News1 min ago
What Is Consciousness?
184 Answers
A sort of carry over from my "question for naomi" thread.
Have been reading the tale end of that debate (with a lot of interest) between naomi and others regarding energy and whether it can survive death. It seems to me that at times there might be some conflict as to what we mean by 'energy'. If we replace the word energy with consciousness then the debate makes a bit more sense....to me anyhow. The question then becomes can consciousness survive (in whatever shape or form). It then begs the question,
what exactly is consciousness?
From everything ive read, it appears to be one of the big questions, as science , as yet, has no idea exactly what consciousness is or how it arises.
Just curious, how do we define consciousness and what is it?
Thanks
Have been reading the tale end of that debate (with a lot of interest) between naomi and others regarding energy and whether it can survive death. It seems to me that at times there might be some conflict as to what we mean by 'energy'. If we replace the word energy with consciousness then the debate makes a bit more sense....to me anyhow. The question then becomes can consciousness survive (in whatever shape or form). It then begs the question,
what exactly is consciousness?
From everything ive read, it appears to be one of the big questions, as science , as yet, has no idea exactly what consciousness is or how it arises.
Just curious, how do we define consciousness and what is it?
Thanks
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Why would anybody consider that consciousness can exist without a living brain of some sort. It has never been demonstrated to exist anywhere other than in a brain. The notion that consciousness can exist independantly was invented to support equally daft ideas about a supposed 'afterlife' or ghosts. The problem really is that the human brain is not very good at self criticism and is unaware of it's failings.
I don't think that's quite right -- the electron is destructible in the sense that it doesn't last forever. As to there rest. Well, ifs and buts is implying a lot more uncertainty than there actually is. Which brings us to the age-old debate of what exactly "I don't know" means, and how it has to be qualified. 99.99999% certainty, after all, is still "don't know", technically, but it would be wrong or at least seriously misleading to lump it in with 0.0000001% or 50% or anything in between. There are degrees of not knowing.
I am, however, certain that an electron doesn't necessarily last for ever, so that it's "destructible", because after all this is how the LEP (Large Electron-Positron Collider) at CERN worked: by annihilating electrons and seeing what was spat out. It wouldn't have worked if you couldn't destroy leptons. We can run perhaps into a bit of imprecision of language, though. The only way to "destroy" an electron is to collide it with a positron (or even an electron neutrino), so it's a very specific type of "destruction". You couldn't blow one up with a stick of dynamite or something like that.
I am, however, certain that an electron doesn't necessarily last for ever, so that it's "destructible", because after all this is how the LEP (Large Electron-Positron Collider) at CERN worked: by annihilating electrons and seeing what was spat out. It wouldn't have worked if you couldn't destroy leptons. We can run perhaps into a bit of imprecision of language, though. The only way to "destroy" an electron is to collide it with a positron (or even an electron neutrino), so it's a very specific type of "destruction". You couldn't blow one up with a stick of dynamite or something like that.
Jom, //Why would anybody consider that consciousness can exist without a living brain of some sort. //
Because people claim to see or experience things that they can only associate with the consciousness of someone who has died.
Jim.... but you still have something of it remaining so not destroyed. Yes, there are degrees of not knowing.
Night all.
Because people claim to see or experience things that they can only associate with the consciousness of someone who has died.
Jim.... but you still have something of it remaining so not destroyed. Yes, there are degrees of not knowing.
Night all.
/Because people claim to see or experience things that they can only associate with the consciousness of someone who has died. /
Some people claim to have been abducted by aliens, to be a reincarnation of somebody famous, to be able to communicate with the dead etc. Should we believe them or give them psychiatric help?
Some people claim to have been abducted by aliens, to be a reincarnation of somebody famous, to be able to communicate with the dead etc. Should we believe them or give them psychiatric help?
"Jim.... but you still have something of it remaining so not destroyed."
That's not really right. What remains is a photon (or a Z boson, or various other things, depending on the exact decay we are talking about). And a photon is not "something of" an electron. It's an entirely separate thing. And the only information the photon can carry is its energy, momentum and polarisation. Since photons of the same energy, momentum and polarisation can be produced in all manner of different ways, on its own a single photon tells you nothing about where it came from or how it was produced. It's only in combination with other particles that you can start to make some deductions about where they all came from based on the patterns observed. And even then it's a statistical deduction that's made about the entire set of particles, rather than any single one of them.
The picture is entirely the same as in radioactivity (not surprisingly, because deep down they are driven by precisely the same physics). Stare at a single Uranium atom and you will have no idea -- none -- when it will decay. Stare at several billion billion of them and you can say with near certainty that precisely half of them will decay in the next 700 million years or so. Which half? No idea. And if you took the decay products, you could not say which of the uranium atoms they came from.
This discussion may well turn out to be entirely irrelevant to consciousness anyway, but at the very least the analogy drawn in that book you're reading breaks down at the first hurdle, because electrons are indeed destructible. Indeed, perhaps even more destructible than a wire is. After all, the way to destroy a wire is by cutting it, or bending it, or maybe burning it, all of which leave most of the material that made the wire behind in tact, even if it's now useless as a wire. By contrast, destroy an electron and nothing of it remains, and what you are left with is an entirely different particle.
That's not really right. What remains is a photon (or a Z boson, or various other things, depending on the exact decay we are talking about). And a photon is not "something of" an electron. It's an entirely separate thing. And the only information the photon can carry is its energy, momentum and polarisation. Since photons of the same energy, momentum and polarisation can be produced in all manner of different ways, on its own a single photon tells you nothing about where it came from or how it was produced. It's only in combination with other particles that you can start to make some deductions about where they all came from based on the patterns observed. And even then it's a statistical deduction that's made about the entire set of particles, rather than any single one of them.
The picture is entirely the same as in radioactivity (not surprisingly, because deep down they are driven by precisely the same physics). Stare at a single Uranium atom and you will have no idea -- none -- when it will decay. Stare at several billion billion of them and you can say with near certainty that precisely half of them will decay in the next 700 million years or so. Which half? No idea. And if you took the decay products, you could not say which of the uranium atoms they came from.
This discussion may well turn out to be entirely irrelevant to consciousness anyway, but at the very least the analogy drawn in that book you're reading breaks down at the first hurdle, because electrons are indeed destructible. Indeed, perhaps even more destructible than a wire is. After all, the way to destroy a wire is by cutting it, or bending it, or maybe burning it, all of which leave most of the material that made the wire behind in tact, even if it's now useless as a wire. By contrast, destroy an electron and nothing of it remains, and what you are left with is an entirely different particle.
The problem with coming to an understanding of what consciousness is, from whence it arises and where it resides is that arriving at such an understanding apparently also presupposes and entails the existence of a highly evolved vastly complex living functioning organism that in addition to possessing consciousness has developed and honed its capacity to reason.
Jim, I asked you to confirm something that required a simple yes or no answer, but we have now launched into yet another mish-mash of a lecture. Can we just stop there please because if we don’t we will once again find an interesting question abandoned in favour of the irrelevant pedantry of science Let’s get back to the principle here. If the wire is broken it still exists but it’s not fit for purpose, just as a broken (dead) brain still exists but is not fit for purpose. Nevertheless the energy the wire once conducted still exists, albeit possibly in another form, so the question is could the same apply to the energy (in whatever form) that the brain, now dead, once conducted?
Jom, //Should we believe them or give them psychiatric help?//
Until you know differently, you are not qualified to tell them they’re nuts.
Jom, //Should we believe them or give them psychiatric help?//
Until you know differently, you are not qualified to tell them they’re nuts.
Life isn't simple questions. I'll continue to give the answers I think are appropriate. You asked a question about the nature of electrons, I answered it appropriately. If you didn't like the answer, well, I can try to make it clearer, but there is a limit. Everything should be made as simple as possible, said Einstein, but not simpler.
"Nevertheless the energy the wire once conducted still exists, albeit possibly in another form, so the question is could the same apply to the energy (in whatever form) that the brain, now dead, once conducted?"
For me the key words there are "possibly in another form". The brain could (and indeed does) carry energy in various forms (electrical, chemical, etc). After death, this changes into other forms of energy, and in the process the information about what it was before is lost. Consumed for example by the bacteria that feed on flesh, and in the process released as heat. Once life shuts down, the energy that sustained it dissipates into other forms. Primarily heat, which carries no information or structure, and is just a fuzzy mess of nothing much at all.
The question is really not if some form of "energy" can survive death -- I hinted earlier that the answer to this is "yes, but only in a trivial sense" but whether any coherent structure capable of carrying information can. And the evidence for the answer to that being "yes" also is currently scant or even non-existent.
"Nevertheless the energy the wire once conducted still exists, albeit possibly in another form, so the question is could the same apply to the energy (in whatever form) that the brain, now dead, once conducted?"
For me the key words there are "possibly in another form". The brain could (and indeed does) carry energy in various forms (electrical, chemical, etc). After death, this changes into other forms of energy, and in the process the information about what it was before is lost. Consumed for example by the bacteria that feed on flesh, and in the process released as heat. Once life shuts down, the energy that sustained it dissipates into other forms. Primarily heat, which carries no information or structure, and is just a fuzzy mess of nothing much at all.
The question is really not if some form of "energy" can survive death -- I hinted earlier that the answer to this is "yes, but only in a trivial sense" but whether any coherent structure capable of carrying information can. And the evidence for the answer to that being "yes" also is currently scant or even non-existent.
The problem of describing the subjective experiences of consciousness is complex indeed. For we risk objectivizing what is essentially an internal set of experiences and excluding the necessary presence of the experiencer. We cannot remove ourselves from the equation. No scientific description of the neural mechanisms of color discrimination can make one understand what it feels like to perceive, say, the color red. We have a unique case of inquiry: the object of our study is mental, that which examines it is mental, and the very medium by which the study is undertaken is mental. The question is whether the problems posed by this situation for a scientific study of consciousness are insurmountable—are they so damaging as to throw serious doubt on the validity of the inquiry?
Jim, I didn’t ask about the nature of electrons – I asked whether they had now been proven to be divisible – and I’m assuming the answer is no, which is what the man said in the first place - but all that's irrelevant anyway. It just detracts from the subject matter.
//After death, this changes into other forms of energy, and in the process the information about what it was before is lost.//
In that case you concede that we don’t know what it becomes?
//After death, this changes into other forms of energy, and in the process the information about what it was before is lost.//
In that case you concede that we don’t know what it becomes?
Divisibility or not is a key part of the nature of an electron. Electrons are or appear to be indivisible. But tueyy are destructible. In direct contradiction to the passage of the book you are quoting.
Obviously I don't know with 100% confidence what it becomes, asI I've said several times already in this thread. I strongly suspect that like everything else it will become heat, and that in the process all coherent information of what came before is lost. I think there is a good deal of evidence to support my position but I am wary of putting a precise figure on that and of course the evidence may change. Then again it may come down even stronger in favour of this position.
Obviously I don't know with 100% confidence what it becomes, asI I've said several times already in this thread. I strongly suspect that like everything else it will become heat, and that in the process all coherent information of what came before is lost. I think there is a good deal of evidence to support my position but I am wary of putting a precise figure on that and of course the evidence may change. Then again it may come down even stronger in favour of this position.
No it shouldn't and I don't want to discourage it. I'd like to think that at least some of what I say will help to inform that speculation. Anyone speculating on whether consciousness is a bnew form of energy should accept that this would imply that over time it will dissipate as heat and lose information and coherence. So at the very least that is not exactly the right way to think about it.
Something I think worth considering is that, if "ghosts" exist and if we are capable of seeng them, then at least some of their nature will already be described by current physics (specifically by the theory of light and matter), because our sight works by absorbing photons. This probably means that the nature of electrons, among other known particles, is after all very relevant to the discussion.
Something I think worth considering is that, if "ghosts" exist and if we are capable of seeng them, then at least some of their nature will already be described by current physics (specifically by the theory of light and matter), because our sight works by absorbing photons. This probably means that the nature of electrons, among other known particles, is after all very relevant to the discussion.
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