[ExI] A paper that actually does solve the problem of consciousness

[Brent Allsop]

Hi Damien,

We must be failing to communicate, you don't understand the mechanics of 
what it is to incorrectly 'seem' within a representational model, or 
something.

Within a representational model, to seem is to have 'knowledge' that 
doesn't accurately represent it's referent.  In other words, if you have 
an optical illusion that surrounds two instances of the same color with 
two different colors, our brain can, based on the surrounding colors, 
change it's representation of the same color light the eye is sensing.

In other words, even though the light coming in to our eye is the same, 
because of the different surrounding colors, our eye represents these 
same colors with different qualia.  So, to say it 'seems' like they are 
different colors says our brain is representing the same color with two 
different quale.

When you put a pencil half in a glass of water, and then look at it, it 
'seems' to be bent.  This means your knowledge of the pencil, in your 
head, is bent, even though the real pencil it represents is not.

Even though the brain is using two different elements, with different 
phenomenal qualities, to represent the same color light, this does not 
mean that the phenomenal nature of these two different elements being 
used to incorrectly represent the same light will ever change for anyone 
at any time.

Does that make sense?

Brent




Damien Broderick wrote:
> At 07:18 PM 11/15/2008 -0700, Brent wrote:
>
>> First, whatever it is we discover that has this red phenomenal 
>> property, the theory predicts, will reliably always produce the same 
>> sensation no matter what mind it is in, no matter where in the visual 
>> field it is, no matter when...
>
> If you start with a primitive as demonstrably false as that, your 
> whole model collapses without further ado. But maybe you didn't really 
> mean what you just claimed. If you did, that a look at some of the 
> visual effects where context and perceptual codes create effed image 
> constructs that *are perceived* as drastically different even though 
> they are identical. For example:
>
> <http://www.illusion-optical.com/Optical-Illusions/ColorFlag.php>
>
> Bzzzzzt.
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