Philosophy Now Forum

Ginkgo wrote: ↑Thu Oct 26, 2017 2:27 am

GreatandWiseTrixie wrote: ↑Thu Oct 26, 2017 1:56 am

Ginkgo wrote: ↑Thu Oct 26, 2017 1:47 am


Dennett is a philosopher not a scientist. Nonetheless, Dennett is just saying what science has known for a long time.

So science can map, where consciousness is, in the brain?

Yes, ever since the advent of the MIR machine.

That is untrue. MRI (I think that the MIR was a Russian space station, or such) scans indicate brain activity. MRI scans can show brain activity in rats, or any critter with a brain large enough to scan. (Can't work with flies, lice, cockroaches.) Unless you have determined that any critter exhibiting brain activity is necessarily self-aware (e.g. your neighbor's stupid dog barking at the full moon last midnight or at something equally unimportant) brain activity is not an indicator of consciousness. As this and every other forum has shown, it is not even proof of intelligence.

GreatandWiseTrixie wrote: ↑Sun Oct 22, 2017 6:39 am Ok so the sad thing is, people get old, the older they get the uglier they get, meat-eaters make themselves look ugly with all the meaty testosterone.

Now whats interesting about this, is the spiritual connections. Isn't it strange that As the brain gets older, we lose passion and interest in life? Like think about it like this...The more you do an activity, the more memory you have being overrun by the activity, and you get sick of the activity. Like if you eat spaghetti every day, you will Lose interest in Spaghetti. And isn't it weird how the "you" (your spiritual consciousness) loses interest When the brain's memory patterns start to pile up? Like as if you are a critic of your own brain, saying "Hmm this brain is getting boring, I want a new one or a reset."

I think Dualism is real because, We are literally sitting inside 1 sense, the First Person Camera of our bodies. But touch and music is an entirely different sense that we are sitting around. There could be 500 senses, totally unfathomable. It's n-dimensional, incomprehensible until it is comprehended. Like our souls are compatible with these things, maybe.

So I think Dualism is real because, Our brain is a network of neurons. And yet all of these neurons are condensed into 1 thing, Us. Thus we cannot be the network of neurons, because there are millions of neurons, but only 1 us, therefore we are an Entity which is not our neurons.

Also, I have no idea and not sure if the brain has an actual "Spot" in the brain where the neurons come into the Exact configuration that our eyes receive, ie. a "Tv screen" of the conscious mind. I remember Daniel Dennett saying that the "TV screen" existed, but I am not sure. I can't find it on google. This piece of information is crucial to the discussion.

But I have a brand new thing no philosopher has ever thought of before. What if Reality is a total mess, total chaos, and its our Consciousness which gives order to space. Like the actual molecules are like wound up and random all over, and our neurons are seeing them all over just random scattered everywhere like viscious vines. But our Consciousness travels the random nuerons, picks and weeds them out and forms a picture of ordered space and ordered sense. ? Anyone thought of this before?

Dear GWT, a.k.a. Trixie,
A few comments for old times' sake.

First off, there is a relationship between physiology and best diet. My father was a butcher, and I'm descended from a long (therefore successful) line of German horse thieves. For me, meat works, veggies except for onions, garlic, and chili peppers pretty much suck. You might want to check out the old book, Eat Right 4 Your Type.

I happen to be old and ugly, but is that a dietary thing? I was ugly at age 17 when I didn't own an ounce of fat and could lift my own weight overhead. I was ugly at age 40 when I could bench press my weight + 20, but had to go to Thailand to find a mousey, unattractive wife for the next 3 years. That's genetics and biological structure, not diet. Friends ten years younger than me appear to be my age or somewhat older.

BTW, I tried a vegetarian diet for six months. No energy. Lost weight and muscle tone, despite frequent gym work. (The best looking guy in that gym was a strict vegetarian. Diet must match genetics.)

Years ago I had a Cherokee ladyfriend, who had suffered her entire life from gut pains, typically after eating. I put her on a diet of fish and fowl (her genetics had been contaminated by a gringo rapist in back history, so she could not eat red meat) and she thrived. The gut pain stopped, until she found a sexier boyfriend and cooked according to his needs.

Within any system of complex variables, there are no absolutes. I also had a ladyfriend who never let a piece of critter pass her lips. After a few breakfasts of stewed turnips, carrots, and some potato, (in lieu of my customary bacon and eggs) she complained that I had begun to stink. The diet that is perfect for you is not necessarily right for others. Check your blood type. It is certainly NOT Type O; I'd guess, AB.

Whatever your culinary preferences, they are no matter, so long as your mind remains alive, curious, and imaginative.

I think that your notion of "our consciousness traveling the web of random neurons," sorting them into a coherent picture of reality, is inherently unique. I've encountered other versions of related concepts, which pretty much suck, and were also unique in their own right.

Step back a bit from your concept. Accept that it is unique, and honor your mind for having developed it. Shit, you can count on the fingers of one hand the number of posters on this forum who have proposed a genuinely unique concept, while one of those fingers is busy fishing boogers out of its nearside nostril. So, good job! You have developed a concept which to the best of mine and others' knowledge is unique.

But don't screw up your shoulder joints patting yourself on the back.

Unique is not a synonym for true, valid, or worthwhile. I've spent a lifetime developing unique stuff, and doing so has paid the bills. Yet 90% of my unique ideas are worthless bullshit. Over time I've learned that the only way to check out the value of an idea is to develop it and see where it takes you. Laud your success only when you reach that destination.

GL

Here are some thoughts about the TV Screen of the Conscious Mind that you talked about.

We do not See things in the external World, but rather we Detect things by using internal Conscious processes that we are born with. We all have a personal Conscious Light Screen (CLS) that we use to detect what is happening in the external World. If we try to describe where this CLS is located it seems to be embedded in the front of our faces in some way. The CLS is vaguely horizontally rectangular with ambiguous edges that are hard to locate exactly. The screen seems to just fade into nonexistence at the borders. But wherever you look, that screen is there showing you with Conscious Light what is in the scene you are looking at.

To understand this better close your eyes and observe what you See. At first there may be various After Images that represent remnants of what you were looking at, but eventually these fade away. What is left is not totally black. Note that you might have to put your hand over your eyes if you are in a bright place in order to cut off external Light from leaking through your eyelids. Most people will notice a background that has a vague grainy noise almost like the video snow noise that used to appear on old analog TVs. Let's call this Conscious Light Noise (CLN). It is due to random Retinal and Cortical firings. CLN really is the background noise in your Visual detection system. Most people easily perceive that this CLN, and possible After Images, are close to the front of their faces. If you move your head around you will See the CLN, and After Images, move around with your head to keep them in front of your face. If you move your eyes up, down, left, or right, the CLN and After Images will seem to be displaced a little in those directions but will still basically be located in front of your face. It is interesting to note that After Images will always look close even if the scene element that caused the After Image is far away. Now you know where your CLS is located.

When you open your eyes the scene that you are looking at is painted onto your CLS and it is harder to perceive that the Conscious Light making up the image is still close to your face. Your Visual system tries to give you the illusion that there are things that are far away and things that are close. If you look through only one eye the depth illusion is less pronounced. But the Conscious Light that the scene is painted with is actually still located close to your face and is at the same distance as the CLN. The illusion of distance is absolutely necessary for moving around in the World.

It should be mentioned that the things and scenes you See while Dreaming are also painted onto your CLS. The CLS is a general purpose Visual Display Device for all Conscious beings, whether Human or Animal. We walk around all day long looking at our CLSs which are embedded in the front of our faces. We cannot See the CLSs of other people but if we could it would be as if everyone was wearing Virtual Reality goggles. But instead of goggles it would be Conscious Light Screens. We think we are Seeing the external World directly but we (our Conscious Minds) are always just looking (in some Conscious way) at our own CLSs.