Thanks for the answer and clarification. Unfortunately, It'll take some days now for me to respond.

Sorry if I don't answer you in detail. But I believe it is better to begin from more general questions of principle.

Do you think that 'punishments' (in a quite broad sense of the term) can never be means of education? Do you think that it is always possible to avoid 'punishments' and still educate efficiently?

'Punishment' here means either causing or allowing some kind of painful or unpleasant experience. I would actually answer yes to both, i.e. that 'punishments' can be means of education and that it isn't always possible to avoid 'punishments' to educate efficiently for the reason I tried to explain in my previous posts.

Wilhelm Reich might argue that people perform this particular punishment as part of their "character armor" instead of it being selfless education. In other words, it's not really about the kid deserving to be treated so harshly, but about the parent's fears about how the child will make them look in the future. — ProtagoranSocratist

Perhaps in some cases yes. In some cases no. Not sure why one would like to think that in the case I was thinking. Let's say that the stolen item was quite costly and if done by an adult the act could be considered a somewhat serious instance of theft.

I mean: I was thinking about the case of an adolescent that isn't easily convinced by a simple 'verbal reprimand'. Indeed, there was no physical harm done to the child in my example from the parent. The parent simply didn't allow the child to go to a place he/she did want to go (let's say having fun with friends) and, instead, brought him/her to the shop owner to apologize and give back the stolen item. It is actually an example of 'restorative justice' that perhaps also can benefit to the offended part here.

I am also not a parent but I do not see any kind of selfish behaviour in the parent. Certainly, 'doing nothing' would be worse. The misbehaving adolescent here might in that case continue in his/her destructive behaviour.

In any case, even a 'verbal reprimand' is actually a form of punishment even if it is less intense.

Even among adults, let's say that a grown man/woman one night drives recklessy and gets a fine for having exceeded a speed limit. Getting the fine might actually be the occasion of changing the way he/she drives. Maybe at first for fear of getting fined again and, later, because he/she comes to see that safe driving, while perhaps more boring, leads to more good than reckless driving.

Of course, punishments should not exceed some boundaries. Of course, at least when possible, dialogue or other 'measures' should be applied instead of punishments. But I think that punishments, when skillfully done, might lead to the good of those punished.

I have no idea what video apokrisis posted. I just did a search. This post is about the same stuff, but there's no link to a video. — Patterner

It was a video that was posted some years ago about a computer simulation of metabolic processes of a cell (I vaguely remember that ATP was also present, that's why I thought the video was the same). It was a very well-made video that gives the idea of how complex are those processes. I hope I find it again.

I'll watch the video as soon as I can. Unfortunately, in the next few days I'll be somewhat busy, so I'll need some time.

I don't mean this is how life emerged, as in abiogenesis. I mean life is various physical processes, such as metabolism, respiration, and reproduction, and we can understand these processes all the way down to things like electrons and redox reactions. There's nothing happening above that isn't explained below. There is no vital force/élan vital needed to explain anything. — Patterner

Ok, I see and I think I agree. But I also think that there is some rudimentary intentionality even in the simplest life forms (and perhaps even in viruses which are not considered living). So perhaps the issues of life and consciousness aren't separate.
I believe that perhaps the properties that characterize life are present in a latent form in what isn't life. Think about something like Aristotle's notion of potency and act.

As I said, consciousness is not physical processes like photons hitting retinas, rhodopsin changing shape, signal sent up the optic nerve to the lateral geniculate nucleus, signal processed, processed signal sent to the visual cortex, and a million other intervening steps. No amount of added detail would be a description of the experience of seeing red. — Patterner

Agreed. To which, I also add the capacity of reason that I alluded to my reference to mathematics.

I don't believe there's any such thing as 'strong emergence'. There's just emergence, which most think of as 'weak emergence'. And it is intelligible. — Patterner

Agreed. I believe that 'strong emergence' at least in the 'epistemic' sense can't be taken seriously. It basically is like saying: "under these conditions, somehow a property emerges...".

No, no subatomic particle, atom, or molecule has the property of liquidity.
... — Patterner

I agree with everything you say here about liquidity. However, life and, above all, mind are a different thing. They seem to present features that have no relation with the properties we know of the 'inanimate'.

I'm not going to do even as much as I just did for water, because this is already far too long. But watch this video about the electron transport chain. It explains how electrons being transported from one thing to the next in the mitochondria leads to a proton gradient, and how the pent-up proteins, when released, power the synthesis of ATP. ATP is the power source of nearly everything involved in those physical processes that are the defining characteristics of life. — Patterner

Unfortunately, the link redirects to this page. I believe, however it is the same video that apokrisis shared some time ago. Yes, that's impressive, isn't it? A purely reductionist explanation to all that doesn't seem credible. So, the 'emergence' that caused all of this is something like a 'non-reductionist emergence' or something like that. However, the details of how the emergence of life happened are unclear and details matter.

Again, I don't deny abiogenesis but I do believe that we have yet to understand all the properties of the 'inanimate'. Perhaps, the hard difference we see between 'life' and 'not-life' will be mitigated as we progress in science.

Mind/Consciousness is even a more complicated case IMO. One is the reason you say in your post, i.e. phenomenological experience seems difficult to be explained in emergentist terms. And as I said before in this thread, I even believe that our mind can understand concepts that can't be considered 'natural' or 'physical'. The clearest example to me are mathematical truths even if I admit that I can't seem to provide compelling arguments for this ontology of math (as for myself, I did weight the pros and cons about the 'existence and eternity' of math and to be honest the pros seem to me more convincing).



Edit: now the link worked. It isn't the video that I had in mind, so I'll watch it.

Observer is a classical thing, and QM is not about classical things, even if classical tools are useful in experimentation. Quantum theory gives no special role to conscious 'observation'. Every experiment can be (and typically is) run just as well with completely automated mechanical devices. — noAxioms

Standard interpretation-free QM is IMO simply silent about what a 'measurement' is. Anything more is interpretation-dependent.

I hope you see this is not an argument against what you said, but a different way of thinking. — Athena

Yes, I see. But I am suggesting that punishments and fear of punishments is a necessary (or perhaps inevitable) part of education. In my example of an adolescent that steals from a shop, the parent decision to lead the child to give back the item stolen and apologize to the shop owner is certainly a punishment even if educative. After experiencing it, the adolescent might gradually come to his or her senses and avoid to do that again, perhaps initially for fear of being punished again and later because he or she understands that the action is wrong.
So, I am not really disagreeing with the 'Eastern' notion of discipline and that a disciplined person in such sense is in a better state than a person who doesn't good only out of fear. But I would say that punishments (in a broad sense, including 'experiencing the natural results of one's actions' and 'educative punishments') and the fear of them are perhaps necessary part of our education.

Clearly, purely retributive punishments can't be read in such a way as their aims do not include education.

Regarding 'divine punishments' in Christianity I don't think that we can say that there is a single view. In fact, I believe that most Christians would say that in some cases the 'divine punishments' are educative. When they say they aren't, many Christians nowadays say that they are actually the consequence of the 'hardening' of the sinner's heart.
I don't, of course, deny that the picture of a vengeful God hasn't been common in Christianity and at times the most accepted one. But there is no single view about these among Christians.

You know what? So do I. I hunted around for that distinction and got several very different ideas about that. Some are more ontic like I'm suggesting and several others are more epistemic (intelligibility) such as you are suggesting. — noAxioms

Ok.

But a more knowledgeable explanation shows that it is getting the music from the air (something not-radio), not from itself. So the music playing is then a strong (not weak) emergent property of the radio. That's how I've been using the term.
Your explanation (as I hear it) sounds more like "I don't know how it works, so it must be strongly emergent (epistemic definition)". Correct conclusion, but very weak on the validity of the logic. — noAxioms

Ok but in the 'ontic' definition of strong emergence, when sufficient knowledge is aquired, it results in weak emergence. So the sound that is produced by the radio also necessitates the presence of the air. It is an emergent feature from the inner workings of the radio and the radio-air interaction.

(Regarding the music, I believe that to be understood ad 'music' you need also a receiver that is able to understand the sound as music)

Regarding your objection, yes I know and I have already said that I can't exclude with certainty an 'ontic' strong emergence. But it seems unlikely.

Are you saying that atoms have intentionality, or alternatively, that a human is more than just a collection of atoms? Because that's what emergence (either kind) means: A property of the whole that is not a property of any of the parts. It has nothing to do with where it came from.or how it got there. — noAxioms

Emergence means that those 'properties of the wholes that are not properties of the parts' however can be explained in virtue of the properties of the parts. So, yeah, I am suggesting that either a 'physicalist' account of human beings is not enough or that we do not know enough about the 'physical' to explain the emergence of intentionality, consciousness etc. A possible alternative perhaps is saying that intentionality is 'latent' in 'fundamental physical objects'. If this is true, however, this would imply that intentionality, consciousness are not an accidental feature - something that 'just happened' to come into being, an 'unnatural' super-addition of the inanimate. So, perhaps, the inanimate/animate distinction is less definite than what it seems.

Life arising from not-life seems like abiogenesis. Life being composed of non-living parts is emergence. So I don't particularly agree with using 'arise; like that. — noAxioms

Yes, I don't disagree with abiogenesis, of course. I just think that we do not have a complete understanding of 'not-life' and therefore the 'come into being' of the property 'life' seems difficult to explain in terms of what we know about 'not-life'. As I said before, this is perhaps because we do not have a complete understanding of what is 'not-life' - perhaps it is not so dissimilar to what is 'life'.

So does any machine. The parts that implement 'intent' have control over the parts that implement the background processes that implement that intent, sort of like our consciousness not having to deal with individual motor control to walk from here to there. I looking for a fundamental difference from the machine that isn't just 'life', which I admit is a big difference. You can turn a machine off and back on again. No can do with (most) life. — noAxioms

I believe that we are reaching a halting point in our discussion here. We know that all the operation of a (working) machine can be understood via the algorithms that have been programmed even when it 'controls' its processes. I just don't think there is sufficient evidence that this is the same for us.

Regarding when a machine 'dies'... well if you break it...

He IS an automated process. Same with parts of a person: What (small, understandable) part of you cannot be replaced by an automated substitute? — noAxioms

In that situation, I would say: his work is equivalent to an automated process in that situation. Regarding your question: I don't know. As I said before, it just seems that our experience of ourselves suggests that we are not mere automata.

I watched my brother's dog diagnose his appendicitis. Pretty impressive, especially given a lack of training in such areas. — noAxioms

Interesting and yes very impressive. Well also 'intuition' seems something that machines do not really have.

Thanks for your answer. I am sorry but I can now only reply on the part about punishments. I think that the matter is quite complex here. I do believe that 'fear of punishments' has a place in our own education. When we misbehave being punished - in some way - is perhaps the best thing that can happen to us. Of course, not all forms of punishments are good for us. Mere vengeance of course isn't good for those who suffer vengeance.

However, punishments can also be educative. For instance, a parent that let his or her child to experience the 'bad natural consequences' of the child's behavior might do the right thing that allows the child to understand the problems of acting in a certain way. Also, I believe that is some cases 'extrinsic punishments' can be educative. Again, a parent that knows that, say, their child stole something from a shop might reprimind the child and decide that the child should go to the shop, give to the owner what has been stolen and apologize etc instead of letting the child do what they are currently desiring. This is clearly an extrinsic punishment in the sense that the child at the end does something that they would not like to do.

Of course, in both cases the point of punishment is educative. So punishments can actually help a person to become virtuous at least if they are skillfully applied.

Nevertheless, a rigid moralism where people are merely expected to follow rules and being punished in a purely retributive fashion if they misbehave risks to be perceived as purely cohercive by those who have to follow it.

So, at least ideally I believe that all punishments should have - among their goals - the education of who is punished. Clearly, it seems that such a goal can't be reached in some cases or can't be the main goal of the punishments but it seems to me that that these situations shouldn't be 'the norm'. Quite often, it seems to me, the problem is not the 'rules' in themselves but rather the approach to them. So 'fear of punishment' and even 'punishments' can actually be good motivators to learn virtue but at the same time can never tell the whole story. The 'moral code' we are expected to follow should be somewhat linked to what is good to us.

If one uses a definition of strong emergence meaning that the snowflake property cannot even in principle be explained by physical interactions alone, then something else (said magic) is required, and only then is it strongly emergent. — noAxioms

I honestly find the whole distinction between 'strong' and 'weak' emergence very unclear and tends to muddle the waters. When we say that the form of a snowflake emerges from the properties of the lower levels, we have in mind at least a possible explanation of the former in terms of the latter.
If 'strong emergence' means that such an explanations isn't possible then I do not think we can even speak of 'emergence'.

So, yeah, I believe that emergence must be intelligible.

Worse, I hold beliefs that I know are wrong. It's contradictory, I know, but it's also true. — noAxioms

I think I know what you mean and I agree.

Being an intentional entity by no means implies that the event was intended. — noAxioms

I get that but the baby is still conceived by humans. You already have a sperm cell and an egg cell that are produced by beings who at least have the capacity of intentionality.
An explanation of 'emergence' of what has intentionality from what doesn't have intentionality IMO requires that among the causes of the emergence there isn't an entity that has at least the potentiality to be intentional.

This clearly mirrors the question to explain how 'life' arises from 'non-life'.

But the (strong/weak) emergence we're talking about is a planet made of of atoms, none of which are planets. — noAxioms

They are nevertheless quite similar as concepts. We are trying to explain how a given arrangement of 'physical things' can explain the 'arising' of mind/consciousness/intentionality etc
In the case of a planet we can give an account of how a planet 'emerges' from its constituents. In the case of mind/consciousness/intentionality things are not so clear...

I suggest that they've simply not been explained yet to your satisfaction, but there's no reason that they cannot in principle ever be explained in such terms. — noAxioms

Perhaps. And perhaps, we do not understand the 'lifeless' as we think we do.

What do you mean by this? Of what are we aware that a machine cannot be? It's not like I'm aware of my data structures or aware of connections forming or fading away. I am simply presented with the results of such subconscious activity. — noAxioms

But we experience a degree of control on our subconscious activities. We do not experience ourselves as mere spectators of unconscious activities. We experience ourselves as active players.

The experiment was proposed well before LLMs, but it operates much like an LLM, with the CPU of the LLM (presuming there's only one) acting as the person. — noAxioms

It's not like any of my neurons understands what it's doing. Undertanding is an emergent property of the system operating, not a property of any of its parts. The guy in the Chinese room does not understand Chinese, nor does any of his lists — noAxioms

That's what I meant, however. The guy in the Chinese room could be replaced by an automatic process. However, if the guy knew Chinese and could understand the words he would do something that not even the LLMs could do.

And I'm not sure that this 'additional feature' can be explained by 'emergence'.

Same way you do: Practice. Look at millions of images with known positive/negative status. After doing that a while, it leans what to look for despite the lack of explanation of what exactly matters. — noAxioms

Unfortunately I have not studied in a satisfying manner how these machines work. But I would guess that their 'learning' is entirely algorithmic, most likely it is based on something like updating prior probabilities, i.e. the machine is presented by some data, it automatically compares predictions to outcomes and then 'adjusts' the priors for future tests.

I don't think we do this. Actually, I think that our subconscious activities work just like that (e.g. as, say, it is suggested by the Bayesian models of perception) but this is not how we experience our conscious activities.

It's difficult to make a machine analogy of what I am thinking about, in part because there are no machines to my knowledge that seem to operate the way we (consciously) do.

OK. Can you name a physical process that isn't? Not one that you don't know how works, but one that you do know, and it's not algorithmic. — noAxioms

Perhaps we will have to agree to disagree here. To me conscious actions of sentient beings have a non-algorithmic components. Yet, physical and chemical processes seem to be algorithmic in character. How the former are possible in a world that seem to be dominated by the latter, I don't know.

Whoo, whoo, you stirred too many thoughts. I can handle maybe 3 concepts at a time. Too many thoughts turn my head into mush, and my mind is like a kaleidoscope, changing shapes and colors, and I can not form a coherent thought from all this sensory overload. :worry: — Athena

Well, I was lucky enough to have enough time to write those long posts (and I also have a tendency to 'overelaborate'...). I'll have likely less time in the following days, so I'll reply less frequently .

Absolutely! — Athena

:up: Yet, sometimes it seems to me that many people do not seem interested to live a coherent life in beliefs and deeds, and/or do not seem to be able to appreciate the consequences of certain beliefs, and/or do not live up to their own standards...
Of course, I am included.

Doing philosophy however helps to do that or at least be aware of these kinds of disconnects.

For sure, it is incomplete. As social animals, our thinking must be inclusive. As supposedly intelligent animals, our thinking needs to consider future generations. — Athena

Agreed!

Yep, nations and cultures can need psychoanalysis just as much as individuals. The way nations play war games makes psychoanalysis very important. — Athena

Again, I agree with this. I believe that, in fact, societies and cultures can 'learn' in a way analogous to how individuals learn. One example is, for instance, how slavery became in time seen as the monstrousity which it is. Nowadays we think that a human being can be considered a property as an abomination but slavery was practised regularly. I believe that at least on this point it is safe to say that humanity (on average) has learned a bit better what is better for each and all individuals.

Something that you mentioned is the middle path, balance, and harmony. As you know, it isn't all about me or all about you, but it is about us. If I am knocking myself out to be the perfect daughter, wife, mother, woman, it doesn't matter. — Athena

Well, we can also say that both an 'unconcerned' and a 'perfectionistic' attitude can damage both oneself and others. If I don't care about the 'goodness' of my actions it is of course a problem. At the same time, however, if I care too much I will probably be unable to act in any way and we get entangled in despair. So, yeah, we need the proper balance. Easier to say than to to do.

In everything we do, who do we want to please and why? — Athena

In a way, both us and others. But, again, we should seek to 'please' in the right way. Assuming that the lecture aims to inform the audience of some theme, the goal is to inform the audience in the optimal way. So, one can't either cause boredom to the audience nor entertain them without any real information. The optimal way is to both inform and entertain. Again, more easily said than done. Realistically, this means that we need to put a limit on both the quantity of information we want to share and the 'entertainment/pleasure' we want to give to the audience.

Furthermore, in some context causing unpleasant feelings can be for the good of the other. While 'punishments' should be avoided as far as is possible, sometimes they are inevitable. Not punishing someone for their inappropriate behavior is hardly uneducative at least in some circumstances. Sometimes the right 'punishment' can be the proper way for a transgressor to come to their senses and change their ways (and if the intent is educative, perhaps it would be better to speak of 'corrections' rather than 'punishments').
Again, this equally applies to someone who behaves badly but also for an addict. If a parent knows that their teenage child assumed drugs, the parent might decide to ground the child and take the child to a doctor against their will. The child perhaps would perhaps find painful this kind of intervention but we can expect that, once the child has become wiser, he or she will be grateful to their parent.

How fast can we change our morals and keep up with a society that is on the move? But here is the question that really bothers me- was the force of social change really better for humanity? — Athena

Good questions. A famous aphorism of Kierkegaard says that life can be lived forwards but can be understood backwords. While I would disagree if this is taken to an extreme, this is largely correct. It is difficult to say if certain changes have been for the better. All we can do is form a well-reasoned opinion given evidence.

A rigid moralism has undoubtedly painful effects on people. Of course, I have said above that painful experiences can be for the better. But, at the same time there are cases where it is evident that a rigid moralism becomes self-referential and makes the 'code of law' something more important than the persons it is supposed to be useful to. If moralism becomes an obstacle to the process to realize the good for the individual and the community it should be put into question.
For instance, if a moral system is supposed to make people more loving but the practical effects are that people become more self-centred, suspicious and so one it is right IMO to question the moral system. But this should be done in a careful way and not in an unreflecting way.

You wrote in favor of this and that, both being part of the truth. I often find truth is both this and that. But right now, everything is moving too fast, and I am not sure we are on the right path. — Athena

Yes, I agree. And the problem with fast changes is that people have not time to think about them in a proper way.

I am not Christian and want to point out that Christianity is in the line of destroying the goddess and supporting the patriarchy, and I have strong feelings against all this. Many native American tribes were matriarchal, and I think that is better for mankind. — Athena

I am also not a Christian partly because I find it impossible to accept some social norms that are generally held by Christians to be 'non-negotiable'. I do believe that there are good arguments for theism and I am very sympathetic to some forms of Christianity but I can't right now join a religious tradition (Christian or otherwise). I know that, perhaps, it doesn't make sense to be a 'non-religious theist' but, to be honest, I can't help myself to be different.

Regarding gender inequality, I think it should be said that we tend to have an 'idealized' view of cultures we are not familiar with. I do not know about native American tribes so what I am saying doesn't apply to them, but over time I came to the conclusion that 'patriarchy' isn't really a problem of a specific religion or culture but simply was a common theme in Antiquity. Indian and Chinese religious traditions and societies haven't generally be 'more open' to gender equality than in the 'West'. Despite its reputation, for instance, you'll find more female writers among in the history of the Catholic Church - whose writings have been highly regarded for centuries - rather than, say, in Buddhist, Confucian, Hindu etc traditions (to my knowledge, I would be happy to be disproven here). I am not suggesting that Catholics are more 'inherently' open to gender equality than anyone else or anything like that but I just note how our assessment can neglect these things.

Furthermore, at least in recent times there are movements inside Christian traditions as well as for instance Buddhist traditions and undoubtedly other traditions that actively try to raise the awareness of the dangers of 'patriarchy', so I am a bit wary to make general assertion about what is the position of a given religion about this matter.

In general, I am persuaded that 'Christianity', 'Buddhism' etc are umbrella terms in which you find extremely huge variations in many aspects. So really if one tells me that he or she is a 'Christian', a 'Buddhist', a 'Muslim' and so on I have to say that I have little information about him or her.

In my humble opinion, I just think that neither 'patriarchy' nor 'matriarchy' perhaps are the best options. Indeed, it seems to me that biological sex shouldn't be thought as a reliable indicator of the place in society that an individual 'should have'. I wouldn't say that biological sexes do not matter at all, but they certainly seem to matter less than our ancestors seemed to believe so firmly.

There are so many things to think about, and I wish we began with scientific thinking, not Christianity a personal God, and individuality, that can be divisive and exclusive and include harmful rationalizations. Destroying the planet for temporary benefits is not good thinking. It is not moral thinking. — Athena

I agree. After all, irrespective of one's own religious beliefs I think that we can establish if certain things are good for us both individually and collectively. As you say ruining the very environment in which we live is certainly not a good thing to do. It is also frustrating how difficult is to get a substantial change here.

You've been leveraging the word now for many posts. Maybe you should have put out your definition of that if it means something other than 'able to be understood', as opposed to say 'able to be partially understood'. — noAxioms

Let's take the weaker definition. Honestly, I don't think that anything changes in what I said.

So I must deny that physicalism has any requirement of intelligibility, unless you have a really weird definition of it. — noAxioms

Partial intelligibility is still intelligibility. For instance, the reason why I don't believe that the Earth is only 100 years old is because a different age of the Earth better supports all evidence we have. This doesn't necessarily mean that absolutely everything about the Earth is intelligible but if I had not some faith in the ability of reason to understand what is the most likely explanation of the evidence I have I could not even undertake a scientific investigation.

So, yeah I would say that intelligibility is certainly required to do science. And I doubt that there are physicalists that would seriously entertain the idea that science give us no real understading about physical reality.

One person's reasonable doubt is another's certainty. — noAxioms

Of course people can be certain without a sufficient basis for being certain. A serious philosophical investigation should, however, give a higher awareness about the quality of the basis for one's beliefs.

I hold beliefs that I admit are not 'proven beyond reasonable doubts'. There is nothing particularly wrong about having those beliefs if one is also sincere about the status of their foundation.

There are more extreme examples of this, like the civil war case of a woman getting pregnant without ever first meeting the father, with a bullet carrying the sperm rather than any kind of intent being involved. — noAxioms

Good point. But in the case you mention one can object the baby is still conceived by humans who are intentional beings.

An even more interesting point IMO would be abiogenesis. It is now accepted that life - and hence intentionality - 'came into being' from a lifeless state. So this would certainly suggest that intentionality can 'emerge from' something non-intentional.
However, from what we currently know about the properties of what is 'lifeless', intentionality and other features do not seem to be explainable in terms of those properties. So what? Perhaps what we currently know about the 'lifeless' is incomplete.

A similar argument seeks to prove that life cannot result from non-living natural (non-teleological) processes. — noAxioms

Yes, I know. However, unless a convincing objection can be made to the argument, the argument is still defensible.

We change our coding, which is essentially adding/strengthening connections. A machine is more likely to just build some kind of data set that can be referenced to do its tasks better than without it. We do that as well. — noAxioms

Note that we can also do that with awareness.

As a curiosity, what do you think about the Chinese room argument? I still haven't find convincing evidence that machines can do something that can't be explained in terms like that, i.e. that machines seem to have understanding of what they are doing without really understand it.

They have machines that detect melanoma in skin images. There's no algorithm to do that. Learning is the only way, and the machines do it better than any doctor. Earlier, it was kind of a joke that machines couldn't tell cats from dogs. That's because they attempted the task with algorithms. Once the machine was able to just learn the difference the way humans do, the problem went away, and you don't hear much about it anymore. — noAxioms

Interesting. But how they 'learn'? Is that process of learning describable by algorithms? Are they programmed to learn the way they do?

Technically, anything a physical device can do can be simulated in software, which means a fairly trivial (not AI at all) algorithm can implement you. This is assuming a monistic view of course. If there's outside interference, then the simulation would fail. — noAxioms

This IMO assumes more than just 'physicalism'. You also assume that all natural process are algorithmic.

Doing science is how something less unintelligible becomes more intelligible. — noAxioms

Ok.

There are other examples of that, such as the robot with the repeated escape attempts, despite not being programmed to escape. — noAxioms

I'll try to find some of these things. Interesting.

Partially intelligible, which is far from 'intelligible', a word that on its own implies nothing remaining that isn't understood. — noAxioms

Well, it depends on what we mean by 'intelligible'. A thing might be called 'intelligible' because it is fully understood or because it can be, in principle, understood completely*. That's why I tend to use the expressions 'partially intelligible' and 'intelligible' in a somewhat liberal manner.

*This 'in principle' does not refer only to human minds. If there were minds that have higher abilities than our own it may be possible that they understand something that we do not and cannot. This doesn't mean that those things are 'unintelligible'.

Not sure where you think my confidence level is. I'm confident that monism hasn't been falsified. That's about as far as I go. BiV hasn't been falsified either, and it remains an important consideration, but positing that you're a BiV is fruitless. — noAxioms

I believe that you believe that some alternatives are more reasonable than the others but you don't think that there is enough evidence to say that one particular theory is 'the right one beyond reasonable doubt'.

I'm saying that alternatives to such physical emergence has not been falsified, so yes, I suppose those alternative views constitute 'possible ways in which they exist without emergence from the physical'. — noAxioms

Ok, thanks.

No, since I am composed of parts, none of which have the intentionality of my employer. So it's still emergent, even if the intentions are not my own. — noAxioms

My point wasn't that the programmer's intentionality is part of the machine but, rather, it is a necessary condition for the machine to come into being. If the machine had intentionality, such an intentionality also depends on the intentionality of its builder, so we can't still say that the machine's intentionality emerged from purely 'inanimate' causes.

Not a very strong argument but it is still an interesting point IMO (not that here I am conceding that we can build machines which have intentionality).

Don't agree. The thing in the video learns. An engine does too these days, something that particularly pisses me off since I regularly have to prove to my engine that I'm human, and I tend to fail that test for months at a time. The calculator? No, that has no learning capability. — noAxioms

Mmm. I still don't get why. It seems to me that there is only a different of complexity. 'Learning' IMO would imply that the machine can change the algorithms according to which it operates (note that here I am not using the term 'learning' as to refer to the mere adding of information but, rather, something like learning an ability...).

Dabbling in solipsism now? You can't see the perception or understanding of others, so you can only infer when others are doing the same thing. — noAxioms

Yes, I agree. But I am not sure that this inference is enough for certainty, except of the form of certainty 'for all practical purposes'.

More importantly, what assumptions are you making that preclude anything operating algorithmicly from having this understanding? How do you justify those assumptions? They seem incredibly biased to me. — noAxioms

They are inferences that I can make based on my own experience. I might be wrong, of course, but it doesn't seem to me that I can explain all features of my mental activities in purely algorithmic terms (e.g. how I make some choices). I might concede, however, that I am not absolutely sure that there isn't an unknown alogorithmic explanation of all the operations that my mind can do.
To change my view I need more convincing arguments that my - or any human being's - mind isn't algorithmic.

So the reason why I said that discussing about 'what is good' is the starting point is that it is the foundation upon which ethics is oriented. — boundless

Forgot to mention that 'what is good' for a person seems to be related to the 'what is a person' and this would in turn imply that ontology and ethics are related. Ethical values can't be an 'arbitrary code' that has no bearing to the ontology of human beings in order to be meaningful.

I did not think you personally started with Christian notions, but I think it is so much a part of our Western culture that it would be unavoidable. — Athena

Ok.

What are possible obscurations to rational thinking? — Athena

A lot of things. I made the example of addiction before. An addict clearly acts against one's own good. And this is because they prefer the good feelings experienced by indulging into the addiction over the long term benefit of stopping it.
Another possible example might be excessive 'self-importance', e.g. someone who tries to force their will on others which likely result in isolation, excessive suspiciousness and fear.

I don't like labels, and I am realizing that is hindering my ability to understand what you are saying. I mean, I know virtually nothing about libertarians. On the other hand, I feel strongly about the importance of learning virtues, but now I am thinking that learning virtues may be culture-bound and that this may be inadequate. Such as, I recently learned, some cannibals feel strongly about the rightness of eating their loved ones when they die. Culturally, eating people is forbidden, but to the cannibals who eat their loved ones, to not eat them is terrible. I think culture puts some limits on what we can think about. — Athena

By 'libertarianism' I mean the position that equates 'freedom' with the mere 'ability to choose between different alternative'. In my view, this understanding is incomplete.

Choices are made with an end in view. If we aren't constrained to act otherwise, if we are presented with different options, we choose the 'best' alternative, i.e. what we think is good for us (even when we experience a 'cost' for such a choice - e.g. in an 'altruistic' choice - we regard it is better to act in a certain way despite the 'cost'). However, we can be wrong in our thinking about what is good and this leads us to choose what isn't good for ourselves.

Regarding the differences between cultures I do think that the best explanation is actually that societies can be wrong in their practices, just like individuals can. I do recognize the possibility that I am 'constrained' in my judgments by my own cultural and social prejudices but I also believe that an excessively 'relativistic' approach leads to absurdity. To make a different example, slavery has been seen as 'something natural' for a very long time. I believe that nowadays we are simply more aware of the evil that slavery is and those societies that considered slavery as 'normal' were simply deluded.

Also such a relativism would also make questionable the dialogue between cultures. If we are so constrained by our cultural and social prejudices, how could possibly have benefit by having a dialogue with someone from a different socio-cultural context?
As always, perhaps, the truth is in the middle.

I have listened to a long explanation of meditation and Buddhism, which makes me think that enlightenment is a totally different frame of mind from our everyday thinking. I don't think I am ready to be free of being a part of our common lives with all our social concerns. — Athena

Neither do I. In any case, I was just using Buddhism as an example where virtue ethics seems to be central. IIRC, some scholars disagree with this interpretation of Buddhist ethics because in Buddhism there is the central tenet of 'anatman', not self, which is generally interpreted as meaning that the 'self is illusory'. At the same time, however, for an 'unenlightened' disciple the 'virtue ethics model' seems to best represent the way in which Buddhism ethics 'works'.

Incidentally, this idea that "we should cultivate virtue because it is good for us" was actually common in Antiquity. It is certainly found also in Greek and many Christian thinkers. However, in the latter case, there are undoubtedly also streams of thoughts that seem to reduce ethics to 'following rules of an extrinsically imposed system' (especially from the Late Middle Ages, if I am not mistaken). But you also find many thinkers that agreed that virtue is it's own good, that we should cultivate virtue because it is beneficial to ourselves and so on.

Well, what would be good for me is an end to pain and more energy, so I could do more volunteering and have greater life satisfaction. This is so far from what I think you are talking about, but, back to us being animals, our health and the amount of energy we have. plays into our decisions. It is hard to be the person I want to be when dealing with pain and having very little energy. Like many people my age, I am learning to keep my mouth shut and let the young find their own way. The way to relate to others is to be encouraging but not interfering. Wow, that is hard for me to do! — Athena

Ok, I see and I appreciate that :up: Note, however, how the conception of 'what the good for us is' influences the 'ideal' of life we have and how the former depends also on the 'worldview' one has.

For someone who has a 'secularist' worldview, clearly, the 'good' arguably is 'flourishing' in this life. And it makes perfect sense in such a framework.

A traditional Buddhist would, however, point out that, if Buddhism is correct, we are bound in samsara and, ultimately, 'flourishing' doesn't resolve the deeper lever of suffering we are into. In other words, those effort would be amielorative but, ultimately, would be unsatisfactory. Practicising for the ending of the cycle of death and rebirth would be the 'highest good' for them. So, in this framework, a monk or a nun that tirelessly practise to achieve Nirvana with limited social contacts would be seen as wiser than an activist.

A Christian can similarly argue that social, environmentalism activism is good. But, again, the general worldview that a Christian has is different from that of a 'secularist' and this influences also the conception of what the 'good' is and certainly for a Christian activism alone can't be the 'highest way of life'.

I could go on with examples.

So the reason why I said that discussing about 'what is good' is the starting point is that it is the foundation upon which ethics is oriented. Also, I think that too often a 'religious life' is assumed to be a life where one imposes to oneself an extrinsic 'moral code' that one follows only due to fear. Incidentally, I also believe that extreme forms of relativism also have the same problem. If there isn't any 'objective' ground upon which we can base values, ethics etc, at the end of the day there is a risk that one system imposes itself. It is no wonder why IMO Nietzsche made so many references to conflict while also be a critic of 'morality' as a form of 'denial of life'.

I deny that requirement. It sort of sounds like an idealistic assertion, but I don't think idealism suggests emergent properties. — noAxioms

If physical processes weren't intelligible, how could we even do science, which seeks at least an intelligible description of processes that allow us to make predictions and so on?

I was on board until the bit about not being a time (presumably in our universe) when intentionality doesn't exist. It doesn't appear to exist at very early times, and it doesn't look like it will last. — noAxioms

I was saying that if there was a time when intentionality didn't exist, it must have come into being 'in some way' at a certain moment.

But it hasn't been fully explained. A sufficiently complete explanation might be found by humans eventually (probably not), but currently we lack that, and in the past, we lacked it a lot more. Hence science. — noAxioms

I sort of agree. And honestly, I believe that everything is ultimately not fully knowable as a 'complete understanding' of anything would require the complete understanding of the context in which something exists and so on. Everything is therefore mysterious and, at the same time, paradoxically intelligible.

Maybe we already have (the example from wonderer1 is good), but every time we do, the goalposts get moved, and a more human-specific explanation is demanded. That will never end since I don't think a human is capable of fully understanding how a human works any more than a bug knows how a bug works. — noAxioms

I don't know. Merely giving an output after computing the most likely alternative doesn't seem to me the same thing as intentionality. But, again, perhaps I am wrong about this. It just doesn't seem to be supported by our phenomenological experience.

Mathematics seems to come in layers, with higher layers dependent on more fundamental ones. Is there a fundamental layers? Perhaps law of form. I don't know. What would ground that? — noAxioms

Yes, I think I agree here. Even natural numbers seem to be 'based' on more fundamental concepts like identity, difference, unity, multiplicity etc. But nevertheless the truths about them seem to be non-contingent.

Good point — noAxioms

In my records, if you agree with that, you are not a 'physicalist'. Of course, I accept that you might disagree with me here.

Just so. So physical worlds would not depend on science being done on them. Most of them fall under that category. Why doesn't ours? That answer at least isn't too hard. — noAxioms

If we grant to science some ability to give us knowledge of physical reality, then we must assume that the physical world is intelligible. Clearly, the physical world doesn't depend on us doing scientific investigations on it but, nevertheless, the latter would seem to me ultimately fruitless if the former wasn't intelligible (except perhaps in a weird purely pragmatic point of view).

Agree again. It's why I don't come in here asserting that my position is the correct one. I just balk at anybody else doing that, about positions with which I disagree, but also about positions with which I agree. I have for instance debunked 'proofs' that presentism is false, despite the fact that I think it's false. — noAxioms

OK. I have a sort of similar approach about online discussions. Sometimes, however, I believe that it is simply impossible to not state one's own disagreement (or agreement) with a view in seemingly eccessively confident terms. Like sarcasm, sometimes the 'level of confidence' comes out badly in discussions and people seem more confident about a given thing than they actually are.

Furthermore, I also believe that a careful analysis of a position one has little sympathy for actually can be useful to understand better and reinforce the position one has. I get that sometimes it is not an easy task but the fruits of such a careful (and respectful) approach are very good.

Close enough. More of a not-unemergentist, distinct in that I assert that the physical is sufficient for emergence of these things, as opposed to asserting that emergence the physical is necessary fact, a far more closed-minded stance. — noAxioms

Not sure what you mean here. Are you saying that the physical is sufficient for emergence but there are possible ways in which intentionality, consciousness etc emerge without the physical?

This is irrelevant to emergence, which just says that intentionality is present, consisting of components, none of which carry intentionality.
OK, so you don't deny the emergence, but that it is intentionality at all since it is not its own, quite similar to how my intentions at work are that of my employer instead of my own intentions. — noAxioms

Good point. But note that if your intentions could be completely determined by your own employer, it would be questionable to call them 'your' intentions. Also, to emerge 'your' intentions would need the intentionality of your employer.

Anyway even if I granted that, somehow, the machines could have an autonomous intentionality, there remains the fact that if intentionality, in order to emerge, needs always some other intentionality, intentionality is fundamental.

So, yeah, I sort of agree that intentionality can come into being via emergence but it isn't clear how it could emerge from something that is completely devoid of it.

It recognizes 2 and 3. It does not recognize the characters. That would require a image-to-text translator (like the one in the video, learning or not). Yes, it adds. Yes, it has a mechanical output that displays results in human-readable form. That's my opinion of language being appropriately applied. It's mostly a language difference (to choose those words to describe what its doing or not) and not a functional difference. — noAxioms

Again, I see it more like a machine doing an operation rather than a machine 'recognizing' anything. An engine that burns gasoline to give energy to a car and allowing it to move doesn't 'recognize' anything, yet it operates. In the same way, I doubt that a machine can recognize numbers in an analogous way we do but I still do not find any evidence that they do something more than doing an operation as an engine does. This to me applies both to the mechanical calculator and the computer in the video.

An interesting question, however, arises. How can I be sure that humans (and, I believe, also animals at least) can 'recognize' numbers as I perceive myself doing? This is indeed a big question. Can we be certain that we - humans and (some?) animals do recognize numbers - while machines do not? I am afraid that such a certainty is beyond our reach.

Still, I think it is reasonable that machines do not have such a faculty because they operate algorithmically (and those algorithms can be VERY complex and designed to approximate our own abilities).

Cool. So similar to how humans do it. The post office has had image-to-text interpretation for years, but not sure how much those devices learn as opposed to just being programmed. Those devices need to parse cursive addresses, more complicated than digits. I have failed to parse some hand written numbers.
My penmanship sucks, but I'm very careful when hand-addressing envelopes. — noAxioms

Do we just do that, though? It seems from our own phenomenological experience that we can have some control and self-awareness on our own 'operations' that machines do not have.

That would be an interesting objective threshold of intelligence: any entity capable of [partially] comprehending itself. — noAxioms

I think I agree with that provided that one adds the word in the square brackets. The problem is: can we have an unmistaken criterion that allows us to objectively determine if a living being, machine or whatever has such an ability?

Would you like to pick up from here and say something? We might consider how different the discussion would go if we held a more scientific mindset, as opposed to assuming Christianity pretty much covers the subjects of morals and ethics, and proceeded with Protestant assumptions. — Athena

TBH, I never wanted to assume the truth of Christianity from the start in my posts, not sure why you think that. I was just arguing that, in my opinion, virtue ethics is a better view about ethics than other models. Virtue ethics is also generally coupled with the 'intellectualist' model of freedom, i.e. that a rational being is truly free when he or she is freed from all 'obscurations' that prevent him or her to recognize properly the good with the assumption that being 'rational' means to spontaneously desire what is recognized as good, in contrast to the 'libertarian' model which, instead, simply assert that freedom is the same as 'deliberative power' to choose among alternatives.

This model of ethics and freedom was certainly accepted among many Christians in history but I think you find it also asserted in completely different traditions like, say, Platonism, Neoplatonism, Aristotelism etc in the 'West' and also in Indian religions. For instance, in Buddhism Nirvana is said to be achieved when spiritual ignorance ('avidya') ceases precisely because the 'enlightened' isn't said to be deluded about what is truly the highest good for him/her.

I now believe, after having reflected upon these things, that these kinds of ideas about freedom and ethics - irrespective (of some form) of Christianity, Buddhism or even 'secularism' etc being right - make most sense and they are the only that allow us to avoid considering 'virtuous behaviour' as the result of merely following an external code which is unrelated to our own nature.

Having made this clarification, sure, I think that scientific studies about the behavior of animals actually give us more understanding about human ethics. I am a bit reticent, however, to use it as a starting point because as you note there are differences among animal species. Still, I believe that the best approach is to study directly what happens among humans. I believe we should make the same observations we can make about animals in the case of humans.

So, I believe that the starting point of this kind of inquiry would be: what is good for a given human being? Considering that humans seem to be 'social animals', i.e. that human beings can't really be in total isolation from other human beings, we might think that, perhaps, relationships with others are essential for the good of a human being. So, how should people relate to each other in a way that it is good for them?

Are cultural differences enough a barrier to prevent us to make some judgments about other cultures? For instance, it seems that it is better for children to be raised by parents who truly love them. This is something that certainly seem to be supported by research in psychology. If we encountered a society that doesn't consider important how parents treat their children, would the difference among our cultures prevent us to say that such a society is simply wrong about this? Are we so hopelessly constrained by our own cultural context that we aren't able to make any judgment about other cultures?

The Count was quick to point this out and I agree. — praxis

:up:

I think human reality is largely shaped by human needs or purposes—and human values. We don’t share the same values however, so if there are objective values, who is right and who is wrong? And what is the purpose of insisting that one set of values is Correct? It provides the means to harness collective power. — praxis

I believe that the best approach here is to carefully examine all proposed 'set of values' with a critical spirit in a similar way one does in science (although the approach can't be the same of course). I happen to believe that, as I said, in the beginning of this post, virtue ethics and the intellectualist model of freedom are right precisely because they make the most sense and not devalue ethics as the mere following of an extrinsic moral code that is estranous, as you put it, to our 'needs or purposes'.

So, I believe that the starting point is to assess and try to find out what what are these 'needs' and 'purposes' are. Clearly some of the 'needs' aren't culturally dependent. It seems that, for instance, all children need genuine love when they are raised. Are we going to argue that this depends on a given culture? Or, instead, we might consider that, say, after reading the brutal effects that being raised in a dysfunctional or even abusive context can have on a person, perhaps we are allowed to say "it is good for children, irrespective of their cultural context, to be raised in a loving environment" as something that might apply to cultural contexts different from our own.

Ok, I watched the video. Nice explanation of how machine learning works.

Still, I am hesitant to see it as an example of emergence of intentionality for two reasons. Take what I say below with a grain of salt, but here's my two cents.

First, these machines, like all others, are still programmed by human beings who decide how they should work. So, there is a risk to read back into the machine the intentionality of human beings who built them. To make a different example, if you consider a mechanical calculator it might seem it 'recognizes' the numbers '2', '3' and the operation of addition and then gives us the output '5' when we ask it to perform the calculation. The machine described in the video is far more complex but the basic idea seems the same.

Secondly, the output the machine gives are the results of statistical calculations. The machine is being given a set of examples of associations of hand-written numbers and the number these hand-written numbers should be. It then manages to perform better with other trials in order to minimize the error function. Ok, interesting, but I'm not sure that we can say that the machine has 'concepts' like what we have. When we read a hand-written number '3' it might be that we associate it to the 'concept of 3' by a Bayesian inference (i.e. the most likely answer to the question: "what is the most likely sign that the writer wrote here?"). But when we are aware of the concept of '3' we do not perceive a 'vector' of different probabilities about different concepts.

This is clearly a bad analogy. Scientific truths are a different category of knowledge than moral truths or values. — praxis

I find interesting that you only quoted this part of my post. You raised the objection that, if all human beings are wrong about 'what is good for them', then 'objectivity' about ethics is impossible. I merely made an example where there has been a context where most people have been wrong.

In any way, I don't believe that one can make such a 'hard distinction' between scientific truths and moral truths. We also learn, at least in part, good and bad behaviour with experience. A coward, for instance, often lives in a tormented state due to their fear. Instead, a generous person might find solace in the acts of helping others and live a more serene life than say someone greedy who lives in either a constant fear of losing one's possessions and/or in a state of disappointment for not having all the desired riches.
I already made the example of the addict. Clearly the addict acts under a self-deception (sometimes mingled with some awareness of behaving against one's own interest) about what is 'good' and might completely ruin his or her life.

These are clearly empirical observations one could make. They perhaps do not tell the whole story about what is 'virtue' and what is 'vice' but nevertheless they are important in a context of virtue ethics. I like virtue ethics because, as I said, seems to me the only ethical framework where ethical behavior never becomes an external imposition.

I still have not find a compelling objection of the apparent objective validity of, say, the statement "an addict, while indulging in the addiction, acts against one's own good".

:vomit: I am sorry, I am strongly opposed to using the God of Abraham religions to understand reality. It stood in the way of science and stopping, or at least slowing down, the destruction of our planet. It continues to stand in the way of science, and this has divided the US. I feel no mercy for those who bring this upon us. — Athena

It seems that you have an aversion against Christianity and apparently other Abrahamic religions. I just say that generalizations are never helpful and I think if you seek enough you'll find that there are very different ideas among Christians on a huge variety of topics.

But note that I wanted to make a general point about virtue ethics which was widely accepted, I believe by many Christians in history. But, in fact, not only Christians but you find the idea in many ancient cultures (e.g. Indian religions, Taoist texts like Daodejing and Zuanghzi and so on).

Clearly, virtue ethics assumes that there is a distinction between 'virtues' and 'vices' and the firsts are 'better' than the seconds for a given person.

The way many humans dealt with this moral conflict was to create a story where the hunted animal agreed to being killed and eaten in exchange for a benefit the humans would provide. However, the Christians have a different relationship with nature that is not so nice. — Athena

Well, I would not say that about all Christians... anyway, I believe that even the most radical vegan would recognize that, in order to live, we have to kill some animals (e.g. the insects that would destroy our crops).

Also, note that Christians actually recognize that this world is not (at least now) 'what is meant to be', so perhaps e.g. the inevitability of conflict with other species would be better understood in that light.
This is not to say that, of course, that many Christians didn't have a 'not so nice' relationship with nature.

In a more general viewpoint, it seems to me right to say that a human being should seek 'what is truly good' for herself or himself. At the same time, it is also obvious that, even within a 'secularist' viewpoint, that (most? all?) human beings often act against their own good, are confused about what is 'better' or 'worse' for them and so on. This is to say that 'virtue ethics' is IMO applicable even within a purely naturalistic view of human beings. In fact, it seems the only view to me that avoids a 'legalistic' reason to consider some intentions, behaviors etc 'right' and others 'wrong'.

We will absolutely misunderstand — even about ourselves — so how can there be objectivity? — praxis

I would say that, yes, it seems that it is inevitable for human beings to misunderstand and act against our own good.

Regardless, I do not see how even if all human beings misunderstood what is 'truly good' for them or even what is 'better for them' and what is 'worse for them', this would falsify the possibility, in principle, of making objective statements about 'what is truly good for human beings' and so on.

There was a time when most people believed that the Earth was the center of the universe and all celestial bodies revolved around the Earth. Yet we know that geocentrism is 'objectively false'. So, it would be not surprising that we might in a condition that we do not know what is truly good for us and nevertheless, in principle, we could know it.

And I do not see a contradiction between what I said above with the claim that philosophy might help us to improve our understanding of 'what is truly good for us' (in general or in a particular situation) etc.

thanks for the video. It seems interesting. I'll share my thoughts tomorrow about it.

No, I'm sure monkeys dislike being eaten.

Monkey consumption is still good or bad relative to the perspective—whether one is the eater or the eaten. — praxis

This doesn't imply that "for a monkey it is bad being eaten" is 'relative'. At best, it might show that the what is good for the tiger is bad for the monkey and this leads to conflict between the two animals.

That "the same event might be good for a being and bad for another" hardly implies that "there are no objective statements about what is good for a given being". Indeed, even this 'relativistic statement' ( i.e. "the same event might be good for a being and bad for another") seems to be a truth that is independent for any given perspective on the matter.

At the human level there are situations that seem ambiguous but some seem obvious. For instance, indulging in a drug addiction seems good to the addict because of the pleasant feelings the consumption of a given substance might give. But when compared to the painful consequences the addiction bring, it seems to me clear that the addict acts under a deception about 'what is truly goodfor him/her'. And this isn't true only 'for me' but also for the addict himself/herself.

In a 'virtue ethics' framework what is sought is what is truly good for a human being and the reasonable assumption that is made is that a human being might misunderstand 'what is truly good for him or her'.

I would not buy that suggestion. More probably the intentionality emerges from whatever process is used to implement it. I can think of countless emergent properties, not one of which suggest that the properties need to be fundamental. — noAxioms

Ok. But if there is an 'emergence', it must be an intelligible process. The problem for 'emergentism' is that there doesn't seem any convincing explanation of how intentionality, consciousness and so on 'emerge' from something that does not have those properties.

As I said before, that we have yet to find a credible explanation for such an emergence is an evidence against emergentism. Of course, such an absence of an explanation isn't a compelling evidence for the impossibility of an explanation.

Anyway, I also would point out that IMO most forms of physicalism have a difficulty in explaining that composite objects can be 'distinct entities'.

Thus illustrating my point about language. 'Intentional' is reserved for life forms, so if something not living does the exact same thing, a different word (never provided) must be used, or it must be living, thus proving that the inanimate thing cannot do the thing that it's doing (My example was 'accelerating downward' in my prior post). — noAxioms

Ok, thanks for the clarification. But note my point above.

boundless: Ok, but if intentionality is fundamental, then the arising of intentionality is unexplained. — noAxioms

I misphrased this. I meant: if intentionality is fundamental then there is no need for an explanation.

That would make time more fundamental, a contradiction. X just is, and everything else follows from whatever is fundamental. And no, I don't consider time to be fundamental. — noAxioms

Right, but there is also the possibility that ontological dependency doesn't involve a temporary relation. That is, you might say that intentionality isn't fundamental but it is dependent on something else that hasn't intentionality and yet there have not been a time where intentionality didn't exist (I do not see a contradiction in thinking that, at least).

As an illustration, consider the stability of a top floor in a building. It clearly depends on the firmness of the foundations of the builing and yet we don't that 'at a certain point' the upper floor 'came out' from the lower.

So, yeah, arising might be a wrong word. Let's go with 'dependence'.

Again, why? There's plenty that's currently unexplained. Stellar dynamics I think was my example. For a long time, people didn't know stars were even suns. Does that lack of even that explanation make stars (and hundreds of other things) fundamental? What's wrong with just not knowing everything yet? — noAxioms

I hope I have clarified my point above. But let's use this example. Stellar dynamics isn't fundamental because it can be explained in terms of more fundamental processes. Will we discover something similar for intentionality, consciousness and so on? Who knows. Maybe yes. But currently it seems to me that our 'physicalist' models can't do that. In virtue of what properties might intentionality, consciousness and so on 'emerge'?

That's what it means to be true even if the universe didn't exist. — noAxioms

Good, we agree on this. But if they are 'true' even if the universe or multiverse didn't exist, this means that they have a different ontological status. And, in fact, if the multiverse could not exist, this would mean that it is contingent. Mathematical truths, instead, we seem to agree are not contingent.
Given that they aren't contingent, they can't certainly depend on something that is contingent. So, they transcend the multiverse (they would be 'super-natural').

Maybe putting in intelligibility as a requirement for existence isn't such a great idea. Of course that depends on one's definition of 'to exist'. There are definitely some definitions where intelligibility would be needed. — noAxioms

If the physical world wasn't intelligible, then it seems to me that even doing science would be problematic. Indeed, scientific research seems to assume that the physical world is intelligible.

It might be problematic to assume that the physical world is fully intelligible for us, but intelligibility seems to be required for any type of investigation.

A made-up story. Not fiction (Sherlock Holmes say), just something that's wrong. Hard to give an example since one could always presume the posited thing is not wrong. — noAxioms

Ok. I would call these things simply 'wrong explanations' or 'inconsistent explanations' rather than 'super-natural', which seems to me to be better suited for speaking about something that transcends the 'natural' (if there is anything that does do that... IMO mathematical truths for instance do transcend the natural).

Again, why is the explanation necessary? What's wrong with just not knowing everything? Demonstrating the thing in question to be impossible is another story. That's a falsification, and that carries weight. So can you demonstrate than no inanimate thing can intend? Without 'proof by dictionary'? — noAxioms

TBH, I thing that right now the 'virdict' is still open. There is no evidence 'beyond reasonable doubt' to either position about consciousness that can satisfy almost everyone. We can discuss about what position seems 'more reasonable' but we do not have 'convincing evidences'.

That does not sound like any sort of summary of my view, which has no requirement of being alive in order to do something that a living thing might do, such as fall off a cliff. — noAxioms

OK, I stand corrected. Would you describe your position as 'emergentist' then?

But the problem being difficult is not evidence against consciousness being derived from inanimate primitives. — noAxioms

Chalmers et al suggest that the reason why the problem is 'difficult' it is because it is wrongly stated, i.e. the assumption that we can 'get' consciousness from inanimate primitives is wrong. Of course, the absence of a solution is not a compelling evidence of the impossibility of finding one but the latter is a possible explanation of the former.

Probably because anything designed is waved away as not intentionality. I mean, a steam engine self-regulates, all without a brain, but the simple gravity-dependent device that accomplishes it is designed, so of course it doesn't count. — noAxioms

If there is intentionality in something like a steam-engine, this would suggest that intentionality is also fundamental - in other words, the inanimate would not be really totally inanimate. But the problem arises in views were intentionality isn't seen as fundamental but derived from something else that seems to be completely different.

Completely wrong. Fundamentals don't first expect explanations. Explanations are for the things understood, and the things not yet understood still function despite lack of this explanation. Things fell down despite lack of explanation for billions of years. Newton explained it, and Einstein did so quite differently, but things falling down did so without ever expectation of that explanation. — noAxioms

Ok, but if intentionality is fundamental, then the arising of intentionality, assuming that it arose, is unexplained. Conversely, if intentionality is derived, we expect an explanation of how it is derived.
Same goes for 'consciousness' and so on.

Depends on your definition of consciousness. Some automatically define it to be a supernatural thing, meaning monism is a denial of its existence. I don't define it that way, so I'm inclined to agree with your statement. — noAxioms

TBF, I also am a bit perplexed on how some non-physicalists define consciousness. But also note that, for instance, the 'Aristotelian' view, which was later accepted and developed in most philosophical traditions from late Antiquity onwards (Neoplatonic, Christian, Islamic...) of the 'soul' is that the 'soul' is the form of the body and that the 'sentient being' (animals and humans) are actually both body and soul, i.e. matter and form. In this view, we are not composed of two substances ('material' and 'mental') but, rather, the Arisotelian model ('hylomorphism') explains a 'human being' as an ordered entity where the 'soul' is the order that makes the entity ordered. Furthermore, IIRC, there isn't such a thing like 'pure matter' because 'pure matter' would be completely unordered and, therefore, unintelligible.
I don't think that, say, the common arguments against the existence of a 'soul', a 'unified self' and so on that sometimes are advanced by some 'physicalists' can affects these views.

Since I am more or less an 'hylomorphist', TBH I see much of the debate about 'consciousness' as simply not relevant for me.

Anything part of our particular universe. Where you draw the boundary of 'our universe' is context dependent, but in general, anything part of the general quantum structure of which our spacetime is a part. So it includes say some worlds with 2 macroscopic spatial dimensions, but it doesn't include Conway's game of life. — noAxioms

Ok. I am even prepared to say that if there is really a multiverse with all possible 'worlds' with different laws, to equate the 'natural' to 'pertaining to the whole multiverse'.
So I guess that for me 'natural' includes also Conway's game of life :wink:

Good, but being the idiot skeptic that I am, I've always had an itch about that one. What if 2+2=4 is a property of some universes (this one included), but is not objectively the case? How might we entertain that? How do you demonstrate that it isn't such a property? Regardless, if any progress is to be made, I'm willing to accept the objectivity of mathematics. — noAxioms

Being the 'speculative fool' I am, I would say that given that intelligibility seems a precondition of the existence of the multiverse, this would mean that either (i) the multiverse is fundamental and, therefore, its existence is not contingent and intelligibility (and as a consequence all mathematical truths) is an aspect of the multiverse or (ii) the multiverse is contingent whereas mathematical truths are not and, therefore, they exist in something 'transcendent' of the multiverse (I prefer this second option). TBH, however, it would be quite a strange physicalism IMO that accepts the multiverse as being ontologicall non-contingent (i.e. necessary!) - it would become something like pantheism/pandeism* of sorts (i.e. a view that asserts that the multiverse is a kind of metaphysical Absolute). But positing metaphysical absolutes seems to go against what many people find in physicalism. So, it would be ironic IMO for a physicalist to end up holding the idea that the multiverse itself is a metaphysical absolute after having accepted physicalism precisely to avoid accepting a metaphysical absolute.

[*It is important to distinguish this from panentheistic views were the Absolute pervades but at the same time transcends the multiverse. ]

I didn't say otherwise, so not sure how that's different. That's what it means to be independent of our universe. — noAxioms

:up: Do you think that they are independent from the multiverse?

By definition, no? — noAxioms

Yes and no. For instance, I can't give a purely 'natural' explanation of how we can know and understand mathematical truths if I say they aren't 'natural'. If mathematical truths aren't natural, and our mind can understand something that isn't natural, then the 'natural' can't wholly explain our minds.

However, it should be noted that, in my view, even a pebble can't be explained in fully 'naturalistic' terms. Being (at least partially) intelligible, and being IMO the conditions for intelligibility of any entity prior to the 'natural', even a pebble, in a sense, is not fully 'explained' in purely 'naturalistic' terms.
So, yeah, at the end of the day, I find, paradoxically, even the simplest thing as mysterious as our minds.

OK, but that doesn't give meaning to the term. If the ghosts reported are real, then they're part of this universe, and automatically 'natural'. What would be an example of 'supernatural' then? It becomes just something that one doesn't agree with. I don't believe in ghosts, so they're supernatural. You perhaps believe in them, so they must be natural. Maybe it's pointless to even label things with that term. — noAxioms

See above.

Depends on what you mean by 'inanimate'.
... — noAxioms

I sort of agree with that.

I believe, however, that it is easier to discuss about intentionality rather than consciousness.

If intentionality exists only in *some* physical bodies, and we have to explain how it arose, we expect that, in principle, we can explain how it arose in the same way as we can explain other emergent features, i.e. in virtue of other properties that are present in the 'inanimate'. The thing is that I never encountered a convincing explanation of that kind nor I found convincing arguments that have convinced me that such an explanation is possible.

Your own view, for instance, seems to me to redefine the 'inanimate' as something that is actually not 'truly inanimate' and this allows you to say that, perhaps, the intentionality we have is a more complex form of the 'proto(?)-intentionality' that perhaps is found in inanimate objects. This is for me a form panpsychism rather than a 'true' physicalism.

At the end of the day, I guess that labels are just labels and you actually would be ready to accept what I would consider something that isn't physicalism as a form of physicalism. The same goes for what you say about mathematics. This is not a criticism of you but I want to point out that your own 'physicalism' is, in my opinion, a more sophisticated view of what I would normally call 'physicalism'. So, perhaps some confusion in these debates is caused by the fact that we - both the two of us and 'people' in general - do not have a shared vocabulary and use the words differently.

Probably not, but I'd need an example of the latter, one that doesn't involve anything physical. — noAxioms

I meant logical implications. I can, for instance, make a formally valid statement without any reference to something 'real'.

In a similar way, I believe that one can also make a similar point about the 'living beings' in general. All living beings seem to me to show a degree of intentionality (goal-directed behaviours, self-organization) that is simply not present in 'non-living things'. So in virtue of what properties of 'non-living things' can intentionality that seems to be present in all life forms arise? — boundless

Also, I would add that the apparent 'gradation' of 'intentionality' found in 'entities' at the border of being 'living' and 'non-living' like viruses isn't really evidence for a 'reductionist' view. After all, if viruses have a rudimentary form of intentionality it has still to be explained.

That's a false dichotomy. Something can be all three (living, artificial, and/or intelligent), none, or any one or two of them. — noAxioms

I was making a point about the current AI and living beings. In any case, until one can find a way to generate truly artificial life, there is no 'artificial life'. But in my post, I was even conceding the possibility of sentient AI.

I can't even answer that about living things. I imagine the machines will find their own way of doing it and not let humans attempt to tell them how. That's how it's always worked. — noAxioms

That's the hard problem though. The problem is how to explain consciousness in terms of properties of the 'inanimate'. So, yeah, probably the 'hard problem' isn't a 'problem' for 'physicalism' but of all attempts to treat the 'inanimate' as fundamental and 'consciousness' as derivative from it.

In a similar way, I believe that one can also make a similar point about the 'living beings' in general. All living beings seem to me to show a degree of intentionality (goal-directed behaviours, self-organization) that is simply not present in 'non-living things'. So in virtue of what properties of 'non-living things' can intentionality that seems to be present in all life forms arise?

Note that in order to solve both these problems you would need a theory that explain how consciousness, intentionality, life etc arose. If the 'inanimate' is fundamental, you should expect to find an explanation on how consciousness, intentionality, life and so on came into being, not just that they come into being. And the explanation must be complete.

Beyond materialism you perhaps mean. Physicalism/naturalism doesn't assert that all is physical/natural. — noAxioms

? Not sure how. At least physicalism means that the 'natural' is fundamental. In any case, however, with regards to consciousness, consciousness in a physicalist model would be considered natural. And something like math either an useful fiction or a fundamental aspect of nature (in this latter case, I believe that it would be inappropriate to call such a view 'physicalism', but anyway...)

Of course I wouldn't list mathematics as being 'something else', but rather a foundation for our physical. But that's just me. Physicalism itself makes no such suggestion. — noAxioms

Interesting. I do in fact agree with you here. However, I believe that your conception of 'physical/natural' is too broad. What isn't natural in your view?

PS: Never say 'undeniable'. There's plenty that deny that mathematical truths are something that 'exists'. My personal opinion is that such truths exist no less than does our universe, but indeed is in no way dependent on our universe. — noAxioms

Right, I admit that there is no conseus and perhaps the majority view is that mathematics is just an useful abstraction. To be honest, however, I always found the arguments for that view unpersuasive and often based on a strictly empiricist view of knowledge. I believe it is one of those topics where both 'parties' (I mean the 'realist' and the 'anti-realist' about the ontology of mathematics in a broad sense of these terms) are unable to find a common ground with the opponents.

I agree with you about the fact that mathematics doesn't depend on the universe. I have a different view about the relation between mathematics and the universe. For instance, I believe that mathematical truths would still be true even if the universe didn't exist. I do see this universe as contingent whereas mathematical truths as non-contingent.

Let's reword that as not being a function of something understandable.
... — noAxioms

It seems to me that you here are assuming that all possible 'non-magical' explanations are 'natural/physical' one. This seems to me a stretch.

I also don't like to make the distinction between 'supernatural' and 'natural', unless one defines the terms in a precise way. Perhaps, I would define 'natural' as 'pertaining to spacetime' (so, both spacetime - or spacetimes if there is a multiverse - and whatever is 'in' it would qualify as 'natural').

Regarding the point you make about Chalmers, as I said before perhaps the 'hard problem' is better framed as an objection to all reductionist understanding of consciosuness that try to reduce it to the inanimate rather than an objection to 'physicalism' in a broad sense of the term.

That's mathematics, not physics, even if the nouns in those statements happen to have physical meaning. They could be replaced by X Y Z and the logical meaning would stand unaltered. — noAxioms

Yes, we can also make a purely formal syllogism. But that's my point, after all. Why the 'laws' of valid reasoning can apply to 'reality'? If mathematical and logical 'laws' aren't at least a fundamental aspect of nature (or, even more fundamental than nature), how could we even accept whatever 'explanation' as a 'valid explanation' of anything? Also: is physical causality the same as logical causality?

I believe that people who deny the independent existence of 'mathematical' and 'logical' truths/laws assert that our notion of logical implication, numbers etc are abstractions from our experience. The problem, though, is that if you try to explain how we could 'generate' these abstractions, you need to assume these laws are valid in order to make that explanation. This to me shows that logical and mathematical truths/laws are not mere abstractions. But to be honest even if I find such a brief argument convincing of this, I admit that many would not be convinced by this argument. Why this is so, I do not know...

Regarding the distinction between 'living beings' and AI, I believe that @Joshs did a very good job in explaining (much clearer than I could) why I also think why there is a real distinction between them.

Anyway, even if I granted to you that in the future we might be able to build a 'sentient articial intelligence', I believe that the 'hard problem' would remain. In virtue of what properties of the inanimate aspects of reality can consciousness (with its 'first-person perspective', 'qualia' etc) arise?

And even it is unrelated to the 'hard problem', I think that the undeniable existence of mathematical truths also points to something beyond 'physicalism'*. That there are an infinite number of primes seems to be something that is independent from human knowledge and also spatio-temporal location. In fact, it seems utterly independent from spacetime.

*TBH, there is always the problem of what one means by 'physicalism'. I mean, I do not see how, for instance, 'panpsychism' is inconsistent to a very broad definition of 'physicalism' in which "what is spatio-temporal" includes everything that is real.
As I said before, however, I believe we can know something that cannot be included in a meaningful way in the category of the 'physcial'.

Regarding the 'magic' thing, then, it seems to me that the criterion you give about 'not being magical' is something like being 'totally understandable', something that is not too dissimilar to the ancient notion of 'intelligibility'. That is, if one has a 'fuzzy explantion' of a given phenomenon where something is left unexplained, the explanation is magical. If that is so, however, it seems to me that you assume that the 'laws of thought' and the 'laws of nature' are so close to each other than one has to ask how is it possible in purely physicalist terms?
Physical causality doesn't seem to explain, say, logical implication. It doesn't seem possible IMO to explain in purely physical terms why from "Socrates is a man" and "men are mortal" that "Socrates is mortal". If 'physical reality' is so intelligible as you think it is, it seems to me that your own view is actually not very far from, ironically, to positing an ontologically fundamental 'mental' aspect to reality.

I am not saying you are wrong here. I actually find a lot to agree here but, curiously, intelligibility suggests to me that there is a fundamental mental aspect to reality whereas if I am not misunderstading you, you seem to think that intelligibility actually is a strong evidence for physicalism. Interesting.

t means that all energy and particles and whatnot obey physical law, which yes, pretty much describes relations. That's circular, and thus poor. It asserts that this description is closed, not interfered with by entities not considered physical. That's also a weak statement since if it was ever shown that matter had mental properties, those properties would become natural properties, and thus part of physicalism.So I guess 'things interact according to the standard model' is about as close as I can get. This whole first/third person thing seems a classical problem, not requiring anything fancy like quantum or relativity theory, even if say chemistry would never work without the underlying mechanisms. A classical simulation of a neural network (with chemistry) would be enough. No need to simulate down to the molecular or even quantum precision. — noAxioms

Ok for the definition! Yes, and GR seems to imply that both spacetime and 'what is inside of it' are 'physical/natural'. i disagree with your view that mathematical truths are 'natural', though. They seem to be independent of space and time. That our minds are not 'natural' (in this broad sense) is perhaps more controversial. But the fact that we can know mathematical truths is quite interesting if we are 'wholly natural' (I do not know...). It seems to me that however it is better to reframe the 'hard problem' in a different way: can consciousness arise from what is completely inanimate?

The confidence you have in the power of algorithms seems to arise from anunderlying assumption that every natural process is 'algorithmic'. Of course, I am not denying the enormous success of algorithmic models and simulations but I am not sure that they can ever be able to give us a completely accurate model/simulation of all processes.

I admit that I can't give you a scientific argument against your assumption. But for me my phenomenological experience strongly suggests otherwise (self-awareness, the ability to choose and so on do not seem to be easily explainable in terms of algorithms).

OK. Not being a realist, I would query what you might mean by that. I suspect (proof would be nice) that mathematical truths are objectively true, and the structure that includes our universe supervenes on those truths. It being true implying that it's real depends on one's definition of 'real', and I find it easier not to worry about that arbitrary designation. — noAxioms

I lean towards a form of platonism where mathematical truths are concepts and yet are timeless and indipendent of space. it seems the only position that makes sense considering the following: the fact that we know them as concepts, the incredible success that mathematical laws have in describing the behaviour of physical processes, the apparently evident 'eternity' of mathematical truths (that there are infinite prime numbers seems to me indipendent from any human discovery of such a fact for instance) and so on.

Of course, I am under no illusion that I can give an absolutely convincing argument of my view (as often happens in philosophy) but it seems to me the best view after weighing the aguments in favour and against it.

Me considering that to be a process of material that has a location, it seems reasonably contained thus, yes. Not a point mind you, but similarly a rock occupies a region of space and time. — noAxioms

Ok. In a general sense, yeah I perhaps can agree with you that mind is natural or even 'physical'. But it has quite peculiar attributes that it is difficult to explain as arising from 'inanimate' matter. And, as I said before, it seems to have the capacity to understand/know 'something' that is not 'natural'.

By magic, I mean an explanation that just says something unknown accounts for the observation, never an actual theory about how this alternate explanation might work. To my knowledge, there is no theory anywhere of matter having mental properties, and how it interacts with physical matter in any way. The lack of that is what puts it in the magic category. — noAxioms

Ok, I see. But consider that under this definition you risk to include inside 'magic' many partial or unclear explanations that I would not include into that word. In other words, your category of 'magic' seems excessively broad.

For instance, if we were talking in the 14th century and you claimed that 'atoms' exist and 'somehow' interact with forces that we do not know to form the visible objects, would be this 'magic' (of course, you have to imagine yourself as having the scientific knowledge of the time)?

I can argue that people also are this, programmed by ancestors and the natural selection that chose them. The best thinking machines use similar mechanisms to find their own best algorithms, not any algorithm the programmer put there. LLM is indeed not an example of this. — noAxioms

Am I wrong to say that, however, that the operations of these 'thinking machines' are completely explainable in terms of algorithms?
As I said in my previous post, I can't neglect the fact that my own self-awareness, the experience of self-agency and so on seem to point that we are not like that.

And you don't think we do? Our brains are bundles of neurons which all work in very similar ways. You could easily make an argument that we operate in accordance with some very basic kind or family of algorithms recapitulated in many different ways across the brain. — Apustimelogist

No, I don't and you don't here provided sufficient evidence to convince me of your view. Rather, it seems to me that, given the impressive results we have obtained with computers you are concluding that our congition is also algorithmic.

I believe that there is a difference between conscious - and in general living - beings and algorithmic devices. All living beings seem to have a 'sense' of unity, that there is a distinction between 'self' and 'not self' and so on. They do not just 'do' things.

Regardless, I don't think there is any consensus on this topic among scientists. So, after all in a way both our positions are speculative.

As can a human brain. — Apustimelogist

Says you. To me there is a clear difference between how human cognition works and how, say, a mechanical calculator works. And I am open to the idea that, perhaps, our cognition can't even be wholly comprehended by mathematical models, let alone only algorithms.

:up: yeah, I often compare computers to highly sofisticated mechanical calculators. At the end of the day all LLMs are very complex computers and they operate according to algorithms (programmed by us) just like mechanical calculators.

I don't think that many people would think that mechanical calculators or a windmill or mechanical clocks etc have 'awareness' or 'agency'. And computers just like them perform operations without being agents.

In order to have consciousness, computers IMO would have to be aware of what they are doing. There is no evidence that have such of an awareness. All their activities can be explained by saying that they just do what they are programmed for.

That bothers me since it contradicts physicalism since there can be physical things that cannot be known, even in principle. Science cannot render to a non-bat, even in principle, what it's like to be a bat. So I would prefer a different definition. — noAxioms

OK. So what is 'physical' in your view? IIRC you also agree that physical properties are relational, i.e. they describe how a given physical object relate to/interact with other physical objects.
'Scientistic physicalism' is also inconsistent IMO because, after all, that there is a physical world is not something we discover by doing science.

Other than 'consciousness' I also believe in the existence of other things that are 'real' but not 'physical'. I am thinking, for instance, of mathematical truths. But this is perhaps OT.

Materialism typically carries a premise that material is fundamental, hence my reluctance to use the term. — noAxioms

Ok, yes. But it does sometimes clarify at least a meaning that 'physical' can have. For instance, if by matter one means "whatever object exists in a given location of space in a given time", would you agree that this is also what you mean by 'physical'? Note that this would also include radiation not just 'matter' as the word is used by physicists.

Has consciousness a 'definite location' in space, for instance?

People have also questioned about how eyes came into being, as perhaps an argument for ID. ID, like dualism, posits magic for the gaps, but different magic, where 'magic is anything outside of naturalism. Problem is, anytime some new magic is accepted, it becomes by definition part of naturalism. Hypnosis is about as good an example as I can come up with. Meteorites is another. Science for a long time rejected the possibility of rocks falling from the sky. They're part of naturalism now. — noAxioms

OK. But IMHO you're thinking in excessively rigid categories. Either one is a 'physicalist/naturalist' or one accepts 'magic'. Maybe there is something that is not 'natural'. Again, mathematical truths seem to me exactly an example of something that is not natural and yet real. One would stretch too much the meaning of 'natural/physical' to also include mathematical truths in it.

So, I guess that my response here can be summarized in one question for you: what do you mean by 'physical' (or 'natural') and why you think that consciousness is 'physical'?

Agree. — noAxioms

:up:

While (almost?) everybody agrees that such knowledge cannot be had by any means, I don't think that makes it an actual problem. Certainly nobody has a solution that yields that knowledge. If it (Q1) is declared to be a problem, then nobody claims that any view would solve it. — noAxioms

Ok but notice that in most forms of physicalism that I am aware of, there is a tendency to reduce all reality to the 'physical' and the 'physical' is taken to mean "what can be know, in principle, by science" (IIRC in another discussion we preferred 'materialism' to denote such views).
If your metaphysical model denies such an assumption then, yes, my objection is questionable.

Still, however, I believe that any view in which 'consciousness' emerges from something else has a conceptual gap in explaining how consciousness 'came into being' in the first place. It seems that knowing how 'something' came into being gives us a lot information about the nature of that 'something' and if we knew the nature of consciosuness then it would be also possible to understand how to answer Q3.
Notice that this point applies to all views in which 'consciousness' is seen as ontologically dependent on something else, not just to physicalist views.

Not sure about that. One can put on one of those neuralink hats and your thoughts become public to a point. The privateness is frequently a property of, but not a necessity of consciousness. — noAxioms

The content of my thoughts perhaps can become public. But my experience of thinking those thoughts remains private. For instance, if I know that you are thinking about your favourite meal and that this thought provokes pleasant feelings to you doesn't imply that I can know how you experience these things.

My neurons are not interconnected with your neurons, so what experience the activity of your neurons results in for you is not something neurally accessible within my brain. Thus privacy. What am I missing? — wonderer1

'Privacy' perhaps isn't the right word. There is a difference in the way we have access to the content of my experiece even if you knew what I am experiencing right now. That 'difference' is, indeed, the 'privacy' I am thinking about.

And here is the thing. While scientific knowledge seems about the relations between physical objects - and, ultimately, it is about what we (individually and collectively) have known via empirical means about physical objects... so, how physical objects relate to us (individually and collectively*) - 'subjective experience' doesn't seem to be about a relation between different objects. And, also, it seems to be what makes empirical knowledge possible in the first place.

*This doesn't imply IMO a 'relativism' or an 'anti-realism'. It is simply an acknowledgment that all empirical knowledge ultimately is based on interactions and this means that, perhaps, we can never have a 'full knowledge' of a given object. Something about them remains inaccessible to us if we can't detect it.

Even if one assumes that physicalism is right, you need to explain how it is so. Generally, physicalists assume that the 'physical' is what can be, in principle, known by science.

And here we have the problem. All what we know via science can be known by any subject, not a particular one. However, 'experience(s)' have a degree of 'privateness' that has no analogy in whatever physical property we can think of.

I believe that the problem of 'physicalist' answers to the 'hard problem' is that they either try to make 'consciousness' a fiction (because nothing is truly 'private' for them) or that they subtly extend the neaning of 'physical' to include something that is commonly referred to as 'mental'. This unfortunately equivocates the language used and makes such a 'physicalism' questionable (IIRC this is referred to as Hempel's dilemma among comtemporary philosophers of mind).


As I said in my previous post, however, the 'hard problem' IMO is a part of a more general problem of all views that reduce entities to how they relate to other entites, i.e. a denial that entities are more than their relations. For instance, we can know that an electron *has a given value of mass* because it responds in a given way to a given context, but at the same time, it is debatable that our scientific knowledge gives us a complete knowledge of *what an electron is*.

In a way, the 'hard problem' is IMO a form of a more general problem that arises when it is assumed that one can have a complete knowledge of anything by purely empirical means.

For instance, even when we consider what physics tells us of, say, an electron we have information on how the electron behaves and interact with other particles. Even the 'mass of an electron' IMO can be understood in a way that makes the concept pure relational, i.e. how the electron 'responds' to certain conditions.

The very fact that we can a very deep knowledge of the relations between entities and maybe we can know only relations (epistemic relationalism) doesn't imply that the entites are reduced to their relations (ontological relationism). So, perhaps we can't know by empirical means an 'entity in itself'.

In the case of consciousness, there is the direct experience of 'privateness' of one's own experience that instead seems a 'undeniable fact' common to all instances of subjective experiences. Its presence doesn't seem to depend on the content of a given experience, but this 'privateness' seems a precondition to any experience. So, at least from a phenomenological point of view it seems that there is a quality of our own experience that is immediately given and not known by analyzing the contents of experience (as empirical knowledge is acquired). This means that while empirical knowledge can be described in a 'third person perspective' the privateness can only be taken into account in a first person perspective.

I believe that d'Espagnat brillantly explains how we can understand an epistemic interpretation of QM (and how such an interpretation is compatible, in principle, with a 'realist' philosophical view)

Even within a classical, mechanicistic, approach a rainbow, obviously, may not be considered an object-per-se. For, indeed, if we move, it moves. Two different located persons do not see having its bases at the same places. It is therefore manifest that it depends, in part, on us.
...
But still, even though the rainbow depends on us, it does not depend exclusively on us. For it to appear it is necessary that the Sun should shine and that the raindrops should be there. Now similar features also characterize quantum mechanically described object, that is, after all - assuming quantum mechanics to be universal - any object whatsoever. For they also are not 'objects-per-se'. The attributes, or 'dynamical aproperties,' we see them to posses depend in fact on our 'look' at them (on the instruments we make use of and on how we arrange them).
...
And lastly, at least according to the veiled reality conception, even though these micro and macro objects depend on us they (just as rainbows) do not depend exclusively un us. Their existence (as ours) proceeds from that of 'the Real.' — Bernard d'Espagnat, On Physics and Philosophy, p. 348

Soon later:

When N observers are scattered in the fields, each one of them sees the rainbow at a specific place, different from the ones where the others see it. In fact, under these conditions speaking of one and the same rainbow seems improper. It is quite definitely more correct to state that there are N of them, and that each observer sees his own 'private' rainbow. But then, if N=0 there is no rainbow. ... If nobody were there, there would simply be no rainbow. — ibid., p. 349

As d'Espagnat himself says, of course, all analogies are limited and we know the physical causes that are necessary for a rainbow to appear. But suppose we didn't have any possibility to know about the sunlight and the raindrops. What we would know would only be the rainbows, not what is 'beyond' them.
In a similar way, in an epistemic interpretation of QM, the mathematics of QM isn't descriptive. It is more like an alogirthm that allows us to make probabilistic predictions of what we would observer once we assumed certain things. But, according to epistemic interpretations of QM, we have no description of of what is beyond the 'observed phenomena'. Does this mean that 'what is beyond' is impossible, in principle, to describe? No but we are not in the position to know.

D'Espagnat himself, in any case, in his book makes it quite clear that he thinks that there is some reality beyond phenomena but such a reality is 'veiled' and we can't know 'how is it'. It is reasonable, however, to suppose, considering the regularities of phenomena, that such a reality has some structural affinity to the 'empirical reality' that we observe. But of course, we can't 'prove' it. So, in a sense, this is speculative.

I do not deny that the interaction ends the isolation of the system. But such loss of isolation doesn't remove superposition. So, my question is: in your view, what about the other outcomes?

I do not think that anyone is proposing an ontological difference between the device and the system. Both are physical/natural.

But this is exactly the point. In standard quantum mechanics you have to point out at which point you get a definite result from a superposition of states. The problem is that if you treat both the device and the system in the same way you cannot avoid superposition. In fact, what you get is an 'entanglement' of the device and the system which leaves the total system 'device+system' in superposition.

This does give you the appearance of collapse but if you take QM literally all outcomes are real (despite the fact that it appears that only one is real). So you end up with something like MWI (many worlds interpretation).

If you do not want to go that route, you either adopt other 'realist' interpretations or you adopt an epistemic one, where the 'collapse' is simply a way to describe the change of knowlege/degree of belief of an agent after a measurement. These views do not say that mind creates reality but they recognize that we have a limitation in our ability to know the physical world. 'How the workd is' independent of any observation is not knowable.

Sure - as I already said, it’s a product of our design. In other words whatever ‘mentality’ it possesses is ours. — Wayfarer

I always wondered why people seem to miss this point. Experimental devices, computers and so on aren't different from, say, a mechanical calculator.

A mechanical calculator is 'able' to perform calculations but it doesn't 'interpret' its own operations as calculations. We, however, are able to do that. Experimental devices and computers are not really different from mechanical calculators. There is nothing ontologically special about them that would make them different from any other 'inanimate' object.

So if one accepts the idea of a true 'collapse' of the wavefunction IMO the only options are that either all physical interactions cause it (as in Rovelli's relational quantum mechanics) or that it is a purely epistemic process. Such interpretations are, in fact, more like statements on the limitations of our knowledge.

To borrow a statement of Wittgenstein's Tractatus out of context (I sort of like to do that... I believe that Wittgenstein's Tractatus is a flawed masterpiece that can be used to clarify many concepts unrelated to its own purpose) epistemic interpretations of QM try to do something like this:

What can be said at all can be said clearly; and whereof one cannot speak thereof one must be silent. — Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, preface

(source)

Of course it is debatable that the epistemic interpretations are right but I believe that their aim is this.

Yeah, the argument is, empirical knowledge is required to prove logical or mathematical knowledge. But that doesn’t mean empirical and mathematical knowledge are the same. One must be an epistemological dualist to grant that distinction. — Mww

Well, I agree with Kant that knowledge in mathematics and logic is 'a priori'. In fact, I would even say that some knowledge of those domains is a precondition for any kind of rational knowledge. To make an example, we could not be able to know that there are 'three apples' on the table if we didn't have a concept of 'three'.
Regarding mathematics and logic I believe that my view falls in between Kant's and Plato's, if the 'Neoplatonic' interpretation about the latter is wrong, i.e. mathematics and logic study of the structure of thought but, unlike Kant, I believe that, ultimately, their timeless truths are grounded in an 'infinite Mind'. So, I am closer to the Neoplatonic or 'Theistic' view about mathematics and logic.

I suspect that’s true no matter which philosophical regimen one favors. Whether phenomena represent that which is external to us, or phenomena represent constructs of our intellect within us, we cannot say they are unconditioned, which relies on endless…..you know, like….boundless…..cause and effect prohibiting complete knowledge of them. — Mww

Agreed. I also believe this kind of thinking also perhaps inspired mystical experiences. In a certain way, seeing that anything finite seem in some way to have an 'infinite depth' seems something like a 'perennial truth', so to speak. It is compatible basically with any metaphysical position.