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Topic: There is no scientific evidence for consciousness.
Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sat 10/27/12 02:55 PM
Would science be a lot happier if they could say there was no such thing as consciousness? Can you be sure if something is conscious our not? What is consciousness? How can you measure it?

smokeybette Joined Fri 11/23/07 Posts: 465	Sat 10/27/12 03:17 PM
it is the use and awareness of your five senses. if you had no consciousness, you'd either be in a coma or brain dead in the hospital,,,

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sat 10/27/12 05:56 PM
it is the use and awareness of your five senses. if you had no consciousness, you'd either be in a coma or brain dead in the hospital,,, Even with five senses.... what is consciousness? What is awareness?

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sat 10/27/12 05:56 PM Edited by Jeanniebean on Sat 10/27/12 05:59 PM
How does inanimate matter become conscious? Where does consciousness arise from?

TexasScoundrel Joined Wed 10/29/08 Posts: 3693	Sat 10/27/12 08:00 PM
Here it is. Read and learn.

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sat 10/27/12 08:14 PM Edited by Jeanniebean on Sat 10/27/12 08:15 PM
I prefer Peter Russel. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-d4ugppcRUE&feature=related

TexasScoundrel Joined Wed 10/29/08 Posts: 3693	Sat 10/27/12 08:24 PM
ROFLMFAO! Peter Russell is a charlatan. If you want to discuss his nonsense you should post in the crackpot... Eer, strange phenomenon forum.

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sat 10/27/12 08:27 PM Edited by Jeanniebean on Sat 10/27/12 08:27 PM
ROFLMFAO! Peter Russell is a charlatan. If you want to discuss his nonsense you should post in the crackpot... Eer, strange phenomenon forum. That is your limited opinion. He makes a lot more sense than Dennett. Dennett does NOT and cannot answer my question and neither can you.

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sat 10/27/12 08:28 PM Edited by Jeanniebean on Sat 10/27/12 08:30 PM
Dennett is an egomaniac blow hard who can not see beyond physical reality. He has a limited view of reality and he insists that his view is the only thing that exists. (talking about ROFLMFAO! )

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sat 10/27/12 08:33 PM
So the big question is.... At what point in creation, or evolution or what ever you prefer to call it.... did matter (inanimate unconscious matter) go from being inanimate and unconscious to conscious? That question has NEVER BEEN ANSWERED. It has never been answered because everything rises out of consciousness and not the other way around.

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sat 10/27/12 08:45 PM
I realize there are people who are totally fixated on what they can see, hear and touch and observe in this three dimensional reality, and that they believe they evolved from the slime that came from the ocean into what they are today, perhaps through an ape or some other animal. I also realize there are others who think some deity formed them out of dirt and breathed life into them. Neither of these ideas are right. We live in a mind world much like a brain or computer. Our own perceptions and brains project the three dimensional world we see according to what we perceive with our five senses. Since we mostly agree on what we see, this agreement becomes what we call "facts." But what makes you think that what we think we observe is real? It is all just vibrations, atoms and empty space, after all. None of it is "real" in the sense that you believe it is. It is more like a dream world.

TexasScoundrel Joined Wed 10/29/08 Posts: 3693	Sat 10/27/12 09:04 PM
Dennett is an egomaniac blow hard who can not see beyond physical reality. He has a limited view of reality and he insists that his view is the only thing that exists. (talking about ROFLMFAO! ) That's because physical reality is all we can observe, measure and study. There is nothing else to talk about because there is nothing else. And what's not there doesn't need explaining, it's just not there. It's like string theory. It's unproven. All that can be said is that it's logically consistent within itself. String theory is fun and all, but you might as well talk about unicorns and dragons for all the good it'll do you. We know when something is correct when we can use it to accurately predict future events. The way Newton's laws are able to predict the movements of the planets or the way evolution predicted what DNA does long before there was anything like genetics. Until something "beyond physical reality" can be shown to exist there just isn't anything to talk about except coming up with a way to prove it's there.

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sun 10/28/12 12:27 PM Edited by Jeanniebean on Sun 10/28/12 12:32 PM
Dennett is an egomaniac blow hard who can not see beyond physical reality. He has a limited view of reality and he insists that his view is the only thing that exists. (talking about ROFLMFAO! ) That's because physical reality is all we can observe, measure and study. There is nothing else to talk about because there is nothing else. And what's not there doesn't need explaining, it's just not there. Thank you for exposing the box you are in. I understand perfectly where you are coming from and how enlightened you are not. You can't see beyond that box and neither can he. To you, anything else is woo woo land. It's like string theory. It's unproven. All that can be said is that it's logically consistent within itself. String theory is fun and all, but you might as well talk about unicorns and dragons for all the good it'll do you. We know when something is correct when we can use it to accurately predict future events. The way Newton's laws are able to predict the movements of the planets or the way evolution predicted what DNA does long before there was anything like genetics. Until something "beyond physical reality" can be shown to exist there just isn't anything to talk about except coming up with a way to prove it's there. And you are right. For YOU and Dennett, there IS NOTHING MORE TO TALK ABOUT. How can you possibly talk about something you can't even see or imagine? You are in a box. This subject of consciousness and the non existence of time are way over your head.

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sun 10/28/12 12:42 PM Edited by Jeanniebean on Sun 10/28/12 12:47 PM
Wikipedia: Critics of Dennett's approach, such as David Chalmers and Thomas Nagel, argue that Dennett's argument misses the point of the inquiry by merely redefining consciousness as an external property and ignoring the subjective aspect completely. This has led detractors to nickname the book Consciousness Ignored and Consciousness Explained Away. <---- Dennett and his eliminative materialist supporters, however, respond that the aforementioned "subjective aspect" of conscious minds is nonexistent, an unscientific remnant of commonsense "folk psychology," and that his alleged redefinition is the only coherent description of consciousness. However, John Searle argues that Dennett, who insists that discussing subjectivity is nonsense because it is unscientific and science presupposes objectivity, is making a category error. Searle argues that the goal of science is to establish and validate statements which are epistemically objective, (i.e., whose truth can be discovered and evaluated by any interested party), but are not necessarily ontologically objective. Searle calls any value judgment epistemically subjective. Thus, "McKinley is prettier than Everest" is epistemically subjective, whereas "McKinley is higher than Everest" is epistemically objective. In other words, the latter statement is evaluable (in fact, falsifiable) by an understood ('background') criterion for mountain height, like 'the summit is so many meters above sea level'. No such criteria exist for prettiness. Searle says that in Dennett's view, there is no consciousness in addition to the computational features, because that is all that consciousness amounts to for him: mere effects of a von Neumann(esque) virtual machine implemented in a parallel architecture and therefore implies that conscious states are illusory, but Searle points out: "where consciousness is concerned, the existence of the appearance is the reality."

FearandLoathing Joined Fri 12/28/07 Posts: 30121	Sun 10/28/12 02:25 PM
I always figured it was awareness...I'm not familiar with the topic though, does anyone have any decent free work available for me to read? I love learning.

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sun 10/28/12 02:58 PM
It would depend on what you want to learn. I prefer Peter Russel. Dennett is strictly objective and does not believe in subjective ideas about time and consciousness. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-d4ugppcRUE&feature=related

metalwing Joined Fri 11/14/08 Posts: 26218	Sun 10/28/12 05:31 PM
It never ends.

HotRodDeluxe Joined Sun 05/06/12 Posts: 2743	Sun 10/28/12 06:02 PM
Being 'strictly objective' is a negative? Wow! That's just......

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sun 10/28/12 06:49 PM
People locked inside of their objective prisons hate those who are not.

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sun 10/28/12 06:52 PM Edited by Jeanniebean on Sun 10/28/12 06:53 PM
TexasScoundrel said: "Until something "beyond physical reality" can be shown to exist there just isn't anything to talk about except coming up with a way to prove it's there." If you believe that Texas, prove to me that time is there... in physical reality. Show me that time exists. Where is it? What does it look like? How much does it weigh? What are its dimensions?