The Scripture Is False And The Biblical God Is Dead.

[arewethereyet]

My aunt is blind. She has been legally blind since she was in college and it's progressed through her 80+ years.

About the only thing I know she can't do is drive. But if you need directions to somewhere it was always she that gave them and not her sighted husband, even to places she didn't go to when still sighted or slightly so.

We all have limits and we all have ways of working around some of those limits.

[The Architect Of Fate]

We can perform some really really complex tasks like catching an object or avoiding obstacles without qualia. It seems that other complex tasks don't require qualia either.

None of this follows or was demonstrated

[Anomalocaris]

we can catch a ball without involving the conscious self.   however we can’t look at the expression and body language of a fellow human being to deduce his/her emotional state and account for it in our social interactions using blind sight.    the advantage of social astuteness in a social organism needs no explanation,  of if it does, then perhaps you are missing a qualia or two.  and we shall not count on yours being amongst the fitter genes for survival amongst your population.

[emjay]

You know I'm comfortable positing that it doesn't.  

Nevertheless, there's a strong correlation between visual experience and performance in human beings.  People with blindsight are still profoundly disabled.  You wont find many blindsighted outfielders.

It's been a while since I last read about blindsight, but the impression I always got was that the main debilitating factor about it was the lack of trust or confidence in the perception (if you can call it that). Ie normally we have these multiple channels, as it were, of consciousness integrating with and reinforcing each other, giving confidence in what we're perceiving, such as the position of an object. But in the case of blindsight where that sense, again, if you can call it that, doesn't integrate with any of the others, it's understandable there would be a feeling of lack of justification or confidence. Basically I guess what I'm saying is, the ability itself may (or may not) be solid, but without confidence in the perceptions, that seems to be where the real disability lies.

[GrandizerII]

You know I'm comfortable positing that it doesn't.  

Nevertheless, there's a strong correlation between visual experience and performance in human beings.  People with blindsight are still profoundly disabled.  You wont find many blindsighted outfielders.

It's been a while since I last read about blindsight, but the impression I always got was that the main debilitating factor about it was the lack of trust or confidence in the perception (if you can call it that). Ie normally we have these multiple channels, as it were, of consciousness integrating with and reinforcing each other, giving confidence in what we're perceiving, such as the position of an object. But in the case of blindsight where that sense, again, if you can call it that, doesn't integrate with any of the others, it's understandable there would be a feeling of lack of justification or confidence. Basically I guess what I'm saying is, the ability itself may (or may not) be solid, but without confidence in the perceptions, that seems to be where the real disability lies.

Hey emjay, interesting take. When you say "channels of consciousness", you don't mean consciousness itself in various modes (or whatever), but the underlying neurons/neural processes?

That can work for epiphenomenalism, actually.

Going back to the various recent posts (I've missed a lot since my last response), I see there's some conflation going on between perception and [phenomenal] experience, and therefore people from different sides are talking past one other. In the case of vision, visual perception is the interpretative output made by the relevant regions of the brain (and the CNS in general) as a result of processing the electrochemical "data" sent in through the optic nerve, and it is entirely reducible to the activities happening in the CNS (and the rest of the body). Visual experience is the extra layer that goes beyond perception and is observed intimately, privately, subjectively from a first-person perspective (by someone/something that feels like "you") and in which details of perception are vividly expressed in the form of colors, shapes, and such. This is the part that we are unable, as of yet, conceive of how to reduce to activities in the CNS. And more relevant to the current discussion, why we need such a thing at all, if the underlying neural correlates seem to suffice.

[Astreja]

We can perform some tasks. 

We can perform some really really complex tasks like catching an object or avoiding obstacles without qualia. It seems that other complex tasks don't require qualia either.

How do you know that it's "without qualia"?  A lot of things happen in the brain below the level of conscious awareness, but I think it's extremely likely that there is multi-channel sensory data being processed constantly.  When I walk into a dark room, open a drawer and take out a specific object, I'm calling upon multiple streams of information - some of which have been rendered automatic by repetition and familiarity.

[emjay]

It's been a while since I last read about blindsight, but the impression I always got was that the main debilitating factor about it was the lack of trust or confidence in the perception (if you can call it that). Ie normally we have these multiple channels, as it were, of consciousness integrating with and reinforcing each other, giving confidence in what we're perceiving, such as the position of an object. But in the case of blindsight where that sense, again, if you can call it that, doesn't integrate with any of the others, it's understandable there would be a feeling of lack of justification or confidence. Basically I guess what I'm saying is, the ability itself may (or may not) be solid, but without confidence in the perceptions, that seems to be where the real disability lies.

Hey emjay, interesting take. When you say "channels of consciousness", you don't mean consciousness itself in various modes (or whatever), but the underlying neurons/neural processes?

That can work for epiphenomenalism, actually.

Going back to the various recent posts (I've missed a lot since my last response), I see there's some conflation going on between perception and [phenomenal] experience, and therefore people from different sides are talking past one other. In the case of vision, visual perception is the interpretative output made by the relevant regions of the brain (and the CNS in general) as a result of processing the electrochemical "data" sent in through the optic nerve, and it is entirely reducible to the activities happening in the CNS (and the rest of the body). Visual experience is the extra layer that goes beyond perception and is observed intimately, privately, subjectively from a first-person perspective (by someone/something that feels like "you") and in which details of perception are vividly expressed in the form of colors, shapes, and such. This is the part that we are unable, as of yet, conceive of how to reduce to activities in the CNS. And more relevant to the current discussion, why we need such a thing at all, if the underlying neural correlates seem to suffice.

Hey there By 'channels' I simply meant, in your terminology, conscious experience... sight, sound etc at the highest level, and then kind of sub levels within each, such as say colour, or depth perception in vision. Though I'm sure what I was saying would apply equally to the underlying neural mechanisms, whatever they may be. The point being that in conscious experience, those channels... those components of consciousness feel integrated and reinforce each other.. and the more reinforced they are the more confidence you have in what these different channels of feedback are telling you. For instance if a ball was coming at you you might have, at the most basic, visual feedback combined with audio feedback, both telling you that it's say coming from the right hand side. If those two channels of feedback did not agree... ie there was some error in their integration... eg if your vision told you that it was coming from the right but your hearing suggested it was coming from the left, you'd understandably be confused and lack confidence in your perceptions. As an extension of that thinking, blindsight then is an experience that seems to lack any kind of reinforcing feedback, and thus I would think would be similar.

Thanks for the clarification on the differences between perception and experience. I used to be very interested in neuroscience etc, but not so much any more, so I'm pretty out of the loop these days... if I was ever in it; tbh I fear there was perhaps a bit of Dunning Kruger going on back then. Suffice to say I lack the confidence in it I used to have, and likewise for related philosophical questions or stances like epiphenomenalism; I really don't have a position on that any more... I just don't know.

[Anomalocaris]

i think the use of the word “channel” brings in colloquial meaning that is not necessarily appropriate. i think it is more reasonable to envision several parts of the brain that can all process visual signals and generate decisions and commands. not all of these necessarily communicate with the part of the brain which are responsible for subjective perception. The reason why the brain is wired this way is precisely because it was not designed, but evolved by taking advantage of opportunities afforded by mutation that frequently act by replicating genes and thus make available to the brain excess process mechanisms that is already partially adapted for previously existing functionality but which remain flexible enough to alter these pre-existing adaption to serve other needs.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

I can’t help but wonder if some of the studies of blindsight were concocted by sick fucks who just wanted to throw stuff at blind people.

Boru

[emjay]

i think the use of the word “channel” brings in colloquial meaning that is not necessarily appropriate.  i think it is more reasonable to envision several parts of the brain that can all process visual signals and generate decisions and commands.  not all of these necessarily communicate with the part of the brain which are responsible for subjective perception.    The reason why the brain is wired this way is precisely because it was not designed, but evolved by taking advantage of opportunities afforded by mutation that frequently act by replicating genes and thus make available to the brain excess process mechanisms that is already partially adapted for previously existing functionality but which remain flexible enough to alter these pre-existing adaption to serve other needs.

Excellent post... that makes a lot of sense. And yeah I agree 'channel' was a poor choice of words and a bad analogy... better now I think would be an anology of layers, like layers in a paint program (if you're familiar with that function; you work on different parts of the image in different layers, say the background in one layer and the foreground in another, and can toggle each individual layer's visibility on and off... it's a cool feature) or layers of transparent projector film on top of each other... in that analogy the overall image (with 'image' here as a stand in for the whole of conscious experience) appears the same and complete at a superficial level, but that seeming integration - that leads to richer and richer detail as it were in the image - is more like independent overlays on top of each other; remove any layer and you'd notice it's loss in consciousness - probably taking it for granted beforehand, as much literature on brain damage seems to suggest -  but together they appear to be a rich and integrated whole. That analogy would fit in well with what you're saying about the evolutionary side as well, I think.