Thanks for the daily dose of mini-existential crisis.
[Internal Monologue] What the fuck am I? HOW IS BEING ALIVE POSSIBLE? WTF?!?
Comment on Me too.
atomicbocks@sh.itjust.works 1 day agoConsciousness is 100% an emergent property.
DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works 9 hours ago
SippyCup@feddit.nl 5 hours ago
You are a nervous system, piloting a space suit made of meat.
AnActOfCreation@programming.dev 21 hours ago
Can you explain what this means?
atomicbocks@sh.itjust.works 5 hours ago
Conscious (sentience / sapience) is an ineffable, unmeasurable, quality. There is no way to say that one sentient being is more or less sentient than another. In fact there is no way to tell that I am not the only consciousness in existence but it feels rude not to give others the benefit of the doubt. We can create neurons and even small brains in the lab but we don’t have any way to instill life into that neuron. Consciousness simply emerges out of the constituent parts of being alive, possibly even as a result of the interactions of such a complex system.
AnActOfCreation@programming.dev 1 hour ago
Thank you!
mnemonicmonkeys@sh.itjust.works 11 hours ago
There’s no biological structure the creates consciousness to the ppint where you can say “if you have x, you’re conscious”, to the point where saying “humans are conscious” or even “only humans are conscious” aren’t always true. Many elephants are conscious. Some dogs are consciohs. Some humans aren’t. And no, the split between humans are/aren’t conscious ARE NOT CORRELATED WITH DEMOGRAPHIC (fuck Nazis and racists), nor is it easy to draw a line in the sand because it’s a spectrum.
It comes from having a brain that’s complex enough. Decision making process start interacting together in unexpenced ways, with subtle variations caused by genetics and history. Literally just read the wikipedia page the previous person posted and apply that same logic to brains and minds.
AnActOfCreation@programming.dev 1 hour ago
Thank you!
TempermentalAnomaly@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I would be strongly emergent then. And strong emergence is basically magic.
derek@infosec.pub 22 hours ago
I don’t see how either sentence follows. Rephrasing your comment and supplementing it with context to explain your reasoning may better communicate your point.
TempermentalAnomaly@lemmy.world 19 hours ago
Weak emergence has qualities that arise from the fundamental features of the parts and the rules that connect them. For example, the shapes made by flocks of birds can be reduced to simple local interactions among the birds.
Strong emergence has qualities that cannot, even in principle, be reduced to the parts and their rules. These qualities are genuinely novel and bring powers that are not found in the constituents alone.
Strong emergence is like mixing two chemicals in a lab and, instead of producing a new compound, discovering an entirely new fundamental force of nature. Consciousness, in particular, seems to lack any physically grounded ontology. While this is a divisive claim, it is hardly original. Physicalists who appeal to weak emergence have not yet shown—nor may they ever be able to show—that consciousness is physically emergent. If strong emergence is to be taken seriously, it must be framed in a way that avoids looking like something from nothing, which would be indistinguishable from magic.
As of now, the physicalists have to demonstrate weak emergence. Failing that, we cannot dismiss strong emergence so that we don’t close the investigative and theory making space.
derek@infosec.pub 17 hours ago
That makes more sense. Thanks for the response! I’m not sure if can agree with your conclusions. It may be that I’m still missing context you’re working within. My best guess is you’re assume some axioms that I am not. That doesn’t necessarily mean I think you’re incorrect. We might just be operating with different frameworks.
I agree that strong emergemce and weak emergence seem different by your definitions. I’m not convinced strong emergemce is a thing. Is there a compelling argument that the perception of strong emergence is actually a more complex weak emergence that the observers have not fully understood?
Something something Occam’s Razor / god of the gaps something. I find these sorts of discussions quite compelling. Thanks again for engaging. :)
wols@lemmy.zip 18 hours ago
I can see what points you’re making, but it’s unclear what you’re arguing for. It would be helpful if you made that explicit, too.
My best guess is that you don’t think that consciousness is emergent. What then, do you consider the nature of consciousness to be? Are you perhaps agnostic on the matter?
I agree that strong emergence sounds like magic and I’m therefore highly sceptical of its existence. I find consciousness one of the most intriguing and mysterious phenomena we know of - I don’t really think I understand it to a degree where I can make confident claims about its nature. But dualism sounds like magic too, so weak emergence seems to me the most reasonable and likely mechanism, not least because it’s one we actually observe in reality.
Chakravanti@monero.town 20 hours ago
He’s not communicating. He’s bragging. Although in truth, he’s actually demonstrating because there’s no purpose in showing you his knowledge. That means he’s showing you what he understands and sees rather than explaining. Explaining is extensive and difficult because the many are blind even though they can read and don’t see their own lack of ability to see reality.
I can explain more deeply but I think I’m just going to go masterbate instead.
idiomaddict@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Like why Reubens are so good. I don’t like salty protein, bread with caraway seeds, thousand island dressing or Swiss cheese, but fuck is a Reuben delicious.
Fedizen@lemmy.world 22 hours ago
Reubens are the only beef food I used eat in my 20s.
idiomaddict@lemmy.world 18 hours ago
That’s why I said salty protein :) Swiss cheese is imo so unremarkable that the dairy free version is just as good, and a vegan Reuben is still a perfect sandwich.