On 17 Sep 2013, at 19:17, Craig Weinberg wrote:
On Tuesday, September 17, 2013 12:40:27 PM UTC-4, freqflyer07281972
wrote:
Thanks Craig, you've articulated quite well a number of difficulties
in approaching the hard problem, IMHO. I was reading this article in
the SEP and thought of your approach:
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/nishida-kitaro/
Thanks, cool
Look especially under his glossing of the idea of 'pure experience.'
It reminds me of your MR/PIP and seems quite congenial to it.
Whaddaya think?
Yes, I agree his 'pure experience' matches my 'sense' in a lot of
the important ways. I use the opposite assumption about it being
'MU' or 'nothing'. It is tempting to conceive of the limitation of
our local experience and propose 'nothing' beyond it, but I think
that it works much better when we invert it and suppose that beyond
local experience is 'everythingness' and 'eternity'.
I particularly recognize "Pure experience launches the dynamic
process of reality that differentiates into subjective and objective
phenomena on their way to a higher unity, and the recapture of our
unitary foundation is what Nishida means by the Good."
This is the same as my model, although I would say that the
differentiation first diverges from pure experience to subjective
qualia, where objective qualia emerge from the public
intersubjectivity (quanta). His concept of higher unity is "Good"
while mine would see good as only a particular measure of subjective
'likeness' and the actual higher unity I see as "Significance"...the
reconciliation of diffracted sense as it is separated from the
entropy of scaled distance and time.
Thanks,
Craig
On Monday, September 16, 2013 1:35:27 PM UTC-4, Craig Weinberg wrote:
The Hard Problem of consciousness asks why there is a gap between
our explanation of matter, or biology, or neurology, and our
experience in the first place. What is it there which even suggests
to us that there should be a gap, and why should there be a such
thing as experience to stand apart from the functions of that which
we can explain.
Materialism only miniaturizes the gap and relies on a machina ex
deus (intentionally reversed deus ex machina) of ‘complexity’ to
save the day. An interesting question would be, why does dualism
seem to be easier to overlook when we are imagining the body of a
neuron, or a collection of molecules? I submit that it is because
miniaturization and complexity challenge the limitations of our
cognitive ability, we find it easy to conflate that sort of
quantitative incomprehensibility with the other incomprehensibility
being considered, namely aesthetic* awareness. What consciousness
does with phenomena which pertain to a distantly scaled perceptual
frame is to under-signify it. It becomes less important, less real,
less worthy of attention.
Idealism only fictionalizes the gap. I argue that idealism makes
more sense on its face than materialism for addressing the Hard
Problem, since material would have no plausible excuse for becoming
aware or being entitled to access an unacknowledged a priori
possibility of awareness. Idealism however, fails at commanding the
respect of a sophisticated perspective since it relies on naive
denial of objectivity. Why so many molecules? Why so many terrible
and tragic experiences? Why so much enduring of suffering and
injustice? The thought of an afterlife is too seductive of a way to
wish this all away. The concept of maya, that the world is a veil of
illusion is too facile to satisfy our scientific curiosity.
Dualism multiplies the gap. Acknowledging the gap is a good first
step, but without a bridge, the gap is diagonalized and stuck in
infinite regress. In order for experience to connect in some way
with physics, some kind of homunculus is invoked, some third force
or function interceding on behalf of the two incommensurable
substances. The third force requires a fourth and fifth force on
either side, and so forth, as in a Zeno paradox. Each homunculus has
its own Explanatory Gap.
Dual Aspect Monism retreats from the gap. The concept of material
and experience being two aspects of a continuous whole is the best
one so far – getting very close. The only problem is that it does
not explain what this monism is, or where the aspects come from. It
rightfully honors the importance of opposites and duality, but it
does not question what they actually are. Laws? Information?
Panpsychism toys with the gap.Depending on what kind of panpsychism
is employed, it can miniaturize, multiply, or retreat from the gap.
At least it is committing to closing the gap in a way which does not
take human exceptionalism for granted, but it still does not attempt
to integrate qualia itself with quanta in a detailed way. Tononi’s
IIT might be an exception in that it is detailed, but only from the
quantitative end. The hard problem, which involves justifying the
reason for integrated information being associated with a private
‘experience’ is still only picked at from a distance.
Primordial Identity Pansensitivity, my candidate for nomination,
uses a different approach than the above. PIP solves the hard
problem by putting the entire universe inside the gap.
Beyond the ambiguities, comp put the physical universe in the gap,
when the gap is modeled by the logic "*" minus the logic not-"*".
I mean G* minus G, etc. In fact physics (should) appear in Z* minus Z,
X* minus X.
Like I said, beyond ambiguities, what you say fits very often comp,
except when you argue *from* what you say, that comp has to be false,
of course.
Bruno
Consciousness is the Explanatory Gap. Naturally, it follows
serendipitously that consciousness is also itself explanatory. The
role of consciousness is to make plain – to bring into aesthetic
evidence that which can be made evident. How is that different from
what physics does? What does the universe do other than generate
aesthetic textures and narrative fragments? It is not awareness
which must fit into our physics or our science, our religion or
philosophy, it is the totality of eternity which must gain meaning
and evidence through sensory presentation.
*Is awareness ‘aesthetic’? That we call a substance which causes the
loss of consciousness a general anesthetic might be a serendipitous
clue. If so, the term local anesthetic as an agent which deadens
sensation is another hint about our intuitive correlation between
discrete sensations and overall capacity to be ‘awake’. Between
sensations (I would call sub-private) and personal awareness
(privacy) would be a spectrum of nested channels of awareness.
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