Consciousness is being aware of yourself and the world around you. If your quote is true, then why do newborns have no awareness of themselves and the world around them if they have the soul of someone who just died, who was before they were dead quite self-aware?
Mystery of Self-Consciousness?
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Consciousness is being aware of yourself and the world around you. If your quote is true, then why do newborns have no awareness of themselves and the world around them if they have the soul of someone who just died, who was before they were dead quite self-aware?
(Q),
They have awareness, but it is undeveloped.
You misunderstand.
The soul is the person (newborn).
jan.
They have awareness, but it is undeveloped.
You misunderstand.
The soul is the person (newborn).
jan.
That makes no sense. You either are aware or not.
Then, it stands to reason even more so that the newborn should become that other person, fully aware with all their memories and life experiences intact.
(Q),
They are aware, but their awareness is not yet developed,but given time....
Why does it?
jan.
They are aware, but their awareness is not yet developed,but given time....
Why does it?
jan.
heliocentric
Registered Senior Member
I find this quite a common position within philosophy departments now. It's as if dualism proper has been replaced by a kind of physical dualism - 'the body' and 'the brain' as two distinct things with not much to do with each other. I think the first problem that crops up when you conceptualise consciousness this way (and you already outlined it very nicely) is that you immediately feel as though you dont have any free-will atall - the body is doing things, that you (the brain) dont particularly want to do.
But this is all based upon the assumption that your body has nothing atall to do with who you are, or how you perceive yourself, and that everything that's tangibly 'you' is stored inside the brain - Something which ive never found particularly convincing. Assuming for example, that it were possible to keep me alive as a 'brain in a vat', I think my sense of self would be so radically altered that it would be meaningless to say i was the same person as when i was in possession of a body.
Eastern/zen philosophers always got this. A zen philosopher wouldnt say: "i hear a bird tweeting" theyd just say "bird tweeting" because that's all there is at that particular time - experiential content. There's no 'subject' and therefore no reason to posit an 'object' that's facilitating the experience.
So there's never really a need to for dualism in zen philosophy (physical, immaterial, or otherwise) because subject/object distinctions are seen for the linguistic contrivances they always are. It's taken western philosophy about 300 years to get to grips with that, and even now you still find endless varieties of dualism knocking round analytic philosophy departments.
I see the brain as the processor and the body as the input/output mechanism.
If you swap the mechanism for an artificial one that provides exactly the same inputs and outputs to the brain, do you really think "you" would be any different. You would still feel the same, see the same things, hear the same things - all of which are interpreted (as far as we know) within the brain. So if you can provide the same input but from an artificial mechanism (e.g. Brain in a vat) - I would say you would still be you.
But can you differentiate "you" from the relationship between your inputs and outputs - i.e. the mechanism that is your brain?
If you swap the mechanism for an artificial one that provides exactly the same inputs and outputs to the brain, do you really think "you" would be any different. You would still feel the same, see the same things, hear the same things - all of which are interpreted (as far as we know) within the brain. So if you can provide the same input but from an artificial mechanism (e.g. Brain in a vat) - I would say you would still be you.
But can you differentiate "you" from the relationship between your inputs and outputs - i.e. the mechanism that is your brain?
Sarkus,
Mechanically, probably not.
But during the developement of the new body, you would have new experiences.
I agree, you would still be you.
But the "you" in this context, is the sum total of its experience.
That is the point the BG text, you are always you, dispite the change of experience.
Yes, because although the mechanicm undergoes continuos changes, the
"you" is always recognisable as you.
jan.
Mechanically, probably not.
But during the developement of the new body, you would have new experiences.
I agree, you would still be you.
But the "you" in this context, is the sum total of its experience.
That is the point the BG text, you are always you, dispite the change of experience.
Yes, because although the mechanicm undergoes continuos changes, the
"you" is always recognisable as you.
jan.
heliocentric
Registered Senior Member
I think people like Daniel Dennett would certaintly believe so, or state that it's 'logically possible' or something. Empirically its still a very contentious idea though.
I think so. Or at least, i think its something we do quite naturally anyway. "I" (whether you want to say its illusionary or not) is an emergent property of the whole system, you cant really reduce it down to its parts. Much in the same way that you couldnt reduce say the colour 'green' that a plant has to its individual cells - go down that far and 'greeness' disappears altogether.
lol
anyway, i guess it'll boil down to that there's no self consiousness because there are no souls..
i mean, selfconsiousness is unprovable, in the same way souls are.
um, you can add god to them too eh?
No, they are not.
I'm going by YOUR logic here, Jan. You should be able to answer your own question.
If you are asking about the self-consciousness portion of the statement, the other person is correct. You cannot prove self-consciousness. Others with self-consciousness tend to think it is likely because they have it, but it is an absolutely private phenomenon. One cannot provide evidence of it.
Children become self aware after a couple years. I'll have to look it up when I get home to find out the normal age.
But there is a spot test that psychologist do, where they put a spot on the childs face while the child is asleep, then when they wake up they put a mirror in front of them, if they wipe the spot off it shows that they are aware of themselves and that they know they have a spot on them.
Also great apes are the only other animal that has ever passed this test.
There's a lot of discussion on this within developmental psychology. It's really interesting stuff.
