Re: Stop It!!


Mike Vandeman wrote:
> On 4 Dec 2005 03:33:58 -0800, pbowles@xxxxxxx wrote:
>
> .
> .Mike Vandeman wrote:
> .> On 27 Nov 2005 19:58:26 -0800, pbowles@xxxxxxx wrote:
> .>
> .> .
> .> .pbowles@xxxxxxx wrote:
> .> .> Mike Vandeman wrote:
> .> .> > On 26 Nov 2005 21:55:55 -0800, pbowles@xxxxxxx wrote:
> .> .> >
> .> .> > .Ecosystems are comprised of communities;
> .> .> >
> .> .> > BS. They are comprised of INDIVIDUALS.
> .> .>
> .> .> Ecosystems are large-scale associations. A group of individuals is
> .> .> called a population. A group of populations of different species is
> .> .> called a community. A group of communities is called an ecosystem.
> .> .> Gosh, you're really getting an education in the basics of first year
> .> .> ecology here, aren't you?
> .> .
> .> .And on that subject, on further reflection I see why it is you're
> .> .struggling with this idea. You're missing a fundamental principle, at
> .> .least as it relates to ecology. Are you familiar with the idea of
> .> .emergent properties? That is, characteristics that spontaneously emerge
> .> .from a combination of individual components lacking those
> .> .characteristics? Consciousness as an emergent property of particular
> .> .arrangements of neurons is a popular example.
> .>
> .> No, it isn't. It's either there or not, like heat or mass.
> .
> .Both heat and mass are variable, and both are products of atomic and
> .molecular processes - the motion of particles in the case of heat. The
> .source of mass is unclear, but particle physicists invariably believe
> .there is it one. it doesn't just magically exist, and nor does
> .consciousness. Neuronal damage can impair functions of consciousness,
> .such as causing people to become unaware that their limbs belong to
> .them, and consciousness itself exhibits evolutionary development from
> .apparently wholly unaware animals
>
> What's an "apparently wholly unaware animal"? Even single-celled organisms are
> aware.

"Aware" in the sense that it can conceive of its environment and/or
itself through some sort of mental state, not simply that it has the
ability to respond to sensory stimuli which, certainly, all animals do
- in fact it's one of the characteristics traditionally used to define
life itself. But by such measures as an ability to associate external
stimuli with pain or the ability to exhibit emotion, frogs appear to be
"wholly unaware" based on experimental results. Certainly as they lack
these elements of consciousness, the phenomenon must represent a
gradual evolutionary development rather than something that came
fully-packaged - different parts of it developed at different times.
Certainly brain structures known to be associated with consciousness
have evolved at different times - our emotional centre first evolved in
the reptiles (and is therefore often referred to as "the reptilian
brain"), while the neocortex, associated with processing and retaining
memories, is unique to mammals. This ultimately implies that at one
time there could well have been animals with no elements of
consciousness at all.

See Donald Griffin's _Animal Thinking_.

I've heard of it. Wasn't he the one who speculated that all animals may
be conscious because consciousness is the most efficient way to process
information? Also, if I'm right, he was writing that some forty years
ago, long before neuroscience came of age and began investigating the
link between conscious awareness and different parts of the brain.

> . to those able to feel pain, to those
> .that exhibit differing levels of awareness of others and their
> .intentions, to chimps and humans which exhibit self-awareness. Lower
> .levels of consciousness are associated with species and groups with
> .fewer neurons than those exhibiting higher levels..
>
> I don't think you know much about what various species are aware of.

I'm not a neuroscientist. But I do know that other people have studied
it in depth and have carried out experiments with the results I
describe, as well as studying the effects of damage to parts of human
brains on the level of consciousness patients exhibit. If the cause of
trying to investigate what animals are aware of is really so hopeless,
however, it's no more credible to claim that all animals are aware and
to what extent than it is to claim that none or a proportion of them
are.

> .But you apparently
> .> love to believe & defend the standard explanations of things, however absurd.
> .
> .Is it really more absurd to believe that consciousness is the natural
> .product of interactions between specialised cells than that it simply
> .exists without some cause?
>
> I assume that the same laws of physics apply to living things & nonliving
> things, making consciousness not something restricted to "higher organisms", any
> more than chemical processes are restricted to living things.

Yet certain chemicals are restricted to particular living things and in
particular certain brain structures and their attendant neurons are
found only in particular organisms. You accept, I presume, that
consciousness is confined to living organisms, and is absent from
stars, volcanoes and so forth? If so, in some way it must have evolved
during the development of life, and why must that have been at the
start? Most people who attribute consciousness to animals don't
attribute it to fungi, plants or bacteria, so we're further restricting
it to the development of animal life. Again, why start at the beginning
of that lineage? What's special about it? Let's take it a step further
still - consciousness seems to require a brain. That discounts
single-celled organisms, sponges, jellyfish, corals, anemones, worms,
most molluscs and apparently echinoderms (which lost their brains
during the course of their evolution). Once we get to this stage, is it
really hard to credit the notion that brains with different structures
and complexities may exhibit no consciousness at all or different
levels of consciousness and that instead consciousness evolved
gradually some way down the line?

Evolution has seen countless innovations in organs, in brain structure,
size and development, and indeed in the structure and development of
other tissues. Why should consciousness be something excluded from this
process, some fundamental law of nature that was there all along rather
than a product of the evolutionary process that has shaped every other
aspect of living things?

Philip Bowles

.

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