White Cat Experiment

[Atlas]

I haven't read the whole thread but it got me thinking about stuff and wanted to jot down some notes before running out the door.

I have notions about the past and future. They are so real that I have no problem saying the past exists or the future exists.

This kind of existence though needs its own definition. I like to think Justice exists. In the OJ trial Justice prevailed strangely, counter-intuitively, - but in one sense of the word Justice OJ goes unpunished because he is not guilty. There is another sense to the word Justice that makes one believe that what happened at OJ's trial was not Justice.

Does that mean that Justice doesn't exist? That the past and future don't exist? These notions and those of God and other intangible things are real to us but we can in each case argue whether they exist.

What exists is, for me, intellectual apprehension. Apprehension of meaning. It is a brain function or phenomenon. Without brains - or living things - in the universe I have trouble believing that the past, future, justice or God would exist. Such a state of everlasting isness would be devoid of meaning.

Imaginary white cats are made of this same immaterial substance. Thought? Yes... but thought itself seems valueless. It is the meaning associated. It is our appreciated meaning that identifies for us just how materially real or immaterial something is and whether or not it lies within our understanding of existence.

 

[H3LL]

Sorry H3LL, I forgot dualists aren't allowed to add any spice to their remarks.

Are you still willing to write a response to my questions or are you planning on leaving the discussion??

I already answered any possible question about anything in a manner that is less "disturbing".

I see little point in adding to it.

 

[Roboramma]

How can we say this consciousness is a material thing when, unlike any other thing in existence, it isn't empirically observable?

How so? You may not be able to dirrectly experience my thoughts, but you also can't dirrectly experience a rock. You can see it, feel it, touch it, taste it, whatever, sure. You can make deductions from your senses about it's shape, size, hardness. You can define things like mass and determine them based on measurements, but all this still goes through your senses. But can you dirrectly experience it in the same way you dirrectly experience your own conciousness?
And what you could do with a rock, you could do with my own experiences. You can look at the signs I give of what I'm feeling - facial expressions, tone of voice, what I say I'm experiencing. You can measure what's going on inside my head, and see how it relates to measurements about what's going on inside of your brain. One day you might even be able to replicate my own brain state inside of yours and feel my experience.
So, from your perspective, how is the rock any different from my experiences?

Here's an experiment that could not yet be conducted. Build a human brain, atom by atom, inside of a tailor made human body. Question: would it behave like any other human? If so, why?

The real fact here is this: I don't know how you experience the colour red because your consciousness isn't accessible to me, even in theory, unlike any material thing in existence.

But if we found that the physical processes in your brain when experiencing "red" were the same as mine when experiencing "red" it would certainly seem likely that our experiences were the same. Would we have any reason so beleive they aren't?
Now it might not be as simple as that. Everyone's brain it quantitatively different from everyone else's in some ways. It's possible that the way my brain codes "red" might be different from yours, and it's also possible that the experience might be different as well. But it also might not be. When a french person says "rougue" (sp?) he's still talking about the colour of blood.

Answer me this: If every single piece of material, on it's own, is exactly 0% conscious, and has exactly 0% feeling, how can consciousness and feeling arise?

Answer me this, if every piece of material is exactly 0% car, how can we build a car from peices of material? After all, they cannot move on their own, are useless for the combustion of gasoline, etc. How is it that when we put a bunch of them together we get a car? Is this a miracle?

Where does that consciousness come from?

Or for that matter, where does a car come from?

How do you explain this something from nothing miracle?

How do you explain the car miracle?

It's more likely to think that perhaps each piece of material has some semblance of feeling and consciousness, and when it combines with other bits of material, the feeling accumulates and creates what we know as consciousness. That would warrant a completely new view of what material actually is, though.

And maybe each peice of material has some semblance of an internal combustion engine, and when it combines with other bits of material, the internal combustion accumulates and creates what we know as "car". That too would warrent a compltely new view of what material actually is, though.

 

[Roboramma]

The problem with the computer analogy is that it assumes the code we assign to the physical processes in it actually exists 'inside' the computer. This is not so, I'll show you another example to illustrate the problem better:

The problem with your analogy is that a computer houses both the hardware and the software. The software in your analogy is the writing, the hardward is the human mind. The system that the human mind uses is a code that conects symbols to words.
This code can certainly be shown to exist: it can be taught, it is the same from one mind to another.
But if two minds are not working with the same code, they cannot communicate: try talking to someone who doesn't speak your langauge, or reading a letter from them. It's not that the letter isn't based on a real workable code, just that you don't understand it.
It might even be possible to figure out the code used if you had enough letters, and events to connect them to (ie. this is the letter Jack wrote to Jill durring the five month separation after their wedding. This is the letter that Jim wrote to James after James' brother was killed). Most children do exactly this when they learn to speak.
The phsyical reality of the code in the computer is in the way it's hardware is put together. The physical reality of the code in the human mind is in the way the brain is put together.

If you try to run a computer program on a computer with the wrong hardware, it won't run. But if you can translate that code from one system to the other, you will be able to make it run.
If you try to read the Oddessy in the original greek (unless of course you read greek) it won't make any sense. But if you pick up a translate, it'll make perfect sense.

 

[yinyinwang]

what about a tv pic?

 

[Filip Sandor]

Digging deeper...

Originally posted by P.S.A.

[--snip--]
Nothing exists which can be directly observed, if your Red is not the same as my Red... because every single exterior object is not comparable to the internal understanding. You cannot tell me what it's like to be a pig. Or a tree. Or to be brownian motion at work. Or what temperature is. You can only tell me what you experience them as.
[--snip--]

I think the problem of fusing mind and matter logically is very unusually difficult, even in spite of what neuroscience has taught us, in my opinion. It almost doesn't make sense to me why something so seemingly simple and normal as mental phenomena is so tough to crack. Common sense would to tell me that it shouldn't be so difficult, unless there is some profound knowledge to be gained if we ever manage to unravel this part of nature's secret. The nature of matter seems so inherently different from the nature of thought in the context of making simple measurements to understand the bigger picture that it leads me to be skeptical of logic thought itself, which I admit I depend on greatly.

I have a very good imagination and I believe myself to be somewhat above 'average intelligence', but I honestly can't even begin to visualise a simple explination for this - I should point out that I'm not referring to the complexity of the factors or measurements involved in mapping out 'mental activity' in a purely descriptive manner. Maybe I am just looking at it too deeply.. but then again maybe I am not. Unless emphasizing the mystery of the logical gap between mind and matter leads us any closer to identifying the answer I don't think we are on the right track in neuroscience. Neuroscience has benefited us greatly and I don't think we should quit studying the brain we would miss many clues to questions about how we can treat certain diseases and mental disorders that undoubtably help us to alleviate unnecessary suffering in people, but as far as shedding light on the mind/ matter problem I think neor-scientists are floating in the dark. However, I believe that neuroscience will eventually bump into the mind/ matter problem more frequently as more of the brain and psyche are mapped out until the problem is finally laid out on the table and put under the microscope, possibly even opening a completey new neuro-scientific field that might be more akin to "scientific philosophy" rather than just material science.

I think we still have a long way to go before the scientific community embraces the 'hard problem' of consciousness and accepts it as a field of research backed by financial support from academic (and other) institutions the way that neuroscience is at the moment.

 

[Filip Sandor]

The problem with your analogy is that a computer houses both the hardware and the software. The software in your analogy is the writing, the hardward is the human mind.

Actually that's not entirely correct, in my analogy I did not define what the 'code' or software actually is or where it exists, I only made it known that the creators of this mysterious 'code' substance, view it as being somehow housed inside the hardware. The hardware in my analogy is the sheet of paper with ink on it. So from the perspective of the tribe members, there is some unidentified 'substance' which we only refer to as 'code' for the sake of identifying "it", that exists inside the sheet of paper.

We still have no explination for what the 'code' substance is, all we know is that the tribe members believe this stuff exists inside the sheet of paper with ink on it. The fact that both tribe members believe something entirely different is contained in the same sheet of paper illustrates that whatever this 'code' stuff is not actually physically present in the sheet of paper since we know that whatever is actually in the sheet of paper is the same regardless of who looks at it. (Keep in mind we are not talking about different interpretations of the same physical structure here, we are talking about what is (or in this case, is not) actually there.)

While this analgoy doesn't explain what mental phenomena is, it clearly implies that is has some very unusual characteristics.

 

[Roboramma]

Actually that's not entirely correct, in my analogy I did not define what the 'code' or software actually is or where it exists, I only made it known that the creators of this mysterious 'code' substance, view it as being somehow housed inside the hardware. The hardware in my analogy is the sheet of paper with ink on it. So from the perspective of the tribe members, there is some unidentified 'substance' which we only refer to as 'code' for the sake of identifying "it", that exists inside the sheet of paper.[/B]

I'm sorry but I just don't see that. I'll try to be clear about why.
Your example seems to be no different from any other written langauge or use of symbols, but in case you feel there is a difference I'll stick with your example.
Let's say that one memeber of tribe A shows the paper to another memeber of the same tribe. Why is it that they both agree about what's on the paper? It's because they've both been taught the same system of interpretting those symbols. Also, where did that meaning come from in the first place? Someone decided that triangle means old, or whatever. They aren't arbitrary, and the meaning of the symbol triangle is not contained within the symbol itself, but rather in how it is interpretted. Ie. In the human mind.
As another example, what would happen if a person of tribe A shows the symbol to an illiterate person of the same tribe? That individual would not see anything but a triangle. But now, teach him to read and how will agree with everyone else about the interpretation. In fact, this is why all members of the same tribe do agree - because they were all taught the same system of interpretation. They all the the same code in their brains that equates triangle with old, or whatever.

The letter R does not make a sound, nor does the sequence of letters "Roboramma", but because you and I have been taught how to interpret them, we can string together the sounds of those letters and agree about how to pronounce the word. However, if you had never learned to read, you would not be able to make any sense of them. The 'code' for reading those letters is stored in your brain. It tells you what they mean. Without that code, they don't mean anything.

We still have no explination for what the 'code' substance is, all we know is that the tribe members believe this stuff exists inside the sheet of paper with ink on it.

The code is simply the agreed upon linking of a symbol with an idea. The only thing inherent to that peice of paper is the way the symbols are ordered, and which ones are used. To someone from a different tribe, the ordering might not make any sense, just like a French speaker with no knowledge of English might be able to make out the letters in my post, but would not find any meaning in it, because the way they are strung together to form words and sentances would not be compatible with the "code" in her brain. This pattern is the only thing inherent in the paper and ink.

The fact that both tribe members believe something entirely different is contained in the same sheet of paper illustrates that whatever this 'code' stuff is not actually physically present in the sheet of paper since we know that whatever is actually in the sheet of paper is the same regardless of who looks at it.

The fact that both tribe members beleive something entirely different illustrates that they are working with a different set of rules for connecting symbols with ideas. The stuff on the paper is identical no matter who looks at it, but their interpretation is not.

 

[Humphreys]

How can we say this consciousness is a material thing when, unlike any other thing in existence, it isn't empirically observable?

How so? You may not be able to dirrectly experience my thoughts, but you also can't dirrectly experience a rock. You can see it, feel it, touch it, taste it, whatever, sure. You can make deductions from your senses about it's shape, size, hardness. You can define things like mass and determine them based on measurements, but all this still goes through your senses. But can you dirrectly experience it in the same way you dirrectly experience your own conciousness?

No, I can't, that's the point. Things of consciousness are directly experienced (as you call it), whereas actual material things in the real world are not. Not only that, but these things of consciousness that are directly experienced, are only directly experienced by the experiencer, unlike that rock, which can be seen, felt, smelt and tasted (although I wouldn't reccomend it), by anyone who is conscious. The rock is empirically observable, another person's consciousness is not.

The real fact here is this: I don't know how you experience the colour red because your consciousness isn't accessible to me, even in theory, unlike any material thing in existence.

But if we found that the physical processes in your brain when experiencing "red" were the same as mine when experiencing "red" it would certainly seem likely that our experiences were the same. Would we have any reason so beleive they aren't?

Unless you presuppose that materialism is true, and that all consciousness is is the processes going on in our brain, then what reason would we have to presume they would be the same experience?

Answer me this: If every single piece of material, on it's own, is exactly 0% conscious, and has exactly 0% feeling, how can consciousness and feeling arise?

Answer me this, if every piece of material is exactly 0% car, how can we build a car from peices of material? After all, they cannot move on their own, are useless for the combustion of gasoline, etc. How is it that when we put a bunch of them together we get a car? Is this a miracle?

False analogy.

When we get a car, we are not getting anything new, there is no miracle occurring. Material does have the ability to move. Not without something acting on it, but it can move. A piece of paper doesn't move on its own, but I can shove it accross the room without a problem.

There is nothing about movement that poses a problem for material things. When we make a car, we are not getting something from nothing.

When we have an emergent property, it always has a precursor of that particular emergent property, but supposedly there is no example of a precursor of feelings.

Material supposedly has no feeling whatsoever. Yet when we put lots of bits of material together, somehow feeling accumulates, and consciousness springs into existence.

Where does that consciousness come from?

Or for that matter, where does a car come from?

You're just totally, off the cuff denying the obvious hard problem of the existence of consciousness, and equating thoughts and feelings with mundane things like movement. Ridiculous.

It's more likely to think that perhaps each piece of material has some semblance of feeling and consciousness, and when it combines with other bits of material, the feeling accumulates and creates what we know as consciousness. That would warrant a completely new view of what material actually is, though.

And maybe each peice of material has some semblance of an internal combustion engine, and when it combines with other bits of material, the internal combustion accumulates and creates what we know as "car". That too would warrent a compltely new view of what material actually is, though.

Your analogy doesn't even make sense.

You can't have some semblance of an internal combustion engine, and internal combustion engines can't accumulate

 

[Roboramma]

The rock is empirically observable, another person's consciousness is not.

No. Certain properties of the rock are empirically observable. As I said you can not dirrectly experience the rock's existence. But, you can observe things about it. You can measure it.
And the same is true about other people's conciousness. We're not at a point now that we can get as much information about other people's experiences as we can about the rock but we certainly can see some things. We can infer some things from the way they react to stimuli. If your response to something burning your hand is the same as mine would be, if we measure both of our brainwaves under the same experience and find them to be similar, if we both avoid putting our hands on burners in the future, it makes sense to infer that we are in reality experiencing the same thing. And if after repeated observations we find that everyone follows this pattern the inference gains even more weight. Certainly it seems to have more strength than a theory that says other do not experience pain.
Now, how do you know how the mass of a rock?
You can put it on a scale and measure see if it balances with a standard weight you have. But this only tells you that you observe it to balance right now. Well, because you have theory of the way balance scales work, and gravity, because you have a theory that says that if the two weights are the same then their mass is the same, you can infer the weight of the rock. But this too relies on a theory about the universe and is no more certain than that I am experiencing pain just like you.

1. Your experiences aren't empirically observable, only the physical processes are, and we can't know for a fact whether those processes cause you personally, to have experiences.
2. I know, even if it's an illusion, that there is a thing out there which I call a rock. But, I don't know that you have experiences.
3. I can't deny the existence of my own consciousness, but I can deny the existence of any rock you find me.

1. What if the physical processes are the experiences? We don't yet understand enough about them to show how this is so, but it's possible that one day we will. Regardless, we can see the outcome of those experiences, and the fact that the outcomes of my experiences tend to be similar to yours is good cause to suggest that we are in fact both having experiences.
2. a) You know that when you interact with this thing it behaves in certain ways and has certain properties that you've named "rock".
b) You know that you have experiences and this cause you to behave in certain ways and have certain properties.
c) You know that I behave in the same way and have the same properties (I mean this in a broad sense, such as reaction to pain).
d) Can you connect b and c? I'm not suggesting that it's possible to prove experience, just that it's on about as firm ground as anything else.

I can't (despite what you think) touch them, I can't feel them, I can't see them, I don't know what colour they are, or where they're located, I can't pick them up, or smell them, if I can do anything at all it would be with some physical processes going on in your brain.

You can touch them if you touch my brain, but there's skull in the way. I know you don't accept this, but neither do I accept your supposition that it's not the case. You may not be able to feel my experiences now, but you can feel something similar by exposing yourself to the same stimulus. Here's an experiment you can preform:
Think of something you've never experienced before. Now, ask someone you know to describe what it's like. Then go and experience it for yourself. Was it in any way similar to the description? Does this suggest that the other person may in fact have experienced it as well? If not, what other explanation can you offer?

I don't know, it depends what consciousness is. If those atoms have some semblance of feeling to begin with, then I don't see why not.

What would it mean for atoms to have some semblance of feeling?

But if we found that the physical processes in your brain when experiencing "red" were the same as mine when experiencing "red" it would certainly seem likely that our experiences were the same. Would we have any reason so beleive they aren't?[/QUOTE]

Unless you presuppose that materialism is true, and that all consciousness is is the processes going on in our brain, then what reason would we have to presume they would be the same experience?

Here's why:
1. The phsyical state of the brain changes depending upon what it is feeling/thinking/recalling etc. Why would this be the case if it were not somehow connected to those thoughts/feelings/recollections?
This the same arguement as someone in pain acting like he's in pain, only stronger, because now there is no reason that the brain should look like that (after all, most of the time no one can see it) unless it is in fact the physical site of experience. Unless you can tell me why?

Try to remember, it's only materialism which states that consciousness is simply the processes going on in our brains. Other positions say there is something more going on, something we can't observe in any way because it's not made of material.

When a French person says 'rouge', he is describing his personal experience of the colour of blood, not yours, or mine, necessarily.

That's what I was saying. I said it's possible that there is a difference between my experience of red and yours. However, it's also possible that there isn't. One thing that suggests that there is no difference (or that if there is a difference, it's small) is that most people when asked to describe "red" will use similar words. If they were experiencing something completely different, why the similar vocabulary?

False analogy.

When we get a car, we are not getting anything new, there is no miracle occurring. Material does have the ability to move. Not without something acting on it, but it can move. A piece of paper doesn't move on its own, but I can shove it accross the room without a problem.

I don't think it is a false analogy. I shouldn't have said "move" although it's true enough. If you look at what I said I said "move on their own" as in under their own power. But please, let's leave that part of the analogy.
A car is capable of taking energy in the form of gasoline, and converting it into first thermal and then kinetic energy in order to move you from point A to point B in time T. How does it do this? Is there some property in matter that gives it this ability, but only works when you build up enough of it?
No. It does this because of the specific way it is designed. Just as the brain can experience thoughts and emotions because of the specific way it is designed. It's not the inherent properties of matter that allow this in the car any more than in the brain. Atoms no more think or feel than they drive around.

You're just totally, off the cuff denying the obvious hard problem of the existence of consciousness, and equating thoughts and feelings with mundane things like movement. Ridiculous.

Again, I appologise for the use of the word "move". That was not the property of cars that I was suggesting to be "unique" as in, not inherent in the matter that makes them up.
I could just as easily have used the analogy of a telephone. The matter that makes up a telephone does not have some semblance of the ability to communicate with other matter, but when assembled in a specific way, suddenly it can be used as a telephone.

Your analogy doesn't even make sense.

You can't have some semblance of an internal combustion engine, and internal combustion engines can't accumulate

That's the whole point. What doesn't make sense about the internal combustion engine also doesn't make sense about your understanding of conciousness.

PS by the way, I won't be able to come on tomorrow, but will try to get back when I can.

 

[RandFan]

Or for that matter, where does a car come from?

Good post Robo, I would suggest substituting flight for car. Your example is good but in the end you still have an object. It is a valid analogy but lacks the punch of comparing consciousness to flight.

Where does flight come from? Certainly not from any individual constituent part of the airplane. It does not even come from the airplane itself alone. Flight is the result of many individual variables acting together including the air flowing over the wing.

FWIW, I am intuitively a dualist. Not a necessarily metaphysical one mind you. Just one that believes that we don't yet know all of what makes consciousness and I'm not convinced that it (consciousness) is substrate neutral. IOW, I don't think consciousness could exist in a computer made of gears, pulleys and twine. Of course there are physical constraints of making such a computer that could rival even the computers of today much less a computer capable of reproducing human thought. But those constraints have nothing to do with logic systems themselves. There is nothing about electricity and semi conductive materials that would preclude such a computer other than the ability to perform operations at very high speeds and in very small dimensions.

I also don't believe that we should insert god into the gap of our knowledge whether that gap is perceived or real.

I believe (I don't use those words often) that we are on the cusp of the greatest discovery of mankind. The complete understanding of the most complex system in the entire universe. The human mind.

Of course some would say we pretty much do understand it. We simply lack a coherent whole to that understanding. Is the human mind simply logic, state and heuristics? I don't personally think so but I'm prepared to accept such a conclusion when the weight of the evidence is such that it can't be denied. To those who say we are already there I would say that there are still significant questions to be answered. Chief of which is the binding problem.

 

[MRC_Hans]

*snip*
We still have no explination for what the 'code' substance is, all we know is that the tribe members believe this stuff exists inside the sheet of paper with ink on it. The fact that both tribe members believe something entirely different is contained in the same sheet of paper illustrates that whatever this 'code' stuff is not actually physically present in the sheet of paper since we know that whatever is actually in the sheet of paper is the same regardless of who looks at it. (Keep in mind we are not talking about different interpretations of the same physical structure here, we are talking about what is (or in this case, is not) actually there.)

While this analgoy doesn't explain what mental phenomena is, it clearly implies that is has some very unusual characteristics. [/B]

Not at all. Now, as I have said repeatedly elswhere, we can choose to distinguish semantically between information and meaning (a very useful distinction, in fact), and in this case meaning becomes essentially non-materialistic. This does not, however, mean that it is something strange.

Your two tribes use different languages. So what? So do you and I (although I happen to be able to use your language too). The difference is not in the information, but in the coding of the brains that decode the information. Let me give you a less abstract example:

Consider the word "fart".

In English, it means, ...well you know what it means.

In Danish it means speed (motional speed).

The difference lies in the coding our brains received when we learnt our respective languages.

Humphreys:

What I mean is, material things are objectively accessible to anyone. Take a cup for instance. We may experience the cup a little differently, but the cup is out there for all to see and interact with. Even if we weren't conscious, we'd still have the ability to interact with that cup, in theory.

No, you are wrong. Not all material things are accessible or directly observable. Something as simple as air is not directly observable. Most of the electromagnetic spectrum, with the exception of the very narrow band of visible light (less than an octave) is not directly observable; gravity, electrical and magnetic fields are not directly observable. All these things can only be observed indirectly, by observing their effects on something else.

The consciousness of other humans is also not directly observable, but it can easily be observed indirectly, by its effects.

I can communicate with you and ask how you feel, I can tell you a joke and observe you laughing, I can insult you and observe you angry. All the indirect observations indicate that you have a consciousness that is not fundamentally different from the one I can observe I have myself.

It's the same with all material things. But not consciousness.

How can we say this consciousness is a material thing when, unlike any other thing in existence, it isn't empirically observable?

Because it is indirectly observable, like lots of material things.

Filip Sandor:
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by MRC_Hans
No contradiction at all. It is like running Excel on a PC and a MAC. The codes are different because the CPUs are different. Both codes are right. The PC code is right for a PC and the MAC code is right for a MAC.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hans, in my example there is only one code bearing structure.


quote:
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Nonsense. Since our brains are not quite identical, our codes are likely to be different. Both versions are right.

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See above... also see my last response to Darat where I posted a very clear breakdown of why the 'contradiction' exists, if you don't agree with me that there is no physical evidence of this 'code' I hope you agree at least on the last point I made in that post. On the other hand, I would like you to tell me if there is anything about my example to Darat that you don't understand.

What do you mean by "only one code-bearing structure"? Which is that?? Every individual brain is a code-bearing structure, and we have no reason to believe that any two are exactly alike. Certainly no two human brains have exactly the same coding.

Yes, I think I understood your response to Darat. You described two tribes with different languages. So what?

Hans

Edited for some of the typos

 

[Humphreys]

Roboramma and RanFan, in your car and flight example, I would argue that we aren't gaining anything. All we are doing in accumulating already existing properties of matter, and arranging them in such a way that the laws of physics will take over to make an object act in a particular way.

For example, in your flight example, a plane needs to have wings. Wings are made from an accumulation of matter. Wings need to have width. Therefore, matter needs to have width. If the smallest piece of material in existence, which made up all other pieces of material, had a width and height of 0, then you'd never be able to create anything, because nothing in existence would have any width or height.

If we add something with a width of 0 to another thing with a width of 0, our total width is 0. It's the same with feeling.

0 amount of feeling + 0 amount of feeling should equal 0 amount of feeling, but somehow feeling apparently pops into existence, out of nowhere, when we combine enough bits of material with 0 amount of feeling.

What you're arguing is if we put matter into the proper arrangement, a property called 'flight' pops out of thin air, and flight is not a property an individual piece of matter possesses, so therefore my argument is refuted. But the thing is, flight isn't a property in the first place! Flight is something we use to describe an arrangement of matter acting in a particular way e.g. "moving through the air without falling to the ground". Flight itself doesn't actually exist, something can be described as flying, but flight isn't actually a thing that exists. Could you imagine how ridiculous it would be to ask the question "is flight physical?".

So no, we haven't gained flight! Matter is just acting in a slightly different way, and we call this phenomena 'flight'.

Feeling really is something gained, though. It exists. Thoughts exist. The white cat you imagine in your head really does exist, we can't deny that. Matter is not just acting in a slightly different manner, or working together in a way so that already existing properties get accumulated allowing them to function slightly differently.

No, feeling really does just leap into existence, without us having any good explanation as to how or why.

 

[MRC_Hans]

*snip*Feeling really is something gained, though. It exists. Thoughts exist. The white cat you imagine in your head really does exist, we can't deny that. Matter is not just acting in a slightly different manner, or working together in a way so that already existing properties get accumulated allowing them to function slightly differently.

No, feeling really does just leap into existence, without us having any good explanation as to how or why.

Feelings are demontratably linked to electrochemical signals in our brains. You will always have those signals when you experience feelings, if you don't have them you don't experience anything. So, feelings have an observable material manifestation. Do you have any good reason to claim that they are anything besides that manifestation?

Hans

 

[Humphreys]

No, you are wrong. Not all material things are accessible or directly observable. Something as simple as air is not directly observable.

Air occupies space though, right? So, why isn't it directly observable, in theory?

It's a question, not an argument, because I don't know the answer.

 

[Humphreys]

One other thing. Aren't even gravity waves themselves thought to be directly observable, in theory?

 

[Darat]

Air occupies space though, right? So, why isn't it directly observable, in theory?

It's a question, not an argument, because I don't know the answer.

I think what Hans is referring is to a point I also made earlier. There are a lot of things we accept exist even though we can’t “directly” observe them, such as magnetism. If you think about it we don’t directly know that air exists, we don’t feel it we can’t see the molecules, however we can indirectly experience the air, temperature, wind and so on.

(Flip - when I’ve time I'll get back to your posts - they need a bit of thunking to answer respectfully.)

 

[kk2796]

Definition of non-physical phenomena: any phenomena that is known to exist for sure, for which no physical evidence has ever been observed

My mental image of a white cat is one such phenomenon.

Your submitted testimony, stored electronically in the randi.org server, that the your mental image exists is physical evidence that your mental image exists. Thus, by your own definition, your mental image of a white cat is not a non-physical phenomenom.

That was hard.

 

[Humphreys]

I think what Hans is referring is to a point I also made earlier. There are a lot of things we accept exist even though we can’t “directly” observe them, such as magnetism. If you think about it we don’t directly know that air exists, we don’t feel it we can’t see the molecules, however we can indirectly experience the air, temperature, wind and so on.

No, I don't think so. I think Hans is arguing that consciousness is exactly like air, in that it is impossible to be directly observed, even in theory.

Now, I believe, and someone can correct me if I'm wrong, that even things like gravity and air are thought to be directly observable, in theory.

Does anyone here think consciousness is directly observable, in theory? I don't think it is - it doesn't occupy space, for a start.

 

[Darat]

No, I don't think so. I think Hans is arguing that consciousness is exactly like air, in that it is impossible to be directly observed, even in theory.

Now, I believe, and someone can correct me if I'm wrong, that even things like gravity and air are thought to be directly observable, in theory.

Not by "us" they aren't and by that I mean through our 5 (or 58 ) senses.

Are you saying you can directly observe say magnetism? That is something most of us seem to accept exists but there is no way we can observe “it” directly.

Does anyone here think consciousness is directly observable, in theory? I don't think it is - it doesn't occupy space, for a start.

Just depends on how you define "directly"?