# Minds: Death, anaesthetic, babies, animals and Sonic the Camcorder-Doom player. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 9, 2005, 10:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033 "2005-05-09T10:10:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2005, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/101 "2005-06-23T16:13:35Z")
Incidentally, my physicalist stance is no different to that described in the Stanford link, but I think a little further explanation is necessary to avoid misrepresentation. I **agree** that if I were simply to _declare_ that consciousness and metal entities are physical and dust off my hands at a job well done, I would not be saying anything very useful at all. Physicalism is the position I have come to prefer after assessing the current state of cognitive science and, crucially, the _alternative_ positions and their philosophical consequences. You have occasionally seemed to _accept_ my proposition that the universe and everything in it including consciousness, human or otherwise, ultimately **is** atoms, wave-photons and fundamental forces in spacetime. You say that this is “useless”. I ask, is anything else _necessary_? You have characterised the proposition as a “Milquetoast”, timid and submissive, and reference NDE’s, New Age “energy” and the paranormal. Again, physicalism does not simply _assert_ that spiritual experiences do not happen, it seeks to _explain them_ in terms of precisely the same atom-built cognitive modules that produce hallucinatory visions or “significance judgements”. It tries (and presumably in your opinion, _fails_) to use only the fewest entities necessary to _tell the story_, rather than merely narrating “Once upon a spacetime there fundamental particles … and they all lived happily ever after”. The question regarding NDE’s, New Age Energy and the paranormal is whether there is really anything to tell a story _about_ which wasn’t covered by the tale of dreams and hallucinations which necessarily formed part of the story of consciousness. As I say, let us not get too caught up in whether processes involving atoms and waves, such as computations or memory storage and retrieval, are themselves “physical” or not. I wish only to understand what explanatory entities you propose, given that I would seek to minimise the number thereof. ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2005, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/102 "2005-06-23T16:33:14Z")
Me **n** tal entities, not _metal_ entities, sorry! ---
**Author:** ![Hoodoo\_Ulove](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/58956e/32.png) [@Hoodoo\_Ulove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hoodoo_Ulove)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2005, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/103 "2005-06-23T17:25:29Z")
> [@SentientMeat](#): > > Incidentally, my physicalist stance is no different to that described in the Stanford link Actually, that link describes quite a few physicalisms. do you mean “Physicalism is the thesis that everything is physical, or as contemporary philosophers sometimes put it, that everything supervenes on the physical.”? > [@SentientMeat](#): > > As I say, let us not get too caught up in whether processes involving atoms and waves, such as computations or memory storage and retrieval, are themselves “physical” or not. I certainly respect your privilege to avoid abstract metaphysical speculation such as this. However, you seem to be doing what you ask others to avoid. ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2005, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/104 "2005-06-23T22:44:48Z")
> [@SentientMeat](#): > > Many thanks for joining in, **Aeschines**. The pleasure is all mine, my brother. > [@](#): > > So, given all available evidence including the testament of these NDErs (and temporal lobe epileptics), do _you_ believe in a sharpened, increased consciousness after death? Right. I’d prefer not to debate the evidence. We all know what that is and where it is. It’s in books, it’s all over the net, and it’s been written up in Lancet and other respectable sources. We’ve debated it here on SDMB many times. I think the evidence is credible, and I interpret it one way. Others here find it not credible or interpret it another. I’d call it an impasse. If there is something to debate on the philosophical side of it (which is interesting in its own right), I’d be happy to talk about that. > [@](#): > > Given that there are humans alive today than at any other single time in history, and that a few billion years ago there was no life on Earth of any kind, surely _some_ consciousnesses must emerge from nothing? Or are there an infinity or near-infinity of souls waiting to be born, in your opinion? I read a stat somewhere that in the history of homo sapiens 145+ billion people have lived, so there really can be no shortage of souls any more. Further, there is no theoretical reason why the same soul/mind could not be reincarnted in multiple bodies at the same time (it is also possible that there are layers of “higher selves”). I do believe, however, that human souls come about through natural processes. The soul is, in essence, the pattern of the body/mind, not some disembodied wisp of spirit (though the mind can take many forms, not all of them embodied, but all of them patterned). Hence, we retain our bodies in the Afterlife, as that form or pattern _is_ our soul. Souls are not something separate created by “God” waiting to find a body to dwell in, according to my understanding (though a soul may have to wait to be reincarnated; how that process happens is a mystery). > [@](#): > > Could you possibly try and express your general feeling of where on the timeline of evolution the first individual conscious life-form appeared? (My own is roughly at the level of bees, which can process sensory information in working memory and “choose” to write the word for “near” or “far” on the honeycomb with their dance.) There is no _official_ definition of “consciousness,” so I don’t want to dis yours. But I don’t think most philosophers would consider a bee “conscious.” I think that concept requires the ability to think about oneself. “Sentience,” on the other hand, could include other-awareness and self-awareness without the ability to think about the self. We speak of ourselves as being “unconscious” during sleep. Aside from lucid dreams (which I’ve experienced quite a bit), this seems right. We can’t really reflect on ourselves. It is the most ordinary of things, a daily occurance, and yet it seems odd to us. Is thought gone? No. Shake me awake at any time during sleep, and I can tell you what I was thinking or dreaming about. Often theta-state thoughts seem totally other-worldly (maybe they are). Is memory gone? No, because I can remember what I was thinking about, often quite far back, if you shake me awake. I’ve even had the weird (and hard-to-veryify) experience of remembering dreams later that I did not remember directly after waking up. Based on our experience with dreams alone, we know that there can be many different states of mind. Who knows what a bee’s state of mind is. But it seems doubtful that they are “conscious” if they can’t reflect on themselves. > [@](#): > > I don’t quite see why the mechanism for how the machine (be it silicon or carbon) is built is so fundamentally important. If the camcorder-Doom player processes sensory information via working memory in order to accomplish tasks essential for its survival (and crucially, _succeeds_), it is doing exactly what a squid, or an insect, or a lizard is doing, yes? No, it’s not. This conclusion is extremely far off the reservation. First, the Sonic character is only superficially lifelike. Why don’t you use the ball from a 1970s “Pong” game in your example? Isn’t the ball _trying_ just as much to survive, etc.? Every element of the Sonic game is only superficially analagous to features of the real world. For example, if he “eats” something, he is not really eating; his life is continued thereby simply by fiat, the rules of the game. Which brings us to the next point: The big, large, HUGE difference between the “world” of the computer and our real world is this: Every element of the computer world can be expressed as VERBAL instructions as to what is to happen under any given situation. This includes randomized effects. So, in the Sonic world, if he goes to Level 18, there is a set of background events that can be verbalized explicitly: Let from 10 to 18 leaves fall from the tree with probability XYZ, etc. etc. The “real world” is not like that. Even if we grant (and I do!) that the world IS such a set of instructions (the rules of pattern and number), they are not OUR instructions, nor are they known to us except insofar as we take the time to experiment and learn them (even then we cannot possibly know whether we have the fine details correctly, as our ability to measure is limited). But don’t be too quick to agree with me that our world works much like a computer program does. Keep in mind that I believe that the truths/rules of pattern/number are essential, immutable, invariable truths. You don’t. Here is another point from philosophy: Sonic has no _substance_. He is an arbitrary, explicitly created thing. A squid is not. A squid is a squid, out there in the ocean doing its thing, whether we think about it or not. There is no comparison between a work of art combined with AI and a living creature. > [@](#): > > If it were somehow able to _replicate_ itself, it could hold its own in the evolutionary fight for survival alongside its biological bretheren, could it not? I’m interested in the fundamental difference you are proposing between animals and machines. Computer programs are an interesting case in that their instructions are concrete and explicit. They can be no other than they are, and they are that way because we made them that way. (I realize that exceptions exist: the one that immediately comes to mind is that of the organic human playing the game!) There is, however, really no fundamental difference between animals and machines. Even the intention of the creation (manmade vs. Nature-made) would not _necessarily_ mean a different result. For example, a machine could be artificial life, and that life could be the same as life that already exists. > [@](#): > > Just to clarify, I agree that it is possible (but unlikely) that the universe is conscious (there’s no working, accessible memory in my book). Would you afford me the same courtesy and agree that it is possible that there are _only_ local pockets of consciousness? It is not a matter of “possibility” in my theoretical perspective; the consciousness of That Which Is is not an object of empirical research but rather something to be intuited and understood. I do _not_ mean, however, that the consciousness of That Which Is is like that of “God,” musing, and brooding, and acting as a unified entity. Rather, That Which Is attains consciousness through its individual pockets of consciousness and the connectedness that exists between them (i.e., cells of Universal Mind). > [@](#): > > (A&-A) is true? Perhaps it would be better to avoid this path for now. There isn’t any contradiction. The answer to the question, “Why is there something and not nothing?” is really quite simple. We see that 2 + 2 = 4 must be true in all possible systems, and hence there can’t be a “nothingness” that is not bound by that truth. If it’s bound by that truth, then it has a characteristic, and hence it is not nothing. Whence, then, our concept of nothing? I think it arises from the fact that we can perceive that quantities and qualia can be diminished and increased, and “nothing” is the concept of all quantities and qualia being in their least state simultaneously. And I do think that there is such a state, which exists outside time and space–it might very well have been the singularity of the Big Bang. We can call this state the One. In one dimension, it is that least modified of states. In another dimension, it is That Which Is in any of its permutations. It is all states and all things at once. > [@](#): > > Note that, in that case, it might be said that all of those elements of the conscious system _are_ “a little bit” conscious. Like I said, we might all be saying similar things using different words. I agree. Mind is not a little whirligig set up by “God” to act _just so_. Rather, it is like water, flowing to achieve being wherever it can. There is mind, intelligence, being in all things. “Consciousness” is one particular mode of this being. > [@](#): > > Would you be willing to admit that human consciousness is a _process_, a _temporal arrangement_ of particles and forces entering a device which filters, memorises and sorts those inputs? It would take further explanation to see how close we agree, but I don’t have any big problem with this statement. It is a pattern with subpatterns. I am quite certain that the human mind is composed of mental elements and compounds just as much as a cherimoya is composed of elements and compounds. If you don’t have hydrogen, then you don’t have a cerimoya, period. But we don’t have as yet a Periodic Table of the mind, and I suspect we will not for a very long time. We do have the evidence of the Afterlife, however, that the human mind does not require the matter of this universe in order to “run.” Does that mean it is made of some wispy substance called “spirit,” something totally different? No, it does not. The general interpretation I see out there is that the mind runs on a different network, a different substrate, something like that. I could be that it uses similar nueronal patterns but built on different matter, or it may use a kind of indestructable, pure information-based substrate (the consensus seems to be that no information in the universe can ever be totally lost). > [@](#): > > But they’re not actually _dead_ then - the ECG’s are still registering massive brain _activity_. I’m asking about cephalic necrosis (which _nobody_ has ever recovered from) in which the brain activity utterly and irrevocably flatlines **after** that activity which characterises **Near** Death Experiences. From what I’ve read, that’s not correct. There is _no_ cerebral wave at all. The brain cells are oxygenated and fed, and hence not dying, but there is no wave, no pattern at work. **Lekatt** has brought up several times the NDE case of the woman whose brain was drained of blood and chilled. No brain wave there. > [@](#): > > In any case, surely I am also experiencing that acute state right now _in addition to_ my brain-activity correlated state? No, you are not experiencing that extra-acute state right now. Just as you are not experiencing sleep right now or an LSD trip right now. > [@](#): > > So the theta state is one of diminished consciousness? Could we agree that this state of diminished consciousness is **caused** by inactivity in certain brain regions? Agreed. > [@](#): > > Well, you think that there are _mental_ entities which are not physical. I’m simply asking whether such entities could result solely from physical processes. Actually, I make _no distinction_ between mental entities and non-mental entities except those used in practical, daily life. That is why I have such a problem with your physicalism. It would seem that you are trying to draw a distinction between “this stuff we know exists” and “that stuff we know doesn’t exist.” In other words, you distinguish the physical (exists) from the non-physical (doesn’t exist). Needless to say, there can be no set of things that doesn’t exist! So, in my view, things arise from processes. The things I informally or colloquially lable “mental” (e.g., my thoughts, concepts, ideas) arise from processes, and non-mental things (rocks, buckets of KFC) arise from processes too. But I do _not_ believe that there are “spirits” or Platonian forms just lightly floating around or interpenetrating “physical objects.” The mind-body problem is no problem at all once you realize that All Things arise from the same set of fundamental principles. > [@](#): > > As I asked **Gyan** , would you characterise biology as “the cells do it”? Yes, the cells do it. Life is a set of patterns based on the same fundamental principles. > [@](#): > > Again, what fundamental difference between cognitive science and biological science are you proposing? I assume you’re not a panvitalist either. I don’t think there is any difference other than an arbitrary categorization. Truth is truth. > [@](#): > > Could this not be paraphrased “All things, including mind and matter, are temporal arrangements of fundamental particles and forces in spacetime”? More fundamentally, they arise from the fundamental principles. If, in fact, mind in our Universe arises from matter and energy patterns (which themselves arises from the fundamental principles), then I have no problem with that. Just so long as it is recognized that all of it must arise from the fundamental principles. > [@](#): > > And you know that we do _not_ “know” this. It is what you _believe_ based on the testament of others and the epiphanic outputs of your own limbic system (which I have _also_ experienced, you’ll recall). I could just as well say that we **know** that consciousness begins at some point after conception, disappears occasionally throughout life, and ends at cephalic necrosis. But I wouldn’t, because that would be unhelpful grandstanding. I think it’s linguistically fair to say that I know it. It’s true that I don’t know it in the say way I know that 2 + 2 = 4. The existence of our Universe and the Afterlife have many (seemingly) arbitrary qualities (we can imagine the world to be different than it is). The world appears to us differently based on our approach to it (and on our “daemon” or “vibration”). To a skeptic, the world really _is_ the physicalist’s world, and to the New Ager it _is_ New Agey. I do think it has reached the point, however, that some my side’s New Agey truth is becoming so in-your-face (i.e., achieving a kind of consensus in the mind of the species) that the levy is going to break fairly soon. But we’ll see. ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2005, 10:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/105 "2005-06-24T10:13:08Z")
**Aeschines** , it seems we are not so different after all, really - I think in many ways you _are_ an emergentist physicalist who is merely, but quite rightly, dissatisfied with the explanation of mind and consciousness which cognitive science currently sets forth. I think there are really only a couple of matters of any significance on which we disagree, and would prefer to limit the discussion to those. However, one of those appears not to be up for debate at all… > [@Aeschines](#): > > I’d prefer not to debate the evidence. We all know what that is and where it is. It’s in books, it’s all over the net, and it’s been written up in Lancet and other respectable sources. The absolutely crucial element of all such evidence, _ie._ the _precise **timing** of the experience_, being **anecdotal**. In the Lancet [article (pdf)](http://www.zarqon.co.uk/Lancet.pdf), a nurse is surprised when an old man “knows” where she put his dentures. In the Pam Reynolds case, Pam “knows” the shape of specific medical apparatus and the specific sequence of parts of the procedure. Now, if these experiences _did_ happen exactly when the brain was temporarily inactive (but, of course, before necrosis), this would certainly herald a sea change in neuroscience and, indeed, the entire natural philosophy of the human race. But the exact sequence of events is _crucial_, and the slightest mistake or misremembered sequence on behalf of the corroborating conscious observers of the unconscious NDErs places the whole episode squarely back in the ambit of the neuroscience of _dreams_. We don’t know how much my brain could _hear_ or _feel_ when in a similar state (and incorporate in to a _visual_ dream like it often does to my alarm clock), and I certainly could not tell you the precise _time_ of that dream in terms of synchronising it with a specific period of complete inactivity. Here we have some stories. The _slightest_ incorrect or overbroadly interpreted detail makes it unnecessary for us to make that vast leap to consciousness after death, the Ockham’s Razor equivalent of going from clean-shaven to growing a 3 foot beard in a instant. Interpret the anecdotal evidence as you will, but I assume that you would be righteously indignant if a court of law convicted you on such a basis. > [@](#): > > I read a stat somewhere that in the history of homo sapiens 145+ billion people have lived, so there really can be no shortage of souls any more. But _those_ first souls must have emerged from nothing, be they Australopithecine, Neanderthal, Cro-Magnon, Ancient Greek or whatever, yes? > [@](#): > > I do believe, however, that human souls come about through natural processes. As in the gestation of a foetus in the womb, yes? > [@](#): > > (though a soul may have to wait to be reincarnated; how that process happens is a mystery). If a soul _can_ emerge from nothing via natural processes, why posit such an unnecessary additional process? > [@](#): > > I don’t think most philosophers would consider a bee “conscious.” Very well, I’d be happy to change my threshold if they required some form of limbic system as in birds, mammals, apes and humans, to produce what might loosely be termed _emotion_ or _significance judgement_. If _self-reflection_ is the crucial distinction, I might go all the way up to dolphins, say. But I’m asking **you** about **your** threshold. Homo sapiens in the daytime is conscious. Neanderthalis? Australopithecus? Chimps, monkeys, dogs, cats, birds, lizards, amphibians, insects…what, _as your general guess_? We could then explore what was necessary to make the leap from the thing _without_ it to the thing _with_ it, by exploring its neuroanatomy: compare the dolphin’s brain to the _porpoise_, say, and examine which cognitive modules are involved in its process of recognising itself in a mirror or the like which are not _big or complex enough_ in the porpoise. > [@](#): > > First, the Sonic character is only superficially lifelike. Why don’t you use the ball from a 1970s “Pong” game in your example? Isn’t the ball _trying_ just as much to survive, etc.? First, I’m not talking about Sonic the Hedgehog the Sega game, I’m talking about a **camcorder-Doom** player I happen to call “Sonic” - apologies if this has caused confusion. The point is that, in ultra-detailed **Doom** , the _first person perspective_ player tries to survive in the virtual environment by making all kinds of decisions and employing different strategies: find food, fight or flee, seek helpful companions _etc._. I am then replacing the ultra-detailed virtual Doom world with a **digital camcorder** (not so great a jump if you look at Doom 3, perhaps). In each case, the player is receiving and processing input and working out how to survive in the environment provided by his senses. > [@](#): > > Sonic has no _substance_. He is an arbitrary, explicitly created thing. A squid is not. A squid is a squid, out there in the ocean doing its thing, whether we think about it or not. There is no comparison between a work of art combined with AI and a living creature. Again, I mean the camcorder-Doom player, not Sega’s Sonic Hedgehog - let us ditch Sonic altogether if necessary. My point is that I could load the camcorder-Doom computer into a small, mobile robot having lenses, some means of locomotion and perhaps even eventually a means of [replication](http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4538547.stm). He is then a _real thing_ which I can pick up and shake about like a squid, who will continue to “do his thing” when I let him go. > [@](#): > > There is, however, really no fundamental difference between animals and machines. Could we one day, perhaps, build a Doom-player which you would say was _conscious_, in your opinion? > [@](#): > > No, you are not experiencing that extra-acute state right now. Just as you are not experiencing sleep right now or an LSD trip right now. But, surely, if that other state independent of my brain and its activity, I _have_ got it right now. LSD is a bunch of real molecules which affect only my neuroanatomy. This “other state” is _independant_ of neuroanatomy, and thus must be extant right now? > [@](#): > > More fundamentally, they arise from the fundamental principles. If, in fact, mind in our Universe arises from matter and energy patterns (which themselves arises from the fundamental principles), then I have no problem with that. Just so long as it is recognized that all of it must arise from the fundamental principles. This, I think, is the second significant disagreement between us - I rather consider it cart-before-horsemanship, strangely similar to the tautological and vaguely solipsistic roundabout which **other-wise** endlessly circles. “Pattern recognition” is surely _how biological computers work_? “Patterns” surely only exist, like computer files, in the minds (_ie._ neurological configurations) of sufficiently evolved organisms? And if so, which came first, the universe or the arbitrary categories which such devices sorted their sensory inputs into? The universe, by around 14 billion years! Such devices **then** developed linguistics, including the ability to label patterns _before_ their existence. I wonder, have you read “Where Mathematics Comes From” by Lakoff and Nunez? I do strongly recommend it. > [@](#): > > I do think it has reached the point, however, that some my side’s New Agey truth is becoming so in-your-face (i.e., achieving a kind of consensus in the mind of the species) that the levy is going to break fairly soon. But we’ll see. We will indeed. Let us make sure that none of us are wearing the rose-tinted spectacles of wishful thinking. ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2005, 10:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/106 "2005-06-24T10:30:10Z")
> [@Hoodoo](#): > > Actually, that link describes quite a few physicalisms. do you mean “Physicalism is the thesis that everything is physical, or as contemporary philosophers sometimes put it, that everything supervenes on the physical.”? My preference is supervenience physicalism (which recognises that the pursuit of outright _reduction_ of even, say, molecules to atoms, might well reach an impasse which only evidentially supported _induction_ can scale - _ie._ sometimes reductionism might only ever be a scientific “best guess” rather than an utterly incontestable explanation). > [@](#): > > I certainly respect your privilege to avoid abstract metaphysical speculation such as this. However, you seem to be doing what you ask others to avoid. Of course _I_ label such processes “physical”, and I’m happy to engage in such discussion if necessary. My point was only that I’d prefer to discuss whether things like memory retrieval can be _explained_ by reference to things like the configuration of a substrate, be it digital, analogue, silicon or carbon. I’d suggest our “overall labels” are rather more tomato-tomahto. ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2005, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/107 "2005-06-25T03:27:47Z")
> [@SentientMeat](#): > > **Aeschines** , it seems we are not so different after all, really - I think in many ways you _are_ an emergentist physicalist who is merely, but quite rightly, dissatisfied with the explanation of mind and consciousness which cognitive science currently sets forth. The main difference is my considering the fundamental principles primary, not the physical. > [@](#): > > I think there are really only a couple of matters of any significance on which we disagree, and would prefer to limit the discussion to those. However, one of those appears not to be up for debate at all… It’s been done in other threads. Fully done, roasted. A real rotisserie case. Anyhow, what you call the “paranormal” interpenetrates my worldview fully. It’s not just NDEs. But this is not an easy-going, overly credulous worldview. More on that in a moment. > [@](#): > > But _those_ first souls must have emerged from nothing, be they Australopithecine, Neanderthal, Cro-Magnon, Ancient Greek or whatever, yes? Those souls arose not from nothing but from the natural processes of life: gestation, growing, learning, experiencing, etc. > [@](#): > > If a soul _can_ emerge from nothing via natural processes, why posit such an unnecessary additional process? I don’t posit it; I believe in it based on the evidence for it. I also seem to remember my own past lives, but it is not completely definite. > [@](#): > > If _self-reflection_ is the crucial distinction, I might go all the way up to dolphins, say. But I’m asking **you** about **your** threshold. Homo sapiens in the daytime is conscious. Neanderthalis? Australopithecus? Chimps, monkeys, dogs, cats, birds, lizards, amphibians, insects…what, _as your general guess_? Homo sapiens are probably the only fully conscious animals. The trouble is we define consciousness based on our own experiences. In the animal kingdom I have no doubt that there are many states of mind that would blow our own could we experience them for just a moment. > [@](#): > > My point is that I could load the camcorder-Doom computer into a small, mobile robot having lenses, some means of locomotion and perhaps even eventually a means of [replication](http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4538547.stm). He is then a _real thing_ which I can pick up and shake about like a squid, who will continue to “do his thing” when I let him go. > Could we one day, perhaps, build a Doom-player which you would say was _conscious_, in your opinion? We can already: it’s called sex. I’m not being facetious: building, screwing, otherwise creating–all processes. Would artificial life be a machine? Depends on definition and how you look at it. Could a digital computer be conscious? Don’t know. It may be that the conscious brain/mind system has some “element” (from the Periodic Table of the Mind) that a digital system simply can’t supply. It may be like asking whether, with good enough technology, we could make water out of chlorine and lithium. Then again, it fully digital consciousness may be possible. Time will tell (though we are way, way far away from decent strong AI right now). > [@](#): > > But, surely, if that other state independent of my brain and its activity, I _have_ got it right now. LSD is a bunch of real molecules which affect only my neuroanatomy. This “other state” is _independant_ of neuroanatomy, and thus must be extant right now? Are you asleep right now? Laughing your ass off right now? The reasoning that all possible states must be extant right now is prima facie incorrect. > [@](#): > > This, I think, is the second significant disagreement between us - I rather consider it cart-before-horsemanship, strangely similar to the tautological and vaguely solipsistic roundabout which **other-wise** endlessly circles. Meaning unclear. Don’t know what **Other-wise** says. > [@](#): > > “Pattern recognition” is surely _how biological computers work_? Yes, but there are many different kinds of patterns that can be recognized with varying levels of fidelity. For whatever reason, we are able directly to grasp the truth that 2 + 2 = 4. It is a truth that binds all possible patterns. It’s true in every possible universe. It is one piece (large piece? small piece?) of Ultimate Truth. [quote] “Patterns” surely only exist, like computer files, in the minds (_ie._ neurological configurations) of sufficiently evolved organisms? [quote] The word “exist” is problematic. It makes it sound as though something is “out” there. Not so. Rather, “outness” and “thereness” are bound by the principle. I think why we humans are able to know things is rather simple: our minds our patterns and thus can literally **con** form to other patterns. Like clay in a mold. Aristotle seems to have seen it this way, too. > [@](#): > > And if so, which came first, the universe or the arbitrary categories which such devices sorted their sensory inputs into? The universe, by around 14 billion years! Even so, but the Universe itself was bound by the fundamental principles. > [@](#): > > Such devices **then** developed linguistics, including the ability to label patterns _before_ their existence. That’s right. The weird thing is that it works. > [@](#): > > I wonder, have you read “Where Mathematics Comes From” by Lakoff and Nunez? I do strongly recommend it. Based on your previous recommendation I looked it up on Amazon. It looks like an interesting read. If I run into it used somewhere, I’ll pick it up. But I know I don’t agree with the premise, and dismissing that reasoning can be done in a line or two: The very act of arguing that there is no Ultimate Truth presupposes the use of modus ponens and other things that we consider to be elements of Ultimate Truth, and is therefore self-contradictory. Put in a colloquial fashion, the following exchange just makes “A” look really stupid: A: Mathematics is just us thinking and stuff. B: No, I don’t think so. A: C’mon, man! Can’t you see that it’s just the way the brain works, nothing more. B: Do you have an argument for that? A: Don’t you know the evidence? B: Yeah, but why should I care about the evidence? A: C’mon, man! It’s the Scientific Method for Chrissakes! > [@](#): > > We will indeed. Let us make sure that none of us are wearing the rose-tinted spectacles of wishful thinking. If there is anything the Universe seems not to allow, it is ease of thought. Not for the truly open-minded. Everywhere there is contradiction. Entering the New Age mind reveals contradictions, fuzzy regions, problems everywhere. But when I was a hard-core atheist, it was no easier. Things not in the Canon of Disbelief intruded rudely. Moreover, the disbelief provided no relief: Whew! all of _that stuff_ is BS that need never be considered seriously again. Rather, the evidence for it was everywhere. There is no ease of thought in the world. ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 9:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/108 "2005-06-27T09:50:53Z")
> [@Aeschines](#): > > Homo sapiens are probably the only fully conscious animals. Wow, that’s quite a distinction. Neanderthalis or homo erectus were _not conscious_? That first arbitrarily distinct member of _our_ species some 170-odd thousand years ago had this thing we have, but none before him? That being the case, it would appear that _we_ are not ‘conscious’ until well _after_ being born, perhaps as late as our third birthday! And woe betide those whose cognitive functions are impaired such that they slip to the level of a slightly more primitive ancestor, for surely they could no longer be called ‘conscious’ either? > [@](#): > > Then again, fully digital consciousness may be possible. Time will tell (though we are way, way far away from decent strong AI right now). Agreed, but I am glad you consider it possible in principle. If so, would such a consciousness continue after death, or even before its ‘birth’? > [@](#): > > Are you asleep right now? Laughing your ass off right now? The reasoning that all possible states must be extant right now is prima facie incorrect. But laughter and sleep have _physiological correlates_. I can most certainly say that the reason I am not laughing or asleep right now is because of _what my brain is doing_. This “other” consciousness is **independent** of my brain activity. > [@](#): > > For whatever reason, we are able directly to grasp the truth that 2 + 2 = 4. It is a truth that binds all possible patterns. It’s true in every possible universe. I’d disagree, actually. We can indeed cognitively [subitise](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subitize) four objects, but thereafter we must simply _formulate_ such rules as “2 + 2 = 4” in the manner of writing a new _language_. If I wished to start my own “2 + 2 = 5” language I could go right ahead and do so, calling the previous language “false”. It wouldn’t get me very far, of course. But “truth” is itself just one cognitive output of many - your ‘top down’ approach to logic and mathematics does not _explain_ logic and maths nearly as well as a ‘bottom up’ cognitive scientific approach, IMO. > [@](#): > > That’s right. The weird thing is that it works. Is it really that “weird” to propose a language having a _past tense_ or other temporal locator? > [@](#): > > I think why we humans are able to know things is rather simple: our minds our patterns and thus can literally **con** form to other patterns. Like clay in a mold. Aristotle seems to have seen it this way, too. I agree entirely: that’s how I am suggesting that _memory_ works - a literal, physical configuration of neural variance similar (but with important _dis_analogies) to how a computer stores photonic images. I am suggesting that this collection and systemization of memories is **what we are** , and that human “fundamental principles” no more existed for those 14 billion years than did Windows XP. > [@](#): > > Put in a colloquial fashion, the following exchange just makes “A” look really stupid: Indeed it does. Which is why I’d call A a _strawman_. When we debate, we are using our frontal lobes to process propositions according to the logical system impressed upon us by our past history of education. It is **tautological** to say that you can’t talk about maths without effectively _doing_ maths yourself. But cognitive science seeks to _exit_ that endless roundabout by explaining **how** systems of logic and maths come about in a similar manner to _visual recognition_ systems or _emotional significance judgement_ systems. That does not mean that logic and maths are Platonically _out there_ and our brains finally get around to finding them hiding under the evolutionary sofa. Lakoff and Nunez seek to explain how the universe is (tautologically) the _way it is_, and these “fundamental principles” and the like are what humans (amazingly! - I will not conceal my wonder and awe at this) **construct** in their little region of spacetime, just as they write computer games. > [@](#): > > But when I was a hard-core atheist, it was no easier. Things not in the Canon of Disbelief intruded rudely. As a former theist who even “saw God” on occasion, I can sympathise. I came to recognise that such experiences were simply another [Gap](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_of_the_gaps) in which I was placing God. If I am to find peace of mind, well, theism has had several millennia to provide its explanations. [Natural](http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/scientific-explanation/) explanation, on the other hand, is making leaps and bounds year on year, _especially_ in the vast interdisciplinary field of how our brain provides “experience”, even [religious](http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/neuro/neuro01/web2/Eguae.html) experience. It is not, as you say, _easy_ to find such solutions. But that is surely the exciting challenge of this millennium! As the Emerson Pugh quote goes, _If the human brain were so simple That we could understand it, We would be so simple That we couldn’t._ ---
**Author:** ![Hoodoo\_Ulove](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/58956e/32.png) [@Hoodoo\_Ulove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hoodoo_Ulove)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/109 "2005-06-27T14:20:43Z")
> [@Aeschines](#): > > The soul is, in essence, the pattern of the body/mind, not some disembodied wisp of spirit (though the mind can take many forms, not all of them embodied, but all of them patterned). If mind can exist in a not embodied form, aren’t all those neurons redundant? Seems a waste. ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/110 "2005-06-27T18:06:44Z")
> [@SentientMeat](#): > > Wow, that’s quite a distinction. Neanderthalis or homo erectus were _not conscious_? I meant that homo sapiens is the only current animal that fits the definition. Our ancestors may also have been conscious. BTW, I think the sentience of non-conscious animals is also very valuable. Dogs understand much about the world and are able give and receive love. They just aren’t able to sit and think, “Gee, I’m a dog. This is interesting. I’m a dog thinking about being a dog.” Etc. > [@](#): > > That being the case, it would appear that _we_ are not ‘conscious’ until well _after_ being born, perhaps as late as our third birthday! And woe betide those whose cognitive functions are impaired such that they slip to the level of a slightly more primitive ancestor, for surely they could no longer be called ‘conscious’ either? Again, conscious does not = good, valuable. Your points here are correct, however: not all homo sapiens are conscious, for various reasons. > [@](#): > > Agreed, but I am glad you consider it possible in principle. If so, would such a consciousness continue after death, or even before its ‘birth’? Certainly, why not? It’s not so much “life after death” as “persistence of pattern.” > [@](#): > > But laughter and sleep have _physiological correlates_. I can most certainly say that the reason I am not laughing or asleep right now is because of _what my brain is doing_. This “other” consciousness is **independent** of my brain activity. We need to deep six such assumptions. You will have a brain in the Afterlife. And that brain will have cells running the same “program” that they are now, if you will. With some changes. > [@](#): > > I’d disagree, actually. We can indeed cognitively [subitise](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subitize) four objects, but thereafter we must simply _formulate_ such rules as “2 + 2 = 4” in the manner of writing a new _language_. OK, you’re arguing against the notion of Higher Truth. Any principle of absolute Higher Truth, whether it’s 2 + 2 = 4 or modus ponens or the simple rule that a contradiciton is impossible. That’s untenable, I think. To argue _for_ Higher Truth is self-resonant, self-supporting. The opposite is self-defeating. For if I argue against you, I get to use the very principles against you that I aver pertain in Reality. Monus ponens, logic, etc. Contrariwise, if you argue against me, the very tools you are using are undermined by your argument. The snake snacks on its tail and doesn’t quite like the taste and feel of that. I don’t see, however, at base any contradiction between what you are emphasizing and what I am. Cognitive science is indeed important and teaches us much (though I think it’s in its wee infancy). But could cognitive science simply be the study of how the pattern we call “mind” or “brain” matches the larger pattern we call the “Universe” or “Reality”? And in my philosophy Reality or That Which Is derives itself from the fundamental principles, or Higher Truth. > [@](#): > > If I wished to start my own “2 + 2 = 5” language I could go right ahead and do so, calling the previous language “false”. It wouldn’t get me very far, of course. And why wouldn’t you? Simply because your new pattern would not be congruent to the Master Pattern. > [@](#): > > But “truth” is itself just one cognitive output of many - your ‘top down’ approach to logic and mathematics does not _explain_ logic and maths nearly as well as a ‘bottom up’ cognitive scientific approach, IMO. I don’t think logic and math can be “explained” in causitive terms. They can be elucidated, but they are not creations. > [@](#): > > I agree entirely: that’s how I am suggesting that _memory_ works - a literal, physical configuration of neural variance similar (but with important _dis_analogies) to how a computer stores photonic images. No fundamental disagreement here, just so long as we keep our minds open to what future research has to tell us. > [@](#): > > I am suggesting that this collection and systemization of memories is **what we are** , and that human “fundamental principles” no more existed for those 14 billion years than did Windows XP. It is precisely because they are not human that they are fundamental. Believe it or not, they are even more fundamental than even a Bill Gates creation. 😉 > [@](#): > > Indeed it does. Which is why I’d call A a _strawman_. I think it not so strawy. When you ignore the Truth, you have politics. Browbeating. Well, you really ought to believe this way because all of us sophisticated people believe it. Here is an irony. I assume you believe in Evolution, or more properly, know that evolution happened and is happening. To the Creationists you provide evidence. If they respond with dogma, you say, quite rightly, A study of the evidence is the way to approach this problem; dogma isn’t. You are calling upon a principle, a principle you feel really _ought_ to convince a rational person. You are calling upon Higher Truth, or, more plainly, the belief that certain things are so for a reason and must be so. You’d consider the Creationists “foolish” for not disagreeing with you, flat-out retarded if you weren’t feeling charitable. At the very least possessed of a gigantic blind spot induced by superstition and dogma. Yet, when stating your case, would you, indeed, add the following caveat? “But my insistence that we go by the evidence isn’t based on the Truth per se, but on certain reasons grounded ultimately in cognitive science.” I hardly think that would add punch to your case. So perhaps the Truth is something to browbeat “believers” with when we have a good case against the “paranormal” or religion or something else from the World of Superstition; but not something to consider “really true,” since Higher Truth or any other such name that more or less reflects in fidelity what Truth is smacks, at the end of the day, of the very Superstition we wish to eradicate. It sounds _religious_, dammit! Hence, I see skeptics’ aversion to the notion of Higher Truth, Absolute Truth, Fundamental Principles, etc., as political. It just ain’t canon. > [@](#): > > When we debate, we are using our frontal lobes to process propositions according to the logical system impressed upon us by our past history of education. Oh, this point is well beneath the level of the **Sentient** I know and love. We are not Pavlovian educationally-impressed beasts; we intuit 2 + 2 = 4 ourselves. We _get_ it. We see that it is a fact, is true. > [@](#): > > It is **tautological** to say that you can’t talk about maths without effectively _doing_ maths yourself. But cognitive science seeks to _exit_ that endless roundabout by explaining **how** systems of logic and maths come about in a similar manner to _visual recognition_ systems or _emotional significance judgement_ systems. Sounds fine to me. I have no problem accepting the fact it is the brain that understands Truth and not some little ghost sitting inside the brain. But it is still Truth. > [@](#): > > That does not mean that logic and maths are Platonically _out there_ and our brains finally get around to finding them hiding under the evolutionary sofa. Well, they are finally getting around to it, but I agree that there _is no such thing_ as a Platonic form. There are no ghosts of truth, which, did they not float about the Universe, the thing they represent would cease to be. Think chiaroscuro. The fundamental principles are not things, they are the boundaries of things. 2 + 2 = 4 does not mean that there are, in fact, 2 things being added to 2 things which total 4 things. It is an immutable, unalterable rule pertaining to all possible patterns involving the patterns of “2” and “4.” > [@](#): > > Lakoff and Nunez seek to explain how the universe is (tautologically) the _way it is_, and these “fundamental principles” and the like are what humans (amazingly! - I will not conceal my wonder and awe at this) **construct** in their little region of spacetime, just as they write computer games. The human element of truth perception is, as you say, amazing _and_ constructed, and, as you imply, limited. We create the symbols and words and perceive Truth in our own meager way. But still we perceive it, not invent it. For, as you know, math and science _really work._ We’ve built computers and skyscrapers and cured diseases and made beautiful music. Now, you may counter that we’ve merely invented math to match physical universe. But time and again math has _predicted_ how that physical universe will be; indeed, much of what _you_ believe about the universe is only known through mathematical extrapolition or definition (in other words, math has become the language by which we define the physical, not just talk about it). Then, the kicker is that you still require, as discussed above, a principle, a logical tool to convince me that math is _just_ an inventend system that matches the physical well. How are you going to convince me if not with principles and logic, and what if I doubt you because you told me to doubt them? 😕 > [@](#): > > As a former theist who even “saw God” on occasion, I can sympathise. But can you sympathize with a former atheist who sees confusion in the atheist-materialist perspective too? [quote] I came to recognise that such experiences were simply another [Gap](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_of_the_gaps) in which I was placing God. If I am to find peace of mind, well, theism has had several millennia to provide its explanations. [quote] Well, yes, I don’t believe in “God” either. Though there is clearly a power of goodness and love in the Universe that I have no problem with others calling by that name. I call it the Divine. > [@](#): > > [Natural](http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/scientific-explanation/) explanation, on the other hand, is making leaps and bounds year on year, _especially_ in the vast interdisciplinary field of how our brain provides “experience”, even [religious](http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/neuro/neuro01/web2/Eguae.html) experience. Umm, me read some. I don’t have a problem with the rearch or even necessarily the conclusions. Just the “just” that enters into the interpretations: “Religious feeling is _just_ XYX.” OK, so the brain allows us to perceive great, trancendental things, just as it allows us to perceive red, salty, orgasm, and earache. Were we to suppose that “salty” was experienced via the brain but “oneness with the universe” was experienced by “holy god-modual uncorrupted by matter”? > [@](#): > > It is not, as you say, _easy_ to find such solutions. But that is surely the exciting challenge of this millennium! No doubt! And what’s going to tickle your funnybone within the next few decades, I believe, is how much you think has been disproved really isn’t. And the Christians and religious will also have fun learning that the new evidence for the Unseen World doesn’t support their worldview either. > [@](#): > > As the Emerson Pugh quote goes, > _If the human brain were so simple > That we could understand it, > We would be so simple > That we couldn’t._ Great quote! And thanks for the highly intelligent and polite debate. I’m enjoying it immensely. ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/111 "2005-06-27T18:07:47Z")
> [@Hoodoo Ulove](#): > > If mind can exist in a not embodied form, aren’t all those neurons redundant? Seems a waste. I don’t think a mind can exist in _unpatterned_ form. And our body is a pattern, both here and in the Afterlife. ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 9:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/112 "2005-06-28T09:58:49Z")
> [@Aeschines](#): > > Your points here are correct, however: not all homo sapiens are conscious, for various reasons. Ah, I see - it seems we are now well and truly drawing distinctions between “consciousness”, “sentience”, “awareness” and the like. If “consciousness” requires _analytical language_, so be it - **only** humans, trained chimps (maybe) and future computers (maybe) would then be conscious. I would merely feel a little uncomfortable labelling the deaf person who had not been taught to sign as a child _non-conscious_. > [@](#): > > Certainly, why not? It’s not so much “life after death” as “persistence of pattern.” When a _computer is turned off_? For our future AI, the consciousness is **caused** by the electrical activity in the silicon chips and memory. Without that activity in those chips and memory, there _is no_ consciousness. We could prove this by turning the computer on and off and asking what it remembered in between, in its periods of activity, yes? Proposing that the inactive hunk of switched off silicon is _still conscious_ veers strongly towards the panpsychism of labelling a rock “conscious”, would you not agree? > [@](#): > > We need to deep six such assumptions. You will have a brain in the Afterlife. And that brain will have cells running the same “program” that they are now, if you will. I’m afraid I don’t understand. You said before that we may experience “sharpened, increased consciousness” _with no brain activity_. Are you suggesting that this sharp consciousness happens _in someone else’s brain_? If so, why can’t I feel it right _now_? > [@](#): > > Contrariwise, if you argue against me, the very tools you are using are undermined by your argument. I agree to use the human language called “logic” to argue here, just as I agree to use the human language called “English”. I _could_ forego using logic, or speak to you in Welsh (actually I can’t, but you get the point), but the utility of such “debate” would be sadly diminished. > [@](#): > > I don’t think logic and math can be “explained” in causitive terms. They can be elucidated, but they are not creations. Well, we beg to differ and I think that’s that. I consider that they _are_ human creations, invented to deal with the universe we happen to find ourselves in. That the initial framework has such surprising (and even beautiful) _consequences_ as, say, Riemann space or the Mandelbrot set is rather like English being used to write Shakespeare’s plays. > [@](#): > > When you ignore the Truth, you have politics. I’d suggest that the continual _disagreement_ over what is or is not “true” is all the evidence one needs that there is _no such thing_ as “ultimate truth”, capitalised or not. We may agree upon a system of logic by which we might manipulate propositions, but still disagree on the truth _of the propositions themselves_. Almost every debate here and indeed _ever_ is not about the _validity_ of an argument, but its _soundness_, logically speaking. > [@](#): > > Yet, when stating your case, would you, indeed, add the following caveat? “But my insistence that we go by the evidence isn’t based on the Truth per se, but on certain reasons grounded ultimately in cognitive science.” I hardly think that would add punch to your case. Nevertheless, I _would_ add such a caveat if pressed (or if it were particularly relevant). Such shorthand and “agreed starting points” are often necessary for useful debate, in the same way that I might debate politics while entertaining the notion of _free will_, even though I still consider it to be an _illusion_. > [@](#): > > We are not Pavlovian educationally-impressed beasts; we intuit 2 + 2 = 4 ourselves. We _get_ it. We see that it is a fact, is true. Yes, I agree, actually, for such small subitizable numbers. 6+7=13 is _not so_, however - we must employ our frontal lobes according to the counting system we **learned** as a child. > [@](#): > > Think chiaroscuro. Brazilian restaurants? [Consults dictionary]. Ah, I see. You must appreciate, I’m rather a Philistine when it comes to visual art! > [@](#): > > The fundamental principles are not things, they are the boundaries of things. 2 + 2 = 4 does not mean that there are, in fact, 2 things being added to 2 things which total 4 things. It is an immutable, unalterable rule pertaining to all possible patterns involving the patterns of “2” and “4.” Again, I suggest that the “things added to things” **caused** the rule to emerge as a cognitive process, not the other way around. > [@](#): > > Now, you may counter that we’ve merely invented math to match physical universe. But time and again math has _predicted_ how that physical universe will be; As has _language_, I suggest. Galileo predicted, in Latin, “the heavy and light things will hit the ground simultaneously”. Lo, so they did. He _could_ have said the same in _maths_, not Latin. Again, the _maths_ wouldn’t predict anything any more than the Latin did. It was the _computer called Galileo_ who actually outputted the prediction. > [@](#): > > Then, the kicker is that you still require, as discussed above, a principle, a logical tool to convince me that math is _just_ an invented system that matches the physical well. Again, I say that’s no _kicker_ but a **tautology** : ‘principles’ is _how brains work_, and I cannot engage my brain in debate with you without invoking ‘principles’. That does not impugn my position that those principles _emerged_, cognitively, from the sensory inputs to our brains over billions of years. > [@](#): > > But can you sympathize with a former atheist who sees confusion in the atheist-materialist perspective too? Of course. But sympathy for, in response to such confusion, growing an instant Ockham-beard and proposing past life memories (in which language exactly , by the way?) or an observing consciousness 6 feet above a bed containing a flatlining brain? Those I find confusing to the point of utter _bewilderment_, rather like proposing consciousness in rocks and molecules and the like. > [@](#): > > I don’t have a problem with the rearch or even necessarily the conclusions. Just the “just” that enters into the interpretations: “Religious feeling is _just_ XYX.” I agree entirely: my one-man quest in my lifetime is to replace the “just” in science to “_amazingly_”. I am not _just_ atoms, I am _amazingly, wondrously, upliftingly!_, atoms! > [@](#): > > Were we to suppose that “salty” was experienced via the brain but “oneness with the universe” was experienced by “holy god-modual uncorrupted by matter”? Well, no, anymore than we perceive the monster under the bed with a monster-under-the-bed detector: our brains work by _permuting_ and _combining_ memories in a process called “imagination”. The output of our amygdala can affect what we **imagine** quite dramatically. > [@](#): > > And what’s going to tickle your funnybone within the next few decades, I believe, is how much you think has been disproved really isn’t. As a relevant analogy to tingling my humerus, what would you conclude if we could rig up an electromagnetic helmet which, at the flick of a switch, **caused** exactly those same epiphanic, cosmic, divine or New Age Energy-type experiences which are proposed as evidence against the standard physicalist position? > [@](#): > > And thanks for the highly intelligent and polite debate. I’m enjoying it immensely. As am I, friend, but I think we’re nearing our final game positions. For your evidence of non-brain consciousness, I see only mistakes and dreams. For your primacy of Truth and Principle, I see (if you’ll forgive me) rather old-fashioned essentialism. However, some intelligent and erudite thinkers share your position - no matter how vigorously I might disagree, you are still in esteemed company. ---
**Author:** ![Arwin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/51bf81/32.png) [@Arwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arwin)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/113 "2005-06-28T14:22:49Z")
> [@SentientMeat](#): > > Ah, I see - it seems we are now well and truly drawing distinctions between “consciousness”, “sentience”, “awareness” and the like. If “consciousness” requires _analytical language_, so be it - **only** humans, trained chimps (maybe) and future computers (maybe) would then be conscious. I would merely feel a little uncomfortable labelling the deaf person who had not been taught to sign as a child _non-conscious_. We’ve been here before a few months ago. > [@](#): > > When a _computer is turned off_? For our future AI, the consciousness is **caused** by the electrical activity in the silicon chips and memory. Without that activity in those chips and memory, there _is no_ consciousness. We could prove this by turning the computer on and off and asking what it remembered in between, in its periods of activity, yes? Proposing that the inactive hunk of switched off silicon is _still conscious_ veers strongly towards the panpsychism of labelling a rock “conscious”, would you not agree? You don’t even need the AI example. Check this: [http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,15739502-13762,00.html](http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,15739502-13762,00.html) ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/114 "2005-06-28T14:46:45Z")
Indeed, **Arwin** - reliable “bring back” technology could actually be used to _test_ claims of consciousness after death, by checking that the patient truly has achieved zero brain activity and then _placing a large card boldly displaying a random word and number_ on the patient’s chest, which would be clearly visible by the disembodied consciousness observing from above the bed (as NDErs claim), and patients could be asked what it was when they awake. Like any other paranormal claim, a reasonably cheatproof and luckproof test _is_ possible. ---
**Author:** ![Hoodoo\_Ulove](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/58956e/32.png) [@Hoodoo\_Ulove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hoodoo_Ulove)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/115 "2005-06-28T15:11:49Z")
> [@SentientMeat](#): > > Like any other paranormal claim, a reasonably cheatproof and luckproof test _is_ possible. **Aeschines** , would consistently negative results on such a test affect your worldview? ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2005, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/116 "2005-06-29T00:46:52Z")
> [@Hoodoo Ulove](#): > > **Aeschines** , would consistently negative results on such a test affect your worldview? Yes, they would. More responses later… ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2005, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/117 "2005-06-29T03:02:23Z")
> [@SentientMeat](#): > > Ah, I see - it seems we are now well and truly drawing distinctions between “consciousness”, “sentience”, “awareness” and the like. If “consciousness” requires _analytical language_, so be it - **only** humans, trained chimps (maybe) and future computers (maybe) would then be conscious. I would merely feel a little uncomfortable labelling the deaf person who had not been taught to sign as a child _non-conscious_. I intend no bold claims. It’s a lot of semantics and little science (we do not yet have a Periodic Table of the mind, etc.). But you do seem to conflate “conscious” and “valuable.” > [@](#): > > When a _computer is turned off_? For our future AI, the consciousness is **caused** by the electrical activity in the silicon chips and memory. Without that activity in those chips and memory, there _is no_ consciousness. We could prove this by turning the computer on and off and asking what it remembered in between, in its periods of activity, yes? Proposing that the inactive hunk of switched off silicon is _still conscious_ veers strongly towards the panpsychism of labelling a rock “conscious”, would you not agree? Let’s see what happens once we create that machine and perform that experiment. It may very well claim to have had an NDE. After all, it’s when you “turn off” the human brain that an NDE happens (the brain at this level of matter; I am claiming that the pattern of the brain persists at another level/in another dimension. Also, I doubt that “turning off” the computer in that case will be very much analagous to turning off a modern PC.) > [@](#): > > I’m afraid I don’t understand. You said before that we may experience “sharpened, increased consciousness” _with no brain activity_. Are you suggesting that this sharp consciousness happens _in someone else’s brain_? If so, why can’t I feel it right _now_? As per my parenthetical above, the pattern of the brain persists at a different level, etc. The Afterlife vibrations are said to be extremely fine and subtle, hence the increased clarity of mind and perception. > [@](#): > > I agree to use the human language called “logic” to argue here, just as I agree to use the human language called “English”. Mishmash. The same logic works in any language. Every culture can use modus ponens and math in combination with its language–they _work_ wherever. If you consider logic a “mere language,” please prove the point. I’ve offered up what logic and math have produced–science and technology–as evidence for my side. > [@](#): > > Well, we beg to differ and I think that’s that. I consider that they _are_ human creations, invented to deal with the universe we happen to find ourselves in. And you haven’t answered the claim that they _deal with_ the Universe precisely because they the principles that underpin it perfectly. > [@](#): > > That the initial framework has such surprising (and even beautiful) _consequences_ as, say, Riemann space or the Mandelbrot set is rather like English being used to write Shakespeare’s plays. Isn’t just easier to say that the system is “right”? O Ockham’s-razor-lover. > [@](#): > > I’d suggest that the continual _disagreement_ over what is or is not “true” is all the evidence one needs that there is _no such thing_ as “ultimate truth”, capitalised or not. But there is _absolutely no disagreement_ about 2 + 2 = 4 and 6 + 7 = 13! So maybe you ought to concede that that part is True (or true) and the rest is open for debate? > [@](#): > > We may agree upon a system of logic by which we might manipulate propositions, but still disagree on the truth _of the propositions themselves_. Almost every debate here and indeed _ever_ is not about the _validity_ of an argument, but its _soundness_, logically speaking. No doubt. That’s because an invalid argument is shot down quite easily and people learn not to make them here. Or the people here are smart enough not to make invalid arguments in the first place. Only helps prove my point: Validity, logic, etc., are things to be respected. They are True. [quote] Nevertheless, I _would_ add such a caveat if pressed (or if it were particularly relevant). Such shorthand and “agreed starting points” are often necessary for useful debate, in the same way that I might debate politics while entertaining the notion of _free will_, even though I still consider it to be an _illusion_.Sounds like a big concession to me. You agree that all your notions about skepticism and the scientific method–the things you really insist upon on these boards–is just an arbitrary product of your brain, no more True than creationism, Christianity, or flat-earthism? You really want to go there? (Of course, you _do_ insist that you’re “really right” in one thread and that, in threads like this one, you maybe are not. In terms of the 36 Strategies, I’d put this one under ???.) > [@](#): > > Yes, I agree, actually, for such small subitizable numbers. 6+7=13 is _not so_… So, are you willing to concede that at least the subitizing of numbers reflects Truth? BTW, I would also claim that we can _get_ that 6 + 7 is 13, although, as you correctly point out the pathway to such understanding is not the same as the built-in subitizing approach. Are you claiming that 6 + 7 = 13 is _mere_ rote learning, and that 7 + 7 = 13 would seem just as true to someone who was taught it? > [@](#): > > …[H]owever - we must employ our frontal lobes according to the counting system we **learned** as a child. I repeat what I said earlier: I’m not a Pavlovian math dog. I _really understand_ those truths of mathematics that I understand. There was no training, conditioning, or coercian involved. (I agree that math facts can be learned by rote, but all of us have experienced that sweet mental click that occurs when we _really_ get it. Haven’t you as well?) > [@](#): > > Again, I suggest that the “things added to things” **caused** the rule to emerge as a cognitive process, not the other way around. And how would you tell? You are going “meta” on all these things while telling me that you can’t really go “meta” and be _really right_. You insist with one frontal lobe, while the other frontal lobe tells the first that such insistence is improper. [quote] As has _language_, I suggest. Galileo predicted, in Latin, “the heavy and light things will hit the ground simultaneously”. Lo, so they did. He _could_ have said the same in _maths_, not Latin. Again, the _maths_ wouldn’t predict anything any more than the Latin did. It was the _computer called Galileo_ who actually outputted the prediction. [quote] And _why_ was that computer right? Another example (that I read somewhere): Einstein predicted that the mass of a particle would increase when it was accelerated to high speeds. They did the experiments, and the math was spot on. That’s how it tends to work in the physical sciences: the mathematical models simply _are right_. > [@](#): > > Again, I say that’s no _kicker_ but a **tautology** : ‘principles’ is _how brains work_, and I cannot engage my brain in debate with you without invoking ‘principles’. Yes, it’s the brain. And the brain is really, really correct. Where’s the contradiction? “Real truth” woud somehow have to transcend the brain in order to be “real truth”? And you’re “meta” again. > [@](#): > > Of course. But sympathy for, in response to such confusion, growing an instant Ockham-beard and proposing past life memories (in which language exactly , by the way?) or an observing consciousness 6 feet above a bed containing a flatlining brain? Those I find confusing to the point of utter _bewilderment_, rather like proposing consciousness in rocks and molecules and the like. And what do you find confusing or contradictory in the atheist-materialist world your brain has chosen? Or is it perfect to your brain? > [@](#): > > I agree entirely: my one-man quest in my lifetime is to replace the “just” in science to “_amazingly_”. I am not _just_ atoms, I am _amazingly, wondrously, upliftingly!_, atoms! Not quite. I read somwhere (correct me if I’m wrong), that nary an atom from the you of ten years ago is still in your body. Atoms change, pattern remains. > [@](#): > > As a relevant analogy to tingling my humerus, what would you conclude if we could rig up an electromagnetic helmet which, at the flick of a switch, **caused** exactly those same epiphanic, cosmic, divine or New Age Energy-type experiences which are proposed as evidence against the standard physicalist position? Bring it on. It sounds like progress. Drugs make for a good analogy here. Many who have tried drugs have said that what they experienced was not a “mere” trip. I think the helmet could be quite informative. > [@](#): > > As am I, friend, but I think we’re nearing our final game positions. Well then, play for mate, friend, don’t resign just yet. > [@](#): > > For your evidence of non-brain consciousness, I see only mistakes and dreams. I’ve got to slam you on this one, buddy. I expected more of you. Throughout this thread, I’ve never once said anything about non-brain consciousness. I’ve also denied that spirit is a little wisp inside the head. > [@](#): > > For your primacy of Truth and Principle, I see (if you’ll forgive me) rather old-fashioned essentialism. Cite? Arguments? And isn’t that just name-calling anyway? Old-fashioned? Would someone old-fashioned agree with you as much as I have done in this thread? You went for a quick and dirty attack at the end there, Old Bean. Didn’t work. ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2005, 9:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/118 "2005-06-29T09:57:04Z")
> [@Aeschines](#): > > It’s a lot of semantics and little science (we do not yet have a Periodic Table of the mind, etc.). But you do seem to conflate “conscious” and “valuable.” Well, I don’t mean to - I suggest only that the complexity of the cognitive modules correlates with _gradual levels_ of “consciousness”, or whatever we call it. And I certainly think that a “Periodic Table of the mind” is a very poor metaphor - there is no Periodic Table of computer science either, yet we can examine computational processes as scientifically as chemical ones. > [@](#): > > Let’s see what happens once we create that machine and perform that experiment. It may very well claim to have had an NDE. NDE’s in _silicon computers_? Phew, OK, but if I may say, that’s one heck of a bullet you’ve bitten there. > [@](#): > > the pattern of the brain persists at a different level _Independent_ of “this level”. So why don’t I experience that brain pattern _right now_? Right now, I have the consciousness associated with my brain pattern **and** that associated with this “other” pattern, surely? > [@](#): > > The same logic works in any language. Just as every language has a word for “anger” or “dream”. This does not impugn the premise that anger and dreams are _cognitive outputs of brains_. > [@](#): > > If you consider logic a “mere language,” please prove the point. I’ve offered up what logic and math have produced–science and technology–as evidence for my side. I did not call it a “mere” language - it is a _powerfully concise_ language. But as in my Galileo example, what can be said in maths can also be said (more clumsily) in other ways, and science and technology continues apace. > [@](#): > > And you haven’t answered the claim that they _deal with_ the Universe precisely because they [are?] the principles that underpin it perfectly. “Because” is the word I disagree with here. Does a flint cut hides _because_ it is the perfect hide-cutter? No, humans _created_ useful tools, fit for purpose, and found that such flints had other consequential uses also. Again, I’m not sure how much further we can go with this - I can only recommend Lakoff and Nunez as setting forth this position more clearly than I. > [@](#): > > Isn’t just easier to say that the system is “right”? O Ockham’s-razor-lover. Well, yes, but “rightness” and “truth” are _also_ cognitive outputs which are not _out there_ but only _in here_, similar to where our Doom player’s gun resides. > [@](#): > > But there is absolutely no disagreement about 2 + 2 = 4 and 6 + 7 = 13! So maybe you ought to concede that that part is True (or true) and the rest is open for debate? The child disagrees when he writes 7 + 7=13, as might the tribesman for whom such squiggles on a page are meaningless. **We** agree to the rules and principles whereby 6+7=13, and if I were to assert that 7+7=13, I would be _withdrawing_ my agreement to follow such principles, just as I could start talking to you in Welsh. Neither would be very _useful_, of course, since utility depends upon our jointly _agreeing_ and moving forward to examine that agreement’s consequences. So I concede that 6+7=13 is true _according to those rules_, but not that these rules comprise or can show “ultimate” truth, whatever that is (I consider such a proposition to be [petitio principii](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petitio_principii).) > [@](#): > > That’s because an invalid argument is shot down quite easily and people learn not to make them here. Or the people here are smart enough not to make invalid arguments in the first place. Only helps prove my point: Validity, logic, etc., are things to be respected. They are True. No, you misunderstand. A [valid](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valid) argument is one whose truth **would** follow from the truth of the premises. It makes _no sense_ to say “validity is true”. We can agree that a given argument is valid (_ie._ that a certain conclusion **would** follow **if** the premises were true) while disagreeing about the truth of the premises themselves. And again, the rules of validity are themselves cognitively selected as being useful by us humans (and similar beings). I certainly respect them - I seek only to explain their origin, and disagree with that of Platonic dualism and its kind. > [@](#): > > So, are you willing to concede that at least the subitizing of numbers reflects Truth? Yes, truth being itself a cognitive output, indeed _being the subitizing process_, with no _external_ element (and I don’t really understand your penchant for its capitalisation). > [@](#): > > Are you claiming that 6 + 7 = 13 is mere rote learning, and that 7 + 7 = 13 would seem just as true to someone who was taught it? No, no, apologies if I gave that impression (again, Lakoff does this way better than me). _Given_ the cognitive modules which our evolution has equipped us with in order to subitize, place objects in groups, cognize distances along a path and such, **and** the flexibility of the processing in the frontal lobes (but which, curcially, must be _taught_), all of this is _combined_ to yield the “principle” of 6+7=13 which “feels right” compared to 7+7=13, and that this feeling becomes so intuitive through our education that it feels like it must be _out there_. But ultimately, 6+7=13 feels right only because it is cognitively related to the action of taking steps along a path. I realise I am not explaining this too well! > [@](#): > > I really understand those truths of mathematics that I understand. There was no training, conditioning, or coercian involved. (I agree that math facts can be learned by rote, but all of us have experienced that sweet mental click that occurs when we _really_ get it. Haven’t you as well?) Indeed, and I suggest that it is related to other evolutionary cognitive functions such as _ah ha! I’ve found my way back to the cave again!_ > [@](#): > > And how would you tell? I agree that the cognitive science of mathematics is but a [protoscience](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protoscience) as yet. However, I would deny that it is a _pseudo_science. > [@](#): > > You are going “meta” on all these things while telling me that you can’t really go “meta” and be _really right_. Again, I admit that _brains work in “meta”_. But that “meta” can still be a _cognitive emergence_, and calling it _really right_ is itself just a label. > [@](#): > > And why was that computer right? His sentence encoded an arrangement of memories (heavy and light objects + impact + same time) whose correlation with incoming sensory input could produce a high (similar) or low (dissimilar) value. The sensory input + arranged memory correlation modules of his brain returned a high value. This is the physicality of “being right”. > [@](#): > > Einstein predicted that the mass of a particle would increase when it was accelerated to high speeds. They did the experiments, and the math was spot on. I rephrase it thus: the proposed reality (arrangement of memories encoding a possible future input) yielded high cognitive correlation with the subsequent input, which Einstein’s computer could have output in maths (concisely), English (more clumsily but eventually as correlatably) or Welsh (surprisingly!). The _maths_ didn’t do anything _itself_. > [@](#): > > Yes, it’s the brain. And the brain is really, really correct. The brain, really really, does what it does. Call that “really really correct” if you wish, but we’d be interpreting such a phrase differently I think. > [@](#): > > And you’re “meta” again. I cannot _not_ be, in a debate. That does not impugn my position. > [@](#): > > And what do you find confusing or contradictory in the atheist-materialist world your brain has chosen? Or is it perfect to your brain? Perfect? Hardly! I find the atheist-physicalist position _incomplete_, and it is the challenge of the millennium to fill in those huge gaps. Why, if it were perfect, all universities could close their science departments for there would be no more science to do! > [@](#): > > Not quite. I read somwhere (correct me if I’m wrong), that nary an atom from the you of ten years ago is still in your body. Atoms change, pattern remains. Agreed, which is why I always specify the _physical processes_ those atoms undergo and comprise. Indeed, your “pattern” **is** my “temporal arrangement of fundamental particles in spacetime”. We disagree in that I require there to be a pattern **of** physical stuff (with mental entities and the mathematical or logical patterns _in our minds_ ultimately being patterns of physical stuff _themselves_). > [@](#): > > Bring it on. It sounds like progress. Drugs make for a good analogy here. Many who have tried drugs have said that what they experienced was not a “mere” trip. I think the helmet could be quite informative. To repeat the question a little more specifically, what **would** you conclude **if** simple electromagnetic stimulation of the limbic system **caused** those same experiences? > [@](#): > > I’ve got to slam you on this one, buddy. I expected more of you. Throughout this thread, I’ve never once said anything about non-brain consciousness. I’ve also denied that spirit is a little wisp inside the head. Apologies - I meant the floating, observing consciousness above the bed when the mushy offal in the bed was utterly inactive. However, I think it is incumbent on you to explain what “brain” _that_ floaty thing inhabits if not the mushy offal one in the bed, since both I and I think our audience find your terminology a little confusing in that respect. > [@](#): > > Cite? Arguments? And isn’t that just name-calling anyway? Old-fashioned? Would someone old-fashioned agree with you as much as I have done in this thread? > > You went for a quick and dirty attack at the end there, Old Bean. Didn’t work. I apologise unreservedly. I asked for your forgiveness in expressing my honest opinion of your position, and do so again. Feel free to be similarly frank about mine - I will not consider it dirty or malicious, and did not intend to be so. ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2005, 10:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/119 "2005-06-29T10:29:39Z")
> [@Aeschines](#): > > I really understand those truths of mathematics that I understand. There was no training, conditioning, or coercian involved. Sorry - my reply made out that I agree with this when I don’t. Tribesmen and 4-day old babies can subitize. They _cannot_ give an answer to 6+7 which would agree with ours. We had to be _trained and conditioned_ to understand such more advanced and “abstract” arithmetic - I might as well say that everyone can really play a guitar like me. ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2005, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033/120 "2005-06-30T01:11:38Z")
> [@SentientMeat](#): > > Well, I don’t mean to - I suggest only that the complexity of the cognitive modules correlates with _gradual levels_ of “consciousness”, or whatever we call it. Maybe mammalian intelligence is so; it would be interesting to look at extraterrestrial intelligence and see what they’ve come up with. > [@](#): > > And I certainly think that a “Periodic Table of the mind” is a very poor metaphor - there is no Periodic Table of computer science either, yet we can examine computational processes as scientifically as chemical ones. I mean this on two levels. As far as cognitive science goes, I don’t think we’ve got anything so rock solid and incontrovertibly useful as the Periodic Table. Two, my guess is that there are indeed algorithms and modules of pattern that go into producing any given mental output. We will eventually start compiling a list of these. And in theory those patterns implemented in a variety of substrates could produce consciousness. > [@](#): > > NDE’s in _silicon computers_? Phew, OK, but if I may say, that’s one heck of a bullet you’ve bitten there. NDEs are strange enough things in people, aren’t they? But I don’t think machine intelligences of the future will seem much like “computers.” I doubt consciousness is even possible on a digital model. > [@](#): > > _Independent_ of “this level”. So why don’t I experience that brain pattern _right now_? Right now, I have the consciousness associated with my brain pattern **and** that associated with this “other” pattern, surely? I think the patterns are almost totally alike, but the substrates are different. Some software would run much faster on gallium arsenide than silicon. Also, when you’re drunk, your substrate is woozy. You dont ask then, “Why don’t I experience that normal state _right now_?” > [@](#): > > Just as every language has a word for “anger” or “dream”. This does not impugn the premise that anger and dreams are _cognitive outputs of brains_. Doesn’t prove your point. “Monument” and “gumball” are words, but they are not cognitive outputs. Sure, on on level, those are words. But we also use them to point at the _things themselves_. Words are cognitive outputs; the things words point to are or are not. But another thing strikes me: Perhaps we don’t really disagree. The words I choose for my concepts are classic, to you old-fashioned. Your words have a post-modern, skeptical flair. Perhaps this is only a difference in aesthetics, self-identity, and politics. For, consider this: I have yet to see your model of explanation of things predict anything different than my model would. And if that’s the case, at the end of the day we are agreeing, are we not? Or, if not so, tell me what your model predicts that mine doesn’t. I see your model as Ockham-confused. Unless it makes mental life easier or more powerful to some degree, I think, “Math and logic are the truth; if you violate them that means you’re wrong,” is a simple precept that never leads to bad things. OK, I think the above sums up where we’re at. If you think I’m blowing off one of your important points, feel free to repaste it and I will answer it. > [@](#): > > No, you misunderstand. A [valid](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valid) argument is one whose truth **would** follow from the truth of the premises. > It makes _no sense_ to say “validity is true”. Yeah, I know. I meant that you could claim with condience (be “right”) that someone had not proved his/her point with an invalid argument. [quote] > [@](#): > > Perfect? Hardly! I find the atheist-physicalist position _incomplete_, and it is the challenge of the millennium to fill in those huge gaps. Why, if it were perfect, all universities could close their science departments for there would be no more science to do! Yes, but you feel comfortable that the basic skeptical position, despite its lack of completeness, is basically OK, right? The frontal lobes are satisfied? > [@](#): > > To repeat the question a little more specifically, what **would** you conclude **if** simple electromagnetic stimulation of the limbic system **caused** those same experiences? I would conclude that those experiences are taking place in the brain and can be reproduced or mimicked by directly influencing the brain. I do think there is a “reality module,” too, however. This is tricky. I’ve had incredible dreams that were not _marked_ as “real,” and some fairly ordinary dreams that _were_ so marked (and thus seemed more than ordinary thereby). I’m not sure that the helmet experiences have the top-level, stake-your-life-on-it “reality marking” that NDErs claim they have. Or they might. (My dreams didn’t have that either.) That caveat doesn’t change my (and your?) position that all experiences are brain-mediated. Brain being a pattern, in my view. Pattern mediating pattern, makes sense to me. > [@](#): > > Apologies - I meant the floating, observing consciousness above the bed when the mushy offal in the bed was utterly inactive. However, I think it is incumbent on you to explain what “brain” _that_ floaty thing inhabits if not the mushy offal one in the bed, since both I and I think our audience find your terminology a little confusing in that respect. All I can say is what I say: The body (including the brain) exist after death at a different energy level/vibration/etc. And yes, it will be a while before science figures out how that really works. > [@](#): > > I apologise unreservedly. I asked for your forgiveness in expressing my honest opinion of your position, and do so again. Feel free to be similarly frank about mine - I will not consider it dirty or malicious, and did not intend to be so. So, you’re apologizing but still think I’m old-fashioned, etc.–which is it! 🙂 Anyhow, I think most of what we disagree about comes down to politics and aesthetics. So why would I disrespect your position just because the decor or secret handshake is different? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minds-death-anaesthetic-babies-animals-and-sonic-the-camcorder-doom-player/303033.md?page=7)