What do you think consciousness is?

[Mentat]

Originally posted by Jeebus
We could, of course, discount for these purposes the role of
mental qualities in sensing things. But that would undermine the
very distinction between being conscious of something by sensing it
and being conscious of that thing by having a thought about it. If
our awareness of our conscious states involves no characteristic
mental qualities, it is indistinguishable from our being conscious
of those states by our having thoughts of some suitable sort about
them.

We could or can conclude, then, that we are aware of our conscious
mental states not by sensing them, but by having thoughts about
them. To have a convenient label, I shall refer to the thoughts in
virtue of which we are conscious of our conscious mental states as
higher-order thoughts.

Just a hypothesis on consciousness, I suppose.

Basically this is correct, but I would modify it somewhat, in light of Dennett's reasoning on the matter. You see, it's true that we only ever subjectively experience things (it doesn't make sense to "objectively experience something"...if it's your experience, it's subjective), but the process of subjective experience, is purely a neuronal/synaptic activity, which requires 1) having had previous input from the objective reality, and 2) having remembered it.

 

[Mentat]

Originally posted by Rader
This is the very essence that distinguises humans from all other animals. Conscious thought, reason, free will and purpose not only conscious stimulus and reaction.

Have you read Consciousness Explained yet? Conscious thought, reason, free will (which is dealt with in much more detail in "Freedom Evolves", also by Dan Dennett), and purpose are just advanced (modified and specified) versions of those same "stimulus/reaction" actions of the other animals.

We are aware of awareness, to the point of making conscious decisions based on purpose not only need.

But this is a result of the multi-tasking of sets of neurons...again, you've got to read that book!

I believe it is provable though conscious objective facts, individually and collectively.

So, you mean it's testable, right? No hypothesis can ever be "proven".

 

[Rader]

Originally posted by Mentat
Have you read Consciousness Explained yet? Conscious thought, reason, free will (which is dealt with in much more detail in "Freedom Evolves", also by Dan Dennett), and purpose are just advanced (modified and specified) versions of those same "stimulus/reaction" actions of the other animals.

Its ordered along with Darwins dangerous idea. But first i have to read Power verses Force and The eye of the eye by David Hawkins.

I could advise you to read The self aware universe by Amit Goswani, Totality of implicit order by David Bohm and The self aware universe by Alan Wolf.

But this is a result of the multi-tasking of sets of neurons...again, you've got to read that book!

I will thank you for telling me about it.

So, you mean it's testable, right? No hypothesis can ever be "proven".

HYPOTHESIS> A tentative explanation that accounts for a set of facts and can be tested by further investigation; a theory
Something taken to be true for the purpose of argument or investigation; an assumption.

A hypothesis is testable it works like this thought>assumption>theory>experiment>proof.
These are the 5 basic steps of science. But then again is it not the biggest assumtion of all time to thing that proof will not change.
No experiment is ever finished, since any number of observers may yet observe the results and influence them.

 

[pelastration]

Originally posted by Rader
What would be your explanation of consciousness when no biological functions or stimulus are occurring from the outside world?

Then you capture oscillations of deeper spacetime layers. Spacetime layers act as conductors.

 

[Mentat]

I could advise you to read The self aware universe by Amit Goswani, Totality of implicit order by David Bohm and The self aware universe by Alan Wolf.

Hmm, maybe I will. Not my usual kind of reading, but I like to stay open-minded.

 

[Rader]

Originally posted by Mentat
Basically this is correct, but I would modify it somewhat, in light of Dennett's reasoning on the matter. You see, it's true that we only ever subjectively experience things (it doesn't make sense to "objectively experience something"...if it's your experience, it's subjective), but the process of subjective experience, is purely a neuronal/synaptic activity, which requires 1) having had previous input from the objective reality, and 2) having remembered it.

Dennets proofs or reasoning? Reasonings are assumptions also not proven. There is just as much evidence out there that it works biologically, that there is, that it does not, the evidence of ESP PK NDE DREAMS ect. ect. ect., that consciousness is not only a biological function. There has been research and confirmed results by qualified scientists well above probability. Probability is mathematics.

1) having had previous input from the objective reality, and 2) having remembered it.

You brought up the two points that determine the proof. These two points have been proven wrong in the 1980/s by scientific testing with probability proofs. The tests were to prove, that consciousness is also outside the body, and that it does not need to have either, objective reality experience, or remembrance of it.
It was found beyond probabilty that this was true.

One of the greatest debuncker of charlatans of all time in the end became a believer Richard Hodgson.

Besides, as I said, there is a deductively valid argument supporting my stand that it is impossible for a non-physical object (by the very definitions of the terms being used) to interact with a physical one.

Why is that? That is precisely what happenes when energy is converted into matter. Fuzzy states become objective reality when observed. What does observed really mean? Contact with the wave funtion. Why can not?, the wave funtion of thought, not interact with others to create objective data. Thats exactly what happenes on the fundamental level, with thought waves, its not only internal biologically, only part of the function.

Read the work of Hans J. Eysenck and Carl Sargent

 

[Rader]

Originally posted by pelastration
Then you capture oscillations of deeper spacetime layers. Spacetime layers act as conductors.

Why can not?, the wave funtion of thought, not interact with others to create objective data. Is thought limited to inside your head. Why?

Only with one starting 'membrane tube' everything can be explained

This would be the mother SAS (self aware structure) that no one has yet defined mathematically, to define how fuzzy structures evolve into complexity.

Does your pelastration tube have a mathematical structure defined as of yet?

 

[pelastration]

Originally posted by Rader
Why can not?, the wave funtion of thought, not interact with others to create objective data. Is thought limited to inside your head. Why?

Sorry don't get it.
Spacetime layers interact with each other. Excitations make new couplings: New data.
Spacetime communication by spacetime oscillations is also non-local. (thus not limited to the brain). This is the explanation for example: Jung's unconsciousness.

Originally posted by Rader
This would be the mother SAS (self aware structure) that no one has yet defined mathematically, to define how fuzzy structures evolve into complexity.

I don't claim that the total system is self-aware. Indeed I explain how 'chaos' becomes 'order'. What's your alternative? None. You haven't even a single image to solve that. You are lost in dualism. I just state that from a certain level of complexity you have interactions that provide various levels of information exchange, because specific spacetime levels conduct oscillations which are 'recognized' by other resonant couplings.

Originally posted by Rader
[Does your pelastration tube have a mathematical structure defined as of yet?

You don't have to be a rocket-engineer to understand that if everything happens INSIDE a closed structure ... everything that stays inside that closed system is in balance. There is no lost of energy. So what's your point? Math is just book-keeping.

 

[Rader]

Originally posted by pelastration
Sorry don't get it.
Spacetime layers interact with each other. Excitations make new couplings: New data.
Spacetime communication by spacetime oscillations is also non-local. (thus not limited to the brain). This is the explanation for example: Jung's unconsciousness.

That was a question of agreement. Was justlooking for a deeper answer. The concept is the same. This is how consciousness interact with other consciousness. There have been an exhauted number of experiments with ESP testing of non-local consciousness and the results have been well above probability that they are not chance.

I don't claim that the total system is self-aware. Indeed I explain how 'chaos' becomes 'order'. What's your alternative? None. You haven't even a single image to solve that. You are lost in dualism. I just state that from a certain level of complexity you have interactions that provide various levels of information exchange, because specific spacetime levels conduct oscillations which are 'recognized' by other resonant couplings.

My alternative is, for the the total system to be self-aware, it would need a purpose. That would have to be the first paramenter in order for it to work. 'chaos' becomes 'order' with purpose.

You don't have to be a rocket-engineer to understand that if everything happens INSIDE a closed structure ... everything that stays inside that closed system is in balance. There is no lost of energy. So what's your point? Math is just book-keeping.

You answered my question on your site. Yes i have read also the Michael Kaku comment. But... the book the bookkeeper and the accounting are all important to understand knowledge.

The most interesting and important scientific work is - in my opinion - "deformational structures" of Sergey Kokarev, and contains the WAY to prove TUNITY. I work actually on a mathematical presentation.

I found your site very interesting, many of your points, i found through thouht, many years ago before reading or searching the answers.

 

[Mentat]

Originally posted by Rader
Dennets proofs or reasoning? Reasonings are assumptions also not proven. There is just as much evidence out there that it works biologically, that there is, that it does not, the evidence of ESP PK NDE DREAMS ect. ect. ect., that consciousness is not only a biological function. There has been research and confirmed results by qualified scientists well above probability. Probability is mathematics.

Nothing is provable beyond probability, especially not in Science. QM dictates that all things happen as a function of expressed probabilities. Aside from this, the very Method of Science is an Inductive one, and can only attain Inductive validity...which is not equal to "truth".

You brought up the two points that determine the proof. These two points have been proven wrong in the 1980/s by scientific testing with probability proofs. The tests were to prove, that consciousness is also outside the body, and that it does not need to have either, ojective reality experience, or remembrance of it.
It was found beyond probabilty that this was true.

BS. There's no way this could have been "proven", for the following reasons:

1) It would have created a "shockwave" throughout the scientific and philosophical community that would have put an end to AI research, and would never have allowed Dennett and LeDoux to write their books.

2) Nothing is ever "proven", in science.

One of the greatest debuncker of charlatans of all time in the end became a believer Richard Hodgson.

Irrelevant (no offense); we are not to follow the example of previous skeptics, except in their skill at practicing skepticism.

Why is that? That is precisely what happenes when energy is converted into matter. Fuzzy states become objective reality when observed. What does observed really mean? Contact with the wave funtion. Why can not?, the wave funtion of thought, not interact with others to create objective data.

Because there are no discreet units of "thought" (read the book, man). Besides, thought occurs in brains, which are composed of neurons, which are way too big to be distinguished from a rock at the subatomic level.

Read the work of Hans J. Eysenck and Carl Sargent

Who are they?

 

[selfAdjoint]

Here is Eysenck's obituary. He was a famous and controversial psychologist who emphasized the genetic origins of intelligence and other personality characteristics. I would be very interested to know why Rader thinks he supported PK.

 

[Rader]

Originally posted by selfAdjoint
Here is Eysenck's obituary. He was a famous and controversial psychologist who emphasized the genetic origins of intelligence and other personality characteristics. I would be very interested to know why Rader thinks he supported PK.

It seems to be a biased obituary, that you found selfAjoint, it has that after taste upon reading it. Thanks for leaving the link so anyone can verfify and make there own opinion. Eysenck's wrote after 1980, books publicizing the results of scientific investigation on PK. Prior to that he wrote over 600 publized articles and 32 books, he was an expert in his own field. The whole controversy hear is not who supports what. What does support mean?, that's a new one. The question is >What do you think consciousness is? You have read all my posts. My answer is > consciousness is awarenes inside and outside of biological systems. My conclusion is, that after several decades of hard scientific studies on this question, there is substantial evidence. Substantial evidence is evidence well beyond 50% probabilty graph. I do not use the word proof as proof in scientific studies is only temporal, knowledge changes, or rather our scientific conclusion of it changes. Proof of anything is only temporal !, scientific evidence is a good basis to verfy a objective reality, although even scientific evidence can be wrong or new knowledge added to it, to make it more perfect. Do you really think that the existnece of the electron has anymore verificablity than if consciousness exists outside of the biological system? We each do our best to judge with the evidence on hand. My opinion is based on probability results the same as the existence of the electron. The evidence >http://twm.co.nz/teleg_PK.htm
http://twm.co.nz/conscuniv.htm

 

[Rader]

Originally posted by Mentat
Nothing is provable beyond probability, especially not in Science. QM dictates that all things happen as a function of expressed probabilities. Aside from this, the very Method of Science is an Inductive one, and can only attain Inductive validity...which is not equal to "truth".

I agree and the reasoning behind it is that knowledge changes, or rather our scientific conclusion of it changes. Yes again, inductive validity is only proofs for the moment. The wave function of knowledge changes over time, that's why nothing is a absolute "truth"

BS. There's no way this could have been "proven", for the following reasons:

1) It would have created a "shockwave" throughout the scientific and philosophical community that would have put an end to AI research, and would never have allowed Dennett and LeDoux to write their books.

2) Nothing is ever "proven", in science.

1) "Shockwave" You mean like when Copernicus told the world the sun is the center of our the solar system. The Catholic Church agreed 500 hundred years later, it was so. Not that there approval made it so but though many scientific probabilty studies, then did they accept it, as do you and I. For every book written there is a opposite opinion.

2)Parden me my deepest apologies. Proven was a slip of the tongue though my own falt. Probably based on probability results, is the correct word as proofs there are none. They say English is the most precise language to express thought, i still find it clumbsy and insuficient to express what we think is reality.

Irrelevant (no offense); we are not to follow the example of previous skeptics, except in their skill at practicing skepticism.

Why, we accept, or at least listen to, the professionals on this website, as being expert in there fields. Is there input irellavent?

Because there are no discreet units of "thought" (read the book, man). Besides, thought occurs in brains, which are composed of neurons, which are way too big to be distinguished from a rock at the subatomic level.

I will read the book, it is ordered. At anyrate i am interested in one mans opinion as the other, especially if it is not mine. This is why i post. I would hope that the book has lots of scientific probabilty tests.

Who are they?

They were scientific professionals, who tried to find objective evidence if consciousness is, and acts, also outside of biological systems, through probabilty proofs, just the same way that anything is finally accepted, through a book Explaining the unexplained 1982. It includes Walkers theory > http://users.erols.com/wcri/CONSCIOUSNESS.html and a lot of non-partial information, trying to come to a difficult question to answer. I would hope that it is read not to convince anybody of anything but to put forth a very scientific explanation of this thread.

 

[Sariaht]

Life is communicating bacterias in a vassel among other things.

 

[sage]

to radar. impressive link. shows how quantum effects can exist in synaptic transmissions and hence in the development of consciousness.but still the explanation is completely physical . the fact that brain uses quantum effects is hardly surprising as we know that exploitation of quantum phenomenon can greatly increase the effeciency of computers and our brain is nothing but the most powerful parallel processor ever built. but no matter how sophisticated the technology(whether silicon based or carbon based) all processors are still turing machines in essence and rely on algorithms for information processing.nothing metaphysical about this.

 

[Rader]

Hmmm

to radar. impressive link. shows how quantum effects can exist in synaptic transmissions and hence in the development of consciousness.but still the explanation is completely physical . the fact that brain uses quantum effects is hardly surprising as we know that exploitation of quantum phenomenon can greatly increase the effeciency of computers and our brain is nothing but the most powerful parallel processor ever built. but no matter how sophisticated the technology(whether silicon based or carbon based) all processors are still turing machines in essence and rely on algorithms for information processing.nothing metaphysical about this.

Sage, its Rader not radar. This thread has been dead for ages but since you dug it up. Sounds like you would be interested in AI. Yes quantum effects in the brain, only becase we are investigating the brain. Is not everything only quantum effects, when we examine them? Its all based on QM are you saying that it is not, highly abstract or theoretical. You must believe then that computers can become conscious? I do too, but not for the same reason.

 

[sage]

to rader-"Its all based on QM are you saying that it is not, highly abstract or theoretical".
sorry for mispelling your name. having difficulty comprehending what you are saying especially in the sentence above. please clarify a little bit before i hazard a reply.
p.s-i seemed to have given you a curt reply stating what you are saying was unscientific. sorry for that.

 

[Rader]

quantum biology

What I am saying is that QM is highly abstract and theoretical but has usefull verifiable applications. Here its used to discuss the casual efficacious appeance of consiousness in the brain. I think it can help to solve the unaskable question, how biological processes in the human body somehow know how to do exactly what they have to, instantaneously. There is nothing physical in QM just probabilites or superpositions of states until the V vector collapses. One change in the state of the V vector locally, affects all others non-locally. This is why or maybe how all biological processes are controlled in the entire body automatically. Please pay no attention to my non-linear thinking, it was just a thought for the moment.

 

[sage]

i define a phenomenon as physical if it conforms to the laws of physics. in that sense the explanation offered is physical as quantum effects have been considered. it is only when the metaphysical ideas are bandied about to explain something that i begin to see red. otherwise new ideas will always be welcome.

 

[pelastration]

i define a phenomenon as physical if it conforms to the laws of physics. in that sense the explanation offered is physical as quantum effects have been considered. it is only when the metaphysical ideas are bandied about to explain something that i begin to see red. otherwise new ideas will always be welcome.

Hi Sage,

Consciousness is overview.
Overview by an individual.
Individual overview is always limited and very narrow.

Overview is based on the data the individual receives:
(1) from his sensors,
(2) from his body,
(3) from his experiences in his past (personal knowledge) stored in the brain,
(4) from learned knowledge stored in the brain (knowledge collected by others),
(5) from genetic information embedded in his complete body (and not just in his brain microtubulines),
(6) from hidden events in his surrounding (i.e. radiation, food),
(7) from his location in spacetime (i.e. effect of gravity, non-local information).

All these effects or parameters influence the perception of what the individual is conscious about. How he sees his "reality".

So try to combine all these parameters in one system that is constant dynamic and where all those elements are constantly interconnected and interacting.