(January 20, 2019 at 11:43 pm)Thoreauvian Wrote: I have already offered you information that explains why brains allow for consciousness when other systems do not. You simply don't agree with it.
I must have missed this information. What was it again?
If by "consciousness" bennyboy means qualia -- the experience given to us by the senses as perceived by a subject -- then he's right that this hasn't been explained yet. Gazzaniga, as you recall, said that this question hasn't been answered yet. I haven't followed all the posts, but earlier this is what bennyboy and I were talking about.
Quote:So you simply are not arguing in good faith, apparently because you feel your pet theory is threatened by real science.
What gives you the impression that bennyboy is being disingenuous? In what way is science threatening something he likes? Since science has no competing theories for how qualia appear to us, he is not arguing against any science.
The three ideas he's suggesting -- idealism, panpsychism, and physical supervenience -- are current speculations offering tentative explanations to things science has not explained and, as of yet, has no testable theories about. They may or may not be true, but I don't see bennyboy declaring that they must be true.
