Comment on Our understanding of reality might be a result of the way cousciousness works

• CannonFodder@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  A model is an understanding of how it works. It allows one to predict how things might react in different general cases, which can be very useful for innovation. You don’t need to try understand things if you don’t want to, but it’s a bit ignorant sounding.

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  • ageedizzle@piefed.ca ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    The way you’re discussing ‘models’ seems to assume two points: (1) that all useful models will be physical models, and (2) that we have models that work in this context. Neither of these assumptions are correct.

    For the first point, arguably the most popular model of consciousness we have at the moment is Integrated Information Theory (IIT). IIT is explicitly a panpsychist theory (all matter has some non-zero quantity of consciousness). This lends itself very well to non-physicalist interpretations (where consciousness is a fundamental constituent of the universe, irreducible to matter). 

    For the second point, all this discussion of models is largely besides the point. Because there is currently no model of conscious experience that works. No theory is widely accepted. And the theories that were once popular (global workspace theory and even IIT) seem to not the supported by evidence (proponents of these theories have tried to modify them to fit the data, but you can only do that so many times before things start to looks sketchy). So whether we use a model or not, it’s not really relevant to this discussion, because we currently have no scientific models of consciousness that work.

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  • AnDoLiN@lemmy.zip ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    A model is an understanding of how it works.

    “Models work because they help us make better models, and we know better models work because… they’re better models.”

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    • CannonFodder@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      I think maybe you misunderstand what a model is in this context. It’s any way of mapping observations to a theory of how things work. I would say a good model is one that can create useful testable predictions. This tests the accuracy of the model, and it also provides for innovation. You can have a model based on a random sky fairy magically doing stuff and writing a book about it. But that model is untestable, and useless.

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      • AnDoLiN@lemmy.zip ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

        Again, define useful/useless? To what end do you create these models?

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