Our server costs ~$56 per month to run. Please consider donating or becoming a Patron to help keep the site running. Help us gain new members by following us on Twitter and liking our page on Facebook!
Current time: March 28, 2024, 9:44 am

Thread Rating:
  • 0 Vote(s) - 0 Average
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
Sam Harris On Defining Consciousness
RE: Sam Harris On Defining Consciousness
There was a study dealing with ants in which they were treating the colony as an organism or 'brain' if you will, and considered the ants as neurons. The study was dealing with developing algorithms of the different behaviors such as guarding or food gathering. The instance of the food gathering algorithm demonstrated the ability to seem as though the ants knew what they were doing but it was simply a random search 'first in' scenario. The scientists are considering that this may be how our own neuron system works.
You make people miserable and there's nothing they can do about it, just like god.
-- Homer Simpson

God has no place within these walls, just as facts have no place within organized religion.
-- Superintendent Chalmers

Science is like a blabbermouth who ruins a movie by telling you how it ends. There are some things we don't want to know. Important things.
-- Ned Flanders

Once something's been approved by the government, it's no longer immoral.
-- The Rev Lovejoy
Reply
RE: Sam Harris On Defining Consciousness
I don't really care about terms because everybody seems to have their own. It's very frustrating.The only way to conversations like this is to precisely define ones terms. Of course, then everyone will argue about the definition. You can never get to the actual argument.
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former.

Albert Einstein
Reply
RE: Sam Harris On Defining Consciousness
Which is why it's useful not to use one word to mean 20 different things............why, if you want to understand something as broad as "the human experience", for example, you might want to use more than just one word for all that it contains.
I am the Infantry. I am my country’s strength in war, her deterrent in peace. I am the heart of the fight… wherever, whenever. I carry America’s faith and honor against her enemies. I am the Queen of Battle. I am what my country expects me to be, the best trained Soldier in the world. In the race for victory, I am swift, determined, and courageous, armed with a fierce will to win. Never will I fail my country’s trust. Always I fight on…through the foe, to the objective, to triumph overall. If necessary, I will fight to my death. By my steadfast courage, I have won more than 200 years of freedom. I yield not to weakness, to hunger, to cowardice, to fatigue, to superior odds, For I am mentally tough, physically strong, and morally straight. I forsake not, my country, my mission, my comrades, my sacred duty. I am relentless. I am always there, now and forever. I AM THE INFANTRY! FOLLOW ME!
Reply
RE: Sam Harris On Defining Consciousness
(August 28, 2015 at 10:29 pm)Rhythm Wrote: Which is why it's useful not to use one word to mean 20 different things............why, if you want to understand something as broad as "the human experience", for example, you might want to use more than just one word for all that it contains.

Well, that's the problem with reality.  You have composite things, made up of multiple parts and interactions, and it's often arbitrary where that dividing (literally "defining") line goes. I see the merit in your choice, btw: it has the advantage of being usable in the everyday reality in which we interact with things, at least. The problem is that there's something much more interesting happening with the experience of existence than your definition accounts for.
Reply



Possibly Related Threads...
Thread Author Replies Views Last Post
  On the consciousness of a new born baby Macoleco 8 769 April 7, 2022 at 7:22 am
Last Post: brewer
  LOOK!>> -Consciousness After Death -official <<Clickbait! ignoramus 10 1840 October 19, 2017 at 10:02 am
Last Post: Brian37
  Quantum consciousness... ignoramus 109 15372 August 30, 2017 at 5:32 am
Last Post: ignoramus
  Giulio Tononi's Theory of Consciousness Jehanne 11 3253 September 18, 2016 at 6:38 am
Last Post: BrianSoddingBoru4
  Intelligence, Consciousness and Soul, oh my; Sy Montgomery's "The Soul of an Octopus" Whateverist 11 2122 February 2, 2016 at 11:10 pm
Last Post: Neo-Scholastic
Lightbulb Abortion/Consciousness/Life TheGamingAtheist 244 40371 October 4, 2014 at 11:06 pm
Last Post: Chas
  Banishing consciousness: the mystery of anaesthesia orogenicman 5 2082 December 2, 2011 at 11:34 am
Last Post: Mister Agenda
  Higher consciousness in animals Justtristo 4 3242 March 31, 2011 at 11:33 am
Last Post: ib.me.ub



Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)