Thread 24677035

Why do we experience qualia?
Why didn't we just start out as philosophical zombies?

In the grand scheme of things, this feel very arbitrary, yet pointless.

nobody knows

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Life only feels pointless when you're neglecting your duty to live right.
Consciousness transforms life. We are participating in the creation of reality.

Any books for "this feels very arbitrary yet pointless" yet Ick-shall-ask-anyways type-post? Any books for "quantum fluctuations: who are they? And when where they?" type-video-games? Any questions for "does bathroom graffiti qualify as philosophy" type-book? Any qualias to describe "OP: does he enjoy (or LOVE) asking questions that amount to "eating one's own tail" (in this case the tail and mouth is made of words) type-qualia? Is language a futile device type-question?

>>24677035 (OP)
We can imagine things that are not conscious, like rocks.
We can imagine machines that approach human-mind capabilities that are probably not conscious, like computers.
If we assume that neither are conscious, we can conclude that a philosophical zombie could theoretically exist, yet we are not.

>>24677035 (OP)
Reality isn’t fundamentally material.

consciousness is a mystical superstition akin to the animist rain dance

>>24677035 (OP)
How are qualias different from feelings?

>>24677035 (OP)
qualia is just what existent things (or material things) are like. so just by virtue of being material things we are made of qualia. the reason why we experience a continuous and local consciousness however is because of memory (and other interconnecting brain processes), which creates the illusion of continuity. everything else is just unconnected qualia. philosophical zombies aren't possible.

>>24677150
I disagree with everything you've said and will demonstrate why you're wrong using the same level of explanatory power you've provided.

>>24677154
if you think enough about it you will reach the same conclusions.

why is brain matter correlated so completely to internal states? because they are the same. if they are the same why don't we see internal states when we open up a brain instead of just seeing brain states? because we are seeing the qualia which represents their qualia, and not seeing their qualia directly. our brain represents external and internal things with representations which have an arbitrary relationship to what they represent. for example the word tree does not look like a tree and "green" is not green, but the sentence "the tree is green" conveys the same relationship that the tree and green has. the representations in the brain work like this. the brain then strings together those representations using memory, which creates your continuous experience which is what qualia and consciousness are. our entire internal world is that subset of "material things" (but actually qualia) which are involved in this process.

if you assume that the material that makes up the brain in reality looks like qualia (ie those neurons or brain waves ARE in reality the color red) then the correspondence problem goes away. everything is made up of qualia, but if a memory mechanism strings those qualia together and uses them to represent things it perceives, they are conscious in the way we are.

>>24677035 (OP)
there's actually no such thing as "consciousness", we just all like to pretend to say "oh look at me i'm conscious bla bla" but it's just words...

ask a blade of grass if it's conscious and see what it says.. we're no more or less conscious than a grain of sand or a super computer.. it's all gradients, the whole universe, nothing "is", everything bleeds through and over and under... "consciousness" is just a word we attribute to our perspective, but our perspective is not special.. we experience qualia as a neurobiological/chemical process. mushrooms & mountains & algae also experience qualia but a more primordial form... the more complex the chemical/biological process the more complex the qualia.. that's why there are humans who discuss "consciousness".. "p-zombie" is a weird distinction that somebody made a long time ago, a thought experiment of somebody who felt more special than other people for a stupid reason, the same reason people argue about "consciousness". there are no "p-zombies", it's a word... every entity in the universe has the same amount of consciousness, and it's most likely 0. we just observe. observe the inside & the outside; these are qualia, our sensory inputs, our observations.

it's only arbitrary & pointless, if you want it to be. i had a lot of fun writing out this response so it was definitely worth it.

Only about 20% of global population has an internal monologue. The average person IS a philosophical zombie. And internal monologues are a recessive trait.

>>24677205
>every entity in the universe has the same amount of consciousness, and it's most likely 0. we just observe. observe the inside & the outside; these are qualia, our sensory inputs, our observations.
>we have no consciousness... we only have... consciousness
riveting

>>24677205
if we are just chemicals firing off why should we trust our own reason?
your perception is just an imperfect chemical reaction, how is it any more real than watching shadows dance on a wall?

>>24677344
you're starting to get it, man. the truth is only in your head, my perception is only my perception, your perception is your perception, neither one is more "right" or more "wrong", they are independent versions of the truth.

you're right, it's all totally not real at all, my post (and my entire existence) is a mere shadow on the wall of your imagination.. same way that your post (and your entire existence) only a mere fleeting shadow on the wall of my truth, on the wall of my perception.

you should trust your own reason because it's the only thing you can use to navigate around the universe. what else are you going to use? the truth is ungraspable, unapproachable, unspeakable, ever-changing, but we make up DIY theories & frameworks within our reason, using logic, to make sense of the universe & approach it in the best way we can.. once you're satisfied with a framework you leave it to the unconscious mind and forget about it, it runs in the background. you use reason to figure out how a ladder works the first time you approach it, but afterwards you do it automatically.

it's all imperfect man, but once you see it's imperfect you can feel perfect about it, cause it's the only thing we got

>>24677330
so that's your definition of "consciousness" > qualia, sensory inputs, observations?
what about free will, bozo? have you thought about the logical limits of free will? do you put 'free will' in that IKEA packet of definitions? your definition is different from mine, and seemingly less rigorous

>>24677317
That's not what a p-zombie is.
A p-zombie is a person that doesn't experience qualia, while otherwise functioning identically to a normal person.
A person who is aware that they have no internal monologue is functionally different from someone who does have an internal monologue.
You are also assuming that animals don't feel qualia for no reason.

>>24677035 (OP)

You will find the answer in the Five Aggregates in Buddhism

>>24677055
>that are probably not conscious
Flawed assumption.

>>24677479
Physicalist retard