What does "external" mean?

[warpus]

What i am saying is NOT about the end-result, which is as you said (triggered by something external, we end up having a concept which refers to it). I am talking about the process which (non-consciously to us) allows us to form a concept of something external, while apparently ALL our means (concept-formation and concepts themselves) are by definition internal.

What about it though? Our brains take in external input and build an internal approximation of what is being input via the senses. We use this approximation to make sense of the data and to interact with this external object, if we choose to do so. Our brain tells us "These objects are external", even though it all resides inside our brain as an internal approximation.

This isn't foolproof. From time to time people will see ghosts, spirits, angels, gods, bigfeets, aliens, and whatever else. In some of these cases these entities that the brain is saying "hey these are external" are actually internal manifestations that do not have a corresponding external object. So the system is by no means perfect, and you can't always trust what your brain is telling you is external.

I fail to see how all of this could work otherwise. Our brain has to build an internal approximation of an external object. And we have to understand that this is a representation of something that actually externally exists as well. If we didn't understand that, we probably wouldn't be intelligent enough to build up a civilization.

but if you position yourself within the "computer"
you cannot know whether those data are really external or just made up by you

Yep, my brain could be sitting in a vat somewhere, and everything I think is external, is actually internal. But so what?

 

[Hrothbern]

Yep, my brain could be sitting in a vat somewhere, and everything I think is external, is actually internal. But so what?

Indeed
a very inpractical poiunt of view, also complex see my other post above, but completely valid if you stay and die in your vat.

 

[Kyriakos]

I think we run here in a typical example that logic has only limited use, or so to say limited stating power.

A bit comparible with the paradox of Xeno where the hare will never overtake the turtle
because following the sheer logic, both never reach the point in time or space where the hare and the turtle are at equal distance
because the logic is a limit formular.

If you box yourself in with the solipsistic logic and exclude external, you have to assume that your mind is able to make up a complete universum, including all laws of physics etc.
That is much more complex than the far more elegant and simple assumption that there is an external world.
(of which we see a distorted view because of our internalisation process)

so there is never proof, only likelyhood from a belief in elegance.

I agree with the above, though they are part of a quite different (albeit tangential) discussion ^^

Re Zeno's Achilles: the main point is that the observer is allowed to view that race ONLY as something happening in the mental realm, cause the race only moves a step when the tortoise has made its new advancing move (Achilles is stuck for all steps of the progression at best being in the same position of the tortoise, and actually always a little - always diminishing but never reversing - behind). Imo Zeno (and Parmenides) meant to refer to physics (ie actual external stuff) too, and not just dialectics (internal), whereas my specific topic is just about internal ^^

 

[Kyriakos]

What about it though? Our brains take in external input and build an internal approximation of what is being input via the senses. We use this approximation to make sense of the data and to interact with this external object, if we choose to do so. Our brain tells us "These objects are external", even though it all resides inside our brain as an internal approximation.

This isn't foolproof. From time to time people will see ghosts, spirits, angels, gods, bigfeets, aliens, and whatever else. In some of these cases these entities that the brain is saying "hey these are external" are actually internal manifestations that do not have a corresponding external object. So the system is by no means perfect, and you can't always trust what your brain is telling you is external.

I fail to see how all of this could work otherwise. Our brain has to build an internal approximation of an external object. And we have to understand that this is a representation of something that actually externally exists as well. If we didn't understand that, we probably wouldn't be intelligent enough to build up a civilization.

But what i am asking is HOW the concept (which i think we agreed was purely internal, despite the external trigger; for at length the external trigger also if factored needs to be factored through its own concept, which again would be internal...) of the internal gets twisted to form a concept of the external. I am asking something of a different type than what you refer to, and i largely agree with what you said of that different object..

Imo it is an interesting issue. I might examine it a bit more. It certainly is far below the realm of usual conscious objects we use.

 

[warpus]

But what i am asking is HOW the concept (which i think we agreed was purely internal, despite the external trigger; for at length the external trigger also if factored needs to be factored through its own concept, which again would be internal...) of the internal gets twisted to form a concept of the external. I am asking something of a different type than what you refer to, and i largely agree with what you said of that different object..

Imo it is an interesting issue. I might examine it a bit more. It certainly is far below the realm of usual conscious objects we use.

What is getting twisted though? I still don't understand the problem with this.

Your brain gets input. It build corresponding internal representations inside your mind and flags them as "actually external", so that you know that the lion is not just a fantasy but is actually something that's right in front of you and something you should deal with.

If we didn't evolve a way to understand that the stuff we're seeing with our eyes is actually real, then we'd have rather big problems surviving, as we'd be unable to distinguish between genuine external threats and internal fantasies.

Are you asking how the brain knows that the data it is receiving is actually an external object and not something happening inside the brain? Our brain, from what I've noticed, tends to mark almost everything as "yep, this thing exists externally". So when you wake up from a dream and you are still half-dreaming, or you see a face in the shadows that isn't actually there, your brain's first instinct is to tell you that it is an external thing, and not internal. That's why people on drugs have at times a hard time making sense of what's real and what isn't. The brain keeps telling them that the flying donkey is real, even if there's no way that's possible.

 

[Borachio]

consciousness could very well exist free of the material world, our brain is contained to it.

I would really like to see you demonstrate this convincingly.

I've so far seen zero evidence for consciousness existing independently of the functioning brain.

 

[Kyriakos]

What is getting twisted though? I still don't understand the problem with this.

Your brain gets input. It build corresponding internal representations inside your mind and flags them as "actually external", so that you know that the lion is not just a fantasy but is actually something that's right in front of you and something you should deal with.

If we didn't evolve a way to understand that the stuff we're seeing with our eyes is actually real, then we'd have rather big problems surviving, as we'd be unable to distinguish between genuine external threats and internal fantasies.

Are you asking how the brain knows that the data it is receiving is actually an external object and not something happening inside the brain? Our brain, from what I've noticed, tends to mark almost everything as "yep, this thing exists externally". So when you wake up from a dream and you are still half-dreaming, or you see a face in the shadows that isn't actually there, your brain's first instinct is to tell you that it is an external thing, and not internal. That's why people on drugs have at times a hard time making sense of what's real and what isn't. The brain keeps telling them that the flying donkey is real, even if there's no way that's possible.

Wouldn't this make it likely that the concepts of internal and external are not that far apart? Usually it is among things which are tied that one notices interchangeablity, no?

Re 'what the problem is', i just find it interesting that an apparatus which is fully tied to being internal (our mind) actually can have a concept of an external (and it does). It isn't as straightforward as one might think; yes there are reasons why it is extremely useful, but it would be extremely useful for myself to have 1 million euros and yet it doesn't happen.

 

[Hygro]

It means you gotta plug it in via USB


#Ericaism

 

[Birdjaguar]

That's flawed
strictly speakin

you position yourself in a third person position

but if you position yourself within the "computer"
you cannot know whether those data are really external or just made up by you
from that within posiotion you have to ASSUME that that data list as seen by internal does come from an external source
and strictly reasoning: you cannot know that.

Enough examples of people that make up whole stories of a past they never had
our brain is a master in making up stuff
including the most realistic details

Consciousness and its cohort in crime (the brain) is just a limiter that obscures the reality that matter as we experience it is an illusion.

 

[Birdjaguar]

I would really like to see you demonstrate this convincingly.

I've so far seen zero evidence for consciousness existing independently of the functioning brain.

It would all be anecdotal.

 

[warpus]

Re 'what the problem is', i just find it interesting that an apparatus which is fully tied to being internal (our mind) actually can have a concept of an external (and it does). It isn't as straightforward as one might think; yes there are reasons why it is extremely useful, but it would be extremely useful for myself to have 1 million euros and yet it doesn't happen.

It doesn't happen because it's useful, IMO it happens because it's the only way. If our brains were not capable of simulating the external world inside our minds to some degree, then I don't think our species would have gotten nearly as far as we have. From what I understand our brain takes in a lot of input and it filters it heavily, preferring to use only a small % of it and calculate and predict the rest. Some optical illusions are examples of this effect. From what I remember reading, a human brain could never process all the information it receives so fast, so instead it uses only small parts of it and assumes what the rest is by filling in the blanks. In order to do this it has to create some sort of model from the information it receives. So you get the external being simulated in the internal, and that connection is interesting I suppose, but I just don't see any other way to understand and study the external, if you are unable to have a concept of it. And imagine a tiger is running at you and you have no concept of the external, you're gonna die.

 

[Perfection]

Someone should ask David Chalmers how complex an organism needs to be to experience qualia.

In his older works Chalmers was pretty non-committal there, speculating that there may be extremely simple rudiments of qualia in a form of panpsycheism but also taking more conventional approaches seriously. Not sure if he's evolved on that issue.

Given that he thinks that computer chip mimicking the brain will reproduce brain qualia, I think he would say minimal complexity is required. ??

I think the lack of an accepted definition of qualia precludes it being very useful.

A computer chip miminicking the brain presumably would be as complex as the brain. I see no reason why computer chips could not be made as complex as brains.

Did he say this recently? I was sort of under the impression that he didn't believe we would ever solve the "hard problem" of consciousness because we would never be able to artificially recreate qualia.

Chalmers was always on the side of consciousness being artificially recreateable. The hard problem is why should certain mental states be associated with phenomenal experience (qualia). You can still view Strong AI as possible (as he does) and still see the hard problem as a hard problem.

That is quite interesting. I can't claim to be particularly familiar with his work, but in my experience he has generally been brought up by people making arguments against the possibility of technologically reproducing human consciousness, along the lines of "robots with human intelligence wouldn't be able to experience qualia and so wouldn't really be 'conscious'."

I should probably just read some of his papers tho

His books The Character of Consciousness and The Conscious Mind are definitely worth picking up (I'd just get one to start).

Note that, while I like Chalmers, I'm pretty skeptical of his arguments. I'm more drawn to deflationary approaches to consciousness, which instead of explaining the mind with grand principles, attempts to let out the hot air.

That means, get some Daniel Dennett too, just for balance.

Consciousness and its cohort in crime (the brain) is just a limiter that obscures the reality that matter as we experience it is an illusion.

I largely agree. I think with exceedingly careful and rigorous thinking and experimentation, one can catch glimpses of how reality really operates.

 

[Birdjaguar]

I largely agree. I think with exceedingly careful and rigorous thinking and experimentation, one can catch glimpses of how reality really operates.

Ah ha, you are a mystic at heart.

 

[Kyriakos]

It doesn't happen because it's useful, IMO it happens because it's the only way. If our brains were not capable of simulating the external world inside our minds to some degree, then I don't think our species would have gotten nearly as far as we have. From what I understand our brain takes in a lot of input and it filters it heavily, preferring to use only a small % of it and calculate and predict the rest. Some optical illusions are examples of this effect. From what I remember reading, a human brain could never process all the information it receives so fast, so instead it uses only small parts of it and assumes what the rest is by filling in the blanks. In order to do this it has to create some sort of model from the information it receives. So you get the external being simulated in the internal, and that connection is interesting I suppose, but I just don't see any other way to understand and study the external, if you are unable to have a concept of it. And imagine a tiger is running at you and you have no concept of the external, you're gonna die.

I don't think it is (literally) "the only way"; otherwise there would be no such thing as full autism, or the ability to have mental states (even chronic) where the person doesn't seem really aware of the external world in a number of crucial ways (eg no input, or no input tied to actual examination of it which allows for usefulness; in such a case a tiger may be there but the person would not identify it as external, and be eaten).
Moreover, at least in some psychoanalytical theories, it is viewed as a relapse to animism - which is why i mentioned animism, and we had a brief discussion with Hroth on that; it is a tied issue

I think that the concept of the external likely was not there to begin with (in earliest hominids) but developed out of some (very real, and obvious) need to deal with external dangers. Likewise, i think that logical thinking got to be so distinct due to similar reason. Otherwise... animism potentially can include more complexity than logic, much like current mental patients with high IQ can have more complicated (albeit not objectively true) views than a logical person.

It is - perhaps - possible that the concept of the external is itself not a polar extreme to something internal in the consciousness itself, but an extreme to the internality of the non-conscious (deeper) world of the person. In such a scheme, consciousness is in the middle, with more internal (deeper mental world) on one end, and concept of an external on the other end. Still, this would not alter the fact (as in how i presented it) that all three are concepts of the internal, just split in a way that allows for an antithesis.

 

[Hrothbern]

In such a scheme, consciousness is in the middle, with more internal (deeper mental world) on one end, and concept of an external on the other end.

Yes
I guess along the same basic lines.

Dreaming becomes interesting then.

Because your consciousness is more a spectator of what flows, or perhaps better positioned, just one of the guys contributing to the total flow without the usual chairman control, which does include external concepts as internalised (and probably finetuned/calibrated during that dreaming).

I see the internal process of our brain pretty much as being a bunch of jazz musicians.... all parts doing their thing, their contribution, in the setting of of music made by other internal musicians.
And once different parts of your internal "I" can be there as different entities (the basic entities your instincts), it is not that difficult to imagine that external objects, after being internalised, get a equal role, can be a mussician as well in your jazz ensemble.
Become for example persona's.

Once you switch back to the higher control of consciousness, it becomes more a symphony orchestra.
Which still enables a lose control up to micromanagement control by hard math like logic.

But most important I think that if there is no need to communicate in a defined way (logic, language, consistency, reliability),
if that need is not there, you can leave out consciousness, and still have dreamlike the more internal and internalised external.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

I would really like to see you demonstrate this convincingly.

I've so far seen zero evidence for consciousness existing independently of the functioning brain.

I think it's the other way around entirely, and I don't think the burden of proof should lie with me, but with the "status quo" so to speak. I think the prevalent idea that one (1) consciousness somehow arises from one (1) brain and that the two are somewhat sheltered from all other consciousness is something heavily debatable, it seems to me very constructed to fit our narrative of individualism and freedom of choice

we are but entirely limited to empiricism, we cannot prove the existence of consciousness in, nor around us, sadly

Introducing an external world is a matter of convenience for your internal world.

that sentence is sexy as ****

Yes


I see the internal process of our brain pretty much as being a bunch of jazz musicians.... all parts doing their thing, their contribution, in the setting of of music made by other internal musicians.
And once different parts of your internal "I" can be there as different entities (the basic entities your instincts), it is not that difficult to imagine that external objects, after being internalised, get a equal role, can be a mussician as well in your jazz ensemble.
Become for example persona's.

Once you switch back to the higher control of consciousness, it becomes more a symphony orchestra.
Which still enables a lose control up to micromanagement control by hard math like logic.

But most important I think that if there is no need to communicate in a defined way (logic, language, consistency, reliability),
if that need is not there, you can leave out consciousness, and still have dreamlike the more internal and internalised external.

that's a very nice metaphor indeed

 

[Kyriakos]

^^
While 'introducing the concept of an external world may be a matter of convenience', it can also be more gloomily likened to a benign tumor
(though i accept this wouldn't be quite as sexy)

 

[Manfred Belheim]

I think it's the other way around entirely, and I don't think the burden of proof should lie with me, but with the "status quo" so to speak. I think the prevalent idea that one (1) consciousness somehow arises from one (1) brain and that the two are somewhat sheltered from all other consciousness is something heavily debatable, it seems to me very constructed to fit our narrative of individualism and freedom of choice.

Call me old fashioned, but I think the burden of proof should really be with the person who's claiming the existence of a phenomenon which has not been observed to actually exist, at all, ever, and which flies in the face of everything that actually has been observed to exist, and our understandings thereof.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

Call me old fashioned, but I think the burden of proof should really be with the person who's claiming the existence of a phenomenon which has not been observed to actually exist, at all, ever, and which flies in the face of everything that actually has been observed to exist, and our understandings thereof.

I agree my friend, but the thing is simply that there is no evidence for either theory -- The one that is commonplace is simply the one we deem most likely. Since this is a matter where empirical research has failed us the only science we can fall back on is philosophy, and I'm sure you agree that in philosophy there has never really been a consensus as to whether consciousness emerges from the individuum or not.

Many new branches of psychology are popping up trying to answer questions precisely like this one, but they're still so far from having satisfying answers.

But please, do elaborate on what exactly is the scientific consensus on consciousness, I am always here to listen.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Our very idea of life is built around the idea that a living thing is separate from its environment from individual cells to whole humans. Separateness is built into our very being at every level. Cells have walls; organs have walls; creatures have skin. The notion that we are separate is fundamental. Consciousness only reinforces that notion.

Our conception of these barriers is a bit arbitrary. Every living thing nevertheless has a causal relationship with its surroundings to the best of our understanding in physics, and the atoms that comprise living things change pretty fast.

The precise workings of consciousness isn't something we completely understand. We make the external/internal cutoff because it has consistent practical applications, not because it carries any inherent meaning to the physical world beyond our cognition.

I think it's the other way around entirely, and I don't think the burden of proof should lie with me, but with the "status quo" so to speak. I think the prevalent idea that one (1) consciousness somehow arises from one (1) brain and that the two are somewhat sheltered from all other consciousness is something heavily debatable, it seems to me very constructed to fit our narrative of individualism and freedom of choice

We do have evidence. Among all the things in the body you can mess with, the brain is the one that has apparent effects on a person's thoughts, behaviors, and actions.

That isn't perfect evidence, it doesn't even prove or define how consciousness works. But it is still evidence that our thoughts depend primarily on brain function.

Note that this same evidence does not offer any reason to conclude there is "freedom of choice". Brains can just as easily be directly responding to all stimuli in a causal and (in principle) predictable manner, just beyond the capacity of the brains themselves to predict.