Mindfulness or Mindlessness?

[The Grand Nudger]

I know I harp on this in every conversation like this - but fully mapping and explaining a single human consciousness could not be expected to derive necessary insight into the next human consciousness and certainly would not apply to consciousness in toto if there's even one other non human consciousness anywhere in the universe.

All we could ever say was that for this particular human...so and so..and humans broadly, so and so....though not uniformly - as none of us are completely identical in every relevant respect.

Wouldn't it be horrible (for explanations) if every consciousness was as individually organized as that consciousness was individually instantiated in a meaningfully distinct conscious being? We could never do better for an explanation than a cognitive form of pidgin, no matter how much data we collected..and if resolving this was the bar for resolving the purported mystery of consciousness...we could know everything about every instantiated consciousness and even come up with a universal translation between every known example and still not satisfy that explanatory demand.

If that's not a manufactured mystery, fuck me if I know what would be...but maybe I simply lack the phenomenal concept required to ideate and understand...

GODDAMNIT!

[vulcanlogician]

[The Grand Nudger]

Why would functionalism be insufficient in the case of a sound coming from the bushes..and, to apply your previous objections to color...to sound..are those sounds coming from the bushes..or from mind? Does sound exist outside of the mind? I mean, isn't it just the variable compression of waves in a medium filtered through a layer of processing specific to the system hearing the "sound"....?

I think angr might be the bear here, I'm just an old boar.

[vulcanlogician]

I know I harp on this in every conversation like this - but fully mapping and explaining a single human consciousness could not be expected to derive necessary insight into the next human consciousness and certainly would not apply to consciousness in toto if there's even one other non human consciousness anywhere in the universe.  

All we could ever say was that for this particular human...so and so..and humans broadly, so and so....though not uniformly - as none of us are completely identical in every relevant respect.  

Wouldn't it be horrible (for explanations) if every consciousness was as individually organized as that consciousness was individually instantiated in a meaningfully distinct conscious being?  We could never do better for an explanation than a cognitive form of pidgin, no matter how much data we collected..and if resolving this was the bar for resolving the purported mystery of consciousness...we could know everything about every instantiated consciousness and even come up with a universal translation between every known example and still not satisfy that explanatory demand.

Nudger, this is metaphysics. Satisfying explanatory demands ruins all the fun.

When all the possible explanatory demands are satisfied, the metaphysician presses onward. And that may be the point we've come to here. There's really no sure-fire way to know that we have. If it is the case that that's the point we've come to, no further explanation is possible... so, no point in pursuing further explanation. One of my professors shared a story about when he was in grad school: one of his fellow students would carry around a card with an "M" printed on it. The "M" stood for metaphysics. And whenever the conversation drifted from, say, ethics to metaphysics, he'd pull the "M" card out of his pocket and raise it up... to signify that the debate was drifting into metaphysics... and thus wasn't worth carrying further because the issue would never be resolved.

Another one of my professors expressed disdain for this anecdote. She said, "Well, I'm just going to pull out my 'E' card-- for epistemology-- because you're assuming knowledge you don't have." And she had a point. Since Descartes's time, we haven't "resolved" the mind problem. But we've clarified it. We've increased its resolution. Spinoza vastly improved upon Descartes's theories. And he was a contemporary. So, there is value in trying to clarify these issues, even if there's no way of knowing that they can't be further resolved.

[The Grand Nudger]

I agree, even in a tunnel of ignorance any increased accuracy is consequential (and I'd say the same of sensory accuracy anytime we employ the semantics that might deny that accuracy). Saying that there is no color in the universe is false on it's very face, and any further elaboration which relies on this is in exponential experiential error. Saying that there is no color.... exactly as we perceive it..... may be true, but irrelevant to apprehension or the content validity of apprehension.

If the "mystery" of consciousness is predicated on the force of such objections.....this, it's no mystery at all, and there are no such valid objections. That doesn't mean there can't be mysteries, and mysteries of consciousness.......just that this is demonstrably not one of them - so, couldn't be referred to as a demonstration of the existence of that set.

If consciousness is a control schema, it doesn't have to look like anything in particular, but it does have to look like something, and the granted ability of that schema is directly correlated with how well the simulated content matches the actual content..which is pretty well...according to our instrument derived measurements of millimeters or colors. The distribution of accurate sensory input and subsequent apprehension through process is non-zero/unknown, and the more successful we see those processes to be, the further from non zero that non...non-known...... set, is demonstrated to be.

Red is real, even if not real in the way we imagine it, and the same might be said of consciousness in general.

I think this even though the way I think about consciousness allows at least the product of consciousness as we know it (so much as we do) in all manner of disparate circumstance.

[Angrboda]

[Neo-Scholastic]

In what way do you find functionalism unsatisfactory?

Because it sneaks mental concepts in through the back door by using tacitly intentional language. Another way of saying function is purpose. Teleology, anyone?

Tell you what. I have new reductive mind-body theory. It's called Valualism. For every instance that a functionalist theory uses the term "function" substitute "value". Now you have a 1:1 coincidence of value with brain-state....by definition. No need to explain values. Values don't exist...they just are brain-states with evolved advantage. It's a just so story. So basically what I am saying facetiously is that functionalism is an empty theory. Any intangible can be inserted into the place of "function".

[The Grand Nudger]

Model based control is the function of mind.
Model based control is the value of mind.

AST would then go on to explain model based control in theory and in practice. Demonstrate model based control, and the advantages of model based control - and then make predictions about systems using model based control.

Valualism, you say, provides no further elaboration? Offers no explanation, provides no further avenue for questions, and makes no predictions?

[Neo-Scholastic]

[The Grand Nudger]

Boundary boxing is a form of model based control that should answer those questions.

It's a body model. A system is supplied with values for it's dimensions and information about it's environment. Interestingly, the values about it's dimensions don't have to be completely accurate..and are intentionally inaccurate in many cases as a buffer. The system then simulates itself in that environmental data, and this layer of processing between sensor input and collision avoidance systems..for example, offers clear and impressive advantages.

A functionalist would tell you that any system...organic or inorganic..which has a structure which provides this function, has a body model, and is using model based control. That body modeling doesn't reduce to and isn't limited to any specific individual body model or body models instantiation. The applications are tremendous, this is how autonomous navigation of a factory floor or on a highway (someday) is accomplished. The utility to a living creature write's itself.

Do you think that you have a body model? What do you use it for? Closes your eyes and then slowly open and close your hands. Can you see your hands? If you woke up in your bedroom on a pitch black night, could you find some cherished item on a table without the use of your eyes and minimal (if any) groping? Do you have an idea of how many steps you could take out of bed before you ran into a wall?