Mind is not reduceable to brain

[metacrock]

So, you are saying that reason and awareness are a part of mind/spirit, but reason and awareness only describe what the mind does, not what it is. The physical brain can be described as embodying those same properties,

no it can't/ you are confusing cvonsciousne4ss with brain function. In any case we can't answer the hard problem so we can't say

so what I'm asking you is to describe the mind as a thing in itself. Does it take up space, does it have legnth, width, volume, etc etc, by what mechanism does it reason, in what sense is it conscious and of what is it conscious of?

It's immaterial. Like light doesn't take up space it's not an organ. It may be im another dimension. we don't know.

But light doesn't do anything, so I don't think it a good analogy for describing the mind. You know what a better analogy for mind would be? The brain.

It's good analogy. all analogies have a breaking poi t where they don't apply. analogies are not proof, their only function is to illustrate concepts. they bridge the gap between known and unknown.

[metacrock]

When you are sleeping, you also lose the faculty of consciousness, yet you are aware of an alternate reality and live in it as though in a waking life. And you can believe that EvoUK and the science he is relating to you to be quite wrong, but the science, the empirical evidence, contradicts your belief.

no it doesn't. no scientific evidence says there is not a faculty of consciousness that transcends brain function,. there is no disproof of that., there is only the fact that you can't produce a positive proof and you are taking that to be positive proof there is not.,

in the OP I gave six reasons why mind can't be reduced to brain. you have no answer for them. since mind is not brain it must be something, you fill in the blank with ideology and your ideology says there can't be immaterial things, I do not fill in the bank because I don't know. I am willing to consider. I am willing to consider the immaterial.

the positive reasons why mind is not reducible:


*problem of binding



There is a problem with understanding what it is that binds together the unity of a conscious experience. We have many different kinds of conscious faculty at work in the process of being conscious, symbolic thinking, literal thinking, sense of temporal, sense of reality, and physical perceptions. Somehow it all gets brought together into one coherent sense of perceptions. How are the individual aspects, such as color, form, the temporal, and united into a coherent whole experience? Unification of experience is not achieved anatomically. There is “no privileged places of structures in the brain where everything comes together…either for the visual system by itself or for sensory system as a whole ” [17] McDougall took it as something that physicalilsm can’t explain.[18] Dennett and Kinsbourne recognize the phenomena marking top down causation and acknowledge it, they spin it as undermining unity.[19] The old approach was to assume there must be an anatomical center for binding. Without finding one the assumption was that it couldn’t be explained. Modern explanations of unity are based upon a functional approach.




The essential concept common to all of them is that oscillatory electrical activity in widely distributed neural populations can be rapidly and reversibly synchronized in the gamma band of frequencies (roughly 30-70 Hz) thereby providing a possible mechanism for binding.” (von der Malsburg 1995). A great deal of sophisticated experimental and theoretical work over the past 20 years demonstrates that mechanisms do exist in the nervous system and they work in relation to the normal perceptual synthesis. Indeed Searl’s doctrine of biological naturalism has now crystallized neurophysiologically in the form of a family of global workspace theories, all of which make the central claim that conscious experience occurs specifically and only with large scale patters of gamma band oscillatory activity linking widely separated areas of the brain. [20]






In other words if consciousness was reducible to brain chemistry there should be an anatomical center in the brain that works to produce the binding effect. Yet the evidence indicates that binding mechanisms must be understood as functions of various areas outside either the brain (nervous system) or in different parts of the brain which means it can’t be reduced to just a physical apparatus but is systemic and that is indicative of top down causation.




* Projective activity in perceptual process




Our brains act as a sort of “word generating virtual reality system.”[21] That is the brain is constantly projecting and updating a model of the perceptual environment and our relation to it. Top down cross modal sensory interactions have been recognized as the rule rather than the exception, in perceptions, as several studies indicate (A.K. Engle et al, 2001; Shimojo and Shams 2001). [22] Evidence indicates that the ultimate source of projective activity may originate outside the brain. A great deal of knowledge is put into action for use in understanding language and in writing. Some researchers have advanced the view that the fundamental form of projective activity is dreaming.[23]




[B] *[/B] Semantic or intentional content; word meaning and other form of representation.


This has been dealt with traditionally through reductionism. Representations were said to work by resembling things they represent. This was disproved by Goodman and Heil (1981). [24] In cognitive psychology there is a rule of thumb that meanings are not to be conceived as intrinsic to words, they are defined by the functional role they play in a sentence. The major approach to the problem used now is connectionism, from dynamic systems theory. The meaning of a given response such as settling of a network into one of its attracters or firing of a volley of spikes by a neuron in the visual cortex is identified with the aspect in the environment that produces the response. This account can’t deal with abstract things or non existent things. There’s nothing in the environment to trigger it. Responses do not qualify as representations nor signs as symbols. “That something,” as Searl so effectively argued (in 1992) “is precisely what matters.”[25]






* problem of Intentionality



Intentionality is the ability of representational forms to be about things, to reflect meaning and to be about events and states of affairs in the world. [26] The problem of intentionality has plagued both psychologists and philosophers. Intentionality is inherently three ways, involving the user, symbols, and things symbolized. Searl tells us that intentionality of langue is secondary and derives from the intrinsic intentionality of the mind. “Intentionality can’t be obtained from any kind of physical system including brains.”[27]




*The Humunculus Problem



The Homunculus was a medieval concept about human reproduction. The male was said to have in him little men just like him with all the basic stuff that makes him work that’s how new men get born. In this topic it’s the idea that we need in the mind another mind or brain like structure to make the mind work. The problem is it keeps requiring ever more little structures to make each one before it work; in endless regression of systems. Kelly and Kelly et al site Dennett’s attempt to solve the homunculus problem in the form of less and less smart homunculi until the bottom level corresponding to heard ware level end the recursion so it’s not infinite. (Dennett 1978)[28] Searl (1992) responds that there has to be something outside the bottom level that knows what lower level compositions mean. Cognitive models can’t function without a homunculus because they lack minds, as Kelly tells us.[29]




No homunculus problem, however, is posed by the structure of our conscious experience itself. The efforts of Dennett and others to claim that there is such a problem, and to use that to ridicule any residue of dualism, rely upon the deeply flawed metaphor of the Cartesian theater a place where mental contents get displayed and I pop in separately to view them. Descartes himself, James, Searl and others all have this right: conscious experience comes to us whole and undivided, with the qualitative feels, phenomenological content, unity, and subjective point of view all built in, intrinsic features. I and my experience cannot be separated in this way. [30]

give me all BS about how I have no data to back it up

[EvoUK]

when I was in the coma I lost the faculty of being conscious. yet I was aware of a reality and lived in it as though in a waking life.

... You were dreaming? Without knowing the details of your coma it is hard to comment - usually coma patients show no signs of the normal sleep-wakefulness cycle, which means they are unlikely to be dreaming. However some have claimed to dream or experience nightmares, so this probably depends on the cause & severity of the coma.

I also think you are quite wrong about corresponding a bran function to a physical part as Talis says this is not something we can do.

Noting correlations between physical alterations to the brain and corresponding brain function is very well documented, so I am unsure what basis you have for claiming this to be incorrect? Or do you have alternate explanations for each and every one of these documented cases? As mentioned, the documentation & evidence is wide ranging and relatively straightforward, so I'm interested as to why you think a whole section of science to be factually incorrect?

[EvoUK]

*problem of binding

[...]

In other words if consciousness was reducible to brain chemistry there should be an anatomical center in the brain that works to produce the binding effect. Yet the evidence indicates that binding mechanisms must be understood as functions of various areas outside either the brain (nervous system) or in different parts of the brain which means it can’t be reduced to just a physical apparatus but is systemic and that is indicative of top down causation.

This is currently relatively accurate - at least in so much as we don't know how to explain the 'hard' problems of consciousness (I'm referring to Chalmers 'easy' and 'hard' problems of explaining consciousness - 1995).

Essentially, whilst we can describe the neurophysiology of consciousness, we cannot describe why it happens to start with. Many scientists in this particular field think that consciousness can be explained given enough knowledge and understanding of the human brain. I am personally agnostic towards whether science can answer the hard problems of consciousness.

However, as previously mentioned, a good case can be made that everything about consciousness resides in the brain. Due to increased interest in consciousness from a neurological perspective since the 90’s, over twenty neurological correlations have been noted between brain physiology and consciousness. Thus there's nothing about human thought and behaviour that appears to defy the laws of physics and every indication that all of it is the result of physical processes. When certain parts of the brain or specific glands are removed or damaged, there are specific effects on the way we think and feel.

I see you also mention Baar's global workspace theory- based on the view that the brain is made up of many different processors or modules each capable of performing some task on the symbolic representations that it receives as input, and this model of the brain is fairly well-supported by evidence from anatomical studies and studies of patients with brain damage.

What global workspace theory attempts to explain is the serial stream of thought emerges from the masses of unconscious mental computations that are proceeding simultaneously in the brain.

Global workspace theory gives the most complete account to date of the relationship of conscious and unconscious processes in perception, learning, problem-solving and language, among others.




However, it is still incomplete - to go back to your original point and others you have listed below. However I am fine with that, as the neurophysiological basis for consciousness (or parts of it) is still well documented - you point seems to be there are gaps in our knowledge so we must throw it all out?

[metacrock]

... You were dreaming? Without knowing the details of your coma it is hard to comment - usually coma patients show no signs of the normal sleep-wakefulness cycle, which means they are unlikely to be dreaming. However some have claimed to dream or experience nightmares, so this probably depends on the cause & severity of the coma.

I don't I was dreaming I know I was. people fr4om the hospital were in the dreams even though I had not met them in waking moments. you can doubt this all you want to I know it was real.

Noting correlations between physical alterations to the brain and corresponding brain function is very well documented, so I am unsure what basis you have for claiming this to be incorrect? Or do you have alternate explanations for each and every one of these documented cases? As mentioned, the documentation & evidence is wide ranging and relatively straightforward, so I'm interested as to why you think a whole section of science to be factually incorrect?

your position suffers from an inescapable epistemological failing you cannot resolve., it's just of getting you to understand the concept., the Ray Tallis quotes on OP back me up. just damaging some part of the brain \does not prove the behavior is caused by that part of the brain rather than just being accessible by it. All you have to claim that you know is an ideological answer that says this has to be. it's not proof.

If brain function is access to mind then damaging brain function cuts off access that does not prove the mind goes away. even if it was that does not mean that mind and brain are the same, mind can still live on beyond brain even if it is caused by it.

[metacrock]

This is currently relatively accurate - at least in so much as we don't know how to explain the 'hard' problems of consciousness (I'm referring to Chalmers 'easy' and 'hard' problems of explaining consciousness - 1995).

this is binding not hard problem, it is a good reason why mind id not reducible to brain.

Essentially, whilst we can describe the neurophysiology of consciousness, we cannot describe why it happens to start with. Many scientists in this particular field think that consciousness can be explained given enough knowledge and understanding of the human brain. I am personally agnostic towards whether science can answer the hard problems of consciousness.

that's true and it's a bog feral you still have to deal with each of those si things independently and one of them beats reduction.

However, as previously mentioned, a good case can be made that everything about consciousness resides in the brain. Due to increased interest in consciousness from a neurological perspective since the 90’s, over twenty neurological correlations have been noted between brain physiology and consciousness. Thus there's nothing about human thought and behaviour that appears to defy the laws of physics and every indication that all of it is the result of physical processes. When certain parts of the brain or specific glands are removed or damaged, there are specific effects on the way we think and feel.

none of that is proven to be anything more than access. it does not prove that mind is brain,.

I see you also mention Baar's global workspace theory- based on the view that the brain is made up of many different processors or modules each capable of performing some task on the symbolic representations that it receives as input, and this model of the brain is fairly well-supported by evidence from anatomical studies and studies of patients with brain damage.

What global workspace theory attempts to explain is the serial stream of thought emerges from the masses of unconscious mental computations that are proceeding simultaneously in the brain.

Global workspace theory gives the most complete account to date of the relationship of conscious and unconscious processes in perception, learning, problem-solving and language, among others.




However, it is still incomplete - to go back to your original point and others you have listed below. However I am fine with that, as the neurophysiological basis for consciousness (or parts of it) is still well documented - you point seems to be there are gaps in our knowledge so we must throw it all out?

all of that is in the Kelly's book irreducible mind they site journal articles backing it up. saying it's incomplete is not a disproof all of it is incomplete your own words show your position is incomplete.

[EvoUK]

I am answering both posts here, as I do not see a need to produce several posts to one user.

just damaging some part of the brain \does not prove the behavior is caused by that part of the brain rather than just being accessible by it. All you have to claim that you know is an ideological answer that says this has to be. it's not proof.

Ok, forgive me but I do not see how your conclusions flow - or at least it seems I am missing something in your logic.

It appears that although you agree in evidence supporting the idea that physical damage to the brain causes some high brain functions to alter or be removed, you disagree that this has anything to do with those higher brain functions being a result of the brain, and instead lean towards the idea that it merely shows that it is 'accessible by it'? I do not know what evidence you are pointing to which would suggest this is the case - the points you raised earlier amount to we do not have a full picture yet, so it must therefore be impossible. No one is suggesting we have all the answers yet, nor is anyone suggesting that the subject of consciousness isn't a difficult one, scientifically.



I would contest that the correlations point to a causality, however I am afraid that I do not see your logic that this doesn't prove anything? Surely the hypothesis that correlations=causality is a simpler method than adding anything else to the mix, which it appears on the face of it that your are doing?

You also claim that I am providing an ideological answer - I am assuming by that you mean I am basing my arguments on the assumption that this is all due to natural causes (this is, after all, all science can prove or point to - the rest being more of a philosophical debate)? Or are you referring to another ideology?

If brain function is access to mind then damaging brain function cuts off access that does not prove the mind goes away. even if it was that does not mean that mind and brain are the same, mind can still live on beyond brain even if it is caused by it.

'If brain function is access to mind then damaging brain function cuts off access that does not prove the mind goes away' - well, yes - if we make the assumption that the mind is separate to the brain, then we can conclude that damage to the brain does not make the mind go away. However this is based on an assumption which I am finding it hard to find a reason for accepting to begin with - namely that the mind is separate to the brain. I would suggest that it is a direct cause of activity in the brain, rather than being a separate entity.

Other than what I can gather so far is an a-priori assumption that it is separate, I see no further reason to conclude this based on your points thus far. Is there something I am missing?

We also have no reason to think that the mind lives on without a functioning brain - brain dead states being the obvious example, as this does not relate to those in a coma.

this is binding not hard problem, it is a good reason why mind id not reducible to brain.

What you refer to as 'binding' seems to correlate directly to so-called 'hard problems' with consciousness, such as showing a correlation between specific neural activity in the brain and focusing on a given object (selective attention), or synchronised neuronal firings and gathering information about an object (Crick’s Theory) are relatively simple to show and prove scientifically. However, what we cannot yet do is explain how these result in our conscious experience. As previously mentioned, I am agnostic towards the idea that this will ever be proven scientifically - you seem to suggest that due to gaps in our knowledge that everything must therefore be thrown out?

none of that is proven to be anything more than access. it does not prove that mind is brain,.

I addressed this earlier, but again I would dispute that nothing other than correlations=causality is necessary. Suggesting that the mind is separate to the brain based only on information showing us that it isn't doesn't appear to be prove your point.

It only does not prove that mind is brain if you assume that it can't be - on the contrary it actually shows the opposite. Why do you feel the need to think that the mind is separate to the brain? You have not shown that it is, and can only explain all the evidence that it is as simply 'having access'. I would suggest that your point is actually a philosophical one, rather than a scientific one.

saying it's incomplete is not a disproof all of it is incomplete your own words show your position is incomplete.

Yes, it is. I actually stated that scientific knowledge on consciousness is incomplete. I do not see how this proves anything further than we have more to learn.

[Jim B.]

When you are sleeping, you also lose the faculty of consciousness, yet you are aware of an alternate reality and live in it as though in a waking life. And you can believe that EvoUK and the science he is relating to you to be quite wrong, but the science, the empirical evidence, contradicts your belief.

When my tv set is off, it no longer transmits images. By tinkering with certain components and functions of my tv set, I can alter the transmissions in specific, repeatable ways, including its ability to ever transmit images ever again. This is a possible analogy to what meta and I are suggesting, although, as he says, all analogies are severely limited.

The problem with consciousness being wholly reducible to the brain is the hard problem, as EvoUK mentions. It's a conceptual hurdle and until it's cleared, I don't see how another century of empirical data will make any difference.

[Jim B.]

I lean, as a Christian, towards the emergent dualism of William Hasker - or something there about...

I'm not familiar with Hasker. Emergent dualism has its appeal but I think you need something else there to explain how the emergence happens.

[Jim B.]

I would contest that the correlations point to a causality, however I am afraid that I do not see your logic that this doesn't prove anything? Surely the hypothesis that correlations=causality is a simpler method than adding anything else to the mix, which it appears on the face of it that your are doing?

I agree that correlations indicate causality unless we have good reasons to think otherwise. I think the arguments against reducibility are good enough reasons to suspend judgment on the nature of causality when it comes to experiences. If consciousness is a basic property, then brain function might be what enables or facilitates consciousness without being the sufficient cause. And if some kind of dual aspect theory is right, then brain function and consciousness would each be a 'projection' of something else responsible for both of them.

[seer]

Emergent dualism has its appeal but I think you need something else there to explain how the emergence happens.

Magic?

[EvoUK]

I agree that correlations indicate causality unless we have good reasons to think otherwise. I think the arguments against reducibility are good enough reasons to suspend judgment on the nature of causality when it comes to experiences. If consciousness is a basic property, then brain function might be what enables or facilitates consciousness without being the sufficient cause. And if some kind of dual aspect theory is right, then brain function and consciousness would each be a 'projection' of something else responsible for both of them.

This is one of the reasons why I personally find the subject so fascinating. Personally, from my viewpoint and from everything I think I understand about the universe and how it operates, I would see no reason why consciousness wouldn't be a result of brain activity and higher cortical function.

However, I also actually believe it to be more complicated than that. Consciousness seems to me to be a product which is the cause of something more complicated than synaptic function. For example, the rise of quantum mechanics as a realm of scientific knowledge shows us that our understanding of the universe at a macro (our) level doesn't hold out at a quantum level.

“If quantum mechanics hasn’t profoundly shocked you, you haven’t understood it yet. Everything we call real is made of things that cannot be regarded as real.” – Niels Bohr

For example, there are several theories to consciousness using quantum mechanics - such as Penrose & Hameroffs quantum model, which suggests that quantum fluctuations in the microtubules of neurons leads to 'bursts' of consciousness, at a rate of about 40 to the second.

To be honest, I do not know enough about quantum mechanics to comment fully..!

[metacrock]

Magic?

I'm pretty sure he means something esle naturalistic or at least compatible with science., I can prettymuch guaronteehe doesn't mean magic.

[metacrock]

Evo Uk you keep putting in these qualifiers attributed to me such as Brain and mind have nothing to do wi9th each other., I did not say thyat.l two points you just don't get

(1) the epistemological problem you can't overcome--you can't turn correlation into cause--limits your ability to argue the brain damage argument as proof of reducibility. I don't have to disprove that, you do. It's a logical limit on proving cause and you must get over it to make your argument work. I don't have to disprove cause. you must prove it.

(2) IU don't have to prove there a magic entity called the soul that live on after death, I only argued that mind is not reducible to brain. I have given evince of that and it's evidence you can't answer.

Given that mind is not reducible the possibility of LAD is raised but I don't have to defend it because that's not the claim I made ion the OP.

enough of the smoke and mirrors you can't prove reducibility.

[seer]

Here is an interesting take by Sam Harris...

The problem, however, is that no evidence for consciousness exists in the physical world.[6] Physical events are simply mute as to whether it is “like something” to be what they are. The only thing in this universe that attests to the existence of consciousness is consciousness itself; the only clue to subjectivity, as such, is subjectivity. Absolutely nothing about a brain, when surveyed as a physical system, suggests that it is a locus of experience. Were we not already brimming with consciousness ourselves, we would find no evidence of it in the physical universe—nor would we have any notion of the many experiential states that it gives rise to. The painfulness of pain, for instance, puts in an appearance only in consciousness. And no description of C-fibers or pain-avoiding behavior will bring the subjective reality into view...

...Most scientists are confident that consciousness emerges from unconscious complexity. We have compelling reasons for believing this, because the only signs of consciousness we see in the universe are found in evolved organisms like ourselves. Nevertheless, this notion of emergence strikes me as nothing more than a restatement of a miracle. To say that consciousness emerged at some point in the evolution of life doesn’t give us an inkling of how it could emerge from unconscious processes, even in principle.

https://www.samharris.org/blog/item/...-consciousness