Consciousness

What is consciousness? What are the processes that lead to it coming about? What structures bring it about? Is it merely an illusion or is it the truth?

I think it'll take scientists hundreds of years of research to eventually understand this. Either that or someone genius - on the level of Einstein - will come along and throw back the curtain to reveal it to us. We seem to be short of geniuses in the 20-21st century though. Well, "the wheelchair guy" exists.

well, first we'd have to define conscious, conscious on a human level? or that of a pig or dog? if we 'program' a consciousness, and let's say a consciousness is made up of different basic instincts and reactionary patterns, which we can copy by programming, that then are teh basics on which advancements are based. Which 'instincts' should we leave out then? and how will it affect the level of consciousness? what if we want limitations on them, like the aasimov rules for robots thingy, how would such limitations of instincts affect consciousness?
Since robots don't die, or forget, how advanced would it be after 50-100 years?

lol, it's pretty hard/impossible to find out, and that's just using that, rather bad, definition of consciousness. But i agree, it would be cool, and we can see the first steps now, with south korea making ethical, and other, laws for/about robots. 

How fucking dare you claim a pig or a dog is conscious, you ass. They exist on instincts and behavioral tempering rather than anything else, a fucking dog can't compose shit and animals do NOT have the ability to communicate even a fractional power of what we are able to, you insult consciousness itself by claiming so and have thus proven how little you actually know about it.

Why didn't the nazis use their amoral experimentation and just damage random parts of their test subjects' brains and see how it effected them? Of course its too late for that now.

Are there any humans who have accidentally had part of their brain damaged and seem to act like robots or something? Or their problem solving skills destroyed? Then again, I'm not sure consciousness has to do with problem solving. Even rats and monkeys can problem solve, so that isn't really consciousness. How about humans who act like animals? But actually, the feral kids they've sometimes found don't have any damage at all, its just they lack the social skills and social development that they needed to become civilized. It's sort of hard to define consciousness. Are animals really not conscious? Sure, they act on instinct, but they still make decisions and respond to stimulus in a semi-intelligent manner. (Rats running through mazes faster each time or monkeys who learn to use tools, or that one parrot who was in the news who supposedly actually could make up words and expand its own vocabulary which seemed far beyond the usual mimicking parrot.)

But anyway, it seems like animals may still have some very primitive form of consciousness, while humans are obviously on a whole other level - possibly due to the development of the frontal lobes.

I know many people will disagree, but I agree with the idea that Hofstadter put forth, that maybe we cannot understand consciousness because we are not intelligent enough, and as we evolve and become more intelligent, our consciousness will always be a step ahead of us. I am more than willing to accept that strong AI is possible, but I havn't seen anything SO FAR, that is even remotely close to what we can do.

The problem with the idea that we're AI is, it would have to be so insanely complex, because given a huge number of factors, the same person will respond to the same event in totally different ways. All the different moods and chemicals would also have to interact in that "programming." Maybe it is possible though, that as determined by our dna and what we see around us when we're infants, the brain begins to "write" its own instructions, a sort of AI script.

>>4
It would be the height of irony if our fundamental understanding of human consciousness came out of Nazi experimentation.

>>8
Ironic in the sense of all the shit in the Alanis Morissette song?

>>1
We seem to be short of geniuses in the 20-21st century though. Well, "the wheelchair guy" exists.
There are plenty of geniuses in the late 20th - 21st century. You only know about "the wheelchair guy" because of the fact that he's in a wheelchair.

>>10

Also, he's not that much of a genius

>>10
Then who are the other geniuses?

>>12
who cares, they don't have ALS.


also,
>>7
please think about the idea of trying to put someone in the same event twice.  because you cant.

>>13
Sure you can. Dog poops on carpet one day, a person says "YOU FUCKING DOG EAD." Then the dog poops on it a month later and the person just kinda scoops it up and mutters "stupid dog"

>>14
The first time it happens, the dog has been pooping on the carpet for n months, the second time it happens the dog has been pooping on the carpet for n+1 months. They are different situations.

>>15
no u. They're both dogs shitting.

>>16
Same situation means "same situation", not "two different situations that share a bit in common".

>>17
More like same situation with the only difference being when. That'd be the same situation with only a bit not in common.

>>12
Ludwig Wittgenstein, John Searle and Noam Chomsky have all revolutionized the way we view this topic and are all geniuses. Do you think your average person understood what Newton was doing in the 1700's? There are very few geniuses’s that make there way into public light, and even fewer that deserve the title; however its foolish to assume a lack of

>>17
If they have everything in common except for one thing, then they aren't the same situation. Very similar != same.

>>19
>Noam Chomsky

HAHAHAHHAHAHA GTFO

>>20
Enjoy your anal-retentive nitpicking

>>21
It isn't nitpicking, it is making an important point. A number of people in this thread seem to be making the case that determinism implies that a person will react in a very similar way to two very similar situations. That is not correct; determinism says that a person will react the exact same way to two situations which are the exact same. However, the latter is an empty statement, as for the exact same situation to occur twice they would have to occur at the same time, and thus would not be distinct from each other.

>>21

">>19
>Noam Chomsky

HAHAHAHHAHAHA GTFO"

?

>>22
True, so that means proving determinism is epistemologically impossible...

>>23
It means Noam Comsky is a political ideologue, not a genius.

>>22
Time doesn't scientifically exist

>>25
Is this thread about politics? Hes a genius because of his work in linguistics / psychology

>>27
What did he discover?

we're some sort of computer that works with brain cells and synapses instead of 1s and 0s. That's about as far as we can tell.

>>24
No it doesn't.

>>28
Nothing, he just re-iterated what we've known for practically centuries. He's more of a genius at self-publicising than a productive genius.

Neuroeconomics > Dualism

>>28
Hawking Radiation

Basically that blackholes evaporate via virtual particles and entropy. Not really that great though. For the most part he's just proposed stupid "theories" that aren't really theories, but read enough like a sci-fi novel that they get a lot of publicity.

Here's a look at some of his most recent stupidity.
http://c2ore.com/archives/?itemid=1549

>>33
Look at the post that the post he's quoting carefully, it's talking about Noam Chomsky, not Hawking. We all know Hawking is pretty smart and discovered stuff.

This is your invitation:

www.lost.eu/2ec07

Stephen Hawking was just like every other mediocre person on earth until he became disabled. It wasn't until then that he decided to seriously take up physics.

If more people just tried.

>Stephen Hawking was just like every other mediocre person on earth until he became disabled.

Waht. I thought he was born like that and that's why he's a genius?

Hawking didnt contribute enough to science to be considered a genius. Hes only considered one because of his book that sold sooo well

>>37
Uh, no. He was "born with that", I believe, but it didn't actually affect him until after he had finished his schooling. And it is unconnected to his intelligence.

>>39

yeah, stephen hawking was just a lazy college bum, then some doctors told him "steve man, u gonna die!" and he thought "ohshi, i better start getting things done then" and he studied alot and became very smarty.
the end.

Mdoern geniuses prefer to become millionaires.

>>40
Don't you  think in the face of death he should've been more lazy than workaholic? Like going around fucking bitches and doing drugs?

>>40
Don't you  think in the face of death he should've been more lazy than workaholic? Like going around fucking bitches and doing drugs?

>>43
Yeah really, studying a lot to become smart and gain fame is a long term way of getting bitches.

>>41
QFT

Except for that guy who proved the Poincare Conjecture.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grigori_Perelman

>Sir John Ball, president of the International Mathematical Union, approached Perelman in St. Petersburg in June 2006 to persuade him to accept the prize. After 10 hours of persuading over two days, he gave up. Two weeks later, Perelman summed up the conversation as: "He proposed to me three alternatives: accept and come; accept and don’t come, and we will send you the medal later; third, I don’t accept the prize. From the very beginning, I told him I have chosen the third one." He went on to say that the prize "was completely irrelevant for me. Everybody understood that if the proof is correct then no other recognition is needed."

>According to a recent interview, Perelman is currently jobless, living with his mother in St Petersburg.

Living with his mother at that age? I bet perelman is a /b/tard.