White Cat Experiment

[Filip Sandor]

Are you suggesting that computers don't apply logical processes to inputs in order to create outputs?
Or are you accepting that they do and suggesting that our brains don't?
I'm not trying to be rude, just want to clarify before I start arguing with you about something you may not have said.

Well what do you think a logical process is if it is not an ordinary physical process? How would you differentiate between a logical physical process and an illogical physical process?

 

[Filip Sandor]

I didn't say "Mental phenomena" and "physical phenomena in the brain" are the same thing- I don't remember mentioning "physical phenomena in the brain" at all, because such a term is very vague. I said that what most people, especially imaterialists and wannabe mystics call "mental phenomena", are nothing more that the interaction of the physical processes (see the different word there?)- the brain's electrochemical reactions.

I don't intend to make this any more confusing than it already is, but I don't see why a conceptual model of something is necessarily a physical phenomenon. A definite interactual relationship between the two might imply that they are probably logically consistent, but I don't see how it implies that both are necessarily physical.

How would the said relationship necessitate that?

 

[Roboramma]

Well what do you think a logical process is if it is not an ordinary physical process? How would you differentiate between a logical physical process and an illogical physical process?

I wouldn't. All physical processes are logical as far as I can see. But I don't want to get messed up in semantics right now. I'll explain what I meant when I said "logical processes".
A computer's circuits are made up of logic gates which use a system called boolean logic. The simplest gate is a NOT gate, which, if you input a binary digit, gives the opposite for it's output - 1 becomes 0 and 0 becomes 1. OR and AND gates require two inputs. AND gates mean, if both inputs are 1, the output is 1. An OR gate says "if input A or input B is 1, then the output is 1".
That's all I meant by "logical processes". Of course it gets much more complicated when you have complex combinations of these gates. It is with combinations of these gates that your computer is able to do all the things that it does. When I say they follow logical processes, I mean that they physical processes are not random or arbitrary but designed so that it can multiply or divide numbers entered as inputs and give a resultant output. The way it does this is based on the logic of the way the gates are put together.
By the way I don't know that much about computers, so if there are any errors in the above (probably too much of a simplification) I hope others will point them out.

Clearly it is the way this physical system is arranged that allows it to add numbers together. It is first hard wired in such a way that one input is interpreted as "1" and another is interpreted as "0". It can then produce an output when asked to add those numbers. Because the logic in your computer is far more complex than this it can also do a lot more than that. For instance, when you put a DVD movie in your DVD drive, it can play it for you. The sound and picture will all come out the same on your computer as mine, because both follow the same code which says "this series of binary digits means produce these series of colors on the monitor". And that code is inherent in the physical structure of the computer.
I don't know that much about computers. But part of that physical structure is the player program you've installed on your computer - it has a physical reality inside of your machine. And it is able to decode the data on your DVD and produce a movie from it.
Without that player, you can't watch your DVD.

And by the way, I won't suggest that your brain uses Boolean logic, only that it uses a physical process, similar to this, to do what it does. Such as interpret words on a page.

 

[Filip Sandor]

When I say they follow logical processes, I mean that the physical processes are not random or arbitrary but designed so that it can multiply or divide numbers entered as inputs and give a resultant output. The way it does this is based on the logic of the way the gates are put together.
By the way I don't know that much about computers, so if there are any errors in the above (probably too much of a simplification) I hope others will point them out.

So in more or less words, we assign certain meanings to a set of physical processes (or logic circuits) in a way that the meanings represented are logically consistent with the conceptual framework that exists in our minds. For example we call the color green on our computer monitors "green" because it is logically consistent with our conception of "green". Likewise, we assign things like numbers (a man made concept) to the different physical states within a logic circuit to make a 'calculator'; however, an electronic calculator has no conception of numbers, nor is the concept of numbers inherent to the physical processes in the calculator.

I don't know if there are any materialists here who accept this model of computation, but if there are I am curious what you think is the source of the logical rules our thought processes follow.

 

[Roboramma]

Likewise, we assign things like numbers (a man made concept)

I'm not sure what you mean by saying that numbers are a man made concept. Our understanding of numbers may have been developed in the minds of human beings, but I have two hands, two eyes and two ears, and that is a fact independant of my brain's interpretation.

to the different physical states within a logic circuit to make a 'calculator'; however, an electronic calculator has no conception of numbers, nor is the concept of numbers inherent to the physical processes in the calculator.

I gave the calculator as a simple example and said so. I don't suggest it has a 'concept' of numbers in the way you mean (as in, it is concious of what it is doing'). I suggest that the way that it adds numbers is analogous to the way that we add them.
But it was the last part of my post that was more to the point. Ie. that a computer uses a code to determine what to do with inputs in order to create it's output. And I still can't see the difference between this and my reading words on a page.

 

[Piscivore]

I don't intend to make this any more confusing than it already is, but I don't see why a conceptual model of something is necessarily a physical phenomenon. A definite interactual relationship between the two might imply that they are probably logically consistent, but I don't see how it implies that both are necessarily physical.

How would the said relationship necessitate that? [/B]

There you go on about "physical phenomena" again. This is an ambiguous term. As you've used it above, it seems to represent "something created by a physical process." If you mean something different then please illuminate. The problem with this- as goes for your paragraph above and indeed every post you've made in this thread- is the assumption that this "conceptual model" is an entity separate and distinct from the physical processes. There cannot be a relationship between the physical processes and the concept model, because the latter is wholly and completely the relationship between two physical processes.

Let me give you a riddle to illustrate what I mean:

Light waves are emitted from the nuclear reaction we call the sun. These waves radiate out in all directions, some of them travelling eight minutes or so to reach our planet. these waves continue on into the atmosphere, where some of them intersect droplets of water vapour in the atmosphere. Those waves that intersect the droplets are divided by the way different wavelengths interact with the H2O molecules they collide with, and continue on separately until they reach the retina of a person standing on the surface of the planet. The waves of light, still separated by varying wavelenths, stimulate the rods and cones in the eye. The different wavelengths stimulate the cells in differing degrees and kind, such that the cells "fire"-or don't- in a certain way for each. The cells that are stimulated in turn activate various neurotransmitters that stimulate nuerons in adjacent cells, all the way to the brain. This is an entirely "physical" interaction, right?

Where is the "rainbow"?

 

[Filip Sandor]

I'm not sure what you mean by saying that numbers are a man made concept. Our understanding of numbers may have been developed in the minds of human beings, but I have two hands, two eyes and two ears, and that is a fact independant of my brain's interpretation.

An 'interpretation' is another non-physical phenomena, just like any other concept. Numbers are also a conceptualized tool we use to analyse our immediate (least altered and most "hard-wired") perceptions, like vision, 3-D spacial co-ordination, smell, touch, taste, hearing, movement, etc. The problem is that although numbers are useful in forming a 'numeric map' of different aspects of physical systems the logic itself that we use to invent such conceptualizations is not a logical consequence of the matter we are able to observe.

This is why I say they are a 'man made' invention!

In other words, "numbers" pertain to another of the many systems of thoughts in our minds operating in an orderly fashion in order to help us achieve the purpose of knowledge, but the actual meanings we perceive in our minds are not a logical consequence of matter in themselves - we can see that one physical system is here and another is there and that they are more or less physically interconnected, etc., but observing these interactions alone is not enough to determine the nature of logic. Since numbers are a logical construct they can only exist within the logical framework of our minds.

Hence we come back to my original arguement that certain phenomena (ie. mental phenomena) are not logically deduced from an understanding of material processes and we only believe they exist because we have a direct awareness of them, not a logically deduced one.

These talks of epistemology can obviously lead into many directions, but I am getting sleepy here, so if anyone wants to pick up where I left of go ahead..

 

[Piscivore]

In other words, "numbers" pertain to another of the many systems of thoughts in our minds operating in an orderly fashion in order to help us achieve the purpose of knowledge, but the actual meanings we perceive in our minds are not a logical consequence of matter in themselves - we can see that one physical system is here and another is there and that they are more or less physically interconnected, etc., but observing these interactions alone is not enough to determine the nature of logic. Since numbers are a logical construct they can only exist within the logical framework of our minds.

Hence we come back to my original arguement that certain phenomena (ie. mental phenomena) are not logically deduced from an understanding of material processes and we only believe they exist because we have a direct awareness of them, not a logically deduced one.

These talks of epistemology can obviously lead into many directions, but I am getting sleepy here, so if anyone wants to pick up where I left of go ahead..

Now you are treating "logic" as a discrete entity. Is this the only game you have?

Any hope of you actually answering one of my questions?

ETA: And since when was logical deduction the only key to understanding? It is very easy to come to a completely valid logical deduction that is completely and egregiously wrong. Such as your deductions, for example.

 

[Filip Sandor]

Now you are treating "logic" as a discrete entity. Is this the only game you have?

Any hope of you actually answering one of my questions?

ETA: And since when was logical deduction the only key to understanding? It is very easy to come to a completely valid logical deduction that is completely and egregiously wrong. Such as your deductions, for example.

Piscivore, the point I am trying to make about logic is that it is a system of thought which is not apparent in the physical processes in our brains. All the meanings we perceive in our minds are basically an arbitrary construct of our minds... you can't decipher any real meaning from pure physics.

 

[Piscivore]

Piscivore, the point I am trying to make about logic is that it is a system of thought which is not apparent in the physical processes in our brains.

Argumentum ad ignorantium it is, then. Thanks for playing.

All the meanings we perceive in our minds are basically an arbitrary construct of our minds... you can't decipher any real meaning from pure physics.

What does "meaning" have to do with Logic or consciousness? You are starting to sound like Iacchus now.

So now it is "meaning" that is the discrete entity, eh? What next? Of course there is no "meaning" in physics. "Meaning" is derived from pattern-matching- developed through evolution- in the network of stimulation and response of the neurons in the brain. That's why it is so subjective.

 

[Filip Sandor]

Argumentum ad ignorantium it is, then. Thanks for playing.

It's not Argumentum ad ignorantium Piscivore, it's very logical.

The conceptual understanding we have of things in our minds is not visible inside the physical processes in someone's brain unless.... pay attention here or you might miss it, unless that individual tells us what they are perceiving mentally. Now you tell me, why would the individual who's brain we are studying have to say anything at all?? Why can't we simply look inside their brain and say, "Ahaaah!!! There is happiness in there!!" or "Ahaaah!! There is anger there!!?"

The answer is simple...

We need verbal feedback from the individual to confirm the existence of the mental phenomena because the electrochemical/molecular activity in their brain does not indicate any mental phenomena without it. I suggest you re-read that a couple times and think about it, I'm sure you'll agree.

So why don't scientists doubt that what the individual is telling them is true? Is it because they can prove the existence of the mental phenomena? No, the real reason scientists don't doubt what the individual is telling is the truth is because all scientists already experience mental phenomena themselves and so they know it exists from their own experiences, which gives them far more confidence that their patient is really telling the truth.

If you're going to ask me to elaborate on how it all works, I don't know and I'm not claiming that I have the answers. I don't think there is anything wrong with not having all the answers, what's wrong in my mind is when we create false theories to cover up the harder problems in science. Another good example of rejection by the scientific community of a phenomena worthy of scientific investigation is the case of research of anti-gravity devices. Even though many experiments have already been reproduced where a rotating disc made of superconductive materials causes objects above it to lose weight... many scientists and skeptics continue to insist that anti-gravity devices are "proposteruous!!!" or "belonging in the realm of quacks!!!" and have cut funds to research projects in the field because they turn red at the thought that someone might find out what they are spending money on. Does that mean the results of the experiments so far conducted are false?

It just makes some scientists blush that's all.

 

[Piscivore]

Please forgive the lateness of my reply.

It's not Argumentum ad ignorantium Piscivore, it's very logical.

Which of course has no bearing on whether it is actually correct.

The conceptual understanding we have of things in our minds is not visible inside the physical processes in someone's brain

Is "visibility" the sole test of whether something is "physical" or not?

unless.... pay attention here or you might miss it, unless that individual tells us what they are perceiving mentally. Now you tell me, why would the individual who's brain we are studying have to say anything at all?? Why can't we simply look inside their brain and say, "Ahaaah!!! There is happiness in there!!" or "Ahaaah!! There is anger there!!?"

Well, in an indirect sort of way, we are learning to:

With the advent of positron emission tomography (PET), researchers began looking for the physical substrates of emotion and feeling. When subjects were asked to imagine and reenact emotional states, there were "profound changes" in the PET images, Dr. Damasio said. Feeling the emotion of sadness, for instance, resulted in bilateral insular cortex activation and partial activation of the cingulate gyrus. Feeling happiness activated the insula cortex in a slightly different pattern and also activated the posterior cingulate and secondary somatosensory cortex. Feeling fear resulted in deactivation of secondary somatosensory regions, he said.

If experiments demonstrate that this holds true for every person it is tested on, wouldn't that exactly fit your criteria?

The answer is simple...

We need verbal feedback from the individual to confirm the existence of the mental phenomena because the electrochemical/molecular activity in their brain does not indicate any mental phenomena without it. I suggest you re-read that a couple times and think about it, I'm sure you'll agree.

Maybe last century. As you see above, that doesn't seem to be holding true any longer.

So why don't scientists doubt that what the individual is telling them is true?

Who says they don't?

Is it because they can prove the existence of the mental phenomena? No, the real reason scientists don't doubt what the individual is telling is the truth is because all scientists already experience mental phenomena themselves and so they know it exists from their own experiences, which gives them far more confidence that their patient is really telling the truth.

I'd like you to show me where a research neurologist has pre-decided that "mental phenomena" exist as a discrete entity as part of his research. Unless I am mistaken, the prevaling thought is as I described, that "mental phenomena" are the interactions between neurons. Please show me otherwise.

If you're going to ask me to elaborate on how it all works, I don't know and I'm not claiming that I have the answers. I don't think there is anything wrong with not having all the answers, what's wrong in my mind is when we create false theories to cover up the harder problems in science.

Like Platonic white kittens?

Seriously, I don't know either, man. But running to "immaterialism" or Platonism to me is not parsimonous.

Another good example of rejection by the scientific community of a phenomena worthy of scientific investigation is the case of research of anti-gravity devices. Even though many experiments have already been reproduced where a rotating disc made of superconductive materials causes objects above it to lose weight... many scientists and skeptics continue to insist that anti-gravity devices are "proposteruous!!!" or "belonging in the realm of quacks!!!" and have cut funds to research projects in the field because they turn red at the thought that someone might find out what they are spending money on. Does that mean the results of the experiments so far conducted are false?

It just makes some scientists blush that's all.

I know nothing about this, so I won't comment. Other than to say "get me a rotating disc made of superconductive materials to stand on." Didn't the discs have to be super-super cold for that to work?

 

[Filip Sandor]

Please forgive the lateness of my reply.

Don't worry about it sometimes I reply late too.

Is "visibility" the sole test of whether something is "physical" or not?

Visibility seems to be the sole test of physical phenomena. Most scientists want to see some kind of visual evidence of something or at least the effects of it (visually observed) before they will agree that it exists. Sound is another way an object physical process can "identify" itself, but I think most scientists would want to be able to see it too and compare their visual observations with what they hear to determine if the sound is in fact genuine to a certain physical process. Once this connection has been established and the physical process that generates a sound is observed visually, one can turn around and point out when that physical process occurs, just by hearing the sound.

If experiments demonstrate that this holds true for every person it is tested on, wouldn't that exactly fit your criteria?

No, it wouldn't, the experiments described assume a knowledge of the mental phenomena already (ie. scientists TOLD THE PATIENT TO IMAGINE....). It's just that happiness and sadness are emotions most neurobiologists don't spend time on with the PET and it's something new and interesting. I am all for neurobiology though, as I stated before, aside from obvious medical reasons, eventually we'll have so much of the brain mapped out it will start to become more obvious that either we are imagining the mental code in the brain or that the evidence we use to support it's existence is very flaky at best.

 

[Piscivore]

Visibility seems to be the sole test of physical phenomena. Most scientists want to see some kind of visual evidence of something or at least the effects of it (visually observed) before they will agree that it exists. Sound is another way an object physical process can "identify" itself, but I think most scientists would want to be able to see it too and compare their visual observations with what they hear to determine if the sound is in fact genuine to a certain physical process. Once this connection has been established and the physical process that generates a sound is observed visually, one can turn around and point out when that physical process occurs, just by hearing the sound.

This sounds very like a strawman. Any evidence this is correct?

No, it wouldn't, the experiments described assume a knowledge of the mental phenomena already. It's just that happiness and sadness are emotions most neurobiologists don't spend time on with the PET (and I think they definately should)!

I'm sorry, were not you the one championing the existance of these "phenomena?" These experiments seem designed to begin to test that existance by looking at what happens in the brain when the subject is "happy" or "sad." Or is it just that you've already decided that these tests must be flawed because the hyopthesis behind them is that there is a connexion between emotion and brain activity?

From my brief googling it seems Dr. Damasio is one of the leaders in this field. If more neurobiologists do take up his study and confirm it, will that satisfy?

Why am I all for neurobiology you might be asking.... well, aside from obvious medical reasons, I know that eventually we'll have so much of the brain mapped out it will start to become more obvious that either we are imagining the mental code in the brain or that the evidence we use to support it's existence is very flaky.

Again, I've never supported the idea of a "mental code." That to me is just as much a metaphysical creation as your white cat. What neurobiologists do support such an entity?

How do you feel the mapping of the brain will give credence to the Platonic "mental phenomena" you are theorising?

 

[CaveDave]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: White Cat Experiment

Consider this, we now have cochlear implants that can help deaf people to hear again, we build these by having a “practical” understanding that when you stimulate certain nerves people say they “hear” something, now we don’t know if they all ”hear” the same things and so on but we do know that if fitted properly everyone says they “hear” something. This hints that our perceptions are a result of “physical” (in the meaning of things that interact with one another and are detectable) processes.

(Edited for blending and words.) [/B]

I don't think the cochlear implant functioning relates to the internal imaging question in that, as I understand it, the otic nerve's input is more mechanical than any other sense: the sensory fibers along the length of the cochlea respond to narrow frequency bands, and if a spectral component is present, that fiber responds proportionally to intensity of input. Therfore, a probe can be inserted which will stimulate the perception of a certain frequency at each point along the length. This is similar to a Fourier transform of the input spectrum (which, I believe, is what the computer driving the electrodes does to the input signal).

What the brain then does with these inputs is less deterministic. I believe each individual brain may store any particular memory of a past sensory input in many different areas: visual outlines in one region, color/texture in another, and such things as associated sounds, smells, tastes, tactile impressions, and even memories of emotional reactions, each in their own region of the brain, but still linked in such a way that playback of one ties in the others to form a more or less complete complex mileau(sp?)

To answer the question, I see the cat: it is real to me.
Dave

 

[CaveDave]

We can make a computer that records images of cats, and program it to recall them and color them white, without displaying them anywhere. We could examine a memory dump and verify this, because it is technically possible to make a memory dump from a computer and because we know exactly how the image is encoded in it.

We do not, at present, have the ability to make a memory dump of a human brain, and we also do not know the exact coding. However, this in no way implies that it would not be theoretically possible to make that operation.

...Unless you want to make the "argument from ignorance" fallacy.

Hans

I agree completely. In fact, there is evidence that each individual brain may store perceptions in different places and in different ways, and that they may not be at all linear, such that a 'core dump' that works on one brain might get scrambled data from another. One school of thought is that storage may be analogous to holography, where many memories may share each data point (or neuron).
Dave

 

[CaveDave]

We can make a computer that records images of cats, and program it to recall them and color them white, without displaying them anywhere. We could examine a memory dump and verify this, because it is technically possible to make a memory dump from a computer and because we know exactly how the image is encoded in it.

We do not, at present, have the ability to make a memory dump of a human brain, and we also do not know the exact coding. However, this in no way implies that it would not be theoretically possible to make that operation.

...Unless you want to make the "argument from ignorance" fallacy.

Hans

I agree completely. In fact, there is evidence that each individual brain may store perceptions in different places and in different ways, and that they may not be at all linear, such that a 'core dump' that works on one brain might get scrambled data from another. One school of thought is that storage may be analogous to holography, where many memories may share each data point.
Dave

 

[Filip Sandor]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: White Cat Experiment

I don't think the cochlear implant functioning relates to the internal imaging question in that, as I understand it, the otic nerve's input is more mechanical than any other sense: the sensory fibers along the length of the cochlea respond to narrow frequency bands, and if a spectral component is present, that fiber responds proportionally to intensity of input. Therfore, a probe can be inserted which will stimulate the perception of a certain frequency at each point along the length. This is similar to a Fourier transform of the input spectrum (which, I believe, is what the computer driving the electrodes does to the input signal).

What the brain then does with these inputs is less deterministic. I believe each individual brain may store any particular memory of a past sensory input in many different areas: visual outlines in one region, color/texture in another, and such things as associated sounds, smells, tastes, tactile impressions, and even memories of emotional reactions, each in their own region of the brain, but still linked in such a way that playback of one ties in the others to form a more or less complete complex mileau(sp?)

To answer the question, I see the cat: it is real to me.
Dave

Dave it sounds like you really know your stuff - are you studying neurology by any chance? You definately have a better understanding of the 'sensory mechanics' involved in the brain.

I find your answer pretty interesting that the cat is "real to you".. are you suggestings that it might not be 'real' to someone other than you?? How could someone verify that the image in your mind actually exists if they didn't believe you?

 

[Filip Sandor]

I agree completely. In fact, there is evidence that each individual brain may store perceptions in different places and in different ways, and that they may not be at all linear, such that a 'core dump' that works on one brain might get scrambled data from another. One school of thought is that storage may be analogous to holography, where many memories may share each data point.
Dave

Hey CaveDave,

What do you mean by 'perceptions' being 'stored' in the brain?

What is a perception? How is it stored in the brain?

 

[CaveDave]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: White Cat Experiment

Dave it sounds like you really know your stuff - are you studying neurology by any chance? You definately have a better understanding of the 'sensory mechanics' involved in the brain.

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Thank you. I study many things which fascinate me, but not in an academic sense. My sister studies neurology/neuropathology and she passes on some of her books.

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I find your answer pretty interesting that the cat is "real to you".. are you suggestings that it might not be 'real' to someone other than you?? How could someone verify that the image in your mind actually exists if they didn't believe you?

As far as the image goes, it would have no external reality that could be 'proven' to another other than during the process of imagining the cat, there might be detectable changes that would occur within my brain, but nothing I could hold up to another's eyes. The image itself probably exists only for me. If they still don't believe me, I must allow them their doubts.