From: Case (Case@iSpots.com)
Date: Mon Nov 07 2005 - 03:18:13 GMT
Case said:
Beyond the attack ad hominem, this idea that consciousness evolves in fits
and starts is fundamentally flawed. It is far more likely that changes in
the ways cultures see the world are ratcheted forward by technology rather
than evolution. Inventions like astrology, the plowshare, the drainage
canal, animal husbandry or the development of a leisure class more than
account for the paradigm shifts we observe in history and as far as we can
tell in prehistory.
Scott:
Do they account for the evidence that the data has changed, about which
understandings of the world are formed?
[Case]
That is what a paradigm shift is; so yes they do.
Case said:
I believe it has been readily demonstrated that in addition to being
linguistic creatures human beings think, learn and respond in many ways that
are purely nonverbal, from jumping at the sound of thunder to orgasm. We
"just get feelings about things."
Furthermore to identify the totality of experience with language seems a bit
limiting especially if this is based on semiotics which appears to be a
theory designed to explain language. The Saussurean model doesn't even need
to bother with referents since languages can be developed to talk about
nothing at all.
However, language is not even the only way we communicate.
There is a whole set of unconscious nonverbal behaviors that take place
between mothers and their infants. Both seem to be genetically programmed as
partners in a dance.
Humans are as easily conditioned as dogs in a Pavlovian sense.
In normal face to face conversations much, if not most, of the actual
information conveyed is not verbal.
Scott:
I again made the mistake of using the word 'language', rather than
'semiosis', since obviously there is more to reality than English, French,
Chinese, and so on. What I am saying is that every thing/event is a sign.
It exists *because* it is a sign. Here I am working from the semiotics of
Peirce (together with an important observation of Barfield's -- see below),
rather than Saussure.
[Case]
Even adding the referent this is still a theory of language not of
consciousness nor even communication. Nor do I see how it is relevant to the
behavioral examples I listed.
Scott;
Put in MOQ-speak, it is that a static pattern of value is a pattern because
it repeats. An event in a pattern is an event only because it takes part in
a pattern. Hence we jump at the sound of thunder, because there is a
biological SPOV that the sound takes part in. That sound acts in the same
way that a word acts in a sentence. It is a sign. It signifies the concept:
be alert when hearing a loud noise because there might be danger, though of
course the body does not need this English translation.
[Case]
Ones reaction to thunder has nothing to do with signs or referents or points
of view. This startle response requires no previous experience to elicit. It
is more akin to the knee jerk reflex. It is in no way similar to a word in a
sentence. None of that processing is required in the response. Translation
of any kind may be fun post hoc but that's about all.
The same holds true of classical conditioning. It is not linguistically or
conceptually mediated except after the fact and not usually or even
necessarily then.
Same with mother-infant interactions.
I submit that very little behavior is linguistically mediated. Try driving
to work in full tilt conceptual analytical mode. You'll be lucky to get the
keys in the car.
Signs, signifiers and referents are part of the post game show not the
leading edge of experience.
[Scott]
Now on to the (in your view) weird stuff. In another post you explain the
development of intelligence as the expanding of the scope of temporal
buffers. This makes a lot of sense, but leaves out one thing: in a strictly
spatio-temporal world, how can there be a temporal buffer? To hear a single
note in a melody requires that several hundred alternations in air pressure
be smoothed out into a tone. How does this smoothing out happen?
[Case]
There is an extensive literature on how memory is processed. I was talking
primarily about biological temporal buffering but mentioned genetics,
memory, language and writing. The list could go on. Memory, in one form or
another, is precisely the vehicle that removes us from the spactio-temporal.
It provides a degree of random access. This makes us other than
spacio-temporal creatures. The smoothing occurs because that's what buffers
do.
[Scott]
Barfield starts "Saving the Appearances" with the observation that we all
know that that which we experience (the contents of sense perception:
colors, shapes, etc.) are not at all like the entities that physics tells us
exist in the absence of perception, that is, quantum wave/particles. One can
also observe that what makes quantum physics weird is not that it is
paradoxical (there are no paradoxes in the mathematics that is used to
formulate it) but that what is formulated cannot be pictured. Now what is
picturable is the spatio-temporal. Quantum physics tells us of entities that
cannot be fit into a strictly spatio-temporal structure. From this we should
conclude that spatio-temporal structure is a product of perception, while
what feeds into perception is not spatio-temporal. In short, the familiar
macroscopic world's structure is the product of perception, and exists only
when perceived. We know this, remarks Barfield, but then we immediately
forget it when we ask "where does consciousness come from". We forget it
when we assume that consciousness is a byproduct of the brain's
spatio-temporal activity. In doing that, we are attempting to explain
consciousness with the products of consciousness (which Steiner refers to as
being like Baron Munchhausen saying that he lifted himself off the ground by
pulling on his hair).
[Case]
It seems to me that quantum physics confirms what we see in Macroworld: That
is there is plenty of uncertainty, so chose your metaphors carefully because
anything can happen.
I see no connection between quantum physics and perception in what you have
said other than that you say they are connected. I do see that by our nature
we access our senses sequentially and memory only fudges the problem by
allowing us to randomly access the past sequentially. The fact that we
experience things sequentially does not make them sequential
I see that our conceptions are shaped by our perceptions but whether the
spatio-temporal exists when we perceive it or not, has little to do with
whether it continues to exist when we don't. What's more we don't even have
to be conscious for all of this interaction to take place. Besides, I was
not aware that physicists had settled on the number of dimensions so I don't
see how any of this is relevant.
But all of that aside for a second, are you or Barfield suggesting that
human consciousness is not dependant on brain activity of any kind?
[Scott]
What this implies is that the contents of sense perception are signs of the
non-spatio-temporal reality we know (partially) as the quantum world, just
as the physical (spatio-temporal) sounds and figures we call speech and
writing are signs of concepts, which are also non-spatio-temporal -- which
are, I would say, the temporal buffers you refer to. The amoeba reacts to
vinegar, not because there is a mechanical series of chemical reactions, but
because there is a non-spatio-temporal "amoebic intellect/consciousness",
which we call instinct, and which includes the habit (the temporal buffer,
the concept, the SPOV) of moving away in this situation. (Note: this last
sentence is speculative -- it is a possible redescription, made possible
once one has overcome the Munchhausen fallacy.)
[Case]
While signs and concepts may help us communicate with others or to solve
problems they are a hindrance when the actual living needs to be done. They
guide us into the future by pointing to the past. Their main value is gives
us a static edge against the dynamic future.
Since the amoeba's behavior can be entirely explained as a series of
chemical reactions. It hard to see what "amoebic intellect/consciousness"
adds to our understanding. Once again there is no habit involved. There is
not even the possibility of habit forming in a amoeba.
[Scott]
Anyway, that's the basis of what you call weirdness, and I would appreciate
if these arguments were addressed rather than simply dismissed as 'weird'
and 'nutty'. And in this vein I would like to add one thing. In another post
there was this exchange.
[Case]
It is just a matter of personal taste I suppose but I would rather hear you
trashing Wolfram than praising some obscure dude whose work is out of print.
Excuse me.
[Mike]
The second, closely related, point of disagreement lies in your (Scott's)
claim that "to say of some process that it is intelligent is meaningless
unless there is value involved, and to say there is value involved is
meaningless unless there is awareness involved, and a process that involves
choosing among possibilities based on estimating consequences."
[Case]
There is a house of cards waiting for a gentle breeze.
Scott:
Could you waft that breeze my way so I can see what is so fragile about my
house of cards?
[Case]
You are piling infinitives on top of prepositional phrases pasted together
with conjunctions to threaten us with meaninglessness if we underestimate
the consequences of random possibilities. With that kind of logic you could
convince someone that they think like a tree. Oh wait...
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