PHILOSOPHY - Epistemology: Science, Can it Teach Us Everything?

[@mshioty]

“I have a friend who's an artist and has sometimes taken a view which I don't agree with very well. He'll hold up a flower and say "look how beautiful it is," and I'll agree. Then he says "I as an artist can see how beautiful this is but you as a scientist take this all apart and it becomes a dull thing," and I think that he's kind of nutty. First of all, the beauty that he sees is available to other people and to me too, I believe. Although I may not be quite as refined aesthetically as he is ... I can appreciate the beauty of a flower. At the same time, I see much more about the flower than he sees. I could imagine the cells in there, the complicated actions inside, which also have a beauty. I mean it's not just beauty at this dimension, at one centimeter; there's also beauty at smaller dimensions, the inner structure, also the processes. The fact that the colors in the flower evolved in order to attract insects to pollinate it is interesting; it means that insects can see the color. It adds a question: does this aesthetic sense also exist in the lower forms? Why is it aesthetic? All kinds of interesting questions which the science knowledge only adds to the excitement, the mystery and the awe of a flower. It only adds. I don't understand how it subtracts.” ― Richard P. Feynman

[@zahnpastacremetube]

With the same argument people tell that scientist have no idea about ethics and empathy.

[@JsSargent2024]

@@zahnpastacremetube science cannot say what is good and what is bad.

[@akginganinja]

From Wikipedia- "In contrast to epiphenominalism, Jackson says that the experience of red is entirely contained in the brain, and the experience immediately causes further changes in the brain (e.g. creating memories). This is more consilient with neuroscience's understanding of color vision." This is the guy who created the thought experiment saying it's garbage.

[@williamkibler592]

Once/If we can describe consciousness lets come back to this idea

[@Paraselene_Tao]

Science can explain and describe consciousness, but not to a very high resolution that's necessary to form a complete model of consciousness in a simulation. It's going to take more time for us to complete a large & high resolution model. Things are happening to neurons at the quantum mechanical level. The electrons flowing through your nervous system work on a quantum mechanicical level. We're not done charting how it all works yet. Once we chart the quantum level interactions, then we need to upscale this to a human sized brain. It's possible, but not yet.

[@mesplin3]

In 2011, Graziano and Kastner proposed the "attention schema" theory of awareness. In that theory, specific cortical areas, notably in the superior temporal sulcus and the temporo-parietal junction, are used to build the construct of awareness and attribute it to other people. The same cortical machinery is also used to attribute awareness to oneself.

[@magicaznkidz]

Thanks for the reply! Even if we can just something new about ourselves by direct experience with something, instead of learning about the experience from someone else, that still supports the conclusion that the Knowledge Argument (the argument in the video) aims to draw. Namely, the conclusion is that we learn something new that science can't teach us.

[@WirelessPhilosophy]

Hi lewisner! I'm not sure I understand your question. Are you asking whether we can demonstrate that, in our thought experiment, the person knows all of the facts that can be communciated in the language of the natural sciences, with an experiment? Of course, the answer is 'no', as there is no actual person -- it's a thought experiment. The idea is that, *in the imagined situation*, the person knows all the facts communicable in the language of the natural sciences.

[@svmz7676]

Science cannot tell us about prescriptive moral values either! Or about the scientific method itself, or about Mathematics, or about Logic, or Law or about Politics. There are important and interesting areas of reality that are beyond Science, but contrarily, Philosophy has much to say on these subjects.

[@langedarm1775]

actually science CAN tell you about moral values, moral values are the result of evolution. just because we cannot explain something by using science YET doesnt mean that science is uncapable. It means we are uncapable

[@Max-nc4zn]

@lange darm science can only possibly determine the causes and effects of our morals, but not what they ought to be. Science is amoral. Morality is arational.

[@zahnpastacremetube]

@@Max-nc4zn but science delivers the facts necessary to make ethical decisions.

[@zahnpastacremetube]

@@tomol6 Of course science can not explain everything, and I think it doesn't claim to. What do you mean by "prescriptive statements"?

[@diablominero]

That's because moral values aren't knowledge, but mere beliefs. fMRI is already approaching the level at which it could tell someone what moral values a specific person believes to be accurate.

[@zeusblue9441]

The scientific argument for why science can't teach us everything. 1) Science can only describe observables. If something moves too fast, we will never receive light from it (expandable universe for example) 2) Heisenbergs uncertainty principle: For very small things, the uncertainty becomes too large for us to know anything about it. 3) Human lives are too short to know if our description are complete, or if they slowly change over time. So, we can't really describe things that are beyond the light horisont, very small things that are impossible to accurately observe, things that change very slowly over time.

[@TheBlidget]

that's a misrepresentation of the uncertainty principle

[@diablominero]

Indirect experiments suggest that the uncertainty principle isn't simply a result of our limited measuring equipment, but a feature of the underlying world we're measuring. The wavelike nature of all particles guarantees they don't have infinitely precise position and momentum.

[@AntiCitizenX]

You have no clue how any of those principles work, dude.

[@Howleebra]

The world Works in an inherently simple way, in development you discover things and then have them described to you... this experience is most hyper when you're a baby and subsequently slows down as you age. As you age learning becomes more relational because you know a lot more therefore have more things to relate new discoveries to

[@princegrwl]

Its the same argument that Robin Williams character gives Matt Damon's character in the movie "Good Will Hunting" about Sistine Chapel and Love.

[@Gnomefro]

At best, I think one could argue that people might have different subjective experiences and that there could be aspects of our nature that prevent us from understanding certain aspects of reality from the subjective perspective of other creatures.

[@guitarandvoice7]

So we have empirical and sensory knowledges? That's what I understand from this. Is there a bigger argument trying to be put forth?

[@DilworthJonathon]

+Michael Orlinsky I believe "Mary's Room" can be used as an argument for contemporary dualism.

[@guitarandvoice7]

Gotcha. So, what I gather, is that there are things that we can't quantify because they don't adhere to empiricism, but are different based on our perceptions of them. (Which is based on our sensory information, which is known to be "flawed" in that our minds and senses can easily be tricked.) So the argument is that we are to adhere to these "conceptions"? and set them apart as a separate pseudoscience? Or is it that we could let perception inform science to lead us to empirical conclusions, and make our decisions based on them?

[@DilworthJonathon]

From what I understand, the argument is that phenomenal consciousness ("consciousness characterised in terms of what it’s like for the subject to experience") lies outside the domain of functional explanation: "there are aspects of reality that cannot be described in the language of the natural sciences". For example, we are unable to know what it is like to be a bat, we understand that they navigate using a type of sonar - perhaps we can imagine what it would be like for ourselves to be a bat, but this is still not characterised in terms of what it's like for the subject. The argument is hinting in either one of two directions: either we cannot, and never will be able understand phenomenal consciousness, or our current scientific paradigm (or perhaps our current methods of communication, our semantics) is unable to accommodate for phenomenal consciousness. The reason as to why this may be used as an argument for contemporary dualism is because it quite clearly divides knowledge into objective and subjective domains; I suppose you could think of these as mind and matter. You may want to look up "The Hard Problem of Consciousness" - David Chalmers. As a side note, I haven't studied Philosophy in any kind of detail, so I wouldn't take my word for anything.

[@guitarandvoice7]

Jonathon Dilworth Well, you explain it in a way I can understand and accept. Thanks.

[@Tuberitter]

Someone inside this room, with all this knowledge, would be able to construct a device that will generate the colors inside the room. No need to go "outside".

[@anujabhave7606]

Given that a person now learns something new about the coffee by tasting, it seems that the person now has complete description of what coffee is supposed to be.

[@magicaznkidz]

Hi derre98, It seems to me that if we think of description as information about the ways things move and experience as a set of causes and effects in the brain, then descriptions and experiences are two sides of the same coin. Namely, they both result from something moving, as you phrased it. As for description, we create it by noticing about something that's moving. For experience, there are movements of nerves and brain cells in our body causing us to sense reality.

[@WirelessPhilosophy]

Hi vix. So, this video isn't about an argument for the existence of God, so I'm not sure what you mean when you say it is the 'same old god of the gaps'. Care to elaborate?

[@AntiCitizenX]

It sounds like this argument is trying to equivocate incorrigible propositions with synthetic propositions. "What's it like?" is not really a scientific question. It's a question about sensory experience. Science is about formulating descriptions with predictive power. Another option may be simply to lump science itself in with the observation. But then what happens when you ask questions like "what's it like to see radio waves?" Is that even meaningful?

[@Tracejen]

Help me out here. It seems the issue is about data collection and not the ability of science. Not seeing red or not tasting coffee are things specifically restricted. I say it's merely missing data.

[@Slimpack4321]

Not a bad video and argument. One thing I thought of after watching this, is that the weakness of science that this video points out can pretty much also be applied to any form of verbal communication. For example if someone gives an extremely detailed description about how delicious a pie tastes, I won't actually 'learn' what the pie tastes like until I eat it. If you think about it that way, it isn't so much a limitation of science so much as it is a limitation of non-psychic communication.

[@Paraselene_Tao]

I've heard, read and seen this argument many times. My main hangup with this is that a good scientist would experience the color red, or the flavor of coffee. A part of being a good scientist would be having these experiences and able to recognize the experience.

[@Paraselene_Tao]

@@h20taku60 I'll read your comment a little later. I'm at work right now. Thanks.

[@Paraselene_Tao]

@@h20taku60 Let's start with a few things about myself. I've studied the Philosophy of Science a tiny bit. Im not an expert. I've simply done a little reading and listening. Hopefully I'm not on the pointy tip of Dunning-Kruger Effect, but maybe I am. I get a large portion of my Phil of Sci education from Dr. Paul Hoyningen-Huene. He is a wonderful professor of this subject, and he has a wonderful lecture series on KZbin about the philopshy of science. His lecture series includes Inductivism, Deductivism, Khun's Paradigm model, and Hoyningen's own model named Systematicity. I've used other materials in my study of Phil of Sci too. In a direct manner, I agree with you about "Scientism". Whether or not dogmatic belief in science is a real thing or not, "Scientism" is wrong because it not the correct way to use science. Science isn't interested in "Knowing". "Knowing" is a philosophical activity outside the capabilities of science. Science isn't interested in the items of your second paragraph either. It never needed to prove those things. Science builds models, produces theories, discovers laws, predicts events, and creates technical applications of all these aforementioned items. Science does not yet explain causality, validity of reasoning or whatever: those are left to philopshy to answer for now. Science is a systematized way of understanding reality. We might never fully "know" reality, but science is a way to systematically and asymptotically approach an understanding of this universe. Also, science doesn't claim it's the only way to discover an understanding of the universe. Many philosophies grasp at Nous. Science ignores much of philosophy, and attempts to create a working, agreed upon, and systematized understanding of the universe. It's unfortunate that the layperson might use dogmatic faith in science, but I would rather they have a dogmatic faith in science-Scientism-than a dogmatic faith in other faith-based philopshies (including religions). It takes a lot of time and work to reach a personal, systematized understanding of Science. If humans lived longer, many millenia perhaps, then we might all expect to mature each individual's understanding to the level that you and I desire: or even further beyond current understanding. Thomas Khun's Paradigm theory of science and Hoyningen's Systematicity theory are subjects most people will never learn. I forgive ignorance of these high level perspectives. My first comment remains valid though, doesn't it? Wouldn't a good, systemically driven scientist go and experience red or coffee for herself? Isn't this a part of "systematically understanding the universe" AKA science? Nothing stops her from producing a red colored laser beam, or a coffee flavored beverage in her prison cell.

[@Paraselene_Tao]

@@h20taku60 Ah, yes. I am anti-theist but I don't use Science as a tool to prove theism wrong. I do support evolution, abiogenesis, the big bang and so on, but these don't dispove god or theism. Primarily, my main argument against theism is the lack of evidence for god or theism. Secondarily, I refute all the arguments people have made for god throughout the millenia. Maybe it's biased of me somehow to throw all of these arguments away: I have done my best to read and understand them, but I can't find any that I believe in. The closest I approach theism is Spinoza's pantheism, Leibniz's monad, or Plotinus' One. These all come close to the same idea for me: the universe appears to be one, large thing that "Be's". Whether there's a god, first-mover or whatever is very hard to support at this time.

[@Paraselene_Tao]

@@h20taku60 I'm busy a lot of the time, but I'll try to reply to you soon.

[@Paraselene_Tao]

I don't know whether this is the right thing to do, but I strongly compartmentalize science and philosophy. They're two separate areas of thought. Like I said, I don't use Science to disprove theism, because that's mostly impossible. Thiesm is an unfalsifiable, non-experimental, universal perspective. Theism neccesarily lies outside the scientific method. The Big Bang Theory (B), abiogenesis (A) and evolution (E) are nets I cast out to see how you respond to science. You got tangled up in this BAE net. It shows how you conflate science and philosophy. Unless I'm wrong, then these two shouldn't overlap. It would take me a long time to fully explain the fabric and design of this BAE net. BAE are long topics and require a great professor to help learn them. Has science become a dogmatic religion? I don't think so. The scientific method is fundamentally critical and skeptical in nature. If the professor teaches correctly, the student ought to learn critical & skeptical thinking too. Science shouldn't be a dogmatic faith. It's wrong when it's used like a philosophy or a religion. Can we ever combine Science and Philosophy? I don't know. For now I've separated them. Combining the two requires a scientific explanation of philosophy-maybe a new, fourth part of the BAE net. Maybe the fourth part is a nearly complete and scientific explanation of consciousness. If we can explain consciousness and the mind, then we might be able to get at a scientific understanding of philosophy. I don't know when this will happen, if ever. I have to be optimistic that we will do it. Although philosophy is separate from science, philosophy is still a beautiful and comforting thing. I can't give you a great scientific explanation for why the "Golden Rule" is moral & just, but I can tell you about Epicurus and Lucretius. I can't tell you a scientific reason to overcome emotional hardship of life, but I can point to philosophies of Epictetus, Stoicism, and Logotherapy. Psychology is a kind of child of philosophy and science: the psychoanalysts like Freud, Jung, and Frankl are extremely valuable (to name a few). I'm truly sad to say that these schools of philosophy and psychology lie completely (or mostly) outside science and there's nothing I can do to bring them into science yet. Like I alluded to with the fourth part of the net: we don't have a nearly complete understanding of neuroscience. We haven't figured out most of consciousness, memories, emotions and so on. Like the deep ocean and outer space, we're far from done with scientifically exploring the mind. Reductionism and Emergence theory together probably won't solve the mind problem. It's likely going to take time and a lot of "Eureka" moments to crack open the puzzle of our mind. Along with a stronger "Science of Mind" than psychology, I hope that in my lifetime I can see the creation and full implementation of Neurotheology. NT would explain the numinous experiences people are capable of feeling. This would help explain the revelatory experiences that people claim to have. These experiences are an important part of being human, and science hasn't yet explained what's happening. --- --- Can science ever explain something like the Kalam cosmological argument? I doubt it. "Everything that begins to exist has a cause" Is this really a statement we can totally support? Are we certain that all things that begin have a cause? I'll read more about the Kalam cosmological argument. I have a bias towards William Lane Craig. He is extremely well educated in this area of theology. He's done his very best to support theological arguments in his lifetime. He's a great opponent for me to read and listen to. I simply don't agree. The universe doesn't need a cause, theism or god for it to run the way it runs. WLC will continue writing and supporting Christian apologist work until he dies. There is nothing I can do about WLC. He's helped create a web of thought to capture many people's minds. The most I can do is keep building and supporting a network of science. Today I've explained some of that network, and I'll continue explaining more if you ask for more.

[@raverus2126]

Isn't that just the difference between a priori knowledge and empirical knowledge? It seems like her knowledge of the color red was theoretical until she saw the tomato. However, I do agree with your general argument that science can never be complete, or what we know for that matter.

[@TheBoxysolution]

Science *can* teach us all there is to know, because if it cannot be described by science, neither can it be truly known. In the example with Mary, the problem isn't that she first attains information through a scientific way, and then, upon seeing the actual color red, attains unscientific information. Rather, direct observation is the best way to initiate a scientific understanding. This is why *repeatability*, that other people can *also* make this observation as well, is so important in science. Suppose that Mary was intelligent enough that she figured out how to maniulate her own brain to believe it observed the color red, when, in reality there were no red objects in sight. Wouldn't she then have learned the experience of the color red *purely* through science? At any rate, we can all relate to Mary in the sense that we all live lives severly lacking in the experience of observing infrared and ultraviolet radiation. If, however, we wanted to perceive these wavelengths, only science could give us the knowledge we need to do so. 3. Premise 1 presumes that the direct experience of coffee cannot be described by science, which can easily be refuted by saying that it actually *can* be, and the entire argument falls apart as any further discussion would become like that Monty Python scetch with the argument clinic.

[@sc7597]

+Martin Årvik Nobody presumed that experience of coffee cannot be described. You can easily describe it. But you don't get the actual expirience from a description of it.

[@TheBoxysolution]

Ambivalence The experience is just a description, though, of the contents of coffee, transmitted through electric pulses. The problem isn't that we can't describe the experience of coffee (it is itself a description), it is that we don't have the bandwidth to upload the information through high level language, and unpack and process it so that the information actually makes sense.

[@TheBoxysolution]

+Ambivalence Keep in mind that there is nothing special about the english language, or any other verbal communication methods. A statement that is true in english is aslo true in machine code. The only problem is information technology, of which our nerves, eyes and ears are a part of.

[@sc7597]

+Martin Årvik I wouldn't dare to claim anything else.

[@XPimKossibleX]

The problem isnt science as a concept, but simply its medium - language. language is not nor can it be complete in transferring or recording reality - as not only the human observation cannot be complete, but it's transcription to a language too.

[@diablominero]

Knowledge "what it's like to," like knowledge "how to" isn't usually what we mean when we argue about the nature of knowledge.

[@NEOVOLTER-gaming]

how can we be so sure that for example at some point in the future scientists develop some technology of transferring or copying the information with experiences such as taste of coffee from brain to brain of the person who didn't had this kind of knowledge (experience) before?

[@ianhruday9584]

I'll never forget the time the Phil grad coordinator freaked out when someone brought this thought experiment up in a meeting. She started doodling cartoons with stick figures stabbing each other. The caption read "the first red Merry will see will be her own blood because I stabbed her!!!" She really found this thought experiment irritating. Come to think of it, so do I.

[@chrissidiras]

I am not buying into this argument. The fact we yet have no knowledge of qualia in advance of a new kind of perception (here the redness) is not enough. I don't see any reason to believe this is impossible. Actually I think we will be able to do it in a few decades.

[@arthurwieczorek4894]

Does the scientific methodology have limits of applicability? Where does the scientific method end and devine revelation begin?

[@nimi8538]

Is Mary not mapped on spacetime navigation thingemy? We those settings her self N functions interacting W the sensation?

[@magicaznkidz]

Hi, in the above comment, I agreed with you that with unlimited science power, I believe we can experience virtually in our minds. However, like I responded to "midareashi" earlier, whether or not Mary can see "red" matters only because the choice of example that Frank Jackson (the creator of Mary's room) picked. Jackson could've motivated the same conclusion using a new roller coaster ride that Mary hasn't been on. That experience isn't something that synesthia can replicate.

[@blueteafly]

Is it fair to say that the limiting factor is within science, or is it more accurate to say that the method of communication of all the facts is insufficient. I would hate to say that a particular (the scientific) method was flawed when indeed it was the particular Communication (spoken/written language) method in which the scientific method was implemented that caused the shortcomings. In other words our language fails to communicate important and relevant facts about what it is like to experience the color red or the taste of coffee, etc. Imagine that we could construct a different form of communication, one that involves the direct transfer of sensory experience from one person to another. For example, a computer that is able to read the neurons that are firing in my brain as I see red and transfer that information into a program that would then stimulate those neurons in the brain of Mary. I am not saying that this technology currently exists, however that it is possible that we could create such a machine and thus have a better form of communication that would eliminate the limits placed on it by our current method, i.e. the spoken and written languages. Note that this visual computer aided telepathy communication with Mary might fail between her and I, but that would be due to the chance differences in structures in our brains, and might he analogous to field communication between two people who have not agreed upon the grammatical rules of a language as they try to communicate. The only part that is this analogous would be that the two people could simply discuss what rules to set up in advance, whereas Mary and I cannot go into our brains and restructure them. Therefore my little experiment with the visual communication computer, telepathy thingy, only works if we can assume that human brains are of similar enough structure that such neuronal simulation three communicated reliably and from one person to another. How would we test reliability? overtime we would need to observe the use of these communications and see if miscommunications could be corrected by for the communication or not.

[@rubenmendoza-marcelino1902]

you talking about transhumanism?

[@Gnomefro]

All it would take to make the argument about Mary pointless is for it to be possible to produce experiences in humans without actually doing them. Say, that you had an extra-cranial neural stimulation mechanism that was so advanced that it could produce experiences. In such a case, the statement that Mary would "know everything" would include her having all possible subjective knowledge as well.

[@zondrakj]

This isn't a limitation of science, but in effect, the limitation of language and communication. We do not share sensations directly, but through description.

[@ZenLucifer]

Oh. and it might be interesting to add to the experiment things like moral and aesthetic judgements that while a part of reality cannot be described the same way as color, age, gender or physiology. Simply because the fields of query are outside the domain of knowledge that belongs to science. We can say if any person in a room is good or bad or if a table is pretty, or at least speculate about it. But we can´t make those statements in the language of science.

[@anujabhave7606]

The argument presented here relies heavily on ones own subjective experience of the phenomenon under consideration. But what if we are only taking about the descriptive aspect of science? science relies on removal of human experience in an attempt to rationalize and standardize all aspects of reality. Science removes the subjective appeal of an experience but can completely describe the system within its current limit of understanding. (The trick is I believe where you draw the line) with the inherent incompleteness of science (its own non-subjective descriptive limits) it is impossible for science to ever completely describe anything. (The idea can extend to infinite regression of questions one can come up with given a simple preliminary description. It seems probable that at some place our current understanding of science has to fail. And this failure is not attributable to science's inefficiency in explaining the system from a subjective manner but rather a descriptive one) But if one is satisfied with our current limits and understanding of science, one can indeed completely explain the system.

[@Carlowski]

What the first-time coffee drinker doesn't know is how the compounds that constitute coffee will interact with his body and how his brain will associate such interaction with his previous experience. This is not a fact about coffee, but a fact about the drinker, that is how he learns and how the billions of neurons in its brain reconfigure themselves based on an external stimulus. A fact in the future for that matter, which can only be predicted but not *known* until it actually happens

[@fourdotsYT]

This is the old "qualia" problem. One of those constructed philosophical problems that might not really be a problem. Firstly it holds only in an artificial thought experiment. Further, philosophers like Daniel Dennett extends it to show it's a non-problem: Among the info is a detailed scan of someone's brain seeing red. Let Mary now build a high-tech machine to do detailed brain surgery on herself to include that neural info. Will she still learn something new when seeing red for the 1st time?

[@vectorshift401]

Science is working on how brains work, when we have conscious sensations, when conscious sensations occur, when redness occurs (etc). A long way to go but with FMRI and future devices but getting there. There's an unspoken claim in this argument that because science hasn't yet done something that it never will. What if Mary never saw an episode of Opra, then she saw it. She may have read the transcript but still lacks the visual experience of seeing it. She will learn something by seeing it but so what.

[@fremenchips]

+Vector Shift That means you can detect the effect of redness not understand it self. I can have a theoretical understanding of what a 2D shape is but I've never actually seen one because for something to be visible to our eye it has to have depth. Yet no matter how much theoretical knowledge of I have of it, it's still not something that I can actually understand because that isn't how our bodies work to interpret sensation.

[@vectorshift401]

+fremenchips 2D shapes are theoretical notions. A theoretical understanding is all there is.

[@fremenchips]

Vector Shift I'm not sure I'd agree with that, as I assume you mean that they're theoretical notions because we can't detect them with our sense. Yet that would by the premise automatically invalidate any outcome.

[@vectorshift401]

+fremenchips They don't exist physically. They are conceptual only.

[@fremenchips]

Vector Shift How would one be able to say they don't physically exist when none of our sense are evolved to detect them? We can certainly describe them yet if theoretically a 2d shape did exist how would you detect it.

[@magicaznkidz]

Hi, I agree that usually subjective views drift away from facts. Opinions, for example, are not facts. However, a statement like "John learned what coffee tasted like after he had some" is a fact. This fact is independent of the subjective opinion of John on what coffee tastes like, insofar as John formed an opinion on the taste of coffee after having some.

[@aow59]

It seems like the obvious problem with this argument is that it's conflating objective facts, for which there are likely robust scientific explanations available, with subjective experiential facts for which no a priori scientific explanation could reliably be available. By calling them "facts" without this distinction, those who are eager to reject scientifically grounded epistemologies are given a clumsy reason to continue to reject scientific explanation. Further, this argument would hold science to a standard that no other epistemology would survive.

[@OrigamiMaster06]

But, does that not confirm the presenter's point? The presenter is claiming that a scientific description of reality will be fundamentally incomplete because it is limited to objective truths. Thus, it is not capable of describing every aspect of reality. This doesn't necessarily mean that science is wrong just that it cannot be solely used to describe the entirety of reality. I think what should be gathered from this video is that science is fundamentally limited in its scope and that it must not be used outside of empirical data-driven statements of reality.

[@tbayley6]

This has to be seen in the context of 'scientism' and its devaluation of anything that can't be measured i.e. subjective phenomena. Opponents sense an encroaching tyranny, 1984-style ;-), in which thinking represses its own foundation. Eliminativists, for example, assert that the experience of qualia is an illusion. But actually, which comes first - knowledge or experience? Which of the two would have been possible without the other?

[@srelma]

I think the problem of this video is that it hangs everything with language. In my opinion that's not the only way science can convey information. If you look at almost any scientific paper, it has lots of figures in it. So, at least using our sight is used as a way to explain science other than just language. It would be trivial to write a paper with a red colour and this way explain Mary, what is red. The other senses are not used, but I think this is more like a technical problem rather than a fundamental problem with science. So, I would rather ask, is there anything that science can't explain to us about reality by feeding us information through our senses? I don't think it could still explain, for instance angels, if they were real.

[@korona3103]

Lol - I think you're agreeing with the video. Look at the original premise - that the language of science can describe everything. If you can't describe something with any language whatsoever then you're definitely not going to be able to describe it with scientific language!

[@srelma]

Well, as I wrote, pictures are part of the language of science (as I said, look any scientific paper and you will see that it's full of figures). The video, however, only talks about language as in written or spoken words. Yes, you can't describe red with spoken or written words, but you can describe it, if you use figures (it would be trivial, put a red blob in the paper).

[@gerardvandergraff7031]

Science isn't a language. Science is a method. And if you weren't using all available sensory input (and more if you include mechanical/electronic sensing equipment) then you are doing piss poor science. You know, garbage in and garbage out? Incomplete data yields poor scientific studies/theories. Now if someone was trying to imply there are things in the universe that are untouchable by the scientific method, totally free from human scrutiny, then I'd like to know how they could possibly know that. Because if they know it then it must be something we can scrutinize.

[@harryharman6409]

Hey spoken or written language is not the only language. Mathematics is a language as well as logic and computer languages. Languages develop all the time to carry our knowledge. So who knows in the future what languages will be able to describe.

[@matthewkwak8934]

Some things do not need to have evidence to be known. For example, proofs by contradiction.

[@ReligionInTheBin]

I'd phrase it differently; There's stuff to *experience* that no amount of knowledge can teach us. To me that's self-evident and no surprise. I can know what a screwdriver is but that doesn't let me experience how it would be to be a screwdriver. IMO, that's not really what we're after when one asks if science can explain all of nature at some point.

[@xasancle]

Science explains things, if there's no-thing there's no science, neither the thing.

[@conorita]

the thing is that it is absolutely physical!!! experience. that is knowledge.

[@zafthedon]

Science struggles with moral values - subjective conscious experiences and with meaning. Its a great tool for observation and prediction. Hardly a method for everything.

[@rainergro4055]

I don't agree. By simulation social interactions science is able to derive rules that make a flourishing society. That's *moral values.* Our knowledge about the brain is growing: electrical processes of our nerves and neurons, the influence of hormones, the role of epigenetics... I don't see any principle limitation to a complete description of *subjective personal experiences.* And personal beliefs can be seen as direct consequences of subjective personal experiences, as an interpretation. The ascribed *meaning* of things is extremely individual (thousands of religions, billions of beliefs). This proves my point. All the best to you!

[@zafthedon]

@@rainergro4055 Science doesn’t make flourishing societies (Nazi/ USSR) the value pre supposed by the society usually due to inheritance of a tradition or trial and error produce flourishing societies. Science itself is a product of trying to study the material world to find ‘truth’ which is a product of both in all cultures. Meaning and purpose isn’t subjective it’s social and historically transformative which gives in relevance. Billions of religious experiences, rights, beauty, love, ethics and even the self are things that are out of the domain of science. They are usually in the domain of religion, philosophy and mysticism. Of course scientific data also needs interpretation as well which would put in the same socially constructive camp and it changes throughout time with 100s of different views throughout history or paradigm shifts as Thomas Kuhn calls it. All the best.

[@ThatisnotHair]

@@zafthedon Interpretation of scientific data is done by it's predictive power. If a scientific theory cannot make predictions then it is discarded. Infact superiority scientific epistemy is because of its ability to make predictions

[@davonbenson4361]

@@rainergro4055. That’s not true. The trust for knowledge can easily lead to corruption.

[@davonbenson4361]

@@ThatisnotHair. Making predictions have nothing to do with morality. A first world country can make predictions on ways that would lead to them stealing more resources from a third world country.

[@ArnesKlisura]

we need everything to see everything

[@marladeklotz6693]

I feel like he just made an argument that direct experience may be beyond the reach of all language to describe, not "the language of science" specifically...

[@Gnomefro]

There is an assumption in the argument that scientific methodology could not bridge the gap to the person's own subjectivity though, but it's not obvious that this would have to be the case forever. I'm not sure if you're familiar with the expression "martian colors", but it arose from a color blind synesthete who could see colors in numbers via her abnormal brain connectivity that she could not see in the real world. She's similar to Mary, but might be able to know what it's like to "see red".

[@samlounder1271]

I present a counterargument. Premise 1: Before drinking coffee, you know all facts describable in the language of natural science. Premise 2: After drinking a cup of coffee, you learn a new fact. ↯ This cannot be true, because, in accordance with Premise 1 and my personal argument, you would have a complete description of how any brain responds to any stimuli. This includes the exact experience that your brain would have in response to drinking the cup of coffee that is brought to you. Therefore Premise 2 is false, since you would not learn anything new. Hence the conclusion that there is some fact that is not describable in the language of natural science is not proven (assuming that my personal argument is correct.)

[@CDeruiter5963]

But how can you know what your brain would look like, how your senses would be engaged, if you had never subjected yourself to the experience of drinking coffee. I worry that you'd be assuming foreknowledge.

[@Marlonfive]

But you can't deny that you learn something, according to your personal addition, maybe an association between the experience of drinking coffee E with a description D (with physical vocabulary) that corresponds specifically for that E

[@XESolar]

But the coffee and color arguments are flawed in the fact that experiencing those things is subjective. Science can only describe objective matters. Everyone sees color slightly different and tastes thing differently.

[@AnandVazirani]

the video is very informative but i love your small picture Gaurav

[@ishankashyap3350]

Read this article: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy_of_science

[@macsnafu]

Knowledge isn't a replacement for experience. This makes sense, but there's a couple of problems with it. For one, experience isn't knowledge per se but something that can be used to derive knowledge from. More generally, knowledge, especially scientific knowledge, is often based or founded upon experience. Scientists observe something that happens repeatedly and consistently. They form a hypothesis about how and why it occurs. They test the hypothesis with experimentation (specifically-controlled experiences) and if supported, the hypothesis becomes a theory of science. In the real world, too, we often learn from experience. That is, we draw conclusions about reality based on what we've experienced. Even complex chains of logical reasoning are usually based upon some fundamental experience or experiences that form the initial premises of the logic. Does this mean that science can teach us everything about reality? I'm not so sure about that. All I'm saying is that your argument isn't very supportable.

[@petervaneersel5573]

How would a dog describe the room, how would a dog experience the room? How would a bat? My point is that science and language are human experience driven. To describe everything, all senses should be included. The senses humans don’t have, but also the ones that humans cant even imagine. Humans can’t describe and experience like dogs or bats would, and are of course incapable to describe and experience through senses (and measurement instruments as a human sense extension) that are unknown. Like red is not a thing, but a range on a scale of wave -lengths, so are senses. The fact that we pick up some information from the room through our eyes and some other information through ears or noses gives a very human interpretation. Science does the same with definitions and categorisations to create a workable, explainable environment. But the explanation is only valuable inside that world, created by and for science.

[@magicaznkidz]

Hallucinations create imagery. That's right. But I think the point of limiting Mary to see only white and grey is that we can introduce a new color, which Mary hasn't seen. The thought experiment could have just as well used a new type of cloth that Mary tried on, or a new roller coaster ride that Mary went on to illustrate the point that Mary learns something new by doing something she hasn't done before.

[@KarascioM]

So the answer is science can't teach us experience? Like I can learn all the physics behind roller coasters and the effects they have on the body, but until I experience it, I can never actually know. (?)

[@keystothebox]

This video fails since it makes a false equivocation between a descriptive text and a sensory experience. Please delete this video and start over.

[@keystothebox]

***** The argument is saying because a methodology hasn't done "x" yet, it is impossible and therefore can't be used for everything. Science is just a systematic study of the world around us though, so saying we can't use sense data to uncover sensory information about drinking coffee is a straw man. The video makes a weak argument based on "possibility". For this argument to work it needs to prove that it is impossible for the method to ever determine something to be true within reason. This means it can't do something that people wouldn't try due to ethics or resource, time, or technology constraints.. etc.

[@yeziu3475]

keystothebox keystothebox just straight up get to hume you cannot get an is from an ought the is-ought problem there then science can’t teach at about ethics secondly science can’t teach us how to experience stuffs just to know stuffs not to know what we experienced on that stuff because our experience is relative to everyone, lastly science can’t teach us how to live he teach us how to be healthy and all but not to have a fulfilling life. The thought experiment isn’t flawed you just missed the point entirely.

[@Thunder9987999]

No, the idea that we cannot know something is admitting our own inability to observe the whole universe. We only have 5 senses. No matter how hard we try or how hard we measure, we simply cannot comprehend the sixth sense of a shark. We can understand how it works, we can define it. But as an individual it is impossible for you to "sense" what a shark does. Thus, you have an incomplete picture and cannot say that you can observe the whole truth.

[@killer4hire]

Seeing the color red for the first time is an experience. It is subjective even though it indicates objective things in the real world. The experience of the color red is not a fact as experiences are not true or false. If there is no possible truth involved then it follows that there is no knowledge aspect to it. It then follows that Mary did not gain any knowledge when seeing the color red for the first time. This is why Mary's room does not prove or refute anything.

[@vixthesnarky2885]

Not a new argument same old god of the gaps. The entire argument is based off of devaluing searching for information because you might not know something.

[@MarcMcDoom]

If you have described fully the interaction that will occur between your brain and this coffee, you will know what tastes like before you taste it. Science has not progressed that far, and could not map that interaction with absolute certainty, but that doesn't make the experience of tasting coffee indescribable.

[@jhmelo31]

Not being an expert on philosophy myself, I also think science cannot explain anything to its full extent. Nevertheless, I feel that the argument presented here is not satisfactory. If the woman in the experiment is not able to have access to a red thing, then her scientific knowledge about redness is incomplete. One cannot expect science to explain everything about redness if the science about redness is incomplete. Since science is unfinished (and will always be) and non-perfect (it is always subject to mistakes and further corrections) it cannot explain everything. It would be interesting to ask ourselves: If science were complete and perfect, would it explain subjectivity and morals?

[@ZenLucifer]

Of course one could further clarify that there are things that cannot be described by the current language of science. Not that science should strive for being able to describe the taste of cofee or all possible experiences into some sort of code that when apprehended provides the experience of what it explains. Scientific language should not strive to do this, it hasn't and I don´t think it will,

[@ricardosoca7380]

All that these examples show are the limitations of human language, not the limitations of science. There"s a very famous phrase ""A picture is worth a thousand words.'" So of course you won"t ever know what red looks like until you see it, but that"s not due to the limits of science but rather to the fact that language alone is not a sufficiently adequate substitute for sight. The same can be said for the rest of the senses.

[@davonbenson4361]

Lol, you need language for Science, because you have to classify things for repeatable studies. The limitations of language leads to the limitations of Science.

[@jeffreysegal2065]

Can science tell us why we need to see a hand seeming to draw the images in this video? Is frivolous a scientific description of this visual technique?

[@rainergro4055]

*I think this reasoning is not correct.* Two points: 1. Things one has not experienced (red, coffee) are not part of ones reality. He / she can not describe them. But the thought experiment states that others know that they exist. This added dimension of personal knowledge and objective knowledge makes the thought experiment worthless. Things only challenge our understanding of reality (and require a description) when they are experienced. (New scientific observations challenge existing theories.) No reality, no need for a description. (Okay, you could still argue that things really do exist that nobody has ever experienced. You might call them "universal reality". But I refuse to enter that swamp.) 2. How is the impression of red or coffee not describable scientifically? Yes, our understanding of mental processes is incomplete, still. But such a thought experiment should include advances in science. If we understood everything that's going on in our brain (and our hormones and our epigenetics) including the psychological implications... There are - in principle - no limitations to the completeness of the scientific description. Nice try, though. And suitable for confusing many. 🤪

[@eddobh]

what if scientists could simulate on one's brain the sensation of the color red or the taste of coffee. And do this to someone who never experienced this sensations, after testing the device on people that know those experiences and claim that they feel the exact same sensation. You could say that it's not the natural language of science, but, still, science would be used to teach something that human natural language can't. ps.: I'm not a native english speaker. Sorry if it's too bad.

[@derre98]

Seems to me this is simply a weakness of natural language. The word description to me is simply information about the way things moved. Experience on the other hand is totally different set of cause and effect in the brain which can only happen with a proper cause which obviously is quite different from the cause like analytical information (obviously doesn't result in the same brain state as the real thing). There doesn't appear to be anything particularly puzzling about this.

[@turbopro10]

what!?! You have defined Premise 1 to suit your argument. As it is, you can dictate that "all facts" does not include facts about what it is to taste coffee, or see red. The sleight of hand mental gymnastics are entertaining. Rigourous, methinks not. A quick review of objections to Jackson's papers from back in the 80's should have informed our philosopher of the below: Wikipedia -- Jackson now believes that the physicalist approach (from a perspective of indirect realism) provides the better explanation. In contrast to epiphenominalism, Jackson says that the experience of red is entirely contained in the brain, and the experience immediately causes further changes in the brain (e.g. creating memories). This is more consilient with neuroscience's understanding of color vision. Jackson suggests that Mary is simply discovering a new way for her brain to represent qualities that exist in the world. In a similar argument, philosopher Philip Pettit likens the case of Mary to patients suffering from akinetopsia, the inability to perceive the motion of objects. If someone were raised in a stroboscopic room and subsequently 'cured' of the akinetopsia, they would not be surprised to discover any new facts about the world (they do, in fact, know that objects move). Instead, their surprise would come from their brain now allowing them to see this motion. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_argument Before the web, one could get away with misinforming the masses.

[@magicaznkidz]

Hi, I agree with you on this. I believe that with unlimited scientific power, we should be able to simulate an experience in our minds without actually having that experience. For example, we should be able to imagine the experience of tasting the coffee, by taking account of factors such as the physical properties of coffee, the process by which we taste food, and the mechanism by which we response to that taste emotionally and physically.

[@juandominguezmurray7327]

But you never presented any new fact in any of the experiments. If they both knew all the facts then they would also know how they will respond to them. Having a new experience is NOT necessarilly learning a new fact, specially when you knew all that there is to know about something to begin with. One thing is not equal to the other. You are basically using a poor choice of language to prove your argument. It would be like using the poor choice of language that Einstein used, to say he believed in a god (when he was actually redefining the word "god" to be "all the laws of physics"). A tricky and wrong choice of language does not help your argument.

[@eugenew2]

Science is limited to what we can observe. Everything else is just a guess.

[@moes80]

Awesome video!

[@Constantstate]

Sorry, but in this context drinking the coffee is a science experiment in itself. Once tested and compared to other beverages, the person's scientifically gained knowledge of the taste of coffee, becomes the data they were missing.

[@SpionCTFT]

Premise 2 assumes the conclusion. If all facts are describable in science then you did not learn a new fact by drinking coffe.

[@DogBehaviorGuy]

I came to say this same thing. Hooray for begging the question.

[@UnratedAwesomeness]

He said that they know all facts that can possibly be described by science, not that science describes all facts.

[@dr.zoidberg8666]

+UnratedAwesomeness but how can we be sure that science could never describe all facts? That's where my trouble comes in. Surely science currently describes all sorts of things which people never thought it would at the dawn of the scientific revolution. I guess I don't understand how one can justify that it is certainly impossible for science to ever be able to convey personal experience & the knowledge therein directly into our brains without us having to have those experiences.

[@srp01983]

So it is a failure of language, rather than a failure of science, that prevents a scientist adequately describing the colour red. A real scientist would devise another method of communicating the concept of the colour red to the subject, since language clearly has limitations, probably by just showing her a tomato. Or if he was really clever he might work out what sort of stimulation is needed in which particular part of the brain and use that knowledge to impart the fact of the colour red to the subject. Thus overcoming the limitations of language, and demonstrating that science can actually describe what the narrator thinks is indescribable. That’s the problem with philosophers - they forget we live in a real world sometimes.

[@lefthand8051]

All the color argument is really saying is that you need to relate the objective description of color to the subjective experience of color, and I don’t see why science can’t do this.

[@ThatisnotHair]

There is a big difference imagine a thing and feeling a thing. We can use science to describe things. Feelings are different domain itself.

[@ThatisnotHair]

Science can't do it because it ends with its tools and instrument's readings,graphs and numbers. Live feeling cannot be captured by this method.

[@ThatisnotHair]

For eg. A doctor can study a cancer in all its details. But he will never understand what it likes to be until he gets the cancer.

[@fips001]

there is a wrong conclusion in the video "there a aspects ... that are non physical" . No, of course not! Of course kicking a ball is different from describing in language what happens when you kick a ball. But that is rather trivial. But to conclude from the Mary in the black-white room thought experiment that there are non-physical aspects of the world is simply wrong. She made a new experience yes, but what happens there is physical and by the way she could have had the same experience already in the room by just stimulating the right photoreceptors in the retina.

[@littlenarwhal3914]

Uselessly long video for a simple concept. Everything could have been made much shorter...

[@boutje0471]

IK HEET OOK ROMBOUT

[@menotyou135]

I don't think that you are learning a new fact. You are experiencing a new perception. When I see blue, I don't say, "My perception of blue is a fact." Facts are 3rd person descriptions of phenomena, while things like tasting coffee or seeing a color are first person experiences. Language. In the same way I cannot see what another person experiences, you cannot communicate subjective phenomena in an objective way in any cohesive way. If two subjects are familiar with the same experience, like red, then they are able to communicate the idea through language, but that requires prior experience of the first person phenomena.

[@garrettcooper9589]

How can blue be a fact outside of the subjective experience of it? There is no blue with subjetive experience. Without an eye, there is no color. Without an eardrum, there is no sound. That's the hard problem of consciousness. How does our subjective experience relate to our objective world?

[@tchedoumenou1165]

many problems with these arguments.

[@benquinneyiii7941]

All is number

[@benquinneyiii7941]

Scientism

[@tbayley6]

Btw the idea that a scientist could induce an experience of red (or even implant a memory of 'seeing' red) does not get round the fact that 'red' exists only as a subjective phenomenon which is not measurable. For me, the real point of this thought experiment is that we cannot 'know' everything through abstract means alone - we have to do something more to make experience happen. To adapt the zen saying: to see the moon you can't just look at the finger pointing to it.

[@Max-nc4zn]

The shortest distance between two points is a straight line.

[@martinmickels1478]

Scince everything is just particle physics and the laws of nature, and science can explain that, science can explain everything. But everything can not understand the description, because, for example, it is not smart enough. A cat would understand less, but a human would probably understand more. A very complex being would maybe understand everything, including how it would be to experience it. But if science would want to describe everything for humans, it would simply allow humans to experience it just as it would give a explanation of how and why, including how and why it was experienced

[@ingenuity168]

Only science has taught us something, anything.

[@lukaobradovic9784]

The question is scientific, answered by science

[@GhostEmblem]

Your premises are flawed if she already knows everything about the color red that would include what it looks like, she wouldn't learn anything new regardless of whether she or anyone could describe the color red if she alreaday knows all there is to know about it then she knows what it looks like the same goes for coffee.

[@hahhahhahhahhahh]

+Ghost Emblem You're assuming that "she already knows all there is to know," in which case of course she can't learn anything. The argument assumes that she already knows all there is to know that can be communicated through language of natural sciences--not necessarily everything. I think the argument boils down to description vs experience.

[@gerardvandergraff7031]

The whole point of the video was whether science could teach us everything or not. Not whether or not the language we use can adequately transfer this knowledge. Science is a method, a bullshit filter of sorts. It's not a language and it doesn't really operate on a language. Properly performing the scientific method means using all possible data, so it would include the personal sensory data from Mary seeing red. Leaving that out would just be bad science, so that's why she didn't know what red was. The science was incomplete, aka bad science.

[@afrankiuk78]

+Gerard Van Der Graff Well Said!

[@matthewkwak8934]

But that still doesn't answer the question of whether or not Knowledge of a phenomenon is equal to the Experience of the same phenomenon. Perhaps I'm misguided in thinking like this, but I think that the previous statement is central to the question at hand.

[@anujabhave7606]

But isn't it the case that the moment she sees a red apple and also incorporates that personal subjective element, she now knows everything about the color Red?

[@prettysure3085]

Lebron is god.

[@rcmps772]

You remove experimentation,an essential part of the scientific method and then make a bold claim about the limitations of science. What a joke of an argument.

[@rcmps772]

***** "You entirely missed the point of this video" Could you clarify?

[@boutje0471]

MY NAME IS OLSOW ROMBOUT

[@harryharman6409]

This argument just shows the limitation of language as we know it today. So it is cannot put any limitation on future language. Language is changing as science is discovering new facts about the word. New words are added to our dictionaries everyday. It is possible that in the future, language will be able to describe first person experiences.

[@garrettcooper9589]

This is not a given. It's the hard problem of consciousness.

[@harryharman6409]

The "hard" problem of consciousness, is only a problem given the current paradigm in philosophy of the mind. It just shows that we desperately need a paradigm shift. It is like Newtonian laws of motion could not explain a lot of things and we needed Einstein's paradigm shift of Relativity. The "hard" problem is not that sciences could not reduce consciousness to brain functions. But to have philosopher to accept the explanations. The problem is that philosophers do not want to give up their current paradigm (set of assumptions) and try shove the new discoveries of neuroscientist into it. Seeing that they do not fit, they cry out, you see there is a problem. It is like trying to shove Relativity into Newton's laws of motion and telling us that it does not work. What I am saying here is that currently philosophy is left behind by science in general. It became a self serving circle jerk. In any case, philosophy ONLY can ask questions. It never answered any of them. Science on the other hand very successful asking and answering questions. That is why most scientist do not bother with philosophy, accept for ethics.

[@garrettcooper9589]

You're mistaken. The number of scientists taking a hard look at the problem is a growing at a rapid rate. The problem is, they can only find correlation to this point, which is an easy problem of consciousness. If cave men found a tv and figured out which button turned it on, they still have no idea how a tv works; they don't know how or why it works. But they've found correlation. Just as science has been able to identify the areas of the brain that are active when a subject reports feeling certain things. But it's much much more than that. There is nothing in our physical understanding of the universe that suggests there should be any subjective experience or consciousness. If we didn't have it ourselves, we'd have no reason to look, and thus find it at all. To the video, I disagree: words will never being to give rise to the actual experience of consiousness. You're essentially suggesting that words are the key to simulation. That if we find the right words, we can get people to feel like they're eating a steak, while they're actually starving to death. If you're right, we could construct whole realities as real as this one, by simply reading the right words to people. That's far from a safe assumption.

[@TheBlidget]

+Harry Harman hypothetical: we have the perfect definition for first person experiences. there would still be no way to know it was the perfect definition since we can't be in someone else's subjective experience.

[@harryharman6409]

Well, at this stage we cannot have another person"s subjective experience. But in the future we may develop the technology to connect two brains in one to one fashion. So we could experience another person's subjective experience. Never say never! It is conceited to think what will not be possible in the future.

[@vectorshift401]

Science has not yet developed a theory of colors/perception that would actually convey the sensation of redness. *Not YET.* It's a bit much to say that it never will.

[@vectorshift401]

+Paul Hill By stimulating those brain functions which generate the sensation. Theories stimulate a person's brain whenever a person learns or uses them. Some people already experience colors when looking at printed letters, "Synesthetes see characters just as others do (in whichever color actually displayed) but simultaneously perceive colors as associated with or evoked by each one." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia

[@vectorshift401]

+Paul Hill "These seem to be two quite different matters." So do shapes and colors. So do shapes and sounds. In synesthesia colors are generated by the classification of shapes. Concepts generate color. All of our subjective sensory experiences are generated by our brains according to extremely complicated classifications of sensory input. The distinctions themselves are generated by our brains. We have just barely begun to investigate this scientifically so jumping to a conclusion that it can't be done by science is grossly premature.

[@vectorshift401]

***** If scientists had to get permission from philosophers to pursue theory development there would be no progress at all. Your concerns are trying to establish philosophical connections that science needn't worry about - mustn't worry about. Our current concepts of reality are only approximate, we shouldn't expect conceptual completeness or consistency of new theoretical notions with current ones. Newtonian physics, relativity, quantum mechanics all have major 'philosophical issues' but are wonderful descriptions of reality. Ruling out the possibility that science will ever explain color based on current concepts grossly pessimistic. Colors are mental constructs as are theories and both the result of brain stimulation. An analysis using defective concepts is inadequate to rule out further empirical connections that may provide a scientific description of colors and other subjective experience. *Concepts are in some sense abstractions, they cannot 'generate' colour.* A great part of what our brains do is classify stimuli according to various conceptual relationships and use that to generate subjective sensations. That's how the subjective aspects get there to begin with. Redness is "brain paint" that it decides to use when certain abstract conceptual relations obtain either in sensory input or dreams etc. Concepts generate colors all the time, by how they interact in our brains.

[@vectorshift401]

+Paul Hill _"You say, "A great part of what our brains do is classify stimuli according to various conceptual relationships and use that to generate subjective sensations. That's how the subjective aspects get there to begin with". Maybe, but that's brains causing sensations not concepts causing them (even if brains use concepts in doing so)."_ It is the conceptual relationships between input stimuli that determine the subjective nature of our experiences. Input stimuli are in fact not even needed since we experience subjectively in dreams. Hypnosis, drugs can also generate subjective experiences without actual sensory input. Can you imagine the color red? If you can call forth any inking of color in your imagination ( including just remembering) then it demonstrates that subjective experience, at have some creation by communication. Do you think it impossible that a form of communication could be found to directly instantiate a subjective experience in the consciousness of the recipient? Even if not fully possible with current mental abilities some augmentation of our mental functioning seems extremely plausible to this end. We needn't limit scientific explanations/theories to current cognitive capabilities.

[@jezzbanger]

+Vector Shift I support what you're saying. Importantly, there is no reason why we should restrict the agent in this thought experiment to a complete understanding of the domain of possible natural scientific knowledge of red. If we're prepared to endow her with such powers then we may also endow her with the natural knowledge to construct a machine that could scan her brain in perfect detail in real time, making that information known to her. We can also state that she may have a complete understanding of how her neurons would respond to the incoming energy of red light (or any other stimuli), allowing her to accurately predict their future state if she were exposed to whatever red object. We should then allow her to construct an additional machine, connected to the first, that perfectly imitates the effect on her neurons that the light would have had, allowing her to gain knowledge of how her body would respond to any stimuli describable in terms of natural science. It's not hard to show that allowing her a few more constructions using natural science, we could computationally solve any 'experience' problem related to any solved 'stimuli' problem, invalidating the conclusion of the thought experiment.

[@futureDK1]

Artificial Intelligence could.

[@MisterKonradical]

You are making science subjective by treating peoples' experiences as "facts", of course they will be new, but they will also be unique to each person.

[@notyourbusiness5530]

Waste of time. Of course some sense experiences cannot be described by science yet. You didn't need 10 minutes to explain that idea.

[@Kumbaya6991]

khan academy meets philosophy tube, nothing original