Jude the Obscure
by Thomas Hardy

The Sociology of Knowledge: Toward a Deeper Understanding of the History of Ideas
by Werner Stark

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It is only through the conversation of man with man that ideas come into existence. Two human beings are as necessary for the generation of the human mind as they are for the human body
~Feuerbach

Interesting introductory quote; I'd agree with this: Consciousness is essentially interactive.

Sounds plausible. I'm just reading Michio Kaku's The Future of the Mind and he touches on the issue of thought and the quantum realm. I'm a pantheistic neutral monist; I think thought is ubiquitous.

Civilization and Its Discontents by Sigmund Freud — Maw

A classic. Enjoy.

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My favourite overall sci-fi.

The Forever War
by Joe Haldeman

Conceptual Issues in Psychology
by Elizabeth R. Valentine

The Future of the Mind: The Scientific Quest to Understand, Enhance, and Empower the Mind
by Michio Kaku

Unlike you, I got bumped a grade ahead due to high iq (and general academic performance). Worse thing that could have happened to me. I think evaluating people in different functional areas in order to provide feedback for remediation makes more sense than trying to assign a number to intelligence.

Discipline & Punish
by Michel Foucault

Dennett often utilizes language in a conflationary sense. Here, he's not saying so much that consciousness doesn't exist, as that it does exist, but has the nature of an illusion. But the whole concept of illusion makes sense only with respect to subjective experience. So he's trying to sneak consciousness in by the back door, in order to dismiss it. Consider this excerpt from Foucault, on the inherent reality of the illusive:

Insofar as it is of the essence of the image to be taken for reality, it is reciprocally characteristic of reality that it can mimic the image....If illusion can appear as true as perception, perception in its turn can become the visible, unchallengeable truth of illusion. (Madness & Civilization)

Illusions are real only insofar as they are perceived. An atmospheric condition in the desert only becomes a mirage when it is seen. So if consciousness is in some sense illusory, it is also the reality which substantiates the illusion.

It's a descriptive knowledge that allows no force or value to descriptions of subjective experience.

I am thinking about the nature of human consciousness. I am wondering how others understand Dennett's outlook and also about the connection between human consciousness and language in culture. In many ways this does go into the field of anthropological consideration. I am also rereading Julian Jaynes' ideas about the connection between language emerging from images in the development of consciousness. However, I will end this here, and I am interested to know your understanding of the relationship between language, consciousness and culture. — Jack Cummins

I have always "answered" Dennett in my mind to the effect that he must have a completely different experience of what it means to be conscious than me. If Dennett chooses to argue that he isn't conscious in any strong sense of the word, I would question, for example, who or what is aware of the illusion? If there is nothing to be aware of an illusion, the entire concept of "illusion" loses its force. You end up with an empty semantics, devoid of any real meaning.

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I understand that may not be entirely colloquial, and that's why I shared the definition I'm using. — Tzeentch

I get that, but the term does have overtly physical connotations. I thought that disengaging the term "violence" from the whole idea of ethical violence might be meaningful. After all, people can do a whole lot of horrendous damage to other people without ever lifting a finger against them. Disenfranchising a person or a group, for example. Maybe "trespassing" is a suitable match for the concept? In which case the question becomes, is it ever ethical to trespass against others?

How come? Isn't a subject being forced to do something against their will through physical force? It's violence, and, like all violence, unethical. — Tzeentch

Perhaps the use of the term violence is misleading. I was a martial artist, and our tournament fighting was extremely violent, but our philosophy was highly ethical.

As you say, the really violent thing is, what, imposing one's will on another? Maybe that could be rephrased as not respecting the sanctity of the other. The categorical imperative, right?

we just need new tools that upgrade human or non-human (AI) senses as well as cognitive capacities — Josh Alfred

Yes, this overlaps with the theme of the other thread I mentioned - what are the effects of the integration of tools into human culture, for society, and for the mind? Our whole existence is inextricable from our instrumentalities (perhaps even describable in terms of them).

Intelligence, it seems, doesn't require a brain. Proof? The universe is acting in ways that we would ascribe to a genius (re mathematical precision and sense) and we know the universe doesn't have a brain. That is to say, intelligence can exist sans a brain. Intelligence is nonphysical or thereabouts. — Agent Smith

Yes. Individual humans consistently exhibit self-centric cognitive biases in interpretation, which results in biases in perception. Humans as a species likewise exhibit anthropo-centric biases. In another thread the fact that human culture and tools can be viewed as "natural" was raised. That's true. Equivalently, if human beings are alive (or conscious), then so is the universe....

I've just presented a premise to the effect that it isn't pseudo-science. I hear what you're saying though, it is often abused. But then, so is science nowadays. I'm suggesting that there may be systems involving energy patterns that we can now conceptualize (using tools like systems theory) possibly taking place at very large scales of space and time. Even in our world we can see hints of such patterns. Who knows exactly what is being transmitted through culture? It's more than just a simple blueprint.

It most likely isn't something that we can "study," any more than an amoeba can study human society. However perhaps it represents a direction in which our understanding can evolve....

I am leaning towards the much-maligned concept of spirit. Energy presents a dizzying array of forms. And evolution has been going on for an extremely long time. Who knows what shape a very, very long-lived type of spiritual entity might take? I

I've just been re-reading Foundations of Cognitive Science by Michael Posner, and the chapter on experimental methods kind of concludes directly on point with the OP.

"The history of humankind is one of increasing use of tools for extending our power, expanding or amplifying our physical senses, and more recently for amplifying our intellectual senses, our mental powers."

So, the question really is, to what extent can we effectively use these tools without understanding them?

I've been arguing that lack of understanding of the tools is a serious problem. @Ciceronianus has been arguing the opposite. The chapter I just read tends to support his perspective, citing evidence that experts are generally unaware of the subtle cues and mechanisms whereby they effect their judgments. So I guess the only real problem is when it comes to the creation of the tools themselves. Can we have a healthy and integrated society where there is sharp division between the majority who use the tools, and the minority who understand and develop them?

I agree, there's a case to be made for conflating consciousness and self-consciousness. My main idea is, that if nature evolves to produce these discontinuous realms, who is to say there isn't another beyond whatever is our current apex?

The psychological reality is the awareness. — Raymond

Self-consciousness versus consciousness though......

Yes, I knew this was coming.

But the self-perpetuation of the manufactured portion of the "natural" world consisting of human products is contingent on the transmission of cultural knowledge, which means that the kind of understanding-gap problem which is the theme of the OP then becomes a critical issue.

Ok, I will look at that for sure. Do you think there is any reason in principle why there may not be even higher levels of description than those accessible to us? I doubt the amoeba has much awareness of its own psychological reality.....

What a picturesque scenario. Almost romantic, in a weird way. — john27

Yes, although I'm not sure if picturesque or graphic is the word I'd choose....

Karl Jaspers notes that there are obvious discontinuities happening between different levels of description corresponding to the apparent hierarchy of evolving physical systems - physical - chemical - biological - psychological. While a lot of effort goes into reduction, Jaspers is not incorrect. I see no reason why there could not be more.

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Yes, there was a lot of talk about the film production a few years back. I've been holding my breath.

Yeah, despite the dire setting, I wouldn't necessarily agree that violence is an ethical response. — john27

I don't believe that violence is ever an ethical choice. But I think that the "defense of reason" position may be one of the strongest.

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Toward the middle of the eighteenth century, a farmer in the north of Scotland had his hour of fame. He was said to possess the art of curing insanity. Pinel notes in passing that this Gregory had the physique of a Hercules: "His method consisted in forcing the insane to perform the most difficult tasks of farming, in using them as beasts of burden, as servants, in reducing them to an ultimate obedience with a barrage of blows at the least act of revolt."

I first read this shortly after the book came out. When I was eleven I found it picking through the grown-up side in the library. Re-reading the wikipedia, I see that might have been an abridged version, so I just ordered a copy from Amazon. This is hands down my favourite science-fiction novel.

Huh. So violence is like a cure/response to madness, if I understand correctly? — john27

That is the suggestion, as an historical analysis. Violence as enforcing reason. It is kind of chilling.

I'm just reading Foucault's Madness and Civilization, which characterizes the horrific brutality with which the Age of Reason addressed what is antithetical to reason, madness. I guess in those terms, violence is seen as being ethical when it is applied to unreason:

...the age of reason confined. It confined the debauched, spendthrift fathers, prodigal sons, blasphemers, men who "seek to undo themselves," libertines. And through these parallels, these strange complicities, the age sketched the profile of its own experience of unreason.

From your list you might enjoy The Forever War, if you haven't read it already.

Well, the natural world is a self-creating, self-maintaining, and organically fundamental and essential environment, for starters.

I'm not so focused on the power dynamic aspect of things. But I do think more and more people know less and less about the world they live in. Farmers traditionally have been able to fix vehicles and build and use tools that rely on principles of mechanics (tackles, etc), construct things, etc. I'm thinking your average city-dweller dropped in the wilderness would survive about 3 days. Technology is insulating us from reality, not enhancing it.

I think there is a real distinction between expert knowledge and not knowing how electricity works. Or gravity.

There a huge knowledge-deficit that is a snowballing social problem, yes, for sure.

Seems to me that, in a situation like this, the more technology evolves, the larger the deficit grows, the more the world is going to be subject to corrective back-pressures....

Check out the movie "Don't Look Up" if you haven't already seen it. It is a hilarious (and frightening) look at people enslaved by their own tech.

Interesting. Having found out recently that I am coming into enough money to finally retire, I have been asking myself what I would like to do.

Of course, there's a big difference between having just enough to live comfortably, and having a great surplus. But that's kind of the key to me. Life is just a series of habits. As we live, so we think. For me, my thoughts are to have a nice home gym, to establish healthy patterns of eating and exercise, to read and write a little more, to donate a bit more to and also volunteer a bit with some local charitable organizations, like the food bank. Maybe we will buy ourselves a nice, new electric vehicle (I'm thinking of a Hyundai Kona).

If I had a whole lot of money, and allowed my life to become about buying a lot of things, well that would become one of my dominant and defining habits. I'm not sure how that advances the set of cognitive habits that constitutes me. It doesn't really make me anything more than a consumer, a hyper-consumer. That's not something I aspire to be.

What do you aspire to be?

Technology is not an end in itself; it is just one of many means that we humans employ in the project of survival. So even if our goal is only to survive, having an imperfect or limited understanding of technology reduces the value of that technology itself. Everyone knows how to make a wheel. So even if all the wheel-factories in the world were to be destroyed, people could still build their own wheelbarrows and carts. Most people don't understand the science of electricity however. So if there was an apocalyptic event, a few people would be able to generate electricity; most couldn't.

If the project of humanity is more than just survival, then the problem is even greater. Let's say the project of humanity is to optimize human existence. Not just survive, but survive in such a way that individual and social existence is improved as much as possible. Bare minimum, this can only occur if advances in human life are passed forward from generation to generation. However you only use a technology optimally to the extent that you understand it. And you can only pass forward what you understand.

For example, many people think that discovering a source of unlimited, inexpensive power would solve the world's problems (fusion energy). This is naive. All power, when used or applied, ends up as heat. So suddenly increasing power-consumption by an order of magnitude could result in an environmental catastrophe.

Technology can only be used optimally to the extent it is understood. Or to the extent that it's use is directed and controlled by those that really understand it, I guess....