Mind is the brain?

[Angrboda]

Yes, but you've already established the reasonableness of the assumption when studying human subjects.  Whether that assumption would be reasonable in the case of robots is a separate case which does not inform the original case.  You're simply raising an impotent objection as if it were potent.

I don't think I've established that at all.  Care to quote?

You haven't explained how you have ascertained that the physical structure sitting in your lab (i.e. the person) actually does experience qualia. . . . Now, in the case of people, this is a very easy assumption to make.  

[Kiekeben]

Quote from you: " Qualia are the "what it's like" of experience-- what it's like to taste pineapple, for example, cannot be explained by any observations outside the direct experience of tasting pineapple."

So, have a person eat a pineapple for the first time (removing every other sense beside taste) and have them describe the "what it's like". Then (hypothetically) destroy the portion of the brain primarily responsible for taste. Have them eat pineapple again and get the description. The "what it's like" will have changed. This is seen in brain injury victims. Loss of taste, smell, touch, ability to understand speech, ability to speak, ability to recognize shapes/people/places. Their "what it's like" has changed.

You are then correlating not mind and brain, but words and brain.  You are relying on sounds coming out of a physical system to stand in lieu of mind.  Normally, this is perfectly sensible-- it's one of the more pragmatic assumptions that I've made, and makes communicating with people much more enjoyable.  However, it's still an assumption and not actually an observable fact.

You appear to be ignoring two things. First, that you could perform this test on yourself. You may not strictly speaking know that other people have qualia, but you know that you do. Second, that from everything else we know about the world around us, we have every reason to suppose that other people have qualia: similar causes, similar effects.

You are right that qualia present a unique problem. But in one sense, the problem has been way overstated, IMO. Both the materailists who are mysterians and the dualists go beyond merely saying that qualia are unique to arguing that this somehow makes consciousness problematic for materialism. I don't think so at all, because the uniqueness of qualia is something we should expect whatever is true about the makeup of the mind. It all has to do with the simple fact that qualia simply ARE the experiences each individual has, and are therefore private to each individual. So of course you can't experience someone else's qualia! And that's why there is a "problem" of zombies, and all that.

(In fact, it's not just that I can't experience your qualia and you can't experience mine. It's that right now you also can't experience any qualia other than the ones you are experiencing now (obviously), and so you cannot be certain - for the same reason you cannot be certain that I'm not a zombie - that you weren't a zombie five seconds ago. Your memory that you weren't could be false. But again, you do have every reason for thinking that you in fact were conscious, as per the above.)

[The Grand Nudger]

I have a tablet powered down right here in front of me...what do you think it's computing?

Nothing.  But I'm not asserting that Windows is a CPU.

 I see, so we won't be acknowledging the absurdity of the question you asked, then..will we?  We'll jump off to some other pool because the water was no longer to our liking?  Relevance fallacy. 

Do you really need an answer to that?  I mean, I can list the ways, but. . . ru serius?

Very, because we're going to need to list out ways that those two examples of yours are unique in relation to something -other- than what they're made out of, specifically..you'll need to explain how they are unique as regards mind, or comp, or processing. Otherwise, you're continuing to pull the constant relevance fallacy refrain.

I don't care about processing and comp unless it addresses qualia as what it's like to experience things.

Which it does, even in your own case.  Hello Annie.  You're simply not satisfied.

I didn't say the computer has nothing to do with my qualia.  I said that there are probably no qualia in the computer-- at least not of the type you are describing.

You keep using the word "in".....and that's probably keeping you from understanding just this one type of material explanation for qualia. 

Links.

You have google, I'm tired of your demands, and it isn't as though satisfying them will change your position...you'll refuse to even acknowledge my response for what it was, -just as you did here-.

 
Right.  There's no single place.  And yet, there are my water bottle, an old beer bottle, the sound of my dog snoring, the smell of my dinner leftovers, and at the center of it is me, my agency.  Where is it?  Give me even a plausible lead.

I keep telling you that santas workshop doesn't exist and you keep responding by demanding that I point it out on a map.

Maybe.  The Buddhists would probably agree with you, I think.

Broken clocks are right twice a day. Buddhists and I agree on a great many trivialities. We disagree strongly with regards to any substantial portion of an explanation for mind.

[brewer]

Wrong. A conscious person is aware of things, an unconscious person isn't.

Do you know that for a fact?  The way general anesthesia works is that it immobilizes the body but they are aware and just do not remember.

General anesthesia (GA) is the state produced when a patient receives medications for amnesia, analgesia, muscle paralysis, and sedation. An anesthetized patient can be thought of as being in a controlled, reversible state of unconsciousness. Anesthesia enables a patient to tolerate surgical procedures that would otherwise inflict unbearable pain, potentiate extreme physiologic exacerbations, and result in unpleasant memories.

The combination of anesthetic agents used for general anesthesia often leaves a patient with the following clinical constellation:

1. Unarousable even secondary to painful stimuli
   
2. Unable to remember what happened (amnesia)
   
3. Unable to maintain adequate airway protection and/or spontaneous ventilation as a result of muscle paralysis
   
4. Cardiovascular changes secondary to stimulant/depressant effects of anesthetic agents
   

[url=http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/1271543-overview][/url]

bold mine

Where in this article does is say that they are aware? They mention "reducing awareness".

During some procedures the physician wants the patient to have the ability to respond (speak, move, blink, ....). The anesthesia used is specific (in type and dose) to that purpose. If the anesthesiologist is not a dick they will most often include an amnestic medication (during or immediately after).

For most other procedures the general anesthesia used "reduces" awareness to near nothing. If you are not aware of painful stimulus (as stated in your post) you will not be aware of almost any stimulus (tactile, auditory, visual, temp. .....). Your respiratory center is not "aware" that you are suffocating, therefore ventilation support. Respiration is one of the brain functions that continues when other awareness functions have ceased.

Don't get me wrong, there are cases of procedures being performed where the patient has been aware. Most often these are cases of inadequate anesthesia delivery or monitoring. In some cases there is no explanation. The trauma often damages the patients for life.

[bennyboy]

I don't think I've established that at all.  Care to quote?

You haven't explained how you have ascertained that the physical structure sitting in your lab (i.e. the person) actually does experience qualia. . . . Now, in the case of people, this is a very easy assumption to make.  

Making an assumption and establishing something are diametrically opposite in meaning, at least the way I view those words.

[IATIA]

Where in this article does is say that they are aware? They mention "reducing awareness".

During some procedures the physician wants the patient to have the ability to respond (speak, move, blink, ....). The anesthesia used is specific (in type and dose) to that purpose. If the anesthesiologist is not a dick they will most often include an amnestic medication (during or immediately after).

For most other procedures the general anesthesia used "reduces" awareness to near nothing. If you are not aware of painful stimulus (as stated in your post) you will not be aware of almost any stimulus (tactile, auditory, visual, temp. .....). Your respiratory center is not "aware" that you are suffocating, therefore ventilation support. Respiration is one of the brain functions that continues when other awareness functions have ceased.

Don't get me wrong, there are cases of procedures being performed where the patient has been aware. Most often these are cases of inadequate anesthesia delivery or monitoring. In some cases there is no explanation. The trauma often damages the patients for life.

EEG = awareness. Unconscious persons have an EEG. No EEG = no awareness and probably dead. Levels of awareness? Different story.

[bennyboy]

 I see, so we won't be acknowledging the absurdity of the question you asked, then..will we?  We'll jump off to some other pool because the water was no longer to our liking?  Relevance fallacy. 

Metacommentary fallacy. You're not saying anything.

Very, because we're going to need to list out ways that those two examples of yours are unique in relation to something -other- than what they're made out of, specifically..you'll need to explain how they are unique as regards mind, or comp, or processing.  Otherwise, you're continuing to pull the constant relevance fallacy refrain.

Composition is an important part of function. You might think that mind is just input, processing and output. But the way things are processed is very important. Obviously, brains and computers process differently in very many ways.

You keep using the word "in".....and that's probably keeping you from understanding just this one type of material explanation for qualia. 

Mind is not all the brain, for sure. Therefore, if there's mind and it is brain function, it's in the brain.

I keep telling you that santas workshop doesn't exist and you keep responding by demanding that I point it out on a map.

You keep telling me that a unified agency isn't a thing. Then I watch a movie, and realize that something is bringing together sound and light into an interesting experience. It's that unity that you have no answer for.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Wrong. A conscious person is aware of things, an unconscious person isn't.

Do you know that for a fact?  The way general anesthesia works is that it immobilizes the body but they are aware and just do not remember.

I didn't say anything about their mobility, or lack thereof. Indeed, with my first sentence, I discarded the idea that consciousness is connected with mobility at all. In other words, a conscious person may or may not be immobile, and an immobile person may or may not be conscious.

The answer I was responding to was the claim that "One moves around more and says stuff."

Physical activity is not the standard for consciousness. By that standard, falling rocks are more aware than rocks at rest.

It should also be noted that speech is not a metric for consciousness. Tape recordings of speech aren't conscious.

Bottom line, BB's reply was facetious, of course, but I was simply operating with the definition of "consciousness" you'll find in dictionaries.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Show me something in all this process that ISN'T an interface with something else.  Where does the buck stop, and we can say: "Here.  This is where a bunch of electro-chemical signals is experienced"?  What is the principle by which all the hundreds or thousands of separate circuits firing in the brain are coordinated into a single sense of agency?  In what "space" are processes in different parts of the brains brought together in this way?  

I think the real issue is seeing the mind as a thing, rather than as a process. Nicholas Humphries has written a lot of good stuff about this, but the essence of it is that consciousness arises as one part of the brain observes another part in action, analyzing it and operating on its output. It's been a long time since I've read any Humphries, so forgive me if I've misstated anything -- and also, iirc, there's no evidence for his suppositions, simply intriguing guesswork on his part.

I'm sure any mistakes in this post will be corrected forthwith.

[bennyboy]

You appear to be ignoring two things. First, that you could perform this test on yourself. You may not strictly speaking know that other people have qualia, but you know that you do.

This is an excellent point, and I kind of suggested a cyborg experiment along those lines a couple pages ago, in which you could start to break out of philosophical solipsism by transferring parts of experience among people (hypothetically at least). But it's only fairly recently that subjectivism and science have been so at odds with each other, especially in the study of the mind.

Both the materailists who are mysterians and the dualists go beyond merely saying that qualia are unique to arguing that this somehow makes consciousness problematic for materialism. I don't think so at all, because the uniqueness of qualia is something we should expect whatever is true about the makeup of the mind. It all has to do with the simple fact that qualia simply ARE the experiences each individual has, and are therefore private to each individual. So of course you can't experience someone else's qualia! And that's why there is a "problem" of zombies, and all that.

Fair enough. To me the problem isn't so much with humans, who I just kind of "feel" have minds and accept that feeling. It's with any other physical structure. How do we know whether anything else experiences qualia, even if it seems to? How do we know that all electrochemical or electromagnetic interchanges aren't actually little sparks of awareness all through the universe?

It's hard, not having found what about the brain is actually responsible for qualia, to turn whatever we learn out into the physical universe in general, which I think is very much the aim of science: to take specific cases and succeed in establishing general rules.


Good post, by the way. I like the way you think.