I prefer to use Strawson's terms "non-experiential" for matter and "experiential" for mental. — Manuel

Democritus called it atoms. Leibniz called it monads. Fortunately the two men never met, or there would have been a very dull argument. — Woody Allen, My Philosophy

Welcome to the forum. — T Clark

Thank you

Very interesting quote from Nagel. I am not well read on philosophy or even history so this is very insightful.

But a connection between the two is obviously there. If I experience whatever conscious quality, then there is a material counterpart in the brain — GraveItty

What if this connection is just a sort of coincidence?

because modern culture is so reliant on that implicit subject-object framework, it can't come to terms with this fact. That's why modern thinking is generally convinced that only what exists 'out there somewhere', in time and space, can be real. That is what leads to 'eliminative materialism', the idea that there really is no such thing as consciousness per se — Wayfarer

This is along my line of thinking. We know consciousness exists and we also can see how it cannot be explained materialistically, so maybe all we can do as philosophers is interpret what this means. I don't think interpretations can count as a scientific proof but maybe it gives insight on the reality beyond what can be explained physical. Sort of how the different interpretations of quantum mechanics can help us understand reality in a different way.

The explanatory gap is a scientific problem, not a philosophical aporia, because it concerns explaining facts of the matter which philosophy does / can not; therefore philosophers can only propose woo-of-the-explanatory-gap nonsense — 180 Proof

Isn't the issue that there is nothing to explain the gap between physical and experience? And in that case I think we should consider philosophers interpretations on the matter. By definition these can be sufficient explanations.

Consciousness simply can't be explained. Only experienced — GraveItty

Why is that?

What do you all think about the following thought experiment:
Imagine a physical universe of space and time exactly like ours in which all of the same laws of physics apply and all of the same events occur but in this universe there is no conscious "experience". Meaning that there are plenty of books and discussions between philosophers and scientists about consciousness and experiences but no real "observer" in any of these scenarios.

The "we" an inner homunculus? If not, why the restriction? — bongo fury

Information flows in from the environment. Or to be more precise, a bunch of sensations flow into the brain from ongoing contact with the environment, and the brain has to make sense of that. Some would argue this is done in a predictive or Bayesian manner.

We're not looking out at the world as it is, we're interfacing with it in a way we can makes sense of.

Why is that?

What do you all think about the following thought experiment:
Imagine a physical universe of space and time exactly like ours in which all of the same laws of physics apply and all of the same events occur but in this universe there is no conscious "experience". Meaning that there are plenty of books and discussions between philosophers and scientists about consciousness and experiences but no real "observer" in any of these scenarios. — Flaw

Because all explanations have the consciousness as subject matter. They don't have access to the consciousness itself. There is no knowledge of the consciousness itself. You have to feel it on the inside, experience it. So no explanation can be given. You can construct theorize endlessly about its context though. Say the matter it's in (the neural structures in the case of things like vision, thoughts, memories, sound, itch, spacetime awareness) or its function, or it's origins, but the stuff itself is not explained. That's why it's called the hard problem. Outside of it you can see the difference (matter(, inside you can feel it (consciousness, even when you see things outside of your body).

Oh, you can imagine a world like you do, but it is just a soul depleted world, you have extracted the matter of the universe only, without its content, and placed it in an Imaginary world.

How will you ever explain the colors you see, the sounds that you hear, or the feeling of music that makes you cry? Apart from their function and reasons of having them? How do you explain blue? In a sense I litterally explained it here in the sense that you know what blue is. Can a blind man ever experience it? It is said so. A blind man can even be afraid in the dark, or see motion when he sees black only. But I doubt if he can experience blue. Maybe an abstract concept of it. If he has no neural correlate for it, it's questionable, if not impossible. Blue is no concept.

Ok, that’s fine. Russell is saying the development of a certain point of view for the distinction between mind and matter, gives an illusory result. The development of a different point of view may be sufficient to relieve the illusory distinction, but it may just as well raise another one.

Which begs the question....why does the necessarily given need to be developed?

As respectable and informative your writing is, it still doesn't explain my conscious feeling of pain. How can it. The conscious pain cannot be explained. A scream explains it too. Litterally. It ex plains, shouts out.

I was asking about the alleged restriction of "everything that we can directly observe". What is (or what did Russell mean by) direct observation? Is it,

ongoing contact — Marchesk

?

Which begs the question....why does the necessarily given need to be developed? — Mww

Because if one isn't careful, they will begin to think that they are looking directly at a brain and believe that non-mental activity (neuronal and electrochemical activity) is mental activity.

But the physiologist hasn't touched the mind.

He has interpreted the data and is giving reports based on his own experiential activity, not on some activity outside his experience, which presumably would be non-mental.

What do you all think about the following thought experiment:
Imagine a physical universe of space and time exactly like ours in which all of the same laws of physics apply and all of the same events occur but in this universe there is no conscious "experience". Meaning that there are plenty of books and discussions between philosophers and scientists about consciousness and experiences but no real "observer" in any of these scenarios. — Flaw

This experiment supposes soul and matter can exist independently from each other. Maybe they can, but in that case your mentioned world cannot exist.

Oh, you can imagine a world like you do, but it is just a soul depleted world, you have extracted the matter of the universe only, without its content, and placed it in an Imaginary world.

How will you ever explain the colors you see, the sounds that you hear, or the feeling of music that makes you cry? — GraveItty

I don't believe that the world/scenario that I mentioned is more or less imaginary than the one we currently live in. Nor do I think it makes a difference in explaining colors, sounds, and all other experiences because these things are not explainable by the "matter" in the first place. This is why I proposed the thought experiment.

When I give this scenario a bit more thought, all of the colors, sounds, feelings, and other experiences that I feel, actually seems more explainable.

I don't believe that the world/scenario that I mentioned is more or less imaginary than the one we currently live in. — Flaw

Isn't it the same world the? How can a material brain, body, and universe exist without the creature seeing, for example, colors, or the world around them? Faces would have no meaning as there is nothing to express.

Isn't it the same world the? How can a material brain, body, and universe exist without the creature seeing, for example, colors, or the world around them? — GraveItty

They wouldn't see colors, they would just react to wavelengths of light in a certain range. We have this question with robots and various light detectors. Do they see color? Only in the sense that they detect a frequency of light we see as red. If that sounds weird, then ask yourself what colors a radio telescope sees.

The p-zombie argument is that all the neural and biological activity could take place in principle without there being experiences of color, sound, pain, etc. And that's because the neural, biological, chemical and physical descriptions don't make use of colors, sounds and pains. They're completely abstract descriptions, because that's how we do science. We abstract away from our creature-dependent sensations.

No. I don't think so. Philosophical speculations can't solve scientific problems.

Isn't it the same world the? How can a material brain, body, and universe exist without the creature seeing, for example, colors, or the world around them? Faces would have no meaning as there is nothing to express. — GraveItty

Yes I suspect it is the same world then. My position is that thinking that a material brain, physics, and universe needs an experiencing creature to see colors, hear sounds, etc, is just an assumption. @Marchesks comment explains how that would look.

The p-zombie argument is that all that neural and biological activity could take place in principle without there being experiences of color, sound, pain, etc — Marchesk

This is the first time I am hearing of the philosophical zombie argument so thanks for referencing this. I think I'll start reading up on this to see what other philosophers have to say about this.

Philosophical speculations can't solve scientific problems. — 180 Proof

Yes I agree. But not everything is solvable, not everything is a problem, and I suppose that not everything is physical. I also would not use the word speculation, but rather interpretation. I think philosophical interpretations of reality can move us in a certain direction and have application in real life. I think the interpretations of consciousness especially will be really important in the next few years in society especially with the growth of artificial/computational intelligence and machine learning.

Pain is a physical sensation or mental cessation; the experience of pain is: distracting, misdirecting and/or beguiling. If we are trying to shoot a target with a gun, pain has a chance of making us miss; either by sheer power or by hiving(parasite on mind/psyche).

The feeling of pain is placid, mental pain is loss and all phsycial pains are gain related.

Physically, rapid-gain is enough to distract, misdirect or beguile a playmaker.

Mentally, mass-loss is enough to distract, misdirect or beguile a playmaker.

The spirit doesn't feel pain but has the burden of experiencing mental and phsycial pain.

All solutions to problems are material solutions. What other kind(s) of solutions can you offer an example of? — Janus

Psychological solutions, or are therapists completely worthless?

"The explanatory gap" is misinterpreted by many philosophers as an "unsolvable problem" (by philosophical means alone, of course) for which they therefore fiat various speculative woo-of-the-gaps that only further obfuscate the issue. An "unsolvable problem", after all, is merely ill-formed, a pseudo-problem. "The hard problem of consciousness" is a conspicuous example of a pseudo-problem and remains "unsolvable" in so far as "the explanatory gap" is treated as a metaphysical topic rather than a scientific one.

Psychological solutions, or are therapists completely worthless? — RogueAI

Example?

Ok. Thanks

I thought you wanted to articulate an opposing view. :worry:

Oh well, I suppose I'll have to mostly agree with you in some other thread.

"The hard problem of consciousness" is a conspicuous example of a pseudo-problem and remains "unsolvable" in so far as "the explanatory gap" is treated as metaphysical topic rather than a scientific one. — 180 Proof

So do you see phenomenal consciousness as essentially being an emergent property of the brain's processing capabilities? Details to be understood in the fullness of time via a scientific approach?

doesn't explain my conscious feeling — GraveItty

Right, no comprehensive explanations.
My comments at least (612641, 612834) are just about delineation.
Giving up (or mystification) not really warranted, and epistemophobia is irrational.

^{Pop: Neuroscientists Have Followed a Thought as It Moves Through The Brain (Jan 18, 2018)
Paper: Persistent neuronal activity in human prefrontal cortex links perception and action (Dec 18, 2017)}

Learning to accept my intrusive thoughts and not fight them went a long way in solving my rumination problem.

OK, I was thinking more in terms of answers to questions, but in any case, "learning to accept my intrusive thoughts and not fight them" is a material change of behavior isn't it. I mean instead of sitting or lying there and ruminating, don't you go and do something else?

OK, I was thinking more in terms of answers to questions, but in any case, "learning to accept my intrusive thoughts and not fight them" is a material change of behavior isn't it. I mean instead of sitting or lying there and ruminating, don't you go and do something else? — Janus

Distracting can help, but mostly it's a process of telling the intrusive thought (something along the lines of): hello irrational thought, I'm not going to fear you.

:up:

The explanatory gap" is misinterpretation by many philosophers as "unsolvable problem — 180 Proof

Who says it's unsolvable?

If you're of the mindset that all mental states are brain states, then psychological solutions are material solutions.

Who says it's unsolvable? — frank

I think it is. I think scientists can study this for a thousand more years and still not know how minds are produced by brains. This is because there's no way to verify other minds exist. You can only be certain that your own mind exists. So, if a scientific theory predicts that that clump of matter over there is conscious, how are we going to verify it? That seems like an insolvable problem.

I have no idea what else they could be, although I prefer the term 'processes' to 'states'.