2.
Some theories on consciousness in the west.
Popular models of consciousness today
Some intriguing questions
3. “If the brain were so simple we could
understand it, we would be so simple we
couldn't.”
- Lyall Watson (writer)
4. Popular theories in the past:
• Mind body dualism (17th century)
•The Higher Order Thought theory(18th century)
•Epiphinomalism (19th century)
•“What is it like to be a bat?” (late 20th century)
5.
Mind and brain are different things.
Believes that the “being” in human being is because of the
mind which is different from the brain.
“I think, therefore I am”
Describes mind as an immaterial, nonextended substance
that engages in various activities such as rational thought,
imagining, feeling, and willing.
Matter conforms to laws of physics.
Human body is composed of both matter and mind.
Ex1: Willing the arm to be raised causes it to be raised. The
willing comes from the mind which manifests outside.
Ex2: We can only see with the eyes, hear with the ears and so
on. But we can think and imagine anything with the mind. So
mind is not restricted to matter.
6. A mental state is conscious only if one is aware
of that state.
We are aware of mental states that are
conscious by having a thought that one is in that
state. These are the higher order thoughts.
One is conscious if one is able to report it.
Otherwise the person is not conscious.
Example, while sleeping one doesn’t know that
he/she is sleeping. So it is not a conscious state.
7. Mental events are caused by physical events in the
brain.
The relationship between mind and brain is like the
relationship between the steam-whistle which
accompanies the work of a locomotive engine and
the engine itself.
Just as the steam-whistle is caused by the engine’s
operations but has no causal influence upon it, so
too the mental is caused by the workings of
neurophysiological mechanisms but has no causal
influence upon their operation.
8.
How can we say that a living thing is conscious without
experiencing things from its perspective?
One can never imagine what it would be like to be that
living thing, so one cannot conclude whether the living
thing has a conscious experience or not.
Ex1: A bat has experience. So there is something that it
is like to be a bat. But their means of perception is
different from ours. So we can never imagine what it
would be like to be a bat. So to conclude that it has no
consciousness would be wrong.
His theory can also be seen in terms of a famous quote:
“Only the wearer knows where the shoe pinches.”
9.
10.
Psychoanalytic theory by Sigmund
Freud (author of Dreams).
Mind has 3 parts:
Conscious: Includes everything we are aware
of. Close to the preconscious level with which
it interacts.
Preconscious: Represents ordinary memory.
Helps retrieve information to consciousness.
Unconscious: The reservoir of feelings,
thoughts, urges and memories. Ex:
responsible for heart beats.
11. Approach from a Computer Science point of view.
Both hardware and software exist in the brain.
Explains it with the analogy of an ant colony.
Individual ants seem to cooperate as teammates and not
randomly wander off. Over years of evolution, the ants have
reinforced themselves into a collective behavior that results
in an ant colony.
Just like ants interact through chemicals (signals), the
neurons interact using chemicals as well.
The signals are low level active sub systems of a complex
system. These signals trigger other signals.
12.
A single ant does not carry any information about the
colony structure. Then who is controlling the building of
the structure?
The answer is that every ant has a “built-in” hardware
according to which it behaves. This behavior leads to the
collective behavior of building the colony. Our neurons
similarly have built-in properties. These properties are
very basic.
Intelligence is produced on top of this hardware. Just
like any program can be written on a computer, any
thought can occur on top of the hardware of the brain.
If some ants can build a colony, then a billion neurons
can help see, hear, taste, feel etc.
13.
Words, messages, stories, pictures stay in some
form in our brains. These form the “data” or
“programs” stored in our brains.
Just like we have regions specialized in hearing,
seeing etc, we have regions which operate on
this “data” and infer something new.
Why all these rules is still unclear. But he
believes that there is an underlying
commonness among all the human minds. This
common mind is called the “Noosphere”.
14.
15.
16. •Depends on how we define consciousness.
Still an area of research.
•Tests conducted suggest that animals like
elephant, dolphins, apes are self-aware.
•Elephants recognize themselves in a
mirror, can paint etc.
• Parrots can “learn” language.
•Humans considered to be most “aware”.
This suggests there are levels of
consciousness.
17.
18. There are levels of consciousness. To the ant, for instance,
what kills it the next moment is not known, but we can
decide its fate. The ant has its own level of consciousness.
Similarly as we go up the hierarchy, the level of
consciousness increases.
Extrapolating this implies that there are levels we are not
aware of and there are things not in our control.
The ant hasn’t seen the entire earth, so to it that is the
universe it is unaware about. Similarly, we are restricted to
our level of existence and are unaware about the “universe”.
So in my opinion, we are just another species staying at our
own level of consciousness and there are higher ones we are
not aware of.
19.
As stated in yesterday’s presentation that
there are softwares which can build other
softwares themselves.
Then these softwares can build softwares
that can build software themselves too.
If this is true, then it is possible that a human
brain understands a human brain itself.
20.
Just like humans thought once upon a time that earth is flat
and then later discovered the true nature, is soul something
which still needs to be understood, given that it exists?
Why do we live in a world of rules and methods? Why is there
an order to everything? For example, why are we designed to
survive only on oxygen and not just anything?
There is some correlation between the ratio (brain size/body
size) to the amount of understanding of the world. This is in
context of all the species on the planet. So are we really
restricted by our brains to achieve the supreme level of
understanding? Or is there an immaterial soul which is
unrestricted by physical size?
Editor's Notes
The presentation looks at the understanding of consciousness in modern times. The topic consciousness in the context of Indian Philosophy has largely been covered in class, hence the choice of modern times. But it does touch upon some ideas from the ancient times.
Add some flow diagram
Mind and consciousness are often used interchangeably and here is a popular quote on mind. This justifies why it is so difficult to understand mind/consciousness.
Mind is an “ immaterial, non extended substance that engages in various activities such as rational thought, imagining, feeling, and willing”.Matter, or extended substance, conforms to the laws of physics in mechanistic fashion, with the exception of the human body.Human body is different as it is affected by the mindBelieved that soul resides at the location of the pineal gland.He chose pineal gland as he thought (erroneously) that it is the only organ that was not duplicated.
The conscious mind includes everything that we are aware of. This is the aspect of our mental processing that we can think and talk about rationally. A part of this includes our memory, which is not always part of consciousness but can be retrieved easily at any time and brought into our awareness. Freud called this the preconscious.The preconscious mind is the part of the mind that represents ordinary memory. While we are not consciously aware of this information at any given time, we can retrieve it and pull it into consciousness when needed.The unconscious mind is a reservoir of feelings, thoughts, urges, and memories that outside of our conscious awareness. Most of the contents of the unconscious are unacceptable or unpleasant, such as feelings of pain, anxiety, or conflict. According to Freud, the unconscious continues to influence our behavior and experience, even though we are unaware of these underlying influences.The personality of a person is composed of three elements:Id, ego and superego.Id-The only component that is present since the birth. Entirely unconscious. The id is driven by immediate gratification of all desires.Ego-The component responsible for dealing with reality. Strives to satisfy id’s needs.Super ego- The superego is the aspect of personality that holds all of our internalized moral standards and ideals that we acquire from both parents and society--our sense of right and wrong. The superego provides guidelines for making judgments. According to Freud, the superego begins to emerge at around age five.Super ego consists of two parts: The ego ideal(the good behavior learnt from society) and the conscience(behaviors to avoid).Ideally all id, ego and super ego must be balanced.
Animals can’t express their experiences through a language. Does that mean they are not conscious?Many philosophers consider experience to be the essence of consciousness and that experience can only be known from the inside, subjectively.Then arises “the problem of other minds”. Which is, how do you know that the other entity is conscious?Similarly it can be argued that determining whether animals are conscious or not can only be based on experiments and observations.Plan on keeping the video or not depending on how the presentations go along.Tests conducted include “Mirror self recognition” (MSR)
Given that I am a CS major, I tried to find if there is any relation between consciousness and computers.
Having studiedabout consciousness I still have these questions to which I could find no answers.
