Re: consciousness

>Lance wrote:
Paul <pgrieg@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> >What sort of structural defect could in principle
> >prevent our minds from understanding something?
>
> The structural defects of ant's mind means it can't understand Godel's
> theorem or even read the simplest Booker prize novel. So if an ant's
> mind can have such limitations, isn't it likely that ours has similar
> limitations? We evolved to chase antelope not to solve abstruse
> philosophical problems, so why should we expect to solve the mind-body
> problem?

By what criteria do you conclude that we can't? it is not even clear
precisely what the problem is with consciousness so saying we are not
equipped to understand it rather begs the question. Our minds are also
far more than being adapted to chase antelope, after all lions and
cheetahs do that too (as well we may instead have evolved initially to
scavenge on kills from the above rather than hunt actively). We have
clearly evolved the capacity for abstract reasoning, we have after all
developed quantum mechanics, string theory and a conception of the
universe involving distances our minds cannot have evolved to cope with.
By your analogy none of these problems should be amenable to our poor
grey matter, yet they are.

> >The problem of consciousness doesn't seem to be hard because it is huge.
>
> I agree, it's hard because we don't even have an idea about how to
> start to solve it. More science (brain scans) will not help because
> they will forever remain on the brain side. More introspection (or
> Buddhist meditation) will not help becuase it will always remain on the
> mind side.

So you combine the two, you have a system where informed philosophers
engage with the data and suggest theoretical frameworks for the
scientists to test. And we can do far more than brain scans. What about
Ramachandran's work with the focally brain damaged showing that
consciousness is not all or nothing, but modular? Like the man who could
see his left visual field but was not aware of it?

People will continue to have strokes, clinicians will continue to define
the lesion and document deficiencies. It will take time but using this
experimental system ,bolstered with accidents with bolt guns, you have
an ethical black box approach that has served to unlock the secrets of
kidneys, livers, guts, communities, and ecosystems. The information
gleaned from initial black box studies have enabled the unpicking of
these systems. They all evolved, so did brains, so if you want to posit
that brains are not amenable you have explain both what features brains
have that prevents it and at what stage they evolved.

As Dennett makes clear, our minds evolved, that means much of the why
will be forever in the realm of just so stories but the what should be
just as amenable as everything else.

At base it is clear that brain affects mind, if you doubt me come round
and I'll hire a bolt gun.

> >as Peter Ashby makes clear, researchers are chipping away at it hoping
> >that a gradual accumulation of small findings will gradually >make it
> >yield).
>
> I think carrying on with the brain scans is a good idea simply for the
> sake of understanding the brain. But how can you know you are chipping
> away at the right piece of marble?

By measuring the output. With a TMS helmet you can even target regions
for temporary stimulation or inhibition.

Peter

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