[ExI] Nobody knows the true colors of things, on this day of color.

Sat Mar 19 15:09:38 UTC 2022

On Fri, Mar 18, 2022 at 7:51 PM Brent Allsop via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

>
> Hi Jason,
> logical/information/mathematical stuff is all abstract.
>

Yes, I believe consciousness lies in the abstract informational patterns
and relationships, not in any material component that may contribute to an
instantiation of that abstraction.

>   Like the word 'red' you can't know what it means, without a dictionary.
>

I don't think a dictionary, or any serialized information content for that
matter, is capable of communicating such quale as red. The foundation of
all meaning rests in ostensive definitions. Two civilizations belonging to
two different universes who could only communicate bits back and forth
would be unable to communicate the meaning of their units of measure for
distance, mass, or time. The meaning of a "meter" would be impossible to
communicate as we could do nothing to render it into terms meaningful for
those in the other universe. The same limitation exists between two
entities in two different simulated realities. And likewise, I think this
can explain the incommunicability of qualia between two minds, which are
similarly isolated and have no way to share properties internal to their
own mental worlds.

> Redness is just a physical fact. a property of something in nature.
>

Nature yes, but I would say physics is the wrong level to attempt a
description of it. It would be like trying to explain the operation of a
word processor at the level of electric fields in the semiconductors
composing a computer's memory and processor. I would also say, redness,
like pain, can be different things to different minds and creatures. Does a
colorblind person who can distinguish between red and green, but not blue
and yellow, experience red the same way a normally sighted person does?
Does someone with a higher ratio of red cone cells experience red in the
same way as someone with a lower ratio? I would say redness (in terms of
the experience) has very little to do with physics and everything to do
with minds.

> It is simply a fact that your brain uses whatever has that redness quality
> to represent your knowledge of red things with.
>

Computers represent everything on your screen right now (buttons, cursor
position, pixels, sounds, the time, the software of your e-mail client,
etc.) with just two symbols. Likewise, the optic nerve does not send
"redness" from your eye to your visual cortex, it sends what are just "dots
and dashes" timed pulses of neurons spiking, "ones and zeros", "bits". This
signal is all your brain needs and all it uses to create the experience of
red. The important quality of these pulses is that they can form different
patterns which can be distinguished.

> Your redness is your definition of red.
> The limiting factor is how many intrinsic coolness qualities we can
> discover in nature.
>

We know there are a countably infinite number of unique computer programs,
each of which can be provided with a countably infinite number of different
possible inputs. Across these infinite programs, every computable relation,
data structure, knowledge state, information state, and I would say
conscious state, could be found. Physics then, would have nothing to do
with it, as in any physical universe where it is possible to build a
computer, it would be possible to instantiate any conscious state.

> Let's assume there is a new coolness quality we discover which nobody has
> ever experienced before.  let's call it Grue.
> Then we can computationally bind it into your consciousness.
> Then we throw the switch, at which point you say: "oh THAT is what Grue is
> like" and you  now have your dictionary for 'Grue'.
> Then you augment your eye to detect the new wavelength you want to
> represent with Grue, and wire it up to represent information collected
> about that particular wavelength.
>
>
>
This has actually been done for monkeys:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/09/090916133521.htm

My question is: is there any limit to the number of primary colors that in
principle could be perceived by a conscious mind, or are there infinitely
many distinct primary colors? The experiment with the monkeys suggests if
we insert a new functional capacity into the retina, such that it sends a
more complex signal to the visual cortex, the visual cortex, within a few
weeks, develops new processing structures capable of differentiating and
distinguishing new colors which previously could not be distinguished.

Jason

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> On Fri, Mar 18, 2022 at 6:11 PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat <
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
>> Are there infinitely possible primary colors, given there are infinitely
>> many possible organizations of brains?
>>
>> There're colorblind people and most mammals with two primary colors,
>> primates and fish with three, birds and some tetrachromat humans with four,
>> and I think there's some shrimp with 16. If there's no fundamental limit to
>> the number of primary colors a mind can perceive, then are primary colors
>> physical/chemical/neurological properties, or are they
>> logical/informational/mathematical properties? I lean towards the latter
>> grouping.
>>
>> Jason
>>
>> On Fri, Mar 18, 2022, 7:50 PM Brent Allsop via extropy-chat <
>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi Darin,
>>>
>>> When say "colors" are you talking about properties of things that
>>> reflect a particular pattern of light, the properties of the light, or the
>>> intrinsic qualities you brain uses to represent conscious knowledge of red
>>> things?  All very different things.
>>>
>>>
>>> On Fri, Mar 18, 2022, 4:17 PM Darin Sunley via extropy-chat <
>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>>
>>>> All objects with a specific property are made of arrangements of things
>>>> that lack that property.
>>>>
>>>> Colors are formed by particular arrangements of atoms and particles
>>>> that are intrinsically colorless.
>>>>
>>>> On Fri, Mar 18, 2022 at 4:09 PM Brent Allsop via extropy-chat <
>>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Yes, any language that uses only one abstract word, for everything
>>>>> that represents 'red' makes that language qualia blind  or unable to
>>>>> represent different intrinsic physical qualities which may be representing
>>>>> red.
>>>>> All of our peer reviewed physics, in it's entirety does this. so none
>>>>> of it can model different qualities like redness and greenness.
>>>>> That is why we use the term 'redness' or colorness intrinsic
>>>>> qualities, to distinguish from red and color intrinsic qualities.
>>>>> Something is 'red' if it reflects or emits red light, it has a color.
>>>>> Redness, is something entirely different, it is a colorness quality.
>>>>> An intrinsic quality out of which your consciousness is composed.
>>>>>
>>>>> A big part of consciousness is the ability to computationally bind
>>>>> elemental qualities like redness and greenness together, to enabl3e
>>>>> computation like: I (represented by something in your brain) intend to eat
>>>>> that strawberry, represented by redness quality, also in your brain.
>>>>>
>>>>> Adrian claimed my definition is circular.
>>>>>
>>>>> No it isn't circular.  If we experimentally demonstrated that our
>>>>> description of glutamate, reacting in a synapse, is your redness, and
>>>>> glycine is your greenness, then these would be saying the same thing.
>>>>>
>>>>> objective version:  My glutamate knowledge is like your
>>>>> glycine knowledge, both of which we call red.
>>>>> Subjective version: My redness knowledge is like your greenness
>>>>> knowledge, both of which we call red.
>>>>>
>>>>> Just because our brain seems be gray (we represent out knowledge of it
>>>>> with something that has a greyness quality) doesn't mean al that stuff is
>>>>> actually gray.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Another important part of all this, is there are two ways to gain
>>>>> knowledge.
>>>>> We can see colors, (can be mistaken, if you get the dictionary wrong)
>>>>> and we directly apprehend colorness qualities (can't be mistaken),
>>>>> representing our knowledge of colored things, the final result of color
>>>>> perception.
>>>>> For more detail see our Distinguishing between reality and knowledge
>>>>> of reality
>>>>> <https://canonizer.com/videos/consciousness/?chapter=differentiate_reality_knowledge>
>>>>> chapter of our video.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On Fri, Mar 18, 2022 at 3:48 PM Stathis Papaioannou via extropy-chat <
>>>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On Sat, 19 Mar 2022 at 08:38, William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat <
>>>>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I think that what you see is what you get and that there is no
>>>>>>> intrinsic color of anything.  I don't even know what intrinsic means in
>>>>>>> this context.   bill w
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I think Brent means the experience of the colour, or colour qualia,
>>>>>> as opposed to description of the processes that lead to the experience.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On Fri, Mar 18, 2022 at 4:21 PM Brent Allsop via extropy-chat <
>>>>>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Happy color festival, everyone.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Do you guys realize, nobody knows the true intrinsic color of
>>>>>>>> anything?  All we know is the colors things seem to be.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> See my answer to a question on color on Quora.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> P.S.  Thank you Stathis, for your upvote.  That is HUGE for me.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
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>>>>>>>>
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>>>>>>>
>>>>>> --
>>>>>> Stathis Papaioannou
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