Causality and Consciousness

[Animus]

I'm struggling with a few ideas here and this board may be the best place to get feedback.

For the last few years I have put my focus largely on empirical science. A few books I've read include:

The Astonishing Hypothesis: The Scientific Search for the Soul by Francis Crick
The Quest for Consciousness: A Neurobiological Approach by Christoph Koch
An Introduction to Consciousness by Susan Blackmore
Freedom Evolves by Dan Dennett
Neurophilosophy of Free-Will: From Libertarian Illusions to a Concept of Natural Autonomy by Henrik Walter
Causality or Causation: The Fundamental Fact Plainly Explained by Ted Honderich
Brain-Wise by Patricia Churchland
The Engine of Reason the Seat of the Soul by Paul Churchland
Being No One (Partially) by Thomas Metzinger
Introduction to Psychology by Peter Gray
Developmental Psychology by David Shaffer
BRS Neuroanatomy by James D. Fix

There are more, but this should give an idea of where I'm coming from. I think I've come to this conclusion:

Consciousness in the human brain occurs due to self-similarity and feedback. A system of representations feeding back into itself its own representations, such that the input is self-similar to the system. This is the "causal" antecedent of human consciousness. However there exists multiple extant problems that aren't resolved by literally any understanding of causality. They are "qualia" (what it is like to be conscious) and the binding problem for example. The problem of qualia of course being that "experience" cannot be observed through a microscope or mathematical expression, it can only be experienced. But it is inherently dependant on a causal dynamic. I'm beginning to think "qualia" is a kind of causality which doesn't relate to any other kinds of causation we are familiar with, because the only way to observe this kind of causation is to actually be this kind of causation. I'm not suggesting we have "Free-Will" but that "qualia" might be like causation, in that the "inner workings" of causation or unassailable.

The binding problem is that there is no central locus of experience in the brain. Everything is diffuse, spread out across different areas and operate somewhat independantly. There is no physical or causal explanation for the perceived unity of consciousness. Consciousness made not be unitary, but we still need to explain why it "seems" that way. And ironically "seeming" is a property of consciousness. So perhaps if it "seems" to be unitary then it is. I could be wrong, but now that I've realized that the "inner workings" of causality is a paradox, I'm pursuing ways of reconciling the scientific evidence. To me, it all has to make sense.

[Ataraxia]

I most interested in this subject too,animus.In fact I've gone back to uni to specifically study it;although it seems I'm going to have to wade through alot of other stuff first. On reflection it would've been more expediant just to read the books you've listed.

As far as i can tell so far,the binding problem is only a problem for materialists like Churchland and to a lesser extent Dennet.Would that be fair to say?

Have you read anything by Daviid Chalmers?

[Animus]

Hi Ataraxia,

Tell me first of all, are you a member of Skepticforum.com or have you been in the past? The name is very familiar.

I have a friend I met on youtube, he is a physicist and neuroscientist working on brain imaging techniques in Tübingen Germany. He was amazed at my grasp on the topic and lamented at the fact that most of his time is spent on technical details rather than the philosophical significance. Its kind of a catch-22 I think. You spend all that time gaining knowledge but never putting it to philosophical use, because in practice its all technical and very time consuming. Something to think about anyway.

I suppose the binding problem is really a problem for "materialists" but its no less of a problem for dualists who simply presuppose some mystical force. I'd like grapple with that "mystical" force to try to understand some of it, obviously not all.

I have read some of Chalmers' compilation of Papers on Consciousness, but not much authored by Chalmers himself.

http://consc.net/online

[Ataraxia]

Hi Ataraxia,

Tell me first of all, are you a member of Skepticforum.com or have you been in the past? The name is very familiar.

I've read the forum a couple of times,but no,never posted there.

[guest_of_logic]

http://consc.net/online

Wow, what a share. Thanks.

[Animus]

Wow, what a share. Thanks.

No problem, its quite a lot of information. It doesn't seem to be working properly with Chrome though. It says all the catagories contain 0 documents, but selecting them from the standard HTML list at the bottom of the page works anyway.

I've read the forum a couple of times,but no,never posted there.

That's weird, I thought for certain I had seen your name there.

[DivineIntercourse]

I'm struggling with a few ideas here and this board may be the best place to get feedback.

Would you mind giving a few examples of these ideas?

[Animus]

I'm struggling with a few ideas here and this board may be the best place to get feedback.

Would you mind giving a few examples of these ideas?

The problem of qualia is what it is like to be something. What it is like to be a bat for example. The issue is how one can do a scientific experiment to observe qualia. It is impossible unless we can come up with a mathematical description of a physical correlate. If we can do that we can possibly identify qualia in the universe but never be able to observe it. It could be as simple as what we call reason.

When you think about something as simple as "I AM" it sounds like a tautology. It's an obvious statement to make. But why is that so obvious to us? Is that obvious to a snake? Someone will say its just common sense, reason, etc.. but only give synonyms for it. If you say, reason is unreasonable then you've accepted reason as truth in the process of refuting it. On an empirical level its based entirely on convention. Wood is obvious when you see it and the word probably comes to mind. But the wood itself and the word are not the same thing. They are different symbols which appear together. Therefore it is reasonable to call wood, wood. Or to hammer a nail, blow on a flute, etc.. All our world is constructed from exposure to it, but the brain immediately tries to tie it all together in a coherent whole. It takes many shortcuts in doing this. Is it possible to experience the raw input? If not, why not?

If someone suffers damage to their eyes they can still imagine an image in their minds. Therefore their consciousness still is. A person can fail to see motion, fail to recognize objects, fail to see but still perceive objects through the superior colliculus, fail to be able to imagine anything at all, fail to understand language. The center of consciousness seems to be in the PFC, but not to be taken too literally. It is mainly by two things appearing together repeatedly that one understands anything at all. We have to be shown things repeatedly to understand their causality. After a while we are able to infer an objects causal properties. All of this is just by convention and to some degree we learn logic by exposure as well. A classic example is "people people left left". We have to work that out with some rules of language which we ultimately take for granted. The example just demonstrates how easily it normally comes.

So perhaps consciousness is really self-similarity to the degree that the brain is capable of representing the world. And when we are aware of something repeatedly we eventually realize it in consciousness. But to what degree then are we just making stuff up and believing in it. Our reason leads to many failures before successes, are they really successes? Or just delusions?

Is consciousness a causality in that it is the part we ultimately don't understand. The reason why it is necessary. We can only observe a causalities necessity and only within models, we can never explain why it is necessary. Is it possible that it has some ability to cause things contrary to a static mathematical equation? I mean how do we understand anything at all? If we use the brain as a basis we've already accepted several bedrock assumptions. We've established reason and observation as axioms. And ultimately leads us to the fact that we know nothing anyway. It could have easily been said that there are no inner reasons for reason and thus reason is unreasonable and we know nothing. That is a contradiction but so is the scientific evidence. We just think we know things we can't perceive the infinitude of them.

Nevertheless brain damage seems to be very real and very debilitating. So there must be things to learn about consciousness, if there are things to learn at all. The Kabbalahist use all kinds of obscure language and I've tried think of their levels of God as essentially different types of causality. For example boundaries and contrast vs biological evolution or consciousness. One will say that a black background surrounding a white dove caused the dove to exist. Is this the nature of everything? Is there one simple formula? Or a few? And what is the basis for that formula? I've often heard philosophers say "If one wants a useful philosophy...". They have already committed to self-interest and avoided truth. Either way I take our "place" in the universe to be pretty special in that we can learn by convention and recognize it as such.

If the universe is really a bunch of energy arranged into different patterns and constantly changing then we are seeing it incorrectly. We perceive colour where there is none, boundaries and form where there is none. Everything is one. Where does consciousness fit into all of that? Or does it literally fit into all of it? One can only live and have faith in the end. I recently watched a video where a guy said the whole process of enlightenment is discovering what you are and realizing you were there the entire time. The whole process would be easier if we didn't have to make the journey and could just see it to begin with.

I've pretty much been a pan-experientialist in accepting that some forms can be conscious, but it isn't a form as much as it is a process or perhaps the very bedrock of reality. Like the dog chasing its own tail, attempting to catch itself. The universe observing itself and trying to figure itself out when it is all that is. That seems quite unreasonable.

[David Quinn]

I think the "problems" you are detailing are illusory at bottom.

While it is true that, scientifically, the existence of consciousness is a challenging problem, no amount of scientific explanation will ever bridge the apparent gap between what we experience as consciousness and our models of it.

Even if we were to devise the most brilliant, sophisticated, irrefutable model of consciousness, there will always remain that gap. It is the gap between our own subjective awareness and any object perceived with it, which can never be closed.

I personally don't consider consciousness to be any more mysterious than any other object in the universe, but I can understand it when people become mesmorized by it. Their own subjectivity is caught up in the issue. They believe that the occurance of their own subjective existence is somehow more inexplicable and more cosmically important than, say, the occurance of trees or red. As a result, they are unable to be truly objective about it.

Yet consciousness, like all things, necessarily has causes and those causes will necessarily seem radically different to it. Just as a metal (sodium) and a poisonous gas (chlorine) can mysteriously combine to form table salt, consciousness is also a combined result of disparate elements which are nothing like consciousness. It's a matter of accepting that this is how causality works and that there will always appear to be gaps between things and their causes.

I also don't see the issue you have with the "binding problem". A computer is also a diffuse phenomena, with thousands of seperate processes spread out over different areas and yet combining to perform a coherent function. It is a matter of how these seperate processes are allayed with one another, whether they are able to work together to produce something more holistic or not.

In terms of our evolution, a unified consciousness obviously provides a strong survival advantage. So there is no great mystery there either.

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[Ataraxia]

It is the gap between our own subjective awareness and any object perceived with it, which can never be closed.

Yes,you are most likely right about this.

However,

I personally don't consider consciousness to be any more mysterious than any other object in the universe, but I can understand it when people become mesmorized by it. Their own subjectivity is caught up in the issue. They believe that the occurance of their own subjective existence is somehow more inexplicable and more cosmically important than, say, the occurance of trees or red. As a result, they are unable to be truly objective about it.

This is basically ad hominem.And seems, to me at least,disingenous from a thinker whose entire philosophy is contingent on consciousness itself.

Yet consciousness, like all things, necessarily has causes and those causes will necessarily seem radically different to it. Just as a metal (sodium) and a poisonous gas (chlorine) can mysteriously combine to form table salt, consciousness is also a combined result of disparate elements which are nothing like consciousness. It's a matter of accepting that this is how causality works and that there will always appear to be gaps between things and their causes.

This is not an account of consciousness.All it is saying is that "it is caused"

Perhaps that is a good enough explanation to you, but It seems consciousness is a mysterious to you as it is to animus,Chalmers,me and the rest of the scientific and philosophic community.

In terms of our evolution, a unified consciousness obviously provides a strong survival advantage. So there is no great mystery there either.
-

Agreed.

[David Quinn]

I personally don't consider consciousness to be any more mysterious than any other object in the universe, but I can understand it when people become mesmorized by it. Their own subjectivity is caught up in the issue. They believe that the occurance of their own subjective existence is somehow more inexplicable and more cosmically important than, say, the occurance of trees or red. As a result, they are unable to be truly objective about it.

This is basically ad hominem.And seems, to me at least,disingenous from a thinker whose entire philosophy is contingent on consciousness itself.

It wasn't meant to be an ad hominem. Objectivity is often lacking in people when it comes investigating consciousness, which embroils them in all sorts of imaginary "dilemmas".

If a person cannot see that his consciousness is in no way unique - that it is no more complex or sophisticated or inexplicable than any other thing in the universe - then he has lost his objectivity. He is not in touch with the underlying principle of things.

Yet consciousness, like all things, necessarily has causes and those causes will necessarily seem radically different to it. Just as a metal (sodium) and a poisonous gas (chlorine) can mysteriously combine to form table salt, consciousness is also a combined result of disparate elements which are nothing like consciousness. It's a matter of accepting that this is how causality works and that there will always appear to be gaps between things and their causes.

This is not an account of consciousness.All it is saying is that "it is caused"

Perhaps that is a good enough explanation to you,

The thing to realize is that there is no other explanation. No other explanation is available or possible.

When you start moving away from the (philosophic) causal explanation and towards the devising of scientific models, you immediately enter the realm of speculation and uncertainty.

but It seems consciousness is a mysterious to you as it is to animus,Chalmers,me and the rest of the scientific and philosophic community.

There is nothing mysterious about it in the slightest.

Again, it is important to learn how to stop creating imaginary dilemmas about it. Indeed, all wisdom is essentially about putting an end to imaginary dilemmas.

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[maestro]

Nice discussion.

If a person cannot see that his consciousness is no way unique - that it is no more complex or sophisticated or inexplicable than any other thing in the universe - then he has lost his objectivity. He is not in touch with the underlying principle of things.

Is consciousness inexplicable because explanations involve analogies with simple things with which we have first hand experience, and consciousness is experience itself.

Is not consciousness change itself. If part of the universe is able to acquire memory and keep track of changes in itself, is that consciousness?

[mystex]

It is the gap between our own subjective awareness and any object perceived with it, which can never be closed.

The gap exists because you make it exist. Is its existence not useful?

If a person cannot see that his consciousness is no way unique - that it is no more complex or sophisticated or inexplicable than any other thing in the universe - then he has lost his objectivity. He is not in touch with the underlying principle of things.

Good.

The thing to realize is that there is no other explanation. No other explanation is available or possible.

How would you know? 1+1=2. Fine. But there are people who can make 1+1=1.

When you start moving away from the (philosophic) causal explanation and towards the devising of scientific models, you immediately enter the realm of speculation and uncertainty.

I like both. It makes a person feel free while grounded - you know what I mean?

There is nothing mysterious about it in the slightest.

Again, it is important to learn how to stop creating imaginary dilemmas about it. Indeed, all wisdom is essentially about putting an end to imaginary dilemmas.

So basically wisdom is knowing that you know nothing and can never know anything for certain – is this correct?

[Animus]

Thanks for the responses.

The issue with the binding problem is that there is no central locus in the brain. There is no "Monitor" like there is with a computer. A computer has centralized processors, centralized graphics and memory and the image is portrayed on a single screen. In the brain the representation for colour happens apart from form and motion, yet somehow these properties are bound in perception to appear as one thing. These representations in the brain don't usually cross paths. Which has led some to believe that phase-locking the frequencies creates the binding.

The problem for qualia, it isn't a problem if you accept that certain processes can be conscious. Instead, scientists want to know what makes the brain different than a computer with exactly the same structure. They have assumed computers aren't conscious. Well... Crick and Koch don't do this, they are trying to find a minimal structural correlate to use as a litmus test for consciousness, Crick's dead now, but if Koch or others eventually figure this out we might find computers are conscious.

I think I mentioned before I think it is the results of architecture, specific architecture, that produces the kind of consciousness we are familiar with, but then the "qualia" doesn't really exist... it doesn't exist objectively, yet we can't deny it exists, we talk about it all the time, we are aware of it above all else. So it must be a metaphysical reality... and all that exists objectively is the brain.

[mystex]

What's the qualia? (spirit?)

I think that the only thing that separates us from a computer program is complexity. Eventually, I don't see why an AI wouldn't be possible.

[David Quinn]

It is the gap between our own subjective awareness and any object perceived with it, which can never be closed.

The gap exists because you make it exist. Is its existence not useful?

In a way, that's true. The gaps are part and parcel of being conscious. To be conscious is to be conscious of "things", with gaps automatically inserted in between each thing.

Logically, we can know that the gaps aren't really there, that each thing blends seamlessly into its causes. But that doesn't stop the gaps being created by our consciousness.

If a person cannot see that his consciousness is no way unique - that it is no more complex or sophisticated or inexplicable than any other thing in the universe - then he has lost his objectivity. He is not in touch with the underlying principle of things.

Good.

Good.

The thing to realize is that there is no other explanation. No other explanation is available or possible.

How would you know? 1+1=2. Fine. But there are people who can make 1+1=1.

Only through sleight of hand.

How do I know that causality is the only possible explanation? Because there is nothing deeper than causality. Because it is logical in nature.

When you start moving away from the (philosophic) causal explanation and towards the devising of scientific models, you immediately enter the realm of speculation and uncertainty.

I like both. It makes a person feel free while grounded - you know what I mean?

Both is good, so long as one isn't fooled by either. Science is interesting and important, but it is powerless to resolve philosophical issues.

The main problem of our modern age is that people only know science (leaving aside the idiocy of religion for the moment). They know nothing of philosophic wisdom and conclude that because science can't resolve ultimate issues nothing can.

In truth, we are still living in the Dark Ages.

There is nothing mysterious about it in the slightest.

Again, it is important to learn how to stop creating imaginary dilemmas about it. Indeed, all wisdom is essentially about putting an end to imaginary dilemmas.

So basically wisdom is knowing that you know nothing and can never know anything for certain – is this correct?

Quite the reverse, wisdom is the omniscience which can see into all.

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[David Quinn]

If a person cannot see that his consciousness is no way unique - that it is no more complex or sophisticated or inexplicable than any other thing in the universe - then he has lost his objectivity. He is not in touch with the underlying principle of things.

Is consciousness inexplicable because explanations involve analogies with simple things with which we have first hand experience, and consciousness is experience itself.

Consciousness isn't inexplicable. As with anything else, it is a phenomenon that has arisen naturally through its causes.

The problem that people have with consciousness is that they try to integrate what they experience as consciousness with unconscious things like neurons, hormones, electrical impulses, feedback loops, and the like. They just can't marry all these things together in their minds. They don't realize that it can't be done in that manner, and that the issue is purely imagined to begin with.

Is not consciousness change itself. If part of the universe is able to acquire memory and keep track of changes in itself, is that consciousness?

If consciousness is change itself, then how could consciousness arise in the first place?

I agree with you that memory is integral to consciousness, to the point that consciousness would be unable to exist without it.

-

[David Quinn]

Thanks for the responses.

The issue with the binding problem is that there is no central locus in the brain. There is no "Monitor" like there is with a computer. A computer has centralized processors, centralized graphics and memory and the image is portrayed on a single screen. In the brain the representation for colour happens apart from form and motion, yet somehow these properties are bound in perception to appear as one thing. These representations in the brain don't usually cross paths. Which has led some to believe that phase-locking the frequencies creates the binding.

Memory is the thing which unites all the various incoming data-streams and perceptual representations. We never have an experience without our own memories of similar past experiences playing a role in shaping it. So that would be analogous to the monitor.

It is through memory that we are able to establish a consistent identity through time, to which everything we experience in the world forms a relationship.

The problem for qualia, it isn't a problem if you accept that certain processes can be conscious.

Wouldn't that be a case of passing the "problem" along to other areas, without actually resolving it?

Instead, scientists want to know what makes the brain different than a computer with exactly the same structure. They have assumed computers aren't conscious. Well... Crick and Koch don't do this, they are trying to find a minimal structural correlate to use as a litmus test for consciousness, Crick's dead now, but if Koch or others eventually figure this out we might find computers are conscious.

I'd say it would be very unlikely. Maybe in a few centuries time, our computers and robots will be conscious (i.e. on a par with what we know to be consciousness).

According to my intuition, consciousness is an organic thing with intimate ties to the physiology and abilities of the organism in question. For example, the sophistication of our own consciousness is in proportion to the dexterity of our hands and complexity of our speech faculties. Given that a computer is a contrived, inert thing designed primarily to "crunch numbers", which cannot fend for itself or run away in the face of danger, whatever consciousness it does have would have to be very limited.

I think I mentioned before I think it is the results of architecture, specific architecture, that produces the kind of consciousness we are familiar with, but then the "qualia" doesn't really exist... it doesn't exist objectively, yet we can't deny it exists, we talk about it all the time, we are aware of it above all else. So it must be a metaphysical reality... and all that exists objectively is the brain.

The brain too is just an object of consciousness and hence part of the subjective illusion.

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[Animus]

I was involved in a very long thread on the subject of causality being universally true.

Someone had posted the question "Who are we and why are we here?"

I chose to focus on one word from the question; the word "why".

The word why appeals to one of two temporal references to an event. It refers to either an antecedent cause or a predetermined effect (i.e. purpose). This alone implies a causal and predetermined nature for reality. The next 380 posts were pretty much a reiteration of this simple fact. Though I demonstrated that the mind and our understanding of the world depends on contiguity and hence causality, many wondered how this disproves discontiguous/non-causal events in the universe. My response was that it doesn't, but it makes understanding any such events impossible and such events should not be assailable to the human intellect. Nevertheless no one agreed with me. They'd much rather believe in the unintelligible in order to assert free-will in political discourse.


But I think there is a point to this, maybe some things are not comprehensible.


"Qualia" is kinda difficult to describe. Qualia, or Quale (Singular), are thought to be the "atoms" of awareness, the smallest indivisible chunk of awareness. But its more or less just a quaint term for referring to a specific phenomena. The phenomena of awareness. It does not refer to any content of awareness, but the phenomena of awareness itself. Of course particular content is often referred to as qualia. Because qualia are considered to be the smallest atoms of perception they might hypothetically all have content. But the core issue is why they constitute awareness.


To explain better and to explain why there seems to be a problem. Why should a set of neurons so configured constitute qualia, yet the information stored on a hard-drive does not?

Ultimately it becomes a question of what are the physical correlates of chunks of consciousness. Dan Dennett likes to call this "material dualism" because it still considers qualia a separate phenomena from the physical brain. His Multiple Drafts Theory kinda parallels what you were saying David, if I understood correctly. It has to be the answer to me, that some redrafting of an event is the conscious part. Several experiments have shown conscious awareness lags behind most of brain processing.


I think of it as a system differentiating input data, generating representations, storing the representations and recalling them as input data. So there is a constant re-entry of the output data. But what is the criteria really? And what else constitutes conscious awareness in the universe? It leads us towards a shallow form of panexperientialism.

[mystex]

In a way, that's true. The gaps are part and parcel of being conscious. To be conscious is to be conscious of "things", with gaps automatically inserted in between each thing.

Would you say that because of these gaps there is room for error? (experience may aid in such error)

Good.

Through experience and intuition, I know that there are people who know more and see more than others. Natural selection is based on this principle.

Only through sleight of hand.
How do I know that causality is the only possible explanation? Because there is nothing deeper than causality. Because it is logical in nature.

There are tricks for various purposes which I'm not fully aware of.

Both is good, so long as one isn't fooled by either. Science is interesting and important, but it is powerless to resolve philosophical issues.

First and foremost, it's important to be well grounded.

The main problem of our modern age is that people only know science (leaving aside the idiocy of religion for the moment). They know nothing of philosophic wisdom and conclude that because science can't resolve ultimate issues nothing can.

Appearances can be deceiving.

In truth, we are still living in the Dark Ages.

I don't believe so. I'm sure we've made some progress since then.

Quite the reverse, wisdom is the omniscience which can see into all.

Yes, but that doesn't mean it's immuned from some sort of petty error. Getting an alarm/security system for the house is ok especially when one's been violated in the past, but there's no need to go overboard. However, some suspicion is healthy.

Consciousness isn't inexplicable. As with anything else, it is a phenomenon that has arisen naturally through its causes.

The deeper we delve, the more is revealed to us. (i.e. think of an ocean, with one diver, and a single flashlight... Now think of several divers - further - think of what happens when you drop a dark substance into a glass of water ...)

The problem that people have with consciousness is that they try to integrate what they experience as consciousness with unconscious things like neurons, hormones, electrical impulses, feedback loops, and the like. They just can't marry all these things together in their minds. They don't realize that it can't be done in that manner, and that the issue is purely imagined to begin with.

I'm not entirely sure of what you're saying there..."manner"?

If consciousness is change itself, then how could consciousness arise in the first place?

This is why if AI is ever going to be possible, it'll be sometime in the far future. I'm optimistic by entertaining the idea that it may eventually be proven possible.

I agree with you that memory is integral to consciousness, to the point that consciousness would be unable to exist without it.

There's an ocean of memory with various lessons learned, etc...

It is through memory that we are able to establish a consistent identity through time, to which everything we experience in the world forms a relationship.

Good.

Wouldn't that be a case of passing the "problem" along to other areas, without actually resolving it?

Still scratching the surface I see.

I'd say it would be very unlikely. Maybe in a few centuries time, our computers and robots will be conscious (i.e. on a par with what we know to be consciousness).

According to my intuition, consciousness is an organic thing with intimate ties to the physiology and abilities of the organism in question. For example, the sophistication of our own consciousness is in proportion to the dexterity of our hands and complexity of our speech faculties. Given that a computer is a contrived, inert thing designed primarily to "crunch numbers", which cannot fend for itself or run away in the face of danger, whatever consciousness it does have would have to be very limited.

Limited in what respect? Perhaps the suffering is amplified/exemplified in some.

The brain too is just an object of consciousness and hence part of the subjective illusion.

I completely understand this.

Objectivity is often lacking in people when it comes investigating consciousness, which embroils them in all sorts of imaginary "dilemmas".

Yes, I must agree.

There is nothing mysterious about it in the slightest.

You can't be serious!

[maestro]

If consciousness is change itself, then how could consciousness arise in the first place?

In its bare bones form, excluding the mind and memory is it not change itself.
If consciousness is change itself then it is ever present, never lost.

[brokenhead]

While it is true that, scientifically, the existence of consciousness is a challenging problem, no amount of scientific explanation will ever bridge the apparent gap between what we experience as consciousness and our models of it.

Even if we were to devise the most brilliant, sophisticated, irrefutable model of consciousness, there will always remain that gap. It is the gap between our own subjective awareness and any object perceived with it, which can never be closed.

But since that gap is true for literally everything, then consciousness has that in common with everything, even all things which we perceive as somehow simpler both in form and function.

There are many things for which we collectively have devised very successful models. Models can be successful either for their predictive powers, for their consistency as compared to less appealing models, or their intrinsic beauty and/or simplicity (which are often in fact the same thing.)

That gap almost seems negligible in many models of other objects. But with consciousness, it often seems as if it itself is the gap. That is, in trying to say what consciousness "really is" we are ignoring the fact that it is necessary for the modelling of every other object. Consciousness is required to perceive the object, but it is also required to perceive the model since consciousness has literally created the model in the first place. When it itself is the object, then all we have is the gap. The gap is an assumed part of every model of objects in our experience, except when the object is the gap.

Consciousness is maddening if you dwell on it, as early QM theorists discovered. For the first time in the history of Western science the gap was part of the model. That consciousness caused the breakdown of the wave function is part of the theory, but what it actually is has never been an accepted (agreed upon) part of the the theory.

[brokenhead]

Would you say that because of these gaps there is room for error? (experience may aid in such error)

In my view, these gaps actually ensure error. Just as our perception of a thing is not the thing, any model of any thing cannot be the thing by the very fact that it is a model.

On the other hand, sometimes there is more than one model for a thing. It is logically consistent to examine a model and its implications and thereby consider the model as an object in its own right, completely divorced from the thing for which it has been devised to explain. Sometimes an alternative model - conceived entirely separately - can be mathematically demonstrated to be equivalent to the original model. In this case we have two different models that imply precisely the same things so thereby imply each other. It may be thought of as "If and only if model A then model B." In this case there is no "gap" if either model is considered to be an object under investigation.

But then this is simply ignoring the gap - and therefore irreducible error - between either model and the phenomena which it describes.

[brokenhead]

If consciousness is change itself, then how could consciousness arise in the first place?

In its bare bones form, excluding the mind and memory is it not change itself.
If consciousness is change itself then it is ever present, never lost.

I find myself disagreeing that consciousness is change itself. Change is something directly perceivable. Indeed, it is difficult to be awake and not be aware of some change occurring. Yet consciousness itself is not directly perceivable because it is itself involved in the perception. It is like you view an object without directly perceiving your eyeballs.

I think the first step in successful meditation is coming to the realization that consciousness and change are distinctly different things. The common metaphor is that one attempts to still the surface of the water. Any slight thing impinging on that surface creates ripples, and the sensation of movement and change. But the search for the eternal, the perfect, and the consequently changeless requires a deep conviction that such a state of awareness is possible under certain favorable conditions. One is seeking the direct experience that change is in fact illusory in nature. If it changes, then it must be an illusion on some level.

[David Quinn]

I was involved in a very long thread on the subject of causality being universally true.

Someone had posted the question "Who are we and why are we here?"

I chose to focus on one word from the question; the word "why".

The word why appeals to one of two temporal references to an event. It refers to either an antecedent cause or a predetermined effect (i.e. purpose). This alone implies a causal and predetermined nature for reality. The next 380 posts were pretty much a reiteration of this simple fact. Though I demonstrated that the mind and our understanding of the world depends on contiguity and hence causality, many wondered how this disproves discontiguous/non-causal events in the universe. My response was that it doesn't, but it makes understanding any such events impossible and such events should not be assailable to the human intellect. Nevertheless no one agreed with me. They'd much rather believe in the unintelligible in order to assert free-will in political discourse.

The mere fact that the principle of causality is almost never spoken about, whether it be in general converstaion, or in schools, or in religious discourses, or in science, or even in academic treatises (except when they try and refute it), even though everyone intuitively understands that the world operates by cause and effect, indicates that the human race has a deep fear of it. Everything is done, subconsciously, to keep it out of mind.

But I think there is a point to this, maybe some things are not comprehensible.

Don't give up too easily. Push the causal line of enquiry to the very end.

"Qualia" is kinda difficult to describe. Qualia, or Quale (Singular), are thought to be the "atoms" of awareness, the smallest indivisible chunk of awareness. But its more or less just a quaint term for referring to a specific phenomena. The phenomena of awareness. It does not refer to any content of awareness, but the phenomena of awareness itself. Of course particular content is often referred to as qualia. Because qualia are considered to be the smallest atoms of perception they might hypothetically all have content. But the core issue is why they constitute awareness.

Inventing "qualia" is too contrived and abstract to be of any real use. All it does is create more meaningless dilemmas. That might make the academics happy, but it's the wrong approach if you actually want to resolve the issue.

To explain better and to explain why there seems to be a problem. Why should a set of neurons so configured constitute qualia, yet the information stored on a hard-drive does not?

Why does a fire erupt in one bundle of wood and not another?

Ultimately it becomes a question of what are the physical correlates of chunks of consciousness. Dan Dennett likes to call this "material dualism" because it still considers qualia a separate phenomena from the physical brain. His Multiple Drafts Theory kinda parallels what you were saying David, if I understood correctly. It has to be the answer to me, that some redrafting of an event is the conscious part. Several experiments have shown conscious awareness lags behind most of brain processing.

Yes, everything we experience is a redrafting. When we look at a mountain, the brain is constructing the experience out of the electronic impulses that it receives through the senses and nervous system.

Moreover, there is no compelling need for the brain to construct an exact replica of what is "out there". A creative representation that is sufficient for our survival needs is good enough.

As an analogy, a radar in a fighter plane has no need to replicate what is out there. A few simple shapes will do.

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