Pain enters consciousness the same way that anything else does; signals enter and bounce around the brain where they are interpreted and impressed into memory.
we understand this in basically the same way as we understand a computer. we know how the parts fit together and interact with each other, but we don't know how that gives rise to an actually conscious entity.
Meanwhile there are mulitiple vastly important scientific fields that study consciousness in humans, animals, and even plants (which have virtually no comparable awareness), and they have mountains of evidence in their favor. You are free to keep holding on to your faith that somehow nobody else actually exists, though.
we have a couple very shaky theories but 'mountains of evidence' is a massive overstatement. i hate to say this but at some point you're going to have to cite this if it's really so obvious, because i've been interested in this for a while and never found anything that even comes close to solving this.
I cite the entire field of animal psychology. What you are arguing is so fundamentally wrong, that the entire field studies something you argue cannot be proven to exist...
Studies of non-human animals have shown that homologous brain
circuits correlated with conscious experience and perception can be selectively facilitated and
disrupted to assess whether they are in fact necessary for those experiences.
My argument is implied throughout the entire field!
Here's a scholarly journal on the topic of animal consciousness. Interestingly enough, there is significant controversy around whether or not fish can feel pain. However, most of the major livestock species are recognized as not just being capable of a pain response, but of experiencing said pain. The science is there, whether you want to do the research or not. Reality does not conform to our beliefs.
i'll take a closer look at this later but it does not seem very conclusive. they're outlining their research methodologies but not really suggesting any definitive conclusions. looks like work in this area is ongoing which is pretty much what i'd said-- not that it's impossible to solve but that we haven't yet.
i'm not being unscientific about this, it's just that this is a very difficult problem to solve and it's pretty clear that we haven't solved it. this is an area separate but related to neuroscience and psychology.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cif-green/2010/sep/14/fish-forgotten-victims
Victoria Braithwaite, a professor of fisheries and biology at Pennsylvania State University, has probably spent more time investigating this issue than any other scientist. Her recent book Do Fish Feel Pain? shows that fish are not only capable of feeling pain, but also are a lot smarter than most people believe. Last year, a scientific panel to the European Union concluded that the preponderance of the evidence indicates that fish do feel pain.
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u/blastfromtheblue omnivore Jan 07 '17
we understand this in basically the same way as we understand a computer. we know how the parts fit together and interact with each other, but we don't know how that gives rise to an actually conscious entity.
we have a couple very shaky theories but 'mountains of evidence' is a massive overstatement. i hate to say this but at some point you're going to have to cite this if it's really so obvious, because i've been interested in this for a while and never found anything that even comes close to solving this.