Hello Consciousness Theoreticians,

A tangent started in the Welcome new Endogenous Light Nexus Camp thread about reorganizing the top level structure of this topic.

So I wanted to start an entirely new thread that was more obviously focused on this important issue to this topic, and move the discussion here.

Currently, there is only the 'consciousness has nothing to do with the supernatural' camp which most everyone seems to be unsatisfied with, especially the way one is either in this camp or not.

ELN Theory has proposed the following new structure:

1) Consciousness can be explained entirely by presently known physics.

2) Consciousness can be explained by some combination of presently known physics and presently unknown physics.

3) Consciousness must involve the intervention of magical/supernatural forces or other consciousnesses forever beyond any technological understanding.

Grey agreed and has indicated his Consciousness is representational and partly illusory camp belongs in 1).

My own personal thoughts are:

As for camp 2), I would definitely want to include more than just consciousness includes some 'presently unknown physics'. Unless this 'presently unknown physics' is approachable, understandable, can be manipulated, able to be engineered, shared, improved... there is no difference between this camp and camp 3) right? So I think it is important that we specify this in camp 2). As Robin pointed out, I'm not the best at coming up with the words to specify all this. Perhaps someone can come up with a proposed 2) statement that would be more than what we have now?

Also, I would propose that the qualophile "consciousness is representational and real" camp be included in this 2) camp appropriately enhanced. Are there any supporters of the representational and real camp that would object to being moved under such a new 2) branch of the structure? Remember that silence implies you do not object.

So, where do all the other top level camps want to be? We've got at least one camp in 1), and possibly one in 2), is there any camp that would want to be in 3)? What else do we need at this level to include everyone? It would be great if we could have at least one representative of each top level camp indicate where they would like their camp to be at a new top level.

Brent

The four level reorganization is more symmetric because it places the two groups that are adamant about consciousness being "not possible" in a physical versus metaphysical camp structure, while the other two "possible" groups are in a physical but, today versus tomorrow camp structure.

So we might want to use a two layer structure, Possible versus Impossible, Leading to possible with todays physics, and possible with tomorrows physics under the possible camp, and Physically impossible and Metaphysically impossible under the impossible camp.

I'm currently unsure whether my view should be classified as "metaphysically impossible", or out on its own. I think I need to rewrite my statement, or delete it and make a new camp. That would be called something like "Consciousness is neither natural nor supernatural", with an explanation that by "natural" I mean a "natural kind", the sort of thing that science can (or can be expected to) completely explain.

>> "Consciousness is neither natural nor supernatural",

And I'd like to start a new camp that consciousness is BOTH natural AND supernatural, while at the same time being NEITHER natural NOR supernatural, both at the same time, and neither at either time, simultaneously and in parallel, forever and never amen!

Come on guys, either consciousness is REAL and EXISTS in the universe known to SCIENCE, or it wouldn't exist in the first place and would never have been experienced!

If experience is experienced (and I sure experience MINE!) then it is REAL. If it is REALLY real then it exists in the REAL universe, and if it exists in the REAL universe then it exists in the universe known to science.

All else can bubble off into a totally independent totally unreal universe that never existed and is never experienced and nobody ever has to worry about it ever again! Do we need a camp for THAT?

>> "Consciousness is neither natural nor supernatural",

And I'd like to start a new camp that consciousness is BOTH natural AND supernatural, while at the same time being NEITHER natural NOR supernatural, both at the same time, and neither at either time, simultaneously and in parallel, forever and never amen!

Come on guys, either consciousness is REAL and EXISTS in the universe known to SCIENCE, or it wouldn't exist in the first place and would never have been experienced!

If experience is experienced (and I sure experience MINE!) then it is REAL. If it is REALLY real then it exists in the REAL universe, and if it exists in the REAL universe then it exists in the universe known to science.

All else can bubble off into a totally independent totally unreal universe that never existed and is never experienced and nobody ever has to worry about it ever again! Do we need a camp for THAT?

In reply to slehar, I'm sorry, but as I already said, I don't have time to get into a deep philosophical discussion at present.

I did take a few minutes earlier today to think about my camp, and I've decided to delete it (I'm the only supporter!) and replace it with a new, top level one, assuming that there are no objections. (That is, canonizer-related objections -- I won't let philosophical ones put me off!)

Given my lack of time at the moment I'd be grateful for explicit instructions on how to proceed with this.

I just noticed that there's still a link on the home page to oism.org

I consider that organisation and those associated with it to be thoroughly discredited, and I don't want to be associated with it in any way. As long as that link remains, I won't be making any more contributions to canonizer of any kind.

Why do I think it's discredited? Try searching for "Frederick Seitz" at http://www.realclimate.org and read some of the results.

I think we're making progress.

I also still wonder about just deleting the "Cns has nothing to do with supernatural".

As for scientific w/ today's phsyics, or tomorrow's, looks to me like we'd either have to hook the first to a specific date, or else, once one mentioned "physics", then there is sort of a slant or hierarchy that's imposed . I'm not saying that's necessarily evil, but perhaps the option then becomes laying out physics ~regions, perhaps even speculative physics regions , and then edging the various trial theories into different ones of those regions.

The honest religious and spiritual theorists are going to just be quiet or say something like "God is wildly ineffable". Then there are all the other instance of structured duality -- or scribbling up various chunks of structured coding that is going to hit or miss on inducing a broarder paradigmatic shift and consensus. That is, we're all talking about scribbling out structured code and some of that is going to be excessively overly speculative while other chunks are going to be seeds that land in fertile, fruitful soil. That is, a likely possibility is bits of one person's translation may fit or contribute into some other expressions. Or else, for instance, folks might pave the "current physics" parking lot and still come up empty, even with combinations. That would be a useful finding, too, falsifying the "consciousness has a description in ~current physics".

On the deeper level, there is also the view that, er, there sort of IS the supernatural level and the natural/physical level in our natural setup with respect to experience and consciousness of experience.

To try to cover God with another dirty cloth, I suppose another small, bland human way to describe this would be to suggest structural codings that are strings of totally rare singularities, influencing adaptations in the structural codings in the more physical levels of organization. Others might wax poetic in other ways using terms like "higher-dimensional", etc.

The trouble with ineffable stuff is we can make up a lot of different descriptions for the one thing.

Anyway, I suspect that some of the recent posts harmonize with such a tendency.

Some readers may notice that I am having moderately good success in this post/thread and others classifying a very large range of things in terms of structured duality and more specifically into different sorts of structural codings. That is particularly true when it comes to translating "objective" into being a strongly repeating form of structural coding (or subjectively). Potentially, although I expect market forces are still pretty resistant to it, rather than classify trial theories in the (archaic) terms of physics or different types of science, the various trial theories could also be spread out in terms of their structured duality or there common sorts of structural coding.

Maybe that will have to develop later.

I any event, for the portion of my trial theory that is "natural or physical", put me in the testable scientific, "current/emerging" physics if that transitional group exists. Furthermore, my trial theory is generally in the atomic/molecular or sp3-hybridized ~ size range centering on structural coding in the ordered water forming within the respiration reaction, linking in large part via hydrogen bonding with memory, imagination, touch, smell, sound, sight, expressions and motility, etc.

Notice that "all that region" is pretty implicit and also catalyzed and deeply automatic (and indeed very natural and physical. The catalyzed aspects, ought to be seen as sufficient initial explanation for existence of any "gap" that one may worry about. Also, of course, the functioning flow is the internal analog language is primary; the neurologic and of course the word-sound-gesture expressions are secondary.

The deeper "physics" structured duality, once it emerges, generally has a more unified multiple state quantum gravitation flavor.

Perhaps others can classify their trial theories in a similar manner, relating ~size range/coding.

Think about it.

Best regards, Ralph

http://structuredduality.blogspot.com http://magtet.com/images/phpshow.php

Consciousness Theoreticians,

refrost said: "The honest religious and spiritual theorists are going to just be quiet or say something like "God is wildly ineffable." and I think such would be unfortunate. I would really like to know what, if any intelligent theories there are along these lines, and if intelligent people think such is fruitless, for whatever reason, not worth trying or whatever, I would really like to know why. So I hope to sometime include anyone with such beliefs in this survey.

But, for the time being, they all do seem to be not yet participating, or not speaking up. ELN Theory had one camp for:

3) Consciousness must involve the intervention of magical/supernatural forces or other consciousnesses forever beyond any technological understanding.

But so far, nobody has said they want to exist in such a camp. In my experience, there is no utility in creating camps until there is some real person willing to join and support it.

Everyone that has spoken up, so far, and still participating, has indicated they agree with the consciousness is approachable via science and the scientific method. The only apparent difference I can see is that some of us feel that nothing new is required, and most others think something new is required.

So, what would everyone think about something like a new 3 camp structure with something like:

 Name: Approachable Via Science

 We believe consciousness to be approachable via the
 scientific method. Scientific research will not only eventually
 result in a real demonstrable understanding of where
 everything in the mind is, what it is, and how it works, but also
 eventually allow us to objectively share, to artificially
 engineer, fix, and significantly improve everything to do with
 consciousness and the mind.

 Name: Nothing New Required
 Parent Camp: Approachable Via Science

 Consciousness can be explained entirely by presently known
 physics.

 Name: New Science Required
 Parent Camp: Approachable Via Science

 There is something special about consciousness that
 requires either some new yet to be discovered physics, or
 some new way of thinking about existing physical models of
 reality.

I would propose that the Consciousness is Representational and Real camp and refrost's Cns is structurally coded water camp be moved into the "New Science Required" camp, and Grey's Partly Illusory camp be moved into the "Nothing New Required" camp.

Does anyone have any problems with this? Have I missed anyone? Would anyone in the above camps object to me making these changes?

Are there any other's willing to participate in this process - willing to join these (perhaps with some modifications), or any other camps? How about the 4 supporters of either of the zero point theory camps?

Brent Allsop

Brent I think you have over generalized the question

The problem is not is there no need for new science, but is there a need for a new physics. I would be the first to suggest the need for new science. I just don't believe we need a new physics to achieve it. What we might need is more a reinterpretation of existing physics to do away with philosophical approaches that have turned out to be invalid.

This approach is not consistent with the concept that nothing new is needed.