On Wed, Apr 28, 2021 at 12:06 PM John Clark <johnkcl...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Wed, Apr 28, 2021 at 11:17 AM Terren Suydam <terren.suy...@gmail.com> > wrote: > > >> We should always pay attention to all relevant *BEHAVIOR**,* including >>> *BEHAVIOR* such as noises produced by the mouths of other people. >>> >> >> *> Got it. Accounts of subjective experience are not the salient facts in >> these experiments, it's the way they move their lips and tongue and pass >> air through their vocal cords that matters. The rest of the world has moved >> on from BF Skinner, but not you, apparently. * >> > > Forget BF Skinner, this is more general than consciousness or behavior. > If you want to explain Y at the most fundamental level from first > principles you can't start with "X produces Y'' and then use X as part of > your explanation of Y. > OK, I want to explain consciousness from first principles, so Y = consciousness. What is X? Testimony about subjective experience? Nobody is claiming that testimony about subjective experience produces consciousness (X produces Y). > > >> >>> *Why doesn't that represent progress? * >>>> >>> >>> >> It may represent progress but not progress towards understanding >>> consciousness. >>> >> >> *> Why not? Understanding how the brain maps or encodes different >> subjective experiences * >> > > Because understanding how the brain maps and encodes information will > tell you lots about behavior and intelligence but absolutely nothing about > consciousness. > > *> If we can explain why, for example, you see stars if you bash the back >> of your head,* >> > > It might be able to explain why I say "I see green stars" but that's not > what you're interested in, you want to know why I subjectively experience > the green qualia and if it's the same as your green qualia, but no theory > can even prove to you that I see any qualia at all. > I think the question of whether my experience of green is the same as your experience of green reflects confusion on behalf of the questioner. I'm not interested in that. I'm interested in a theory of consciousness that can tell me, among other things, how it is that we have conscious experiences when we dream. Don't you wonder about that? > *> You make it sound as though there's nothing to be gleaned from >> systematic investigation,* >> > > It's impossible to systematically investigate everything therefor a > scientist needs to use judgment to determine what is worth his time and > what is not. Every minute you spend on consciousness research is a minute > you could've spent on researching something far far more productive, which > would be pretty much anything. Consciousness research has made ZERO > progress over the last thousand years and I have every reason to believe it > will make twice as much during the next thousand. > You refuse to acknowledge that one can produce evidence of consciousness, namely in the form of subjects testifying to their experience. It doesn't matter to you, apparently, if someone reports being in extreme pain. > > *> the thing I understand the least is how incurious you are about it.* > > > The thing I find puzzling is how incurious you and virtually all internet > consciousness mavens are about how intelligence works. Figuring out > intelligence is a solvable problem, but figuring out consciousness is not, > probably because it's just a brute fact that consciousness is the way data > feels when it is being processed. If so then there's nothing more they can > be said about consciousness, however I am well aware that after all is said > and done more is always said and done. > > I'm very curious about how intelligence works too. You're making assumptions about me that don't bear out... perhaps that's true of your thinking in general. And I never claimed consciousness is a solvable problem. But there are better theories of consciousness than others, because there are facts about consciousness that beg explanation (e.g. dreaming, lucid dreaming), and some theories have better explanations than others. But like any other domain, if we can come up with a relatively simple theory that explains a relatively large set of phenomena, then that's a good contender. But you know this, you've just got some kind of odd hang up about consciousness. Terren > John K Clark See what's on my new list at Extropolis > <https://groups.google.com/g/extropolis> > > . > > . > > > >> -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > To view this discussion on the web visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/CAJPayv0RTqv_FdnC6szHBEHO_gM%3DSeXJ86z9FEJmkW_Ba%2B7edg%40mail.gmail.com > <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/CAJPayv0RTqv_FdnC6szHBEHO_gM%3DSeXJ86z9FEJmkW_Ba%2B7edg%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer> > . > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. 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