From: [email protected]
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Stathis Papaioannou
Sent: Saturday, March 15, 2014 10:02 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Quick video about materialism
On 14 March 2014 13:12, Craig Weinberg <[email protected]> wrote:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZH2QXQu-HGE
A brief, handy rebuttal to materialistic views of consciousness. I would go
further, and say that information, even though it is immaterial in its
conception, is still derived from the principles of object interaction. Even
when forms and functions are divorced from any particular physical substance,
they are still tethered to the third person omniscient view - artifacts of
communication about rather appreciation of. Real experiences are not valued
just because they inform us about something or other, they are valued because
of their intrinsic aesthetic and semantic content. It’s not even content, it is
the experience itself. Information must be made evident through sensory
participation, or it is nothing at all.
The thing is, this happens in the brain as well. You look at something, neurons
fire, and there is no obvious reason why that should result in a particular
sensation rather than another, or any sensation at all. And yet it does. If
it's magic, then why can't the same magic happen with the computer? If it isn't
magic, but a natural effect, then why can't the same natural effect happen with
the computer?
Furthermore, in experiment after experiment neural brain activity lights up in
the expected areas clearly before the subject first “experiences” the unfolding
moment. We exist within our minds in a model we make of the world. It begins
with our senses, but rapidly involves our memories, our focus and other
concurrent neural activities that can amplify or suppress sense data streams.
Our self-aware being, only emerges within our experience after our brain has
done the work to manufacture our meta “reality” – the reified model of our
perception woven in to the web of our past experience and colored by our
emotional state.
There is growing evidence that our consciousness, self-awareness, our
experienced self-identity are all emergent phenomena within the mind that
operates on and in our neuron packed brain (and now it seems glial cells the
vast majority of electrically inactive cells in the brain play as yet poorly
understood roles in memory formation amongst other things) We are the
shimmering waves that dynamically paint the surface of the sea, emerging at the
interface of water and air. We are emergent, but still incredibly beautiful,
complex, poetic creatures (who in mass are also raping our planet at breakneck
speed) The fact of our emergence does not diminish the value or depth of our
experience.
Emergence seems to be the way of nature…. The universe emerges (seemingly from
nothing), Stars and galaxies emerge and elements are forged in them emerging
into our universe, enabling complex chemistry to emerge from simpler
chemistry.. enabling auto-catalyzing self-replicating carbon chemistry (in our
world at least)) to emerge.. and slowly for life itself to emerge.
Emergence and evolution. As life evolves emergent qualities begin to appear…
the first multi-celled creatures… communism at the cellular level… and the
first simple nervous systems… quickly sensory organs begin to emerge and
patterns of adaptation and evolution become apparent.
Why should emergence just stop at self-awareness, the experience of that we
call consciousness?
Brain activity precedes consciousness; it seems to me that we are the story
being played out by our brains. Certainly we are actors as well (often
prima-donnas lol), and I have no doubt that “I” influence my brain. But what if
that is just my brain playing out the story – just one level deeper. Think
about it and your brain has already beat you to it and supplied you with the
answer you thought you thought. Our brain is always one step ahead of us.
Smells like emergence to me.
Chris de Morsella
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Stathis Papaioannou
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