Can science study consciousness?

[Shakti]

dennet seems interesting but i think he's making a mistake trying to collapse interior perspective (subjectivity) to a empirically measurable phenomena. It's all fine and good to ask people about their perspective and their experience of reality, but to believe that just anyone could adequately transmit that experience to another and then that person could quantify it is a huge stretch. Then by adding this self-report to a contrived system of 'objective predictions' of the nature of this individual they claim that all that is knowable or all that is needed to be known about consciousness is known through this process is rather ignorant.

MDAO, nice post, thoughtful and informed.

 

[ebola?]

>>GP:

check out dennett's suggestions regarding heterophenomenology

basically his sketch of how a theory of quantified phenomenology (consciousness) would cash out...

I do believe the current 'research program' (if you will allow me to speak loosely) decomposes the concept of consciousness into multiple different simpler faculties (attention, etc)>>

suggested text or synopsis?

ebola

 

[Papa1]

Is consciousness binary or does it have qualities? Is it meaningful to say that someone is 'less conscious' when sleeping?

If yes to the second question, and I would say yes, then as yougene said earlier it's possible to study how material changes alter the quality of consciousness. This means that the answer to the original question is YES. Although, again as yougene said, this is not the same as studying what consciousness is.

 

[Papa1]

If the only way to study consciousness is through self-report, then as Shakti said there's the problem of verifiability. How do you check that your subject is adequately communicating his conscious state at a particular time. Say for example, memory. If we reversibly change someone's brain, and they report that that change resulted in unconsciousness, how do we know that it didn't really just alter their memory - that is, they were conscious for the period but were left with no memory of it. Or more silly, how do you know that the change in the brain didn't lead to a desire to lie to the experimenter?

Could you design an experiment to get around this?

Is there a way to have reliable self-reports of conscious states?

If not, then there's no way to take measurements and the answer is NO, whatever I just said.

 

[Shakti]

I think there is a degree of reliability in most subjects, but it's not absolute of course. If they're choosing to cooperate with the study, they probably are fine with answering questions relatively truthfully and to the best of their ability. Though there are exceptions too. So there is a good deal of room to operate scientifically on how people perceive their situation. However, we are all inherently limited in our ability to conceptualize our experience and then even more limited in our ability to communicate it.

 

[Shakti]

Is consciousness binary or does it have qualities? Is it meaningful to say that someone is 'less conscious' when sleeping?

If yes to the second question, and I would say yes, then as yougene said earlier it's possible to study how material changes alter the quality of consciousness. This means that the answer to the original question is YES. Although, again as yougene said, this is not the same as studying what consciousness is.

Most scientists would say people are more conscious when awake than when asleep. In a sense this is true, because the aspects of the individuals consciousness are greater and more diverse. So as I said before, scientists are perfectly capable of studying aspects of consciousness, the things associated with consciousness, but again, that is not what consciousness is. Consciousness is ever-present and all-pervading, so it would seem logical to say where there is more form [as in more interiority to an object (greater awareness)] there is more consciousness. However, consciousness is ever-present and all-pervading precisely because it is without quality or dimension, so it is impossible for something like this to have more or less.

 

[Papa1]

I think there is a degree of reliability in most subjects, but it's not absolute of course. If they're choosing to cooperate with the study, they probably are fine with answering questions relatively truthfully and to the best of their ability. Though there are exceptions too. So there is a good deal of room to operate scientifically on how people perceive their situation. However, we are all inherently limited in our ability to conceptualize our experience and then even more limited in our ability to communicate it.

Okay, but what about that memory example? If we're relying on after-the-fact self-reports, how would you distinguish between fucking with someone's memory of being conscious and fucking with their consciousness? Can you think of an in-the-moment self-report of conscious state that's independent of other confounds (e.g. independent of body control)?

 

[Papa1]

Most scientists would say people are more conscious when awake than when asleep. In a sense this is true, because the aspects of the individuals consciousness are greater and more diverse. So as I said before, scientists are perfectly capable of studying aspects of consciousness, the things associated with consciousness, but again, that is not what consciousness is. Consciousness is ever-present and all-pervading, so it would seem logical to say where there is more form [as in more interiority to an object (greater awareness)] there is more consciousness. However, consciousness is ever-present and all-pervading precisely because it is without quality or dimension, so it is impossible for something like this to have more or less.

So you believe that consciousness is binary?

I know I'm really risking getting off-topic, but can you clarify 'ever-present and all-pervading'? Does this just extend to everything physical? Or to abstract things too? Is Youth conscious, or is just a youth conscious?

 

[Shakti]

It's clear that memory is fallible and thus subjective reports of past experience are imperfect. However, it is not their consciousness that you would be fucking with if you fucked with someone's memory, it would be their memory. You cannot fuck with the dimensionless. That simply is.

Can you think of an in-the-moment self-report of conscious state that's independent of other confounds (e.g. independent of body control)?

No, for if you're going to report it, that is in and of itself a contextual limitation or confound, if I understand your use of the word correctly. And, that comes with the necessity of certain biological and neurological processes.

 

[Shakti]

So you believe that consciousness is binary?

I know I'm really risking getting off-topic, but can you clarify 'ever-present and all-pervading'? Does this just extend to everything physical? Or to abstract things too? Is Youth conscious, or is just a youth conscious?

I don't understand what you mean with the term binary. Would you explain that better?

I feel ever-present and all-pervading are self explanatory. Anywhere that is, consciousness is there, even the abstract, non-physical/material. Both Youth and a youth have consciousness.

 

[Shakti]

I want to be clear about my last point, both Youth and a youth have consciousness. This is not to say they each have an individuated singular intellect or awareness. A youth has that, but for Youth it is a multiplicity not a singularity of intellect and awareness that is vast, varying and often self-contradictory, if I can use 'self' in a broader sense.

 

[MyDoorsAreOpen]

If the only way to study consciousness is through self-report, then as Shakti said there's the problem of verifiability.

Exactly. Well, falsifiability, actually. 'So-and-so possesses sentient self-awareness' isn't (at least yet) a scientific statement, because we have no definite criteria whereby we could deem this statement false (or verify the null hypothesis, if you prefer). This is a very tantalizing problem, though, because on a common sense level, it SEEMS so straightforward to put a finger on all the things that comprise self-awareness.

Science fiction has dealt with this issue quite a lot. I think of Blade Runner, and the lengthy and only-somewhat-conclusive test that's administered to determine if the test subject is a Replicant. I think this is the point Philip K. Dick was trying to make: a being could sport ANY AND ALL of the attributes we're used to associating only with a fellow sentient being, and at the same time not be self-aware, or have a sort of self-awareness qualitatively very different from our own.

This issue will become quite germaine as human-machine interaction gets more and more sophisticated: DOES this machine, who interacts with me unfailingly like a fellow human being, actually think and feel and perceive the world as I do? DO androids dream of electric sheep??

Modern academe's debates on Philosophy of Mind / Consciousness Studies aren't really my thing, but from what I know of the guy, Daniel C. Dennett, although definitely an actively researching scientist, is careful to call his ideas on the nature of consciousness philosophy, not science. He's not without his critics, some of whom propose rather different models of how consciousness might be quantified.

 

[Jabberwocky]

>>GP:

check out dennett's suggestions regarding heterophenomenology

basically his sketch of how a theory of quantified phenomenology (consciousness) would cash out...

I do believe the current 'research program' (if you will allow me to speak loosely) decomposes the concept of consciousness into multiple different simpler faculties (attention, etc)>>

suggested text or synopsis?

ebola

Dennet has written about this (his theory) and also Chalmer's has written a bit about this. Check out Dennet's recent book...fuck you're going to make me look up the title...its a weird one he wrote recently (SEC! :D).

edit - http://ase.tufts.edu/cogstud/papers/JCSarticle.pdf

Also search for essays by Chalmers on science + consciousness

You should get to Chalmer's homepage where he hosts HUNDREDS of phil mind papers FOR FREE FOR YOUR READING PLEASURE AND THE ADVANCEMENT OF THE FIELD :D

 

[Jabberwocky]

I do not believe the best way to study consciousness is to study introspective first person reports. Simply for the fact of the matter that we are not the best judges all the time what is in our experience (sounds weird but we get it wrong enough times about whats going on in our experience that supports this claim). Dennet's project was an attempt to show how you could get quantifiable data out of first person reports. I do not believe he intended it to be the end-all-be-all study of consciousness. It was simply a way to turn first person data into third person data (you observed this 'speaking behavior' of the organism and correlated their internal states with the verbal reports they give).

I believe consciousness will advance once certain technological advances are made in brain scanning equipment. We need tools to analyze the brain on the middle level so to speak. We have good tools for analyzing single neuron activity and global activity (nucleus activation within major brain areas), but we lack that middle level where representations actually are realized and de-realized.

I also believe there is a lot of conceptual work still to be done. That's lucky for us because some of us don't know how to run the brain scan machines. We know how to apply logical axioms and derive meaningful statements from a set of assumptions. Don't throw the old philosophical warhorses out quite yet! :D

 

[yougene]

An issue in applying the science method to interior states is the way it usually approaches problems. An object is studied from one dimension of analysis in isolation from all other dimensions of analysis. But the analysis of interior objects consists largely of correlating with exterior physical structures. This form of analysis requires one to connect data from multiple domains of knowledge. This is something science is only beginning to get a solid grasp of.

So for example, take the body, heart, mind, soul, spirit structural hierarchy of consciousness. An interesting conception passed on to us by the traditions. How does it stack up against other fields of knowledge? It has interesting correlations with the human triune brain. A hierarchal brain structure consisting of a reptilian brain-stem(body), a mammal cortex(heart), and a neo-cortex(mind) unique to us. An interesting point of further investigation at the least.

 

[MyDoorsAreOpen]

I also believe there is a lot of conceptual work still to be done.

Indeed. Don't let any of the heavy hitters in this field fool you into thinking we're mere inches away from a simple scientific statement about what consciousness is, and how to measure it or tweak it.

All scientific advances make possible certain practical applications that were not possible before. The prospect of artificial intelligence definitely gives many people the heebie jeebies. After all, it's comforting when you can assume that anything that acts like a sentient person is indeed just that. (Or rather, it's disquieting to NOT be able to make that assumption.) But what about the other end of things? I'm quite put off by the prospect of this scientific knowledge being abused to TAKE AWAY part or all of a person's self-awareness, while maintaining that person's outwardly manifest behaviors, for the purpose of exploiting them (enslaving them, in effect). In other words, if we can make and verify a scientific statement like 'The ingredients for self-awareness are X, Y, and Z', then what's stopping someone with few ethical qualms from manipulating a person's body so that they no longer have X, Y, and/or Z, but are otherwise indistinguishable from other humans?

 

[Jabberwocky]

I think mainly harder sciences are looking for correlations physical realizers maybe if you want to get fancy metaphysically speaking

As far as I can tell nobody is wanting to deny that consciousness does not also have historical and social dimensions (that deviate from the simply physical)

for example, the analysis of content ascription (ie the 'stuff' of the experience) cannot be done without analyzing the organism as situated synchronically and diachronically in its environment

an analysis of whats literally going on in the head is connected with what goes on outside the head (ie ecologically)

 

[Papa1]

I do not believe the best way to study consciousness is to study introspective first person reports.

I believe consciousness will advance once certain technological advances are made in brain scanning equipment. We need tools to analyze the brain on the middle level so to speak. We have good tools for analyzing single neuron activity and global activity (nucleus activation within major brain areas), but we lack that middle level where representations actually are realized and de-realized.

But if consciousness is an experience, how does a device measure changes in it without asking the experiencer? As MDAO and I and you and others were saying, there's a definite problem with this (i.e. decoupling the experience from the communication of the experience) but I don't see any other way. Measuring the activity of brain circuits on the resolution of neurons, which is I think what you're suggesting, can correlate brain activity with these self reports, but without the self reports... Just as MDAO said, at first this seems so simple: correlate something physical with changes in consciousness. But how do you reliably measure changes in consciousness??

 

[Papa1]

I'm quite put off by the prospect of this scientific knowledge being abused to TAKE AWAY part or all of a person's self-awareness, while maintaining that person's outwardly manifest behaviors, for the purpose of exploiting them (enslaving them, in effect). In other words, if we can make and verify a scientific statement like 'The ingredients for self-awareness are X, Y, and Z', then what's stopping someone with few ethical qualms from manipulating a person's body so that they no longer have X, Y, and/or Z, but are otherwise indistinguishable from other humans?

I'm saying this for pretty naive reasons, but I wouldn't be scared of scientists separating human self-awareness from human functionality. Self-awareness seems necessary for us to behave as socially. The non-social things we do (e.g. organ function) clearly don't need self-awareness and happen pretty happily when we sleep, fall into comas, etc. Importantly though, we can become aware of autonomic functions (e.g. through intense meditation) but clearly we don't need to be aware of them. If the relationship between awareness and social behaviour is the same, if we didn't need it, then why go to all the bother in the first place? Why is our awareness primarily social? Because it's too complex for auto-pilot? It seems to be that awareness is necessary for normal human behaviour.

Eep, heh heh, although I'm just thinking now - if someone functions socially but isn't self-aware, that is has the ability to act as though self-aware but isn't, how would we know? Maybe the world is filled with zombies! And how would we know?!

 

[Jabberwocky]

But if consciousness is an experience, how does a device measure changes in it without asking the experiencer?

First person access is just one way to access the content of the experience. There are third-person ways to access what we call the experience...brain scanning machines are already used to isolate the correlated activation in the brain and nervous system widely construed. Theoretical sciences such as ecology handle the environmental context and psychology handles the positing of mental states while sociology analyzes aspects that have to do with community, organization, etc.