Fear of death.

doesn't mean our experience don't exist.

it means they don't exist outside of ourselves. just like photosynthesis doesn't exist outside of a plants' cells. what does a plant experience when it photosynthesizes? unknowable, but no reason to think its experience of it is "special" with respect to the laws of physics.

Does the subjective experience of red break any known physical laws?

Not sure this is a answerable question.

I really think you are apples vs. oranges with this whole consciousness & the laws of physics angle. It really doesn't make any sense.

Please explain how the experience of red follows physical laws and it'll make a little more sense to me.

Is there any reason to suspect it does? Does a thermometer responding to the temperature break physical laws? Why would a brain responding to certain wavelengths? Is it magical simply because we don't understand it fully, and may never?

Hey you brought it up

Merdeyeux you're saying that we're a complicated organism so our consciousness is more complex, though not functioning differently than the varying degrees found elsewhere in biological life?
I don't know if you saw my supercomputer scenario I presented that touches on the same point. If it is advanced enough to cross the line into arguably being conscious, is it not still a computer that that consciousness is tethered to only when it is operating?

― Evan, Friday, September 28, 2012 1:28 PM (2 hours ago)

yeah, i agree here. in terms of analysing them i think there's something ~notable~ about the distinction between self-organising biological consciousness and externally-induced electronic consciousness, but i'm not really sure what.

organisms respond to external stimuli, and organize it in order to function and reproduce in their environment. experience of red springs from that. '
what doesn't make sense to me is labeling a particular subjective experience (or set of experiences) as "consciousness" and then arbitrarily imbuing it with a magical properties.

So everything in the universe is obeys the laws of physics. Except for consciousness. Why? Because it's special. Why is it special? Because it is.

Because it special to us, in such a way that we can't accept it just ends.

If the only argument for it's specialness is "you never know...you can't prove otherwise", that is literally the weakest argument possible while still remaining with the realm of logic.

So how much does this consciousness weigh?

why do i keep doing it's for its jeez

how much does love weigh? how much does hope? how much does resentment? how much does the color red?

Your arguing for the specialness of the human experience is really no stronger an argument. Why is birth-to-death perception the only meaningful existence?

You know what Granny I'm OK with arbitrarily imbuing magical properties to consciousness as a what-if, because existential what-ifs are interesting, but I'm not OK with equating its possibility with the scientifically inferred outcome.

There's nothing special about human experience, that's the whole point. Consciousness is defined by "birth-to-death" perception/existence. If you believe in other forms of existence, you're going to have to find a new term for the perception of it.

Magical magical magical magical magical magical science science science science science

sigh

I'm sorry.

What would be sufficient proof that consciousness wasn't special, and obeys physical laws? If I show you fMRI or CAT scans of electrical activity in the brain, and how it correlates with certain thought patterns, ways of perceiving stimuli, levels of attention, etc., you can always just say "nah I'm not convinced, it *feels* like there's something more to it than that". Well, okay *shrugs*.

I can't abide with the notion that an argument that insists that a concept that occurs within the universe must abide by the laws of the universe is no stronger of an argument than one that contends that a concept is unique and breaks physical laws merely because it *feels* special and you can't measure it.

Where did anyone say it breaks physical laws?

Conservation of energy is a physical law.

conservation of energy, not conservation of form or functionality. entropy is also a physical law.

really think you are apples vs. oranges with this whole consciousness & the laws of physics angle. It really doesn't make any sense.

― Emperor Cos Dashit (Adam Bruneau), Friday, September 28, 2012 10:59 AM (34 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Please explain how the experience of red follows physical laws and it'll make a little more sense to me.

― Emperor Cos Dashit (Adam Bruneau), Friday, September 28, 2012 11:00 AM (33 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

sorry if i was wrong to assume you were insinuating that consciousness may break physical laws here.

That was in response to a post where you said the experience of red doesn't break physical laws.

The only thing magical is the thought that consciousness is a process that we have a coherent understanding of.

We don't know everything about it, but that doesn't mean we know nothing about it.

I didn't say the experience of red doesn't break physical laws. I asked what is the reason to think it doesn't?

No. What is the reason to think it DOES. What is the reason to think consciousness does? WHY is it special?

Unraveling what we think we know only brings us back to the start. It doesn't support claims of an afterlife, so we can't possibly equate that to anything but a story.

One could build a computer today that can detect red, that can detect touch, sound, all the human senses. A computer that can measure time. Yet somehow this computer is not conscious. What's the missing element there?

What exactly is the experience of red? Is it something physical, measurable? The computer is measuring it. Does that mean it is conscious? My video camera is measuring red, does that mean it is conscious?

My guess would be a more complex structure. But humans not knowing the missing element of a phenomenon is not sufficient reason to assume that phenomenon is any different from any other in the universe in basic characteristics.

no the computer is measuring the wavelengths. YOU are experiencing its measurements as red.

the trouble is that we can't get outside of consciousness to describe it 'objectively'. it's the opposite parable of the blind men trying to describe the elephant - we're stuck inside the elephant.

― Autumnal the faun (ledge),

otm

The eyeball trying to see itself

Evidence against our logic is not the same as evidence for the opposite. None has been presented, just the picking apart of our arguments.

Either way, thank you to those that put up with the debate, I've enjoyed reading/participating.

Maybe that fact alone, that there is no objective way to measure consciousness, is proof of it's specialness. I mean, what else in the universe is it logically impossible to objectively measure?

quarftrons

that was glib cause I'm spent! i'd classify it with love, hope, etc as I mentioned before. they are almost by definition unmeasurable. you can measure the increased heart rate, the dilated pupils that occur when one is experiencing love but to measure love itself?

there could be an infinite amount of thing in the universe that are impossible to measure. we don't know they exist, because we can't measure them! we only know (and I would say we are tricked into thinking it exists, thinking that is a "thing" rather than a concept) it exists because we experience it subjectively. before we could measure them, no one knew xrays, gamma rays, etc existed.

'Consciousness is defined by "birth-to-death" perception/existence.'
I feel like if there were a lightbulb attached to you when you were born that indicated when you were conscious or not, it wouldn't be permanently on, and certainly not from the get-go, and really you'd have to change bulbs a lot of times, too.

I agree. Life, quite literally, provides the electricity. I don't see any reason to think that once it ends, the lightbulb remains lit.

When a brain is under the influence of LSD, consciousness is almost unrecognizable from its sober brain version. Where did it go? How does it return?

not judging against LSD, it's probably really groovy, but you could just take a nap if you wanted to give consciousness a vacation.

No, I know. I was trying to think of a state where you DO have consciousness, it's just altered.

How about people that are technically dead and come back to life? That implies some sort of continuity that can't be measured...