A theory of consciousness

Hermes, what I would do is open a thread and copy what you've written as a top so it can be discussed further. This would also allow you to refine your own thoughts after collaborating with others. So take a paragraph or two, open a thread only about that specific topic and move it in here so it can be further discussed. That's the best way to generate feedback.

Hello Justin,
OK - thanks for the advice... it's just kind of difficult to break it up into paragraphs, because I meant for it to be read as a whole. Also I feel bad starting a new thread! Umm... OK how about a summary of my interpretation of Dasein as a new thread, would that be OK for discussion?

Hello hermes. I'm glad I'm not the only one who is searching for how consciousness forms.

I have yet to come to anything that I can hold with confidence for myself.

But a couple of questions to bring up I suppose. Basically you have labelled a flaw to the theory that is apparent in the diagram itself. By making it non linear, you've established it is immediately a paradox, unless your reasoning is that consciousness is intrinsically non linear.

Non linear as in a loop, or well, a figure eight. I just want to know if that was your intent, and quite interested because I have come to conclusions much like yours (in that they are like a cycle).

The problem is whether consciousness relies on causality, in which case, potentiality. The now is like the nowness and the now that was is like information. Our minds register both.

I think the main difference between computers and us conscious beings is how we base our potentiality. We define our environment, our reality it seems, on its past influences, and whether that has potential on our biological makeup, our being. Computers only find potential in what is inputted which is like a constant nowness. The potential is pre programmed or commanded upon the computer and stored as memory, but is not accessed into a nowness, namely, its not mingled with the input, but remained separate; therefore potential is not given from the now that was.

Existence is contextual, dualistic; thoughts, memory, concepts, notions... everything that exists is contextual.

'Consciousness' has no context.
'Consciousness' is 'perfectly symmetrical'.
The 'Perfectly symmetrical' can have no features or qualities at all. No context. Non-dual. Nothing that can 'fit' into thought or memory.

You'll never find it anywhere you can look.

A guy is walking down the street one night and sees a fellow on hands and knees looking for something under the streetlight.
Walking up to him the guy asked the problem, to which the other replied that he had lost his car keys.
"That car?" asked the man, seeing a car down the block in a pool of darkness.
"Yes", said the fellow.
"So, you lost them around here?"
"No, but the light's better!"
(Sounds of a 'rimshot', and footsteps fading into the night....)
*__-

Me too



Keep going! I've been working at this on and off for years... I got to the point where I thought, I'm either right or wrong, so I should test it with other people.



I really recommend you read at least the explanation of the schematic, here.



OK I don't see how it is a paradox... could you elaborate?

The loop came about through a lot of "trial and error" of thought, considering different configurations of Interpretations. I didn't start with a preconception that it should be a loop - though I can think of some good reasons why one would start with that assumption! (the gross interconnections of the brain for one)



I'm a little unsure of what you mean by potential...
I think I see you general point... and I agree. It's clear there are big fundamental differences between traditional computation and the kind that the brain performs - probably just a reflection of different necessities.




Hehe in which case I am wrong, and it can never be found? :eek:

Nameless, thats just an opinion though, right?

We can have a good idea of what causes consciousness. Or at least try.

Just 'this' Perspective. One among 'many'.


Certainly 'try'! Do as you must, and enjoy the ride!
I certainly can't predict your ideas, 'good' or otherwise, but if Consciousness is not 'caused', then i would say no, we can't, but if it is, then perhaps you will be the one to make the discovery! How cool would that be? Nobel prize stuff! *__-
Good fortune...
Happy trails!

You'll never find it anywhere you can look.
Perhaps you'll find it where you cannot look?
Perhaps, like 'Truth' it cannot be found.
One does not 'find' Truth, one IS Truth. That is what is 'found'.
Perhaps 'Consciousness' is nondifferent than 'Truth/Reality'? (I'd say so.)
Food for meditation?
*__-
Peace

Nameless, TBH I don't really understand your arguments!
Those concepts of "truth" or "reality" are totally meaningless within any practical theory of consciousness. Our minds are a product of evolution, not a hypothetical construct of a philosophising creator. We are born from a physical/biological world, that knows no "truth" or difference in "reality" and this world is all that is required to explain our condition.

Evolution may be ingenious, but compared to our brains it is stupid. I believe that anyone who would posture that evolution/natural selection could create something beyond our knowledge is living in a very skewed reality.

All this is beside the point, IMO, though. The question of consciousness is either possible or it is not. What use is there in debating this point? Why don't we just try to find the answer directly? Such debates are the bane of philosophy, for they are not (or rarely) useful in any sense. In the introduction on this page on my site I put my arguments forward in a different way..

"Practical theory of Consciousness"? There cannot even be a concentually accepted definition of Consciousness. Nor can there be. Undefines and poorly understood, I think that we are far from any "Practical theory of Consciousness".


That is one Perspective.


not what I said, but that might be another Perspective.


And another Perspective.


For some. For you perhaps. Some require very little to be content with an 'explanation' (especially if it agrees with what they already think), others, more. Some need no 'explanation'.


Carry on, McDuff...


Thats one Perspective. I find all this food for critical thought, and many various Perspectives, to understand the lifeblood of philosophy.


Depends on youPerspective.
*__-

And his perspective is brought to you by an opinion which is explained quite thoroughly through a 'website'.

But honestly, do you believe that we did not come to be from a set of conditions?!

Science could come to understand consciousness in the sense that, some time in the future, some brilliant scientist might be able to construct some apparatus which, according to his enormous research, should be conscious; there is, however, no way to prove that it is conscious.

What science is inherently incapable of doing, simply because it rests on empiricism, is to understand or analyze consciousness itself, i.e., the experience of consciousness; and what, after all, is consciousness but that experience? This is so because to analyze requires observation, the ability to step back; consciousness of others is private and beyond reach altogether; consciousness of oneself cannot be understood by oneself because there is nothing with which it could be compared; one cannot get outside oneself to define consciousness.

Thus, humanity will never be able to understand its own existance (the what is life question), through science, though it may come to understand how entities like ourselves apparently came into being.


To Holiday:

As far as consciousness is concerned (individual consciousness as experienced, not the idea of consciousness we all might share) , there were no conditions for its existance; once, there was nothing, I assume, and then BAM, I became conscious and remain so, except at night...:bigsmile:

You do not believe that consciousness progresses? That would imply need for conditions.

I'm sorry but consciousness is not this one dimensional boundary that you all of a sudden grasp at a certain point. It is proportional to something else.

You might observe that as animals developed, there was increasing complexity of nervous tissue and of brain activity. No doubt, in terms of the 'scientific world', consciousness developed gradually. That's not the point; that is the idea of consciousness, not consciousness itself, as experienced. Consciousness as experienced is all inclusive and as such has nothing outside itself, like the universe (hmm, what a coincidence...): i.e., there are no causes of consciousness as experienced. Think of this next time you wake from a deep sleep or die...lol.

But like the universe, there are determinates that make the universe able to be called what it is. Unless you wanna take some stereotypical, philosophical approach and say that the universe doesn't exist.

Nameless - Hehe well you force me to agree! Of course it is one perspective, and everyone can choose and have their own. I think, however, that the basis for one's perspective is important and serves in some way to validate that point of view. If I were to believe that it's possible to create consciousness, but justify this by claiming an Angel visited me in my sleep and told me so... well I'd be having a lot more trouble explaining myself. But my justification, and that of all scientists, is scientific knowledge. I am fully aware that many philosophers have trouble with the lack of a metaphysical foundation to science, or issues defining "knowledge" or "understanding", but this is made irrelevant in the practicality of science. Science is about testing theories, and so that is what I wish to do also.

BrightNoon -

So.. we can explain our existence but NOT understand it? If I can explain how a piece of paper is made, does that mean I do not understand it?
Explaining the function of something, how it is made and how it interacts with the World (Being-in-the-World in a physical sense) is understanding a thing. That's all there is.

When you talk of "understanding", I think you mean private, individual knowledge of a thing (ie. the piece of paper as a means for writing on) - and this is rarely equivalent to the complete scientific knowledge of that thing.

OK I may be missing your point here, but you are aware of your senses, no? To say that consciousness has "nothing outside of itself" seems like a total falsehood. "Being-in-the-World" as Heidegger puts it is an intrinsic part of Dasein being able ot become conscious.
You make a totally arbitrary distinction between the "idea"/"process" of consciousness (which you claim science can know) and the "experience" of consciousness (which you say science cannot). The experience is a product of the process, and so has exactly the same requirements.


---------------

Perhaps I should have started this thread out differently as Justin said, the difficulty being that what I would like to talk about is not here... I appreciate the discussion, but it has so not really been on topic. I understand that many people have preconceptions as to whether a model for consciousness is or is not possible, and what it should be like etc.
But here I do not wish to debate such issues, rather what problems there are with the model I have put forward. OK... I'm gonna try and transfer a page of my site here....

OK here is one page from my site, which roughly describes how I believe the basic process of Dasein operates. Perhaps it is not clear or fully understandable from just this page - a) the site is a work in progress, b) there is more to the site.

What I would like you to imagine is; if this process is coded and enacted within a suitable machine, could that machine become self-aware? If not, then why not?
(original page here)



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Here we shall follow the flow of the schematic to better understand how the functions fit together. This section only deals with the top cycle, that of the Function of Dasein.
[CENTER]

[/CENTER]
Now + Now-that-was
The Now is the current state of the mind in the present. Its Being is one of the Entities at hand, the senses and Entities of the present as they relate to the Entity of Dasein and as the Function of Dasein determines the present to be. At any one moment in time, the Now is the collection of Entities that the Function of Dasein is "experiencing" at that time, the focus of Dasein's ken, the region of Dasein that is the present.
The Now-that-was is the remnant Entities of a just-passed Now, the Being of Dasein as it was a moment before. This short, immediate "history" of Dasein is vital to provide a vector, so to speak, for the extrapolatory Interpretation called Anticipation. To perform a strong temporal Interpretation, a comparison of two things is required. The Now-that-was then serves to produce, on Interpretation with the Now, a differential, the change in Being of Dasein, which change can be identified with changes in the memory of Dasein, it's Entities.


Anticipation
As said, by Interpreting the Now and the Now-that-was, Anticipation produces an Interpretive product that is a status of the Being of Dasein, in the future, based on the Entities held within Dasein (its past experiences, thus Anticipation is "with respect to the past"). This Interpretive product is called the Potentiality-for-Being.


Potentiality-for-Being
Just as the Now is the state of Being of Dasein in the present, the Potentiality-for-Being is the state of Being of Dasein in a possible future. The nature of that future, the quality of the prediction so the speak, is clearly dependent on the range and depth of experiences Dasein has stored as Entities that are Interpretistically relevant to the Now at hand. If it has encountered a similar situation before, then the Anticipation Interpretation is more likely to be accurate.
An important feature of the system to note at this point is the temporality created by this predictive Interpretation. By taking Dasein into a possible future, the Being of Dasein is not only in the past through its Entities, nor also in the present through its senses, but reaching into a future it has created of its own action. This point will be very important for the emergent properties of Dasein, discussed in the Birth of Dasein and the Development of Dasein.


Senses
The senses obviously take physical interactions in-the-World and translate these to signal patterns "readable" by Dasein. There may be some degree of "pre-processing" whereby the sense "organ" in question encodes or optimises the signal for Interpretation, but this is not strictly necessary and is rather a way to help subsequent functions focus on what has been determined important in the sense, by evolution or the creator.


Making present
This is the second big Interpretation performed by Dasein, it compares the Anticipation Interpretation (future) with the senses (present) and in doing so creates the Now, completing the cycle. For the Potentiality-for-Being to have any impact, it must be brought back to the present, and in Interpreting it thus with the senses, the predicted state of Being of the World can be reckoned with what the senses record.
Again, there are emergent properties of this system that are discussed on other pages. But even now one should be able to simply imagine the effect this would have on the casual execution of Dasein. Consider dropping a ball in front of yourself. At any one "moment" in time, Dasein has the current position of the ball as the Now, and traces from its immediate knowledge of where the ball was an instant before to Anticipate where it shall be next (with respect to prior experience, Interpretation is of Dasein's Entities); and this Potentiality-for-Being is appreciated whilst the ball is falling. The senses will then corroborate this in a normal situation, the Making present brings this synthesis of the future and the present back to the Now, and Dasein's expectations have been realised. They didn't have to be realised, but this is a matter for the next section.



Motor action, The World, the "They" and Being-in-the-World belong in part to the emergent functions of Dasein and cannot be understood outside the context of the birth of Dasein. As such, they are defined in the section, Birth of Dasein.

No, I have no 'beliefs'.
Honestly, I do not think "that we come to be from a set of conditions".
We arise synchronously with and as our 'conditional/contextual' universe, every moment, synchronously.

I wouldn't say that there is, nor can be any 'choice' involved (feels like it sometimes, though), nor that there is anyone 'seperate' to 'have' a Perspective. I am a Perspective. You are a Perspective. A 'relic' of the Perspective is an egoic self image that is inherent in some Perspectives, at some moments. It is that egoic self image that 'has', 'wants', 'deserves', 'owns', 'chooses'...


The Perspective/existence/universe of the moment needs no 'validation', it's very existence is validity, as the moment can never be any other than as it is. There is no 'could be' or 'could have been'. What is, is. Every synchronously arising (Planck) moment.


Then you are in trouble, as 'scientific theories' (science does not have 'knowledge', no 'Truth') are constantly altering as the universes seen are different every moment, to every Perspective. You could speak, from a 'linear' Perspective, of the evolution of 'scientific knowledge', or the tentative nature of 'scientific knowledge', but that would be philosophy of science, not 'science'.


You are correct! My neighbor, physicist Richard Feynman, told me, once, that if it doesn't agree with experiment, its worthless!
Test away!
Be careful, though, that the 'tools' of your experimentation, and the specific 'stuff' that they can help you understand don't become an insular tautology; when you have/are a hammer, you naturally ignore the screws, and see nails everywhere! *__-