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Liquid_Dimension
Lighthousekeeper



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What is Consciousness?
#8052096 - 02/21/08 02:18 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Is it our inner thoughts? feelings,personalities...the hidden stuff of our private selfs? or simply self awareness?
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soulcircus
Stranger


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Post deleted by soulcircusReason for deletion: .
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Herbus
...

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Quote:
Liquid_Dimension said: Is it our inner thoughts? feelings,personalities...the hidden stuff of our private selfs? or simply self awareness?
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Bernackums
The universe will have its way.



Registered: 08/06/07
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: soulcircus]
#8052204 - 02/21/08 02:51 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
soulcircus said: aware of awareness
-------------------- Let's get the fuck out of here.
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backfromthedead
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: Bernackums]
#8052276 - 02/21/08 03:07 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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As there is no clear definition of consciousness and no empirical measure exists to test for its presence, it has been argued that due to the nature of the problem of consciousness, empirical tests are intrinsically impossible.
-wiki
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Sophistic Radiance
Free sVs!



Registered: 07/11/06
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This question drives me crazy. If anybody has some insights I'd love to hear 'em.
-------------------- Enlil said: You really are the worst kind of person.
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Entropymancer


Registered: 07/16/05
Posts: 10,207
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I think of consciousness as something that arises when a complex network (like a brain) gains enough feedback loops to recognize itself as a whole.
I guess that's just my way of phrasing "awareness of self" or "awareness of awareness".
But then there's ramifications. A computer circuit is a complex network not too different from the brain... so is consciousness something that could arise spontaneously in computers when the circuits get complex enough?
Or is it more than that? I can see where just the quantity or complexity of the connections may not be enough... maybe it takes a certain diversity of feedback loops. Our brain has thousands of little biochemicals cycles, processes, and loops which all inter-regulate one another. Maybe it's not just the complexity of the circuit but the diversity and inter-regulation of feedback loops that accounts for the emergence of consciousness.
Good question.
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Sophistic Radiance
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Even if it's that simple, what is consciousness, its fundamental nature? Is it energy, matter, or something else?
-------------------- Enlil said: You really are the worst kind of person.
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Entropymancer


Registered: 07/16/05
Posts: 10,207
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Energy of course. Because matter is just a form of energy ( ). Though there may be a more fundamental thing than energy, I'm skeptical.
I know that doesn't really answer what you're getting at though. And I think that really the answer to your question is both. It's molecules in our brain doing various things to generate action potentials (energy) which is transmitted along to the next set of molecules which generate some action potential that gets transmitted to the next set of molecules....
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Sophistic Radiance
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That much is obvious. I'm planning to pursue a career in neuropsychology.
But what is the substance of your thought? How do those little synapses become the things that you experience? Your perspective? Clearly the brain functions somewhat like a computer, and the activities of its structures can be discerned, but that simply cannot satisfy the need to know what awareness is.
Maybe you're satisfied, but the current model only tells us what it looks like and that's not enough for me.
-------------------- Enlil said: You really are the worst kind of person.
Edited by Tchan909 (02/21/08 05:17 PM)
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Entropymancer


Registered: 07/16/05
Posts: 10,207
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.... ya got me on that one.
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AlteredAgain
Visual Alchemist



Registered: 04/27/06
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Quote:
Liquid_Dimension said: Is it our inner thoughts? feelings,personalities...the hidden stuff of our private selfs? or simply self awareness?
I wonder if consciousness is even something that can be pointed at. Because if it is elusive by its very nature, then the question what is consciousness basically becomes obsolete.
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deranger


Registered: 01/21/08
Posts: 6,840
Loc: off the wall
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human consciousness is our awareness, our ability to perceive and observe. the more aware we become of awareness, the more conscious we become... this is the importance of meditation and self-reflection.
i feel human consciousness is connected earth consciousness, without the life of earth we would not be able to be conscious. i see this earth as one conscious organism, as everything is alive, dynamic and growing. without earth we would cease to be conscious. consciousness exists on many levels, many of which the human mind could never conceptualize.
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deranger


Registered: 01/21/08
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Loc: off the wall
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Quote:
Tchan909 said: That much is obvious. I'm planning to pursue a career in neuropsychology.
why? you think by receiving more conceptual information your understanding of consciousness will grow? i see it as a distraction. i plan to pursue a career in silence.
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backfromthedead
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: deranger]
#8052885 - 02/21/08 05:37 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
SyntheticMInd said:
Quote:
Tchan909 said: That much is obvious. I'm planning to pursue a career in neuropsychology.
why? you think by receiving more conceptual information your understanding of consciousness will grow? i see it as a distraction. i plan to pursue a career in silence.

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Entropymancer


Registered: 07/16/05
Posts: 10,207
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Quote:
Tchan909 said: But what is the substance of your thought? How do those little synapses become the things that you experience? Your perspective? Clearly the brain functions somewhat like a computer, and the activities of its structures can be discerned, but that simply cannot satisfy the need to know what awareness is
Alright, that was bugging at my brain, and here's what came out:
The substance of thought is the mind and the molecules and energy contained therein... I don't think you can break it down any further than that... there's not any one thing that is consciousness, it's what arises out of the whole.
That's like asking what's the basic substance of life. The basic substance is the whole living body... sure life stops if you take out the heart or the brain, but that doesn't make either of these more fundamental to what life is; life is just the combination of all of the processes that occur in a living being... we can ask more specific questions about the different components of life (ie different organs), but life itself is irreducible...
It's the same with consciousness... consciousness is irreducible; we can look at particular aspects of consciousness, and we can try to tease apart the particulars of these processes, but I don't know that's going to come any closer to really answering what awareness is... but I don't know what the question can be answered in the broad terms that it's stated.
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Sophistic Radiance
Free sVs!



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I don't plan on being silent.
Maybe I haven't phrased myself correctly, but it's just not as simple as the sum of its parts.
-------------------- Enlil said: You really are the worst kind of person.
Edited by Tchan909 (02/21/08 05:40 PM)
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Entropymancer


Registered: 07/16/05
Posts: 10,207
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: deranger]
#8052902 - 02/21/08 05:40 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
SyntheticMInd said: why? you think by receiving more conceptual information your understanding of consciousness will grow? i see it as a distraction. i plan to pursue a career in silence.
I think maybe you said it better than I.
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deranger


Registered: 01/21/08
Posts: 6,840
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Quote:
Tchan909 said: I don't plan on being silent.
silence brings awareness, without awareness how do you plan on gaining any knowledge of consciousness?
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Entropymancer


Registered: 07/16/05
Posts: 10,207
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Quote:
Tchan909 said: Maybe I haven't phrased myself correctly, but it's just not as simple as the sum of its parts.
Really? How do you know? Because I bet proving that would be worth a tenured position somewhere.
Edit: In fact, I don't see how it can be anything other than the whole of its parts, without invoking magical explanations like aether. We could always just say that consciousness is produced by the aether in the space between atoms in the brain.
Edited by Entropymancer (02/21/08 05:57 PM)
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Sophistic Radiance
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We don't know everything about the brain. In fact, a cursory glance at what we do know will tell you there's far more we don't know than do. A lot of it mystifies me. What is so strange about that?
Stating that current science can't explain everything that exists is most certainly not invoking magical explanations like aether.
Edited by Tchan909 (02/21/08 06:04 PM)
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deranger


Registered: 01/21/08
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We cannot objectify the inner workings of the mind and experience, thinking we can do so is the biggest of delusion.
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Sophistic Radiance
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: deranger]
#8053058 - 02/21/08 06:16 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Says who?
-------------------- Enlil said: You really are the worst kind of person.
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AlteredAgain
Visual Alchemist



Registered: 04/27/06
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I think what he's saying is that experience is integral to everything we call objectivity, because what we call objective reality is in itself a concept that stems from direct experience of consciousness.
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deranger


Registered: 01/21/08
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: AlteredAgain]
#8053155 - 02/21/08 06:34 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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exactly!!
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Sophistic Radiance
Free sVs!



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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: deranger]
#8053174 - 02/21/08 06:37 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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That is true. So what? There are things we don't understand. Such has it always been. What we call "objectivity" constantly expands along with our understanding. Is that so hard for you to wrap your head around?
-------------------- Enlil said: You really are the worst kind of person.
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deranger


Registered: 01/21/08
Posts: 6,840
Loc: off the wall
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Quote:
Tchan909 said:What we call "objectivity" constantly expands along with our understanding. Is that so hard for you to wrap your head around?
but what i am trying to say is... what brings us more of an understanding of reality, indulging in our synthetic construction that is objective reality, or being more aware of that which creates our creation?
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Sophistic Radiance
Free sVs!



Registered: 07/11/06
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: deranger]
#8053221 - 02/21/08 06:49 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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I disagree with your assumption that they are mutually exclusive.
-------------------- Enlil said: You really are the worst kind of person.
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Entropymancer


Registered: 07/16/05
Posts: 10,207
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Quote:
Tchan909 said: That is true. So what? There are things we don't understand. Such has it always been. What we call "objectivity" constantly expands along with our understanding. Is that so hard for you to wrap your head around?
No. But saying that there are things we don't undestand is not the same as saying the whole is greater than the sum of its parts; the former is completely reasonable, while the latter smacks of violating the first law of thermodynamics.
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deranger


Registered: 01/21/08
Posts: 6,840
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Quote:
Tchan909 said: I disagree with your assumption that they are mutually exclusive.
this was not my assumption..
can we understand a dream more by indulging in the dream world or becoming lucid?
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AlteredAgain
Visual Alchemist



Registered: 04/27/06
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: deranger]
#8053247 - 02/21/08 06:54 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Perhaps both! Each in moderation. That way scientific pursuit can co-exist with a humbleness to the silence of mystery.
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deranger


Registered: 01/21/08
Posts: 6,840
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: AlteredAgain]
#8053255 - 02/21/08 06:55 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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that was my original thought, i just wanted to state the importance of something that tends to be forgotten...
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Sophistic Radiance
Free sVs!



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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: AlteredAgain]
#8053258 - 02/21/08 06:56 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Thank you.
I don't understand why a rational curiosity about the deep dark unknowns inherent in consciousness should be so damned controversial.
-------------------- Enlil said: You really are the worst kind of person.
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AlteredAgain
Visual Alchemist



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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: deranger]
#8053261 - 02/21/08 06:57 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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deranger


Registered: 01/21/08
Posts: 6,840
Loc: off the wall
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: AlteredAgain]
#8053298 - 02/21/08 07:04 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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AlteredAgain
Visual Alchemist



Registered: 04/27/06
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: deranger]
#8053313 - 02/21/08 07:08 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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deranger


Registered: 01/21/08
Posts: 6,840
Loc: off the wall
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: AlteredAgain]
#8053353 - 02/21/08 07:15 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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you created a ruckus in the wave
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AlteredAgain
Visual Alchemist



Registered: 04/27/06
Posts: 11,181
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: deranger]
#8053382 - 02/21/08 07:19 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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prickly particles FTW!
gooey waves too of course.
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OrgoneConclusion
Blue Fish Group



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First one starts with a bunch or conscion particles then arranges them in a crystalline matrix...
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OrgoneConclusion
Blue Fish Group



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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: AlteredAgain]
#8053419 - 02/21/08 07:24 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Hey, you wrote it first!
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deranger


Registered: 01/21/08
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: AlteredAgain]
#8053482 - 02/21/08 07:34 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
AlteredAgain said: prickly particles FTW!
gooey waves too of course.
at the subatomic level, are particles not waves? (and vise versa)
ooh the connection!
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backfromthedead
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: deranger]
#8053754 - 02/21/08 08:17 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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AlteredAgain
Visual Alchemist



Registered: 04/27/06
Posts: 11,181
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lol, i don't think i get that one.
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deranger


Registered: 01/21/08
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OrgoneConclusion
Blue Fish Group



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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: AlteredAgain]
#8054487 - 02/21/08 10:40 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
lol, i don't think i get that one.
That's because you are not a chicken.
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Bernackums
The universe will have its way.



Registered: 08/06/07
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: deranger]
#8054506 - 02/21/08 10:45 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
SyntheticMInd said:
Quote:
Tchan909 said: I don't plan on being silent.
silence brings awareness, without awareness how do you plan on gaining any knowledge of consciousness?
Perhaps he is one of the people who hasn't ruled out consciousness strictly being a product of the brain, so why wouldn't poking around and studying the brain help him gain knowledge about consciousness? Even if the knowledge is of what consciousness isn't, it is still knowledge.
Edit: Oh, there are two pages that I seemed to have missed.. oh well.
Edit's edit: It's been resolved, disregard.
Edited by Bernackums (02/21/08 10:51 PM)
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OrgoneConclusion
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: Bernackums]
#8054560 - 02/21/08 11:01 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Consciousness without a correlating biological mechanism is a ridiculous 'theory' as it can never be tested nor is there a single data point to back it up.
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redgreenvines
irregular verb


Registered: 04/08/04
Posts: 37,532
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i like the beginning of this thread although "aware of awareness" is more like self consciousness or a kind of awakening. and some of biology is essential. and stream of consciousness is pertinent.
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_ 🧠 _
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Sophistic Radiance
Free sVs!



Registered: 07/11/06
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I don't think anyone has put that theory forth here.
-------------------- Enlil said: You really are the worst kind of person.
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OrgoneConclusion
Blue Fish Group



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I am guilty of the first ever non-sequitur in P&S history.
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Sophistic Radiance
Free sVs!



Registered: 07/11/06
Posts: 43,135
Loc: Center of the Universe
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But would you say gumdrops are conscious?
-------------------- Enlil said: You really are the worst kind of person.
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OrgoneConclusion
Blue Fish Group



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Only the cherry-flavored ones.
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redgreenvines
irregular verb


Registered: 04/08/04
Posts: 37,532
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does a gumdrop have the buddha nature? this could be a koan.
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OrgoneConclusion
Blue Fish Group



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An ice cream koan?
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Lakefingers

Registered: 08/26/05
Posts: 6,440
Loc: mumuland
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"What is consciousness?" consciousness asks. "What is nothing?", being asks. "What what what?", questions ask. "This this this", answers give us new questions.
Interestingly you're asking "what is consciousness?" at a time when that quesiton usually means "how is consciousness?" The scientists and laymen all want to know how consciousness is, how it ticks, what can be proven, which chemicals do what, how is it to be a bat or a man or a woodpecker, but who cares what it is? Few, if any. Maybe we don't even know how to understands 'whats' anymore. Even if you know the "how", you may never know or understand "the what". There's no better way to forget the "what" than by focusing on "how".
Study the mind all you want. Consciousness studies, cognitive studies, philosophy of mind, drugs, Buddhism...there are many ways, no overview, although some like to reduce the others to such and such. Have a good bullshit detector on when you do look for answers about, or study, consciousness. That is, unless you really want to delve into some specific scientific or medical field. For me the best way to study consciousness was by studying those things I mentioned above. They unlearned everything I thought I knew and systematically destroyed (self-imploded if you like) all the dogmas they were teaching. ...Why else would I be such a radicial skepticist, so radical that I have no suspicions at all?
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Lakefingers

Registered: 08/26/05
Posts: 6,440
Loc: mumuland
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Like an eggcube.
I had one the other day due to a fridge accident.
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Lion
Decadent Flower Magnate


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Quote:
OrgoneConclusion said: An ice cream koan?
If ice cream fell off its cone in the forest, would you pick it up and eat it?
-------------------- “Strengthened by contemplation and study, I will not fear my passions like a coward. My body I will give to pleasures, to diversions that I’ve dreamed of, to the most daring erotic desires, to the lustful impulses of my blood, without any fear at all, for whenever I will— and I will have the will, strengthened as I’ll be with contemplation and study— at the crucial moments I’ll recover my spirit as was before: ascetic.”
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backfromthedead
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: Lion]
#8055593 - 02/22/08 09:12 AM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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PhanTomCat
Teh Cat....



Registered: 09/07/04
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: Lion]
#8057910 - 02/22/08 06:58 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
Lion said:
Quote:
OrgoneConclusion said: An ice cream koan?
If ice cream fell off its cone in the forest, would you pick it up and eat it?
HHhhhhhmmmmmm.... Not sure if the 5-second rule applies for ice cream, I will have to look up the official rules....  Until then, carry on as though it applies.... 
>^;;^<
-------------------- I'll be your midnight French Fry.... "The most important things in life that are often ignored, are the things that one cannot see...." >^;;^<
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OrgoneConclusion
Blue Fish Group



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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: PhanTomCat]
#8058226 - 02/22/08 08:21 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Depends on the season and temperature.
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Boots
Disenchanted


Registered: 07/25/07
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Consciousness is the state we are in when we are conscious; conscious means having an awareness of one's environment and one's own existence, sensations, and thoughts; therefore, consciousness, to me, is a state of being aware of the awareness of one's environment and one's own existence, sensations, and thoughts.
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OrgoneConclusion
Blue Fish Group



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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: Boots]
#8058672 - 02/22/08 10:31 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
Consciousness is the state we are in when we are conscious
Wait a minute. Not so fast.
*Shmoopy grabs pen and paper*
I gotta write down this gem.
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AlteredAgain
Visual Alchemist



Registered: 04/27/06
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Write down awareness too. They both go together.
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MarkostheGnostic
Elder


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A recent read of mine. It attempts to do what C.G. Jung and Wolfgand Pauli started to collaborate on - the unified theory of space-time and consciousness. Consciousness is simultaneously both and analogies can be made with the particle-wave (wavicle) concept of electrons, in which the wave function collapses into individual particles when observed! Observation effects the nature of space-time, whch is to say self-conscious awareness effects the nature of space-time because conscious awareness and space-time are not separate but operate in a paradoxical manner. It is the paradoxical that drives you crazy. The author uses M.C. Escher pics to illustrate some of the paradox.
The bottom line of the book is that consciousness is the eternal substratum of Reality and space-time (creation) is an emergent phenomenon of consciousness. This is tantamount to saying in religious language (the author is Hindu) either Hindu or Christian, Jewish or Islamic, that 'God' [Consciousness, or its archaic term, 'Spirit'] gives rise to space-time, not at one point in history (Big Bang), but continuously. Another analogy is the phenomenon of photons appearing in the vacuum of space, not emanating from a light source. For us monkeys, like the fictional two-dimensional beings in the book Flatland, the insertion of a higher dimensional being into a lower dimensional world looks to supernatural lower dimensional beings.
Jesus allegedly appeared to his apostles behind shuttered doors and windows (the 'upper room'). A human 3-dimensional finger inserted into the plane of Flatland appeared to 2-dimensional beings as a point of light that broadened into a wide band of light. It seemes to appear out of thin air when it was really entering 2-dimensions from a third dimension which was incomprehensible to beings who lived in a plane. 'Up' and 'down' didn't exist physically, but were metaphysical suppositions. This analogy is not in the book, you'd have to read Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions.
-------------------- γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself
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MarkostheGnostic
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Quote:
Liquid_Dimension said: Is it our inner thoughts? feelings,personalities...the hidden stuff of our private selfs? or simply self awareness?
Ancient Indian thought refers to consciousness as 'The Eye which sees but which is never seen.' It is the substratum of Ultimate Reality and can not be defined inasmuch as it is colorless and qualityless. It cannot be qualified as 'a thing' among other things because it is ontologically prior to all individual things. It exists eternally and it is the source of all subsequent form.
Human self-conscious awareness mistakenly identifies itself in terms of the individual human being who is pondering this mystery. The sages, yogis, rishis, siddhas and Buddha himself identified the mistaken identification of our form (mind-body) with Consciousness as due to the specialized mental phenomenon of ego - jivatman or ahamkara in Sanskrit - the 'I'- sense. If one could transcend this 'I' sufficiently, one would Realize that who and what we are is this timeless and spaceless Consciousness which Buddhism calls the Clear Light of the Void.
I prefer Vajrayana Buddhist descriptions because its psychology is developed well beyond any of the theistic faiths which seem to have not articulated this interface of physics, metaphysics and metapsychology but relegate such inquiries as presumption and an intrusion into God's mysteries. Theistic faiths seem to prefer remaining in unconsciousness by assuming untested affirmations of faith called dogma. If Reality is being discussed, it must include the human experience, not fabricate fictional answers to important questions such as yours.
-------------------- γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself
Edited by MarkostheGnostic (02/24/08 03:30 PM)
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MokshaIs
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couldn't we say that consciousness is a fundamental aspect of Reality? That it exists outside the matrix of mind, outside the domain of possible human experience? Perhaps in order to take form, something must exhibit a degree of consciousness. Consciousness would exist without the brain, no? It doesn't seem that consciousness, or awareness, is the product of something of the conceptual world. If no humans inhabited the earth, no mammals, no organisms with brains, is awareness still? is consciousness still? is being itself synonomous with consciousness? or perhaps synonomous with aspects of consciousness? perhaps consciousness itself is major bedrock of reality, something so vast and deep that it is beyond quantifiable deduction. consciousness just is as IS. Therefore, silence is dandy, for it allows one to see is as IS, not through the filter of mindforms, which arise within the eternal field of consciousness.
-------------------- in all of Infinite there is but One and it is nOne ever and always in every and all ways
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MokshaIs
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Ancient Indian thought refers to consciousness as 'The Eye which sees but which is never seen.' It is the substratum of Ultimate Reality and can not be defined inasmuch as it is colorless and qualityless. It cannot be qualified as 'a thing' among other things because it is ontologically prior to all individual things. It exists eternally and it is the source of all subsequent form.
The sages, yogis, rishis, siddhas and Buddha himself identified the mistaken identification of our form (mind-body) with Consciousness as due to the specialized mental phenomenon of ego - jivatman or ahamkara in Sanskrit - the 'I'- sense. If one could transcend this 'I' sufficiently, one would Realize that who and what we are is this timeless and spaceless Consciousness which Buddhism calls the Clear Light of the Void.
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perhaps i posted three pages too soon
-------------------- in all of Infinite there is but One and it is nOne ever and always in every and all ways
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Entropymancer


Registered: 07/16/05
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: MokshaIs]
#8066388 - 02/24/08 09:18 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
MokshaIs said: couldn't we say that consciousness is a fundamental aspect of Reality? That it exists outside the matrix of mind, outside the domain of possible human experience? Perhaps in order to take form, something must exhibit a degree of consciousness.
Sorry, you're talking to the wrong guy. That sounds like mystical mumbo-jumbo to me. 
Quote:
MokshaIs said: Consciousness would exist without the brain, no?
No, not as far as I'm aware. YMMV.
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MokshaIs said: It doesn't seem that consciousness, or awareness, is the product of something of the conceptual world. If no humans inhabited the earth, no mammals, no organisms with brains, is awareness still? is consciousness still? is being itself synonomous with consciousness? or perhaps synonomous with aspects of consciousness?
Interesting thoughts, but it seems completely pie-in-the-sky.
On what do you base the idea that consciousness exists external to a consious being? I've never seen any indication that consciousness is universal to life, much less that it's universal among inanimate forms.
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haroldmeeks
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this questions is seriously offlimits
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Sophistic Radiance
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Even if consciousness as we know it is an illusion, what is the observer of the illusion?
Illusions are literally nothing without an observer.
-------------------- Enlil said: You really are the worst kind of person.
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Entropymancer


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I never bought the whole idea that the entire world could be an illusion simply because we don't know that it isn't (I think that's what you're getting at). And math is the reason.
Math is a set of theorems and rules and tricks that can be shown to be true, both by application and by mathematical proof. It's pretty hard to deny that math is fundamentally sound (thus has an objective basis regardless of our subjective experience of it).
But people can teach you new tricks in math. There are some brilliant theorems that I could never in a million years work out on my own. If all life is just an experiential illusion created by my brain, who came up with Euler's theorem? (ei*pi+1=0) That shit is brilliant and undeniable. Euler's theorem is my proof of objective reality.
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MokshaIs
everywhereeverpresent

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Quote:
Entropymancer said:
Quote:
MokshaIs said: couldn't we say that consciousness is a fundamental aspect of Reality? That it exists outside the matrix of mind, outside the domain of possible human experience? Perhaps in order to take form, something must exhibit a degree of consciousness.
Sorry, you're talking to the wrong guy. That sounds like mystical mumbo-jumbo to me. 
Quote:
MokshaIs said: Consciousness would exist without the brain, no?
No, not as far as I'm aware. YMMV.
Quote:
MokshaIs said: It doesn't seem that consciousness, or awareness, is the product of something of the conceptual world. If no humans inhabited the earth, no mammals, no organisms with brains, is awareness still? is consciousness still? is being itself synonomous with consciousness? or perhaps synonomous with aspects of consciousness?
Interesting thoughts, but it seems completely pie-in-the-sky.
On what do you base the idea that consciousness exists external to a consious being? I've never seen any indication that consciousness is universal to life, much less that it's universal among inanimate forms.
It's all mumbo jumbo... the confusion arises when we say consciousness arises from materiality, ie consciousness is a product of the brain. it is in fact the other way around. "consciousness creates the material universe". It's as if consciousness is the infinite potentiality and the materiality is one of the infinite manifested, experienced, observed, etc... consciousness isn't the product of anything, instead, everything is a product of certain states/levels of consciousness. consciousness just is. objectivity is encompassed by subjectivity, therefore the quantifiable, scientific perspective is silly willy due to the inherent influence and alteration of data/findings by the observers' state of consciousness. The brain or mind don't produce consciousness, the brain and mind and geese and even that arise within the field of consciousness. its a field of infinite potentiality, so whatever is is just a one of the infinite, a little bit of eternity. no little bit of eternity is responsible for producing the eternity, for producing consciousness. It seems to me that consciousness is a word that is synonomous for terms such as God, essence of existence, Self, Being, etc. ..Do you think trees are conscious? blades of grass? a rock? air? perhaps the fact that these things are taking part in "your" consciosness, they too must exhibit a degree of consciousness. consciousness doesn't belong to any one thing i think. No one thing has it and another doesn't. were all, its all, all is within The Field of the One Consciousness. Every thing is just exhibiting a different level, a different state contained within the infinite potentiality of the One Consciousness.
-------------------- in all of Infinite there is but One and it is nOne ever and always in every and all ways
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OrgoneConclusion
Blue Fish Group



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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: MokshaIs]
#8067460 - 02/25/08 02:10 AM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
it is in fact the other way around. "consciousness creates the material universe".
Ya gotta love stuff that people make up with nary a drop of evidence and declare it as fact.
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fireworks_god
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Its just as likely and as evidenced that consciousness creates the universe as it is that the universe creates consciousness. That is to say, its a mystery, which of course means it cannot be declared as fact, but, as needs to be said, its a complete mystery.
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If I should die this very moment I wouldn't fear For I've never known completeness Like being here Wrapped in the warmth of you Loving every breath of you
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OrgoneConclusion
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Or you could say the universe is made out of pixie dust and chocolate sprinkles.
Gee, fantasy is fun!
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fireworks_god
Sexy.Butt.McDanger



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A mystery is a mystery.
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If I should die this very moment I wouldn't fear For I've never known completeness Like being here Wrapped in the warmth of you Loving every breath of you
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OrgoneConclusion
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Thanks for increasing my knowledge base.
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fireworks_god
Sexy.Butt.McDanger



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And what is your knowledge base on the nature of consciousness? Anything objective?
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If I should die this very moment I wouldn't fear For I've never known completeness Like being here Wrapped in the warmth of you Loving every breath of you
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OrgoneConclusion
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Saying something is equivalent to itself tells us what that we didn't already know?
Consciousness is an emergent property of certain complex, living, neuronal structures. Beyond that, everything is pure speculation.
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redgreenvines
irregular verb


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I think most of us think that consciousness pertains to awareness, and without trying to define awareness in terms of itself or consciousness - creating a circular definition, can anyone see what pattern in nature is awareness itself?
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fireworks_god
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Exactly, its a mystery. That is the equivalent of looking into the mirror, seeing that we are experiencing reality, giving it a name, and then surmising that, since this pattern over here in our visual field looks pretty much the same as we do, then they must be having that experience as well.
Mystery.
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If I should die this very moment I wouldn't fear For I've never known completeness Like being here Wrapped in the warmth of you Loving every breath of you
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redgreenvines
irregular verb


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but maybe that complex analogy is simmilar to giving up and saying that the world is flat because you have no answer or good idea.
pre-columbus people really did believe in "global" flatness and had architected hierarchical cosmologies that reflected this.
I think we are not that far from consensually emerging from the flatworld-consciousness-ignorance, but it wil be disruptive to much status quo when we find the curve in mental space, especially as it has been under our noses so to speak all this time.
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haroldmeeks
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oh go build a sand castle bake a burrito and fly to jupiter in a trashcan
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backfromthedead
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 FTW!!
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deranger


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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: MokshaIs]
#8068252 - 02/25/08 11:26 AM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
MokshaIs said: couldn't we say that consciousness is a fundamental aspect of Reality? That it exists outside the matrix of mind, outside the domain of possible human experience? Perhaps in order to take form, something must exhibit a degree of consciousness.
It is rediculous to deny the possibility of whether or not consciousness exists outside the brain and which is not recognizable by our perception. Leaning to the belief that we are the most intelligent species in the universe, and labelling other possibilities as mumbo jumbo is typical human arrogance and egoism.
The truth is we could never know with this mind and in this physical reality an intelligence that exists beyond our perception. If a cell were conscious, how could it perceive the workings of its greater body? Similarily to a cell we may exist in the microcosm of a macrocosmic body. But we could never form into thought a concept of the macrocosm... believe nothing and wonder the possibilities without judgement. We have the ability to wonder, why suppress it with human thought and conditioning? Is there not a knowledge and understanding that is not of human creation and language? I susptect many of us have lost touch of this knowledge through "them" bringing something into "us", and making us believe there exists nothing outside of conceptual reality.
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BlueCoyote
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Subtract the self from self-consciousness, then the conscious states between animals, plants and 'otherthings' may become fluent, but sadly not better identifiable
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MokshaIs
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: BlueCoyote]
#8068554 - 02/25/08 01:20 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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the consensual reality is not Reality, not truth. The mind knows not of Truth, yet Truth knows the mind yo fo sho.
does a pen exhibit consciousness? ... o sure it does, just look at it, all consciousnessed up...whoa...
I guess I feel that consciousness is innate to existence itself.
so the mind can't graps the totality, but, perhaps pure awareness, pure consciousness can. so um, yea, go consciousness!
-------------------- in all of Infinite there is but One and it is nOne ever and always in every and all ways
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fireworks_god
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: MokshaIs]
#8068885 - 02/25/08 03:10 PM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
MokshaIs said: I guess I feel that consciousness is innate to existence itself.
We know no existence without consciousness. No experience of consciousness, no way to know existence.
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If I should die this very moment I wouldn't fear For I've never known completeness Like being here Wrapped in the warmth of you Loving every breath of you
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MokshaIs
everywhereeverpresent

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Quote:
fireworks_god said:
Quote:
MokshaIs said: I guess I feel that consciousness is innate to existence itself.
We know no existence without consciousness. No experience of consciousness, no way to know existence.
existence still IS even if we don't "know" it. so do some of you think that if all animals with brains on this planet ceased to exist, so would consciousness? does the tree not have a "knowing" of reality just as valid and "real" as ours?
-------------------- in all of Infinite there is but One and it is nOne ever and always in every and all ways
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JoseLibrado
return


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The problem with the question is that we are trying to find out what that something means to our lives, through the very thing we experience that life, as life.
Conciousness is then a term that will only be understood, when we can experience where conciosness lacks.
Ie/ Are plants unconcious, if so, name the differences and bang there is your deffintion.
I think conciosness is the potential to relate and interact. I think of conciousness as a void, where everything can exist. But the only thing which can harbour everything, would be pure void, lack of thing or no-thing. It is because of this that i say it is hard to point out conciousness. It is everywhere. It is us. IT is, It is, it IS.
to experience what i think conciousness is - look into someones eyes and forget about everything you know about them, anything you will know about them and experience them with NO-mind, NO-thing in mind. Literally, say i want to experience them with NOthing in mind.
Ive experienced this and i have to say you dont look at anything and say oh thats conciousness...because a the moment you experience it, It becomes everything. Nothing else exists.
Give it a shot, its pretty fun.
-------------------- The mind is a creative tool. It searches to protect you, through message sensations(feelings). It is no different than a computer, you need to make sure its anti-virus program is in check and that it doesnt have a script that limits your experience, because of to much precaution. And remember the computer does not appear to respond to words of anger and frustration - just give it input, in the form of new meanings that you know to be true and its messages to you and the limits it lays out for you, will change. Guilt is an outcome of believing you are the cause of the problems. Yet, we are not a cause to something, we see is negative or bad - Unless you believe your intentions are directed towards a bad outcome....
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MokshaIs
everywhereeverpresent

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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: JoseLibrado]
#8070957 - 02/26/08 12:19 AM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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“All things, oh priests, are on fire . . . The eye is on fire; forms are on fire; eye-consciousness is on fire; impressions received by the eye are on fire.”
-buddha
-------------------- in all of Infinite there is but One and it is nOne ever and always in every and all ways
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Entropymancer


Registered: 07/16/05
Posts: 10,207
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: MokshaIs]
#8071140 - 02/26/08 01:19 AM (15 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
MokshaIs said: “All things, oh priests, are on fire . . . The eye is on fire; forms are on fire; eye-consciousness is on fire; impressions received by the eye are on fire.”
-buddha
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fireworks_god
Sexy.Butt.McDanger



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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: MokshaIs]
#8071274 - 02/26/08 02:28 AM (15 years, 10 months ago) |
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Quote:
MokshaIs said: existence still IS even if we don't "know" it. so do some of you think that if all animals with brains on this planet ceased to exist, so would consciousness? does the tree not have a "knowing" of reality just as valid and "real" as ours?
Who knows. All we do know is that we are conscious and this is why we have an experience of reality. It is impossible to conclude more than this, really. We are immersed within a mystery.
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If I should die this very moment I wouldn't fear For I've never known completeness Like being here Wrapped in the warmth of you Loving every breath of you
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OrgoneConclusion
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Quote:
We are immersed within a mystery.
Wrapped in a toasted whole-wheat fajita...
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MokshaIs
everywhereeverpresent

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Quote:
OrgoneConclusion said:
Quote:
We are immersed within a mystery.
Wrapped in a toasted whole-wheat fajita...
and IT is dandy
-------------------- in all of Infinite there is but One and it is nOne ever and always in every and all ways
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ChiefGreenLeaf

Registered: 01/11/07
Posts: 1,596
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If you strip down all our experiences of the biological tricks our brain enjoys playing on us then I think you would have raw consciousness. Meditation is the only way to no for sure (or the closest we can come).
I need to post i here more. I'm a frequent lurker, but it feels good to step out of the shadows.
Edited by ChiefGreenLeaf (02/26/08 03:38 PM)
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MokshaIs
everywhereeverpresent

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yo fo sho...
-------------------- in all of Infinite there is but One and it is nOne ever and always in every and all ways
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marc.b.allard
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awareness of the soul. aware that we posses something that mother nature alone could not create, and has no purpose in evolution.
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Entropymancer


Registered: 07/16/05
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Quote:
marc.b.allard said: awareness of the soul. aware that we posses something that mother nature alone could not create, and has no purpose in evolution.

Consciousness has no purpose in evolution?
Seems to me it'd be a pretty big leg-up. I don't see monkeys plowing fields with John Deeres.
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OrgoneConclusion
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Quote:
I don't see monkeys plowing fields with John Deeres.
What about deer plowing the fields with...
Oh, nevermind!
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Neanderthal
Philosopher


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The most commonsensical, unquestioned, half-formed notion of "consciousness" seems to define it as an invisible, unmeasurable, undetectable aspect of the universe possessed by certain entities and not others.
If we greatly enlarged our brains and took tours within, we would find mechanism and flesh--a world conforming strictly to physical law. Would you find "consciousness" present?
Consciousness is a reified concept that lacks a clear-cut, indisputable referent. There is simply no object that can be called "consciousness"; ants respond to heat, hence they are "conscious"; bats use sonar to navigate in the air, hence they are "conscious"; humans are able to nimbly respond to external stimuli, hence they are "conscious"; but what is consciousness? It's an entire bundle of decentralized processes--such as sensory-information processing, computational decision-making, et cetera.
Let us suppose a student is visiting a nearby university. The student is given a tour that shows the library, the labs, the sports arena, and so on. But then the student may very well ask the tour guide, "But where is the university?" I can observe goal-directed behavior, adaptive responses to environment, and neurological processes--but where is consciousness?
-------------------- "I will give you consciousness expansion that will turn your blood to ice water." -- Terence McKenna
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AlteredAgain
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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: Neanderthal]
#8095102 - 03/02/08 08:11 PM (15 years, 10 months ago) |
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good post and welcome
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Neanderthal
Philosopher


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Re: What is Consciousness? [Re: AlteredAgain]
#8095133 - 03/02/08 08:20 PM (15 years, 10 months ago) |
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Quote:
AlteredAgain said: good post and welcome
-------------------- "I will give you consciousness expansion that will turn your blood to ice water." -- Terence McKenna
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