[ExI] What is "Elemental Redness"?

[Ben Zaiboc]

On 01/05/2023 20:22, Gadersd wrote:
>
> I think you have “communicating” and “convincing” confused. I am 
> confident that most members on the list understand what your theory 
> is. The problem is that we just don’t find it convincing.

Well, I don't understand it. I can't make head nor tail of it. Which is 
why I'm asking these questions. I originally thought that the argument 
was that, literally, molecules had experiences, and that our own 
experiences were somehow the same thing (the 'glutamate = seeing red' 
idea (although exactly which shade of red was never mentioned)). 
Obviously that's nonsense, but that's the only interpretation I've been 
able to come up with. And as my disproof of the idea was not accepted, I 
must have had the wrong idea.

So if lots of people here do understand this theory, surely someone can 
communicate it to me in words of no more than 3 syllables? Preferably 2.

As if explaining it to an 8-year old, who happens to know a lot of 
biology, but has never read a philosophy book, please.

I didn't understand what Darren meant (or who he's responding to) by 
"Qualia certainly correlate to physical reality, but declaring causation 
there seems like a bit of a stretch - at least a begging of the question 
of materialism.

it's a very odd sort of causation where the physical properties of the 
presumptive proximate cause have nothing to do with the characteristics 
of the caused phenomena."

Does the mental image of a unicorn 'correlate to physical reality'? I 
don't think so. Or is that not a quale? On the other hand, physical 
reality doesn't cause qualia? Well not by itself, but when oscillating 
pressure waves enter my ears, I normally hear a noise. I'm pretty sure 
that's not just a correlation.

And the last paragraph, does that mean that it's very odd that if you 
poke someone with a stick, they'll probably shout at you? Because I 
don't think that's odd at all. Similarly, what our eyes see is a 
collection of edges and light intensities, but what we perceive is a dog 
leap-frogging a sheep. It might be an odd event, but it's not odd at all 
that we turn the one bunch of things into something completely different.

Ben