On Oct 5, 2:54 am, Quentin Anciaux <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi, > > 2011/10/5 Craig Weinberg <[email protected]>
> > Consciousness happens. Physics has nothing to say about what the > > content of any particular brain's thoughts should be. If give you a > > book about Marxism then you will have thoughts about Marxism - not > > about whatever physical modeling of a brain of your genetic makeup > > would suggest. > > But reading a book is a physical process, photons from the book hit your > retina, which in turns generate electrical current through the nerves to > your brain which acts accordingly to its state and the new input. The same process would be taking place whether you could read or not. Your ability to make sense of the book depends on your subjective learning of language as well as the physical process of optical stimulation. Actually, my hypothesis includes the conjecture that photons may not be physical phenomena at all: http://s33light.org/fauxton > > So If I have a model of a brain in the same state and gives it the same > input, It'll think about Marxism and not whatever whatever whatever... Without having a person who can tell you what they are thinking about, how would your model tell the difference? To physics by itself, every thought is whatever whatever whatever. The 3-p view of the brain is a- signifying and generic. The 1-p view of the psyche is signifying and proprietary. Your expectation that consciousness follows physics is only based upon the a priori unexplained fact of consciousness, not any kind of scientific insight into how consciousness could arise physically in something. It's that expectation which needs to be questioned, not the existence of subjectivity. The expectation of consciousness arising automatically from physical mechanisms alone exiles our ordinary experience of the world to some metaphysical never- never land, an orphaned dimension without any justification or ontology. It forces a Cartesian theater on us, but then denies it, leaving only promissory materialism...'science will provide'. I'm not buying it. > > I don't know where your idea of having the model of a thing could help you > predict inputs outside of it... I'm saying that you can't have a model for brain behavior for exactly that reason. Too much of it comes from outside of it, continuously, dynamically, interactively, intentionally, semantically, emotionally. It's the other guys here who are saying that the brain behavior can be predicted by biochemistry alone. I used to think that too, but I have a better way of making sense of it now. Craig -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
