Just Accept it!!!

Shining One

Here's a quote from the scientific community about the consciousness: Just accept it!

"Those things in a way didn't need to evolve," said Chalmers. "They were part of the fundamental furniture of the world all along."
Instead of trying to reduce consciousness to something else, Chalmers believes consciousness should simply be taken for granted, the way that space and time and mass are in physics. According to this view, a theory of consciousness would not explain what consciousness is or how it arose; instead, it would try to explain the relationship between consciousness and everything else in the world.

Beyond the mystics

Roger Penrose, a mathematical physicist at Oxford University, believes that if a "theory of everything" is ever developed in physics to explain all the known phenomena in the universe, it should at least partially account for consciousness.
Penrose also believes that quantum mechanics, the rules governing the physical world at the subatomic level, might play an important role in consciousness.
It wasn't that long ago that the study of consciousness was considered to be too abstract, too subjective or too difficult to study scientifically. But in recent years, it has emerged as one of the hottest new fields in biology, similar to string theory in physics or the search for extraterrestrial life in astronomy.
No longer the sole purview of philosophers and mystics, consciousness is now attracting the attention of scientists from across a variety of different fields, each, it seems, with their own theories about what consciousness is and how it arises from the brain.

In many religions, consciousness is closely tied to the ancient notion of the soul, the idea that in each of us, there exists an immaterial essence that survives death and perhaps even predates birth. It was believed that the soul was what allowed us to think and feel, remember and reason.
Our personality, our individuality and our humanity were all believed to originate from the soul.
Nowadays, these things are generally attributed to physical processes in the brain, but exactly how chemical and electrical signals between trillions of brain cells called neurons are transformed into thoughts, emotions and a sense of self is still unknown.
"Almost everyone agrees that there will be very strong correlations between what's in the brain and consciousness," says David Chalmers, a philosophy professor and Director of the Center for Consciousness at the Australian National University. "The question is what kind of explanation that will give you. We want more than correlation, we want explanation -- how and why do brain process give rise to consciousness? That's the big mystery."

******Just accept it!!!!!!!!!!

Chalmers is best known for distinguishing between the 'easy' problems of consciousness and the 'hard' problem.
The easy problems are those that deal with functions and behaviors associated with consciousness and include questions such as these: How does perception occur? How does the brain bind different kinds of sensory information together to produce the illusion of a seamless experience?
"Those are what I call the easy problems, not because they're trivial, but because they fall within the standard methods of the cognitive sciences," Chalmers says.
The hard problem for Chalmers is that of subjective experience.
"You have a different kind of experience -- a different quality of experience -- when you see red, when you see green, when you hear middle C, when you taste chocolate," Chalmers told LiveScience. "Whenever you're conscious, whenever you have a subjective experience, it feels like something."
According to Chalmers, the subjective nature of consciousness prevents it from being explained in terms of simpler components, a method used to great success in other areas of science. He believes that unlike most of the physical world, which can be broken down into individual atoms, or organisms, which can be understood in terms of cells, consciousness is an irreducible aspect of the universe, like space and time and mass.

*******irreducible complexity!!!!!!!!!!
"Those things in a way didn't need to evolve," said Chalmers. "They were part of the fundamental furniture of the world all along." LOL
Instead of trying to reduce consciousness to something else, Chalmers believes consciousness should simply be taken for granted, the way that space and time and mass are in physics. According to this view, a theory of consciousness would not explain what consciousness is or how it arose; instead, it would try to explain the relationship between consciousness and everything else in the world.

*******JUST ACCEPT IT!!!!!!!!!!!

Not everyone is enthusiastic about this idea, however.
'Not very helpful'
"It's not very helpful," said Susan Greenfield, a professor of pharmacology at Oxford University.
"You can't do very much with it," Greenfield points out. "It's the last resort, because what can you possibly do with that idea? You can't prove it or disprove it, and you can't test it. It doesn't offer an explanation, or any enlightenment, or any answers about why people feel the way they feel."

********So much for logic and human reasoning trying to figure out the Big Question!!!!!!!!!!!

Rex

greven

I don't see how you can jump from "we don't know (yet!) how consiousness" arose to " *******irreducible complexity!!!!!!!!!! "

Remember that the atom was for a very long time believed to be irreducible; in fact that is what the word 'atom' means in ancient greek: indivisible. Using this "irreducible complexity" as an argument for Intelligent Design is nothing but arguing for a "God of the Gaps".

In other words: "we don't know how it arose so the big guy in the sky must've done it"

oh, and since when is mr. Chalmers opinion equal to that of the scientific community? Seems to me the consensus rejects his opinion stating it is not usable as explanation. It isn't. It explains nothing and makes no predictions. Something any theory is supposed to accomlish.

Greven.

AlmostAtheist

While I wouldn't state it as fact by any stretch, I am becoming more and more convinced that what we call "consciousness" is just very good, very detailed pattern recognition. Everything in nature is about pattern recognition. It's how replication occurs, it's how bees find the flowers, and it's how I find the 7-11 where I buy the cigarettes that create a pattern in my brain that is called addiction. I also see a pattern in the amount I smoke and the amount I cough, so I would like to establish a new pattern. But it all strikes me as just patterns.

I don't see consciousness as anything magical or all that impressive, really. Machines are getting closer and closer to exhibiting behavior that closely mimics what we call consciousness. When that mimicry is good enough, when you can't distinguish it from organic consciousness, wouldn't it at that point BE consciousness? I think so, and it's awfully hard to get all worked up over something that you can build in your garage with parts from Radio Shack. Neat, enjoyable, but not magical. And certainly not miraculous.

Just my opinion, of course. (Maybe it's only *my* consciousness that isn't all that impressive!)

Dave

EvilForce

Oh right the bible and Christianity are such great examples on acceptance....LOL.

Thanks but no thanks I'll follow the Tao.

Harmony is only in following the Way.

The Way is without form or quality,
But expresses all forms and qualities;
The Way is hidden and implicate,
But expresses all of nature;
The Way is unchanging,
But expresses all motion.

Beneath sensation and memory
The Way is the source of all the world.
How can I understand the source of the world?
By accepting.

And I have accepted that I don't understand the argument you started this thread with. Makes no sense to me.

Big Tex

Duly noted

poppers

In order to truly know ALL about something you have to be totally separate from that thing which is being studied so that it could be examined from every conceivable angle. Now, what would do the studying of consciousness except consciousness itself? In order to examine anything one must rely on consciousness - just try to escape it if you can. How would you know if you were successful at escaping it if not for consciousness? Can consciousness be separate from anything, let alone itself? If consciousness could be separate from itself how would it be studied/theorized about? Isn't studying/theorizing simply a form of the formless pure primordial consciousness - consciousness as waves or ripples arising out of the ocean of formless consciousness?

So, I can see how it must be simply accepted because there is no possible way to know it truly. On the other hand you can BE it consciously.

tetrapod.sapien

rexilus hexilus,

why don't you post your sources? you keep bombarding the board with reams of misquoted pseudo-science, the least you can do is post your sources.

just accept it? maybe when it has survived peer review! until then it belongs on the supermarket rack with national enquirer.

Instead of trying to reduce consciousness to something else, Chalmers believes consciousness should simply be taken for granted, the way that space and time and mass are in physics. According to this view, a theory of consciousness would not explain what consciousness is or how it arose; instead, it would try to explain the relationship between consciousness and everything else in the world.

well, whoopty-doo!

EF,

LOL, totally.

TS

Just Accept it!!!

Shining One

greven

AlmostAtheist

EvilForce

Big Tex

poppers

tetrapod.sapien

EvilForce

hamsterbait

tetrapod.sapien

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