When we are conscious of one thing, we are not conscious of a whole range of other things. We can, however, direct our focus to one thing after another. In fact we usually cannot maintain our focus on any one thing for all that long without habituating to it, with the consequence that our consciousness wanders off anyway.

Waking as a state is one thing, alertness is another, focus another, and self-consciousness yet another. Even when we are dreaming, we experience a certain reduced state of consciousness which lacks self-consciousness and our usual focus.

Consciousness is complicated because it has so many aspects and is so variable.

(July 9, 2025 at 8:59 am)Alan V Wrote: When we are conscious of one thing, we are not conscious of a whole range of other things.  We can, however, direct our focus to one thing after another.  In fact we usually cannot maintain our focus on any one thing for all that long without habituating to it, with the consequence that our consciousness wanders off anyway.

Waking as a state is one thing, alertness is another, focus another, and self-consciousness yet another.  Even when we are dreaming, we experience a certain reduced state of consciousness which lacks self-consciousness and our usual focus.

Consciousness is complicated because it has so many aspects and is so variable.

It's all the same stuff....

That's another cool aspect of phenomenal consciousness with a mechanical explanation, and the way they figured it out was cool as shit. Involved active fmri mapping of musicians and close study of nerve clusters and signal transmitting tissue. Only 50-100 "bits" of information (out of tens of thousands in raw power) are available to conscious experience at a given time. This is the nature of the experience of losing yourself in mentally demanding tasks.

(July 9, 2025 at 9:07 am)Ahriman Wrote:

(July 9, 2025 at 8:59 am)Alan V Wrote: When we are conscious of one thing, we are not conscious of a whole range of other things.  We can, however, direct our focus to one thing after another.  In fact we usually cannot maintain our focus on any one thing for all that long without habituating to it, with the consequence that our consciousness wanders off anyway.

Waking as a state is one thing, alertness is another, focus another, and self-consciousness yet another.  Even when we are dreaming, we experience a certain reduced state of consciousness which lacks self-consciousness and our usual focus.

Consciousness is complicated because it has so many aspects and is so variable.

It's all the same stuff....

The underlying brain circuitry, neurochemistry, activation patterns, and EEG waves vary, depending on what variations of consciousness scientists evaluate.  So they are not the same.

(July 9, 2025 at 9:07 am)Ahriman Wrote: It's all the same stuff....

Fundamentally, both in composition and function. Complicated processes can arise or be effected by the manipulation of surprisingly few variables.  Computer nerds know this in another context.  Any complex logic circuit, and any other kind of simple logic gate, can be built using NAND alone. There's a basic structure that all neurons share. While there are specialist neurons, which are marginally different at a structural scale, and while most neurons are different at a molecular scale, consciousness does appear to be a product of a bunch of the same stuff made out of the usual stuff interacting in novel ways.

Evolutionarily and biologically speaking, this is either fortuitous or gravity - as the duplication and reproduction of largely similar bits and bobs that an be constructed from material in the environment is baked in. So if you were going to construct a biological consciousness it would probably lean heavily on the repeated use of universal components. Whereas, if you were to intentionally construct a similar processing apparatus out of silicon, you might leverage it's properties, and build wholly task specific arrays out of a wild assortment of different sub-components, instead.

Speaking of conscious access - memory is nuts. It's actively constructed on recall. Not just memories of things that happen - but the memory of who you are the moment you consider it. Big ways, sure...but think of the little ways, that, all added together, comprise the vast majority of our day to day life and behaviors. A swift crack to the skull can determine whether a person is likely to leave the toilet seat up or down. If said crackee ever has occasion to wonder why they're one way or the other, it's likely they'll construct an answer that very instant, and that answer is unlikely to be "because I got cracked in the skull". Similarly, some non-crackee who leaves it down and pondering the same concludes "because I'm a good guy who's always done that" is also making shit up.

(July 9, 2025 at 9:28 am)The Grand Nudger Wrote: Speaking of conscious access - memory is nuts.  It's actively constructed on recall.  Not just memories of things that happen - but the memory of who you are the moment you consider it.  Big ways, sure...but think of the little ways, that, all added together, comprise the vast majority of our day to day life and behaviors.   A swift crack to the skull can determine whether a person is likely to leave the toilet seat up or down.  If said crackee ever has occasion to wonder why they're one way or the other, it's likely they'll construct an answer that very instant, and that answer is unlikely to be "because I got cracked in the skull".  Similarly, some non-crackee who leaves it down and pondering the same concludes "because I'm a good guy who's always done that" is also making shit up.

Rationalizing is rampant in dreaming, when our access to our short-term memories is impaired.  We make up impromptu stories all the time to "explain" what is happening to us.

The fact is that we can't learn about dreaming while we are dreaming because the neurochemical we need to learn anything is turned off.

(July 9, 2025 at 9:56 am)Alan V Wrote:

(July 9, 2025 at 9:28 am)The Grand Nudger Wrote: Speaking of conscious access - memory is nuts.  It's actively constructed on recall.  Not just memories of things that happen - but the memory of who you are the moment you consider it.  Big ways, sure...but think of the little ways, that, all added together, comprise the vast majority of our day to day life and behaviors.   A swift crack to the skull can determine whether a person is likely to leave the toilet seat up or down.  If said crackee ever has occasion to wonder why they're one way or the other, it's likely they'll construct an answer that very instant, and that answer is unlikely to be "because I got cracked in the skull".  Similarly, some non-crackee who leaves it down and pondering the same concludes "because I'm a good guy who's always done that" is also making shit up.

Rationalizing is rampant in dreaming, when our access to our short-term memories is impaired.  We make up impromptu stories all the time to "explain" what is happening to us.

The fact is that we can't learn about dreaming while we are dreaming because the neurochemical we need to learn anything is turned off.

You couldn't be more wrong....

(July 9, 2025 at 9:56 am)Alan V Wrote: Rationalizing is rampant in dreaming, when our access to our short-term memories is impaired.  We make up impromptu stories all the time to "explain" what is happening to us.

The fact is that we can't learn about dreaming while we are dreaming because the neurochemical we need to learn anything is turned off.

I should have mentioned that I was paraphrasing (and simplifying) from books by Allan Hobson and William Domhoff, two sleep and dreaming scientists.

(July 9, 2025 at 12:28 pm)Alan V Wrote:

(July 9, 2025 at 9:56 am)Alan V Wrote: Rationalizing is rampant in dreaming, when our access to our short-term memories is impaired.  We make up impromptu stories all the time to "explain" what is happening to us.

The fact is that we can't learn about dreaming while we are dreaming because the neurochemical we need to learn anything is turned off.

I should have mentioned that I was paraphrasing (and simplifying) from books by Allan Hobson and William Domhoff, two sleep and dreaming scientists.

Well then I don't know how they came up with that shit because they're completely wrong.