[ExI] Zombie glutamate

[John Clark]

On Sun, Feb 22, 2015  Brent Allsop <brent.allsop at canonizer.com> wrote:

>> I've already suggested what that difference might be, redness is
> associated with one group of crosslinked memories (strawberries, blood,
> sunsets, communists, conservative states) while greenness is associated
> with a different group of crosslinked memories (leaves, emeralds,
> seasickness, environmentalists).



> To me there is LOTS of evidence that falsifies this view, so it in no way
> works in my model because it is so inconsistent with so much of what we
> know.  You can find examples (brain malfunctions, drug induced...) where
> all colors become completely disassociated with all the stuff you talk
> about,


How does that disprove anything? Sure you can screw around with the
crosslinks brain so that they're different, you could change them so you
could smell colors and see sounds, but so what?

> What you are doing is almost exactly what I point out, in the paper, when
> I say:
>  " some tend to think of the actual redness quality as being part of the
> strawberry being perceived"


Well it looks like it's strawman time again. I'd have to be a fool to
believe that the subjective experience of redness is embodied in the
strawberry itself and I am not a fool.


> > or worse, they think it is nothing real at all.


And that would be even more foolish, subjectivity is the most real most
concrete and least abstract thing there is.

> Also, you definition of qualia is so vague, it is of absolutely no use to
> a theoretician or scientist,


Exactly, a theoretical scientist investigating qualia would be nothing put
a pointless timesink because qualia like consciousness is fundamental.

> because there is no way to prove if you're ill defined


First of all in mathematics you can prove things but in science although
you can find evidence you can't prove theories only disprove them. And it's
true that like most important things in life I don't have a definition of
qualia that's worth a damn and you don't either, but we have examples.

>
> > How, exactly, would you reproduce whatever you think redness is,
> artificially?


A even better question  is how could you convince somebody else that you
had been successful.

And even in general I can't imagine what sort of physical explanation would
satisfy you.  If I said A causes B and B cause C and C causes consciousness
you would ask but why does C cause consciousness? If I answered because C
causes D and D causes E and E causes consciousness you would ask why does E
cause consciousness? The chain of "why" questions cannot continue forever,
or at least you can't expect a useful answer forever, because
eventually you will
reach an irreducible axiom of existence, such as consciousness is the way
data feels like when it is being processed.

Consciousness is in no way unique in this regard, start with any physical
phenomena and eventually the chain of "why" questions concerning it will
converge asymptotically to "Why is "is" is?". When that starts to happen
its a sure sign that your time could be better spent explaining other
physical phenomenon. I mean it's not as if there isn't anything else to do.

 John K Clark
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