The Illusion of Self

[wigginhall]

My point is that, for example, in comparing a camel to a ship, I am not implying that camels have cabins or decks.   It's a highly selective comparison.

[Gordon]

Some here do not want to acknowledge the external contribution to the gain of a system because it supposedly creates an infinite regression.

It is more the case that no good reasons have been proposed for 'external contribution': there are, however, no shortage of bad ones (such as the fallacy-fest we see from some theists here).

[torridon]

If the driverless car crashes somewhere, who will be arrested? Certainly not the car!  The software fellows will be hauled up. They are responsible for the mess up.

The software is the mind of the driver less car, the computer is the brain....the human is the spirit.

Responsibility in the case of accidents is an interesting thing to consider, if a diversion. Warning to all wannabee programmers out there : it is not just couriers and truck drivers and taxi drivers whose careers are threatened by the rise of driverless cars - the software of the future will increasingly not be coded by skilled corporate Java programmers but rather will be evolved by machine learning techniques on an open source basis. In which case it is going to harder to assign culpability to a person for bugs in code. And driverless cars are going to have to be capable of taking hugely difficult decisions, whether to mount the pavement and run down that mother with baby in pushchair to avoid that out of control truck headed our way for instance. Diversion over.

[bluehillside Retd.]

SOTS,

In some cases, the analogies while helpful in explaining the point made by the poster also illustrate the problem, as shown in e.g. responses #1, #2, #9, #20 to the opening post.

Some here do not want to acknowledge the external contribution to the gain of a system because it supposedly creates an infinite regression. One attempt to get round the problem is to try and claim that any gain is actually an increase and can therefore come from within the system (extrapolating from examples where an increase can come from within the system, e.g. the example with rivers in #112). The analogies used all have the cause of the gain being external, e.g. the opening post on this thread and the SIMS example in bluehillside’s #106.

Nope, nope, nopedy nope. That’s a “nope” with a thin marzipan layer, fondant icing and marrons glacés on top.

Sometimes new “information” can be introduced – sunlight is an obvious example – but the basic phenomenon of emergence requires no such thing. Provided some core principles are followed (paying attention to your neighbour for example) then remarkable levels of complexity will arise when none of that data exists in the component parts, and when there’s no fresh input of data from an eternal source.

Emergence is simply higher-order complexity arising out of chaos in which novel and coherent structures have coalesced from the interactions between the diverse components of a system. In colloquial terms, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

It’s these interactions (and not an injection of fresh data) that disrupt and so cause the system to differentiate and then to coalesce into something novel. Some Steven Johnson for you again:

“Agents residing on one scale start producing behaviour that lies one scale above them: ants create colonies; urbanites create neighbourhoods; simple pattern-recognition software learns how to recommend new books.”

The point is that there’s no-one in charge, and that simple rules rigorously applied engender complex behaviour.

If you want to know how it works, essentially emergence relies on feedback among neighbouring agents, and on clustering as like finds like.

Anyways, it’s a fascinating subject in its own right. I don’t blame you for looking askance at first sight either – it feels pretty counter-intuitive to begin with – but when you come to understand it it’s a powerful model for all the reality we perceive – even forces and mass being emergent properties of an underlying field of information whose ripples we perceive as elephants and umbrellas and skyscrapers. And indeed as “we”.

Try Stephen Johnson’s “Emergence” as a primer to get you started – it’s an engaging read as well as an informative one.

[Alan Burns]

Yes of course it does.  This goes back to Kant who was the first to formalise the difference between a thing in itself (noumenon) and a perception of the same thing (phenomenon). My perception of the sun shining in the sky would be a phenomenon in Kantian terms, but that doesn't mean that the Sun stops shining when no one is looking.  The perception of a thing is not the same as the thing in itself, but they are related.  Hence the old Zen riddle that a tree falling in the forest makes no sound if there is no one around to hear it - this is exploiting a difference between noumena and phenomema.

The tree falling in the forest will vibrate a few air particles, but this just becomes part of the continuum of material activity.  It does not exist as the phenomenon of sound outside human perception.  All "emergent properties" only exist as separate entities in human perception.

[Sebastian Toe]

The tree falling in the forest will vibrate a few air particles, but this just becomes part of the continuum of material activity.  It does not exist as the phenomenon of sound outside human perception.  All "emergent properties" only exist as separate entities in human perception.

So the tree falling will not be heard by the deer passing a little distance away?

[Sriram]

Responsibility in the case of accidents is an interesting thing to consider, if a diversion. Warning to all wannabee programmers out there : it is not just couriers and truck drivers and taxi drivers whose careers are threatened by the rise of driverless cars - the software of the future will increasingly not be coded by skilled corporate Java programmers but rather will be evolved by machine learning techniques on an open source basis. In which case it is going to harder to assign culpability to a person for bugs in code. And driverless cars are going to have to be capable of taking hugely difficult decisions, whether to mount the pavement and run down that mother with baby in pushchair to avoid that out of control truck headed our way for instance. Diversion over.

The issue of taking responsibility identifies the real Self of the car.

[Sriram]

The issue of 'whether a falling tree makes a sound if no one observes it'.....is not as obvious as it sounds. In a Virtual Reality situation for example, when we are in a virtual forest....does a falling tree make a sound when no one observes it'?  Does  the tree or forest  even exist when no one observes it?

The answer is... no.  There is no forest, no tree and no sound. Its all created in the mind by certain signals. Only when we observe it does the world come alive.

Similarly, if we take the idea of a simulated universe seriously, the entire world is just an appearance, an illusion (Maya) generated by our Consciousness.  If we don't observe it, it does not exist.

[torridon]

The tree falling in the forest will vibrate a few air particles, but this just becomes part of the continuum of material activity.  It does not exist as the phenomenon of sound outside human perception.  All "emergent properties" only exist as separate entities in human perception.

Well you're on the right lines, but of course as Seb points out, it is not just humans that have a sense of hearing; in fact Seb's deer almost certainly has superior auditory perception to any human. You really need to broaden out your understanding, you give the impression that humans are the only creatures that exist and matter.

[torridon]

The issue of taking responsibility identifies the real Self of the car.

Well, OK, but that avoids facing up to the issue of who is responsible when an Uber taxi causes an accident, supposing that all the onboard software was produced through open source evolutionary techniques ?  This is not easy to answer is it; the concept of responsibility sits easily with a human driver, but not so easily with an emergent virtual driver.  This is in part why ancient ideas of duality have gained such traction - they are popular because they are easy rather than because they are right.  Reality is rarely simple and intuitive.

[Alan Burns]

Well you're on the right lines, but of course as Seb points out, it is not just humans that have a sense of hearing; in fact Seb's deer almost certainly has superior auditory perception to any human. You really need to broaden out your understanding, you give the impression that humans are the only creatures that exist and matter.

If the deer just reacts to the vibrating air molecules, then this reaction is just part of the continuum of material reactions.  Conscious perception, (not reaction), of the vibrating air molecules is needed to identify it as sound.

[Gordon]

The tree falling in the forest will vibrate a few air particles, but this just becomes part of the continuum of material activity.  It does not exist as the phenomenon of sound outside human perception.  All "emergent properties" only exist as separate entities in human perception.

This is, quite simply, wrong.

In my younger days I used to own/ride horses and I recall that one day I was riding on the moor at Mugdock (just outside Glasgow) on a well behaved horse that was spooked by a sudden clap of thunder & lightning and (as horses do when frightened) it bolted with me on top - there is no doubt in my mind that the horse 'perceived' the event since it took a couple of hundred yards at a flat-out gallop before I was able to pull-up.

[torridon]

If the deer just reacts to the vibrating air molecules, then this reaction is just part of the continuum of material reactions.  Conscious perception, (not reaction), of the vibrating air molecules is needed to identify it as sound.

The deer experiences it as sound, that is what auditory cortex does and deer certainly have that.  What further cerebral events are triggered by the perception of sound might vary from species to species, but at the base level of loud and sudden noise the stimulus leads to an emotional state of fear or panic and this is ubiquitous throughout the animal kingdom.

[Gordon]

If the deer just reacts to the vibrating air molecules, then this reaction is just part of the continuum of material reactions.  Conscious perception, (not reaction), of the vibrating air molecules is needed to identify it as sound.

I think, Alan, you're effectively making this up by creating your personal 'hook' on which to hand your particular take on the divine which, at its core, is no more than your own personal incredulity getting in the way. 

[Alan Burns]

The deer experiences it as sound, that is what auditory cortex does and deer certainly have that.  What further cerebral events are triggered by the perception of sound might vary from species to species, but at the base level of loud and sudden noise the stimulus leads to an emotional state of fear or panic and this is ubiquitous throughout the animal kingdom.

What you describe is simply a chain of physical reactions caused by the vibrating air molecules.  What you perceive as an emotional state of panic is just your own interpretation of the animal's natural reaction to the vibrating air molecules.  Outwardly perceived reactions can't verify internal conscious perception, which requires no reaction. 

[Alan Burns]

I think, Alan, you're effectively making this up by creating your personal 'hook' on which to hand your particular take on the divine which, at its core, is no more than your own personal incredulity getting in the way.

You are correct in assuming that my own personal incredulity will not allow me to believe that conscious awareness can be generated by the collective behaviour of a group of elementary particles.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Hi Gordon,

I think, Alan, you're effectively making this up by creating your personal 'hook' on which to hand your particular take on the divine which, at its core, is no more than your own personal incredulity getting in the way.

It is extraordinary isn’t it, the way AB has to distort and beat into submission all the evidence that undoes him in order to reach a Frankenstein’s monster reality that fits with his little man at the controls thesis. So other animals that recognise sound are “just processing information” even though the architecture of the brains of some of them share many features with our brains, even though their responses to it are often just those you’d expect if they did experience sound in similar ways to ourselves etc.

I guess he’s so invested in it that the distortions can never be undone now, not least because his premise and his conclusion are the same thing (“God”) so he’s case-hardened against the reason or logic that would disrupt that.

It’s harmless enough I suppose provided he never gets to teach this nonsense to children, but I find it a bewildering spectacle in someone not living before around the seventeenth century nonetheless. 

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

You are correct in assuming that my own personal incredulity will not allow me to believe that conscious awareness can be generated by the collective behaviour of a group of elementary particles.

Just out of interest, do you even understand why personal incredulity is a very bad argument for anything?

[Sebastian Toe]

AB,

Just out of interest, do you even understand why personal incredulity is a very bad argument for anything?

I would guess that his personal incredulity will not allow him to think that is a bad arguement!
 

[Gordon]

You are correct in assuming that my own personal incredulity will not allow me to believe that conscious awareness can be generated by the collective behaviour of a group of elementary particles.

Alan: you do realise the above is you admitting that your reasoning is flawed.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Hi Seb,

I would guess that his personal incredulity will not allow him to think that is a bad arguement!
 

You're probably right. It's a curious sight - not only does he not care that his arguments are fallacious, he seems quite keen to parade their fallaciousness as a sort of badge of honour!

[bluehillside Retd.]

Gordon,

Alan: you do realise the above is you admitting that your reasoning is flawed.

Admit it? He's proud of it!

[torridon]

What you describe is simply a chain of physical reactions caused by the vibrating air molecules.  What you perceive as an emotional state of panic is just your own interpretation of the animal's natural reaction to the vibrating air molecules.  Outwardly perceived reactions can't verify internal conscious perception, which requires no reaction.

Likewise with your wife.  If you shout at your wife, she will show outward signs of distress.  But as you say, 'outwardly perceived reactions can't verify internal conscious perception, which requires no reaction'.  How do you know your wife is not also a zombie like the deer ?

[bluehillside Retd.]

torri,

Likewise with your wife.  If you shout at your wife, she will show outward signs of distress.  But as you say, 'outwardly perceived reactions can't verify internal conscious perception, which requires no reaction'.  How do you know your wife is not also a zombie like the deer ?

Presumably because, having invented a little man at the controls he calls "soul", he's also decided that only one species - his own - can have it, and so all other species are "merely reacting to information" or some such. No matter that there's no evidence whatever for this "soul", no matter that there's ever-developing evidence from neuroscience about how consciousness actually works, no matter that there's strong evidence from biology that many animals experience phenomena like empathy and grief that are analogous to our own, no matter anything. 

See, AB has faith so, armed with the certainties that gives him, his deep irrationalities matter to him not a jot.

[SwordOfTheSpirit]

Anyways, it’s a fascinating subject in its own right. I don’t blame you for looking askance at first sight either – it feels pretty counter-intuitive to begin with – but when you come to understand it it’s a powerful model for all the reality we perceive – even forces and mass being emergent properties of an underlying field of information whose ripples we perceive as elephants and umbrellas and skyscrapers. And indeed as “we”.

Except you kind of gave the game away in your #122 when you said this:

That's emergence - and when you look for it it's pretty much everywhere you look in nature as well as in man-made environments. Single stupid components consistently following a relatively small number of basic rules will produce much more complex emergent phenomena with no need at all for a designer to make it so.

Hence my quintessential objection. The aim is not to get to the truth of the matter, it is to come up with a narrative that does not involve a designer! Therefore the process is not objective, because it is not distinguishing between circumstances where the gain can come from within the system and where the gain happens because of an external influence.

I have no problem with emergence in non-adaptive systems. I've given several examples in the past to support it. Neither do I have a problem with emergence in adaptive systems, so absolutely I would find it fascinating to study.

However...

One key property of an adaptive system is that life is already present. All the analogies/examples using living organisms show this. Your SIMS reference in your #106 is software written by human beings so any emergence that is possible is ultimately because of what human beings have done. The opening post uses an analogy of technology ultimately created by human beings! So if an adaptive system is being claimed for life being caused from organic and/or inorganic matter coming together (or specifically on this thread, 'self' from 'non-self'), the reasoning is circular, whilst a non-adaptive system stays that way.