Hi Bruno Marchal You could be right, but as I see it, organizing and focusing all of that complex network of nerves and their signals into a singular mental point would --to my mind at least-- be done by a singular intelligent agent.
A self, in other words. And an intelligent self would act out of a center, which does the choosing, in ideal space or in real space. Call it a central processing unit if you prefer computer language. Roger Clough, [email protected] 9/20/2012 "Forever is a long time, especially near the end." -Woody Allen ----- Receiving the following content ----- From: Bruno Marchal Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-09-20, 07:33:10 Subject: Re: Bruno's Restaurant On 20 Sep 2012, at 12:03, Roger Clough wrote: Hi Jason Resch Pragmatically speaking, the self has to be a singular, focussed point. I have trouble understanding how that can be done with a network of nerve signals. The semantic of all programs, like the so called denotational semantics, involves abstract points in abstract space. We don't need physical or geometrical points as consciousness is related to the abstract emulation. You should not reduce a person to the network of its nerves, as the person is an immaterial entity, only using its brain, like you are using a computer right now. It might help you to understand that weak materialism (the doctrine asserting the existence of primitive substance) is not compatible with computationalism, so your network of nerves is mainly a fictitious way to describe the brain as an object. You are using a physical supervenience thesis which simply can't work once we assume comp (and don't throw consciousness in the trash). Bruno Roger Clough, [email protected] 9/20/2012 "Forever is a long time, especially near the end." -Woody Allen ----- Receiving the following content ----- From: Jason Resch Receiver: [email protected] Time: 2012-09-19, 11:51:00 Subject: Re: Bruno's Restaurant On Sep 19, 2012, at 8:02 AM, "Roger Clough" wrote: > Hi Jason Resch > > My ionterpretation of the result of the brain splitting on > pain perception is that her "self" is on one side and > the feeling of pain is on the other. Thus she feels the pain, > but cannot associate to her self (doesn't care). > I would agree, but add that the self, in this case, is found in the connected parts of the majority of her brain. Jason > > Roger Clough, [email protected] > 9/19/2012 > "Forever is a long time, especially near the end." -Woody Allen > > > ----- Receiving the following content ----- > From: Jason Resch > Receiver: [email protected] > Time: 2012-09-18, 14:14:31 > Subject: Re: Bruno's Restaurant > > > > > On Sep 18, 2012, at 12:53 PM, meekerdb wrote: > > > On 9/18/2012 10:31 AM, Jason Resch wrote: > No it is absolutely necessary. If you had no knowledge regarding > what you were seeing, no qualia at all, you would be blind and > dysfunctional. > > > You might cite blund sighr as a counter example, but actually i > think it is evidence of modularity if mind. Those with blind sight > appear to have a disconnect between the visual processing parts of > their brain and others. For example, they may still have reflexes, > like the ability to avoid obsticles or catch a thrown ball, but the > language center of their brain is disconnected, and so the part of > the brain that talks says it can't see. > > I agree. But it raises a question about the woman who feels pain > but doesn't care. Who is it that doesn't care? Obviously the > conscious person who tells you they don't care. But is there > another, inarticulate person who feels the pain? or does care? > > > > > Brent, > > > Good question, and a scary thought. > > > I think this might be likely in the case of a fully split brain, but > correspondingly less likely the smaller the isolated (disconnected) > part of the brain is. > > > Unconsciousness under anesthesia results from brain regions becoming > isolated from each other. Maybe they are still conscious but cut > off from the memory, motion control, and speaking areas, so we have > no evidence of the consciousness of the sub-regions. > > > Jason > > > Brent > > -- > 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 > . > > -- > 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 > . > -- 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. -- 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. http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- 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.
