Lola
I get the impression that too much technical stuff about how the brain works scares people off---I suggest we try a different appoach---maybe even a different thread with a different title.
Good idea perception, you start it, ok?
I agree, consciousness just is, but I doubt that it is demonstrable as BoGoWo states. Demonstrable too whom?
But we certainly can assume that consciousness does exist, but we don't have to assume at the same time that we are conscious.
We only have an appearance of consciousness or being conscious because we are only an appearance as an entity.
We think we are the experiencer but if we don't know who or what decides or knows then we are the experience of that which does. As body/thoughts (or whatever we take ourselves to be) we are not even conscious. Just a stream of thoughts in which some of the thoughts are comprised of the ideas that the thoughts themselves are somebody that knows something.
We're transparent, we're being looked through and we can certainly talk and think about who's doing the looking, enquirer into the looker, or we can take it for granted and focus on what it sees; this "self" and this manifestation or we can do both, with the eyes of a reptile, one looking in and one looking out.
Sorry Twyvel;
I wasn't conscious when you made that last remark, could you please repeat it?
Mr. Analogy again!
If one looks at the brain as a computer, which it most definitely is, it is readily apparent to all of us that the computer has limited "ram" (depending on how much it's owner/operator wishes to, or can afford to, provide) and is, therefore limited in its assignment of resources; only the information (application/programme) needed for the current task is "uploaded" into memory, to efficiently do the "work" required; other resources are "called up" as required. If more information is taken into "ram" than there is capacity for, the computer has a "nervous breakdown" - crashes.
This is "consciousness"!
The computer/mind only has sufficient capacity to "concentrate" on the subject(s) at hand, and the rest is memory/storage - subconscious.
This subconscious can be active, below the "aware' threshhold; for example dreams. And there is also "crossover"; when dreams sometimes flip over into consciousness. Normal scenario, daydreams; worst case, hallucination!
Other examples:
normal dreaming; ="defrag", running while you sleep (the brain is "ordering" recent events, categorizing, and assigning storage file paths.)
loop; =madness, unable to make "sense", reach a conclusion (maybe that's where the term "loopy" came from?)
Most concepts are really a lot simpler than they seem; even when not fully "understood"!
BoGoWo
I think you’re confusing “content” with awareness. Concepts and thoughts/thinking are not aware.
mind
Bogowo, 001100010001. "1110010, 11100101001010010010010."
JLN;
that's funny, I would have said:
"0101100010001. "11100101, 111001010010100100100010";
doesn't that make more sense?
polarity
BOGOWO, If you put it THAT way, I agree. It's all a matter of perspective, I guess.
Hey Jln; Those are little "o"s.
I know what happened to you; you were minding your own business, wearing your glasses when your prescription ran out !
Sorry; [sneaky way to slip in a touch of humour]
humour in Canadian
Humor in U.S.ian
Slight difference. Nothing important
I agree on the centrality of the concept of interdependency. All behavior (subjective and objective) is overdetermined, a complex result of the confluence of genetic and environmental (including chemical and cultural) forces.
