Consciousness and the Paranormal — Part 7

[Soupie]

Doing so is no response at all to the two questions I asked you to answer. Where did you get the impression that such strange manipulation of texts constitutes a critically reasoned treatment of what either author has written? It's likely a falsification of both Hoffman's and Heidegger's ideas. Have you had a course in scholarly writing?

Haha. Seriously? Anyhow, they're strikingly similar idas. If you can grok Heidegger's "world" then you can grok Hoffman's MUI. And if you can grok the primacy of phenomenology over physicalism, then you can grok Conscious Realism.

 

[Constance]

Haha. Seriously? Anyhow, they're strikingly similar idas. If you can grok Heidegger's "world" then you can grok Hoffman's MUI. And if you can grok the primacy of phenomenology over physicalism, then you can grok Conscious Realism.

See the ETA to my previous post. I'm quite serious. I wonder whether you are. {Haha?}

 

[Soupie]

See the ETA to my previous post. I'm quite serious. I wonder whether you are. {Haha?}

Constance, I'm trying to help you understand Hoffman's approach which has you apparently bewildered. The mere mention of diode has you pegging Hoffman as a computationalist even though it's quite clear that he's not. He advocates consciousness as fundamental.

Heidegger's concept of "being-in-the-world" is very similar, nearly identical, to Hoffman's Multimode User Interface (MUI). Furthermore, Hoffman asserts that consciousness is primary and the physical derivative. Likewise, phenomenologists assert that experience is primary and the physical is derivative.

You're free to disagree with me.

 

[Constance]

Constance, I'm trying to help you understand Hoffman's approach which has you apparently bewildered. The mere mention of diode has you pegging Hoffman as a computationalist even though it's quite clear that he's not. He advocates consciousness as fundamental.

Your mission as a proponent of Hoffman's hypothesis, should you choose to accept it, is to stop making generalized claims and break down the elements of what Hoffman is arguing and why we should find his argument persuasive. Start with that last sentence of yours just above: "He advocates consciousness as fundamental." What does he mean by 'fundamental'? What do you mean by that term?

Heidegger's concept of "being-in-the-world" is very similar, nearly identical, to Hoffman's Multimode User Interface (MUI). Furthermore, Hoffman asserts that consciousness is primary and the physical derivative. Likewise, phenomenologists assert that experience is primary and the physical is derivative.

Phenomenologists, including Heidegger, do not assert that "experience is primary and the physical is derivative." Where did you pick up that notion? Regarding the claim in your first two sentences above, you need to fish or cut bait. Make the case in detail for the "nearly identical" meanings you attribute to Heidegger and Hoffman or give up these mere assertions.

You're free to disagree with me.

Yes, I know. As soon as you produce a coherent defense of your claim I'll be in a position to agree or disagree with what you write.

 

[Soupie]

When we think scientifically of the universe or nature as containing our world, we are not thinking of the world in the proper philosophical sense as the space of meaning in which anything is intelligible. When we think of the world in this philosophical way, however, then we have to reverse the formulation and say that the universe or nature is within the world (Heidegger 1982, p. 165), for it is always within the world that the universe or nature is disclosed to us. In this way, the world as the space of meaning has priority in the order of philosophical inquiry and understanding over the universe as represented by empirical science.

Phenomenologists, including Heidegger, do not assert that "experience is primary and the physical is derivative." Where did you pick up that notion?

See above quote.

Re me defending Hoffman. I've posted two videos and explained his approach as I understand it in my own words. I'll put all that into a post for you and include a paper of his that I have.

 

[Constance]

Here is a pdf of the David Morris paper referred to in Evan Thompson's NDPR book review copied above:

From the Nature of Meaning to a Phenomenology of Nature

file:///C:/Users/Owner/Downloads/nature%20of%20meaning%20published%20(4).pdf


ETA: sorry, that was a direct download link I received by mail after requesting the pdf from Morris at academia.edu. I'll insert below the link to the paper's abstract at academia.edu where you can request the download yourself. Or of you prefer and have Word on your computer, I'll be happy to email you the Word copy of the paper I transcribed through Adobe. Message me with your email address if I don't already have it.

Here's the academia.edu link to this paper (one of several dozen listed by David Morris):

From the Nature of Meaning to a Phenomenology of Nature

 

[Constance]

@Soupie, in the Thompson review passage you quote again in your most recent post, "priority in the order of philosophical inquiry" does not equate to/signify/ mean priority in the order or structure of physical nature. If you think that Hoffman shares this grounding phenomenological insight, where does he locate the 'motherboard' you referred to several posts back? If you don't want Hoffman's hypothesis to sound like a computationalist hypothesis, you'll need to explain why it is not a computationalist hypothesis, and why he nevertheless uses computational metaphors in his references to 'pixels', 'icon', 'motherboard'. You later claimed that he uses computationalist language as "an analogy." Perhaps it would be best if you quote Hoffman directly concerning his reasons for complicating his approach to consciousness with this computational language.

 

[Soupie]

@Soupie, in the Thompson review passage you quote again in your most recent post, "priority in the order of philosophical inquiry" does not equate to/signify/ mean priority in the order or structure of physical nature. If you think that Hoffman shares this grounding phenomenological insight, where does he locate the 'motherboard' you referred to several posts back? If you don't want Hoffman's hypothesis to sound like a computationalist hypothesis, you'll need to explain why it is not a computationalist hypothesis, and why he nevertheless uses computational metaphors in his references to 'pixels', 'icon', 'motherboard'. You later claimed that he uses computationalist language as "an analogy." Perhaps it would be best if you quote Hoffman directly concerning his reasons for complicating his approach to consciousness with this computational language.

The reason he uses the analogy of computer and user interface for his approach to consciousness is because it is a good one, not because he thinks what-is is a computer and consciousness a computation. Hoffman's approach to the mind-body problem does not in any way sound like a computational one. He does not use computationalist language.

Let me repeat: the analogy of the computer and the UI is a metaphor for what-is and our species-specific experience of what-is.

Here is the key phrase from the ET review that dovetails with Hoffman's approach:

"When we think of the world in this philosophical way, however, then we have to reverse the formulation and say that the universe or nature is within the world (Heidegger 1982, p. 165), for it is always within the world that the universe or nature is disclosed to us."

What I take the above to mean is that nature (what-is) is disclosed to us through the world (human experience).

Hoffman says something which is, on my understanding, nearly identical: Objective reality (what-is) is disclosed to us through our species-specific multimodal user interface (human experience).

 

[boomerang]

Do you have a link to the presentation you refer to in the above? I'd be curious to see it.

Q & A is at the end and sadly short.

 

[Soupie]

The Case Against Reality - The Atlantic

Conscious Realism and the Mind-Body Problem - Paper

Donald Hoffman: Do we see reality as it is? - Video

Conscious Realism as I understand it:

Conscious Realism

CR is the concept that "feeling" entities are ontologically fundamental. These entities interact to form systems, systems of systems, etc. How and why these entities interact is not explicated by Hoffman so far as I have read.

Humans are one such example of a system of interacting entities. How, why, and if these systems of entities share one pov Hoffman hasn't explained so far as I've read.

These systems perceive other systems. Perceiving feels like something because these systems are constituted of feeling entities.

However, perception of other systems is not perfect. That is, perception does not capture all the details of other systems.

Systems of entities evolve in a local environment of other systems; however, evolution dictates that a system evolve to perceive details of the environment that are adaptive.

Different systems will evolve to perceive different systems and moreover to perceive systems differently. For example, dogs and birds will perceive different systems and will perceive the same systems differently.

In this manner, evolving systems are enmeshed and coupled to their local environment which consists of other systems of systems.

Perceptions—and other structures of mind—are real in the sense that they exist, but the phenomenal objects that appear in perception are not perfect representations (replicas) of the systems in the local environment. Phenomenal objects are to be taken seriously but not literally.

In this way, it can be said that consciousness is fundamental and perceived phenomena, such as atoms, molecules, cells, organisms, etc. are secondary, emerging from the evolution of interacting systems of feeling entities.

 

[Soupie]

He is asked if iconic spiritual seers throughout history may have been notable exceptions to the principle of "Faithful Deception". I find his answer intriguing: Possibly, but that perception and cognitive understanding are not synonymous. We therefore cannot say.

So cognitively (conceptually) these seers may have concluded that reality as it appeared to them was illusory, but it doesn't follow that they were then able to perceive reality in-itself.

Maya (illusion) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"Maya in Vedanta Hinduism

Maya is a prominent and commonly referred to concept in Vedanta philosophies.[59][60] Maya is often translated as "illusion", in the sense of "appearance".[61][62] Human mind constructs a subjective experience, states Vedanta school, which leads to the peril of misunderstanding Maya as well as interpreting Maya as the only and final reality. Vedantins assert the "perceived world including people are not what they appear to be".[63] There are invisible principles and laws at work, true invisible nature in others and objects, and invisible soul that one never perceives directly, but this invisible reality of Self and Soul exists, assert Vedanta scholars. Māyā is that which manifests, perpetuates a sense of false duality (or divisional plurality).[64] This manifestation is real, but it obfuscates and eludes the hidden principles and true nature of reality. Vedanta school holds that liberation is the unfettered realization and understanding of these invisible principles – the Self, that the Self (Soul) in oneself is same as the Self in another and the Self in everything (Brahman).[65] The difference within various sub-schools of Vedanta is the relationship between individual soul and cosmic soul (Brahman). Non-theistic Advaita sub-school holds that both are One, everyone is thus deeply connected Oneness, there is God in everyone and everything;[66] while theistic Dvaita and other sub-schools hold that individual souls and God's soul are distinct and each person can at best love God constantly to get one's soul infinitely close to His Soul.[67][68]

Maya in Dzogchen Buddhism

The concept that the world is an illusion is controversial in Buddhism. The Buddha does not state that the world is an illusion, but like an illusion. In the Dzogchen tradition the perceived reality is considered literally unreal, in that objects which make-up perceived reality are known as objects within ones mind, and that, as we conceive them, there is no pre-determined object, or assembly of objects in isolation from experience that may be considered the "true" object, or objects. As a prominent contemporary teacher puts it: "In a real sense, all the visions that we see in our lifetime are like a big dream [...]".[80] In this context, the term visions denotes not only visual perceptions, but appearances perceived through all senses, including sounds, smells, tastes and tactile sensations.

Different schools and traditions in Tibetan Buddhism give different explanations of the mechanism producing the illusion usually called "reality".[81]"

It's fascinating that these contemplative schools arrived at these conclusions, and that Hoffman's study of perception and the mind-body problem led him to a similar conclusion.

As to whether one can "perceive" objectice reality, it would seem not, as we lack the perceptual systems to do so. However, is it possible to experience objective reality in-itself? Seeing as we consist of objective reality (whatever that may be) then perhaps the being is the experiencing.

"Even the illusory nature of apparent phenomena is itself an illusion. Ultimately, the yogi passes beyond a conception of things either existing or not existing, and beyond a conception of either samsara or nirvana. Only then is the yogi abiding in the ultimate reality.[83]"

 

[Constance]

@Soupie, I don't remember if the paper cited below is the one you first quoted in describing Hoffman's hypothesis, but in this paper it becomes clear by the second page that Hoffman and his coauthors are using computational processes metaphorically, as you've said in our recent exchange. I confess to not having read very far in this (or perhaps it was another) paper laying out Hoffman's thought, and you correctly recognized yesterday that my first response to Hoffman would be to react (overreact) to the computational structure he referred to without recognizing that it was being used merely as an analogy to processes he wanted to hypothesize in evolutionary history. I'll now begin to do what I should have done in the first place -- to read Hoffman's writing with an open mind, with apologies for not doing so at the outset of your discussion of Hoffman's ideas.


Natural selection and veridical perceptions
Justin T. Mark, Brian B. Marion, Donald D. Hoffman
Journal of Theoretical Biology
http://cogsci.uci.edu/~ddhoff/PerceptualEvolution.pdf

Abstract: Does natural selection favor veridical perceptions, those that more accurately depict the objective environment? Students of perception often claim that it does. But this claim, though influential, has not been adequately tested. Here we formalize the claim and a few alternatives. To test them, we introduce ‘‘interface games,’’ a class of evolutionary games in which perceptual strategies compete. We explore, in closed-form solutions and Monte Carlo simulations, some simpler games that assume frequency dependent selection and complete mixing in infinite populations. We find that veridical perceptions can be driven to extinction by non-veridical strategies that are tuned to utility rather than objective reality. This suggests that natural selection need not favor veridical perceptions, and that the effects of selection on sensory perception deserve further study."

Extract
". . .This account of perception and its evolution is, no doubt, appealing. But it depends crucially on the claim that truer perception is fitter perception. This raises two questions. Does evolutionary theory support this claim? And what, precisely, is meant by true perception?

We answer the second question, in the next section, by formalizing possible relations between perception and reality. Then, to answer the first question, we use evolutionary games to explore the relative fitness of these possible relations. We find that truth can fare poorly if information is not free; costs for time and energy required to gather information can impair the fitness of truth. What often fares better is a relation between perception and reality akin to the relation between a graphical user interface and the hardware of a computer (Hoffman, 1998). The icons on a desktop guide effective interaction with the computer, but the colors, shapes and locations of the icons do not, in general, resemble any properties of the software or hardware they represent. An interface promotes efficient interaction with the computer by hiding its structural and causal complexity, i.e., by hiding the truth. As a strategy for perception, an interface can dramatically trim the requirements for information and its concomitant costs in time and energy, thus leading to greater fitness. But the key advantage of an interface strategy is that it is not required to model aspects of objective reality; as a result it has more flexibility to model utility, and utility is all that matters in evolution."

I'm a long way from being persuaded that our species and others do not encounter physically real and visible things and structures in the natural environments in which we find ourselves existing, and that we recognize their existence through their phenomenal appearances to our specific species' sensory access to them, but I'm intrigued enough by Hoffman's hypothesis at this point to attempt to understand it.

 

[Constance]

I linked to the Hoffman et al paper cited in my last post from a live link embedded in the Atlantic's article listed first in your series of links posted today concerning Hoffman. After reading that article in the Atlantic I also followed a link to the Quanta article linked below, which was presented on the same page. This recent Quanta article, entitled "In Newly Created Life-Form, a Major Mystery," is testimony to limits reached in genetic research to date, information that is significant in itself but that also suggests the limits we can anticipate encountering in the effort to comprehend the origins and evolution of consciousness (which I think plainly has accompanied the evolution of life).

In Newly Created Life-Form, a Major Mystery | Quanta Magazine

 

[Randall]

I don't think above view mirrors Chalmers view. To say that (1) consciousness is fundamental and (2) that it is dependent on the brain is a contradiction.

Perhaps this is a case of lack of precision in my comment. So allow me to rephrase: Chalmers favors the view that consciousness is fundamental and he likens it to electromagnetism. Of that there is no question because he says so in one of his TED lectures. Therefore, it is true that like Chalmers I'm more of the train of thought that consciousness is something fundamental. This does not mean that either of us think that electromagnetism = consciousness. Chalmers also recognizes that we understand much better the areas of the brain that go along with conscious experience, and therefore he is aware of the overwhelming evidence that directly correlates brain function with conscious experience. However neither Chalmers or I think that brain material = consciousness.

However continuing with the EM analogy, electromagnetism still requires the right configuration of physical elements for it to manifest, and those elements are an electrical current, a conductor, and a core. In every known instance where we have those materials properly configured and live, magnetism manifests. This allows us to safely conclude that such magnetism is dependent on those conditions. Similarly, in every known instance where we are either experiencing it ourselves, or there is someone who claims to be experiencing it who can be studied, a functioning brain has also been present.

So saying, "I'm more with Chalmers train of thought." is perfectly valid. It's not the same as saying I "mirrior Chalmers", nor am I putting words in Chalmers' mouth. I strongly suspect that Chalmers would agree that consciousness as we experience it is dependent on a normally functioning human brain, but I'm not making the claim that he does. If however I run across something definitive by him on that issue, I'll post it up.

And as has been noted several times, any similarities between magnetic fields and phenomenal consciousness (i.e. experience of colors, smells, sounds, textures, etc) is weak at best.

And again, no claim is being made that consciousness = magnetic fields. The claim is that EM fields affect conscious experience and therefore conscious experience may be related and possibly dependent on them. If this is the situation then in a broad sense we can say that the brain as a whole includes consciousness as an element in the same way that an electromagnet includes magnetism as an element, yet each fundamental element ( magnetism and consciousness ) are distinctly separate in nature as a phenomena from the materials associated with them. Yet this correlation is so pervasive that it is a virtual certainty that both phenomena are dependent on the proper configuration and functioning of those materials for their existence. In fact it is so pervasive that there are zero cases where under scientifically valid and verifiable conditions, any person without a brain has exhibited any level of consciousness.

 

[Randall]

Here is one in which he defines what a Conscious Agent is:

Interesting from a conceptual and abstract perspective, but in the end Conscious Realism and Subjective Idealism amount to pretty much the same thing, and both are total nonsense, if for no other reason than all reliable science tells us that the universe has been around far longer than humans have been around to perceive it. The classic counterpoint to this has been Berkley's invocation of God, which carries zero scientific weight.

 

[Constance]

There is an interesting discussion of Hoffman's hypothesis at skeptico. A brief exchange, in medias res, from page 4 of it:

"If the framework is isomorphic to QM, then it will make the same predictions that QM does. He may be just going along for the piggyback ride.

Actually there are possible differences between the models.

Is it a result, or is it a (not-true) perception of the underlying agent schema?

Wouldn't it be both? The underlying schema produces something that, to our perception, looks like a quark.

I think this is the first big challenge Hoffman faces - he has to show the mathematics of the larger true reality, and then show us how this hyper-reality produces us and the observable world.

The second is taking the model and making predictions that can be falsified."

Consciousness and The Interface Theory of Perception

 

[Constance]

A participant in the skeptico discussion links this statement by Hoffman from Edge.org:


Truer Perceptions Are Fitter Perceptions Should be Retired

"Those of our predecessors who perceived the world more accurately enjoyed a competitive advantage over their less-fortunate peers. They were thus more likely to raise children and to become our ancestors. We are the offspring of those who perceived more truly, and we can be confident that our perceptions are, in the normal case, reasonably accurate. There are of course endogenous limits. We can, for instance, see light only in a narrow window of wavelengths between roughly 400 and 700 nanometers, and hear sound only in a narrow window of frequencies between 20 and 20,000 Hertz. Moreover we are prone, on occasion, to have perceptual illusions. But with these provisos noted, it is fair to conclude on evolutionary grounds that our perceptions are, in general, reliable guides to reality.

This is the consensus of researchers studying perception via brain imaging, computational modeling and psychophysical experiments. It is mentioned in passing in many professional publications, and stated as fact in standard textbooks.

But it gets evolution wrong. Fitness and truth are distinct concepts in evolutionary theory. To specify a fitness function one must specify not just the state of the world but also, inter alia, a particular organism, a particular state of that organism, and a particular action. Dark chocolates can kill cats, but are a fitting gift from a suitor on Valentine's Day.

Monte Carlo simulations using evolutionary game theory, with a wide range of fitness functions and a wide range of randomly created environments, find that truer perceptions are routinely driven to extinction by perceptions that are tuned to the relevant fitness functions. The extension of these simulations to evolutionary graphs is in progress, and the same result is expected. Simulations with genetic algorithms find that truth never gets on the stage to have a chance to go extinct.

Perceptions tuned to fitness are typically far less complex than those tuned to truth. They require less time and resources to compute, and are thus advantageous in environments where swift action is critical. But even apart from considerations of time and complexity, true perceptions go extinct simply because natural selection selects for fitness not truth.

We must take our perceptions seriously. They have been shaped by natural selection to guide adaptive behaviors and to keep us alive long enough to reproduce. We should avoid cliffs and snakes. But we must not take our perceptions literally. They are not the truth; they are simply a species-specific guide to behavior.

Observation is the empirical foundation of science. The predicates of this foundation, including space, time, physical objects and causality, are a species-specific adaptation, not an insight. Thus this view of perception has implications for fields beyond perceptual science, including physics, neuroscience and the philosophy of science. The old assumption that fitter perceptions are truer perceptions is deeply woven into our conception of science. The funeral of this assumption will not be snubbed with a back-page obituary, but heralded with regime change."

Edge.org

 

[Constance]

And this one, also from Edge.

Sciborg_S_Patel said: (go to post)
From Edge 2005, not sure if this clarifies anything:

I believe that consciousness and its contents are all that exists. Spacetime, matter and fields never were the fundamental denizens of the universe but have always been, from their beginning, among the humbler contents of consciousness, dependent on it for their very being.

The world of our daily experience—the world of tables, chairs, stars and people, with their attendant shapes, smells, feels and sounds—is a species-specific user interface to a realm far more complex, a realm whose essential character is conscious. It is unlikely that the contents of our interface in any way resemble that realm. Indeed the usefulness of an interface requires, in general, that they do not. For the point of an interface, such as the windows interface on a computer, is simplification and ease of use. We click icons because this is quicker and less prone to error than editing megabytes of software or toggling voltages in circuits. Evolutionary pressures dictate that our species-specific interface, this world of our daily experience, should itself be a radical simplification, selected not for the exhaustive depiction of truth but for the mutable pragmatics of survival.

If this is right, if consciousness is fundamental, then we should not be surprised that, despite centuries of effort by the most brilliant of minds, there is as yet no physicalist theory of consciousness, no theory that explains how mindless matter or energy or fields could be, or cause, conscious experience. There are, of course, many proposals for where to find such a theory—perhaps in information, complexity, neurobiology, neural darwinism, discriminative mechanisms, quantum effects, or functional organization. But no proposal remotely approaches the minimal standards for a scientific theory: quantitative precision and novel prediction. If matter is but one of the humbler products of consciousness, then we should expect that consciousness itself cannot be theoretically derived from matter. The mind-body problem will be to physicalist ontology what black-body radiation was to classical mechanics: first a goad to its heroic defense, later the provenance of its final supersession.

The heroic defense will, I suspect, not soon be abandoned. For the defenders doubt that a replacement grounded in consciousness could attain the mathematical precision or impressive scope of physicalist science. It remains to be seen, of course, to what extent and how effectively mathematics can model consciousness. But there are fascinating hints: According to some of its interpretations, the mathematics of quantum theory is itself, already, a major advance in this project. And perhaps much of the mathematical progress in the perceptual and cognitive sciences can also be so interpreted. We shall see.

The mind-body problem may not fall within the scope of physicalist science, since this problem has, as yet, no bona fide physicalist theory. Its defenders can surely argue that this penury shows only that we have not been clever enough or that, until the right mutation chances by, we cannot be clever enough, to devise a physicalist theory. They may be right. But if we assume that consciousness is fundamental then the mind-body problem transforms from an attempt to bootstrap consciousness from matter into an attempt to bootstrap matter from consciousness. The latter bootstrap is, in principle, elementary: Matter, spacetime and physical objects are among the contents of consciousness.

The rules by which, for instance, human vision constructs colors, shapes, depths, motions, textures and objects, rules now emerging from psychophysical and computational studies in the cognitive sciences, can be read as a description, partial but mathematically precise, of this bootstrap. What we lose in this process are physical objects that exist independent of any observer. There is no sun or moon unless a conscious mind perceives them, for both are constructs of consciousness, icons in a species-specific user interface. To some this seems a patent absurdity, a reductio of the position, readily contradicted by experience and our best science. But our best science, our theory of the quantum, gives no such assurance. And experience once led us to believe the earth flat and the stars near. Perhaps, in due time, mind-independent objects will go the way of flat earth.

This view obviates no method or result of science, but integrates and reinterprets them in its framework. Consider, for instance, the quest for neural correlates of consciousness (NCC). This holy grail of physicalism can, and should, proceed unabated if consciousness is fundamental, for it constitutes a central investigation of our user interface. To the physicalist, an NCC is, potentially, a causal source of consciousness. If, however, consciousness is fundamental, then an NCC is a feature of our interface correlated with, but never causally responsible for, alterations of consciousness. Damage the brain, destroy the NCC, and consciousness is, no doubt, impaired. Yet neither the brain nor the NCC causes consciousness. Instead consciousness constructs the brain and the NCC. This is no mystery. Drag a file's icon to the trash and the file is, no doubt, destroyed. Yet neither the icon nor the trash, each a mere pattern of pixels on a screen, causes its destruction. The icon is a simplification, a graphical correlate of the file's contents (GCC), intended to hide, not to instantiate, the complex web of causal relations."

 

[Constance]

A further text from Hoffman:

"Peeking Behind the Icons" from
Donald Hoffman, Visual Intelligence: How We Create What We See

Extracts:

" . . . Of course it’s not technology per se that creates realistic virtual worlds. It’s the customers, the ones paying their hard-earned cash, who are the real creators. Virtual reality is only possible because we, the customers, construct what we perceive.

We are the source of the stock cars we pass in a virtual drag race, the prospective stadium we scrutinize in a virtual architectural walk through, the molecules whose 3D shape we see and whose electric forces we feel in a virtual chemistry course, and the delicate, bleeding tissues we slice in a virtual open-heart surgery. The high tech displays cleverly prompt us to construct these scenes, and the more clever the prompting the better scenes we can construct (and the more we’re willing to pay). But the displays can only prompt, they can’t construct the virtual realities for us. What makes one display more compelling than another is that it more fully engages the constructive processes of the customer. But now let’s use virtual reality for another purpose, as a metaphor to explore questions that have probably nagged you about the story on perceptual construction. Questions like these: if we each construct all we see, then why do we all see the same things? What is the relationship between “reality” and our constructions? . . . ."


"But what is your relational brain? Does it resemble your phenomenal brain? There’s no reason to suppose it does. In fact, as we saw with the volleyball, there’s no reason to suppose that the nature of the phenomenal brain in any way constrains the nature of the relational brain. Your phenomenal brain is simply a graphical interface that allows you to interact with your relational brain, whatever that relational brain might be. And all that’s required of a graphical interface is that it be systematically related to what it represents. The relation can be as arbitrary as you wish, as long as it’s systematic. The trash can icon on your computer screen is a graphical interface to software which can erase files on your computer disk. The trash can icon is systematically related to that erasing software, but the relation is arbitrary: the trash can icon doesn’t resemble the erasing software in any way. It could be any color or shape you wish and still successfully do the job of letting you interact with the erasing software. It could be a pig icon or a toilette icon instead of a trash can icon. All that matters is the systematic connection."


". . . If “well adapted” doesn’t mean “resembles,” then what does it mean? It means a systematic but arbitrary relation. Our perceptual experiences are well adapted to the relational realm because they provide a systematic but arbitrary guide to those aspects of the relational realm that are critical to our needs and our survival — just as the icon interface on your computer is well adapted because it provides a systematic but arbitrary guide to the computer’s unseen circuits and software. Something might still seem wrong here. Look, you say, when I see a snake slithering toward me in the grass, then I would be a fool not to think that there really is a snake, and I would be a fool not to get out of the way. Natural selection has seen to it that when I see snakes, there are snakes, and there is real danger. Granted, when you see snakes there are snakes, and you must take them seriously. Similarly, when you see a trashcan icon on your computer screen, there really is a trashcan icon, and when you see a document icon representing that text file you’ve been editing for the last five hours, there really is a document icon. And you must take these icons seriously. If you drag that document icon into that trash-can icon then you’ll lose your last five hours of work.

That’s a serious consequence. To say that experiences provide a systematic but arbitrary guide to the relational realm is not to deny that experiences are real and must be taken seriously. Snake experiences are real experiences and must be taken seriously. But they don’t entail that anything in the relational realm resembles a snake, just as a trash can icon doesn’t entail that circuits and software resemble a trash can.

Neither biology nor quantum theory dictates the nature of the relational realm. Nor does any other science. Each studies certain phenomena, and describes these by precise theories. In no case do the phenomena or the theories dictate the nature of the relational realm. We might hope that the theories of science will converge to a true theory of the relational realm. This is the hope of scientific realism. But it’s a hope as yet unrealized, and a hope that cannot be proven true.

So this is a small sample of what happens when we peek behind the icons, when we ask what else there might be in addition to our perceptual constructions. We find a myriad of fascinating questions. We find that we’ve entered the province of philosophy and religion. Because the phenomenal and relational realms need not resemble each other, because their relationship is arbitrary and systematic, the tools of science can help us guess at the nature of the relational realm, but might never dictate a final verdict."

http://anti-matters.org/articles/35/public/35-30-1-PB.pdf

 

[Constance]

Re the David Morris paper "From the Nature of Meaning to a Phenomenological Refiguring of Nature," which I was unable to link directly here yesterday, here is a direct link to it:

http://spectrum.library.concordia.ca/977292/1/nature_of_meaning_published.pdf