Discussion Topic |
|
This thread has been locked |
jogill
climber
Colorado
|
|
|
Sep 23, 2018 - 11:06am PT
|
Me: "However, John, your reply seems to lack evidence of "great progress" by any interpretation (other, perhaps, than accepting as real the wily coyote's romp down the path of Zen). If philosophy has produced such results please spell them out briefly without simply referring to one or another philosopher. That might set in place a productive path of investigation."
-
Largo: "Fair enough. But that's not something that I can dash off as I usually do here. Gimme a minute."
September 15th
Clock's ticking
|
|
Don Paul
Social climber
Washington DC
|
|
|
Sep 24, 2018 - 10:25am PT
|
MikeL you have very thin skin to be so offended by something I said to someone else. In fact I have been careful not to challenge your claim to be able to see or experience things that no one else can. This, as I understand, is your basis for lecturing everyone else. I'm glad to defend my assertion that religions all claim, in one way or another, that the physical world we experience is not real; only the spirit world is, and they are the experts on that. I don't see how my statement is unfair. If anything, the people claiming to have special abilities are unfair, since there is no way to argue about something only they can perceive.
|
|
Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Sep 24, 2018 - 01:05pm PT
|
Yes you are just guessing.
-
So long as you equivocate, we're all guessing, per what you are saying.
My point was that certain things are known (so far as we can know anything), and those are unlikely to change with "new data" or paradigm shifts, no matter the brilliance and abundance of same.
For example, three plus there is unlikely to ever equal eight. Your experience of reading these words is unlikely to morph into an external marmalade you can spread on a loaf of bread. External objects we can measure are unlikely to become phenomenon felt and sensed and experienced but lost from view of our instruments. Modeling rain on a computer is unlikely to ever flood your condo. A bolt of lightening is unlikely to ever be confused for the cloud from which it came. If you want to know about a girl, you'd best spend some time around HER instead of simply observing and analyzing her folks.
The study of mind is full of such simple truths that are probably not going to change much in our lifetime no matter what experiments are forthcoming. The value of new data and information is that it allows us a more nuanced take on what is already widely agreed upon. So in this sense, "old" knowledge is constantly updated and abridged.
Granted, when a revolutionary discovery is found - like time not being a constant - big changes follow per our understanding. Another interesting angle is discovering how our standard (folk, common sense) takes on mind were mistaken, and how we can make that known in logically coherent ways.
For many, the adventure begins with examining what you to be "real." When your understanding is based on sense data and folk "wisdom" alone, you've essentially taken yourself out of the mind game.
And Dingus, when someone starts a sentence, "It's my belief," you are flubbing the shebang by labeling this a "declaration."
|
|
High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
|
|
|
Sep 24, 2018 - 03:42pm PT
|
One more try. (Every year or two I try.)
Largo, is it conceivable to you...
(a) that our memory is 100 percent instantiated in our nervous system physiology.
(b) that the subjective (perceptual) flashes of light we evoke on purpose by wiggling our finger in the corner of an eye at night in pitch black surroundings (a fun experiment doable by anyone) is 100 percent instantiated in our nervous system physiology?
Conceivable? that our memories have a total basis in our rule-bound hardware? that our subjective flashes of light in case above have a total basis in our rule-bound hardware?
Merely conceivable? Yes? No? What?
...
Some here are probably aware that both Sam Harris and Yuval Harari are both serious meditation wonks, and that they have been for decades. What's really remarkable is the degree to which the content and style of their conversations - whether regarding meditation, consciousness or mind-brain relations - differ from the conversations of the serious meditators we're used to here at ST.
|
|
jogill
climber
Colorado
|
|
|
Sep 24, 2018 - 03:58pm PT
|
From Wiki:
"Most modern philosophers of mind adopt either a reductive or non-reductive physicalist position, maintaining in their different ways that the mind is not something separate from the body.[18] These approaches have been particularly influential in the sciences, especially in the fields of sociobiology, computer science (specifically, artificial intelligence), evolutionary psychology and the various neurosciences.[19][20][21][22] Reductive physicalists assert that all mental states and properties will eventually be explained by scientific accounts of physiological processes and states.[23][24][25] Non-reductive physicalists argue that although the mind is not a separate substance, mental properties supervene on physical properties, or that the predicates and vocabulary used in mental descriptions and explanations are indispensable, and cannot be reduced to the language and lower-level explanations of physical science.[26][27] Continued neuroscientific progress has helped to clarify some of these issues; however, they are far from being resolved. Modern philosophers of mind continue to ask how the subjective qualities and the intentionality of mental states and properties can be explained in naturalistic terms.[28][29]"
To me, it appears the only "great progress" in the philosophy of mind has occurred through scientific work. Am I mistaken?
|
|
eeyonkee
Trad climber
Golden, CO
|
|
|
Sep 24, 2018 - 05:06pm PT
|
One way to constrain what mind can be is to ask -- What is more fundamental than mind?
I would conjecture; physics, chemistry, biology, and biological algorithms, in that order (through time). Biological algorithms are the logical layer one up from mind.
|
|
High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
|
|
|
Sep 24, 2018 - 05:42pm PT
|
eeyonkee, I'd throw Systems (science, engineering) in the mix, too. Biology in the last couple decades has become a great deal more systems and engineering oriented. This development also points to the living organism, honey bee to hedgehog to human to horse, as evolved algorithmic entities.
Today, having been thoroughly immersed now in the living sciences, the human sciences, the evolutionary ecological sciences, I hardly ever consider the physics, chemistry and biology of the body without also considering the Systems (Engineering) of the body (which to large extent concerns systems control/processing).
Think Data from Star Trek. "Processing." lol
|
|
Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado & Nepal
|
|
|
Sep 24, 2018 - 06:11pm PT
|
The problem I have with equating the mind to a computer is that the computer is human originated. Not so long ago, people thought the mind and the universe was like a clock since that was their technology at the time. I am sure personally, that sometime in the future when we know how to manipulate biological systems better than we do now, that will be our model of the mind - the mind as photosynthesis or whatever.
|
|
High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
|
|
|
Sep 24, 2018 - 06:15pm PT
|
The problem I have with equating the mind to a computer...
Nobody in the know is equating the mind to a computer. An analogy is being made - whether crude or well-fitting, no matter - as means to framing the thinking and dialoging.
A couple weeks ago I encountered a guy, a non-science type, in a public setting - we were both out and about in mixed company - who was insistent that the body doesn't have circuitry to speak of. Why? Because flesh is largely water and any circuits therein would be shorted out. Just like wires down in a storm, laying on a wet street. Further he thought I should know this already. At my age, I guess. That there should tell you where a lot of the public is - intellectually, educationally - on these subjects.
|
|
MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
|
|
|
Sep 24, 2018 - 06:20pm PT
|
people thought the mind and the universe was like a clock
I would like to know which people and what they said in their own words?
|
|
WBraun
climber
|
|
|
Sep 24, 2018 - 08:58pm PT
|
There you guys go again all worried what people say what the mind is all while you yourselves remain totally clueless what the mind is .....
|
|
MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
|
|
|
Sep 25, 2018 - 07:44am PT
|
DP: . . . your claim to be able to see or experience things that no one else can.
This is a poor reading, or at least not my position on any thing. As for me, I’m not at all sure what I see. As the Duck says above your post: “There are no new ideas or old ideas, there is only as it is …….”
I think anyone can take offense at characterizations that appear mean and narrow-minded.
Some people are reporting what they see subjectively. There’s no special abilities needed, unless one counts careful observation. What careful observations do you have? What do *you* know about “all religions?”
Duck: There you guys go again all worried what people say what the mind is all while you yourselves remain totally clueless what the mind is .....
+1
|
|
Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado & Nepal
|
|
|
Sep 25, 2018 - 08:38am PT
|
OK fructose. People here are not equating the mind to a clock or a computer, they are making an analogy between the two. However, my comments remain the same.
From Wikipedia on the Watchmaker Analogy:
Sir Isaac Newton, among other leaders in the scientific revolution, including René Descartes, upheld "that the physical laws he had uncovered revealed the mechanical perfection of the workings of the universe to be akin to a watchmaker ......."
From Science Journals:
https://www.the-scientist.com/infographics/mind-the-clock-38784
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/your-brain-has-two-clocks/
From Art:
As for the mind as a computer, there are arguments both ways if you Google Mind as Computer. Good illustrations too.
|
|
High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
|
|
|
Sep 25, 2018 - 10:37am PT
|
Thanks, Jan. NBD.
I just find it useful to remember analogies can be "crude" and yet still be useful in setting the stage for a discussion or for framing one's thoughts.
Cool pics.
...
Since brains, like computers, have memory, switches, networks, circuits (of wide variety and function); since they like computers engage in information processing (adding, subtracting, etc), input and output flow, etc; since they learn, can be taught; since they communicate, transmit and receive signals, store data, etc..; since brains like computers are obedient to an underlying ruleset (physics, systems science) and are therefore mechanistic; it's hard not to, and moreover, it's reasonable to, analogize them.
...
Two people with paralysis walk again using an implanted device...
https://www.theverge.com/2018/9/24/17896720/paralysis-spinal-cord-implant-walking-epidural-stimulation-device
|
|
MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
|
|
|
Sep 25, 2018 - 11:19am PT
|
Jan,
I looked at the Wikipedia entry for the Watchmaker Analogy. The quote you give seems to come from:
https://www.google.com/search?tbm=bks&q=0199884781
What did Isaac Newton or René Descartes say themselves?
|
|
Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado & Nepal
|
|
|
Sep 25, 2018 - 12:37pm PT
|
I don't know MH, as I haven't read them since I took a history of philosophy class 50 years ago. I'm sure some of the philosophers on the thread would have a better idea though.
And yes, fructose, I agree that analogies are useful as long as they apply to the times we live in and are not thought to be set in stone. Isn't that in large part what all four Petersen-Harris debates were about? How to decide that the analogy or the narratives no longer apply?
|
|
High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
|
|
|
Sep 25, 2018 - 02:09pm PT
|
It's too bad Bill Cosby, sentenced today, couldn't be given a handful of Seven's nanoprobes to correct his "mental defect." Just as she did for Iko. :(
...
Recall Gazzaniga who made the point many times - If you’re going to talk about “free will” then you should be prepared to contextualize your talking of it by addressing/answering the questions: free from what? and/or free to what? So a “free will” free to…? a “free will” free from…? That’s a major point, I think. Another: A will (i.e., volition) or “free will” is sourced from something somewhere. WHEREAS (a) we can easily conceive this source as a module (a free will module) with inputs, processing and outputs; and WHEREAS (b) by removing any constraint on an input, we free the module and thus free the will with respect to said constraint; so THEREFORE it is proper, it is NOT improper, to think of the will as free in this regard or context concerning this particular constraint.
So these points are at least arguable - and mighty arguable I think - from the so-called "compatibilist" position re the "free will" topic.
I think about my own will in terms of constraints and freedoms imposed on it on a regular daily or weekly basis. I know my will is free in numerous respects while not in others; what's more, I know it's free while other wills of other people, of other living things, aren’t so free if at all. So I think Gazzaniga is right on, that he is spot on, when he says the word “free will” is more or less meaningless in regards to furthering understanding in any academic, scholarly or technical context until people in discussion are prepared to talk about it in a nuanced, contextualized way.
This last point is of course made in similar conversations concerning "God" or "soul" or "consciousness".
|
|
eeyonkee
Trad climber
Golden, CO
|
|
|
Sep 25, 2018 - 03:07pm PT
|
Jan, I would say, not so much that mind is or is like computer. I would say that the higher word/idea is algorithm. Computers and biology both depend on and implement algorithms. The main difference, as I see it, is that biological algorithms are self-evolving and attached to meat. Mother Nature is the ultimate mover of the evolution; both of the algorithm and the underlying meat.
HFCS; with respect to systems engineering; I would say that you have a good point. It seems more fundamental than the biological algorithms that have converged on good systems engineering solutions through brute force.
Edit: The more I think of it, it seems obvious that computer algorithms are also attached to meat, inasmuch as it takes meat to write computer code (although I DO know a vegetarian or two). The computer code comes into existence just a little further down the information transmission line/hierarchy.
My new list after considering HFCS's last post. More fundamental than mind are, in order:
Physics (forces, building blocks and playing field)
Chemistry (things)
Systems Engineering (composite things)
Biology (replicating things)
Biological algorithms (solutions evolved by replicating things)
Where to put systems engineering is the toughie.
|
|
Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado & Nepal
|
|
|
Sep 25, 2018 - 04:49pm PT
|
I like the algorithm idea as it encompasses both the physical and the biological. Perhaps it is no accident that it is a mathematical idea since some claim that the nature of the universe is mathematical. Perhaps Plato had it right.
|
|
|
SuperTopo on the Web
|
Let us know!