Please explain the "TV set" model of the brain [Archive] - Page 2

Interesting Ian

27th July 2005, 04:01 PM

Originally posted by BillHoyt
You've driven directly into the cold, dark heart of the dualist feint. This spirit-stuff is absolutely undetectable. It ain't there. We can demonstrate our ability to fool it, make it go away utterly (at least on the OR table), delude it, make it goofy, uplift its "spirits" or dampen them into the deepest despair. It has no effects, yet it runs the show. It shows no power, yet it runs the show. It leaves no traces yet we can lead it around by its nose.

It is so fantastically weak that we will never ever ever detect it. It is nothing but a lame ideation. It is an idea whose time has yawned.

dawned not yawned.

Yup spirits are absolutely undetectable, as are souls, as are selves, as are consciousnesses. Yet we know at least consciousness exists beyond any shadow of a doubt.

Time for a rethink methinks.

Interesting Ian

27th July 2005, 04:05 PM

Originally posted by aggle-rithm
Pretty much what I thought. There were also a couple of places where he said "science", but it would be more accurate to say "physics". The properties of an object might be completely different depending on the science...like if the table were being analyzed according to the science of anthropology.

You don't want to accept reductive science, then fine. That makes things rather weird. What this means is there are things which cannot in principle be explained by the arrangements and properties of their component parts.

Are you sure you wish to maintain this?

Robin

27th July 2005, 04:44 PM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
The fact that something is affected by the physical does not entail that it is physical itself.
No, it doesn't, which is why I said "So either consciousness is physical or your analogy is a non starter". Do you not understand the meaning of the word "or"?

As a way of thinking about dualism the TV set analogy is not even a useful starting point because we already know that the interconnection between consciousness and the physical is intimate and two way.
Robin: It is unfair to stretch an analogy too far, but to me my emotions are more part of the storyline of my life than the picture quality.

Interesting Ian: I know this is what all materialists believe, and you and they should know I disagree.
Many more than materialists believe this - I can assure you of this. I can't believe that you are arguing that emotions are mere picture quality caused by the interaction with the physical. No love in the next life then!
For me it is absurd to say that I literally am not the same self simply because my mood may happen to change from one minute to the next. Let's say I hear some good news (I have won Â£10,000 or something). I immediately become more cheerful. I really do not see how that necessarily entails I have literally ceased to exist to be replaced by someone else!!!
Did I say this, or anything even remotely like it???? No of course I didn't. I said that emotions were more part of the storyline of my life than the picture quality. You were comparing emotional changes to noise on a television picture - that makes you more the materialist than me.

When people meet and fall in love - they don't literally become someone else, but they are fundamentally affected by it. When a parent holds their baby for the first time the feeling they have is more than physical interference on their consciousness - it is the very plot of their live. If that were not the key, the important part of life, then life would indeed be meaningless.
If some existent is wholly causally inert i.e does not have any impact on the environment whatsoever, how would scientists ever know of its existence in the first place??
Or how, for that matter, would you? If something was unable to be observed then you would never have heard of it and we wouldn't be talking about it. But "outside cause and effect" is not the same as "wholly causally inert".

Nevertheless this merely strengthens the next part of my post (which you did not address). You say the experience of redness has no causal role to play, but the mere fact that we are talking about it (and your point above) contradicts you. The experience of anything does have an important causal role to play as I clearly demonstrated.
Read my post in the blue font!!
Proof positive you don't read the posts properly. You don't even read the part you quote back. You are responding here to a post where I quote from your blue section and respond to it. Read the response properly!!!

P.S.A.

27th July 2005, 05:13 PM

I'm telling you, you MUST believe this!!

Why don't you understand why I'm special?!

Read the text in blue, you stupid people!!

You don't even understand your own philosophy!!

:mad:

I don't need to know how light wave length works to know the mind is like a television set!!

I can't believe how stupid sKeptics are!!

:eek:

!!

?!

??

I've always been different from other people, no one has ever understood me...

:alc:

:mad: Stupid sKeptics!! Stupidist people in the world!! :brk:

:what:

http://forums.relicnews.com/images/smiley/icon_banned.gif

I'm sorry... I don't mean to be rude, but you provoked me so much. :(

Now, I want to discuss materialism here.

I'm telling you, you MUST believe this!!

Why don't you understand why I'm special?!

Read the text in blue, you stupid people!!

:bricks:

*URK!*

http://forums.relicnews.com/images/smiley/tombstone.gif

And then there was nothing.

The End.

Robin

27th July 2005, 05:21 PM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
You don't want to accept reductive science, then fine. That makes things rather weird. What this means is there are things which cannot in principle be explained by the arrangements and properties of their component parts.

Are you sure you wish to maintain this?
I don't think that is what he is saying.

But suppose there really was a case where it could be demonstrated that something existed that could not be explained, even in principle, by the arrangements and properties of it's component parts.

Now you would say that science would either ignore it or try to pretend that it was otherwise. You call this reductive science.

Whereas in reality, if that really was the case, then science would say that was the case.

Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

27th July 2005, 05:43 PM

Ian said:
I need demonstrate no such thing [that we know all the causal properties of rocks and everything else save human consciousness]! You've understood nothing have you Paul, as per usual.
So how do you know that rocks aren't conscious?

I've already shown this [that human consciousness cannot be explained by scientific theory, even in principle]. Read my post with the blue font!
I see nothing whatsoever about consciousness in the blue text. Do I need to read the black text below it, too?

Now you're sayinbg that the quale redness has causal power. OK I agree. Now lets designate physical events by lower case letters, and the quale redness by Q and cause and effect by >

So when we see redness there are particular events occurring in the environment including ones brain. What we have is

a > b > c > d > Q > e > f > g > h etc
Q is a property, while the lowercase letters are events. It makes no sense to connect a property and events with a cause/effect operator.

~~ Paul

aggle-rithm

27th July 2005, 06:11 PM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
You don't want to accept reductive science, then fine. That makes things rather weird. What this means is there are things which cannot in principle be explained by the arrangements and properties of their component parts.

I don't think any branch of science denies the existence of emergent properties. These can't presently be explained by arrangements and properties of component parts, and maybe they can never be (especially that emergent property called consciousness). This doesn't change the fact that they are a consequence of physical realities (or anyway, that's the most reasonable explanation for their existence).

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
Are you sure you wish to maintain this?

Am I sure I wish to maintain the conclusion you came to, based on what I said? No.

Robin

27th July 2005, 07:01 PM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
dawned not yawned.

Yup spirits are absolutely undetectable, as are souls, as are selves, as are consciousnesses. Yet we know at least consciousness exists beyond any shadow of a doubt.

Time for a rethink methinks.
Speak for yourself, I am observing my own consciousness all the time. If it were undetectable I wouldn't be able to do that. I wouldn't be able to observe anything.

Interesting Ian

28th July 2005, 04:17 AM

Originally posted by Robin
Speak for yourself, I am observing my own consciousness all the time. If it were undetectable I wouldn't be able to do that. I wouldn't be able to observe anything.

You do not sense your own consciousness through your 5 senses. To observe something implies an ontic distance between the observer and the observed. This is not the case with ones own consciousness.

Robin

28th July 2005, 06:24 AM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
You do not sense your own consciousness through your 5 senses. To observe something implies an ontic distance between the observer and the observed. This is not the case with ones own consciousness.
Can't find anything in any definition to imply that observation requires senses or distance. Certainly there are special problems observing the thing that is doing the observing.

There are very few things in science that are observed directly with our senses. We can certainly observe (or enquire into, examine or inspect) consciousness.

Measuring, now that is another matter entirely.

Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

28th July 2005, 06:30 AM

Ian said:
You do not sense your own consciousness through your 5 senses. To observe something implies an ontic distance between the observer and the observed. This is not the case with ones own consciousness.
This is nothing more than fooling around with the word observe. Is my sense of balance a process of observation or not?

People with hemineglect pay no attention to things on the left side of their field of vision. They are not conscious of those things. Sounds like sense and consciousness are deeply intertwined.

~~ Paul

Interesting Ian

28th July 2005, 07:40 AM

Originally posted by Robin
Can't find anything in any definition to imply that observation requires senses or distance. Certainly there are special problems observing the thing that is doing the observing.

There are very few things in science that are observed directly with our senses. We can certainly observe (or enquire into, examine or inspect) consciousness.

Measuring, now that is another matter entirely.

You "observe" your own consciousness? Well you can use what word you like, but you do not detect it through your 5 senses. We detect everything else through our 5 senses. Tables, electrons, superstrings, the space-time continuum . .you name it. Consciousness is the ONLY exception. Of course superstrings are only indirectly observed (if they exist at all), but then so is everything else including objects of our everyday acquaintance (except consciousness).

I reject the direct/indirect dichotomy in observing. Everything, absolutely everything apart from consciousness is theory.

Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

28th July 2005, 09:53 AM

Ian said:
You "observe" your own consciousness? Well you can use what word you like, but you do not detect it through your 5 senses. We detect everything else through our 5 senses. Tables, electrons, superstrings, the space-time continuum. .you name it.
We do not keep our balance using the five senses. We do not know the position of our body using the five senses. We do not sense pain using the five senses. And that's just humans.

Consciousness is the ONLY exception.
Apparently not.

~~ Paul

Tricky

28th July 2005, 10:10 AM

Originally posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos
We do not keep our balance using the five senses. We do not know the position of our body using the five senses. We do not sense pain using the five senses. And that's just humans.

Indeed. I believe that I have read that we have many more than five senses, and that even the "classic five" can be subdivided many times ("tactile sense of touch" versus "the ability to feel pain")

So Ian, would it be fair to say that your claim is that we are aware of our consciousness without any input from our neurological system?

Now I'm "detecting" that I'm a bit peckish. Which one of the five senses is responsible for that?

aggle-rithm

28th July 2005, 10:13 AM

Originally posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos
We do not keep our balance using the five senses. We do not know the position of our body using the five senses. We do not sense pain using the five senses. And that's just humans.

~~ Paul

The sixth sense -- proprioception -- tells us the position of different body parts and helps us balance. Oliver Sacks told the story of an unfortunate woman who lost her sense of proprioception and was rendered severely disabled.

This sense is lost somewhat when we are drunk; hence the drunk test where we are required to touch our own nose without looking.

aggle-rithm

28th July 2005, 10:24 AM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
You do not sense your own consciousness through your 5 senses. To observe something implies an ontic distance between the observer and the observed. This is not the case with ones own consciousness.

Actually, we have every reason to believe that our five senses are PART of consciousness. It is the sum total of all brain function, including senses, that makes up a conscious mind.

How do I know this? It is well documented that when someone loses a sense (or a limb, or anything else), the person's consciousness, the sense of "self", is disrupted and needs to be put back together. In fact, Richard Restak wrote about a man who was given sight after having been blind since infancy. This new, ADDITIONAL sense completely destroyed his confidence, leaving him more disabled than before. This new sense forced him to reconstruct his sense of self, and he wasn't up to it.

It doesn't make sense that the addition or subtraction of a sense would disrupt a person's consciousness if it were merely an external mechanism.

aggle-rithm

28th July 2005, 10:26 AM

Originally posted by Tricky
Now I'm "detecting" that I'm a bit peckish. Which one of the five senses is responsible for that?

Cool! Just like the psychic girl on "Team America, World Police".

As her plane was crashing, she said, "I sense that I'm going down..."

Interesting Ian

28th July 2005, 10:47 AM

Originally posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos
We do not keep our balance using the five senses. We do not know the position of our body using the five senses. We do not sense pain using the five senses. And that's just humans.

~~ Paul

I'm talking about senses as in sensory perceptions. That which reveals the external world.

How obvious do I need to be??

Interesting Ian

28th July 2005, 10:53 AM

Originally posted by aggle-rithm
[B]Actually, we have every reason to believe that our five senses are PART of consciousness. It is the sum total of all brain function, including senses, that makes up a conscious mind.

How do I know this? It is well documented that when someone loses a sense (or a limb, or anything else), the person's consciousness, the sense of "self", is disrupted and needs to be put back together. In fact, Richard Restak wrote about a man who was given sight after having been blind since infancy. This new, ADDITIONAL sense completely destroyed his confidence, leaving him more disabled than before. This new sense forced him to reconstruct his sense of self, and he wasn't up to it.

It doesn't make sense that the addition or subtraction of a sense would disrupt a person's consciousness if it were merely an external mechanism.

Of course it would leave him completely confused. But all he need do is close his eyes and he would be able to negotiate the environment as effectively as before!

Sheesh!

I don't understand what you're talking about by "sense of self". If you're suggesting that he has ceased to exist to be replaced by another self then I would simply ask if he agrees that this has happened.

Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

28th July 2005, 01:23 PM

Ian said:
I'm talking about senses as in sensory perceptions. That which reveals the external world.

How obvious do I need to be??
More obvious, because you said:
You "observe" your own consciousness? Well you can use what word you like, but you do not detect it through your 5 senses. We detect everything [bold underline blah blah] else through our 5 senses.
We can agree that some things are truly external, such as the sunset. We can agree that some things seem quite internal, such as the feeling of love. But there's this murky middle ground. Is keeping your balance a question of observing the external world or is it a question of internal awareness? The answer is both. Then there are things that appear to involve the external senses, but are in fact internal, such as hemineglect.

You've drawn a simplistic line so consciousness can be special. It doesn't work. You really should read some books, if not to learn any science, at least to have more data points to check against your model of reality. Who knows, maybe you could even make your model work. As it stands, no one cares, because you don't know anything about the special human cases.

Of course it would leave him completely confused. But all he need do is close his eyes and he would be able to negotiate the environment as effectively as before! Sheesh!
Oh yes, I'm sure the fellow's sense of self was merely a question of bumping into walls, or not.

I don't understand what you're talking about by "sense of self". If you're suggesting that he has ceased to exist to be replaced by another self then I would simply ask if he agrees that this has happened.
His answer would have nothing to do with what you think the question asks, unless he happens to have the same definition of "sense of self" as you, which I very much doubt.

~~ Paul

Interesting Ian

28th July 2005, 02:01 PM

I've had enough of the concrete blocks responding in this thread. There's absolutely no point in any further contributions on my part since people on here are incapable of understanding the most simple philosophy possible.

Robin

28th July 2005, 02:52 PM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
I've had enough of the concrete blocks responding in this thread. There's absolutely no point in any further contributions on my part since people on here are incapable of understanding the most simple philosophy possible.
Just keep on believing that.

aggle-rithm

28th July 2005, 03:06 PM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
Of course it would leave him completely confused. But all he need do is close his eyes and he would be able to negotiate the environment as effectively as before!

Sheesh!

I don't understand what you're talking about by "sense of self". If you're suggesting that he has ceased to exist to be replaced by another self then I would simply ask if he agrees that this has happened.

Well, if he were still alive, you could tell him how wrong he was to be devastated by such a radical change in his life. I'm sure no one else, in the years of medical followup, thought to tell him that all he had to do was to close his eyes.

Too bad he didn't have you around to set him straight.

Interesting Ian

28th July 2005, 03:54 PM

Originally posted by aggle-rithm
Well, if he were still alive, you could tell him how wrong he was to be devastated by such a radical change in his life. I'm sure no one else, in the years of medical followup, thought to tell him that all he had to do was to close his eyes.

Too bad he didn't have you around to set him straight.

But surely he must have been advised, that although he might have perfect vision, he still wouldn't initially be able to see?? :eek:

It doesn't require our experience in giving vision to people for the very first time to strongly suspect that this would happen. At least not for people who actually learn to think :rolleyes: Philosophers centuries ago speculated that precisely that sort of thing would happen. Berkeley for example argued that a man blind from birth, and having his vision given to him for the very first time, would not be able to say which of 2 objects was a sphere and which a cube by sight alone, even though he could unhestitatingly identify them by touch.

Everything we see is a implicit theory that the mind invents. We don't literally see a 3D world, rather it is a construct of the mind. Everything we see is theory, even tables, and chairs and trees and ones own body.

I'm being perfectly serious about not using his eyes initially. Indeed I don't see how he possibly could! :eek: It would just completely confuse him and he wouldn't be able to negoiate the environment as effectively as when he didn't have any vision. He needs to get used to it. Try exploring a computer game environment and learn that objects get bigger as one approaches them etc etc etc. Eventually he would learn to see but it takes time.

Absolutely no need for him to be devastated! It just takes some philosophical thought and he would have realised that he wouldn't be able to see initially! But was he not informed that he still wouldn't be able to see i.e make sense of his visionary qualia?? :confused:

Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

28th July 2005, 03:57 PM

Ian said:
I've had enough of the concrete blocks responding in this thread. There's absolutely no point in any further contributions on my part since people on here are incapable of understanding the most simple philosophy possible.
If you could just explain what you mean relative to proprioception, we might be enlightened.

~~ Paul

Lord Muck oGentry

28th July 2005, 05:35 PM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
We don't literally see a 3D world
[/B]

Unless you have a part-whole fallacy in mind, or perhaps some things that haven't got depth ( such as after-images), we do see a 3-D world. In particular, medium-size dry goods have height, breadth and depth. If you prefer the point in the patter of philosophers:see is a success-word. We see what is there to be seen, and not what is not, whatever we may think.
As for your use of literally , words fail me. What do you think it means?

Regards

Edited to correct "length" to "height".

Tricky

28th July 2005, 06:40 PM

Originally posted by aggle-rithm
In fact, Richard Restak wrote about a man who was given sight after having been blind since infancy. This new, ADDITIONAL sense completely destroyed his confidence, leaving him more disabled than before. This new sense forced him to reconstruct his sense of self, and he wasn't up to it.
This raises an interesting question. If Ian had an operation that gave his brain full functionality, would he find it to be wonderful, or scary? After living so long in a two-dimensional world, would the sudden awareness that he was capable of error destroy his confidence? Indeed can the sense of being fallible be one of the things that makes us fully conscious? And lacking that, is Ian actually clinically unconscious, in spite of his possession of limited perception?

aggle-rithm

28th July 2005, 07:06 PM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
But surely he must have been advised, that although he might have perfect vision, he still wouldn't initially be able to see?? :eek:

It doesn't require our experience in giving vision to people for the very first time to strongly suspect that this would happen. At least not for people who actually learn to think :rolleyes: Philosophers centuries ago speculated that precisely that sort of thing would happen. Berkeley for example argued that a man blind from birth, and having his vision given to him for the very first time, would not be able to say which of 2 objects was a sphere and which a cube by sight alone, even though he could unhestitatingly identify them by touch.

Everything we see is a implicit theory that the mind invents. We don't literally see a 3D world, rather it is a construct of the mind. Everything we see is theory, even tables, and chairs and trees and ones own body.

I'm being perfectly serious about not using his eyes initially. Indeed I don't see how he possibly could! :eek: It would just completely confuse him and he wouldn't be able to negoiate the environment as effectively as when he didn't have any vision. He needs to get used to it. Try exploring a computer game environment and learn that objects get bigger as one approaches them etc etc etc. Eventually he would learn to see but it takes time.

Absolutely no need for him to be devastated! It just takes some philosophical thought and he would have realised that he wouldn't be able to see initially! But was he not informed that he still wouldn't be able to see i.e make sense of his visionary qualia?? :confused:

I'm sorry, but your arrogance is infuriating. We're talking about a person who suffered greatly, and died in a deep depression. When he was blind, he was adventurous and outgoing. After he gained his sight, he took some time to get used to things such as height, distance, and perspective -- but that wasn't the problem. The problem was that he wasn't able to integrate his newfound vision into his other senses. Once he had gained his vision, something he had dreamed about all his life, he was ultimately disappointed in everything he saw. The world became a drab and ugly place to him, and he became a recluse, hiding in his darkened house.

Do you seriously believe that you, through philisophical introspection, can gain a deeper insight into this man's experience than HE HIMSELF DID? Do you believe that someone suffering from a mental illness (depression, in this case) can just think himself out of it?

If I sound angry, it's because I am. Your superior attitude makes light of this unfortunate man's suffering, a suffering neither you or I or anyone else who hasn't gone through it could possibly understand. You apparently believe that you are somehow "above" suffering by virtue of your superior intellect, and can therefore exclaim hautily that he "shouldn't" have gone through what he did.

Restak said that this story is deeply disturbing because of the harsh light it shines on cherished illusions. One such illusion is the belief that giving a blind man his sight is the height of altruism, and that nothing but good can come of it. He went on to say that the real world has a way of refuting our medical or religious preconceptions.

And, in your case, philisophical ones.

By the way, I think you mean Locke, not Berkeley.

Robin

28th July 2005, 07:13 PM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
Everything we see is a implicit theory that the mind invents. We don't literally see a 3D world, rather it is a construct of the mind. Everything we see is theory, even tables, and chairs and trees and ones own body.

So why do you assert this false division between observing our own consciousness and observing sense data.

Interesting Ian

29th July 2005, 04:24 AM

Originally posted by Lord Muck oGentry
Unless you have a part-whole fallacy in mind, or perhaps some things that haven't got depth ( such as after-images), we do see a 3-D world. In particular, medium-size dry goods have height, breadth and depth. If you prefer the point in the patter of philosophers:see is a success-word. We see what is there to be seen, and not what is not, whatever we may think.
As for your use of literally , words fail me. What do you think it means?

Regards

Edited to correct "length" to "height".

No we don't. What is it about our visual qualia that connotes depth? We learn to see in 3D by noticing the patterns in our visual and tactile qualia.

Interesting Ian

29th July 2005, 04:52 AM

Originally posted by aggle-rithm
I'm sorry, but your arrogance is infuriating. We're talking about a person who suffered greatly, and died in a deep depression. When he was blind, he was adventurous and outgoing. After he gained his sight, he took some time to get used to things such as height, distance, and perspective -- but that wasn't the problem. The problem was that he wasn't able to integrate his newfound vision into his other senses. Once he had gained his vision, something he had dreamed about all his life, he was ultimately disappointed in everything he saw. The world became a drab and ugly place to him, and he became a recluse, hiding in his darkened house.

Do you seriously believe that you, through philisophical introspection, can gain a deeper insight into this man's experience than HE HIMSELF DID? Do you believe that someone suffering from a mental illness (depression, in this case) can just think himself out of it?

If I sound angry, it's because I am. Your superior attitude makes light of this unfortunate man's suffering, a suffering neither you or I or anyone else who hasn't gone through it could possibly understand. You apparently believe that you are somehow "above" suffering by virtue of your superior intellect, and can therefore exclaim hautily that he "shouldn't" have gone through what he did.

Restak said that this story is deeply disturbing because of the harsh light it shines on cherished illusions. One such illusion is the belief that giving a blind man his sight is the height of altruism, and that nothing but good can come of it. He went on to say that the real world has a way of refuting our medical or religious preconceptions.

And, in your case, philisophical ones.

By the way, I think you mean Locke, not Berkeley. [/B]

Locke speculated on that question too.

You haven't answered my question of why he was not informed that he still would not be able to see despite perfect vision. Be angry with the people who didn't tell him, not me. I would have told him, although if he were anything like you lot I wouldn't have been believed.

Why he was not informed that he still would not be able to see despite perfect vision???

Yup, he wouldn't be able to integrate his tactile and visual qualia because they are heterogenous. There is nothing about the appearance of a table per se which gives you a clue about its distance away from you.

Why he was not informed that he still would not be able to see despite perfect vision???

Do you seriously believe that you, through philisophical introspection, can gain a deeper insight into this man's experience than HE HIMSELF DID? Do you believe that someone suffering from a mental illness (depression, in this case) can just think himself out of it?

No, and I never realised he was suffering or was depressed, although I guessed he would be. But he wouldn't have been if he had of been bloody told that he still wouldn't be able to see!

One cannot just think oneself out of depression. But even afterwards, if it were explained to him exactly why he still couldn't see I guess that would help. But he was still depressed? (I mean I assume it was explained to him??)

Anyway, there's no purpose in being angry with me. It's not me you should be angry with.

Restak said that this story is deeply disturbing because of the harsh light it shines on cherished illusions. One such illusion is the belief that giving a blind man his sight is the height of altruism, and that nothing but good can come of it. He went on to say that the real world has a way of refuting our medical or religious preconceptions.

If anyone had a medical preconception that this guy would be able to see on getting his vision, then they are as f****** stupid as all you guys!

Jesus! I just don't believe this!! :eek: Are you seriously telling me that people were stupid enough to believe that he would be able to see perfectly?? (I'm therefore guessing it was the first case of its type).

Don't be angry with me, be angry at them.

Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

29th July 2005, 06:31 AM

Did I miss something? Where was it said that this fellow couldn't see?

Ian said:
No we don't. What is it about our visual qualia that connotes depth?
The differences between the images from our two eyes.

We learn to see in 3D by noticing the patterns in our visual and tactile qualia.
Right, so why did you ask the previous question?

~~ Paul

Interesting Ian

29th July 2005, 06:43 AM

Originally posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos
[B]Did I miss something? Where was it said that this fellow couldn't see?

aggle-rithm said, but it's obvious that he wouldn't be able to in any case! :eek: How on earth could he? Are you daft? Stupid question!

The differences between the images from our two eyes.

Sorry I should have asked "What is it about our visual qualia per se that connotes depth?

The differences in visual qualia from our 2 eyes allows us to see in 3D only because we've learnt how to interpret the 2 slightly differing qualia.

Interesting Ian

29th July 2005, 06:44 AM

BTW to "see" means to make visual sense of your environment. Just because one has perfect vision does not mean they can see.

Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

29th July 2005, 06:51 AM

Ian said:
aggle-rithm said, but it's obvious that he wouldn't be able to in any case! How on earth could he? Are you daft? Stupid question!
I'm sorry, where did Aggle-rithm say that?

Sorry I should have asked "What is it about our visual qualia per se that connotes depth?

The differences in visual qualia from our 2 eyes allows us to see in 3D only because we've learnt how to interpret the 2 slightly differing qualia.
What does per se mean here? Does it mean intrinsically?

Say Ian, what about proprioception?

~~ Paul

BillHoyt

29th July 2005, 08:17 AM

Originally posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos
Crap! Now I have to update my TAM2 t-shirt.

~~ Paul

Have Mrs. A. create a TAM4 t-shirt.

BillHoyt

29th July 2005, 08:26 AM

Originally posted by Robin
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by Interesting Ian
dawned not yawned.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Awww, he didn't get the joke. Didn't get the point either. :(

Lord Muck oGentry

29th July 2005, 11:06 AM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
No we don't. What is it about our visual qualia that connotes depth? We learn to see in 3D by noticing the patterns in our visual and tactile qualia.

At the risk of starting the pantomime season early: Oh, yes, we do!
We don't withdraw the claim to have seen the cat on the mat because its tail was curled out of sight or the underside of the mat was hidden from us. And if your definition of see suggests otherwise, you're not using the word in its humdrum sense. Cats and mats have three dimensions; we see cats and mats; we see things that have three dimensions. Literally.... if you like.
I'm sorry to say that I can't answer the question about qualia as I've never come across a credible translation of qualia-talk into Humdrum.

Regards

aggle-rithm

29th July 2005, 06:36 PM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
Locke speculated on that question too.

You haven't answered my question of why he was not informed that he still would not be able to see despite perfect vision.

He also wasn't informed that purple frogs would fly out of his butt. Why would he be?!?

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
Why he was not informed that he still would not be able to see despite perfect vision???

Because they didn't know! No one knew! Philosophers and doctors had speculated, but it was not testable until this instance. Anyone who believed they did know would have to be insufferably arrogant.

This is what science is for. Science is the art of saying: "I don't know. Let's find out!"

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
One cannot just think oneself out of depression. But even afterwards, if it were explained to him exactly why he still couldn't see I guess that would help.

Your guess is wrong. Cognitive studies have refuted the common belief that insight into the cause of depression helps to alleviate it. It doesn't.

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
Jesus! I just don't believe this!! :eek: Are you seriously telling me that people were stupid enough to believe that he would be able to see perfectly??

I doubt anyone thought he would see perfectly. No one was surprised that he had difficulty with perception and other aspects of sight. What makes the case interesting (apart from the psychological issues) is that the specific difficulties he had yielded important information about how the brain works. Even several years after his sight was restored, he couldn't make head or tail out of an unfamiliar object until he had first closed his eyes and felt it with his hands. Also, his drawings, which became quite good after he had become accustomed to vision, were often missing pieces of objects -- such as the radiator grill on a bus -- that he was not likely to have placed his hands on when he was blind.

This is what gave scientists the first clues that a bliind person will use the visual parts of the brain to process information from other senses, since it is not receiving input from the eyes. Thus, the subject's vision remained tied to his sense of touch when his sight was restored.

This leads me back to my original argument, that senses are not a means for consciousness to access the world, they are PART of consciousness. To fiddle with the senses is to fiddle with the self.

Interesting Ian

30th July 2005, 04:35 AM

Originally posted by aggle-rithm
Originally posted by Interesting Ian
Why he was not informed that he still would not be able to see despite perfect vision???

aggle-rithm
Because they didn't know! No one knew! Philosophers and doctors had speculated, but it was not testable until this instance. Anyone who believed they did know would have to be insufferably arrogant.

Well, it would have been extremely surprising if he could have seen perfectly. They don't need to know, they merely need to have said that it's very likely that he still wouldn't be able to see (my definition of see).

This is what science is for. Science is the art of saying: "I don't know. Let's find out!"

And if it tells you things contrary to what you believe, then simply ignore it! That's the approach of so-called "skeptics" throughout history.

:Originally posted by Interesting Ian
One cannot just think oneself out of depression. But even afterwards, if it were explained to him exactly why he still couldn't see I guess that would help.

aggle-rithm
Your guess is wrong. Cognitive studies have refuted the common belief that insight into the cause of depression helps to alleviate it. It doesn't.

Non-sequitur. We already know why he was depressed; namely because he expected to be able to see with perfect vision, but he couldn't. Howver, if he had of realised that eventually he would be able to see that may have alleviated or stopped his depression.

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
Jesus! I just don't believe this!! Are you seriously telling me that people were stupid enough to believe that he would be able to see perfectly??

aggle-rithm
I doubt anyone thought he would see perfectly. No one was surprised that he had difficulty with perception and other aspects of sight. What makes the case interesting (apart from the psychological issues) is that the specific difficulties he had yielded important information about how the brain works.

How the brain works??? What ARE you babbling on about now??? :rolleyes:

This leads me back to my original argument, that senses are not a means for consciousness to access the world, they are PART of consciousness. To fiddle with the senses is to fiddle with the self.

They are a part of consciousness, but they are emphatically not a part of the self! How can the table I see now actually literally be part of my self??? :rolleyes:

aggle-rithm

30th July 2005, 06:25 AM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
Well, it would have been extremely surprising if he could have seen perfectly. They don't need to know, they merely need to have said that it's very likely that he still wouldn't be able to see (my definition of see).

You're assuming they didn't. You also seem to be assuming that his psychological problems were caused by his belief that he would be able to see perfectly.

Originally posted by Interesting Ian

And if it tells you things contrary to what you believe, then simply ignore it! That's the approach of so-called "skeptics" throughout history.

I think what you mean is if it is not consistent with what has already been learned by science, then it is likely that it is not telling you what you think it is telling you.

Originally posted by Interesting Ian

Non-sequitur. We already know why he was depressed; namely because he expected to be able to see with perfect vision, but he couldn't. Howver, if he had of realised that eventually he would be able to see that may have alleviated or stopped his depression.

How do you know?

Originally posted by Interesting Ian

How the brain works??? What ARE you babbling on about now??? :rolleyes:

Which part did you not understand? "How"? "Brain"? "Works"?

Examination of the patient demonstrated that the brain need not operate in the normal, fluent choreography that we are accustomed to. The ubiquitous integration of the senses into a worldview is not a given -- we have to learn how to integrate them. This is not something we can simply assume, it was demonstrated in the case of this unfortunate patient.

Originally posted by Interesting Ian

They are a part of consciousness, but they are emphatically not a part of the self!

We clearly have different definitions of consciousness and the self. In my view, consciousness IS the self -- or rather, the self is a construct that represents consciousness. Consciousness, as an emergent property of the brain, is something that is greater than the sum of its parts; that is, the firing of individual neurons.

Originally posted by Interesting Ian

How can the table I see now actually literally be part of my self??? :rolleyes:

I don't know. It's your strawman, not mine.

This argument is interesting because the book I'm getting my information from, The Brain by Richard Restak, was very influential to me when I first read it twenty-odd years ago. At the time I believed in dualism every bit as much as you do, but my beliefs were difficult to reconcile with what science was continually learning about the relationship between the brain and consciousness.

Maybe before dismissing the wealth of knowledge that has been gained on consciousness in the last century, you should do some studying. If your position is as rock-solid as you believe it is, then you should have no problem integrating this knowledge with your current belief system. You might also be able to teach us a thing or two.

DavoMan

30th July 2005, 11:31 AM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian

And if it tells you things contrary to what you believe, then simply ignore it! That's the approach of so-called "skeptics" throughout history.
I haven't been following this thread much but that sentence is the most f*cking retarded thing Ive seen in a while.

Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

30th July 2005, 05:44 PM

Ian said:
Well, it would have been extremely surprising if he could have seen perfectly. They don't need to know, they merely need to have said that it's very likely that he still wouldn't be able to see (my definition of see).
Ah, no wonder I haven't been able to follow this thread ever since we started talking about aggle-rithm's blind fellow. Some of us are using different definitions of see.

Aggle said:
Maybe before dismissing the wealth of knowledge that has been gained on consciousness in the last century, you should do some studying. If your position is as rock-solid as you believe it is, then you should have no problem integrating this knowledge with your current belief system. You might also be able to teach us a thing or two.
Hear, hear! Test your model of reality against . . . reality.

~~ Paul

DavoMan

31st July 2005, 02:30 PM

I think someone's idea of reality is still in beta stage :D

Robin

31st July 2005, 04:53 PM

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
Well, it would have been extremely surprising if he could have seen perfectly. They don't need to know, they merely need to have said that it's very likely that he still wouldn't be able to see (my definition of see).
I have friends whose son was born with correctable blindness. They were told that the operation was urgent since if the baby did not see in the first crucial months he would never learn to see, even though the eye problem was corrected.

I don't remember the case being discussed here well, but it would appear that if the man saw at all then he must have been sighted in infancy and lost his eyesight at a very young age. In which case learning to see would not have been too much of a problem.

So Berkeley's insight, clever as it was, may have been wrong.
Non-sequitur. We already know why he was depressed; namely because he expected to be able to see with perfect vision, but he couldn't. Howver, if he had of realised that eventually he would be able to see that may have alleviated or stopped his depression.
We don't really know anything of the sort, if what the doctors told my friends was correct the neural component of learning to see cannot form in adulthood so the man must have had this already in which case re-learning to see would have been more straightforward. And as already pointed out it is highly unlikely that he would have undergone an operation of this type without being advised in detail beforehand about post-operative rehabilitation procedures.

The problem is that we need a link to a description of the actual case.
They are a part of consciousness, but they are emphatically not a part of the self! How can the table I see now actually literally be part of my self???
If A is part of B and B is part of C, then it follows that A is part of C.

If the senses are part of consciousness and consciousness is part of the self, then the senses must be a part of the self, or are you arguing that the consciousness is not part of the self?

So the sense of a table is certainly part of the self, even if an infinitessimal, unimportant part for most of us. I know a furniture maker whose life was fundamentally changed by a chair and who certainly believes that furniture is one of the most important parts of who he is (He could throw together a chair with scrapwood and nails and it would be the most comfortable chair you ever sat in).

Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

31st July 2005, 05:08 PM

Robin said:
I have friends whose son was born with correctable blindness. They were told that the operation was urgent since if the baby did not see in the first crucial months he would never learn to see, even though the eye problem was corrected.
Really? You can't learn to see, at least to some degree, at any point in life?

~~ Paul

Jeff Corey

31st July 2005, 06:23 PM

Originally posted by DavoMan
I haven't been following this thread much but that sentence is the most f*cking retarded thing Ive seen in a while.
Please don't insult retarded people that way.

Robin

31st July 2005, 06:23 PM

Originally posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos
Really? You can't learn to see, at least to some degree, at any point in life?

~~ Paul
You have to understand that I am relaying what my friends said the doctors said and so take my rider "if what the doctors said was true" to also include that my friends understood the doctor and I understood my friends.

But the clear message they were given was that, although it was inherently riskier to operate on such tiny eyes, it was absolutely necessary to do so because if the optical problem was not fixed in the first few months of life the child would never learn to see.

The words they were given were "the brain will never learn to process the information".

What this would be like, I don't know.

DavoMan

1st August 2005, 07:22 AM

Originally posted by Jeff Corey
Please don't insult retarded people that way. :hit:

Sorry to turn this thread into an ethics-debate.

Where I am from. the word 'retarded' has other meanings than referring to retarded people. Same with 'gay' & other words like that. I didn't decide that nor disagagree. Hey at least I was nice enough to censor '****'.

For the record (I'm not just making this bit up) the friends I have that are gay including my gay brother who worked with retarded kids understand I'm not harming gays or retards with my colourful metaphores. Penn & Teller have a great ******** episode on profanity.

But if it makes you feel better controlling the speech of others, I'll stop using the word retarded to refeer to broken/mal-functioning and/or mentally-limited statements. Anyone want to take a shot at 'gay'? Fcuk.:arrow:

drkitten

1st August 2005, 07:50 AM

Originally posted by Robin

The words they were given were "the brain will never learn to process the information".

What this would be like, I don't know.

The human (and indeed, mammal) brain decreases in plasticity as the organism ages; this is probably most widely known in terms of language learning -- the language you learn first (your so-called "mother tongue") is actually processed differently in the brain than any languages you learn as "adults," which really means older than about eight years old or so.

But just as an example : human infants are capable of distinguishing the full range of sounds in all (human) languages; they actually "learn" (at the age of a few months) not to distinguish sounds that aren't meaningful in their "native" language. After a year or so old, Japanese infants no longer respond to the distinction between /l/ and /r/, while English ones no longer respond to the distinction between aspirated and unaspirated stop consonants (/d/ and /dh/, for example). A child who doesn't hear properly during this critical period will not be able to develop proper categorial sound perception.

There are similar results for vision. Kittens raised in an environment without horizontal lines will not develop horizontal edge detection cells in their visual corted -- and will literally not be able to see or process horizontal lines. The same is true for kittens raised in an environment without vertical lines. (Related citation). (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=7174898&dopt=Abstract) (Related citation). (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=681993&query_hl=2)

Robin

1st August 2005, 07:53 PM

Originally posted by new drkitten
The human (and indeed, mammal) brain decreases in plasticity as the organism ages; this is probably most widely known in terms of language learning -- the language you learn first (your so-called "mother tongue") is actually processed differently in the brain than any languages you learn as "adults," which really means older than about eight years old or so.

But just as an example : human infants are capable of distinguishing the full range of sounds in all (human) languages; they actually "learn" (at the age of a few months) not to distinguish sounds that aren't meaningful in their "native" language. After a year or so old, Japanese infants no longer respond to the distinction between /l/ and /r/, while English ones no longer respond to the distinction between aspirated and unaspirated stop consonants (/d/ and /dh/, for example). A child who doesn't hear properly during this critical period will not be able to develop proper categorial sound perception.

There are similar results for vision. Kittens raised in an environment without horizontal lines will not develop horizontal edge detection cells in their visual corted -- and will literally not be able to see or process horizontal lines. The same is true for kittens raised in an environment without vertical lines. (Related citation). (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=7174898&dopt=Abstract) (Related citation). (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=681993&query_hl=2)
Thanks, that is really useful information. I have always found it difficult to tell foreground from background noises, for example at parties when everybody is talking I can only hear buzz, but others can obviously hear what each other was saying. A doctor once told me that this was probably because of an untreated ear problem in infancy.