Trying to simplify my Consciousness hypothesis

[bennyboy]

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Okay.  How does it work, and why is it there?

Asking the question over and over again won't make any answer you've already been given, or the wide field of study you know exists...... disappear.

Saying this again and again won't change the fact that the "wide field of study" you're talking about is founded on a question-begging assumption. It is very much NOT known how/why qualia exist.

 

An explanation by brute fact would be to say "why does it exist" - because it exists"....which, ofc, isn't what I said, so?  I gave you a mechanism which is know to exist, and known to be capable of actualizing what is possible.  I thought you'd appreciate it.  Personally, I think the question is malformed....I'm just trying to meet you in the middle.

If I say "Why do waves exist?" you'll say "Water and wind!" and point to the oceans. But that's not actually answering the question-- you are giving the proximate cause, when the distal cause is what matters.

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I don't believe that you experience qualia. Convince me that you do. As far as I You're just a biological automata.

Yeah, I like this answer best. I'd never attempt to do this, as I already know I cannot provide evidence that I experience qualia without demanding question-begging assumptions be made.

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To me, this is the most honest answer.  However, it seems that since qualia can't interact with anything, there would be no mechanism for it to evolve, even by chance.

You say it's the most honest answer but you're entirely missing my point about evolutionary by-products.

There doesn't need to be a reason for qualia to evolve. It's purposeless and useless, a side effect. A side effect of having complex brains that ARE useful.

A moth doesn't have an evolutionary reason for suiciding itself into a hot lamp either. It's an evolutionary by-product and side effect of its flight mechanism that is useful.

All those other by-products are related to something.  Qualia is not derived from anything else, or related to anything else, like all other evolutionary "by products" are.  In your example, the fire and the moon share some physical properties-- they give off light.  The moths have evolved to travel by light, and this ends up in their demise.  But nothing is like qualia.

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And since it's by no means certain even that 'I' exist as I subjectively infer I do. . .

eh?  Who's doing the inferring?