Terry wrote:
Quote: Twyvel, you ignored my response to you (Feb 7 post 551366) regarding the observation of awareness, consciousness, knowledge, and brains, and simply reiterated the one point on which I suggested that we agree to disagree: subject/object dichotomy and infinite regression.
Fare enough
.
Quote:Twyvel: Their behavior may ?'demonstrate' or indicate that awareness is present Terry, but that demonstration or indication of awareness is "not" awareness. There is a significant distinction here. And a determination based on their behavior that they ?'are' aware is a guess. For all we know they could be an automaton.
Terry:Yes, and the moon could be made of green cheese, and their bodies could have been taken over by aliens ... C'mon, twyvel, that is a pretty poor argument even for you.
Twyvel: "even for you"..........What is that supposed to meeeeeeeeean Terry?
Quote: I meant that it is absurd to claim that people may be automatons in order to avoid admitting that their behavior reflects awareness.
In the first sentence above I said, "Their behavior may ?'demonstrate' or indicate that awareness is present Terry,
." So there is no "avoiding admitting that behavior ?'may' reflect awareness, except to add that that premise is a "guess", and stretching that guess, as you do, to claim that the >behavior = awareness< is simply wrong.
There is a big difference between claiming behavior ?'reflects' or indicates awareness, to claiming that observing behavior is observing awareness. And it is the later that I disagree with.
Quote: [sigh] I did not say that we could observe awareness by watching someone walk down the street. But we CAN observe awareness by observing how they respond to questions and novel situations.
Same difference. Behavior is behavior.
Apart from that please explain yourself.
Quote: No, of course not. In order to experience someone else's consciousness, we would have to have a telepathic connection to their mind.
Don't know about that,
. My view is, under no circomstatnces can you experience someone else's awareness, "except' by >being it<, i.e. there is only ?'one' awareness'.
Quote:But we can observe their consciousness by measuring their brain's responses to stimuli and by noting their behavior.
Again, ?'noting their behavior" and "measuring their brain's responses to stimuli", is NOT observing their(?) awareness. Don't you see the distinction?
And it is not ?'their' awareness', if they are the observed. That is, what I take to be myself, ego/body is not aware. It is the observed, a non-subject.
Quote: This one issue is whether or not consciousness can be observed. It is not about suppositions of what may produce it.
Quote:What's wrong with figuring out what produces the consciousness that many of us do indeed observe?
Nothing. And no ?'one' observes consciousness, consciousness is always the observer.
If we ever discovered what produced consciousness that would not tell us what consciousness is.
Quote: Dualism doesn't hold any promises.
Quote:Then of what use is it?
I think the only promise dualism holds is the discovery of its flaws that would lead to its abandonment and eventual inquiry into nondualism.
Quote: Something you fail to grasp is all knowledge is mental.
Quote:Depends on how you define the words. Computers can acquire, store and act on "knowledge" but have no mental concepts of anything.
When does knowledge become knowledge?
A rock holds as much knowledge as a computer, i.e. none.
I think knowledge only becomes so when rocks, computers etc. are interpreted by humans. Knowledge is interpretation.
Quote: Consciousness came from evolution of our brains, which is where it resides and has no reason to go anywhere else (especially after death).
You are welcome to your guess.
Quote: Why should "I" be limited to one state that would encompass wakefulness, various sleep stages, meditation, psychosis, drug-induced hallucinations, coma, and everything else? "I" am not always "myself."
All ?'self's' are objects, and as such are not ?'self''s' except fictionally.
How many (fictitious) ?'self's constitute ?'you'?
Quote: You are wrong, we do not 'know' if consciousness requires brains.
Quote: You may not "know" but my level of knowledge on the subject seems to be a bit more extensive.
Your knowledge may be more extensive at the science/physiological end, but it is lacking in terms of self awareness/philosophy/spirituality/consciousness etc. And I content that you and others in your camp do not known if conciseness requires brains, because ?'they' don't know what consciousness is.
Put it this way:
That a physical, material world exists is an unknown., as such no claims can be made that consciousness requires material brains to exist, since material brains have yet to be shown to exist themselves, i.e. no one can show that they have observed a material brain.
Quote:You don't necessarily need a brain, but at a minimum consciousness requires organized patterns of matter/energy and a way to manipulate them with self-awareness. There must be a source of input, a data storage system, time sense, imaging system (does not have to be visual), a way to process data and evaluate decisions. Unless you believe in magic.
That appears to be a cause?-effect understanding, though cause and effect may be just part of the constructed reality. I think Krishnamurti is correct when he says, "Cause and effect (like everything else) come into existence unpin perception."
Quote: If you are the observer and this observer that you are cannot observer itself then you do not and cannot know anything about ?'you' through observing. Meaning you do not exist as anything observable.
If knowledge comes about through an I observing, and this I cannot observe the I that the I is, then this I has no knowledge of the I that this I is.
Quote:twyvel, this is BS, pure and simple. Of course I can observe myself, others can observe me, and I can observe others and apply that knowledge to my own experience. Have you ever heard the expression "know thyself"? "I" exist as surely as love.
"know thyself"?
.That's a joke, didn't you know,
:
If we were sitting across a table from each other, looking at each other, you could >not< see the seeing that is looking at you; you could not see the looking that is seeing you. You could see my face and my eyes but not the ?'seeing' that sees you. ?'seeing' is invisible, immaterial, (seeing = awareness).
And you looking at me could not see the seeing that is ?'seeing' me.
But you think you are a body and a brain so I guess you will go on thinking that you are a body/brain.
Nondually:
Observation is creative. By that I am not referring to the creation of ?'meaning', but rather, in addition and prior to the creation of meaning, the observation creates what is observed. Looking creates that which is looked at, i.e. If ?'you' are looking at an apple, the ?'apple' is created in the looking along with the ?'you' that appears to be doing the looking. Both ?'you' (as a pseudo subject) and the ?'apple' (as a pseudo object) are being observed, and are created through the process of observing, (actually both are indistinguishable from the observing since ?'observing' is unobservable).
That's why it is said that there is ?'nothing' there; the ?'object' is dependent on being observed; ?'the object' as both subject-as-object and object (apple). Objects are transitory, coming and going.
The manifested world of objects comes from the unmanifest or void, or what we have been referring to as consciousness or the unobserved observer. This ?'void' is the blind spot in awareness and is ?'us'. It is the one place(?) we cannot look; because we are it (the unobservable observer) and ?'it' not an ?'it' since it is unmanifested.
