On 18 Jun 2016, at 02:25, Bruce Kellett wrote:
On 18/06/2016 3:20 am, Bruno Marchal wrote:
On 16 Jun 2016, at 12:34, Bruce Kellett wrote:
On 16/06/2016 5:26 pm, Telmo Menezes wrote:
On Wed, Jun 15, 2016 at 1:33 AM, Bruce Kellett
<[email protected]> wrote:
On 15/06/2016 12:19 am, Telmo Menezes wrote:
On Mon, Jun 13, 2016 at 3:22 AM, Bruce Kellett
Assuming arithmetic does not even account for mind, much less
account for
matter. Saying that consciousness is a computation is empty
until one
specifies precisely what form of computation.
It might be that all computations are conscious -- but with much
different contents, of course. I feel some inclination towards
this
hypothesis.
But then you explain nothing. You have just made an identification
"computation = consciousness", which tells us nothing useful
Yes, my point here is that, in the worst case, you are no worse
than
you would be with physicalism in terms of explaining consciousness,
but at least you are taking modern science seriously (the brain
looks
like a computer).
I don't see any reason why physicalism might be thought to be in
conflict with a computational model of consciousness.
Physicalism assumes a reality to select the computations. With
computationalism, this is not just not necessary, it cannot work
without appeal to magic. A proof that there is no magic there would
only be a proof that such physical reality equal the one derived
from (intensional) arithmetic + computationalism.
The physical derived from arithmetic would have to be identical to
the one observed or else you theory would be false.
The physical derived from arithmetic has to be identical with the one
inferred, but it is better that it differs on something, and then we
see which makes the right prediction. But, yes, it better should fit
with the observation, I agree with that.
The evidence that consciousness supervenes on the physical brain
is overwhelming,
I agree. That is the basic motivation for Mechanism. My personal
first discovery of the (universal) number is in the bacterium
Escherchia Coli (in a paper by Jacob and Monod, also Watson).
The appearance of physical computers does not add to physicalism
though, unless of course the facts refute digital mechanism, but as
I have explained, if it looks it is the case (the measure problem)
when we look in the details, the explosion of possibilities appears
to be immense and well structured in a quite similar way in the
physical appearances and in arithmetic (or any sigma_1 complete set).
All these problem dissolve if you reject the notion of a platonic
realm for arithmetic and accept physicalism.
If you succeed in making me doubting that 2+2=4, I might doubt even
more on Hphi = Ephi. If you reject elementary arithmetic, you can
invoke directly the God of the Gap. (and I don't believe in a platonic
realm for arithmetic, I have no real clue what you mean by that).
so no model of consciousness can deny that the physical has an
important role.
Nobody doubt that the physical has an important role. It is, with
consciousness what I want to get some explanation for.
As discusses in another post, I do think that Bruno's ideas (with
the
help of Gödel) provide an explanation to why consciousness looks
like
a mystery to us.
Maybe most of the mystery is in the eye of the beholder!
Well, a part of that mystery has been translated into a
mathematical measure problem.
That is why computationalism is very interesting, it makes a bridge
between theology/philosophy-o-mind/cognitive science and
mathematics, notably with a key role played by arithmetic theories
and others sigma_1 complete sets.
Evolution provides a perfectly comprehensible route to
consciousness,
To the easy consciousness problem. You don't seem aware of the hard
problem, like Chalmers called it.
There is no hard problem ..... there is only confusion on the part
of Chalmers and those who follow him. I think Massimo Pigliucci gets
it right when he asks "What hard problem?", (http://philosophynow.org/issues/99/What_Hard_Problem
).
"I think that the idea of a hard problem of consciousness arises
from a category mistake. I think that in fact there is no real
distinction between hard and easy problems of consciousness, and the
illusion that there is one is caused by the pseudo-profundity that
often accompanies category mistakes."
A category mistake arise when, for example, you ask about the colour
of triangles. This mistake led Chalmers to endorse a form of
dualism. (And I think that ultimately you, Bruno, are also endorsing
a subtle dualism in your approach.)
?
Not at all. In the "final TOE", I assume only elementary arithmetic,
and computationalism at the meta-level. Materialist (in the weak sense
of believer in Matter) are forced to be dualist or eliminativist.
Pigliucci then goes on the endorse the evolutionary account:
"...Once you have answered the how and why of consciousness, what
else is there to say?
In the case of consciousness, the wy is easy indeed. But the how is
very tricky, as digital mechanism illustrates.
"Ah!" exclaim Chalmers, Nagel and others, "You still have not told
us what it is like to be a bat (or a human being, or a zombie), so
there!" ... Of course an explanation isn't the same as an
experience, but that's because the two are completely independent
categories. It is obvious that I cannot experience what it is like
to be you, but I can potentially have a complete explanation of how
and why it is possible to be you.
This shift from consciousness to identity. A complete explanation of
why it is possible to be me, if it exists, makes only consciousness
even more mysterious. See my answer to Clark. The relation first
person consciousness with third person relations is akin to the
simpler case of the relation between equation and surfaces, and then
theories and models, and then machines and private minds.
Then computer science explains this completely up to the matter
appearance or the sigma_1 measure problem.
To ask for that explanation to also somehow encompass the experience
itself is both incoherent, and an illegitimate use of the word
'explanation'."
Of course. Everybody agree here, but that is not what is done by the
philosopher of mind. We still want an explanation for the experience,
and computer science/mathematical logic provides it (at least a solid
embryo). The point is that it should be precise enough to get physics,
which it does, at the propositional level at least.
He goes on to explain that this does not involve the elimination of
the very concept of consciousness or of the self.
Which are two different notion, and the self is many (the 1-self, the
3-self, the 1p-plural, etc.).
The problem with this conclusion by people like Churchland and
Dennett is that they are taking reductionism too far -- although
everything is ultimately made of quarks, and the like, obeying the
laws of physics, that does not mean that higher orders of
explanation are illegitimate or eliminable (the old mistake of
positivism!).
Good, but then it became dualist. You need matter and arithmetic, + a
magic link.
Concepts such as evolution, consciousness, qualia and so on, have a
definite role, but they are not somehow magical -- to attempt to
'explain' these things in reductionist terms is ultimately, as
Massimo says, a category mistake. ("Where consciousness is
concerned, the existence of the appearance is the reality".)
OK with this, and very well exemplified by computer science and
mathematical logic. But the material ontology just do not work, as it
is an invocation of something never seen to stop pursuing the
explanations. I understand it you want study the sky, but don't invoke
the sky to claim the mind-body problem has been solved.
Bruno
Bruce
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