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Georgina Woodward
RE. "meaningless jumble of big words" lorraine Ford
Homeostasis-maintenance of internal conditions to preserve and maintain life functions, or maintain normal nonlife function, if non living.
Google search, AI top result "Homeostasis is the process by which living organisms maintain a stable internal environment to survive and function properly:
Eg. I am here (position in space).I am in a stable stance, I feel I am off balance, I am too hot, I am cold, I am hungry, I have eaten enough, I am thirsty, I am well hydrated, I am tired, I am alert and wide awake, I am fatiged, I am rested, I am in pain , I am injured, I am unwell, All is well.

    Steve Dufourny
    Steve,
    I don't think that consciousness and pan psychism are in any way related according to my definition of consciousness. I do however not discount the possibility that non life of sufficient complexity such as a general artificial inteligence could posess comparable consciousnss. If for example it is attached to sensors giving it some sence of it's environment and internal sensors giving awareness and control of proper functioning of the host machine, so that fuction is maintained.
    The machine and the human body are different and therefore we should not expect machines to have feelings like our own, generated by endocrine system functioning and sensations exacltly as generated by our brains from in put to our human sense organs. Perhaps in recognition of the differences it should be called machine consciousness. In the way we talk of machine intelligence to aknowlege machines work very differetly to human bodies .

      There seems to be an assumption that learned experts, of one sort or another, are required to explain to conscious people what it is like to be conscious.

      The conscious people themselves don’t feel confident to say what it is like to be conscious, and they look to experts, and the experts’ books and videos, to define consciousness for them.

      In particular, the conscious people don’t feel confident to say that their consciousness has a useful function.

      Are there any conscious people out there willing to risk saying that their consciousness is necessary and useful, i.e. that consciousness just might have a very necessary and very useful function in the world?

      No one is willing to risk it. No one is willing to risk saying that consciousness is necessary and useful.

        Ulla Mattfolk
        Ulla,
        life is not just structures of matter, it is energy taking part in many chemical reactions that work together to enable the organism to carry out the activities of living necessary for it'survival and that of it's kind. It is a happening rather than just existence..
        many of the activities of living are to do with getting energy and raw materials from food and oxygen . Getting oxygen, getting food, processing it to rovide raw materials for growth and repair and energy supply.Thereby resisting the second law of thermodynamics.


            Lorraine Ford
            Maintenance of homeostasis is vital for survival. Continual monotoring of the internal environment is used for this and adjustment by behavour ,as well as the automatic adjustments that occur is enabled.
            Gaining knowledge about the external environment through the senses is of vital importance ; for self and ones kind. PREDATORS, RESOURCES, MATES, SHELTER. can all be located using the products of the senses.

              Georgina Woodward
              SPELLING CORRECTION
              I don't really understand what you are saying about time Both animate and inanimate matter exist together. The living thing can prolong it's existence,

                There seems to be an assumption that learned experts, of one sort or another, are required to explain to conscious people what it is like to be conscious.

                The conscious people themselves don’t feel confident to say what it is like to be conscious, and they look to experts, and the experts’ books and videos, to define consciousness for them.

                In particular, the conscious people don’t feel confident to say that their consciousness has a useful function.

                Are there any conscious people out there willing to risk saying that their consciousness is necessary and useful, i.e. that consciousness just might have a very necessary and very useful function in the world?

                No one is willing to risk it. No one is willing to risk saying that consciousness is necessary and useful.

                So, you will never find Georgina, Steve or Ulla saying that consciousness has a very necessary and useful function in the world. Georgina, Steve and Ulla can find no use for consciousness. Georgina, Steve and Ulla seem to think that consciousness is not necessary. IF Georgina, Steve and Ulla found a use for consciousness, then they would probably be able to say what that use is. IF Georgina, Steve and Ulla thought that consciousness had a necessary function in the world, then they would probably be able to say what that function is. So, you will never find Georgina, Steve or Ulla saying that their own personal consciousness is necessary and useful. 🙁 And you will never find Georgina, Steve or Ulla saying that other people's personal consciousnesses are necessary and useful to those people, or saying that other animals' personal consciousnesses are necessary and useful to those animals. 🙁

                  Lorraine Ford
                  Your post shows that you haven't read the responses you have had . To knowledge gained through the senses I ougfht to add other hazzards besixdes predation.

                      Lorraine Ford Hi Lorraine, lol , there is a function evidently , but we have not still reached it. The conscious mind, the subconscious mind, why and how, that is the question. But there is a function and processings indeed. The sensory inputs, the thoughts, the feelings, the informations...are all important to better understand this consciousness and this intelligence is maybe a kind of transcendant consciousness where we can create and extrapolate. The adaptation and survival to our environments so are relevant at my humble opinion. We have like so a main function for this consciousness divided in several functions and complexities when the cognitive paramaters are considered. I consider philosophically a kind of main function where this pantheism, panpsychism and materialism are considered but we have not reached these parameters. But if the informations, cognitions, sensory inputs, memories, adaptations to environments are important for the reflection of senses, thoughts, feelings.....so the fact to take choices due to the cognitions seem essential and so we encode in the memory and learn and it is key because we improve the intelligence with this learning and memory and so we improve the choices even in evolving. That is why the experiences are important and this evolution. That is why the fact to be able to solve problems is also essential for the adaptation and survival and permit to live and adapt in the environments because we have this creativity .That implies now the communications and even social interactions all this . That implies now relevant extrapolations possible when we consider the universal altruism and the 3 main possible roads, panpsychism,pantheism and materialsim because we align to values and goals and intentions in function of feelings. That is why the experiences are an important key at my humble opinion with all the parameters cited above because it implies the ethical comportments even and moralities , it is a hard problem to explain physically and reach due to the parameters missing but we see the generality. We are different from mindless robots......

                          Georgina Woodward
                          Well done! You’ve only made 3 spelling mistakes, this time, in the 2 sentences you wrote.

                          No Georgina, it’s YOU who hasn’t differentiated consciousness from a zombie mathematical system, and a zombie brain and zombie senses, zombie-processing their zombie mathematical equations, leading to zombie mathematical outcomes/ responses.

                          You have merely relabelled parts of this zombie processing as “consciousness” or “knowledge”.

                          You have merely RELABELLED.

                          You HAVEN’T said that consciousness is a separate aspect of the world that has a necessary and useful function in the real-world system.

                            Steve Dufourny
                            Steve, lol.

                            Obviously, the real-world mathematical system is necessary. But I think that you, like Georgina, have merely RELABELLED zombie mathematical processing as “thoughts”, “feelings”, and “consciousness”. So, you can then say that “thoughts”, “feelings”, and “consciousness” are necessary; but what you really mean is that mathematical processing is necessary.

                            If you want to say that consciousness is necessary, then consciousness has to be an entirely SEPARATE part, as well as a necessary part, of a viable mathematical system.

                            I’m saying that consciousness/ knowledge is a separate aspect of the world, and that consciousness/ knowledge is a necessary part of a viable mathematical system.

                                Lorraine Ford lol , yes indeed there are specific mathematical, physical functions, , we have understood what you told about the consciousness, knowledge wich is a necessary part of mathematical system, now you must develop with concrete mathematics and a speific formalism, show me please I am curious, your ideas are interesting but need details I think, regards

                                     We have two processing speeeds -re. Daniel kahnman

                                    They are fast, automatic, unconscious. These are familiar,,repetative, such as motor reflex action that does not even require the brain in some cases.
                                    The other is slow, not automatic but deliberate, conscious The task is unfamiliar, particulrly complex or interesting and fully engages the brain in the thought process.
                                    Slow processing is associated with consciousness ,if it is necessary we do not know though a survival advantage is likely, allowing it to persist across generations.

                                      Georgina Woodward
                                      I mean by my last pagraph, slow processing, and resultant behavioral response to reciept of internal and external sensory information, that is associated with awareness of sensory products, products of hormones acting on the body and awareness of self talk. I am using the term 'consciosness' to refer to all of that. The first part is the process of consciosness. The other part is the experience of consciosness. I am not sure if the 3 kinds of awareness are absolutely necessary for the slow processing and resulting behaviour. Maybe the parts are in nature inseparable.

                                        I think that there are 3 choices for the nature of consciousness, in a mathematical system:

                                        • Relabelling – consciousness is not separate. Consciousness is not separate to the existing zombie mathematical system. So, knowledge, thoughts, and feelings are just a relabelling of small regions of the existing zombie mathematical system.
                                        • Emergence – consciousness is a separate thing that emerges. Consciousness is a separate thing that emerges from the existing zombie mathematical system. I have previously explained why emergence is a failed idea because nothing actually emerges from model mathematical systems.
                                        • Separate part – consciousness is separate. Consciousness is a separate and distinct, but necessary, part of the zombie mathematical system. In which case the “zombie” mathematical system is not actually a zombie mathematical system after all. Knowledge, thoughts, and feelings signify that there exists a separate and distinct, but necessary, consciousness aspect of the world.

                                        What is a mathematical system?

                                        There is an idea that the real-world mathematical system can be described in terms of 3 things: categories (like mass and position), relationships between these categories, and numbers that apply to the categories. This is the zombie mathematical system idea.

                                        But I’m saying that the real-world mathematical system requires at least 4 things to describe it: categories (like mass and position), relationships between these categories, numbers that apply to the categories, AND logical connectives. Consciousness is a logical connective in the mathematical system.

                                          Lorraine Ford
                                          I think where i.e.involving what neural stuctures,,meaning the hardware (wetware) Enabling certain processes and not others is important. A simple ,unconscious, fast ,reflex action may be tuned around at the spine .No need for slower,more complex processing by the brain.Or the lower levels of the brain only may do most of the processing,,eg. cerebellum still relatively fast and unconscious. Or processing that is slow ,deliberate and conscious imay be n eeded, nvolving the most recently evolved brain region that many animal species lack and therefore can't use.

                                              Georgina Woodward
                                              A fast response may help survival and is useful where the problem is simple or familiar. When it is not simple or familiar , the right answer may be more help than a fast incorrect one,.

                                                Steve Dufourny
                                                So Steve,

                                                Re higher-level consciousness:

                                                I think that knowledge/ consciousness has to start somewhere, and it DOESN’T start at the top, with higher-level knowledge/ consciousness.

                                                Higher-level knowledge/ consciousness has to start at the bottom, i.e. it has to be built out of low-level knowledge/ consciousness of the world. Low-level knowledge/ consciousness is the secure foundation out of which higher-level knowledge/ consciousness can be built.

                                                An example of low-level knowledge/ consciousness would be point-of-view, on-the-spot, direct experience of the light wavelength category, and the current number associated with the light wavelength category. Physicists might represent the category and number with special symbols, but low-level knowledge/ consciousness is the direct experience of that reality.

                                                To represent this low-level knowledge/ consciousness/ experience, one has to use logical connective symbols which in effect say that, at this point in time and space, this particular number applying to this particular category is experienced to be TRUE.

                                                And while low-level knowledge/ consciousness is a secure foundation for higher-level knowledge/ consciousness, higher-level knowledge/ consciousness is clearly a bit of a construction, due to many factors including agency/ free will. I think that one should envisage this construction in terms of logical connective symbols, i.e. NOT in terms of the physical matter involved, but in terms of the logical connections involved.

                                                    Lorraine Ford Hi Lorraine, I see. I consider that consciousness and knowledge are related but different concepts, They are not really the same because the knowledge is mainly about information , the skills, the experience, learning,ediucation, adaptation and so it is a kind of ability to comprehend where we apply these informations to solve problems or take decisions. These knowledges can even be ranked in different types.

                                                    On the other side the consciousness is an awareness where we have feelings,thoughts, it is about cognitions , this consciousness too can be ranked and there are different levels. That is linked with the emotions and experiences.
                                                    For the knowledge we collect informations, facts, skills and they are stored and even shared and it seems outside the consciounsess and it is there the big difference because the consiousness seems internal and subjective and is mainly about experiences , feelings, perceptions, thoughts.....

                                                    This knowledge is acquired with the learnings , observations, or this or that but not the consciousness wich is more intrinsic to us , it is continuous even , we dont learn this consciouness . That said this knowledge can shape this consciousness , that is why they are related , because in encodings informations or knowledges, so we can perceive differently but that does not change the consciousness, that change how we utilise it , this consciousness permits so to reflect the knowledge but this onsciousness does not depend of the fact to possess this knowledge. But they interact in being different concepts.