David Chalmers - What Things are Conscious?

[@clownworld-honk410]

I'm watching this guy and I'm searching for a drum kit in the background!😊

[@NeilNicholls-Knight]

My thoughts immediately turned to NWOBHM legends Saxon.

[@sungam69]

It's in his mind.

[@mialotusmusic]

Same 😂😊

[@dplouro]

He is the lead singer of the band Zombie Blues.

[@parthbartakke7988]

😂😂😂😂😂😂

[@woofie8647]

What Chalmers is saying is that knowing what nerves are firing does not "explain" consciousness. The question is "how" those firing neurons create consciousness, if they indeed do. The current technology only shows what parts of the brain are involved. It is similar to our theories of gravity: the mathematics that "describe" gravity do not tell us how it works. There is something mysterious here that scientists cannot explain with the descriptions and mathematics they currently use. There is something deeper we may not be able to understand.

[@declup]

What might the nature of that something deeper be? Also, I'm a bit confused: if there's some explanation other than nerve firings, why do nerves fire at all? Couldn't human beings be conscious and sentient with a second stomach rather than a brain if the brain isn't the mysterious cause of consciousness and sentience?

[@brianlebreton7011]

Well summarized

[@woofie8647]

⁠@@declupNo one knows what that something deeper might be. There is a quote from Haldane, “The Universe is not only queerer than we suppose, it’s queerer than we CAN suppose”. There are many theories of consciousness out there, so you may want to check them out. Some are pretty “queer”, but the fact is with all the great minds working on this problem no one, right now, has the answer. “Why do nerves fire?” Is the same as asking how firing nerves cause consciousness, and no one has a clue. I suspect, as Haldane said about the universe, (and after all, we are a part of the universe), the answer is queerer than we can suppose.

[@declup]

​​​​@@woofie8647 -- Are there any explanations you might discount? For example, magic or consciousness as a holographic projection of some higher-dimensional being's own consciousness? That is, invoking mystery as the explanation for consciousness may be an aesthetically appealing position, but it's not very practical. If mystical and unknowable things are what propel physical existence, what should people do to learn more about them? And how can people come to any agreement about what they are? For example, I could assert that tiny spectral elves use brain tissue as a cobbler shop and that consciousness is nothing more than their daily production of transcendental shoes. Others might ask that I justify my claim, and I could do so by pointing to the mysterious nature of the universe. Why can't we understand the cobblerdom of human consciousness? The universe is too queer for us ever to understand.

[@RedRabbleRouser]

@@declup It’s not that there is (or needs to be) another explanation for what *causes* consciousness, it’s that even if “nerves firing” is the proximate cause of a given conscious state, it doesn’t tell us anything about the effect - I.e. the nature of consciousness itself. Something can cause something else, but understanding that cause doesn’t in and of itself explain the nature of the effect. If I blow out a candle and a puff of smoke spirals up from the wick, my blowing out the candle is the cause of the smoke, but tells us nothing about what the smoke actually is.

[@ervinperetz5973]

David Chalmers is one of the few cognitive scientists that is honest about the deep mystery of conscious experience (the 'Hard Problem' as he calls it).

[@hubertkorzeniak5549]

Because he is a philosopher. Common scientists are very narrow-minded in my opinion. They usually don't want to think deeply, they prefer only "doing" science and dismiss philosophy

[@birdstrikes]

"I love dream theater." - Chalmers

[@kevinfisher466]

everyone heard that. so shutup because we dont need you to type it out Goof

[@tomappletree8086]

Till this video I only read some books from Chalmers, but I didn't know how incredibly cool, authentic and honest this guy is!

[@ryanbourgo4660]

I think we need to differentiate between consciousness and the experience within consciousness. When I’m drunk, I could argue that while my experience changes, my consciousness does not…I am just conscious of a different type of experience. Even in death, it would be impossible to differentiate between unconscious and “conscious of nothing.”

[@maximusolivia9982]

Ahhh yes but what about hallucinogens?

[@Drunk.Casperr]

​@@maximusolivia9982gets trickier

[@michaelschmichael3973]

You may not feel a difference in ( the quality or quantity ) of consciousness when you’re drunk, but believe me- anyone who witnesses you being drunk can tell the difference

[@ryanbourgo4660]

@@michaelschmichael3973 no, you’re conflating consciousness with the quality of consciousness. Consciousness and how the consciousness feels/what you experience are not the same. If I am conscious, it means I am having experience, regardless of what that experience feels like. Hence, as I said, in death it would be impossible to differentiate between unconscious and “conscious of nothing.”

[@MeditativeHandle]

I once randomly clicked on an article on secret NYC things and noticed one that looked interesting. It was an old clock with a red capped elf on top. It was so old that I briefly wondered if I had ever passed it and if it still worked. A few weeks later, I was headed downtown with an acquaintance and suddenly noticed the clock on the street above us. I stopped and said Hey, I saw this clock on a list on NYC sights! My friend asked if it still worked and I said no, I don't think it works anymore. It's like a hundred years old. The parts are wooden. It probably doesn't even ring. At that very moment, the clock rang. It wasn't even on the hour. Everyone nearby stopped at that sound lol.

[@elenaortizsolalinde4204]

I share the idea of a dual, simultaneous, and/or synchronous brain function. As a radiologist, we study the brain morphologically and functionally using different methods of physics: X-rays (RX), CT scans, PET CT, ultrasound (US), MRI, functional MRI (fMRI), and magnetoencephalography (MEG), among others. I understand that two different physical phenomena can coexist at the same time with distinct functions. Personally, I study the integration of consciousness as a possible second system alternative to the well-known brain-neuronal system. The “conscious moment” formulates the theory that integrates as a type of electromagnetic field that is produced secondarily to the specific neuronal function of certain anatomical brain areas (specific areas of the hypothalamus, midbrain, and cerebral cortex). I find it very coherent to explore the possibilities posed by David Chalmers and the Nobel Prize winner in physics Roger Penrose. The latter suggests that the conscious moment is not explained by computational physics and would be better explained as a quantum-like phenomenon.

[@frankjspencejr]

But while I can theoretically observe the physical correlates of consciousness, I can never observe consciousness itself except in myself. It is a first person phenomenon. And since I know absolutely that first person consciousness is real, physicalism and physical measurement fail to capture the most definite aspect of reality. Keep in mind that all of the physical stuff is contingent upon consciousness and appears within consciousness as images, sounds, and thoughts. Somehow, it seems more and more likely to me, consciousness creates (perhaps the illusion of) a very convincing physical reality. Scary, but logical.

[@speedbird3955]

Being human is exponentially more complex than we can comprehend. The more we know the more we know we don't know

[@HeavyMetal45]

Amazing isn’t it? And the smaller we go into the material world, measurement breaks down at 10^-33 meters. Take that further, space time breaks down, so no space time is not fundamental, only consciousness.

[@maximusolivia9982]

@@HeavyMetal45thanks now I won’t sleep tonight.

[@HeavyMetal45]

@@sokunine so?

[@HeavyMetal45]

@@sokunine it’s still fundamental, you can’t deny that it doesn’t exist. Idk if it exists for you but it definitely exists for me :)

[@HeavyMetal45]

@@sokunine look into Donald Hoffmanns work regarding consciousness, he’s definitely onto something.

[@Josh-mu7qy]

This dude's eye contact makes me think he is definitely 100% human for sure.

[@brunoheggli2888]

I think hes german,in german culture you learn to make eyecontact when you speak with someone!

[@lawrenceoffiong1829]

I like to think that consciousness exists on a spectrum. An atom and a human experience the universe in vastly different ways due to their physical makeup. Perhaps the fundamental spark of awareness, could be present to some degree in even the most basic units of matter.

[@DoomSlayer-6660]

Love Dave’s metal look from back in the day

[@cujimmy1366]

David lee Roth. LOL

[@OutHereOnTheFlats]

@@cujimmy1366 What is DLR doing here....😀

[@MikeWiest]

Dave Mustaine!

[@wutangclaney]

When I watch Chalmers speak, I can’t help but ponder if consciousness goes to 11.

[@FrancoisMouton-iu7jt]

There is a principle in Alchemy called enantiodromia, if anything is taken to it's extreme it turns into it's opposite. This turning to a materialist explanation for everything will eventually flip into a spiritual understanding of everything thus doing away with duality.

[@squamish4244]

Exactly. Even Freud conceded that if nothing is spirit, everything is. Buddhism is well aware of this philosophical dynamic. Tibetan lama Chogyam Trungpa wrote, "Technically, there's no such thing as spirituality." And those people consider reincarnation, psychic abilities etc. a given.

[@martinwilliams9866]

I'm for a panprotopsychic approach at the moment & think that physicality, causality, responsiveness is the fundamental property of consciousness, which is meta-responsiveness. Even the intermediaries between the so-called external world & consciousness, the senses, are selectively responsive. The system of greatest responsiveness is the Glial network, which utilises the transverse Hall effect. I think Glials acting on neurons is voluntary attention & neurons acting on Glials is involentary attention.

[@porkylongpig5282]

Fun Fact: Chalmers was offered a role in the coming remake of This Is Spinal Tap.

[@jareknowak8712]

Chalmers goes to 11.

[@minimal3734]

How many decades ago was this interview?

[@mickmullins4257]

Could listen to this bloke all day.I understood almost all of it!

[@cameronmckenzie7049]

Chalmers will hold on till the end. Love your work RLKuhn, i love how the biggest investigator on the topic is a physicalist. I reckon that says something

[@noumenon6923]

Consciousness is the most immediate phenomena possible. Correlation doesn't apodictically imply causation.

[@medhurstt]

A better analogy to use on David is that a current flowing in a conductor produces an electric field. The electric field emerges from the direct action of that flowing current. In the same way we can say consciousness emerges from a running neural network. However it can never be proven to be causal in the same way a flowing current can never be 100% proven to be causal on that electric field emerging. But at some point you just need to accept it and move on. And then you might want to somehow measure consciousness or detect it. But as an emergent property, does it have to be measurable or detectable externally? What if its something that simply cant be measured? Where does that leave us? David and his views are popular because many people want consciousness to be eternal.

[@elenaortizsolalinde4204]

Me parece excelente la explicación de una función cerebral dual. Y como médico radiólogo comprendo que pueden haber dos fenómenos físicos al mismo tiempo. Y yo si creo que la consciencia se comporta como un fenómeno de tipo electromagnético que se produce en forma alterna. Como resultado secundario de las funciones de ciertas partes específicas de la conducción neuronal.

[@frankjspencejr]

The difference being that you can observe the conductor, and you can observe an electric field. They are both defined by observation, third person observation. Whereas with consciousness, you only observe the neural network, you never see the consciousness. It is not observable from the third person perspective. There are no apt analogies for consciousness within the physical world.

[@medhurstt]

@@frankjspencejr It is not observable from the third person perspective. Not everything is observable directly. Nobody ever observed the, ice age for example. But we can see evidence of the ice age's previous existence. Consciousness is observable through the proxy of a simple question. Are you conscious? People answer yes. The question becomes what to make of a machine that might be conscious, also answering yes.

[@frankjspencejr]

But of course, the ice age is defined by the physical findings, by the observations. Whereas when you describe the neural correlates of consciousness, do you feel like you have actually captured all there is about consciousness or is something still missing? And are you saying that if a machine said they were conscious then you would accept that as a fact without question?

[@medhurstt]

@@frankjspencejr If we accept we cant measure consciousness then the next best thing is to understand what creates consciousness. If we allow ourselves to postulate panpsychism or similar, then we shut off that possibility and ignore what we do know which is consciousness is tied to brain activity. As I said, many people want that to be true because they want some part of them to go on for eternity and to be with their loved ones after death. If a machine running a neural network was asked whether it was consciousness, and it said yes, how would you know whether it was or wasn't? My opinion is that while the neural network is running it just could be experiencing consciousness but it probably wouldn't be anything like what we experience. We only know human consciousness.

[@golagaz]

David is the rock star of Mind, Brain, and Consciousness :)

[@SandipChitale]

Note that even to internally recognize that one is conscious and self-aware requires a physically, normally working brain. We all know that perturbing the brain can make us lose partial or full consciousness and self-awareness. In other words subsystems of class S1 (say!) of the brain generates the conscious phenomenon, be it perception of color or self awareness, and subsystem S2 of the brain monitors S1 and recognizes/classifies the conscious phenomenon. If S2 is disturbed, it fails to do its function of recognizing the conscious phenomenon generated by S1. Of course this is a description at an abstract level. We know the workings of S1 like systems quite well. We know we can perturb systems like S2 to knock off the consciousness awareness. Brain injury, alcohol, drugs like LSD and DMT and anesthesia do this all the time (permanently or temporarily) and there is no controversy about that. And we may not fully know yet how precisely S2 like subsystems work and scientists are working on it. Neuroscience is still ongoing and of course difficult problems are likely to be solved last. People should not talk as if Neuroscience is a finished project. When people are discussing these heavy and heady topics, it is almost required that their brain is functioning normally, and thus it becomes a blind spot in plain sight to realize the above aspect. Try having the awareness of self-awareness under general anesthesia. And please do not bring out the bogus argument that brain is a receiver blah blah. "What is it like to be a bat?" is kind of cute and all, but it can be simply phrased as "What is it for conscious entity A to be like conscious entity B?". If you logically and precisely think about it, then the answer is that "not 100% possible". Because most likely those two entities do not have the same representation in their brains of things due to physiology, location in space, history of life experiences, abilities, intelligence, perception. In other words it is a red herring, just like the cute black-and-white room in Mary's experiment proposed by Frank Jackson is. In some sense any new experience one has, is different by definition - that it is a new experience. For example, testing an extremely sour fruit like tamarind first time is different than only having tasted slightly sour orange until that time. So appeal to "black-and-white" room is a red herring. A new experience generates a new neural pattern that is distinct enough that it is discernible by ones brain, which BTW depends on that brains abilities. Good musicians can discern between two subtly different note, sure. Just to be complete, Franck Jackson has now disavowed the original inference of his Mary's room experiment. But people like Philip Goff still trot it out, playing willfully ignorant. I think eventually we are going to find that we will need to rethink the demand of the explanation of consciousness. It will require a conceptual shift to something along the line para 2 above.

[@steve_____K307]

Can I ask, do you think that when the computer s/w algorithms fail to function properly -- when we intentionally disrupt the computer h/w -- is then proof that the computer s/w is just the h/w? Of course not. Can I ask, do you think that a malfunctioning person by way of disrupting the brain (with LSD, or whatever) is somehow proof that conscientiousness is just the brain? If the brain and mind are distinct aspects of reality, yet dependent on one another, and neither causing the other, then would your proposed example make any sense? The computer h/w vs computer s/w, is maybe a useful analogy. The computer h/w, no matter how ordered and complex, will never cause s/w to emerge. The h/w is meaningless without the arrival (not to be confused with emergence) of s/w. And the s/w, without the appropriate h/w, is pointless. And yes, inject failures in the h/w and don’t be surprised if the system gives diminished s/w behavior.

[@SandipChitale]

@@steve_____K307 I think based on your other reply, looks like you are a computer professional like me. We can talk shop :) In the end I do think software is instructions (stored as physical dots on HD or gate states in SSD), which are loaded into the hardware and make the hardware change its states. That is what is the execution of the program is. And yes if hardware is disrupted it may interrupt the ability to execute the loaded instructions and then we call that program failed. Software is our convenient way to talk about hardware stored instructions. What a particular program does and its meaning, spreadsheet number crunching vs image processing vs chat - the software and hardware do not understand its meaning. We impose the meaning on what the program does. Hardware is programmable, and software simply is a mechanism to make the programmed h/w do things. But in the end the code actually runs as a modification of the state of the hardware. And sure a badly written program for example a while(true) loop may make CPU heat up and eventually fail due to heat. But that is because the electrons are racing thru the transistors/gates in the CPU very fast generating heat. That is why we need cooling when the gaming computers hires graphics. Human body is programmable in terms of walking, jumping, running, squatting. The Brain is making the body (legs) do different things, it does not mean that walking is a separate thing from the brain or body. Think of digestion and stomach, when you think of consciousness and brain. Brain is the organ for conscious processes among many other things. I do not think there is anything other than the dynamic electrochemistry of the brain and it's state in terms of historical connections in the neurons and in my example sub-systems of type S2 in working condition is what we call consciousness. "malfunctioning person by way of disrupting the brain (with LSD, or whatever) is somehow proof that conscientiousness is just the brain" yes to that because when the drug effect recedes the functions of S2 subsystem comes back. And if the damage is severe and permanent, specific function of the consciousness can never come back with today's technology. Sure, there is some plasticity in the brain to recover some function. And you will notice that plasticity is a physical concept. Hope this helps to clarify my position. I think next gen LLMs may exhibit true consciousness some day (you may disagree but - but surprisingly David think this will happen some day) that day physical-ism will be proven because we know that we do not sprinkle magic dust on LLMs or their descendant. It is true that we may not practically know deep down in the neural-net what is the captured state. In fact we exploit that many billion parameter value interaction to capture the complex process of token prediction.

[@steve_____K307]

​@@SandipChitale Well, I think we both agree that in similar fashion (if the analog holds) that the computer h/w and computer s/w are distinct entities, neither causes the other to emerge into existence, and both are dependent on the other, and in like fashion, something very similar could well be at play with the relationship between brain and mind. A damaged brain resulting in impaired expression of consciousness might be very similar to how damaged computer h/w impairs the expression of the intended s/w algorithms. It by no means proves that one “is” the “other”. Also, I think we both agree there are a number of ways that a person might inappropriately call upon magic dust as a way to support an otherwise [as yet] unsupported speculation. Cheers.

[@tunahelpa5433]

You started with a false premise, making everything you said thereafter moot. Here's why: we cannot detect or measure consciousness itself but only the neural correlates of consciousness. Therefore to say that consciousness requires a brain is a whopping leap of faith that I cannot take and neither should any respectable scientist. Science is based on empirical evidence, which is at the current time not available for consciousness.

[@SandipChitale]

@@steve_____K307 Actually I don't :). Software is specific hardware with stored set of instruction when static and instructions to modify states of CPU gates and memory gates when executing. In fact both a program and an image is stored similarly on the HD/SSD. What to do with it is coded in the hardware of Bios which boots OS which runs programs. IMO software is a convenient way to talk about stored executing hardware instructions.

[@skylark5249]

I dont think consciousness is physical or tangible. Observing synapses and neural networks are just obsverving the interaction between the tangible and the intangible. Its kinda like observing the parts of an internal combustion engine but not knowing that it runs a car that could travel from Tampa to Portland.

[@alandunlap4106]

"God sleeps in the rocks, stirs in the plants, dreams in the animals, and finally awakens in man." -- Vedic Quote

[@GrahamCrannell]

He's trying to bring Descartes into the neuroscience age and I am absolutely here for it 👌👌

[@singularity6761]

My personal theory is that conciousness is a property of the universe which emerges as soon there are feedback loops in the universe. The more feedback loops are in the spacetime the more concoiusness emerges.

[@zakmartin]

I agree, except I don't think feedback loops are necessary, just randomness and complexity.

[@charlespancamo9771]

I think consciousness is the basic building block of all matter on the sub quantum level and everything is actually one. We are fractal beings off this one main consciousness.

[@zakmartin]

@@charlespancamo9771 That has always been my theory (in fact I wrote a book about it). Consciousness is inherent.

[@kenknight5387]

Why would that occur in a universe where entropy dominates?

[@zakmartin]

@@kenknight5387 Entropy prevails in the non organic realm. In the organic realm, there is a prevailing tendency towards order, complexity, evolution, intelligence and consciousness.

[@rockapedra1130]

At this point, the gap seems unbridgeable. There does not seem to be a way to squeeze consciousness out of our present scientific laws. It's not supernatural, instead, there appears to be undiscovered natural laws that account for it, perhaps. Once we find them, they will be unified into our physics and we need not talk about dualism. I view dualism in exactly that way. There's a big chunk missing in physics, that's the piece that is the dual. Once we understand it, we will probably just fold it in to the standard model.

[@josephhruby3225]

Wonderful . . .

[@alwilsonwastheman]

Chalmers world..excellent..party on!

[@Bakingways]

The titlw is What things are conscious? Can anybody tell me when they tried to answer this question in this video?

[@tunahelpa5433]

See my response for one explanation

[@pandoraeeris7860]

Love Chalmers. Proto-consciousness is an inherent property of all substance.

[@jareknowak8712]

Rocks and sand are also conscious?

[@Resmith18SR]

And what proof do you have that a rock is conscious?

[@BenjaminGoose]

"Proto-consciousness is an inherent property of all substance." According to what science?

[@Resmith18SR]

@@BenjaminGoose According to no science. Panspychism is a philosophical doctrine.

[@charlespancamo9771]

​@@jareknowak8712i dont think thats what he is saying. The observer effect and quantum entanglement show everything might be connected. That connection could very well be consciousness. We don't at all understand what consciousness is or does yet.

[@cujimmy1366]

How are mirror neurons affected in those with autism.

[@Life_42]

Great question!

[@brianlaible565]

I gotta believe Chalmers thinks about these things while listening to AC DC and Def Leppard 😂 🥁

[@ismann9148]

I envision that there is a field permeating the universe which our brains (or maybe all of matter) can interact with somehow. It could be the only way to explain some non-local phenomena pertaining to consciousness.

[@AffectionateBeignets-mx2qd]

You are not alone in thinking that.

[@benmoorecomposer9164]

Finally someone addressing those nagging doubts I've had about brain and consciousness since I was a kid. Brilliant.

[@JarodM]

He left his guitar at home for the interview~🎸🤘

[@eltontheander7431]

Leont’ev’s activity theory is a good place to look.

[@martinrhoads6168]

As far as we know, the human brain has developed to be aware of our external reality thru our senses interpreted by our brain, but also the ability of our brain to go another step further and try and explain itself. When Coco the sign language ape was asked why she was angry, she replied I don't know.

[@biliom7]

Yes but this is not actually a question of knowledge. It's a question of experience. A computer can store knowledge, can compute conclusions to make new knowledge, but that doesn't mean it experiences anything at all. What part of it would experience something , and how? We start with the sekf-evident fact - the most and only truly absolute self-evident fact of all - that we are experiencing something. We may not know why, and we certainly don't know how - but we are. We know that the brain impinges on and affects that experience, and can even reduce it to a catatonic state that is barely aware at all, but that doesn't alter the great mystery of how consciousness can occur when it does.

[@paul-d-mann]

Isn’t this an older interview?

[@truemangibson]

Yes at least a few years

[@Gamster420]

How old is this?

[@maxpower252]

Yeahhh rock and roll !🎸

[@philboast8841]

Living things, obviously

[@fathertedcrilley3988]

Iron maiden are the best band ever and this guy knows it

[@kgrandchamp]

Well maybe there are 3 views of the relation between the brain and consciousness! Bernardo Kastrup posits that the brain is what one's consciousness "looks like" as perceived through one's dissociative barrier (living, metabolizing things are avatars of cosmic consciousness), so they would be one and the same thing! I have difficulty believing and understanding what I just said ! haha! thanks for the great video, Robert and David! 🌿

[@jamesruscheinski8602]

might neural correlations connect to quantum probability being measured into conscious mind / awareness? mind / awareness could have a physical base in brain?

[@ReasonableForseeability]

The "Consciousness" or even the "Other Minds" problems can never be explained by science.

[@dohduhdah]

Are there any instances of compicated mental behavior (information processing) that don't involve subjective experience? Like people who learn to solve differential equations in their sleep or something along those lines? It seems fairly obvious that such activities will only be possible if people are conscious in the sense that they can exert some level of volitional control over their attention.

[@benjiedrollinger990]

Is there any light to be shed on consciousness by understanding alcoholic blackouts? It’s interesting how they can accomplish complex tasks such as driving to a specific location and seemingly be doing this while unconscious.

[@bgalbreath]

I have had a few blackout experiences. I think I must have been conscious during them because I accomplished activities that must have required sensation. My guess is that I was conscious but not able to form a memory of what went on.

[@connerlake1015]

Consciousness may well be fundamental its a fascinating theory but imo we are maybe several hundred years away from having a definitive answer

[@HewhostandsFIRM6]

We aren't several hundred years away. Elon Musk has already figured it out. The Cia also has its just that they keep knowledge like that hidden from the rest of humanity

[@ashmeadali]

If you are, in this very moment conscious, try this experiment : Sing *HU* with an open heart and mind. Search how to sing *HU* as a spiritual tuning fork? Have your own experiences, have fun, you may wish to leave behind onerous explanations?

[@reh0119]

More recent pictures show him with shorter grayer hair; but I think the exact same jacket!😊 🤟

[@LuigiSimoncini]

Problem is... Correlation is all we have, causation is never really observable. The guy admits being a dualist and there's no way of fitting dualism in science. He's simply asking meaningless questions (but i bow to him for having found a way of making a living out of it!)

[@KarimKhan-gy3ks]

shout out to the dot matrix printer behind Dave

[@steve_____K307]

HaHaHa, no kidding, I was thinking the exact same thing!

[@saramolet3614]

I been doing online drum lessons and youtube recommended me this video....🤷🏻‍♂️

[@gettaasteroid4650]

there hasn't been a bigger advancement since Dr.Tatsuji Inouye's discovery of surface cortical organization? there's imaging and deep stimulation so may be

[@brucecombs3108]

His new rock album deals with these very topics both lyrically and musically.

[@kennethmalafy503]

Finally, someone with a more modern way of thinking about it. This is my theory as well, consciousness is one of the fundamental forces of the universe, we will not be able to explain it past extremely rudimentary conceptualization (or how we "experience" it). Not only that, but it goes deeper, consciousness is also the force behind the other forces. It is the "mover and shaker" here.

[@declup]

The phrase you use, "fundamental forces", is pretty suggestive. How is consciousness like electromagnetism or the nuclear strong force?

[@wagfinpis]

​@declup Your question is a trap. No one has any proof or worked out theory for "consciousness" being behind the design of the universe. It is obvious that it is an intuition. It is impossible to argue with left-brain dominant rhetoric like "a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush", but at the same time the right-brain dominant wholeistic imagination that leads to developing the technology that captures the entire flock in a self sustainable habitat so that you can eat generations of well fed birds year round with no stress of hunting is patently superior to left-brain dominant sophist rhetoric. If you look at the ways the idea of the anthropic principle has been borrowed by believers in metaphysics or theology it becomes very obvious what our friend is suggesting. Where do you suppose electromagnetisms' negative AND positive forces come from? What do you think will complete the standard model? Is the Higgs field real or are there more complicated "things" yet to be discovered? Electromagnetism can push or pull; I can to push-ups or pull-ups but I don't have a muscles in my body that pushes. The left-brain dominant attitude tells us that there are 3 principle forces that "everything" comes from, while the right-brain dominant mind senses that there must be more to it, beyond my ignorance. The left brain thinks there ignorance is the end of the universe.

[@dr_shrinker]

@@wagfinpis His asking "The phrase you use, "fundamental forces", is pretty suggestive. How is consciousness like electromagnetism or the nuclear strong force?" is a fair question. You said,, "No one has any proof or worked out theory for "consciousness" being behind the design of the universe." if what you say is true, then there is no way for anyone to claim consciousness is fundamental. The man was not making a claim, he wanted the OP to explain why he feels the mind is fundamental. I don't think it warranted the lengthy reply you posted.

[@samrowbotham8914]

David was beginning to move towards panpsychism last time I looked then on to Idealism. He seems to be looking younger to or is it me getting older I wonder.

[@JHeb_]

It's just the clips that come from old interviews

[@theophilus749]

Cutting short a much more complicated story, the modern scientific method began in the 17th century by deliberately excluding the subjective existence of consciousness and its contents from its picture of physical reality. It was felt that physical science worked best with this exclusion, focussing instead exclusively on mechanics of reality and the mathematical descriptions that went with it. It worked, too. Given all that, though, one cannot then rationally expect such method to explain what it has deliberately left out. Bringing it back in would require a paradigm shift in what is to be counted as scientific method - and in how we are to conceive nature. I'm not holding my breath in expectation of progress any time soon, so correlation between radically different realities we are left with., together with the various attendant philosophically untidy ways we have invented of trying to interpret it: the impossibility of physical reductionism, the magic of emergentism (emergence can only not be magic if we can tell a reductionist tale to go with it), the almost consummate pottiness of pan-psychism (which only pushes the problem of how consciousness can be related to physical stuff further down the chain, and eliminative materialism (which seems to be so close to total clinical insanity that one could only get away with expounding it at all without attracting the attention of psychiatrists and officers of the law with powers of arrest by calling oneself a philosopher).

[@bgalbreath]

Eliminative materialism or illusionism need not equal insanity. Suppose that a given organism is a (very) complex physical system that behaves in complicated ways. One of the ways it behaves is by generating a model of a world and of the organism itself within that world. The model that the organism generates might model the organism as a non-physical entity with non-physical properties and powers (such as consciousness and contra-causal libertarian free will). The organism modeling itself that way might provide useful advantages in terms of enhancing fitness even though the way the organism is modeled is, strictly speaking, false. Consciousness and free will might be useful fictions. Similarly, models of the world might include supernatural gods, and the model containing such beings might have pragmatic usefulness even though the universe is thoroughly material (non-supernaturalistic)

[@theophilus749]

@@bgalbreath Thank you for your well considered response but I can see a central flaw in your very first sentence - suggesting that consciousness can be an illusion. An object of consciousness can be an illusory, of course, as in the case of our seeing a straight line as a curved one. But illusionism cannot _explain_ consciousness since only beings that have real consciousness can be subject to illusions. To be subject to an illusion just is to be in a real conscious, intentional, mental state. No real, intentional conscious mental state (useful or otherwise) - no illusion. So you are putting the cart before the horse. As for the remainder of what you say, I think you raise many issues (many of which simply presuppose physicalism) but I they are at least a tad tangential to the basic issue at play in the video. I say a 'tad' tangential because I am of the view that anything that can properly be called a mental state necessarily involves consciousness somewhere in a basic and foundational position - but I am aware that an adequate defence of this would require a whole lot more careful exposition and argument. For now, I will say that I don't think any of them is inconsistent with consciousness being perfectly real. As for supernaturalism, I do indeed think that this is implied at a further stage of argument but I do not have to rely on it to show that there is a deep problem with any attempt to accommodate consciousness (or kick it out) with any naturalistic view that is based on its exclusion from the start.

[@bgalbreath]

@@theophilus749 Thanks to you as well Theophilus. I have spent some time today trying to grapple with what you say and find myself somewhat at a loss, but I will share it nevertheless. As you suggest, it seems that any being who is subject to an illusion must be conscious. I see a mirage in the desert because I am very thirsty and this makes me prone to interpret ambiguous perceptions as indications that there is water nearby. The hot sands in the distance cause air currents that reflect the sky above in a shimmering way, and that along with my fervent desire to find water, produce the illusion that water is about a mile away. It seems that I could not fall prey to that illusion unless I were having conscious experiences (of my interoception being very thirsty and my exteroception of shimmering air currents). Both the interoception and the exteroception could be mistakes. Maybe I am well hydrated and merely afraid of dying from thirst and my anxiety gets misinterpreted as real physiological dehydration. I mistake my seeing the air currents for seeing water. But if I were not conscious at all, I could not make these mistakes. Or, at least, so it seems. Consider a physical system that we have no reason to believe to be conscious, for example a fairly simple computer chess program. I play chess against the program, but does the program play chess against me? I have intentions. I move my black pieces and try to trap the white pieces. The computer program seems to move the white pieces in ways that avoid my traps while seeming to set traps of its own for me. Even though I am almost irresistibly drawn to attributing intentions (it is trying to capture my queen) or beliefs (it thinks that I will move to a particular square and seeks to prevent that by threatening that square with a piece of its own), I also recognize that the computer program has no intentions or beliefs at all, but is merely simulating being a chess player. Actually, it is just executing pre-programmed mathematical instructions in an ultimately mechanical way. It simulates a chess playing opponent so well that we are caused to almost reflexively attribute intentions and beliefs to it. Could the chess playing program come to mistakenly attribute intentional attitudes to itself? It could be functionally identical to a system that did that. It could be programmed to produce a running commentary about what it was trying to do and about what it “thought” I was trying to do. It could output the words, “I see that you are trying to fork my rook, but I don’t think you see that my bishop will move to block your plan.” Imagine a very sophisticated chess program, one that not only output words about what it was doing and planning to do, but who was functionally identical with an actual chess player. If the human chess player was moved to speak about her beliefs about how the game was going, so would the robot chess player also be moved, and for the same reasons. We suppose that the robot chess player was like a philosophical zombie that acted exactly like a human chess player in every way, but that the human player had phenomenal consciousness of its beliefs about how the game was going and the robot lacked such phenomenal consciousness. The robot would present the illusion to others of being conscious just as much as we present to others the impression that we are conscious. If I present to myself the impression that I am conscious, so too would the robot so present things to itself. Would it be correct to say that the robot suffers from an illusion that it is conscious? If so, then something can suffer from an illusion that it is conscious when it is not. This would conflict with the claim that to be a subject of an illusion is impossible without being genuinely conscious of something. A friend invites me to watch a television program with her. We sit on her couch and the program begins. Later the program ends, and my friend asks me how I liked it. I say that it was OK. She then tells me that I fell asleep in the middle, to the point that I was snoring. I react with surprise. I do not recall any lapse in what I recall as an unbroken period of consciously watching the program, yet I accept what she says and conclude that there was, in fact, a break and that my impression of having been conscious throughout the program is an illusion. Turning from memory to the (more or less) present, I can sincerely say that I am now visually experiencing the world around me in a 180 degree panoramic way, in full color. Yet, if I fixate on a spot in front of me and pick up a playing card with my arm outstretched to the far right and move it gradually forward it has to get quite far before I can identify what card it is, or even what color, proving that my apparently direct experience of the panoramic display was an illusion. When I go to bed at night, I lie for a while with my eyes closed thinking about various things and then, without noticing the change, I lose consciousness. This seems like a tremendous change in state, but I never notice it happening, or whether it happens suddenly or whether what I call “my consciousness” diminishes by degrees. Naive realism about the external world is out of fashion, but belief in naive realism about phenomenal experiences and about consciousness itself remains nearly universal. This leads some of us to say, while we might suffer from (say) visual illusions, we cannot be mistaken about whether we are currently conscious, or at least not when conditions are ideal enough (good lighting, no drugs, not distracted). Maybe so. Or maybe our conception of what consciousness is is so far off the mark that we never in fact manage to have what we believe we have.

[@theophilus749]

@@bgalbreath Gosh ! This is long and full and I guess you know the literature. Never mind, so do I but properly framed reply will take a little time so I will get back to you when I have some. Cheers Theo

[@bgalbreath]

@@theophilus749 Take your time. Your remarks have stimulated me to try to pull my own ideas together, and it's very much a work in progress that I'm not sure hangs together. I supplemented what I already sent you with an additional couple of paragraphs. Please do not feel under any obligation to reply further, or even to read my groping thoughts. If I am a self, a subjective experiencer, then I may have experiences that are illusory. For example, if I am a dreaming self, I may experience being on a trip to Europe with my grandmother. If I am in fact asleep in bed in the US and if my grandmother has in fact died over 20 years ago, then the dreaming self is having illusory experiences that may seem non-illusory until I have woken up. When awake, I might say that I was conscious while I had been asleep, conscious of illusory events in the dream that, in the dream, I could not detect were illusory. I had a disturbance of consciousness and of reality testing, but the consciousness itself was not an illusion, even though the content of my consciousness was illusory. Who was the one who was conscious during the dream? When I report the dream after awakening, I say, “I was in Europe with my grandmother.” I wasn’t in Europe, but was I even “I”? I was in bed. So, not only was the dream content an illusion, but so (at least to some extent) was the seeming subject of that illusion. It wasn’t me because I was in bed asleep and not walking around sites in Europe. The dream self is not the same “me” as my waking self. Not only was the dream contents an illusion, but the purported subject of those contents was also an illusion. Suppose that the self I habitually take myself to be is a fictional character. In that case, both the subject and the object of phenomenally conscious experiences are illusions, an at-best virtual self seeming to have what turn out to be virtual experiences. Some schools of Buddhism teach that there is no substantial self. But, outside of that religious context, thinkers such as Daniel Dennett also argue that the self is a virtual entity, a narrative center of gravity. If I were a non-virtual self, an actual self that exists fully in the world, then it would be true that even if I had a conscious yet illusory experience it would nevertheless be true that I had an experience. My conscious experience might be defective or disordered, but the consciousness itself would not be an illusion, and the critic of illusionism would be right. But if neither I nor the experience existed in any strict sense, illusionism would remain as a viable hypothesis. There would remain work to be done in accounting for my illusion of being a particular conscious being as well as having particular seemingly conscious experiences. For example, to whom or what does the experience seem to happen?

[@jamesruscheinski8602]

could be brain physically produces mind that has awareness of consciousness external to physical nature?

[@r2c3]

3:07 an explanation of consciousness will have to address both physical and mental brain properties...

[@declup]

What are mental brain properties?

[@r2c3]

@@declup purpose is one of them...

[@declup]

​@@r2c3 -- That's an interesting answer, but I'm not sure I understand it. By "purpose" do you mean desire or goal-seeking or something like desire or goal-seeking? In your view, since you call purpose a "mental brain property", what do these have to do with the brain?

[@r2c3]

@@declup more like intelligence or meaning...

[@declup]

​@@r2c3-- I'm even more confused now. You've given three different words: 'purpose', 'intelligence', and 'meaning'. Would you mind clarifying how you consider these to be related and how they're "mental brain properties"?

[@AkaBigWurm77]

Maybe consciousness is a virtual construct of the brain, we are the ghost in the machine

[@biliom7]

Imagine a crowd of blind people in a stadium, and each stand up when they hear the person to their left standing up. In this way, they are able to create a Mexican wave, but none of them get to see it. They are like the parts that make up a mechanistic system. If somehow sight of that wave occurs, then there must be something outside of that system. Experience is exactly like that. It must involve something outside of the mechanistic system.

[@timschmitt7550]

Many words. Short summary: No one has the slightest idea how consciousness arises.

[@christopherwall444]

Closer to Truth episodes on what is consciousness are the most compelling topically and the least satisfying intellectually...the smartest of us can barely even scratch out a theory

[@stoursjoseph]

it must have always been there

[@SteveWray]

What if consciousness isn't special? What if its pervasive, and all around us?

[@MeAlek]

Hey, there are more than just one hard problem. Another hard problem, so to speak, is the "vertiginous question" (lookup in Wikipedia).

[@MeAlek]

Perhaps the two "hard problems" are 2 facets of the same mysterious thing.

[@maniacslap1623]

In the physical world, all life could be considered conscious. Only animals are probably capable of possessing a mind therefore being considered mentally conscious. All to different degrees of course. The mental consciousness is where shyt gets cloudy.

[@AT-ol2yj]

Pretty sure his hair has a conscience.

[@plexus]

His hair knows right from wrong? His hair is His moral compass?

[@sappelsap534]

4:42 I think he is making a big mistake, he is comparing fundamentals laws of physics to the fact that sometimes things can evolve in biology without necessarily having a function. Just as a by product. I don’t think thats a good argument

[@kevinmcnamee6006]

Consciousness could be firmly associated with the brain if... a) Scientists could generate a specific conscious experience by creating a specific brain state... or b) Determine what conscious experience a person is having by examining their current brain state (sort of like reading your mind). I think that neuroscientists will be able to do this in the next hundred years. However, I doubt if either of these would satisfy Chalmers.

[@kenknight5387]

Kuhn spent the entire interview trying to rationalize his own reductionist view of consciousness. Chalmers, by his own admission not a ‘theist’, was politely and charmingly having none of that.

[@vayasaberlo8]

Does consciousness always require an object?😮

[@gireeshneroth7127]

There are no things. Consciousness is all there is.

[@berni602]

Why are they sitting so close?

[@tonymaitland]

I THINK (in words) THEREFORE I AM (conscious). Now get on to considering the real hard problem: language ability of the brain.

[@thomashutcheson3343]

I'm surprised that a cosmic idealust like Chalmers considers himself a dualist. Bernardo Kastrup seems surprisingly (to me, anyway) beyond him on this, given what I understand of Chalmers' outline of idealism.

[@tedgrant2]

Animals are conscious sometimes.

[@michaelnewell6385]

Wasn’t this guy in the movie spinal tap?

[@Gvarab]

I wrote a Sci FI novel about Chalmers Hard problem. 5000 years in the future the protagonist suggests a solution for it.

[@Great_WOK_Must_Be_Done]

There are things in this reality that science will likely never be able to explain. Such as, why does plopping a big chunk of matter into space-time warp space-time? How does that work? We don't know; it just does. I have a hunch it will be the same with consciousness. How does the brain produce consciousness? ................. ? "... a further entity."

[@georgebrucks2833]

I am enjoying Iain McGilchrist’s The Matter with Things. This same issue is discussed, and I would recommend the book, but be warned; it is a two-volume work, but what a wonderful and pleasant read.

[@gerryboudreaultboudreault2608]

It requires a brain to produce conscience. It is a sort of force or field (beyond electromagnetism etc.) that is external. An ESP spectrum, not yet measurable by us...

[@mediocrates3416]

Extracellular electrotonic wave dynamics. EXTRACELLULAR! The 'atom' of qualia is the stripping of H2O from the hydrated ions. maybe.

[@playwithlight357]

All things.

[@DedHedZed]

Blindsight

[@jamesruscheinski8602]

might brain signals traveling through neurons have awareness / mind, including of consciousness?

[@Gnarlylll]

Reduction is the key

[@SashaPortelli-im8zt]

Isn’t this Danny from Withnail & I?

[@feltonhamilton21]

I believe Consciousness rise out from different abstract of vibrations. Inside all particles I believe when the nucleus pull on dark matter that force create electrons through friction. Without a doubt and without friction the electrons would not exist for example. Imagine the nucleus as a set of helicopter blades and the electrons are the shadows between the blades, now imagine the helicopter blades spinning so fast until they begin creating these vibrating, shadows between them this is because the speed of the blades are cutting through the oxygen flow and pulling directly on dark matter causing it to vibrate, but when the blade stop spinning the shadows disappears from in between them My point is electrons circling around the nucleus is just dark forces created by the nucleus and dark matter and the nucleus is the only thing with mass but on the other hand the electrons are massless and not moving fast enough to emanate heat and remain as dark energy coming from both sides of the nucleus and creating a negative and positive pair of separate vibrating shades of dark energy similar to the activity in the double split experiment. Here's the punchline to consciousness mass alone cannot store information without the help of positive and negative vibrating dark energy activating inside every individual particle while functioning together to form a fluctuating space time geometry as the roadway for emanating flows of energy moving simultaneously through all particles and cells and molecules and neurons which giving rise to consciousness dreams thoughts an even imagination to help predict the future and remember the past. This is consciousness an s alphabetical set formation working as a permanent foundation for the mind to dwell inside of.

[@StillOnMars]

You've missed a class or two, huh?

[@akel135]

Derek Smalls

[@HeavyMetal45]

We’re all one consciousness and our consciousness creates the material world.

[@steve_____K307]

Well, 🙂it does seem that there are exactly two choices: 1. Either an eternal Consciousness created the universe(s), ...or... 2. An eternal universe(s) created consciousness.

[@JHeb_]

​@@steve_____K307 You can also state that both exist independently but are in constant interaction.

[@tunahelpa5433]

That is a belief which I share but it isn't a scientific explanation

[@HeavyMetal45]

@@tunahelpa5433 as weird as this sounds, the latest physics is actually pointing towards this.

[@dr_shrinker]

How could consciousness create the material world, unless consciosuness is also material?

[@lucianovisentin7296]

This one was the title: Can Consciousness be Non-Biological?Mr. David Chalmers has changed title -

[@maximusolivia9982]

Wasn’t that dude in pantera?

[@dohduhdah]

It seems a fallacy to claim that the physicalist point of view entails that consciousness only depends on the brain because consciousness is usually about the relationship between information inside the brain and a state of affairs outside of the brain you're aware of. For instance, you can only be aware of the fact that there is a teapot on the table in front of you if there actually is a teapot on that table in front of you. It would be silly to claim that you're conscious of the fact that there is a teapot on the able in front of you if there isn't any teapot there.

[@jimbodimbo981]

Fun fact: he was a stand in drummer for Spinal Tap

[@S3RAVA3LM]

4:51

[@scrambledeggs88]

Chalmers is right but often misunderstood. For sake of argument, let's say you've never felt pain or anger. Can you objectively observe neurons in another's brain and then know what pain or anger feels like? What about sound, if you are deaf? Or color if color blind?

[@user-iksd0713]

무의식과 의식의 차이는 인간이 유태반유로서 지능이 높은 이유인 것의 한 요인에 들어간다 즉 모계 혈통으로 유전되며 어미의 배속에서 오랜 기간 동안 지내면서 지능이 높은 종으로 진화를 하였으며 모든 동식물은 본능적인 행동과 학습적인 행동으로 삶을 추구하는 사회적 동물이다 본능적 행동은 무의식 적인 행동이며 학습적인 행동은 의식 적인 행동이다 무의식 적인 행동은 식물의 본능적 성장 조류 어류의 탁란을 비롯하여 동물의 본능적 행동이 있다 고등 동식물은 무의식의 행동보다 의식적 행동이 학습을 통하여 널게 된다 그러한 이유로 인간을 사회적 동물 이라고 한다

[@imnotbilly8480]

Before I even ask this question i'm gonna make it clear that I don't know a whole lot About neurology But I know that we humans are conscious. My Question. Is how can the energy that created the universe create something that is conscious if it itself is not conscious, In other words how can the universe give a quality to something else that it does not possess.