what is consciousness?

[adge]

any thoughts, do tell......

[Otis Westinghouse]

Watching Joanna Newsom play '81 with perfect acoustics. I have goosebumps on my goosebumps, therefore I am.

[adge]

Sorry to break it to you Otis, but you're a brain in a jar!
what you perceive as reality is nothing but me electromagnetically and chemically stimulating your brain-Joanna is someone i created to keep you entertained for a while.
On the plus side, since you know it's not real, you no longer have to get out of bed to pee.

[Boy With A Problem]

I nearly had a wet dream last night, but I didn't fall asleep in time.

[Jack of All Parades]

Cannot credit a recent sublime musical experience as Otis for such an awareness but will throw my lot in with Rene instead- "Cogito ergo sum".

[migdd]

What isn't?

[adge]

Cannot credit a recent sublime musical experience as Otis for such an awareness but will throw my lot in with Rene instead- "Cogito ergo sum".

Yeah, a lot of people would also follow Descartes on this, though one could doubt the concept of the 'I', for my money consciousness itself is undeniable-possibly the only truth.
I'd credit Wittgenstein with a great insight on the concept too, the nature of language- it as a reflection of our species.
We are inherently social animals, and our ‘sense of self’ originated in terms of ever greater social complexity – as in, rather than some primary egotism, the way that we can regard ourselves derives and develops from a sense of another, essentially the early primary care givers, and later in respect of the communities in which we find ourselves in. As a result our brains developed certain faculties, such as memory, which contribute to a nature that is primed for a certain acutely social capacity. The few cases of children who were outside of society -feral, fail to develop their, 'humanity' fully, there was a case of a girl, pretty much brought up by dogs who, aped their behaviour, not surprisingly, and shows the critical nature of the society/environment in allowing us to flourish as human beings.
So the idea of an 'I' presupposes an other, it's useful in the functioning of human society, but much like language, as Wittgenstein showed, there is no transcendent grounding of language that can be fixed outside of human behaviour – language, like our conception of consciousness, reflects a form of life, it isn’t subject to one, or outside of our socially bound reality as creatures. We may talk in terms of the human species evolved and our inherent capacities, but these are socially bound capacities nevertheless.
I think science is in a quandary on the subject, actually barely understanding the question, as it tends to atomise 'reality', and the resulting reductionism leads to a kind of perpetual dead end.
A prevailing notion of artificial intelligence, or the notion that computer=mind, is another kind of reductionist brick wall, though the myth of neuromythology is as all pervading and mistaken myth as the concept of dualism was in the (17th?) century.
Though i have to say the concept of artificial intelligence fascinates me, it would be, even if we accept it as a reality for the sake of argument, both unverifiable and alien in the Wittgensteinien sense.

[Jack of All Parades]

Rene is the lead for me on this- I simply cannot deny the existence of my mind- my sheer thinking presupposes my mind exists-however I can doubt the existence of my body because I can imagine I might be an incorporeal spirit-not a far step to your notion of artificial intelligence. As Rene said "there is none which is more effectual in leading feeble spirits from the straight path of virtue, than to imagine that the soul of the brute is of the same nature as our own, and that in consequence, after this life we having nothing to fear or to hope for, any more than the flies and the ants".

Steven Pinker has helped me with grasping this concept. His The Blank Slate has been an eye opener for me. Have always had trouble following Wittgenstein- I get lost in his thought processes and aphorisms and so have difficulty following some of your thought. But I do know he said "the limits of my language means the limits of my world". Which I think is where you go in your post.

[Otis Westinghouse]

Whether it's 'I think, therefore I am, 'I speak...' or 'I have goosebumps...', it's all effectively the same thing. Or in Samuel Johnson's case, 'the stone hurts when I kick it, therefore I am.' I do love this story:

Refutation of Bishop Berkeley
After we came out of the church, we stood talking for some time together of Bishop Berkeley's ingenious sophistry to prove the nonexistence of matter, and that every thing in the universe is merely ideal. I observed, that though we are satisfied his doctrine is not true, it is impossible to refute it. I never shall forget the alacrity with which Johnson answered, striking his foot with mighty force against a large stone, till he rebounded from it -- "I refute it thus."
Boswell: Life

[Jack of All Parades]

Bless the 'good' Doctor! No one I know of can cut through bull like him, either with his sharply charged words or, in this case, with a bodily appendage.

[adge]

Whether it's 'I think, therefore I am, 'I speak...' or 'I have goosebumps...', it's all effectively the same thing. Or in Samuel Johnson's case, 'the stone hurts when I kick it, therefore I am.' I do love this story:

Refutation of Bishop Berkeley
After we came out of the church, we stood talking for some time together of Bishop Berkeley's ingenious sophistry to prove the nonexistence of matter, and that every thing in the universe is merely ideal. I observed, that though we are satisfied his doctrine is not true, it is impossible to refute it. I never shall forget the alacrity with which Johnson answered, striking his foot with mighty force against a large stone, till he rebounded from it -- "I refute it thus."
Boswell: Life

They're are the same in that they're attempting to offer some kind of quasi proof of existence, and i would go further than they did by saying that if consciousness was some kind of illusion, then the illusion itself is what we call consciousness.
If we understand the question ‘what is consciousness’ it seems to me, we accept it as a reality.
In fact their tasks were more to do with philosophical scepticism, at least in the sense of eradicating uncertainty in order to construct a kind of epistemological foundation on which to build knowledge, and in the case of Descartes (mentioned earlier), invoking psychic substances to fill in the gaps.

For me it's less a question of ‘am i conscious’ or 'what can i be certain of', but rather how do we delineate the notion of consciousness, and does it compel us to reject purely materialist idea of the universe for example, after all the idea of consciousness isn’t necessary in evolutionary theory-and auto mechanical phenomena can exist, without our invoking the idea of the mind- for example a speak your weight machine, might have a cursory appearance of being conscious, but is in every sense a prosthetic of human consciousness, and we wouldn’t attribute consciousness to it.

[adge]

Rene is the lead for me on this- I simply cannot deny the existence of my mind- my sheer thinking presupposes my mind exists-however I can doubt the existence of my body because I can imagine I might be an incorporeal spirit-not a far step to your notion of artificial intelligence. As Rene said "there is none which is more effectual in leading feeble spirits from the straight path of virtue, than to imagine that the soul of the brute is of the same nature as our own, and that in consequence, after this life we having nothing to fear or to hope for, any more than the flies and the ants".

Steven Pinker has helped me with grasping this concept. His The Blank Slate has been an eye opener for me. Have always had trouble following Wittgenstein- I get lost in his thought processes and aphorisms and so have difficulty following some of your thought. But I do know he said "the limits of my language means the limits of my world". Which I think is where you go in your post.

I don’t know that much about Pinker, and haven’t read the book you mentioned.
He thinks language is innate, al a Chomsky, and this seems perfectly plausible, language is a bi-product of that consciousness, when the individual is immersed in a conducive and nurturing social environment.
I would part company with Pinker on the respective weights given to what we might call a cultural importance in linguistics and the more fashionable emphasis given to the evolutionary psychological model, which stresses our innate, or biological basis for language, rather than seeing language as a transcended activity, or as being autonomous and functioning parallel to our biology.
Maybe Pinker over emphasises the anatomical prerequisites for language too, ie the position of the larynx on the neck etc
My own position is that language finds a way, if the brain and the society are so developed to allow for it's development, I think we would have found another strategy to communicate ie sign language had our linguistic anatomy not been quite as well tuned as it was/is.
I'm only disagreeing about the emphasis, i certainly agree with him for the main part, and as i say, i don't know a hell of a lot about his work or ideas, just some stuff i've picked up.

Just a footnote to this linguistic stuff, it's interesting that Chomsky's linguistic theory was made almost independently of the technological advances that allowed us deeper understanding the brain. His theory is located in anthropological observation, of how language is used, it's universal traits etc.

[A rope leash]

What a silly question. Thanks for asking.

Brains form bundles of nerve endings and create pathways of communication between them. The more evolved a brain is, the more likely the owner is going to sense a "consiousness". The sensory organs attached to the brain create an illusion of "conciousness", or, in other words, an "awareness of being". This is especially true of humans, the brains of which have evolved way beyond the necessity required for survival. Human brains become "people" who "think" they "are".

Of course, they really do exist, but the more evolved brain actually understands that it exists, and therefore can actually ask the question, "what is my mind?" Through the evolved organs attached to the brain, the higher animal can actually communicate the knowledge of its own existence to other beings...

My name is Yon Yohnson, I live in Wisconsin, I work in a lumber mill there. The people I meet when I walk down the street, they ask me..."What's your name?" I tell them. My name is Yon Yohnson, I live in Wisconsin, I work in a lumber mill there. The people I meet when I walk down the street, they ask me..."What's your name?" I tell them. My name is Yon Yohnson, I live in Wisconsin...

Get it?

Now get out of here...






!

[adge]

What a silly question. Thanks for asking.

Brains form bundles of nerve endings and create pathways of communication between them. The more evolved a brain is, the more likely the owner is going to sense a "consiousness". The sensory organs attached to the brain create an illusion of "conciousness", or, in other words, an "awareness of being". This is especially true of humans, the brains of which have evolved way beyond the necessity required for survival. Human brains become "people" who "think" they "are".

Of course, they really do exist, but the more evolved brain actually understands that it exists, and therefore can actually ask the question, "what is my mind?" Through the evolved organs attached to the brain, the higher animal can actually communicate the knowledge of its own existence to other beings...

My name is Yon Yohnson, I live in Wisconsin, I work in a lumber mill there. The people I meet when I walk down the street, they ask me..."What's your name?" I tell them. My name is Yon Yohnson, I live in Wisconsin, I work in a lumber mill there. The people I meet when I walk down the street, they ask me..."What's your name?" I tell them. My name is Yon Yohnson, I live in Wisconsin...

Get it?

Now get out of here...






!

Well let's start at the beginning of your post.
Initially you suggest a correlation between the brain and consciousness, now that view has been widely held for sometime, unless one were to take a kind of absolute materialist perspective on this a la Rhyle or Dennett which deny the reality of consciousness, then you're quickly gonna ascend to a correlative view-and i accept this too, though i think your description of the brain is so imprecise and mechanistic it isn't helpful, remember the brain is as much chemistry as it is mere neural interactions.
My question is not 'does consciousness exist', i know it exists, im asking 'what is consciousness'.

I also don't you saying ' The sensory organs attached to the brain create an illusion of "conciousness", or, in other words, an "awareness of being".
Why is consciousness an illusion? if consciousness is an illusion, what is recipient of the illusion/deception?

You casually throw in something about evolution 'brains of which have evolved way beyond the necessity required for survival. Human brains become "people" who "think" they "are".
If you're suggesting that consciousness was selected for in evolutionary terms, show me how and why?
Human behaviour can be explained in terms of us as animals, our reactions, what we see, these can all be explained in terms of physical mechanisms, algorithms in the brain etc.
behaviourist theory which was pre-eminent until quite recently seemed quite happy to explain the whole human existence, without the need to resort to consciousness at all.
So it's no good blithely throwing in the mind as the upshot of Darwinian selection unless you show some evolutionary necessity for it, the plain fact is, there isn't.

Consciousness exists outside the paradigm of science, scientists like to approach such questions atomistically, and hence class anything outside of their reductive methodology as ‘illusionary’

[A rope leash]

It's really cute how you take it so seriously.

Ask an impossible question, get an impossible answer.

"Why is there air?" - Bill Cosby, 1966

Consciousness is the awareness of being. If you weren't concious, you wouldn't know you existed.

Let's see what onelook.com has to say...

http://www.onelook.com/?w=consciousness&ls=a

"...an alert cognitive state in which you are aware of yourself and your situation..."

Of course, this may insufficient for your search. What you may be looking for is some mystical mind-spirit, that may exist in some separate form and just happens to be inhabiting your person.

Eh, could be. I suspect not.

The brain creates an illusion of entity. It has to for the person to survive. What would you be if you didn't have yourself?

"If people don't want to come out to the ball park, how you gonna stop 'em?" - Yogi Berra, circa 1975

Hey, remember when we used to play "guess the noun?" "Consciousness" would have been a good one.

Love ya.

[bambooneedle]

Hi all.

Awareness?

If you really want to analyze it -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhRWYFJ2pyI

Or read the whole transcript: http://deoxy.org/w_nature.htm

[A rope leash]

Hey Bamb!

'sappenin?!

Yada yada yada how they do go on...

Here's all we need to know...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jymHINLcjlw




The only real question is how does something come from nothing.

[A rope leash]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQccA9guwoE

[A rope leash]

Hey! I think I broke the Internet.

Cool!

[ice nine]

I can't define consciousness, but I know it when I see it.

[adge]

It's really cute how you take it so seriously.

Ask an impossible question, get an impossible answer.

"Why is there air?" - Bill Cosby, 1966

If it's an impossible question, with an impossible answer, why do you keep trying to answer it?, come on boy, think!

Oh, and 'why is there air?' easy peasy, it's so your farts are audible, that way you know to clench your buttocks together to avoid shitting yourself.
Judging from your replies, your elementary canal has been working overtime, so do us all a favour and...CLENCH!

[A rope leash]

Gee whiz...why get so personally insulting? My consciousness can hardly stand it.

...and on my birthday, as well.

hmmf!

[adge]

Happy Birthday ARL, go and alter your state of conciousness, in other words, get pissed- and have one on me

[bambooneedle]

ARL: I don't easily warm up to chummy internet talk much these days,... just so you know. And stop crying like a bitch about being insulted, it's unseemly. There's no real comeback once you make a couple of dumb posts, no matter how cleverly you think you can backpedal.

"beep, beep...." did that enter your "consciousness"?

[A rope leash]

Taking the piss, too, bamboo?

What's the point? Just having a little fun. Sorry if you can't see the humor in it.







(nah, not really...)