Since you're replied to a rather long message without indicating which part you're replying to, I don't know what you think is obviously true.
On 22 September 2014 12:33, Richard Ruquist <[email protected]> wrote: > Of course it is true. But it may nobe the only kind of consciosness > > On Sun, Sep 21, 2014 at 8:24 PM, LizR <[email protected]> wrote: > >> On 22 September 2014 12:07, Telmo Menezes <[email protected]> wrote: >> >>> On Mon, Sep 22, 2014 at 1:34 AM, LizR <[email protected]> wrote: >>> >>>> Good point Brent and one on which I am also equivocal, which is why I >>>> have been keen to tease out whether people are talking about consciousness >>>> or the contents of consciousness, and to try to work out whether there is, >>>> in fact, any difference. If there isn't, consciousness becomes something >>>> like *elan vital*, a supposed magic extra that isn't in fact necessary >>>> in explanatory terms - all that exists are "bundles of sensations" (or >>>> however Hume phrased it). >>>> >>> >>> But in materialism we still have a magic extra: matter itself. In the >>> MUH math is the magic extra. I don't know of any theory that gets rid of >>> all "magic" assumptions. >>> >> >> My point was that on this theory, which is basically eliminativism, >> consciousness doesn't actually exist, in the same way as there was no >> "special ingredient" needed to animate living matter, to distinguish it >> from dead matter, it turned out to be "merely" a question of how the >> constituents were organised. Similarly there *may* be no special >> ingredient needed to turn bundles of sensations into consciousness. >> >> I agree that materialism has magic matter, however that isn't in itself >> an argument against an eliminativist explanation of consciousness. >> Otherwise it could be used as an argument for elan vital, or souls, or >> anything else. It just means the chain of explanation doesn't appear to end >> with matter. >> >> However, I don't agree that the MUH *necessarily* has magic maths, it's >> at least possible that maths is a logical necessity. Since it's the only >> thing we know of that couldn't be otherwise (except in very abstruse ways, >> at least) it is at least a candidate for being fundamental, i.e. the last >> link in the chain of explanation. >> >>> >>> In reply to John's comment, we *don't* know that sure that certain >>>> types of brain activity cause consciousness, that's a (very reasonable) >>>> hypothesis based on the fact the two appear to be always correlated. >>>> >>> >>> We don't even know if they are strongly correlated, because we don't >>> know what else is conscious. Is an insect swarm conscious? Is your >>> computer? Are galaxies? The problem is that we might be confusing empathy >>> for consciousness. It is clear that the more an organism is similar to us >>> the more empathy we feel (human > monkey > cat > insect > bacteria, ...). >>> >> >> Right. Hence my use of "appear to be" above. It's very reasonable to >> assume that consciousness requires a fairly complex central nervous system, >> which somehow generates it - this theory isn't contradicted by any evidence >> I know of, except perhaps for NDEs, and has quite a lot of (apparent) >> explanatory power. That doesn't make it true, of course. >> >> -- >> 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/d/optout. >> > > -- > 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/d/optout. > -- 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/d/optout.
