How materialists know brain produces mind

[MattMVS7]

Scientific materialists claim that the brain produces our experiences in the first place. They would claim that they have empirical evidence to support this idea. The idea is that since there is an experiencer in the brain, then stimulation of neurons in the brain can be experienced. Since you have information of an experiencer in the brain and since this information is wired to all other neurons in the brain, then that is what allows you to experience stimulation of those neurons.

Therefore, since you have an experiencer in the brain, then that is what makes all the neurons in the brain no longer just physical stuff and what actually allows you to have experience. So all the physical stuff (neurons) in the brain and experience are actually the same thing. But an experiencer is what makes experience possible.

In order for the brain to have experiences, then you need the capacity to have experience in the first place because without the capability of having experiences in the first place, then you cannot have any experience at all in the brain. So what is it that unlocks this capacity? I am quite sure it is something known as 'awareness.'

Only a brain that is aware can have experiences. The experiencer I explained can only be defined as an experiencer if he/she has the capability of having experiences. That is the very definition of an experiencer in the first place. Without the capability of experience, then we cannot call this an experiencer. Therefore, since I explained that it is awareness that is this capacity for experience, then the experiencer would have awareness and this is what makes experience possible in the brain according to modern scientific materialism.

[Daecon]

But can you level up if you get enough experience points?

[Eise]

You are making a real mess, MattMVS7. Your wording is so inprecise that your text as nearly worthless.

 

First: the brain does not produce experience. Some of the brain processes are experience: there is no causal relationship between brain processes and experience. A relationship of supervenience is not a causal relationship, but an ontological one.

 

Second: there is no experiencer in the brain. Brain processes somehow are the experiencer.

 

Third: we have no experience of our neurons. We experience ourselves as thoughts, feelings, observations etc. But never we are aware of the neurons that form the physical condition for our experience.

 

Fourth: it is clear for everybody that experience goes together with awareness. But it explains nothing.

 

So to be short. You did not explain anything at all. You just presented us with some 'surrogate understanding'.

[MattMVS7]

You are making a real mess, MattMVS7. Your wording is so inprecise that your text as nearly worthless.

 

First: the brain does not produce experience. Some of the brain processes are experience: there is no causal relationship between brain processes and experience. A relationship of supervenience is not a causal relationship, but an ontological one.

 

Second: there is no experiencer in the brain. Brain processes somehow are the experiencer.

 

Third: we have no experience of our neurons. We experience ourselves as thoughts, feelings, observations etc. But never we are aware of the neurons that form the physical condition for our experience.

 

Fourth: it is clear for everybody that experience goes together with awareness. But it explains nothing.

 

So to be short. You did not explain anything at all. You just presented us with some 'surrogate understanding'.

 

The mind-body problem has been an ongoing debate for such a long time and I was wanting to see what dualists would come up with to debate against my opening post. I would agree what you said there about the brain processes and the experiencer/experience being the same thing. I have already stated that in my opening post.

Edited February 5, 2017 by MattMVS7

[MattMVS7]

Actually, forget my whole "theory." Since I couldn't find an article at the time, then I had to resort to my own personal explanation of things which didn't work out at all. Therefore, here is what I truly wish to talk about here:

I have heard Graziano say that awareness doesn't exist and that it is a simplified model of attention in the brain fooling you into thinking you are aware and are having actual experiences. But my question is, do awareness and actual experience exist by his very definition? In other words, isn't this simplified model of attention the actual awareness and experience itself? If that is so, then I think scientific materialism is still a valid worldview. If not and he is truly saying that experience and awareness are illusions and the brain fooling itself, then I am not so sure.

If he is saying that awareness and experience do not exist at all, then that doesn't make sense to me. When you perceive an optical illusion, that illusory perception is still information in the brain. If we were to take a look inside your brain, then we should find information of a perceived image that wasn't there in the physical world. This should also apply to awareness and experience itself. In other words, awareness and experience should also be information in the brain.

It should be that simplified model in the brain. To say that awareness and experience do not exist at all just doesn't make sense to me. He says that awareness and experience are mere concepts. But even concepts are information inside the brain. Therefore, awareness/experience and information in the brain are actually the same thing according to his theory. The brain just has a different way of looking at that information then. This different way of looking at it is what would yield awareness/experience.

It is no different than a situation where you have a clock. Looking at it from the front side, it goes clockwise. But looking at it from the back side, it goes counter clockwise. But the question is, does it go clockwise or counter clockwise? The answer here would be both. To see it going counter clockwise is just simply a different way of looking at the clock. This analogue would also apply to the physical stuff (neurons) in the brain and awareness/experience.

You can look at the brain as being nothing more than information. That is, nothing more than physical stuff. But a person would report to you how this information was awareness/experience for him/her. So the question is, is the brain nothing more than just information? Is the information nothing more than just physical stuff? Or is all that physical stuff (information) actual awareness and experience? The answer here would be both as well. To have awareness and experience is just simply a different way of looking at that information in the brain.

Also, my whole analogue with the clock makes me think whether this was nothing more than an analogue, or if there is actually some scientific connection here. I wonder if there is some actual science here that connects my analogue with awareness and experience. Maybe perhaps a new theory of consciousness can come from this. Or maybe it is nothing more than just an analogue. I lack the scientific knowledge to determine which is the case. But maybe someone who has a lot of scientific knowledge can make this determination.

Here is the video in which he explains:

I have also watched this video as well:

My question here is, if our experiences are nothing more than just some simplified inaccurate model that our brains construct, then why is it that experience is so powerful and profound to us? Why is it that we would prefer to have experiences of joy, meaning, and value in our lives over being a biological non-sentient machine? This, to me, implies that experience is something more than a mere simplified model. It must of had a greater reason for having come about through evolution.

My next question is, why isn't this simplified model in the brain just simply simplified information in the brain and nothing more? Why is it experience at all? Aren't we still at the hard problem here then? He attempts to explain how our brains construct our sense of experience, but doesn't this still need to be taken further into trying to explain how simplified models in the brain become experiences for us? Even if you take the idea that it is just information of having an experience, then why isn't that still just information? There needs to be an actual transfer from brain processes over to experience and I am still not seeing that even in Graziano's theory.

Thirdly, why wouldn't a full accurate model also have awareness? Why is it that only the simplified model has awareness? If you can't get awareness from a full accurate model, then what makes you think that you can get awareness from a simplified inaccurate model? I would imagine that a full model of paying attention to something would bring full awareness.

Edited February 6, 2017 by MattMVS7

[Zinalu]

"It is no different than a situation where you have a clock. Looking at it from the front side, it goes clockwise. But looking at it from the back side, it goes counter clockwise. But the question is, does it go clockwise or counter clockwise?"

 

Clockwise, since the clock is constructed to measure time as it goes forward, someone has probably created a counter clockwise clock just for the heck of it, but that clock will show time inaccuratly, we are stuck in the present, we cannot go forward or backwards in time and we are alwaus stuck in the now, in this second and we can't do anything about it, if you look at the backside of a clock, it's just the backside of it, the front will still go clockwise and it's not really a matter of perspective there.

 

Experience is learning, learning is survival, wild animal babies play fight with eachother to gain experience in fighting when they grow up so they can survive if attacked, my cat tried to nudge a door and he gained the experience that if he nudge it the door opens in which he can then get to his kibbles, now everytime the door is open enough for him to stick his paw in between he will open the door, he learned from experience that it works.

 

Awerness could be a mixture of several things, instinct, independent thinking, learning and experiencing among other things.

Edited February 10, 2017 by Zinalu