Our theories about the world emerge from our pretheoretical observations and reason...
— Olivier5

What would such pre-linguistic reason consist of?
— creativesoul

"Pre-theoretical" means something different from "pre-linguistic". It means stuff you do in practice without thinking about it in theory. Like when you watch large packs of birds fly. You are not necessarily theorizing about yourself watching birds fly, or even about how the birds fly. You may simply watch them. You may wonder why they fly so high or turn so suddenly, all as one, but it's not a research program yet, more a wonder, a question. You may start to reason that this is peculiar and beautiful, and start filming the phenomenon with your cellphone. You are still not theorizing much. You are just recording whatever you can of the event, thinking your friends will like this.

You may theorize latter, for instance if I ask you why you looked at those damn birds for so long. — Olivier5

Ah. Thanks for clearing that up. Not sure how helpful that distinction is given the task, but at least I better understand what it means.

One thing about consciousness is that it seems to be related to volition, might even be why we have it at all instead of just reflexes, however complicated. Or it could be this is the cheapest way to build up a repertoire of complex reflexes. (I spend far more time talking and writing than I do trying to remember words I want to use.) At any rate, we don't have volition here: I don't choose to see the world as colored, or to smell what I smell or feel what I feel, and so on. I have no control over what's dumped into my awareness and what's not. (Similarly, it's almost impossible not to understand speech in a language you understand, so robust is the habit.) That strikes me as interesting, but I've no idea what to do with it. — Srap Tasmaner

It speaks to the part that recollection plays.

One finger cannot point at itself.

they have gotten all they need out of Trump — Echarmion

Used him for the tool that he is.

Reading a lot does not necessarily indicate learning. — Mww

Well, I picked up Kant far too early, in the beginning of my interest in philosophy, along with Spinoza, Witt, and Russell. So, undoubtedly I did not understand it to the degree that I may now, should I ever read him again.

The CI is one of the best philosophical renderings in history, to this day.

Back to the topic though...

:zip:

Our theories about the world emerge from our pretheoretical observations and reason... — Olivier5

What would such pre-linguistic reason consist of?

Solipsism is fucking rubbish!


Solipsism is a philosophical position.
All philosophical positions require language use.
All language use requires shared meaning.
All shared meaning requires a plurality of creatures.
If solipsism is true there is no such plurality of creatures.
If solipsism is true there is no shared meaning.
If solipsism is true there is no language use.
If solipsism is true there are no philosophical positions.
Solipsism is a philosophical position.

Draw your own conclusion.

:smile:

Solipsism is proof of the distinction between coherency and correspondence(meaning and truth).

Glad to know I'm not the only one who pays such close attention to stuff like that.

It's cool looking.

I think Dennett has done a fine job of quining the notion of "qualia". That's tremendous progress on my view, and I'm not a physicalist or dualist, or panpsychist. Part of the problem is that there remain a few archaic dichotomies at work which serve to cloud understanding rather than add to it. The object/subject and physical/mental are definitely two of them. These are man-made artificial barriers. All conscious experience consists of objects and subjects, physical and mental things. It is not one or the other. It's existentially dependent upon and consists of both.

Furthermore, there are a multitude of different kinds of conscious experience, and these are all getting mashed together in the discussion of 'experience'. They are not all the same, aside from having, emerging, and/or otherwise being existentially dependent upon the same pre-theoretical foundation, which definitely does not include "qualia" as it is targeted by Dennett.

However, the ineffable and private aspects must hold good when we're talking about language less creatures' conscious experience. Sorry Banno. It's not that we cannot talk about their conscious experience, it's that they cannot. Our knowing that much allows us to be able to refine our standard/criterion for what pre-theoretical conscious experience can and/or must include as well. But...

The biggest flaw I see in all of this... including Dennett's paper... is the sheer lack of an acceptable theory of meaning. All conscious experience must be meaningful to the creature having the experience. I suspect, when that is gotten right, the rest of the 'problems' will be much less daunting.

So solving the Hard Problem just means arriving at a decent theory of consciousness. — frank

But how would such a theory ever be confirmed? That theory must be able to tell us the conditions required for consciousness to occur. But how will we test the hypothesis? Until we can somehow make a "consciousness-o-meter" I can't conceive of that happening. The problem is not just hard it's unapproachable. One person can say "consciousness is physical and it arises when x and y occur" and another might say "consciousness is inherent in all matter and combines according to x and y" but without the consciousness-o-meter, they are both just as clueless as a layman as to what is actually happening.

And I can't conceive of how a consciousness-o-meter will be made. How will we make a device that detects something which we're not even sure has any physical impact. If my couch is conscious, that is still consistent with every physical and chemical law there is. We don't even have a clue on how to begin detecting consciousness, only a bunch of hypothesis all of which are untestable. — khaled

...the Hard Problem doesnt insist on any ontological commitments. In fact, it implies that we may have to be flexible in order to solve it. — frank

The problem is a consequence of not understanding our own thought and belief, what it consists of, how it emerges, evolves, what it gives rise to, and the role that all of this plays in our lives(conscious experience).

That's the only place to start.

You gotta quit reading so much Kant.

:wink:

...

How Trump garnered a significant portion of the Christian vote is very telling of the state of Christianity in America... too many years of the likes of Billy Graham and Oral Roberts. — Metaphysician Undercover

Not enough of the likes of Betrand Russell...

Given that we both acknowledge the occurrence of the word "quality" in the English language (you've made use of it), and if in your view conscious experiences do not consist of quality, where does quality take place?

Or is it your view that quality does not take place anywhere, that it has no occurrence, thereby making the term fully meaningless to you? — javra

Quality is not the sort of thing that takes place. It is a standard borne of comparison/contrast.

Accounting by whom and to whom?

We always return to the subject. — Olivier5

And evidently forget where we've already been. You invoked "subjectivity". I argued for it's uselessness as a means to further discriminate between our differing claims about conscious experience.

You returned...

Evolve. Grow lungs. Get out of the subjective waters.

My last reply concerning subjectivity still stands, unmolested and strong.

To deny one's subjectivity is by definition to deny one's own life. — Olivier5

Denying the usefulness of the subjective/objective dichotomy is to deny one particular accounting practice. One's own life is much more than an accounting practice.

Senses are there for a reason, which is to help the animal navigate the world. They can be trusted, they keep us alive every day. — Olivier5

It's not the senses that are the problem here. It's the accounting malpractice thereof.

I bet the casanovas who tried that line are laughing their asses off right now.

"Hello ladies, ever lain with an angel of the Lord? :wink:" — Michael

The consequences of having been named "Michael". Even moreso if one's middle name is "Gabriel".

Baby, I'm no angel...

I just try my best to treat people with a certain modicum of respect and dignity upon first meeting them, was named by people like you who believe in angels and answered prayers.

:kiss:

Yeah. Time to retire for the night.

We can apprehend the world through quality and quantity, hence both of these must exist, at least in our mind. — Olivier5

I've no issue with that aside from the "in our mind" part. Ad homs aren't very compelling.

The discussion is about Dennett's paper, in which he is targeting a certain criterion, description, and/or characterization of qualia. Which of the two different definitions of quality are germane to this discussion? I suspect neither.

Some posters here call subjectivity "self-report" and they see it with a great deal of suspicion... — Olivier5

Guilty as charged on the first count. Innocent on the second. I grant subjectivity in it's entirety.

All things ever thought, believed, spoken, written, uttered, and/or otherwise expressed come through a subject. Thus, we must set the notion aside, for it is incapable of being used to draw any further distinction between our differing claims.

I'm by no means denying my senses. I grant them as necessary elemental constituents of all conscious experience.



Which satisfies Dennett's criterion?

Are those my only choices?

:brow:

What else could what it's like to drink tea consist of if not each and every instance?
— creativesoul

The continuous experience... — Marchesk

We do not drink tea each and every day, all day long, for our entire lives. There is no continuous experience of what it's like to drink tea unless we drink tea each and every day, all day long, for our entire lives...

The continuous tea drinker...

:brow:

We know that doesn't make sense.

Why suppose it needs to be broken down into instances? — Marchesk

What else could what it's like to drink tea consist of if not each and every instance?

What's missing?

One without language can most certainly see the red cup. One without color vision can most certainly see the red cup. Neither can see the cup as red.

Does this conscious experience consist of quality? — javra

Not on my view, but perhaps on yours it may. What counts as consisting of quality?

I'm not enamored with qualia, as previously mentioned. Still, being charitable here, if we can discern and thereby distinguish between different qualities, then the philosophical notion of qualia might make some sense in certain philosophical contexts.

What say you?. — javra

About whether or not there is an entirely private, immediate, and directly apprehensible conscious experience in some basic form?

Sure. It does not consist of qualia or quale.

Well, of course. One will start arguing about both of them being illusory intuition pumpin' machines; the other starts arguing that the quality to it all is going down the drain. And then presto, the magic is lost and there's no more making whoopee between the two. — javra

Or it's laughed off, and immediately forgotten about.

"What it's like" to drink tea is determined by virtue of each and every instance of tea drinking. That is a plurality of tea drinking instances. If each and every instance of tea drinking is different in it's perceptual and/or qualitative value, then there is no such thing as what it's like to drink tea, because the use of "it's" indicates a single entity.

We're talking about a plurality.

Right, because sexual partners have prior to recent philosophy readings never asked each other, "what was it like for you?" — javra

Such intimate conversations will always go awry when "qualia" rears it's ugly head.

Which properties of your private experience are existentially independent from language use? Which ones exist in their entirety prior to your report of them? What do they consist of?
— creativesoul

The various color, sound, taste sensations, but those are words used in language, so naturally you will complain that I'm using language.
— Marchesk

No, I won't. We must use language.

So, let me see if I have this right...

Color, sound, and taste are - according to you - properties of private experience that exist in their entirety prior to language use.

Are you ok with that? — creativesoul

↪creativesoul Yes. — Marchesk

Can a language-less creature offer us a self report? No. Of course not. Can they have some sort of basic, rudimentary, and/or fundamental form of thought and/or belief? If so, then basic, rudimentary, and/or fundamental experience cannot consist of language, or any product and/or bi-product thereof.

Agree?

I think the point is that none of these require talking in terms of qualia in order to be effectively and exhaustively explained.
— creativesoul

Give it a try. — Olivier5

You did a fine job.

Because people who don't like cauliflower try to avoid eating cauliflower independently of the circumstances.

Because an optical illusion cannot be reasoned away, it will crop up again and again, independently of the circumstances.

Because you can recognise the timbre of a musical instrument, the scent of a rose, the color of a dress in spite of them being always a little bit different than the last time.

Because you can recognise the taste of some food that you haven't had for decades, e.g. Proust's madeleines.

Because dogs can follows trails, and find corpses even under water.

Because the same applies to words: their meaning varies from one sentence to the next, and yet we still use them and we still recognise their meaning somewhat. — Olivier5

I think the point is that none of these require talking in terms of qualia in order to be effectively and exhaustively explained.

The p-zombie aspect is a reductio. Seems some miss that point. If a p-zombie counts, then there's a problem with the criterion.

Yeah, I'm working on an ordinary language rendering of the (consciousness)process. Seems to me that the models, such as those being discussed(particularly earlier) by Kenosha, Isaac, and fdrake, are the most promising methods/attempts to situate "qualia" beyond the ability of metacognition in their order of appearance, where metacognition requires common language use.

The judgment/assessment step is most certainly in dire need of unpacking, for there are several levels of complexity to conscious experience, all of which correspond to the cognitive capability of the candidate(which is limited to and facilitated by the physiological/biological 'machinery').

I do not actually entirely agree with Dennett here. I do agree that qualia/quale are misconceptions of the basic fundamental elements of conscious experience. However, I'm trying to keep my engagement about Dennett's paper, or at least on some aspect of his points, as much as possible.