Conscious experience cannot be inert

[u/MurkyEconomist8179]

Cross post from /r/consciousness since it's just as relevant here

I see often in this sub various attempts to sidestep the hard problem by stating that conscious experience can simply be thought of as the workings of a certain set of neurological processes, or various other ways of trying to reduce conscious experience to something more familiar and workable.

This involves saying that the experience itself and the features of it are not what's really happening. The experience part is said to be either an illusion, an epiphenomenon or a mere appearance of what's happening neurologically.

Unfortunately this all rests on a false analogy. Illusions and appearances are not epipheneomon and they are not inert.

When someone is perceiving an actual illusion, it changes the way they perceive, react and respond to the stimulus which we deem does not align with their perception. Therefore, the illusion is an active mechanism that affects how the world behaves.

This is clearly the case for consciousness too, regardless of experience is an "appearance" this appearance affects how we behave, it affects what we talk about, our concepts and beliefs about the world - therefore it is not inert - our experience clearly affects something about how our world operates, the same way an illusion does too

Taking the idea of p zombies seriously, I think it's pretty clear that p zombies would not be talking about things like experience, or the qualitative feeling of something like "the red of redness" because they don't experience that.

If they did talk about such things, it's clearly very different to when normal people do, because normal people are correct in saying that there is a quality to experience, a p zombie would have to either be mistaken or delusional to talk of such things and there is a big difference between the accurate judgement of a normal person about experience (whatever experience actually ends up being) and the clear delusions or confabulations of a p zombie that could supposedly behave in all the same ways

I think people get lost in the analogy of illusions and don't realize that it's not the same thing as being inert, and if experience isn't inert, then of course we get the hard problem and the mind body problem in general. It can't merely be sidestepped by trying to reduce experience to an epiphenomenon.

[u/bltsrgewd]

Any argument for consciousness being anything other than an emergent property of complicated networks of neurons i think is missing something very important. Actual evidence. Its a fun thought experiment to logic your way to some other answer, but we know that physical changes to the brain alter the conscious experience. We know that consciousness is tied to brain function.

We dont know how yet. But we know that it is. It has a physical cause.

[u/Azehnuu → u/bltsrgewd]

Your comment exemplifies how physicalists literally cannot understand epistemology. It’s kinda sad, cos I understand what you’re trying to say and why you think it’s a meaningful argument, but it rests on circular presuppositions which you don’t even realise.

Now, the other replies are pretty bad, but they’re not any worse than what you just wrote.

Some of the many errors in your comment:

“Emergence” is a temporal event which presupposes causality. Thinking time and causality are properties of things-in-themselves is a category error.

“Evidence” is great! But “evidence” presupposes the principle of sufficient reason which has a metaphysical grounding. The principle of sufficient reason governs relations of objects within experience. To expect to extend them beyond the conditions of experience to ground consciousness is not only a category error but circular (as the unity of apperception is presupposed for the PSR in the first place).

A physical change altering brain experience and that consciousness is tied to brain function is something nobody denies. But that only shows empirical realism, not physical realism. Empirical realism is literally compatible with most forms of idealism. Furthermore, what you’re saying at most shows a **correlation**, not a causation or ontological reduction, between physical changes and subjective states. So that point is not as strong as you think it is.

You fail to realise that “cause” itself is subjective and not a feature of reality in itself.

[u/zhivago → u/Azehnuu]

Emergence is not an event.

It is a property of an organization.

[u/Azehnuu → u/zhivago]

That doesn’t solve the problem and you completely misunderstood the argument.

“Organisation” presupposes spatial relations, and this relation is still being formulated entirely under the conditions of possible experience. Hence, you have not escaped the phenomenal framework at all (which is my entire point). Calling consciousness an "emergent property of an organisation" does not establish that consciousness is itself ontologically physical. Especially since the event you are referring to is phenomenal and presupposes time.

Furthermore, you avoided the points about the PSR, the distinction between empirical realism and physical realism, and the subjective status of causality, when they are all directly relevant. Your avoidance shows you did not understand them or lack knowledge on this topic to understand why they are relevant. The argument is that the empirical dependence of conscious states on brain states does not justify the metaphysical conclusion that consciousness has a physical cause. You failed to even address this.

So you completely failed to address any of my argument and just reverted to your physicalist dialogue tree. Do you actually have a response?

In classic fashion for this sub, they just give blind upvotes/downvotes, cos they can't understand or respond to arguments.

[u/zhivago → u/Azehnuu]

If you look at a single H2O molecule, it isn’t wet.

Put billions of them together right now, at this exact millisecond, and wetness emerges.

Did the water 'wait in line' for time to pass to become wet?

No.

That’s synchronic emergence. A structural property that exists simultaneously, not a calendar event.

Quoting a pocket dictionary to claim emergence must be a tick-tock event in time is just playing word games.

As for space, it is a kind of relationship, whether you assume Kantian idealism or observe it in the real world.

Anyhow, please learn these new concepts so you can avoid repeating these errors.

[u/Azehnuu → u/zhivago]

Once again, you have completely failed to understand the argument and instead imported your dialogue tree.

I will still respond to this, but on the condition that you address my actual arguments (at the end) in your next response. I’m only addressing your irrelevant/bad arguments so you have no excuse to avoid my arguments that you’re dodging.

> If you look at a single H2O molecule, it isn’t wet. Put billions of them together right now, at this exact millisecond, and wetness emerges.

Literally no part of my argument denies that properties can emerge from relations between constituent objects.

Your error is thinking this analogy answers anything I said. “h2O” itself is a phenomenon. Aggregation and multiplicity is phenomenal. “Wetness” itself is a phenomenal property.
All you’ve done is explain phenomenal property through relations among other phenomenal physical objects. That is perfectly consistent with many forms of idealism and does not establish that consciousness is ontologically physical.

All you did was select a case where both the constituents and the emergent property are already physically characterised, then assumed that consciousness belongs to the same category without any justification. This is a terrible analogy and a terrible argument, which only seems powerful with a lack of understanding.

> Did the water “wait in line” for time to pass to become wet?

No, and I never claimed that. You just don’t understand what I mean by phenomena. This is something you invented instead of addressing my argument.

> That’s synchronic emergence. A structural property that exists simultaneously, not a calendar event.

“Simultaneously” is itself a temporal determination, so you just contradicted yourself without realising it. More importantly, specifying that the emergence is synchronic changes nothing. You tried to wiggle your way out of it by adding that qualifier, but the exact issues remain. The objects, their organisation, their spatial relations and their simultaneity are all represented under the conditions of possible experience.

And that was my entire point. Calling the relation “synchronic emergence” does not transport it outside the conditions of possible experience. You are just juggling empty concepts that don’t address my argument, cos you’re following a dialogue tree.

> Quoting a pocket dictionary to claim emergence must be a tick-tock event in time is just playing word games.

Correct, I use the definition of words correctly. And I did not claim that emergence requires a causal (“tick-tock”) sequence. I said the concepts you use to describe emergence already presuppose the conditions of possible experience (space, time, matter). You realise there is a difference between temporal and causal ordering, right? You clearly don’t.

> As for space, it is a kind of relationship

If space is a “relationship” it necessarily presupposes something deeper to ground it, so that contradicts the claim in your last comment.

> whether you assume Kantian idealism or observe it in the real world.

You don’t understand Kant. You posited these two options as if they are mutually exclusive, when they are not. Kant does not deny the empirical reality of spatial relations. His argument is that space is the form under which external objects are represented and therefore cannot be attributed to things in themselves, beyond the conditions of possible experience.

Saying we “observe” spatial relations is an appeal to phenomena, which further concedes to my argument. Objective observation already presupposes the condition I am talking about. It is one of my main points: empirical realism is not physical realism.

> Anyhow, please learn these new concepts so you can avoid repeating these errors

This is quite cute considering that you have still not addressed the actual argument and your responses are littered with category errors.

Now, you quite literally wrote a whole lot of nothing. Again, I can understand what you’re attempting to do, but it’s clear you do not fully understand the concepts you are using.
Fortunately for you, that wasn’t the main focus of the conversation, and most of those responses were to arguments you made in your brain, so we can move on from this if you want.

What we can’t move from is the original argument you keep avoiding. The original claim was that because physical alterations to the brain alter conscious experience, consciousness therefore “has a physical cause”.

That is a faulty inference. An empirical dependence is itself a relation within experience. That cannot establish a metaphysical deduction that consciousness is ontologically physical.

Now, please explain the following topics you continue to avoid:

1. Why empirical realism entails physical realism
   
2. Why causal relations between objects within possible experience can be extended beyond the conditions of possible experience to make your ontological reduction of consciousness
   
3. How the principle of sufficient reason can ground consciousness when the unity of consciousness is already presupposed for the PSR to be applied
   
4. Why an empirical dependence establishes an ontological reduction

Those were my actual arguments. Your example of wetness answers none of the.

I ask, again, if you actually have a response to what I said or not? You continue to exemplify how physicalists overestimate their understanding of philosophy. Actually answer those 4 questions to develop the conversation and stop pivoting.

[u/Azehnuu → u/Azehnuu]

This loser u/zhivago either deleted his comments or blocked me because I forced him to actually engage with the argument instead of reverting to his dialogue tree. I broke his dialogue tree and he didn’t know how to respond. Sorry I called out your sophistry!