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Is Consciousness Part of the Fabric of the Universe?
(www.scientificamerican.com)
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this post was submitted on 25 Sep 2023
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Asklemmy
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Conciousness is just an emergent property of the multiple parts of the brain trying to interpret and respond to its surroundings.
Edit: I stand by what I said, but you all don't need to be so mean and vile about it....
Wow. I'm glad you figured that out. I thought it was going to be so much more difficult.
It's ok if you disagree! What do you think it is?
First, I appreciate your calm response in the context of my sarcasm. It's not what I'm used to on the Internet, and it's refreshing.
My simplest answer is that I don't know. Neuroscience has made a lot of progress in the last several decades, but I'm unaware of any credible researchers claiming to have a unified theory of consciousness yet. We probably still have a long way to go, assuming it's even possible to know.
it is not about disagreeing. It is your certainty and absolutism on matters that are in no way certain or absolute
That sounds like a swell, materialist solution, but it just kicks the can down the metaphysical road and creates more questions than it answers. What parts of the brain interact to create it? What is the subjective experience "made" of? Some kind of energy? How much complexity is required for it to emerge? Are there levels of consciousness? Are babies born with a consciousness that grows more robust over time, or does it pop in at some discrete level? Does the galaxy have an emergent consciousness, it's certainly more complex than the human brain. What about the universe?
Even if "it's an emergent property" is true, it's not a very useful answer. It's like saying babies come from the hospital, it skips over the part we're asking the question about.
Panpsychism is probably the most scientifically conservative explanation of consciousness. "Energy fields permeating the universe and interacting with each other" is the model scientists use to explain many, many phenomena, from electromagnetism to mass.
We don't have all the answers yet but we're making progress in finding them.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7597170/#:~:text=A%20crucial%20element%20in%20connectionists,as%20to%20sustain%20conscious%20experiences.
All the evidence so far seems to indicate that consciousness is a purely physical phenomenon .. despite the fact that it may not seem so to us
My favorite response for this is 'point to your mind.'
My mean response is 'notexecutive@shi.itjust.works is just a random user name with some words attached and no person actually exists behind it.'
Another response could be "A car is just some wheels and an engine."
Sure would be fun to watch someone try and drive some wheels and an engine.
The point of emerging systems is that they tend to be more than just a sum of their parts:
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gestalt
In One Piece the main characters name is Luffy.
https://onepiece.fandom.com/wiki/Episode_2
Do you need to be so needlessly rude?
Is 'your' interpretation of things the only one that exists?
No one's been rude though, I don't know what you're considering "rude" or "vile"
The default response I get most of the time I comment on things is along the lines of "You shouldn't have thoughts or opinions and because you shared them I'm going to get as many other users to attack you as possible."
Thought this might be different considering the context of this post, but here we are. You're getting downvoted as much as you are upvoted for pointing out that someone is trying to manipulate the context to attack me. No responses either because if they aren't actually bots they seem to have trouble coming up with any kind of understandable explanation for their behavior.
It's like being in traffic and getting flicked off by the person that cut you off... when there was no one behind you...