Home | Community | Message Board
You are not signed in.
Sign In New Account
Forum Index Search Posts Trusted Vendors Highlights Galleries FAQ User List Chat Store Random Growery

Magic-Mushrooms-Shop.com
This site includes paid links. Please support our sponsors.

General Interest > Philosophy, Sociology & Psychology
Threaded Mode Threaded  Previous topic Previous  View all topics Index  Next topic Next 

Welcome to the Shroomery Message Board! You are experiencing a small sample of what the site has to offer. Please login or register to post messages and view our exclusive members-only content. You'll gain access to additional forums, file attachments, board customizations, encrypted private messages, and much more!

Unfolding Nature Shop: Unfolding Nature: Being in the Implicate Order

Jump to first unread post Pages: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 |  [ show all ]
The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience?
    #12622136 -

Science has come far enough that we can at least in principle understand all the causes and mechanisms for computation (ie thought) and behavior.
How a moth follows the sun is no longer in question, and the same is to some extent true for human language, creativity, etcetera. We know it is a matter of computation carried out by this flesh-processor we call a brain.

But there is one question we have still not yet touched on in the slightest: why is there experience?

To say the brain has architecture X which enables process Y which results in output Z is all well and good, but nowhere in that description is there an explanation for how subjective experience OF process Y occurs.

In a way, it seems totally superfluous.
If process Y can generate output Z through architecture X, why would there be anything extra?
What is experience good for?

I have failed to hit the center of my point here, but you see what I'm saying (I hope).

Subjective experience is something that clearly exists, and we have good reason to believe this experience bears some relationship to the world at large, but why does experience exist in the first place when computational & mechanical systems account for the entire content of this world that we are experiencing?


--------------------
Weedmaster P knows the truth.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: laserpig]
    #12622513 -

This topic seems popular at the moment.

I like that.


--------------------

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: laserpig]
    #12622838 -

Experience exists because it can.:satansmoking:

Find a better answer.


--------------------
"Don't believe everything you think". -Anom.

" All that lives was born to die"-Anom.

With much wisdom comes much sorrow,
The more knowledge, the more grief.
Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: Icelander]
    #12623453 -

Well since there is no physical theory to say that it can, I don't think that answer is true. the only reason you think it can exist physically is because you know it exists and you also hold onto physical theory, so you bind these two beliefs to say that it physically exists. But according to science, experience does not exist


--------------------

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: Noteworthy]
    #12623521 -

I'm with noteworthy on this one.

I mean, in a sense you're obviously right, Icelander, because subjective experience does exist, but we really have absolutely no theoretical foundation which even begins to suggest that subjective experience can exist.

Not only is there no room for subjective experience in scientific theory, there's no need for there to be room for it.
It seems as if every form and function of the universe can be explained computationally/mechanistically, without ever once touching on subjective experience.

It seems as if subjective experience is totally superfluous to the functions of the universe.


--------------------
Weedmaster P knows the truth.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: laserpig]
    #12623585 -

It seems that way... if you swallow reductive materialism


--------------------

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: Noteworthy]
    #12623750 -

It certainly seems like "matter" as we conceptualize it today (through chaos dynamics, emergent behavior, etc) is quite capable of evolving a complex and even beautiful universe.

Think for a moment about insects.
If you have ever programmed robots, as I have, it is transparently obvious that an insect is as "conscious" as the most rudimentary of robots.
They have more sophisticated movement systems, but their decision-making circuits are as simple as can be.
From the tactile feedback of feet and antenna and the light sensitivity of their rudimentary eyes, it is quite obvious that a woodlouse (okay, not technically an insect, but I was looking at them earlier today) follows the most basic kind of "program" there is: move towards dark, consume food when encountered.
Add a parameter for mating and you have the entire logic structure of a woodlouse.

My point is that the behavior of this woodlouse is fully accounted for whether you propose subjective experience or whether you don't.
It simply doesn't matter.
And we are just complicated woodlice.

So why subjective experience?
Why is there an "inside" to our heads?
And if there's an "inside" to my decisions, what about the decisions of an insect?
What about the decisions of a robot?

What has subjective experience and what doesn't?
How can we possibly know, when we can't account for the existence of subjective experience at all?


The best workaround I can find for this in my own theorization is to propose that all matter, indeed "the universe itself," as gay as that sounds, includes, implies, or creates subjective experience.


--------------------
Weedmaster P knows the truth.

Edited by laserpig (05/24/10 11:49 PM)

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: laserpig]
    #12623778 -

Are we just complicated woodlice? We have subjective experience. Does the woodlice? Once you state that we are the same as woodlice and that woodlice are the same as robots then you also state that robots have subjective experience. And then basically that all the universe has subjective experience.
You might be claiming this.

I wonder whether it is a grander claim to say that everything has a sentience or if only some things have sentience? and where could you draw the line?


--------------------

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: Noteworthy]
    #12623794 -

I think that unless we can account for what exactly produces subjective experience in ourselves and not in rocks, we have to assume that subjective experience could very well be universal.

If we assume otherwise, then there has to be a line somewhere, and at present we cannot even begin to find it.


--------------------
Weedmaster P knows the truth.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: laserpig]
    #12623820 -

So heres the next question: I do not experience what you experience.

So automatically there ARE clear lines between experience. Does part of my brain experience one aspect of the moment and another part of the brain experience another aspect of the moment? Or is the moment determined according to the whole brain at once? And why not also the air around the head?

If you have a computer, is it a whole thing? or is it only the brain that can unify consciousness into a single experience? perhaps each transistor in the computer is experiencing its electrical flow, and this would be rather different to the human, whereby we have one experience, rather than 100 billion experiences, or more


--------------------

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: Noteworthy]
    #12623842 -

I don't quite understand your questions about the brain, but in general you raise an excellent point:

If subjective experience is indeed attributable to all matter, then how is it partitioned in the way it is?
Clearly this body (me) is highly connected with the content of this subjective experience (my consciousness), but why?
I mean, it seems a silly question, because wouldn't it be stupid for my consciousness to consist of your experience, but ... yeah, I think we're on the same page here.

I got not answers, just questions.


--------------------
Weedmaster P knows the truth.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: laserpig]
    #12623909 -

yes we could best call it 'the problem of partitioning'


--------------------

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: laserpig]
    #12623968 -

laserpig said:
Science has come far enough that we can at least in principle understand all the causes and mechanisms for computation (ie thought) and behavior.
How a moth follows the sun is no longer in question, and the same is to some extent true for human language, creativity, etcetera. We know it is a matter of computation carried out by this flesh-processor we call a brain.

But there is one question we have still not yet touched on in the slightest: why is there experience?

To say the brain has architecture X which enables process Y which results in output Z is all well and good, but nowhere in that description is there an explanation for how subjective experience OF process Y occurs.

In a way, it seems totally superfluous.
If process Y can generate output Z through architecture X, why would there be anything extra?
What is experience good for?

I have failed to hit the center of my point here, but you see what I'm saying (I hope).

Subjective experience is something that clearly exists, and we have good reason to believe this experience bears some relationship to the world at large, but why does experience exist in the first place when computational & mechanical systems account for the entire content of this world that we are experiencing?


It's a great question, but at the moment my mind is fried.


--------------------

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: Mr. Mushrooms]
    #12624362 -

We live in a paradigm where science (and society in general) focus on the empirical. There has to be empircal evidence for something to exist. For example an empirical mind will generally boil down spiritual, psychedelic, and transendental experinces to chemical reactions in the brain. The content of the experince itself doesn't matter to an empircal mind. Science has limited it's understanding of the whole picture by only focusing on the physical. This type of understanding will never truely crack what the subjective experince is. Until as a collective we start analysing more than just empirical data we will never understand why the subjective experince exists.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: Novelty]
    #12624576 -

I will take a short walk around the park without any neurological references:

experience goes into memory.
but we think of experience as a bright thing, and we think of memory as a dark thing.
recollections join sensation in the bright thing.
recollections enhance sensations making experience more meaningful and resonant.

stop.

is this resonant, meaningful bright thing something special?
is this bright thing consciousness?
is this experiencing?

it must be more elusive - no?
what elusive quality is missing in this bright thing?

OK, now what was that essential question?
are we not yet seeking a missing part?

Yes,
what about the part that looks at this bright thing and goes "wow!"


--------------------
:brainfart: _ :finger:

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: Novelty]
    #12624614 -

Novelty said:
We live in a paradigm where science (and society in general) focus on the empirical. There has to be empircal evidence for something to exist. For example an empirical mind will generally boil down spiritual, psychedelic, and transendental experinces to chemical reactions in the brain. The content of the experince itself doesn't matter to an empircal mind. Science has limited it's understanding of the whole picture by only focusing on the physical. This type of understanding will never truely crack what the subjective experince is. Until as a collective we start analysing more than just empirical data we will never understand why the subjective experince exists.



We live in a world dominated by empirical science because of its successes.  When questions like consciousness are raised, it is assumed, because science is supposed to be the zenith of understanding, it can parse the mystery.  This is entirely untrue because the mystery of consciousness requires both philosophy and science to obtain a fuller understanding of what it is and what it does.


--------------------

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: laserpig]
    #12624624 -

laserpig said:
I think that unless we can account for what exactly produces subjective experience in ourselves and not in rocks, we have to assume that subjective experience could very well be universal.

If we assume otherwise, then there has to be a line somewhere, and at present we cannot even begin to find it.


The line between our type of consciousness and that of every other living thing is evidenced in the results.  We, man, have language, history, the ability to make tools that are used to make other tools and religion.  The line is the difference between perceptual abstraction and conceptual abstraction.

I think the problem with this thread is an assumption that the question can be answered by empirical investigation when it requires the dual approach of science and philosophy.  It's like searching for God with a telescope.


--------------------

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: Mr. Mushrooms] * 1
    #12625050 -

Welcome to the hard problem of consciousness.


--------------------
We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: Novelty]
    #12625323 -

Novelty said:
We live in a paradigm where science (and society in general) focus on the empirical. There has to be empircal evidence for something to exist. For example an empirical mind will generally boil down spiritual, psychedelic, and transendental experinces to chemical reactions in the brain. The content of the experince itself doesn't matter to an empircal mind. Science has limited it's understanding of the whole picture by only focusing on the physical. This type of understanding will never truely crack what the subjective experince is. Until as a collective we start analysing more than just empirical data we will never understand why the subjective experince exists.


This is a straw man.
Yes, many involved in the enterprise we know as "modern science" dismiss psychedelic experience etc because of their own biases, but that is not real empiricism.
Psychedelic experience is obviously a real and repeatable object of subjective experience, and therefore knowledge of it is accessible through empirical study.
The same is true for all facets of experience, save perhaps madness, because there (though the condition is of course repeatable in principle) so many factors come into play that our methods of study fail us.

There is no such thing as "more than just empirical data."
We just have to allow "empirical data" to address the entirety of experience.


--------------------
Weedmaster P knows the truth.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: The real question: what/where/how is subjective experience? [Re: laserpig]
    #12625925 -

Maybe experience is a natural process like all the other processes.
As soon as there is action/reaction there is experience... i can only wonder how a flower 'experiences' say the sun.

:sun:

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Jump to top Pages: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 |  [ show all ]

Unfolding Nature Shop: Unfolding Nature: Being in the Implicate Order

General Interest > Philosophy, Sociology & Psychology
Threaded Mode Threaded  Previous topic Previous  View all topics Index  Next topic Next 

Similar ThreadsPosterViewsRepliesLast post
* We are spiritual beings having a human experience
( 1 2 3 4 all )		 ShroomismM 9,588 75 10/03/17 12:10 PM
by Apples in Mono
* questions for the atheist.
( 1 2 all )		 whiterastahippie 5,046 36 08/01/02 05:01 AM
by MAIA
* Subjective v. Objective Reality
( 1 2 all )		 Joshua 4,436 24 01/31/03 07:31 PM
by Joshua
* Hypothetical questions for christians
( 1 2 all )		 postalboy 5,144 24 08/05/02 05:03 PM
by EvilBastard
* does a "Bad experience" make subsequent exps. bad? xfluffybunnyx 1,413 9 11/14/02 07:46 PM
by Strumpling
* Objective, real, imaginary... same thing Ulysees 1,684 15 02/10/02 01:11 AM
by ArCh_TemPlaR
* What do you think is the best feeling or experienc
( 1 2 all )		 shroom-girlie 5,621 31 09/10/01 07:21 AM
by BBin
* Temporal Experiment the_Landotter 948 3 06/25/02 08:03 AM
by the_Landotter

Extra information
You cannot start new topics / You cannot reply to topics
HTML is disabled / BBCode is enabled
Moderator: Middleman, DividedQuantum
5,157 topic views. 1 members, 1,718 guests and 12 web crawlers are browsing this forum.
[ Show Images Only | Sort by Score | Print Topic ]
Search this thread:

Copyright 1997-2026 Mind Media. Some rights reserved.

Generated in 0.034 seconds spending 0.01 seconds on 18 queries.