Illusion of Consciousness?

[untimelyethos]

So I just watched a TED Talk from Dan Dennett on The Illusion of Consciousness.

Admittedly, I am relatively new to Dennett's philosophy. I am more familiar with Hawking, who appears to share some similar thoughts.

After watching this video, I have to disagree with some of his theories, most of which is his "belittling" of consciousness. I appreciate the value of our growing biological/neurological understanding of how the brain works. However, I think that relating consciousness to "mind tricks" dismisses many of the positive messages that go along with the belief that consciousness is "more than what can be defined"; that it has unbridled potential and a connectivity to other/greater consciousness...

What are your thoughts?

Perhaps I am being to dismissive off the bat, or maybe it conflicts with some of my own personal beliefs and am clouded by bias. But I am interested in learning more!

 

[primordium]

I consider Daniel Dennett one of the greatest living philosophers. His book Consciousness Explained is outstanding, absolutely a must-read work. As a philosopher, though, he is certainly imperfect--e.g., how seriously he takes memetics. Bottom line, though: any one who harbors "mystical" notions of consciousness (e.g., "All is Consciousness," etc.) should grapple with Dennett's challenges.

You've hit a criticism that others had have about Dennett, as well: he doesn't so much explain consciousness as actually explain it away (cf. John Searle), presenting a worldview that ignores consciousness rather than illuminates it. Many competing philosophers, for instance, consider Dennett to not properly address the "hard problem" of consciousness. Although, that is somewhat unfair--it's just that his solution is unpopular and counterintuitive (e.g., "Quining Qualia").

If you would rather follow your intuitions, though, you might find more light from the work of David Chalmers, Galen Strawson, and Jaegwon Kim (all of whom integrate neuroscience into their philosophies while still preserving consciousness, sometimes panpsychically).

To follow Dennett's lead and further explore "illusion" in the philosophy of mind, Chalmers has compiled a nice collection here. Here's a spoiler: the debate is more complicated than Dennett presented.

 

[hixidom]

I have not yet watched the TED talk, but (on a side note) I don't like Daniel Dennett's philosophy simply because he is a compatibilist. In my opinion, with respect to free will, you can't have your cake and eat it too. To relate this to the topic at hand... Knowledge, belief, and meaning are constructions of consciousness. If you explain away consciousness, then you also explain away the knowledge, belief, and meaning used in making your original explanation. In other words, if consciousness is an illusion, then the knowledge, belief, and meaning used to come to this conclusion are also an illusion, in which case I have no reason to belief that consciousness is an illusion. It is in this way that I consider determinism/materialism to be a somewhat paradoxical belief. That's not to say that a belief is not valid just because it is "paradoxical".

After looking at the Wiki page on the "hard problem of consciousness", I found this line to best represent it:
"Why is it that when our cognitive systems engage in visual and auditory information-processing, we have visual or auditory experience"

I think that relating consciousness to "mind tricks" dismisses many of the positive messages that go along with the belief that consciousness is "more than what can be defined"; that it has unbridled potential and a connectivity to other/greater consciousness...

If [consciousness' being more than just the mind] is just a belief, then I would say there is nothing wrong with dismissing it. On the other hand, drawing a line between beliefs and facts is tricky if not impossible. The idea of consciousness as an illusion seems utterly silly to me. After all, if there is no consciousness, then what is it that is being Illuded?!

 

[tetsuotheironman]

I've read a few of his books "Consciousness Explained", "Darwin's Dangerous Idea" and "Freedom Evolves" - the latter probably being slightly more relevant in how he is synthesizing his philosophy of the mind in relation to what we think of 'free will'. (when he isn't being distracted being part of the 'new atheists')

Searle's (and others) criticism regarding 'Consciousness Explained Away' is very well put but I personally would't classify that so dismissively. He (Dennett) is attempting to frame an understanding of consciousness that makes sense from both an evolutionary perspective and integrating the massive contribution the ideas of 'universal computation' provides as a metaphor. I personally find that his critiques of dualism (in all its guises) are very enlightening. I can't say I always agree 100% with everything he says - but I would say he is probably the best modern/working philosopher today.

Here is a recent talk where he discusses how his own belief system is evolving in regards to how well of a model a VonNeumann type machine (serial computation in general) acts as an analogy for the brain... (tldr; parallel/distributed computation ftw)

For a great overview of consciousness studies in general (and very compatible with Dennett's philosophy) check out
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