Hi Craig Weinberg
My understanding of brain scans is that what they are seeing
when one listens to music are electromagnegtic signals. These
can be of some use, but how to interpret them as music
is beyond me. Materialism can monitor the effects of experiences,
which again can be of some use, but I for one would like to be
able to somehow connect directly to the experience in some way.
Roger Clough, rclo...@verizon.net
9/20/2012
Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen
- Receiving the following content -
From: Craig Weinberg
Receiver: everything-list
Time: 2012-09-19, 11:43:08
Subject: Re: music on my mind
On Wednesday, September 19, 2012 10:36:03 AM UTC-4, rclough wrote:
There are two ways of looking at a music signal.
I think it's a mistake to look at it that way. There is no such thing as a
music signal. There is no such thing as a signal. They are abstract
generalizations. Conceptual equivalences with no concrete reality.
What is a music signal? There is an experience of hearing music. There are
experiences of remembering a song that is independent of the memory of the
original circumstance of the listening event. There are experiences of feeling
a speaker cone vibrate, or seeing neurological changes mapped with an
electronic instrument, vibrating strings on a guitar or vocal chords, etc.
These are all different concretely real experiences in the universe. Any
continuity between them is inferred subjectively. All that a signal can
actually be is an experience which is interpreted as having significance.
One is to view it on an oscilloscope as a series of vibrations.
This is what the brain does.
Whatever the brain does is also what we do. If we look at the brain with
eyeballs or an EEG, then we can only see a tiny fraction of what the brain does
- a fraction which does not overlap with the rest of what the brain-self does
and is. If we use an oscilloscope to look at the brain, then we will think that
he brain does what an oscilloscope does.
The other is to listen to it through earphones.
This is what mind does. It decodes the voltages
into sounds. The brain can't hear sounds, it only knows
voltages.
I don't think anything is being decoded. There is an experience of music which
is accessed through the overlap between sub-personal and super-personal
experienced, which facilitates an irreducibly personal experience. The public
and impersonal dual aspect of this experience looks like the activity of a
brain when we find it outside of ourselves.
Craig
Roger Clough, rcl...@verizon.net
9/19/2012
Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen
- Receiving the following content -
From: Jason Resch
Receiver: everything-list
Time: 2012-09-19, 01:57:26
Subject: Re: Bruno's Restaurant
On Tue, Sep 18, 2012 at 3:06 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:
On Tuesday, September 18, 2012 1:33:50 PM UTC-4, Jason wrote:
On Sep 18, 2012, at 10:38 AM, Craig Weinberg wrote:
On Tuesday, September 18, 2012 10:29:44 AM UTC-4, Jason wrote:
Here is an example:
Functional MRI scans have indicated that an area of the brain, called
the?anterior cingulate cortex, processes pain information to determine how a
person is affected.?Severing the link to this part of the brain has a curious
effect on one's reaction to pain.?A condition known as?pain dissociation?s the
result.?Along with brain surgery such as lobotomy or cingulotomy, the condition
may also occur through the administration of certain drugs such as
morphine.?Those with pain dissociation still perceive pain; they are aware of
its location and intensity but pain is no longer unpleasant or
distressing.?Paul Brand, a surgeon and author on the subject of pain recounted
the case of a woman who had suffered with a severe and chronic pain for more
than a decade: She agreed to a surgery that would separate the neural pathways
between her frontal lobes and the rest of her brain.?The surgery was a
success.?Brand visited the woman a year later, and inquired about her pain.?She
said, ?h, yes, its still there.?I just don't worry about it anymore.??ith a
smile she continued, ?n fact, it's still agonizing.?But I don't mind.?
The conclusion: even seemingly simple qualia, like pain are far from simple.
That is a conclusion, but I think the wrong one. Human qualia are not simple,
but that does not at all mean that qualia re not simple.
I agree with this.
We are titanically enormous organisms made of other organisms. Our human
experience is loaded with cognitive, emotional, and sensory qualia,
corresponding to the evolution of life, our species, cultures, families, and
individuals. Our pain is a Taj Mahal, and if you remove enough bricks, some
towers fall and maybe one part of the palace no longer relates to another part.
What you describe suggests exactly that - some part of us feels
