Technology

First, I commented on objects of qualia (“red”, “blue”, “loudness,” “quietness”), not experience. That is, again, a very very very separate concept, and I am not sure what the adjective “internal” is doing here.

Perhaps it helps to define what you mean by objects. My definition is that it's constructs created within the mind to describe aspects of the physical world sourced from sensory data.

And there’s evidence of them using objects in these internal models? Or is there evidence of them having certain behaviors which we associate those behaviors with our own conceptions of objects?

Yes, there is plenty of evidence for that. This is a pretty actively researched area.

I’m not sure why you bring this up, nowhere did I deny that symbols and language require underlying machinery to work. Obviously a rock cannot make use of symbols or language.

Then by extension you must understand that language and symbols don't have primacy, they are derived from simpler components. Hence why the ability to construct language and symbols is an emergent property of the brain.

I read it every single time and respond to every point in great detail. Do not pretend I am not reading your posts.

I'm merely pointing out that you did not engage with my point.

I am talking about the origin of experience itself, that which is sensed/observed/visible/experienced, whatever you want to call it. Telling me about how the brain constructs a model based on sensory data does not tell me anything about this question.

That's a weird thing to say. Where do you think the experience comes from exactly if not from the model that the brain constructs. The brain models itself as part of the environment creating a recursive loop where there's feedback from the model back into the brain. Hofstadter describes this process in detail in I Am a Strange Loop. This seems like the most plausible explanation of the roots of consciousness to me.

Yet again, an analogy that does not work at all. We can observe the camera, the computer, what the camera is recording, as well as the 3d scene that is being produced by the computer program. I am talking about the origin of experiences themselves. If we do not experience reality as it really is, then by definition reality lies outside of experience, and is something that is “given rise to” in the brain as you yourself stated in your own words, which is what I initially responded to. Hence, you have to explain how nonexperiential reality in a particular configuration can possibly weakly emerge experiences.

It's in fact exact same thing. There is no difference here. We experience the reality constructed by the brain based on sensory date the same way a computer constructs a simulation based on data from a camera and whatever other senses are hooked up to it. In fact, this is also how modern robots experience the world and interact with it. The dichotomy you're attempting to create doesn't exist. I've explained the specific steps to you already. You have the environment that is sampled by the senses and you have a model of that environment created based on the data from the sense. There's no magic or mystery here.

I know how computers work, I literally have a degree in computer science, and what you’re saying has no relevance to the discussion at all.

This makes this whole discussion all the more bizarre to be honest.

None of these explain how experience itself could weakly emerge.

You keep repeating this without having actually articulated any basis for your bombastic claim.

We form models of reality based on what we perceive, based on our sensory inputs. Our senses are not themselves models of anything.

I didn't say senses were a model of anything. I said the model is generated within the neural network of the brain based on the data from the senses.

Saying that misinterpretation “logically requires” that the inputs themselves are incorrect models, I do not understand what this even means.

What I actually said was that the model the brain creates internally is a simplified, lower fidelity version of the real world. The senses do not and cannot capture every minute detail. Nor is there a reason to do that. We don't perceive the atomic structure of the objects we interact with, we don't see the quantum interactions within the physical world. These things are completely opaque to our experience.

The fact that we struggle to comprehend quantum physics is a perfect example of just how shallow our model of reality is. We know for a fact that at the quantum level reality defies our intuitions. The reason is that our intuitions are an abstraction created at a particular level. Since you have a degree in computer science, surely you can grasp the concept of abstraction.

The reality in which we experience is not made up of discrete objects. It is a continuum. You cannot draw a hard-and-fast line between any two sets of objects which have no ambiguity at all as to its boundaries.

The reality is a continuum, however that doesn't mean our brains have to model it as such. What I'm arguing is that objects is the way our brain creates abstractions and categorizes things in order to model reality efficiently. Think of it as analogous to how BSP trees work.

There is no reason to form models of reality that have discrete and autonomous objects unless it is for the purpose of having symbols to communicate with others in a social setting.

The purpose of forming discrete objects is efficiency. The symbols and communication arise from these models, hence why we use discrete symbols to describe things.

Reality is not actually composed of these kinds of discrete objects. As far as reality is concerned, there is no “cat,” humans invent the word “cat” as a way to label and talk about a set of observable properties which have some relevance to us in our social context and thus we may wish to communicate with one another.

Yes, I entirely agree with that. However, we don't just create these concepts to communicate with one another. We also use them for our own individual reasoning. And if you think about this in evolutionary terms it becomes obvious that individual models must have formed before creatures could become social. Social behavior requires having compatible world models to exist.

If an animal is in complete isolation from its birth, it would have no need for forming discrete conceptual objects because it would not need to communicate with anybody.

It would need to form these concepts in order to process the world efficiently.

However, there is a key distinction here, which is that the animal never associates the loose collection of experiences which causes it to run away with a symbol like a “bear.” It never promotes the experiences to objecthood, and the insistence that it does is anthropomorphizing the animal. This promotion only occurs if there is a need to communicate it.

Parrots give each other names. https://academy.allaboutbirds.org/how-a-parrot-learns-its-name-in-the-wild/

…? So you agree that the meaning of symbols is rooted in the social conditions?

It's amusing that you don't see the irony of talking about reality being a continuum on one hand and then trying to put social conditions into their own separate box here. Social conditions are part of the continuum of our reality, and the society we live in affects how we construct symbols along with all the other factors of our world. Social conditions aren't a separate realm and are themselves rooted in the material experience.

If you agree that nobody could decipher the symbols, then the “you” of tomorrow would not be able to decipher the symbols created by the “you” of the past, at least in a way that the meaning could be derived with certainty and without any ambiguity.

That's not what I said at all. I merely pointed out that if you came upon a set of symbols that were created by somebody else without any context, then it may be difficult to decipher them. However, we do in fact decipher dead languages based on common patterns and context.

If it is impossible for me to transmit my symbols unambiguously, then even if I do use them tomorrow the same as I did today, I would have no way of even being certain that I am.

I've repeatedly addresses this point, and you just keep ignoring what I said while telling me you are reading what I'm saying. The reason the symbols in our minds are stable is that they're part of the simulation of the world that our minds maintain. They don't exist in a vacuum, they're part of a stable world model.

No, you’ve just decided to devolve into straw man arguments.

I didn't devolve into any straw man arguments. I'm simply pointing out that social world doesn't exist in a separate realm from the physical world. It's a continuum.

All your walls of text have constantly just avoided the question and are trying to run around it constantly, and now are trying to be “clever” by acting like you’re somehow turning this on me by going “no you’re the dualist!!!”

I've repeatedly and directly addressed your points. The fact that you're claiming I've avoided the question shows that you either didn't bother reading what I wrote or you're not arguing in good faith here. As far as I can tell there is a contradiction in your own logic here. Instead of addressing this contradiction you're accusing me of making straw man argument.

The whole time has been me just asking you to make an argument.

I have made the argument, and I tried explaining it in several different ways here including providing examples.

Since you have decided to turn this discussion into something that is not fruitful at all, I am just going to disengage from this discussion and do not plan to reply to you further, as I know nothing in your reply will even make an attempt to address how the crux of the matter.

Bye.