100 Trillion Connections: New Efforts Probe and Map the Brain's Detailed Architecture

[actualfactual]

The noise of billions of brain cells trying to communicate with one another may hold a crucial clue to understanding consciousness

article @ http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=100-trillion-connections

 

[gibran2]

If you believe in the primacy of matter, then fully understanding the brain equals fully understanding consciousness. If you believe in the primacy of consciousness, then fully understanding the brain will not necessarily “hold crucial clues to understanding consciousness”.

 

[burnt]

Why believe in the primacy of consciousness? What I mean is where is the evidence for such an idea? Of course there is a philosophical argument that all you really know if you own consciousness. Although I do think there are many holes in that argument.

 

[endlessness]

Why believe in the primacy of matter? I do think there are many holes in that argument too (for example positive relationship isnt necessarily = cause and effect, which seems to me the main mistake most people believing brain structure creates consciousness fall into)

(Not to say Im tending to any side, I just dont see the point 'believing' absolutely in either of those )

 

[burnt]

I am perfectly open to the idea that there could be other things underlying normal matter. I just don't see why consciousness always pops up as one of those things. A 13.7 billion year old universe was just fine without human consciousness.

 

[gibran2]

Why believe in the primacy of consciousness? What I mean is where is the evidence for such an idea? Of course there is a philosophical argument that all you really know if you own consciousness. Although I do think there are many holes in that argument.

There is currently no evidence that either the primacy of matter or the primacy of consciousness is the “correct” paradigm. Currently, “believing” in either one leads to the same results. (And for all we know, neither paradigm is adequate to explain the true nature of reality.)

You already answered your question a bit – the only experiences any of us have ever had and can ever have are subjective conscious experiences. This doesn’t prove the primacy of consciousness, but I think it’s enough to allow us to consider the primacy of consciousness as a “candidate”. In other words, the consideration of the primacy of consciousness as a paradigm candidate is not arbitrary.

 

[Citta]

A 13.7 billion year old universe was just fine without human consciousness.

Yet neuroscience shows that the thing we call "the world" appears in the cerebral cortex, one of the most advanced parts of the brain that other animals have not developed. Interesting paradox. Evolution and the history of the universe requires a universe with space, forms, things, planets, organisms and so on billion of years before the development of this picture of the world.

I am not arguing against anything, just illustrating how theories do not deal with any "ding an sich", or an observation-independent reality, and that all phenomena is at its primacy mental phenomena with its roots in the nervous system.

 

[benzyme]

animals don't have the prefrontal cortex at all.
for this reason, they lack the ability to make things up, conspire, and engage in political
shenanigans. they operate on basic social instincts.

and yes, show me evidence of this consciousness construct, not new-agey psychobabble.
the best model we have is measuring electro-chemical impulses during certain states of consciousness.

 

[endlessness]

what about orangutans that can have abstract thought and make creative solutions?

Raising the level: orangutans use water as a tool

We investigated the use of water as a tool by presenting five orangutans (Pongo abelii) with an out-of-reach peanut floating inside a vertical transparent tube. All orangutans collected water from a drinker and spat it inside the tube to get access to ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

(complementary video showing him finding the solution and inventing a novel use for water as a tool:

)

 

[benzyme]

hippocampus.

 

[endlessness]

and yes, show me evidence of this consciousness construct, not new-agey psychobabble.
the best model we have is measuring electro-chemical impulses during certain states of consciousness.

You being a man of science should very well know that positive relationship is not proof of cause and effect. All we know is that when certain area of the brain changes, certain aspect of subjective consciousness changes, but this is not the same as saying brain creates consciousness. (*insert here the classic tv analogy where images are not created in the tv )

This is not new agey psychobabble, this is being scientifically prudent. Yes of course electro chemical model can help in many aspects but to jump to the conclusion that this shows brain creates consciousness is nothing but a leap of faith and quite frankly an unnecessary one.

Again, I dont say it is one way or another, we just dont know (yet?). So lets keep researching

 

[Dark Matter]

I am perfectly open to the idea that there could be other things underlying normal matter. I just don't see why consciousness always pops up as one of those things. A 13.7 billion year old universe was just fine without human consciousness.

Consciousness. Not necessary "human consciousness". How do we define consciousness?

Maybe you can't separate consciousness from matter. Maybe the whole Universe is conscious, wich is why it evolves constantly by learning from its experiments performed upon itself. Maybe human consciousness is just the freshest and more complex product to came out of that evolution of consciousness.

Or maybe I'm saying non-sense. Who knows.

 

[gibran2]

animals don't have the prefrontal cortex at all.
for this reason, they lack the ability to make things up, conspire, and engage in political
shenanigans. they operate on basic social instincts.

and yes, show me evidence of this consciousness construct, not new-agey psychobabble.
the best model we have is measuring electro-chemical impulses during certain states of consciousness.

There is no evidence that the correct paradigm is the primacy of consciousness, just as there is no evidence that the correct paradigm is the primacy of matter.

You can measure all of the electro-chemical impulses you want, but how do you know you’re making the measurements and how do you know the results? Via consciousness.

The fact that electro-chemical impulses occur in the brain during various conscious states neither supports nor refutes either paradigm.

 

[benzyme]

no, but it does make for more empirical, repeatable (in some cases) observations.
more tangible than other methods, like surveys.

objective vs. subjective
that's what separates science from religion.
the ability to measure and make empirical observations, reproducibly.
that is a better means of showing correlation, than merely speculating.

 

[gibran2]

no, but it does make for more empirical, repeatable (in some cases) observations.
more tangible than other methods, like surveys.

objective vs. subjective
that's what separates science from religion.
the ability to measure and make empirical observations, reproducibly.
that is a better means of showing correlation, than merely speculating.

Well, it seems as if you’re beginning to define “reality”: “to measure and make empirical observations, reproducibly”. When you do this, all you can really say for sure is that your subjective conscious experiences are organized, coherent, and reproducible.

Here’s a quote I made in another thread:

The only thing we know for certain to be real is that “something” has subjective conscious experiences, and we ordinarily call that something “self”.

Science is the study of the content, structure, patterns, and relationships of subjective conscious experiences. Subjective conscious experience seems to be all we have and all we are.

Science doesn’t study the physical world. The physical world as we know it is an abstraction used to make sense of the stream of our subjective conscious experiences. We cannot say whether or not a physical world exists outside of consciousness. (Which also means we can’t say whether or not our physical bodies exist.)

So we can be certain that subjective conscious experience exists, yet we can’t be certain that physical reality exists.

 

[clouds]

I remember reading once in this forum more or less the following:

burnt: Matter is first.

gibran2: Consciousness is first. All we know is that we are having a subjective conscious experience.

burnt: Consciousness needs a "place" to exist. To have a "subjective conscious experience" you need a place to have it.

gibran2: Yeah you're right.

 

[benzyme]

Science is the study of the content, structure, patterns, and relationships of subjective conscious experiences.

no.
science applies objective (not subjective) observation, so as to rule out bias.
this way, it may be observed by all.

this is why we seek evidence, and not anecdotal speculation

 

[gibran2]

I remember reading once in this forum more or less the following:

burnt: Matter is first.

gibran2: Consciousness is first. All we know is that we are having a subjective conscious experience.

burnt: Consciousness needs a "place" to exist. To have a "subjective conscious experience" you need a place to have it.

gibran2: Yeah you're right.

Well, I don’t remember that at all.

Actually, I have vague memories of it. The discussion there was more about how we define “subjective” vs. “objective”. I think we were talking about reality, and if there is indeed an objective reality.

I agreed that there was, but concluded that it wasn’t necessarily anything like what we ordinarily consider to be objective reality.

As I formulate it now, consciousness itself is the ultimate “objective” reality.

 

[gibran2]

Science is the study of the content, structure, patterns, and relationships of subjective conscious experiences.

no.
science applies objective (not subjective) observation, so as to rule out bias.
this way, it may be observed by all.

this is why we seek evidence, and not anecdotal speculation

By “subjective”, I don’t mean an opinion, personal bias, etc. I mean coming from one’s self. If you don’t like the word “subjective”, either remove it or replace it with “self”.

Let me re-phrase that quote:

The only thing we know for certain to be real is that “something” has conscious experiences, and we ordinarily call that something “self”.

Science is the study of the content, structure, patterns, and relationships of our own conscious experiences. Conscious experience seems to be all we have and all we are.

Science doesn’t study the physical world. The physical world as we know it is an abstraction used to make sense of the stream of our own conscious experiences. We cannot say whether or not a physical world exists outside of consciousness. (Which also means we can’t say whether or not our physical bodies exist.)

So we can be certain that our own conscious experience exists, yet we can’t be certain that physical reality exists.

I’m not sure how you define “objective observation”, so please define it.

 

[benzyme]

objective observation is one made where no judgement is made on a phenomena, and it can be experienced by anyone.
an empirical interpretation may be made made for a given event, where a hypothesis is tested, in the presence of a control, and the outcome can be observed by anyone.

a subjective observation is solely dependent on the individual experience, thus so is its interpretation. therefore, it is rooted in personal bias.

Difference between objective and subjective? - Answers

Subjective observations cannot be seen. They are ideas, thoughts, or opinions. If you cannot see it, feel it, hear it, or smell it, it is a subjective observation. Objective observations can be seen. If you can see it, feel it, hear it, or smell it, it is an objective observation. Objective...

wiki.answers.com

this is why science is the ultimate equalizer against megalomaniacs like the pope or jesus.