Random Thought #30

[Guest]

Oh wait tnf... I have an idea, why don't you try discussing what it is he talked about instead of just refering me to that book? Just curious what the guy has to say really. don't take this the wrong way, but this message board, isn't my librarian, maybe if you actualy talked about it rather than jsut state a book and go read it I might pick up the book to read it knowing what it's gonna be about. Make sense?

[Foo]

Because we all think you're a lost cause too far up your own ass to waste time typing long replies to?

If you go read it and come back with some points which actually referenced respected works, your words would have some credibility. People would listen. Seriously. That's how it works.

Moran Elert?

[s0are]

See I was thinking to myself the other day

in your interest, please stop it, you' re hurting yourself

[Guest]

Because we all think you're a lost cause too far up your own ass to waste time typing long replies to?

If you go read it and come back with some points which actually referenced respected works, your words would have some credibility. People would listen. Seriously. That's how it works.

Moran Elert?

I've never heard of anyone talk about this before to be honest so if someone else has already thought of this then I didn't know. either way, none of you have even asked any relevant questions towards what I'm talking about so you're as usless as you say I am.

[tnf]

Oh wait tnf... I have an idea, why don't you try discussing what it is he talked about instead of just refering me to that book? Just curious what the guy has to say really. don't take this the wrong way, but this message board, isn't my librarian, maybe if you actualy talked about it rather than jsut state a book and go read it I might pick up the book to read it knowing what it's gonna be about. Make sense?

Because once your 'ideas' are discussed, examined, and generally refuted (or dismissed, depending on whether or not they are attempting to explain the empirical or just delving into the realm of philosophy), you still won't accept the fact that there are flaws in your logic.

You see Kracus, you are a phony on many levels - including the one where you pretend to want to engage in intellectual discussion. You've demonstrated this many times in your 'hey I figured out how parallel universes work" type threads. You make statements that are so....well, just wrong...in your attempt to rehash subjects that have been discussed and explored in great detail by some of the great philosophers and scientists. Generally, that is where debates on subjects like these kind of start - unless, of course, you have the data and research to back up your new paradigm of thought. In most cases, there is very little substance to your arguments because there is absolutely no research or evidence of deeper understanding behind them. This, ironically, can make them harder to refute - because refuting a nonsensical question or idea requires you to first educate the person with the question or idea in the subjects that they must understand to see the nonsensical nature of their inquiry.

I have recommended countless books because you seem, at the surface, to be a guy who is genuinely interested in this world around you and how it works. Yet you exhibit an unparalleled amount of mental inertia (just to so you know, inertia means a tendency to resist change). You steadfastly refuse to actually educate yourself. Instead, you persist in throwing out random bullshit that is 100% unsubstantiated by anything but for the weed induced misfirings of the neurons in your brain, and then get defense when your ideas aren't taken seriously.

So, there's my idea.

[Guest]

Yeah but tnf look at the typical type of response I have to put up with? Please tell me you don't think that might have some effect on the type of response I give. You state that I refuse to change my ideas on stuff like this and you couldn't be more wrong.

[Guest]

My main point though was to discuss how the idea that death, or the act of dying may actualy be responsible for our conciousness.

edit: which really is a pretty neat statement if you ask me.

[[xeno]Julios]

Kracus,

It is worth introspecting your intuition. Why does the idea jive with you?

You may be right, but you haven't really given any reasons as to why it makes any sense.

You've invoked the metaphor of walking and falling, but what makes you think that this metaphor maps onto consciousness and dying?

I can perhaps see how consciousness may need a process to make itself manifest - perhaps in a constant stream of neural events. But I fail to see why this process would need to be oriented towards death.

Also might help to keep in mind that ...

*HOLY SHIT JUST SAW A FUCKING INCREDIBLE FALLING STAR OUTSIDE MY WINDOW (I'm in oman right now) - LOOKED LIKE A GREEN FIREWORK - LASTED FOR ABOUT FIVE SECONDS!*

the processes that lead to death in the human body aren't necessarily located in the brain. Heart failure for example is a common cause of "natural" death.

gnite - 1 am here

[tnf]

Well, here is one issue - you need to establish what I call "operational definitions" first (a term used in designing experiments). So, what is your operational definition for consciousness?

How do we define it? Self awareness? How do we test a subject to see if it demonstrates consciousness?

[Guest]

Well, here is one issue - you need to establish what I call "operational definitions" first (a term used in designing experiments). So, what is your operational definition for consciousness?

How do we define it? Self awareness? How do we test a subject to see if it demonstrates consciousness?

See that's a good question, that's the type of thing I love cause if I can awnser that question (yeah it may lead to more) then that's great! that' what I like about discussing shit.

so how do you define conciousness? Well I think that's the crux of the problem, no one really knows what conciousness is, at least I've never really heard of a good one, the dictionary states that it's the act of being conscious which is slightly odd definition to use the word your defining as it's definition... but anyway.

The way I see conciousness is that it exists outside the universes influence to an extent. Any inanimate object is completely at the mercy of what the universe is going to unleash on it. A concious being has the ability to predict (not always acurately) events and decide what course or path to take in the universe rather than being completely helpless to the universe. Ultimately we are at the universes mercy but only to a certain degree, our consciousness is that other degree.

I think that our consciousness is actualy present in us because of several things, as I've mentioned our body's parts combined make up our consciousness and that the body's perpetual dying causes this consciousness to take shape. See the problem I see with a conscious being is that it can't simply be made conscious. Let's say for example that I had programmed a computer to simulate everything in every respect to do the same thing a human mind does. Once the programing is complete all you really have in your possession is a lot of code on your computer. Activating it may produce some results but beyond that it won't evolve unless you program it into the code. but what causes this program to evolve? Why would it evolve? What would be the trigger to set things in motion?

There needs to be somekind of need for there to be any kind of response. It may be primitve at first and indeed today's modern AI seems very primitive, probably along the same lines of the intellect of a snail but I might argue that might classify as a state of consciousness. Not a very evolved one but one nonetheless. I think for it to evolve there needs to be a need for it to evolve and by making it's shell a constantly dying organism you'll get the desired effect because it gives the portions controlling the analyzing part of the brain something to analyze and a way to analyze it. I dunno... I'm rambling again I know.

But basicly, my definition of conciousness is our abiity to affect things in our universe that was not originaly caused by any inanimate objects in our universe or events outside our control. If that makes any sense to you Now to awnser julios.

[Guest]

Kracus,

It is worth introspecting your intuition. Why does the idea jive with you?

See that's the thing with these random thoughts, I don't know why they jive with me so well and others don't. I just sense there to be some type of valuable information locked in what I just thought but I can't always grasp what it is. Usualy, when I post it here I'll find out some author somewhere already talked about it, I'll doa little research online about that author and find that he thought a lot like I do and I'll be satisfied with that. Other times though I just want to know if I'm the first one to think of something like this.

You may be right, but you haven't really given any reasons as to why it makes any sense.

Well that's the reason I post it here, in the hopes someone will ask the right question as to why it won't work. So I can explore that question and figure if it's completely bogus or just slightly wrong or what degree of wrongness I've acheived in this random thought. Sometimes though the points people make don't do anything to argue with my points but people don't seem to get this when I point it out.

you invoked the metaphor of walking and falling, but what makes you think that this metaphor maps onto consciousness and dying?

Well I just like metaphors cause sometimes explaining how an idea works is easier to explain if you can find a metaphore that's similar. Just like you need to fall to step forward I think the body needs to die so it has something to do to stop it from dying. It's that automatic (heart/liver/bloodcells etc...) and not so automatic (choosing not to step in front of oncomming traffic) that's giving us what we perceive of as our consciousness. I think if we were more like a machine, with no dying parts and no need for any kind of automatic signals being sent by the controlling program (IE brain) that there wouldn't be any consciousness there, there would just be a bunch of metal/organic parts that are simply there. It's the dying/falling act that causes the automatic reactions in our brains.

I can perhaps see how consciousness may need a process to make itself manifest - perhaps in a constant stream of neural events. But I fail to see why this process would need to be oriented towards death.

I thought about this but I think it needs to be a constant and death is really the only eternal constant in our universe I think... Tell me if you can think of another.

Also might help to keep in mind that ...

*HOLY SHIT JUST SAW A FUCKING INCREDIBLE FALLING STAR OUTSIDE MY WINDOW (I'm in oman right now) - LOOKED LIKE A GREEN FIREWORK - LASTED FOR ABOUT FIVE SECONDS!*

the processes that lead to death in the human body aren't necessarily located in the brain. Heart failure for example is a common cause of "natural" death.

gnite - 1 am here

Yeah i'm not arguing that though.

[Foo]

I thought about this but I think it needs to be a constant and death is really the only eternal constant in our universe I think... Tell me if you can think of another.

I think you mean the only permanent state (in that it can't be reversed once it happens), as opposed to a constant which is an unchanging thing. Obviously since anything which is considered dead must once have been alive, it's not a constant. Discrete, perhaps.

Tricky though, if you consider an infinite universe and and infinite timeline, it seems likely that the exact same matter would re-assemble in the exact same way at some point in the future.

And I have to swallow my pride right now and admit that this thread does have potential. At least, it does now.

[Guest]

Thanks man But yeah that's a good point too that it is possible that the exact same materials may recombine to create another duplicate but you can't recreate time so in a sense I think it would be impossible to have the exact same thing exist again in the exact same form since the time it was created would always be an ongoing changing thing, never again to be the same.

[Guest]

Also I should mention that it's not so much death that I'm talking about but the fact that our cells perhaps at an atomic scale or sub atomic who knows constantly change (AGE) which ultimately leads to death. So it's not so much the death part that's interesting it's the fact that every living piece in our body's lurches forward with only one inanimate objective which is to reach a state of non living tissue, IE: death. It's the one major thing all living things have in common, they die. Not all have a conciousness but those that don't like plants are more inanimate than animate. They also don't choose so much how to interact with our universe either but I think that has everything to do with evolution and nothing else really.

[andyman]

Kracus,


Well I just like metaphors cause sometimes explaining how an idea works is easier to explain if you can find a metaphore that's similar. Just like you need to fall to step forward I think the body needs to die so it has something to do to stop it from dying. It's that automatic (heart/liver/bloodcells etc...) and not so automatic (choosing not to step in front of oncomming traffic) that's giving us what we perceive of as our consciousness. I think if we were more like a machine, with no dying parts and no need for any kind of automatic signals being sent by the controlling program (IE brain) that there wouldn't be any consciousness there, there would just be a bunch of metal/organic parts that are simply there. It's the dying/falling act that causes the automatic reactions in our brains.

?

[Guest]

lol so true... It's ironic really cause Johny 5 was dying... And was artificialy intelligent...

[andyman]

lol so true... It's ironic really cause Johny 5 was dying... And was artificialy intelligent...

It's not ironic at all. I didn't randomly post that.

[+JuggerNaut+]

lol so true... It's ironic really cause Johny 5 was dying... And was artificialy intelligent...

It's not ironic at all. I didn't randomly post that.

hey wait - you mean you consciously posted that? unreal.

[andyman]

lol so true... It's ironic really cause Johny 5 was dying... And was artificialy intelligent...

It's not ironic at all. I didn't randomly post that.

hey wait - you mean you consciously posted that? unreal.

Yeah you know.....I'm trying to not die and all so I thought I would consciously do something.

:icon32:

[Guest]

How little you realize...

[andyman]

How little you realize...

so how do you explain how we don't die every time we fall asleep.

edit: and don't say we only die (for good) once since we all know that and there is proof to back it up.

[+JuggerNaut+]

It's not ironic at all. I didn't randomly post that.

hey wait - you mean you consciously posted that? unreal.

Yeah you know.....I'm trying to not die and all so I thought I would consciously do something.

:icon32:

ha u smot cookie

[Guest]

Automatic functions in the brain are keeping your body alive. (heart pumping, breathing etc.... regenerating cells or slowing they're rate of decay, replacing new ones.... you get the idea)

All these process are happening in the brain creating an array of information which if processed right could create something tangible in the mind along with non automatic processes that react to what's being analyzed. Maybe that's how the subconcious works, not sure. but it's that constantly changing and evolving set of signals being analyzed that creates the "movement" or the spark to start this thing called consciousness, This is along the lines that I'm thinking anyway.

[tnf]

Automatic functions in the brain are keeping your body alive. (heart pumping, breathing etc.... regenerating cells or slowing they're rate of decay, replacing new ones.... you get the idea)

All these process are happening in the brain creating an array of information which if processed right could create something tangible in the mind along with non automatic processes that react to what's being analyzed. Maybe that's how the subconcious works, not sure. but it's that constantly changing and evolving set of signals being analyzed that creates the "movement" or the spark to start this thing called consciousness, This is along the lines that I'm thinking anyway.

You need to do some reading on brain function...

The brain doesn't 'slow the rate of cellular decay' for example...

if you are going to go into the details of how hte brain works to create consciousness and the subconscious and whatnot, you really need to have a pretty extensive understanding of how the brain works. This is a prime example of something I mentioned earlier...before you can really get into some groundbreaking ideas, you need to have a fundamental understanding of the systems you are dealing with. I think you'd make a much more persuasive argument if you demonstrated basic knowledge of science first..

[andyman]

Automatic functions in the brain are keeping your body alive. (heart pumping, breathing etc.... regenerating cells or slowing they're rate of decay, replacing new ones.... you get the idea)

All these process are happening in the brain creating an array of information which if processed right could create something tangible in the mind along with non automatic processes that react to what's being analyzed. Maybe that's how the subconcious works, not sure. but it's that constantly changing and evolving set of signals being analyzed that creates the "movement" or the spark to start this thing called consciousness, This is along the lines that I'm thinking anyway.

You need to do some reading on brain function...

The brain doesn't 'slow the rate of cellular decay' for example...

if you are going to go into the details of how hte brain works to create consciousness and the subconscious and whatnot, you really need to have a pretty extensive understanding of how the brain works. This is a prime example of something I mentioned earlier...before you can really get into some groundbreaking ideas, you need to have a fundamental understanding of the systems you are dealing with. I think you'd make a much more persuasive argument if you demonstrated basic knowledge of science first..

No because it's like when I drive, when I want to go forward I press the 'I don't want to stop' pedal. THIS PEDAL MAKES MY CAR WANT TO NOT STOP!!! HOW DOES IT GO ABOUT DOING THAT?? I think I am onto something.