What is Consciousness?

[Edward]

All metaphysics aside, all whacked out new-age theories and wishful-thinking nonsense notwithstanding, what is consciousness?

Look, we know it's real. The existence of this forum proves it. But what is it? Is it self-reflection? I've been thinking that in its purest form, it must simply be self-awareness. But am I missing something?

And here's the real question, do animals produce it or do they receive it? That is, could consciousness be a kind of force similar to the physical forces in the universe?

One other question, hypothetically speaking, if precognition were a real phenomenon, what would that say about consciousness?

I'm stuck on this because it seems to me we won't make to many more strides forward in science or math until we acknowledge consciousness. So far, we just put it to the side and go about our measurements of non-conscious phenomena and never even consider that we must be conscious to make those observations and do the science in the first place.

Is nature trying to become self-aware?

[Kyuuketsuki]

Um ... not trying to be funny here but what on Earth makes you think no one is acknowledging conciousness?

At my last count (admittedly some time ago) there were something like 300 peer-reviewed journals on brain function, mentality and so on, there are numerous popular science books on the subject (I believe Stephen Pinker is an author who writes on the subject) so it's not like we don't know anything ... it is just, like any other area of science, an ongoing area of research.

Personally I believe that all advanced animals have levels of conciousness and that humans only happen to be the ones that have made larger strides in that area (presumably due to evolutionary luck).

I think there is no verifiable evidence for precognition and no, I do not think nature or the universe is in any way becoming self-aware.

Kyu

[Edward]

Um ... not trying to be funny here but what on Earth makes you think no one is acknowledging conciousness?

At my last count (admittedly some time ago) there were something like 300 peer-reviewed journals on brain function, mentality and so on, there are numerous popular science books on the subject (I believe Stephen Pinker is an author who writes on the subject) so it's not like we don't know anything ... it is just, like any other area of science, an ongoing area of research.

Yeah, but it's treated like a red-headed stepchild. Case in point: A neurologist I was talking to about a year ago said she didn't believe in psychiatry, and believed eventually all of psychiatry would be rolled into neurology. Currently, both neurologists and psychiatrists are certified by the same board. And why did she believe this? Because no matter what the psychiatric condition, it still only had to do with the functions of the brain.

Consciousness is treated as a kind of anomaly of the brain. But I'm suggesting it's more like a force of nature similar to the other forces. I propose that consciousness is actually out there, and we receive it. We don't generate it.

Of course I can't prove that yet. I may be able to make some philosophical arguments for it, but I want more than that.

Personally I believe that all advanced animals have levels of conciousness and that humans only happen to be the ones that have made larger strides in that area (presumably due to evolutionary luck).

So, you think evolution is just kind of expanding without any direction. In other words, you don't believe there is any goal in mind when it comes to the evolution of species. We are just here for no reason at all? But that can't be what you believe, because you said "luck." You seem to believe it's lucky that humans have advanced consciousness. Why?

I think there is no verifiable evidence for precognition and no, I do not think nature or the universe is in any way becoming self-aware.

I don't think there can be any verifiable evidence for precognition. (1) It occurs randomnly to those who experience it. (2) There doesn't seem to be anything that stimulates it. So based on 1 and 2 it can't be duplicated, which puts its determination and measurment outside of the scientific method.

Also, I'm not sure it can be tested in the sense of using it as a predictive tool. If one has a precognitive episode, they wouldn't know it until it happened.

Case in point: I had a dream that my wife and I and our dogs were in a terrible car accident. It seemed like the type of dream I had had in the past that turned out to be precognitive. We delayed our trip 15 minutes, and in so doing we came up to the Hoover damn 15 minutes later than we would have at around midnight. We stopped our car to look at our map to make sure we were on the right track and a car came from the direction of the damn, stopped and told us the road was out over the damn. Thus we turned around and went an alternate way.

If that dream was precognitive, I'll never know. Actually, I do know. It wasn't precognitive. The event never happened. But would it have happened?

I've had many instances of precognition, but I can't convince anyone of them, because I didn't know it was precognition until the event occurred and then it was too late to say I knew it before hand. So, I'm not trying to convince anyone that I've had precognition. That's why I pose the question as a hypothetical: if precognition was true, how would that change our ideas of consciousness.

I ask you to entertain the possibility, not believe one way or another. If you can't do that, okay. But it's not unusual to ask you to. Schrodinger's Cat is a thought experiment; that's all I'm asking you to do is a thought experiment.

I must say, though, as for the universe becoming self-aware, you seem dichotomous. You say it is not, yet you admit consciousness exists within the universe. Thus the universe contains consciousness. How is it then that the universe is not becoming conscious (assuming consciousness is self-awareness)?

[dagda]

Precognition is a difficult one. Logicaly it could be possible. Although everything is possible, some things are more likley than others. For instance, it is very unlikley that a duck will fly in through my window and sit on my keyboard. However, it is more likley that I may go to the toilet in 15 minutes hence if I say I am going to the toilet in 15 minutes then it is more likley to be proved true than if I said that the duck was going to fly through the window.
Although this is a little simplistic, perhaps precognition is when some people have the ability to unconciously calculate possible probibility and presents the most likley outcome if certian actions are met in the form of dreams/visions etc. It is not quite seeing into the future, but is the next best thing. I hope that made sense.


As for consciousness, I think that it is a life giving and form making force. Without a consciousness, there would be no form to the world as there would be no-one their to observe it. The world did not come into being till a conscious being observed it hence gave it form. In other words, the tree in the forest can not make a sound if there is no-one their as it has not fallen yet because no-one is their.

[Kyuuketsuki]

Yeah, but it's treated like a red-headed stepchild.

What is wrong with redheads? Be careful answering that :/

Case in point: A neurologist I was talking to about a year ago said she didn't believe in psychiatry, and believed eventually all of psychiatry would be rolled into neurology. Currently, both neurologists and psychiatrists are certified by the same board. And why did she believe this? Because no matter what the psychiatric condition, it still only had to do with the functions of the brain.

I'm not seeing a problem here.

Consciousness is treated as a kind of anomaly of the brain. But I'm suggesting it's more like a force of nature similar to the other forces. I propose that consciousness is actually out there, and we receive it. We don't generate it.

And I'd suggest that's complete and utter rubbish ... there is absolutely no evidence beyond healthy imagination that consciousness resides anywhere but the brain.

Of course I can't prove that yet. I may be able to make some philosophical arguments for it, but I want more than that.

Have fun with that, knock yourself out.

Personally I believe that all advanced animals have levels of conciousness and that humans only happen to be the ones that have made larger strides in that area (presumably due to evolutionary luck).

So, you think evolution is just kind of expanding without any direction. In other words, you don't believe there is any goal in mind when it comes to the evolution of species. We are just here for no reason at all? But that can't be what you believe, because you said "luck." You seem to believe it's lucky that humans have advanced consciousness. Why?

On the available evidence I don't think it is reasonable to conclude we are anything else other than the "chance" (though arguably inevitable) product of an uncaring universe, yes.

I think there is no verifiable evidence for precognition and no, I do not think nature or the universe is in any way becoming self-aware.

I don't think there can be any verifiable evidence for precognition. (1) It occurs randomnly to those who experience it. (2) There doesn't seem to be anything that stimulates it. So based on 1 and 2 it can't be duplicated, which puts its determination and measurment outside of the scientific method.

1. No, it doesn't ... there have never been any validated cases of precognition (None that can't be otherwise interpreted as either chance accuracy or reasonably intelligent informed guesswork) that I am aware of.
2. That's because it doesn't happen.

So based on 1 & 2 it's not measurable (on account of it not happening).

Also, I'm not sure it can be tested in the sense of using it as a predictive tool. If one has a precognitive episode, they wouldn't know it until it happened.

And then gets reinterpreted afterwards to fit with hindsight ... how very, jolly convenient.

Case in point: I had a dream that my wife and I and our dogs were in a terrible car accident. It seemed like the type of dream I had had in the past that turned out to be precognitive. We delayed our trip 15 minutes, and in so doing we came up to the Hoover damn 15 minutes later than we would have at around midnight. We stopped our car to look at our map to make sure we were on the right track and a car came from the direction of the damn, stopped and told us the road was out over the damn. Thus we turned around and went an alternate way.

If that dream was precognitive, I'll never know. Actually, I do know. It wasn't precognitive. The event never happened. But would it have happened?

I will offer you the exact same challenge I offered Frodo ... predict something. Something beyond the normal ability of humans to make intelligent informed guesses and/or lucky guess. When you've done that and when objective observers have assessed it as being an accurate and correct prediction THEN come back and I will treat it seriously.

I've had many instances of precognition, but I can't convince anyone of them, because I didn't know it was precognition until the event occurred and then it was too late to say I knew it before hand. So, I'm not trying to convince anyone that I've had precognition. That's why I pose the question as a hypothetical: if precognition was true, how would that change our ideas of consciousness.

Good because you haven't convinced me that your worldview is anything other than some kind of god-substitute.

I ask you to entertain the possibility, not believe one way or another. If you can't do that, okay. But it's not unusual to ask you to. Schrodinger's Cat is a thought experiment; that's all I'm asking you to do is a thought experiment.

Schrödinger's Cat makes some kind of sense in quantum physic terms; precognition doesn't fit with anything currently known but fits perfectly with the kind of claims flakes the world over make, the kind of claims that whenever science turns it's eye to them collapse under rational and objective scrutiny.

I must say, though, as for the universe becoming self-aware, you seem dichotomous. You say it is not, yet you admit consciousness exists within the universe. Thus the universe contains consciousness. How is it then that the universe is not becoming conscious (assuming consciousness is self-awareness)?

Sigh. If the universe itself were becoming conscious then my consciousness would be part of a greater whole ... it isn't, it is separate, distinct, apart; so no ... the universe shows absolutely no evidence of becoming aware.

Kyu

[Edward]

Finally, some responses to my post, but I don't have the time to answer them. I have to eat dinner watch Judge Judy before I go to work. But I'm definitely diving into these responses with teeth bared tomorrow.

Until then!

[dagda]

Sigh. If the universe itself were becoming conscious then my consciousness would be part of a greater whole ... it isn't, it is separate, distinct, apart; so no ... the universe shows absolutely no evidence of becoming aware.

Kyu

You have no possible way of proving that you are not part of the whole in much the same way as I have no possible way of proving that we are part of the whole. Just because we are not aware of the whole just means we are broken, nothing more or less.

[Edward]

As for consciousness, I think that it is a life giving and form making force. Without a consciousness, there would be no form to the world as there would be no-one their to observe it. The world did not come into being till a conscious being observed it hence gave it form. In other words, the tree in the forest can not make a sound if there is no-one their as it has not fallen yet because no-one is their.

I think you and I are in complete agreement here. I'm not sure how the mechanics of consciousness works to form existence, but one day I think I might know.

I like that you say you are a Gnostic. I am very familiar with some of the Gnostic Gospels, especially Thomas, Nicodemus, and Judas. Everyone thinks the way the traditional Christians view Christ is the only way there ever was, and that's just not true. Not at all.

What is wrong with redheads? Be careful answering that :/

Nothing at all! I've just heard they get beat alot by step-parents.

And I'd suggest that's complete and utter rubbish ... there is absolutely no evidence beyond healthy imagination that consciousness resides anywhere but the brain.

Actually there is. The first is precognition. The second is the apparent willful action of protozoa, especially paramecium, which have no brain or central nervous system whatsoever. The third is the fact that in order to say, turn a doorknob, if consciousness is generated by the brain, all the information needed to make your body turn the knob would have to be contained in one neuron in your brain, and then you'd still be left with explaining how that one neuron got its stimulus--but that's another discussion. Then there is the fact that humans have a concept of infinity.

I will offer you the exact same challenge I offered Frodo ... predict something. Something beyond the normal ability of humans to make intelligent informed guesses and/or lucky guess. When you've done that and when objective observers have assessed it as being an accurate and correct prediction THEN come back and I will treat it seriously.

You don't have to treat my belief in my precognition anyway at all. Your opinion about it doesn't change the veracity of it one way or the other. That's the trouble with you atheists, you think the world owes you something.

That does it: I'm going back to a theistic stance. I'm going to stop calling God "Nature" and I'm going to stop saying humans exist to evolve the consciousness of nature when I really mean the human purpose is to be Christ.

It's not so much that I believe in God the way Christians do, because I don't. And I certainly don't believe Christians are right about the life and teachings of Jesus Christ, but atheists are just willful fools, it seems. They say, "Only what I can perceive with my senses is real." And avoid the larger issue of why something exists at all, or how it got there, because that's too hard to figure out.

So, I'm now a theist.

Good because you haven't convinced me that your worldview is anything other than some kind of god-substitute.

You're right. And I can't hide it. Since 1993, I have tried to find a way around my theism, but I can't. I have tried to be a Christian, but I can't. I have tried to be agnostic, but my mind won't shut up and let me live in peace with agnosticism. Now, I've tried on some atheist clothes, but they don't fit at all. A conscious nature = God. There's no way I can pretend it doesn't.

Sigh

.

Yea, yeah, yeah, you're so smart you have to tolerate the poor theists time and time again. Let me tell you something: you don't know half as much as you think you do. So, save your sighs for yourself.

If the universe itself were becoming conscious then my consciousness would be part of a greater whole ... it isn't, it is separate, distinct, apart; so no ... the universe shows absolutely no evidence of becoming aware.

Oh, really? Your consciousness is separate and distinct, is it? And yet earlier from your highhorse you yelled down to me that consciousness can only come from the mechanics of the brain. I guess you are God, then aren't you? I guess that's what you're trying to tell me. After all, if there is the universe, and then apart from that there is your consciousness, that would make you God, wouldn't it?

[Kyuuketsuki]

Just because we are not aware of the whole just means we are broken, nothing more or less.

Or that your imagination trumps your reason!

Kyu

---

And I'd suggest that's complete and utter rubbish ... there is absolutely no evidence beyond healthy imagination that consciousness resides anywhere but the brain.

Actually there is. The first is precognition. The second is the apparent willful action of protozoa, especially paramecium, which have no brain or central nervous system whatsoever. The third is the fact that in order to say, turn a doorknob, if consciousness is generated by the brain, all the information needed to make your body turn the knob would have to be contained in one neuron in your brain, and then you'd still be left with explaining how that one neuron got its stimulus--but that's another discussion. Then there is the fact that humans have a concept of infinity.

I can't answer this so I have asked a question at a site that puts the questions to relevant scientists.

I will offer you the exact same challenge I offered Frodo ... predict something. Something beyond the normal ability of humans to make intelligent informed guesses and/or lucky guess. When you've done that and when objective observers have assessed it as being an accurate and correct prediction THEN come back and I will treat it seriously.

You don't have to treat my belief in my precognition anyway at all. Your opinion about it doesn't change the veracity of it one way or the other. That's the trouble with you atheists, you think the world owes you something.

No we don't, we just tend to be cynical about non-validatable claims.

That does it: I'm going back to a theistic stance. I'm going to stop calling God "Nature" and I'm going to stop saying humans exist to evolve the consciousness of nature when I really mean the human purpose is to be Christ.

Are you being facetious?

It's not so much that I believe in God the way Christians do, because I don't. And I certainly don't believe Christians are right about the life and teachings of Jesus Christ, but atheists are just willful fools, it seems. They say, "Only what I can perceive with my senses is real." And avoid the larger issue of why something exists at all, or how it got there, because that's too hard to figure out. So, I'm now a theist.

No, actually we don't say that, we tend to say that there is evidence and that that is what we interpret, if there is no evidence then (unless there is real "fit", which is kind of evidence in itself) we assume it is untrue. No one is saying that there are things that might be real ads yet unexplained and it is entirely possible that precognition for example might be one of them. The problem lies in the fcat that so many claims are made and there is no way to distinguish between which are valid and which are not UNLESS you demand some kind of evidential support, some tie into reality and our senses (via technology).

Good because you haven't convinced me that your worldview is anything other than some kind of god-substitute.

You're right. And I can't hide it. Since 1993, I have tried to find a way around my theism, but I can't. I have tried to be a Christian, but I can't. I have tried to be agnostic, but my mind won't shut up and let me live in peace with agnosticism. Now, I've tried on some atheist clothes, but they don't fit at all. A conscious nature = God. There's no way I can pretend it doesn't.

Again I am unsure if you are being facetious or not.

Yea, yeah, yeah, you're so smart you have to tolerate the poor theists time and time again. Let me tell you something: you don't know half as much as you think you do. So, save your sighs for yourself.

I've never claimed to be smarter than you or anyone else, more of a realist perhaps, but certainly not smarter ... all I do (all most of us do) is treat non-validatable claims with scepticism.

If the universe itself were becoming conscious then my consciousness would be part of a greater whole ... it isn't, it is separate, distinct, apart; so no ... the universe shows absolutely no evidence of becoming aware.

Oh, really? Your consciousness is separate and distinct, is it? And yet earlier from your highhorse you yelled down to me that consciousness can only come from the mechanics of the brain. I guess you are God, then aren't you? I guess that's what you're trying to tell me. After all, if there is the universe, and then apart from that there is your consciousness, that would make you God, wouldn't it?

No, I am not saying my consciousness isn't a part of the universe, I am simply saying that there is no evidence that various consciousness are linked ... it's not even relevant that I couldn't possibly tell if that's true or not, the fact is there is o validatable evidence so all it becomes is philosophical psychobabble.

Kyu

[Edwardo Piet]

I would think that consciousness is what 'we' are conscious of.
Sub-consciousness is what we are conscious of but on a lower level and its often 'just under the radar' and we don't realize we were conscious of it until afterwards..

UNconsciousness is the part of the brain that we are NOT conscious of...like all our memories that are storied in their that we are not thinking about for example...
Perhaps SELF-consciousness in when we are being more conscious of our own consciousness - e.g thinking about our own thinking...

I would think if there is a distinction between consciousness and SELF-consciousness - I can believe that there could be quite a few at least partially conscious animals - but to be SELF-conscious - to be conscious of the self and one's own consciousness (like we are now - TALKING about consciousness - we are conscious of our own consciousness - one step further.) I don't know if any other animals can do that...

PERHAPS chimps or bonobos or whatever...I have no idea how they would be able to form any sort of even primitive VERY basic concept of the fact that they have consciousness though...
So if a few or even many other animals have consciousness TO SOME EXTENT at least - I think perhaps we humans are the only animal on the planet that has SELF-consciousness. E.G - we recognize and realize that we are 'conscious' that we have 'consciousness' - we are aware of our own consciousness. And we can think about our own thinking...

TBH there are an awful lot of people in my experience who don't think about their own thoughts! They just go throughout the day not really thinking much apart from about practical things that they 'gotta do'. That's a lot of people. Luckily not everyone
But yet they're still conscious of their own self...their own consciousnes - they're still self-conscious...

Perhaps just less aware than they potentially good be.

EvF