the last 10 to 15 years, due to advances in technology. For anybody wishing to get up to speed on these developments I can recommend the youtube channel ibiology for state of the art information from the horses mouth. The old idea that this happens by chance somehow is a nonsense, but Descartes did his job well, so it is still considered a mechanical duck. It is an extremely sophisticated system of self organization, and self organization is consciousness, in my theory. — Pop
It is indeed, but nevertheless meaning arises due to emotions! For a P.zombie it is all meaningless.
My understanding of emotions leans heavily on the Philosophical Zombie argument. Not that such a person can exist, but precisely that such a person can not exist. Without emotions, there can be no consciousness ( self organization ), and hence no life. It really gets to the essential primacy of emotions. — Pop
Lets forget our differences on the other matters and concentrate on this topic?
We agree on your first sentence.
"All emotion is relational information" - maybe. It is information that causes affect, in relation to integrated information. Note, we don't know how the information becomes integrated. We become aware of the integrated information, and the emotion it is accompanied with.
"but not all relational information is emotion" - correct, but it seems all information is entangled with emotion? Can you think of any unemotional information - not a possibility. But can something outside of ourselves produce unemotional information? — Pop
No - you don’t HAVE to reduce this to a defined pinpoint on a constructed spectrum. Most humans and animals are more than capable of acting without that knowledge. What you act on is affect: an ongoing allocation of attention and effort to align ‘where you stand’ (as an interoception) and ‘the reality you create for yourself’ (as a conceptual structure), whether or not you can distinguish these constructions from consciousness. — Possibility
So one could argue that the relational properties of a molecule equate to ‘consciousness’, but it’s not the same ‘consciousness’ attributed as a property to humans. — Possibility
I have not said this is ‘chance’, but I maintain that calling it ‘consciousness’ is a case of false attribution. You’re implying that the DNA molecule is informed of the variability in its relational properties, structure or conditions. But only the epigenetic system has access to this information — Possibility
No, it doesn’t. The way I see it, meaning is pure relational information: its existence is possible, regardless of whether or not emotions can be constructed from this possibility — Possibility
and so on, down to contingency upon an answer to the binary question above, but you’ll just ignore all this underlying structure as irrelevant, because the answer is assumed. — Possibility
Saying ‘we don’t know’ is a cop-out: the neuroscience research into the interoceptive network, conceptual cascades and constructionist theories of emotion show extensive understanding in this area. Ignoring it because it doesn’t support your theory is, well, ignorant. — Possibility
What creates affect? "where you stand’ (as an interoception) ". Interoception, in its many guises, that you are aware of, reduces to feelings, and feelings can only be understood as something pleasant or painful. We can call it interoception, or a feedback loop, or self organization, it is consciousness.
What else also causes affect? " the reality you create for yourself’ (as a conceptual structure)".
It follows this form:
1: Senses input information
2: Information is integrated to reason
3: Reason is experienced
4: Experience is translated to emotion
5: Emotion is translated to a feeling
6: A feeling is located as a point on a pain / pleasure spectrum ( PPS)
This cognizes the instance of consciousness - the point on the pain / pleasure spectrum tells you what this instance of consciousness means for you. At this point, the reason is understood by the whole body; whole body consciousness understands this language.
Again it is a feeling that causes affect, regardless of the conceptual structure that creates your reality.
So feelings always cause affect, and feelings reduce to something painful or pleasant.
Consciousness is subject to a causal chain - the next moment of consciousness is determined by the present moment, but it is not necessarily a simple linear progression, and there can be several trains of thought occurring simultaneously, with interruptions and resumptions in focus, etc. It is not possible to predict the next moment without first orienting yourself in the present moment. It is the present moment of consciousness and its associated emotional state - the feeling - that affects and causes the next moment. — Pop
I have not said this is ‘chance’, but I maintain that calling it ‘consciousness’ is a case of false attribution. You’re implying that the DNA molecule is informed of the variability in its relational properties, structure or conditions. But only the epigenetic system has access to this information
— Possibility
And what is epigenetics? — Pop
No, it doesn’t. The way I see it, meaning is pure relational information: its existence is possible, regardless of whether or not emotions can be constructed from this possibility
— Possibility
Before you have meaning you have to have consciousness, before you can have that you have to have emotion. This is why emotional information is important. If emotional-information is fundamental, then consciousness is fundamental. — Pop
Your description suggests that sensory information is processed through reason before an experience of reason is translated to emotion, which is then translated to feeling, and then justified by reduction to a point on an evaluative spectrum. — Possibility
What I describe is a general formula which accounts for all instances of consciousness derived from external sensory information. The choice of words, I admit, could be better. Quantitative information might be better then reason, but it depends on what is being integrated. There are no assumptions here however, that information is integrated is evidenced by the Euclidian space you see. The rate at which this is sampled is an interesting question. Given there exists a plank length of time, we know consciousness is not a smooth process, as you have conceived it. That information is sampled at the plank length is highly unlikely, given that we are unable to distinguish between 30 Fps and smooth continuous time. So it is unlikely to be more then 30 to 40 a second. Energy efficiency being the pertinent consideration. — Pop
I also provide some proof of the construction through an articulation of qualia.
The qualia of life is consciousness
The qualia of consciousness are experiences.
The qualia of experiences are emotions.
The qualia of emotions are feelings.
The qualia of feelings are points on the PPS
The qualia of points on the PPS are death - pain / pleasure - life.
The qualia of life is consciousness – this completes the consciousness loop.
You see there is a loop that binds my construction together - all these elements are related by qualia and so no individual element can exist on it's own. When you consider one element you can not do so without all the others. Your understanding dose not recognize this at all. You would have to disprove this conception in order to logically dismiss it. — Pop
Your conception has a gaping hole, In my opinion, in that you do not describe an experience at all. You skip from information integration to Affect arbitrarily. In so doing you do not account for what it feels like to be conscious. You skip the pertinent aspect of consciousness - how experience is emotional, how feelings are painful or pleasurable. And so you create a conception of consciousness befitting a P.Zombie. — Pop
The way I see it:
1. The conceptual system predicts an interoception of affect from existing conceptual structures;
2. Affect determines attention and effort across the organism to align with this prediction;
3. This alignment adjusts interaction, directing the organism’s experience of sensory information;
4. Sensory information informs the interoceptive network of errors in the prediction-alignment process;
5. The interoceptive network translates these errors into a dialogue determining the attention/valence and effort/arousal required to most efficiently and effectively re-align with the conceptual system, given the organism’s other anticipated energy requirements. — Possibility
Every one of your 5 points contains an unprovable assumption. It is a typical and reasonable proposition of how information might be integrated, but that is all. There is no hint as to why this should be happening. — Pop
My theory contains:
1. A provable definition of consciousness - every instance of consciousness is self organization - for everything - always. It is a dynamic system even for rocks.
2. How experiences are emotional, ( contain carrot and stick ), as an explanation of what animates the biological system
3. How inanimate matter becomes conscious - through self organization, that has almost universal acceptance in abiogenesis theory.
You may not agree with it, but I don't believe you can reasonably disprove it. So far you have made some dints in certain aspects ( and I thank you for your help ), but it still floats. You offer up an alternative theory, which contains no explanation for the three points I mention, and so from a philosophical point of view I wonder why you even bother with it. Your theory is like dozens of reasonable theories that do not address the hard problem, but wait to be rescued by more information down the track. Unless they address the points I mention, they are just not in the race as an explanation of consciousness, in my opinion. — Pop
From my perspective, all of your vertical down conceptions are P.Zombies without emotion providing impetus. Unemotional Information, energy and matter cannot create consciousness - we know this from an understanding of ourselves. Add emotion, and you have consciousness! It is consciousness that requires emotion, not the other way around. Relational information on it's own cannot create an enduring consciousness until a self is created. Once a self is created then self organization can take place around this nucleus. That a self is created suggests a bias to be, or at least we know that the self that is biased to be will prevail. Selves that are random, or indifferent to be, will disintegrate. Relational information is already consolidated to a higher system, so it is elements of a higher system that are relating and consolidating, and disintegrating, but then a certain type of relational information contains a bias to be, and consolidates and breaks away from the higher system, in the formation of a self. Then enduring self organization can take place ( consciousness ). — Pop
Emotion is information, but it is a private information only you can experience. Why do we have these internal carrot and stick communications? Who or what is communicating internally? — Pop
You’re assuming this evidence of Euclidean space can be ‘seen’ by all life — Possibility
I also provide some proof of the construction through an articulation of qualia.
The qualia of life is consciousness
The qualia of consciousness are experiences.
The qualia of experiences are emotions.
The qualia of emotions are feelings.
The qualia of feelings are points on the PPS
The qualia of points on the PPS are death - pain / pleasure - life.
The qualia of life is consciousness – this completes the consciousness loop.
You see there is a loop that binds my construction together - all these elements are related by qualia and so no individual element can exist on it's own. When you consider one element you can not do so without all the others. Your understanding dose not recognize this at all. You would have to disprove this conception in order to logically dismiss it.
— Pop
This is not proof of the construction - you apply the term ‘qualia’ as a placeholder concept, a metaphor for any type of relational aspect: kind of like ‘God’. Quale is commonly defined as: a quality or property perceived or experienced by a person. The problem with defining any qualitative property with a concept such as ‘qualia’ is that a self-conscious system can then apply the term to refer to objects as if they were consolidated information in themselves. But the only consolidated information in the concept ‘qualia’ is the ‘person’, as a conscious system. Everything else is relative. It makes more sense to state: — Possibility
We both understand what it feels like to be conscious - I don’t need to explain that to you. How I understand it is always going to be different from how you understand it, and any attempt I make to describe an experience will necessarily be positioned within consciousness, and so cannot create a complete explanation of consciousness - only a subjective expression of it.
To explain consciousness, you need to propose and refine a perspective of consciousness beyond ‘feeling’. This is not a p.zombie conception, but rather re-examines Kant’s proposal of a ‘Copernican Turn’: to reject the assumption that human reason is motionless, and that our perspective of reality is central. — Possibility
No, the Euclidian space was bought up as evidence that consciousness is not continuous, as you proposed, but exists as discreet frames for us. How consciousness exists for other life forms is endlessly variable and open ended, but that it should be continuous would seem an unnecessary waste of energy. — Pop
You have focused on the word qualia, whilst ignoring that the elements of this construction are inseparable. You cannot have life without consciousness. You can not have consciousness without experience. You can not have experience without emotion. You can not have emotion without feeling. You can not have feeling without a pain / pleasure spectrum. Qualia articulates them, and they are logically inseparable. Each element is a quality of the element next to it. You can not have one of these elements without also incurring the entire cascade. — Pop
It is a logical construction, confirmed by introspection. So people can check against themselves. I have floated this idea without incurring objection, even my nemesis Banno did not object to the logic. I believe it is logically impeccable. When you experience one of these elements you must also experience all the others, and it must occur in the order stated. This is what animates the biological system. The end result is a feeling that is either painful or pleasurable. This creates Affect. The intensity and energy of Affect (effort and attention) is determined by where on the pain / pleasure spectrum the moment of consciousness resolves to. The more extreme the point - the greater the affect, and so on.
You would have to invalidate the logic of this construction to accept Barrett's interpretation of emotions, I believe. So I look forward to your objections. :smile: — Pop
To give you a head start. Materialism and consciousness are incompatible. The nature of consciousness is idealistic, so an understanding of consciousness negates materialism, and visa versa. All materialist philosophers who tackle consciousness either end up as idealist ( or thereabouts ) like Koch, or deny consciousness like Dennett. The area that they attack consciousness in is the specific point that experience entails emotion - that emotion creates experience, so they attack the P.Zombie argument, qualia, deny consciousness itself. It is why we have no consensus on consciousness and emotion, and will not have any, any time soon. You seem to place a lot of faith in neuroscience, academia, and interoception, and these are important and worthy areas of research, but I think you should consider to what extent materialism influences the outcomes of such research.
It is in this area that Barrett also diverges - she jumps from experience to Affect, thus avoiding the emotional nature of consciousness, which is indeed a problem for such notions as empiricism, objectivity, physicalism, and materialism in general. — Pop
The bottom line is this: the human brain is anatomically structured so that no decision or action can be free of interoception and affect, no matter what fiction people tell themselves about how rational they are. Your bodily feeling right now will project forward to influence what you will feel and do in the future. It is an elegantly orchestrated, self-fulfilling prophecy, embodied within the architecture of your brain. — Lisa Feldman Barrett, ‘How Emotions Are Made’
. I don’t agree that consciousness exists for us in discreet, temporally located frames, like a film. What you refer to as ‘instances of consciousness’ are arbitrarily isolated patterns of information for the purpose of introspection and discussion. — Possibility
Incidentally, you seem to ignore this distinction I continue to make between conscious and self-conscious. I find this distinction is important, because a reasoning, self-conscious system is capable of isolating ‘emotion-information’ from ‘rational information’ (for the purpose of reasoning), whereas a merely conscious system is not. — Possibility
But, as you cannot objectively prove the existence or absence of consciousness, you cannot conclusively prove its existence or absence in any form of life, except your own. I believe that you CAN have life without consciousness — Possibility
I would also argue that you CAN have experience without emotion (but not without feeling), — Possibility
you CAN discuss and think about (but not experience) emotion without feeling, — Possibility
and can even describe feeling without reference to either pain or pleasure. There are a number of different feelings that fall in neutral territory here. How do you use the pain-pleasure spectrum to distinguish between sleepy and nervous, for instance? — Possibility
First of all, I don’t have to invalidate your logic to accept an alternative interpretation of emotions, because frankly, as a self-conscious, reasoning system, I’m not bound by your logic. — Possibility
Secondly, we’re not talking about logic, we’re talking about relational information. Logic recognises ‘feeling’ only as a product of emotion, because it consists only of consolidated information. You’ve effectively isolated relational information at each level with ‘qualia’ as a placeholder, allowing you to form a logical construction that has no relational structure at all. Any self-conscious, reasoning system - with a similar capacity to isolate relational information and imagine a conceptual reality of pure logic, before ‘adding emotion’ back in - will have no issue with this form of construction. But this is not an honest introspection.
You need to address the anomalies I have pointed out. Until such time, your theory is as accurate an explanation of consciousness as any geocentric model is an explanation of the solar system... — Possibility
So, it seems that what you call ‘self-organisation’ is what I refer to as unconsolidated relational information. From the perspective of the system in question, what you refer to as ‘self’ is only a vague awareness of some kind of relational structure to the ‘universe’. — Possibility
The communication occurs between conceptually isolated relational structures within an integrated system, in order to maximise the efficiency of awareness, connection and collaboration. The system communicates with itself through complex organisational systems of ongoing consolidation, relation and integration. It is the integration capacity that is often overlooked in seeking to explain consciousness: we are motivated not just to exist or survive as we are, but to increase awareness, to connect and collaborate with all of existence, regardless of our perceived limitations. — Possibility
You would then need to argue against the Planck length of time. If you accept the Planck length of time, then it is not a matter of whether frame rates exist, but what are the rates for human consciousness.
Given we mistake 30Fps for continuous time, what would natural selection select? — Pop
Can we accept that two conflicting ideas come to mind simultaneously, or that we can feel both happy and sad (melancholy) all at once? Or does logic eliminate these possibilities, even as they occur? — Possibility
Human apperception is bound by a limited distribution of attention and effort in time, but consciousness, self-consciousness and reason are not necessarily bound by anthropocentric logic. It is here that you will find the real source of bias in your theory. — Possibility
Regardless of the focus of consciousness, it always follows the sequence as set out above. Whether the object of focus is external or internal , you always incur the cascade as previously described. If the object is feeling, then you incur the cascade in regard to feeling - you end up with a feeling about feeling. — Pop
The quality of life is consciousness - when you are alive you are conscious
The quality of consciousness is experience - you cannot have consciousness without experience.
The quality of experience is emotion - all experience is emotional / has feelings
The quality of emotion is a feeling - emotions are feelings
The quality of a feeling is a point on the PPS. - all feelings are ultimately painful, or pleasurable, or something in between. There are no unresolved feelings - they may be something vague and fuzzy, but this too is a feeling. — Pop
Nothing is impossible in mind, but in the real world we make one action at a time, so it seems a decision was made / complexity and potential reduced.
I am not suggesting I am describing the actual physical process that creates consciousness, just characterizing logically what seems to occur. — Pop
How can you have a feeling without emotion?
Wikipedia: The Oxford Dictionaries definition of emotion is "A strong feeling deriving from one's circumstances, mood, or relationships with others. — Pop
you CAN discuss and think about (but not experience) emotion without feeling,
— Possibility
Really? What dose that feel like? :lol: All instances of consciousness have feelings associated with them. You can not separate experience and consciousness - they are qualities of each other. The Barrett quote you provided argues much the same! — Pop
Sleepy is an uncomfortable / unpleasant feeling , whilst nervous is an unpleasant fear of an eventuality.
Feelings resolve to an emotional gradient I call the pain / pleasure spectrum. All feelings are either painful or pleasurable, or something in between - what else can they be? How would they be meaningful If they did not resolve to something, and provide impetus to behavior / cause affect?
Every instance of consciousness has to be resolved to an emotional point - a singularity, for the purpose of orientation in ones personally constructed reality. How could our actions be meaningful if we were disoriented in our reality? Note , we can only make one action at a time. Sure life is a juggling act, but we can only catch and throw one ball at a time! — Pop
Yes - or more accurately, a feeling about a sense of feeling. This is what you’re referring to with emotion producing affect, not to feeling as it is in itself. — Possibility
When I recognise that you are alive, I can deduce that I am conscious - but it doesn’t necessarily follow that you are conscious. One can be alive without being conscious. Consciousness is a potential property of life, not a necessary one. — Possibility
Emotions are a reasoning of this sense of feeling, and can occur either before (prediction) or after (justification) the organism is affected. The structure of emotion is a reasonable prediction/justification of affect, based on your conceptual systems. Any structural reduction of emotion (to a point on a PPS, for example) has no direct relation to reality, but is necessarily limited by your self-conscious process. — Possibility
One can be affected without recognising it as a feeling. Feeling is a potential property of self-consciousness, not a necessary one. — Possibility
And I am arguing that your logical characterisation excludes key relational information that affects how we make these decisions and actions, rendering your structure inaccurate, despite its logic. Contradiction is apparently excluded from emotion, but I would argue that contradiction can and does continue to exist in affect, leading to common occurrences of words that contradict one’s behaviour, or thinking one thing while saying another — Possibility
Affect is feeling, emotion is a feeling. — Possibility
Again, I cannot stress enough this difference between feeling (affect) and a feeling (emotion). — Possibility
Sleepy can also be a comfortable, pleasant or neutral feeling, whilst nervous can also be a pleasant or neutral anticipation of an event. It’s the something in between that is particularly significant. When sleepy and nervous are neither particularly pleasant nor unpleasant, if they are both located at the same point on your PPS, then what distinguishes between them? The answer is arousal. What they resolve to is not a singularity, but affect. This is the impetus to behaviour. — Possibility
We are often disoriented in our reality, and yet our actions are still meaningful in that disorientation. Incidentally, we can make more than one action at a time - I can pat my head and rub my belly simultaneously, and I can throw two balls at once, or catch one and throw another... — Possibility
Emotion is a feeling - yes. Affect is the response to a feeling, but it is also an instance of consciousness so incurs its own cascade, and hence feeling. It is an oversimplification of course, as there are multiple trains of thought and action occurring which cloud and complicate feelings and thoughts.
Again, I cannot stress enough this difference between feeling (affect) and a feeling (emotion).
— Possibility
Yes I see. Our different understanding has been a source of confusion for sure. I understand it in terms of the cascade, and so emotion is a feeling, which is pleasant or not, which Affects me so, and so on. — Pop
Yes - or more accurately, a feeling about a sense of feeling. This is what you’re referring to with emotion producing affect, not to feeling as it is in itself.
— Possibility
I don't quite understand you. A feeling is sensed - always. — Pop
In my theory, consciousness is self organisation, and all of life possesses self organisation. You would call it consolidated relational information, I think. The core of consciousness / consolidated relational information possesses a quality that is different to other consolidated relational information that is not enduring - that disintegrates. The difference, I believe, is a bias to be, which I interpret as emotional information. So it is emotional information, from the outset that causes consciousness. — Pop
When you consider your own consciousness, you integrate information in relation to this bias to be, and the result is an answer that is biased to be! It is a very clear emotional answer that the entire, vertical down system, agrees upon. Every instance of consciousness relates to this bias to be, in the form of the cascade as previously described, so the bottom line is always emotional / has feeling that causes affect. — Pop
When you query your own consciousness you are querying this bias to be, and it returns a resounding -YES. When you query my consciousness, the answer is nowhere near as clear. You are nowhere near as biased to be about my consciousness as you are about your own! — Pop
I think I see the difference in our understandings. You have a third party understanding of consciousness, and from that perspective there is little to no sense of emotion - as there is no skin in the game. From a first party understanding there is always skin in the game, so the importance of emotion is much more evident. — Pop
Emotions are feelings that are either painful or pleasurable. — Pop
If you accept the cascade as logical, and inseparable, then you need to explain affect in terms of it. I think the result is more sensible this way. — Pop
One can be affected without recognising it as a feeling. Feeling is a potential property of self-consciousness, not a necessary one.
— Possibility
All instances of consciousness are associated with feeling - necessarily. All instances of information integration relate to the bias to be, and when you relate any information to the bias to be, the integrated product will be emotional. It will be Information and emotion - thus causing affect. Feeling / emotion is the necessary ingredient in the Philosophical Zombie argument that causes consciousness. — Pop
Affect is the necessary ingredient that enables consciousness — Possibility
”Logic is the art of going wrong with confidence” - Joseph Wood Krutch
”Logic: an instrument used for bolstering a prejudice” - Elbert Hubbard — Possibility
I find this illogical - you are placing the cart before the horse. I have provided you with an alternative explanation, which you agree is logical, so I take it you agree that the cascade is inseparable - that to incur one element, is to also incur all the others. This puts in doubt your own theory, in this regard, as you have conveyed it. But instead of altering your own theory, you instead argue the fallibility of logic. I find that illogical. — Pop
I have read the linked essay, and find that I agree with almost all of it. But I have a theory of my own, that is coming from a different direction to arrive at a similar definition of Consciousness. My one quibble is regarding the too broad & vague conception of "Consciousness" in the popular imagination. In my personal thesis, I propose substituting a technical term with a narrower range of pseudo-scientific implications, and more support from cutting-edge Science. It's not just a theory of Consciousness, but a Theory of Everything --- or as Douglas Adams put it : "God, the Universe, and Everything".Below is an extract from my theory of consciousness. The whole theory can be read here. It tackles the hard problem, so you might find it interesting. Any comments would be appreciated. — Pop
Here are my comments (C.) on a "few" quotes (Q.) from your essay : What is consciousness?. I hope they will illustrate the many points on which we agree, and why I prefer to use the more precise term "Information" in place of the vague popular concept of "Consciousness" :Below is an extract from my theory of consciousness. The whole theory can be read here. It tackles the hard problem, so you might find it interesting. Any comments would be appreciated. — Pop
How does a computer sense when I hit the space bar? — Kenosha Kid
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.