Mind Over Matter?

[emjay]

I see consciousness as being a highly conserved property of complex life probably
present in forms as diverse as cuttlefish, cats, parrots and humans.

It's common because it's useful.
Self preservation becomes much easier if self is recognized to be preserved.
Self awareness is a complex pattern in the brain used for self preservation, no
more surprising a construction of functional molecules than a leg
is when used for locomotion.
Your disbelief in the capacity of a neural network to sustain consciousness is
suspect given the brain's evident ability to do so.  

For a plausible meso-scale theory of how the brain creates consciousness I recommend Antonio Damasio:
The Feeling of What Happens.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damasio%27...sciousness
In it, human minds are constructed of:

1. Protoself: Where a representation of somatic internal status is maintained and continuously updated.
   
2. Core Consciousness: A second system which monitors this internal movie.  This system provides moment by moment awareness of self.
   
3. Extended Consciousness: A third system, involving long term storage, maintains continuity of self perception over time resulting in a personal history.
   

Even the least complex of these processes is significantly abstracted from the level of synaptic membrane permeability.  We'll have to trust to Moore's law a while before detailed connections between the lower and higher functions can be determined.  The BRAIN initiative is wildly ambitious like Bush's Mars program or the Human Genome Project.  We'll see if it is useless like the one or useful like the other.


This study is hampered by the extreme complexity of the systems and ethical concerns over experimentation on individuals with minds sophisticated enough to be interesting.  Damasios work is based on case studies of brain pathology and disciplines of neurophysiology, anatomy and histology.  Not so much on neural networks as studied by computer scientists. 

I think consciousness of one form or another is in all animals from the 'lowest' to the 'highest'. Nor have I any difficulty in believing that a non-biological machine could be conscious. I read somewhere but I can't remember where that it can almost be implied by the 'informational' complexity of the data being integrated, and that the 'richness' of consciousness could be mathematically 'predicted' based on that. That theory really struck a chord with me.

I agree also that it is common, useful, and preserved through evolution. But my question in this thread is not whether it exists or not but whether it needs to have a 'visible' (or 'experiential') aspect in order to work... whether all its features could be handled 'under the hood' so to speak.

I'll definitely give the book you suggest a read as it sounds right up my street

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Mind over matter is retarded.  It is basically a pagan concept.

It states that the mind can overcome anything, yet reality contradicts that.

I didn't mean it like that. I don't believe in psychics or anything like that. But as much as I try to keep 'dualism' out of my theories it still always finds a way in, much to my annoyance.

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What is mind? No matter!

What is matter? Never mind!

Or so they say...



@emjay

I don't agree with your dichotomy 1 vs. 2;
What is this consciousness which you are talking about? Can you give me a short definition?

I don't necessarily agree with it either any more - there's definitely more than two

Sorry about using so vague a term as consciousness. I mean more than sentience - just the 'qualia'... all of subjective experience.

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I don't disbelieve in the capactiy of a neural network to sustain consciousness.  I disbelieve that there is any function of human behavior that couldn't be replicated as well by a philosophical zombie as by an actually-sentient human being.  If the universe were purely a mechanical one, then there would be nothing but things doing stuff-- no consciousness required.  Therefore, I have to include that the possibility of sentience is intrinsically included in the makeup of the universe: i.e. that it's no less a part of reality than gravity.

Are you talking about Panpsychism? I have read a few books on that and the jury's still out for me but I have to say I am a biased against it for the reason that the particular form of consciousness in an animal (not that I can do anything but guess what other species experience) is very highly correlated with the brain and its functions. In other words it seems too brain/body specific to be universal.