A case in point

2017-05-21 Thread David Nyman
https://insidetheperimeter.ca/a-quantum-case-of-mind-over-matter/

I think this is probably an example of what I was getting at with respect
to the conceptual consequences of theoretical mis-categorisation in my
recent post. I guess you never can tell though.

David

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Re: A case in point

2017-05-24 Thread Bruno Marchal


On 24 May 2017, at 13:53, David Nyman wrote:



-- Forwarded message --
From: David Nyman 
Date: 22 May 2017 at 10:32
Subject: Re: A case in point
To: meekerdb 




On 22 May 2017 2:44 a.m., "Brent Meeker"  wrote:


On 5/21/2017 5:49 PM, David Nyman wrote:



On 22 May 2017 at 00:59, Brent Meeker  wrote:

It hardly seems like a serious proposal.

​I surely agree.
​
If he were serious, he would have already done the experiment in  
the lab with one or two people.  If they could cause a deviation  
from QM, THEN it would be worthwhile to do it with people far apart  
to avoid inadvertant signaling.


​Sure, but I'm still interested in the category confusion. I doubt  
he's twigged that the very way he's formulated this implies that  
brain function is somehow inconsistent with whatever he thinks he  
means by consciousness. I assume he isn't suggesting that  
neurocognition itself isn't itself reducible to physics.


I think that is what he's suggesting.  He's supposing that  
consciousness can realize FTL signaling.


As opposed to neurocognition which cannot? As I said below, it  
strains credulity that he would believe that neurocognition itself  
isn't part of physics. So he's making an implicit distinction  
between that and consciousness, which he obviously does believe  
isn't physical in some putatively distinguishable sense. Because  
he's also apparently not questioning the latter's ability to  
participate in the implied ontological schema, he's willing to  
credit that it can somehow intercede in causal relations. Trouble  
is, this view would make consciousness inconsistent with brain  
function, as indeed it would have to be to accomplish what the  
former could not.


Is it really? He seems to me to believe that consciousness might  
reduce the wave packet. He seems just willing to believe that  
Mechanism is false, and that consciousness is a non local physical  
phenomenon. Of course, a Mechanist will interpret his experience as  
the nth experience confirming the many-worlds (saving 3p determinacy,  
3p locality, etc.) ... or disproving quantum mechanics.







As I've said, I don't believe that this kind of cognitive dissonance  
could be established or maintained without a fundamental confusion  
of categories between ontology and epistemology. In the view I've  
put forward, both neurocognition and consciousness properly belong  
to the category of a theory of knowledge, the former as an  
observable and the latter as the manner of its observation.  
Consequently both concepts would necessarily be inferences from a  
common ontological​ assumption. Viewed in that way, it would  
hopefully be rather more obvious that they could hardly be  
inconsistent with each other.


I am OK when assuming mechanism is correct. If mechanism is false, we  
can almost imagine *any* weird theory.


Bruno




David



Brent


Consequently it would presumably be subject to the same limitations  
that worry him with respect to any other physical source of  
randomisation. So the contention that "conscious choice" somehow  
isn't thus restricted implies an inconsistency between these two  
categories that on the face of it would make little sense even in a  
dualist framework.


David






http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/



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