On Wednesday, July 17, 2013 10:30:24 AM UTC+10, Brent wrote: > On 7/16/2013 5:16 PM, Pierz wrote: > > > I pretty much agree with you Jason. The materialist > simply posits that the conciousness of a person (or conscious > being) represents a static track through the 4d block universe, > misperceived as changing due to something about the way the brain > processes. What this account fails to explain however is the > moment "now", or rather why I am at this moment now rather than > another or all at once. This is the same as saying that it fails > to account for subjectivity, because from a purely objective point > of view -ie one that does not take into account any observer's > experience - there is no problem. From outside of the experience > of any individual observer, there are just bodies moving/behaving > in space-time. Materialists/scientists are so accustomed to seeing > the world from this abstracted perspective that they don't see any > particular problem with this elimination of the subject. But in > making this move, it has already removed consciousness from the > reality it attempts to explain. A true theory of everything would > need to explain the mysteries of I-ness (why am I me and not > someone else) and now-ness (why am I now rather than somewhen > else). > > > If consciousness, the > subjective qualia, is instantiated by some material process (e.g. > brain computation) then there is no more problem with "now" for a > conscious state than for a physical state.� This physical > state instantiates this qualia and the next physical state > instantiates the next qualia.� You may say it's a mystery, but if it > is then the occurrence of physical states is the same mystery. > > > > Brent
"Now" is a mystery in physics too - there is no marker pointing to the current moment other than the experience of some subject. You can ask why particle p has some position at time t and get an answer, but if you ask why the time is "now" t, you can only ever say "because it is". -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
