[Serious Phil] Brain, Consciousness and Experience

[Joseph Polanik]

Eray Ozkural wrote:

 >jPolanik wrote:

 >>Eray Ozkural wrote:

 >>>The information about red is obviously contained in the recordings
 >>>of the observational apparatus that measured the experience, probably
 >>>just neural spike trains, and that's about it. There is nothing
 >>>magical about it, sorry PDJ it's just neural signals:)

 >>there seems to be a contradiction in your position(s), Eray.

 >>in passages such as the above, you seem to be arguing for an identity
 >>theory --- that experience is identical to some brain activity or
 >>other.

 >>however, in your paper on brain simulation where you discuss the evil
 >>alien thought experiment, you conclude that there is a difference
 >>between consciousness and experience.

 >>if (experience is identical to brain activity; and, consciousness is
 >>not identical to experience); then, consciousness is not identical to
 >>brain activity.

 >both are brain events.

 >consciousness is just the intelligence/higher-order-cognition aspects
 >of the same events, i.e. computational, and obviously those are all
 >physical mechanisms in the nervous system.

 >however, experience seems to be more low level, present without any
 >meaningful/intelligent computation going on.

probably true; otherwise, we'd expect computers to someday compute the
quale of ultraviolet and tell us what it's like.

 >more like the fact that a computer chip also gives off heat,

because the heat radiated by a computer chip is not identical to the
chip itself; and, because the sensation of heat is not identical to the
molecular motion that indicates how hot the chip is.

 >of course i don't drop identity theory.

neither have you established an identity claim.

do you want to give it a shot?

Hypothesis: that a color quale is identical to a physical object.

Fact: a physical object has a definite location that can be measured by
scientific instruments.

Prediction: a color quale has a definite location that can be measured
by scientific instruments.

Test of Hypothesis: induce an afterimage of the color complement type.
stare at a brightly lit green object for a while, then look away at a
white surface. you should see a reddish afterimage.

where is the red?

Joe


-- 

Nothing Unreal is Self-Aware

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