Hard problem of consciousness

we will figure it out when we figure out how a neuron works in precise quantum physical detail.

Pardon my English, not my first language. I've studied science, particularly neuropsychology and physics, for a good chunk of my life and more recently invested myself in the relevant philosophies. I feel that most scientists, even in the mental sciences, are grossly ignorant of what it actually is they're studying.

There is no hard problem of consciousness.

When we describe physical objects such as atoms and neurons, we're not referring to the actual concrete things but rather quantifiable abstract dimensionally extended patterns which we surmise indirectly both theoretically (pure logic) and empirically (scientific method of observation aka neuronal interaction with the environment).

The only concrete, direct actuality we can speak of is experience itself, which we describe qualitatively. What it is like to be rather than how it is structured. Qualitative concepts are categorically different than quantitative ones, so it's completely bizarre that people still try to explain consciousness physically. It is entirely possible, and in my opinion probable, that qualitative experience requires a particular physical structure, one that is computationally self reflective. I'd recommend Hofstadter to get an intro to what I'm referring to. But to ask how quality comes from atoms is to not understand what atoms are.

Perhaps someone with better English can translate what I'm trying to get out if I've not been completely unintelligible.

It is the illusions themselves we refer to...

You're chicken analogy implies there is a true chicken to compare against. Can you describe a true consciousness to compare against?

I don't think he mentioned himself being a chicken?

No shit.

>humans are not really conscious, but merely emulate the behaviors a conscious thing would have.

He needs to either cite and/or define what a real consciousness is that everything is pretending to have. I can cite and define what a real chicken is.

You're wasting your time with OP and his ilk. Their thoughts are typified by circular causal logic.

What Is it Like to Be a Bat?

You need to characterise the difference between objective and subjective experience.

Not the other poster but
>define what a real consciousness
Reminder that philosophy majors do not belong on Veeky Forums

Answer this OP

those vibrations are what makes consciousness.

No shit

>humans are not really conscious, but merely emulate the behaviors a conscious thing would have.

You want science? What the fuck would I test for in this statement? I'll just take a sample of emulated consciousness and and look for qualitative and quantitative similarities with natural organically grown consciousness.

>your argument is unfalsifiable and therefore invalid.
Actually I think you'll more likely find subjective experience is what is in fact unfalsifiable and invalid.

Fuck, I forgot how dumb Veeky Forums could be sometimes.

very witty

Why do we have this thread every week?

Because it's an interesting question that bears resolving.

It's not my job to come up with grounds for your argument in quantifiable terms, it's yours if you're dumb enough to make an argument as complex as the one you're suggesting and actually think it holds weight especially on a board full of autists who major mainly in math and engineering.

Philosophy majors

This is not compatible with evidence though. You make reality comply with ideology instead of making ideology comply with reality

Are you fucking dense? I'm not making any argument at all. I'm asking how the fuck does OP's statement making any god damned sense.

fuarkin noice b8 m8

there is no consciousness. what do you think the 9 months in your moms belly were for? the DNA describes how your body and your brain are build. your brain is preformatted. thats why all humans are alike. only a few minor changes are made from human to human, which is important for diversity (see evolution).

always keep in mind that your consciousness is simply neurons and electrons floating around in your brain, just like the electrons and transistors in your computer form logic.

The way I think it - is how systems are made in nature - like the first from of life, unicellular - it's a fully independent, secluded and functional system that uses information and stores it - then there's signs of intelligence later on.

Mainly life arise because under special conditions organic compounds were formed and they interact with each other as the universe dictated, but then that life was able to evolve, adapt - and become very complex systems that could comprehend environment and devise strategies...

HOW THE FUCK is universe dead or fundamentally alive.

You're right except I wouldn't say 'emulating consciousness' because it gives hard problem / dualism fags the sense you're admitting 'consciousness' exists on some level. I would just say 'consciousness' is a sloppy suitcase word for a bunch of different physical behaviors that we speak about in terms of non-physical otherworld magic because of the illusions of immediacy, detail, and continuity. In reality the data we get from our sense organs isnt immediate, detailed, or continuous but we're compelled to behave as though they are so that it's surprising when on closer inspection we find out what we thought was 'there' is really just a report that tells us something was there in a vague and abstracted way. When asked to imagine an object of some sort we can reliably ask followup questions about details of the objects structure and position to reveal the subject never really had an image of the thing in the first place so much as a reporting behavior where they say they're 'imagining'. Same deal with eye tracking and change blindness experiments, people believe they're seeing everything around them when actually they're oblivious to most everything except a small point of focus.

For every case where someone 'really is' having a deep / vivid subjective 'experience' suppose there's an externally identical case where someone has no such 'experience' and is merely compelled to behave / report in the same way. Then realize you would never have any way of knowing if you were the second case instead of the first since you would be compelled to behave as though you believe you are the first case. Then realize all of our evidence on reported 'experience' suggests a huge difference between what people believe they 'experienced' vs. what actually happened to them. Then realize the second case explains all of our behavior without needing to appeal to the cartesian dualism that most everyone today recognizes as a nonsensical idea. Then you'll understand why 'qualia' and the 'hard problem' are really just misunderstandings of our purely physical reporting behaviors.

>But, being atoms, we're fundamentally incapable of actually being conscious entities.
One would think being made of atoms would be a requisite, rather than a disqualifier.

You guys are only having this discussion because you believe on some level that consciousness is magic or spiritual so you feel the urge to explain it's in fact a illusion of some sort.

Consciousness is essentially magic.

>hurr here look at this assortment of lego blocks; because of their particular arrangement they've become aware of the world around them
In no way is this not equivalent to magic. It makes no difference to use lego blocks, atoms, or stones.

>we have consciousness
I feel real myself, but how do I know you're real?

they never do

all they do is spout a fountain of muh-muh-muh-feelings

But why would anyone care?

Consciousness is not a boolean, and for that matter, is everyone here working off a similar definition of what consciousness is?
Consciousness: The state of being conscious or aware.
I am conscious of the fact that op is a fag.
>to ask how quality comes from atoms is to not understand what atoms are.
based
I'm sorry user. You forced my hand. I have to sound like a scrub brained hippy now; We are the universe becoming alive and self aware.
Are you saying that we need dualism is needed to be truly self aware? What it sounds like you are saying is so stupid I can't really believe it is being said. People are mechanical systems that are self aware.
The way you know you are experiencing things is by experiencing them. If you are experiencing imaginings of words that have pointers to other words that have pointers to meaning you are still experiencing things: imagined words.
If I say imagine a circle, and you imagine the word 'circle' you haven't gone too far off of what I asked, but you're going to have some trouble finding the circumference of the word 'circle'

Nonsense.

Are you negating your own sensations? If you have sensations you are conscious. The hard problem consists of explaining why we have subjective experiences, We have a consciousness. The question is whether or not our sensations have a subjective dimension.

Is qualia real or not, basically.

I like you. If you assume the material world is real and you are made from it, than it's really easy to extend that assumption to include everyone being real. Plus it makes life way better.

>Are you negating your own sensations? If you have sensations you are conscious.
But do I have sensations or do I mistakenly believe what I have to be sensations?

qualia is the sensory being processed. We can assume safely that everyone has it. We can assume that it will be similar based on how base an experience it is. Words are a way of trying to convey it to another person, although they kinda suck, I believe we will get smarter as people, and make our languages better.

What are you trying to refer to when you say 'sensation'?

You actually believe it's magic and then argument against it being magic - but your logic fails there, you started from a puerile assumption all along.

You also interpret awareness as something external and self-actualized in the universe like a field or something, it's just a complex process nothing more, it arise from the brain not the brain catches it as you imply, or even more comical as you said earlier - the brain knows it exists somewhere and it imitates it for survival...

>as you said earlier - the brain knows it exists somewhere and it imitates it for survival...
I struggle to fathom a less accurate reading of what I posted lol. Is this bait? I'm being baited, aren't I? In the future try to make it less plain if so.

My point is very simply that there seems no mechanism by which simple matter can generate subjective experiences, and that therefore the logical conclusion is that our intuition - that we have subjective experiences - must be false.

Who cares? You need consciousness to believe.

Tell me more about your special matter then.

>I don't know how awareness works therefore it must be absolutely false that we have it.

I'd say that a conscious being can never know if any other being is conscious aside from itself, it can only assume something is conscious because it seems to be
in other words you could be the single human player in a universe of NPCs

>I don't understand how you can get AIDS so my intuition that I have AIDS must be false.

Yes, you are having sensations. You can make the crude distinction between the state of being (not-being) before your own birth and the state of being you are in right now. The difference is one also one of difference of sensation... I highly doubt that you are experience your own existences in the same as you would had you not been born.

>Yes, you are having sensations.
But am I? Humans' purported self-knowledge is not necessarily reliable.

It's well possible I'm a mere signal processor like a router or something; and an arrogant one to boot.

Are you saying you could be fooling me into thinking you are aware? Are you saying you could be fooling yourself into thinking you are aware?
Either way, I'm aware that you are aware of the word 'I' If you just meditate on that word for a while you will become more aware of your self, but having that word and using is enough to prove to me that you are self aware.

ITT: Americans being baited.

Didn't american schools teach you philosophy, user?

Doesn't matter. Take your current state of perceiving your surrounding and let that be called 'sensations', basically your perception of things. If perception = sensations, then the lack of sensations is also the lack of perception. You have no sensory input at all if you are lacking sensations. Are you currently in a state of non-existence? If no, you are having sensations. It doesn't matter if you are a brain in a vat, or that you are not perceiving the world as it truly is... all that matters is that you are perceiving something.

Gosh I was feeling kinda depressed about not having a reliable way of determining moral action, and being on the cusp of giving up on trying to help mankind and just doing wagecuck and intellectual hedonism. But then I came to this thread and got reminded that I have self awareness. Life is fucking awesome.

ITT: Babby's first cogito

>Are you saying you could be fooling yourself into thinking you are aware?
Yes, quite.

Man, if only we had a catchy meme-like way to sum that up.
I am perceiving something and I conclude I exist...
Something along those lines.

Then you are thinking, so you are conscious.

I think the problem might be that you are letting too much of your thinking happen in words. In language it is possible to get a contradiction like this.
People fool themselves about things. Me being conscious is a thing. Therefore I could be fooling myself about this!
But if you actually try to think about not being aware you will surely find yourself being a mind aware of it's attempt to think about thinking it is aware even though it is not. Then you can just factor out the other stuff and find your answer: yourself being aware.

Are you telling me that you can exist without being?

No, you cannot conclude that you exist just because you are perceiving something. You can however conclude that you are perceiving something, if you are in fact perceiving something.

If you in turn are perceiving yourself perceiving, you can conclude that you are in fact perceiving yourself perceiving. We label these state of affairs as follows:

Perceiving something = consiousness.
Perceiving yourself perceiving (something) = self-awareness.

If there are no state of affairs then you cannot perceive anything. Thus, you cannot conclude that you are in fact perceiving something, nor that you are in fact perceiving yourself perceiving. The question is not whether or not you exist, the question is whether or not you have a consiousness or not. The only way to conclude that you have a consiousness is if you have a consiousness in the first place, i.e. that particular state of affairs does in fact exist.

I can exist even if there are no perception. I cannot on the other hand say that I have something, i.e. a property that do not exist.

Tell me how something you have never seen looks like?

A few fundamental forces and a literal shit ton of energy was enough to create all the complexities of the universe, including life, as we know them. All that is good and well, but consciousness is where you draw the line?

You're right, it's not debatable. We have the science necessary to explain exactly why there is no such thing as consciousness, but it's just so damned hard for people to accept much like at one time it was hard to accept Earth would not be the center of the universe, not even the solar system. Much like even to this day, many people don't want to accept that we're descended from primates.

Consciousness is nothing more than an emergent property of intelligence, and enough stimulus. It's an illusion that we have a word for, much like free will. Just like a rat is poorly equipped to understand the limitations and workings of its own brain, we're having difficulties doing the same to ourselves from an outside point of view.

He was making a joke about cogito ergo sum, i.e. i think therefore i am/exist.

>We have the science necessary to explain exactly why there is no such thing as consciousness

You are conflating the premises of science with the findings of science. Science investigates objective and observable/measurable phenomena. Obviously it's not able to investigate consciousness, which is subjective. An outside observer can't observe consciousness. It's simply a problem with the method, but the method is not the same as actual reality.

Why are consciousness an illusion? Because it is an emergent property of intelligence, and enough stimulus? Makes no sense to call it an illusion just because of that. If consciousness is an emergent property of intelligence, and enough stimulus, then that is what consciousness is. So it is per definition not an illusion because we do not ascribe an attribute to consciousness which it does in fact not have.

No, I got that. I assumed the reason why he made the joke was because he thought I was expressing a similar sentiment as Descartes. I do not.

This isn't really an illusion tho. It's just an illusion.

>How is it possible that a vibrating mess of atoms becomes conscious?
well, why would it not?

I never understood this or why it is such a big "problem"

Because we are completely unable to explain how sensations acquire characteristics.

>You can however conclude that you are perceiving something, if you are in fact perceiving something.
This thread is kinda cool. It drives anons to say perfectly true, but hilarious things like this.
>Tell me how something you have never seen looks like?
This part of your argument isn't so good though, cause I'm pretty happy making inferences. The inside of my floor looks like a bunch of old wooden beams. I've never seen them, but I know they look like the many wooden beams I've seen.
I can totally observe consciousness. Conscious things can pretend not to be conscious, but unconscious things can not pretend to be conscious.
>Consciousness is nothing more than an emergent property of intelligence, and enough stimulus. It's an illusion that we have a word for
What did user mean by this?

What am I supposed to see?

...and this is A and not-A.

It sounds like you do. I think you're tsundere for descartes.

>completely unable
pretty sure sensations are explained quite well. what do you mean?

>I can totally observe consciousness. Conscious things can pretend not to be conscious, but unconscious things can not pretend to be conscious.

You can only observe behaviour, not consciousness.

Yes, but I said "how sensations acquire characteristics".

This:

No we aren't... matter interacts with other matter. Systems are built from those interactions.
I was going to insult you're intelligence, but actually I find this topic of discussion really cool.
Nice dubs btw.
... and op isn't really a faggot. They're just a faggot.

>The inside of my floor looks like a bunch of old wooden beams

Haha. Not what I asked you to do. You are making an inductive inference based on prior experiences.Describe a non-existent object, which are not composed of objects you have already encountered. You cannot do this, because it is considered impossible.

see

Assuming consciousness from behaviour is not observing consciousness.

>matter interacts with other matter. Systems are built from those interactions.
This is a non-explanation. How does material interactions cause these characteristics of sensations?

I'm wondering if you just don't see this as a problem because you don't read. Are you familiar with the literature?

I know. Still dont know what you mean. It is the "completely unable" part that irks me

>This is a non-explanation
why?
>How does material interactions cause these characteristics of sensations?
Very complex neuroscientific processes

plato.stanford.edu/entries/consciousness/#ExpQueHowConExi
consc.net/papers/facing.html

The point is that our definition of consciousness - at least the cultural definition - has similar connotations as the concept of a soul: In short, something so vastly unique and special, that it's seemingly supernatural. I'm not going to go over the why's of it point by point, but you get my meaning, I'm sure.

What I'm saying, then, is that consciousness is not anything like that at all, it's not even all that hard to define, really. As you increase the capacity and performance of any neural network or intelligence enough, it will move from simple basic instincts, into reasoning and memory not unlike the lower primates. Increase it even further, and it will become able to understand the concept of time, past, and future.. cause and effect. Together with the reasoning skills and memory, this higher intelligence now has the ability for far more complex thinking, and will become able to create and test concepts and their consequences in the mind itself, by simulating what they know the reality is like. It has the ability to reflect, to conceptualize, and to understand and handle abstract information. All of the above would invariably evolve into something like what we experience as consciousness. A simulation, if you will, of the intelligence studying itself and its surroundings.

So that consciousness is just an unavoidable illusion of what is ultimately the byproduct of an extremely powerful biological computer simply doing its calculations and acting upon them as they have been programmed to.

Just as the hardware that is the brain is the product of genetics, its neurological structure and chemical balance... the software that is your personality knowledge and experience was all programmed by all the previous stimuli in your life.

We are all, essentially, nothing more than an extremely complex reflex to the lessons of life, as interpreted by a supercomputer.

>the literature
What's "the literature" you are referring to?
Also, how is this a non-explanation? It's an extremely broad overview, and it makes the assumption that minds are matter based, rather than minds being the base of the universe.
Are you asking why red looks red? that's the feel of red flowing into the part of your mind that discerns red.

It's not a byproduct. They are the same thing.

>Very complex neuroscientific processes
That's not really an explanation though. Saying 'the brain does it' is not a description of the mechanism by which matter can be conscious.

>The cs people are getting real close to making computers think... I didn't think it was possible because qualia/dualism/soul/etc.
"Does that mean we can create machines with qualia/dualism/soul/etc?"
>no, it probably means that humans are mindless machines like computers.
It kinda seems like the question you are asking is answered by "go study brain science"
Surely you must know that the detail that can be explained in a single thread on Veeky Forums is not the same as prolonged study on a subject.

Yeah, I know this. I just dont see what the real deal is. There are many progresses in neuroscience and we are getting closer and closer to understand how the brain functions. Some of the points are just philosophical circlejerk and can be explained by the consciuosness being pretty much an illusion

*big deal

>A few fundamental forces and a literal shit ton of energy was enough to create all the complexities of the universe, including life, as we know them. All that is good and well, but consciousness is where you draw the line?

^This exactly. It's pretty obvious what's going on when you consider this supposedly mysterious, non-physical, 'hard problem' topic people make such a big deal about is their own appraisal of themselves as a phenomenon. That's a pretty huge bias there to want to inflate what this phenomenon is. Much more likely than it really meriting an explanation that goes beyond the ones that account for everything else in the physical universe is that we're just physical structures like everything else and we're compelled to speak as though our behavior is a 'hard problem' because we're biased towards interpretations that make us out to be much more important than we are.

Atoms don't need 'free will' or consciousness to direct their movement. We can tell how they will move by applying formulae of physics. If the parts are going to move the same way per physics regardless of any ghostly intervention from 'you' then we can safely consider these ideas convenient fictions of reporting behavior rather than actual forces. Just because you think you see something doesn't mean anything more than the fact you were compelled to engage in the behavior of acting and speaking in response to stimuli. There is no need to suppose there was an 'experience' of sight on top of those behaviors. It's good enough for your brain to just make you act and report as though the convenient fiction were a real thing.

>consciousness
Doesnt exist. Please go back to /x/ with this spiritual nonsense.

Well, yes. Exactly this. I'm putting that on the late night, thanks for fixing it for me.

>consciousness is an illusion

This again? This doesn't explain anything because it's contradictory. An illusion is an experience that doesn't correspond to reality. If you experience an illusion you are still experiencing, so consciousness exists and doesn't exist.