/sci/ - Science & Math

[Anonymous No.10275521]

Can there ever be a purely physical account of consciousness, /sci/?

[Anonymous No.10275523]

>Can there ever be a purely physical account of consciousness, /sci/?
define "consciousness"

[Anonymous No.10276086]

>>10275521
What do you mean by physical?
>>10275523
Defining consciousness is unnecessary. We can all point out what it is.

[neutermind !GxD0yjEx7M No.10276090]

>tfw when you're the lotto win human.

A world wide dream is charging up for me as I use a mind computer to profit from other people's stray imagination.

[Anonymous No.10276091]

>bro, it's magic!

[neutermind !GxD0yjEx7M No.10276092]

or another reply could be

ignorance is a purely physical consciousness.

[neutermind !GxD0yjEx7M No.10276102]

you have the attention of the universe; the universe, theoretically, is interested in you .

Our consciousnesses only exist because we have the universe's consciousness-type, the universe may not be the same conscious.

My study of the universe suggests it is a powerful consciousness; why not like ditto, the pokemon; the luckiest species?

[Anonymous No.10276104]

>>10276086
No, defining “consciousness” is very necessary, because it’s a word. Words don’t have innately known definitions.

I’ll assume you mean consciousness is “subjective awareness”, in which case, yes, science can presumably figure that out.

[Anonymous No.10276106]

>>10275521
It can be something that emerge from the physical.

[Anonymous No.10276112]

>>10275521
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/7DmA3yWwa6AT5jFXt/zombies-redacted

[Anonymous No.10276115]

>>10276104
We all know that OP means qualia. Dont fucking pretend thats not obvious.

[Anonymous No.10276117]

>>10276115
The idea of “NPCs” is in vogue with the peopel that spill out of /pol/ so just making sure.

[neutermind !GxD0yjEx7M No.10276119]

>>10276117
>>10276115
>>10276112
>>10276106
samefag.

[Anonymous No.10276121]

>>10276086
schizos need concrete proof that they aren't god with amnesia

[Anonymous No.10276122]

>>10276119
wrong.

[Anonymous No.10276125]

>>10276119
Nope.

>>10276117
>>10276104

This is me. Please prove your claim that I am also that other person. I’ll wait.

[Anonymous No.10276126]

your thread doesnt include any thing scientific nor mathematical

[Anonymous No.10276127]

>>10275521
not likely, the best it can do is explain 100% how p-zombies work, but the qualia part will remain unsolved

[Anonymous No.10276132]

>>10276127
P-zombies don’t work. They’re not real.

[Anonymous No.10276163]

>>10276132
Yeah but they show a logical gap.

[Anonymous No.10276175]

>>10276163
.......No. Consciousness is merely due to physical processes, and p-zombies can’t exisf because making one would require making a brain, so it’d just be conscious too.

[Anonymous No.10276183]

>>10276175
retard
we're talking about the explanation mechanism, not the brain
the best science can do is explain the brain as a p-zombie
the final qualia step is beyond science

a crude analogy would be that science can break a piano down to its smallest parts, but can't actually find the music

[Anonymous No.10276190]

>>10276183
No? The brain is the meat lump within which consciousness resides. It’s not a “p-zombie” in any sense. The “music” is the constantly-running neural activity, which is actually really easy to find.

[Anonymous No.10276200]

>>10276190
>constantly-running neural activity
and why is that "red" or "sweet" etc.?

science doesn't have a clue

[Anonymous No.10276201]

>>10276183
Poor example, music can be scientifically studied and characterized. It can "find" the music by using the piano as it was intended to be ued, generation of music is something science can analyze through rhythm, melody, etc. but to use the mind does not produce anything tangible that can be studied beyond locating what regions of the brain are active during different tasks, but this work does not explain the difference between consciousness and cognition.

[Anonymous No.10276204]

>>10276201
>Poor example
https://www.tfd.com/crude

[Anonymous No.10276207]

>>10276204
By self admission that your example is poor, why bother using it?

[Anonymous No.10276214]

>>10276207
why react to it?

[Anonymous No.10276220]

>>10276200
”red” is visible light with a wavelength of 625–740 nanometers. It has unique qualia associated with it because the cones of our eyes are sensitive enough to differentiate it from other wavelengths.

“Sweet” is a form of chemoreception qualia that comes from the tongue. Our taste buds differentiate it from other forms of sensory stimulation, so it is felt as a unique sensation. You might as well ask how a camera can differentiate between red light and green light.

>science doesn't have a clue

It does, actually, as I just explained, but it’s entirely possible, probable even, that future neuroscientists will better explain and understand the mechanisms of consciousness. Certainly better than Descartes ever did.

[Anonymous No.10276226]

>>10276201
That’s not true. We can already reconstruct images from neural activity. The same principle suggests sound and smell can be extracted from the neuromass.

[Anonymous No.10276232]

>>10276220
>625–740 nanometers
why doesn't that create the sensation of "green"

[Anonymous No.10276235]

>>10276232
You could switch them and there’d be no causal effect whatsoever, so who knows?

[Anonymous No.10276238]

>>10276235
>so who knows
not science
Q.E.D.

[neutermind !GxD0yjEx7M No.10276241]

>>10276220
red touches the eyes so there is a sensation in mind with is like red lazer. shut upp

[Anonymous No.10276242]

>>10276238
Yes, we don’t know right now. Are you trying to make a point?

[Anonymous No.10276246]

>>10276242
yes, >>10276127

[Anonymous No.10276247]

>>10276241
What?

[Anonymous No.10276249]

>>10276246
Then you’ve failed. We don’t know right now does not and never will equate to “we will never

[Anonymous No.10276252]

>>10275521
A conscious being is an object which can perform calculations. The act of performing calculations is what is called "subjective experience".

[Anonymous No.10276254]

>>10276249
seeing the truth isn't failing

[neutermind !GxD0yjEx7M No.10276259]

>>10276247
the color red (if looking at the balloon i posted) is also on the surface of your eye on focus; it's light, or matter, distinguishable as red, literally touches your eye, so you have the essence of red in your head; especially direct; through the propogation of light.

[Anonymous No.10276260]

>>10276254
You haven’t demonstrated its the truth, though, only pointed out a gap in current scientific knowledge.

I coin a new term.
Dualism of the gaps.

[Anonymous No.10276264]

>>10276259
ok, what about the inverse us flag illusion
where is the red coming from ?

[Anonymous No.10276268]

>>10276259
Yes, essentially. Sensory receptor receives information. It sends it to brain. Brain processes information, potentially storing for later in memory.

[Anonymous No.10276271]

>>10276264
Our sensory mechanisms and brains are imperfect. I only see the red when the image is minimized, and it gets weaker the larger the image is, so this suggests some physiological issue.

[Anonymous No.10276281]

>>10276260
It's a bad gap - no one has even the slightest clue what to even try to measure, it's not a limitation of money or technology.

And before you dream of new mystery particles or forces, here's a cold shower:
https://youtu.be/x26a-ztpQs8?t=21m

[Anonymous No.10276283]

>>10276264
Have you considered seeing if such an illusion affects someone that has never seen an American flag in their life? I suspect some attempt at “correction” is taking place. The brain does that a lot.

[Anonymous No.10276284]

>>10276220
It's been a really long time and so far Descartes still has the best explanation though, so I'm not sure why you are shitting on him.

[Anonymous No.10276291]

>>10276281
No, it’s just a gap. I never suggested any new particles or forces.

Dualism of the gaps strikes yet again

[Anonymous No.10276293]

>>10276284
No, his explanation is long-refuted. Subjective awareness has a causal effect on reality.

Some dusty old philosopher pales in comparison to basic neurology.

[Anonymous No.10276295]

>>10275521
Consciousness is surprisingly similar as life. Imagine a bactaria. You cannot tell what organell makes them alive, and do organells each have individual "life energy". They do not have them in a physical sense. But more like an emergent property that evolution made. As a result, we cannot measure life quantitatively, but can measure qualitatively. Same goes for consciousness. There is not a single part in your brain that makes one conscious. Its an emergent property and just like we can make an artificial life in computer, we can make artificial consciousness by mimicking crucial functions of biological brain.

[Anonymous No.10276296]

>>10276220
Stop strawmanning everyone you piece of shit. you arent addressing anyones questions about the hard problem, only the easy. Fucking mongoloid trogolodyte scum.

[Anonymous No.10276300]

>>10276296
Triggered. What hard problem is there? I don’t see one at all. Information goes to brain. Brain processes. Subjective awareness is the brain’s activity. “We don’t know why certain information causes certain types of qualia” is a silly thing to get befuddled about and wave around as some massive failure of materialism.

[Anonymous No.10276304]

>>10276283
you seriously think this doesn't work with a blob?
did your parents drop you on the floor when you were a baby?

[Anonymous No.10276306]

>>10276291
>Dualism of the gaps
meaningless

[Anonymous No.10276307]

>>10276291
Its not just gap. its a higher order gap. gaps exist in physics but its very easy to construct plausible theories to fill themand this happens all the time. this is not the case in this issue. ill also point out youre being fellatious as the cocksucker you are by failing to realise this isnt just about explaining the physical world scientifically but also conceptualising it philosophically - this is imperative given that the physical world is convoluted by our subjectivity and vice versa.

[Anonymous No.10276308]

>>10276304
I don’t see any red on that image, except for a bit of yellow at the top right, a bit off the corner, with green around it. I think that’s just part of the image and not an illusion. Why are you even bringing up optical illusions? We know the brain can be tricked.

[Anonymous No.10276312]

>>10276300
Define subjective awareness. Define the mental processes. Youre underdetermining the problem by failing to elucidate those concepts into your model of the world. you are only trying to correlate them. The point is data goes unexplained. If colour we see subjectively is not data then youre a thick brick cunt.

[Anonymous No.10276316]

>>10276308
>Why are you even bringing up optical illusions?
because it breaks the simpleton claim that frequency(Hz) = color

it's not that easy

[Anonymous No.10276318]

>>10276308
>except for a bit of yellow at the top right
idiot
you look at the blob intensely for 30sek, then look at something white

[Anonymous No.10276319]

>>10276264
the brain is designed to do this.

[Anonymous No.10276320]

>>10276307
>gaps exist in physics but its very easy to construct plausible theories to fill themand this happens all the time.

I eagerly await your revolutionary paper explaining the cause of the Big Bang. A billion Nobel prizes.
Please unite quantum mechanics and special relativity if you have time, since it’s “easy”.

>this is not the case in this issue.

>It’s hard to fill this gap so it’s unfillable

Genius.

>ill also point out youre being fellatious as the cocksucker you are by failing to realise this isnt just about explaining the physical world scientifically but also conceptualising it philosophically

Fallacious, you mean, and I’m well aware this is about qualia, not just the brain and rocks.

>this is imperative given that the physical world is convoluted by our subjectivity and vice versa.

Yes, I’m aware.

[Anonymous No.10276321]

>>10276316
Wavelength of light does equate to color, silly! That doesn’t mean optical illusions can’t exist.

[Anonymous No.10276325]

>>10276318
How am I supposed to know something you didn’t explain?

[Anonymous No.10276326]

>>10276325
during looking at white, where is the 4×10^14 Hz coming from?

[Anonymous No.10276329]

>>10276321
during looking at white, where is the 4×10^14 Hz coming from?

[Anonymous No.10276330]

>>10276312
Color is data, yes, and it is explained.

[Anonymous No.10276331]

>>10276264
the brain is designed to do this.

>>10276321
only because of the brain used to interpret it. despite the fact it is an optical illusion, the brain is working normally. colour isnt intrinsic to wavelength. its an extrinsic property espoused by the brain.

[Anonymous No.10276334]

>>10276321
all fire trucks are red, but all red vehicles aren't fire trucks

wavelength is one source of seeing colors, but illusions show there are other explanations too

[Anonymous No.10276335]

>>10276329
Ever heard of lateral inhibition?

[Anonymous No.10276336]

>>10276331
>designed to do this
explains nothing how it works

[Anonymous No.10276339]

>>10276335
is it a frequency?

[Anonymous No.10276341]

>>10276334
If only fire trucks were known to be red, we could say “all red vehicles are fire trucks”. The cones are only “supposed” to react to certain wavelengths of light but shit gets messy because of how the brain likes to make shortcuts

[Anonymous No.10276342]

>>10276121
philisophers need concrete proof they aren't schizos with a library card

[Anonymous No.10276343]

>>10276339
No, it’s a phenomenon of neurons where they inhibit the activity of their neighbors. It causes many optical illusions but also effects the tactile and auditory senses. Best example is the Mach Bands.

[Anonymous No.10276344]

>>10276341
so it's not just frequency?

[Anonymous No.10276348]

>>10276344
The sources of the colors are, but what comes out the other end is warped by neural phenomena.

[Anonymous No.10276352]

>>10276330
its not fully explained. we can explain the mechanisms necessary for colour experience as such but it has no explanatory basis as to why certainwavelengths are experienced as certain colours.


>I eagerly await your revolutionary paper explaining the cause of the Big Bang. A billion Nobel prizes.
>Please unite quantum mechanics and special relativity if you have time, since it’s “easy”.

easier... brainelet. the fact that there are many potential hypotheses shows they are easier. it shows we possess a language and research methodology to talk about those issues. the actual only real issue is empirical backing.

when it comes to qualia or experience this is not the case. as such the issue isnt empirical like the ones above. its about the framework of talking about it and uniting mental and material withojt people asking questions. it doesnt exist.

>>It’s hard to fill this gap so it’s unfillable
>Genius.
strawmanning AGAIN *Clap clap*. This is not my point at all. yes it might be in the future but pointing out unknown unknowns is fucking redundant. lets actually talk about the problem.

>Fallacious, you mean, and I’m well aware this is about qualia, not just the brain and rocks.
the fact i called you cocksucker doesnt suggest an intentional pun?

>>10276331

[Anonymous No.10276360]

>>10276352
>its not fully explained. we can explain the mechanisms necessary for colour experience as such but it has no explanatory basis as to why certainwavelengths are experienced as certain colours

No, you said data wasn’t explained. It is. It’s sensoey information in neurons. I do agree we don’t know why certain “signals” cause certain qualia.

>easier... brainelet. the fact that there are many potential hypotheses shows they are easier. it shows we possess a language and research methodology to talk about those issues. the actual only real issue is empirical backing.

You said theories, not hypothesis....backpedal.

>not likely, the best it can do is explain 100% how p-zombies work, but the qualia part will remain unsolved
>This is not my point at all. yes it might be in the future but pointing out unknown unknowns is fucking redundant. lets actually talk about the problem.

Backpedal.

[Anonymous No.10276374]

>>10276334
Regarding the colour debate most people here are missing out that most of the time its actually normal we dont necessarily perceive objects as the colour of the wavelengths reflecting off of them. The way light reflects off of objects is far more complicated but the brain has evolved to perceive objects as having constant colours across time and context as if they were independent of wavelength. In a way I think this actually shows that colour really isnt just about wavelength and wavelengths of light is an insufficient explanation as to why and how we use colour. When we talk about colour and wavelength its mostly woth regard to the retina and deeper in the brain it gets convoluted.

A similar argument can be said for contrast which reflects difference in brightness between areas and how this information comes into the brain. But contrast is also how we delineate different objects and in the brain youll find that neurons reacting to contrast do not do so in a way that reflects objective brightness.

[Anonymous No.10276377]

>>10276360
>we don’t know why certain “signals” cause certain qualia.
/thread

[Anonymous No.10276379]

>>10276374
Don’t screens of some kind use tiny pixels of different colors to produce a screen of a different color, because that’s the color those colors combine into? Completely forgotten the specific color it is.

[Anonymous No.10276387]

>>10276374
so the signal gets distorted on it's way into the brain, and then some more in the brain.
so what?
The question is, after the travel, how does chemical/electric activity rise to be an "experience", i.e. qualia?
Physics can some day explain every movement of every electron and proton involved but so what.

[Anonymous No.10276393]

>>10276387
We dunno. I don’t actually care, and most people don’t either. Unfalsifiable subjects are for pseuds to wonder about.

[Anonymous No.10276405]

>>10276360
>I do agree we don’t know why certain “signals” cause certain qualia.
which means its not fully explained and my point.

>You said theories, not hypothesis....backpedal
did i? doesnt matter id be using it synonymously im sure.


>>not likely, the best it can do is explain 100% how p-zombies work, but the qualia part will remain unsolved
>>This is not my point at all. yes it might be in the future but pointing out unknown unknowns is fucking redundant. lets actually talk about the problem.

I didnt write the first one and i dont get its connection to the second one and you clearly dont understand what i mean by unknown unknowms are redundant.

Face it. Youre a serial strawman autist who has been EXPOSED.

[Anonymous No.10276407]

>>10276405
No, we’ve actually exposed the travesty that is a lack of IDs on /sci/.

[Anonymous No.10276410]

>>10275521
Working on it
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9_iEg9mvCs

[neutermind !GxD0yjEx7M No.10276425]

In a simulate version of existence if you see red colour, then there is that 'hyper space', in your mind area that turns/blotches red when you see red or that contains a reflection of all that you saw. You can easily make a red color in your mind and see it in your mind's retina.
In our universe, this is constrained to biological stimulation - we are very, very alone.
How is chemical/electric activity qualia?

[Anonymous No.10276439]

>>10276264
Sorry mister, but I see no red. It is clearly blue and black...

[Anonymous No.10276441]

>>10276379
yes same how it works in the brain. trichromacy allows you to efficiently represent the spectrum of wavelengths/colours.


>>10276387
>so the signal gets distorted
i wouldnt say distorted at all. The brain i dont think is supposed to represent parameters of light explicitly. It just uses it as a language for describing the objects light reflects from.

I think its an ill-posed problem as even our scientific theories are actually just as mind-dependent as say colour. Im not sure the question can be answered.

>>10276407
ID?

[Anonymous No.10276459]

>>10276439
sigh. google it

[Anonymous No.10276559]

>>10276252
Does a calculator have subjective experience then, if you added a simple algorithm to it that forced it to do calculations on its own?

[Anonymous No.10276817]

>>10276112
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

[Anonymous No.10276824]

OVER
MINING

[Anonymous No.10276825]

>>10276121
What you’re saying is applicable as an own of idealists but I have no idea why you replied to the anon you did in this way. Maybe im just exhausted

[Anonymous No.10276877]

>>10276817
christ, we need to make basic metabolism and nutrition (at the biology level - not a normie dieting course) so that people realize there's no such thing as fat cells that "dont work", like jesus how do people not know that RMR variation among individuals is 1-7%, 10 at most in extreme cases