Does electron have consciousness ? Molecular biology & molecular evolution Cosmology & cosmic evolution If Universe evolve can electron evolve too ? Does evolution of life begin on electron level ? Origin of life is a result of physical laws that govern Universe Electron takes important part in this work Question Why does the simplest particle - electron have six formulas: E=h*f e = +ah*c e = -ah*c +E=Mc^2 -E=Mc^2 E= ∞ ? Nobody knows Electron is not as simple as we think
In defence of the algorithm though. iot is quite hard for it to determine who is real and who is pseudo as it does not use human reasoning to make a decision when linking videos (with respect to suggestion). For example - take the creationism/ evolution debate. Because both sides use the same words and potentially almost the same science vocubulary (event though in widely different ways. The aklgorithm canno understand this and so link the videos. Shame but that's the limit we have currently.
Apologies. My wife recently left me/seperated from me and all I sense is divorce. And cant help but think it is because I didnt follow through enough of what I just stated. I don't mean to act like a dick.
The "subjective experience" is hidden within the structure of the brain, as the meaning of the gene is not in the double helix, BUT in the arrangement of base pairs. But psudo- is cool for the setting of your "talk"
One thing I am conscious of is that the YouTube system for suggesting associated videos is fucked, since it says some Deepak Chopra quackery is up next. Yeah, no thanks, unless I get to see Dr. Ramachandran talk circles around Chopra while he's spouting misapplied jargon and fluffy vague platitudes. Unfortunately, Chopra is financially unable to recognize science without the pseudo- in front of it, even if he turned out to be mentally capable, so Rama would be wasting his time.
@Keovar ironically Chopra has the same level of understanding of words like quantum and qualia as the youtube algorithms do. When he talks I just hear white noise. I find it reprehensible that in this time of unprecedented knowledge, people like Chopra commit intellectual vandalism and mislead people towards bullshit when real answers are available. I suspect that if we could quantify the damage he did to the education of the general public, his actions would be recognisably criminal.
Yeah, I get the irony and know the tag and title comparison systems are blind, I just wanted to vent a bit. If scientific terms were too obscure and difficult to say (let alone make a sound-bite out of) it would have the opposite effect of Sagan's Cosmos series, pushing people away from science rather than making it approachable. Unfortunately, the psuedoscience quacks jump on the neat-sounding words and subvert then into their form of disorganized religion.
@Keovar yeah I remember an interview Richard Dawkins did with Chopra where Dawkins got him to admit that his use of the term quantum theory was poetic rather than literal. Chopra then had the gall to accuse physicists of being the ones who "hijacked the word for their own use". I've noticed a tendency among professional bullshitters to project their own flaws onto those who criticise them. I think it's so when we say "no that's what you do!" it inevitably sounds weak and reflexive. Slimy fucks.
To bring this back on topic, yet tie it into your projection observation:
When we criticise someone, fairly, cynically, naively, or even as a strawman, how much of the model of their mind and motives is actually based on out knowledge of them, and how much of it is us taking our mental model of ourselves and putting a mask of the target on it? Is every negative opinion we have of another a reflection of who we fear we might be in a different circumstance?
@Keovar good question. I'm not sure what the answer is, but I suspect it's a bit of each. To take an extreme case, obviously we can say a murderer is a bad person without necessarily projecting our own homicides onto them. Regarding whether we fear we would do the same, if we accept that there is no contra-causal free will, we necessarily would do the same as the person we are criticising, given the same genetics and experiences. I do fear that me bringing up free will is opening a Pandora's box
It's okay, I get both perspectives of the free-will argument.
I think society operates better when we do hold people responsible for their choices, but promote rehabilitation where possible. Perhaps all crime can be considered the result of a form of insanity, but all the same we have to keep those that have proven themselves dangerous away from safe, stable people.
Otherwise, it's a bit like the anthropic principle. This mind is all I know, and it /feels/ like I have free will.
WRONG, Oh my look at the caps on that word... I must be sure of myself. Its a hijacked term because they understood the definition long before the label was applied. Plus you guys sound like your reading from a script. Is this your intention?
@Keovar Hi,I agree with you on Chopra ,but what do you make of some prominent theoretical physicists who theorize about consciousness to a similar effect.I am talking about people like Dr. Amit Goswami,Roger Penrose,Fred Wolf etc.,people with solid scientific credentials who seem to entertain the idea of non-locality?
I'm not really familiar with their claims, but if it's conjecture without evidence and testing, that's a hypothesis, not a theory. I can't say whether I like their idea(s) without knowing what they are, but scientists are not immune from having bad ideas or confirmation bias. That's the purpose of peer-review, to run the ideas through many filters before they become accepted.
@Keovar Precisely, it's a matter of distinguishing facts from unfounded claims which is the job of science but there's still too much room for bias interpretation( after all the scientific facts have been established) in the attempt to answer the most fundamental questions .And of course this is where speculation inevitably enters the discussion and it seems to me that you can't describe anything without the observer's own nervous system entering the description.Just like RAW used to say.
I still don't know what claims you're getting at, but human fallibility is no reason to abandon scientific inquiry when you bump into a mystery. It's not perfect, but the concept of 'perfect' is an emotionally-driven thing that doesn't have anything to do with the real world.
@theinquisitor - Deepak Chopra is doing great work in awakening people to their higher selfhood, otherwise most people live their lives without knowing why.
@Keovar I put him, Chopra, Uri Gellar, in the same category: Charlatans. ITo control, our rulers have stunted the learning of Masses, so such TWITs can get away with stupid words in the language like 'MIND', begetting Conciousness, Self, Inner Self, Subliminal to Rampa's Journeys. If I had a Magic Wand, I would make them disappear. But then the world would be a boring place. They bring colour & stupidity. Who wants to be same with such people around. Long live Insanity, the stupor state,
Involved and interesting commentary amoralis123 and please know that I mean that. Though it is not insane to have a different persona than your own. Accusations of insanity because "they" dare to think abstract? The information these people are gathering (like the perceptions of the mind) are important because it suplements a greater understanding of subjective logic/emotional logic. Which is the only way you'll currently stand a chance against the best PC in a chess game.
@Keovar - All down through history any new ideas were greeted with skepticism, ridicule, or worse. It appears your conduct is only a repeat of the same behaviour. Let us hope the time will come soon when it will not be "Greek" to you and you are able to grasp the higher knowledge. Rude remarks do you no favors so learn to discuss the subject and not fall back on insipid personal attacks on those far above you in their insight.
What are you even trolling about? It's been months since I commented here, and there's not any indication to which post you're replying. I don't think I've even replied to you before, let alone hurled any personal attacks your way... but you sure seem eager to use them yourself.
@Keovar - You'll notice my post of "All down through history..." is nestled under the post above and I'm commenting on the disrespect shown to spiritual leaders in our world. When you cannot use sound logic it seems that insults are the best these offensive commentators can do. That is not how to conduct an educated discussion, in my opinion.
That was the post I replied to, so obviously I saw it.
Where was I using personal attacks? Those so-called spiritual leaders are not here, so even if I'd expressed only unrelated ad-hominems, rather than frustration at their charlatanry, it still wouldn't be personal because they aren't in the conversation.
You're the one making it personal with attacks, as if your vain and pretentious posturing makes you better, when all you need is gullibility to attain your level of 'wisdom'.
I would have loved to see this guy interact with J. Krishnamurti. It would make for a very interesting talk and would help to clear up much about the consciousness confusion.
There is one thing that sort of bothered me when I was thinking about consciousness a while ago. I was thinking, that, lets assume what makes you conscious is in both your right and left hemisphere (I may be wrong). But what would happen if you split your brain down the middle? what would the experience be? Would I find what I thought was my soul in the right hemisphere, or the left? Or would I still experience both simultaneously, even though the two hemispheres weren’t connected?
@braveheart2013 interesting question. check out other talks and writings by ramachandran. he's done work specifically regarding split brain patients.
I don't understand why this guy can't see the big problem with saying only humans experience qualia... The reason I know he's wrong is because we know that other animals experience pain just like we do, they have the same pain receptors and act just like we do when they're in pain... if you didn't have a conscious experience of pain then it wouldn't work.
@braveheart2013 Oh but it would work. The actual experience of a qualia is not necessary for any of the circuitry of the neural system to work.
Of course, this applies to humans and nonhumans alike, and I completely agree with you that given that we do experience pain, and we know what circuitry is involved (which is seen in nonhuman animals), other animals do experience qualia. The big mystery is why qualia exist in the first place.
I think the experience of pain is directly linked to qualia, same with pleasure and all of our other emotions... if we didn't have a conscious experience of any of it then those symbols, those feelings wouldn't mean anything. If a robot wasn't aware of its pain, why would it care? I don't know for sure, no one does right now unfortunately, but I believe consciousness is a prerequisite for pain/pleasure.
Your right though, the big mystery right now is why do we have qualia? Personally I think that the brain is like a computer, and consciousness is the software that has somehow developed the ability to see itself through patterns and symbols... but, how can you make software become aware of itself? I do feel like we're missing something though... since consciousness seems to be derived from electricity, maybe electrons have some basic elements of consciousness that the brain works with.
@braveheart2013 We don't know that animals experience pain. In order to know that, we would have to be an animal, and no human would remain to be able to give an account. Pain is first and foremost a sense, not a subjective experience. For animals, pain is simply "there". The suffering humans experience with pain is not the physical pain itself, but its psychological byproduct.
@braveheart2013 For instance, I put my hand above a flame and admixed with the pain I experience such emotions as fear, anxiety, and impatience. In animals, there is no self to reflect on their pain psychologically. Ramachandran once said that animals "know", but they don't know that they know (self-conscious). Perhaps there are other ways of "knowing" besides consciousness. Though, as conscious humans we would be unable to imagine such a condition.
Saying we don't know that animals experience pain, is like me saying I don't know that you experiences pain. And we are all animals, we're not special, we all evolved from the same self replicating RNA molecule. I mean, I know its bad to assume things, but in this case I think that we can. For example, I see that you are human, you look like me, and when your burned, you act the way I do. I can't KNOW that your in pain without having your experience, but I pretty much know...
I highly doubt humans are the only species with consciousness. Pain is the same as an emotion or a color, it is a programmed experience, a horrible sensation designed to consciously teach an animal a lesson. I feel like it was built into consciousness, the sensation is almost primitive. Same with fear, one of the oldest emotions. I don't know how consciousness works, but I think its safe to assume that it evolved with emotions like fear, pain and sexual lust
@hansquad : i have already told you. Conscious is the product of neuronal activity.. when these cease, you cease to exist. Simple as that. U are your experiences.. of course there is much to be found out, that is why this guy can say whatever he wants..
he is making something from nothing,, it is just like he said,, a cascade of reactions. That's it. Qualia is chemicaly based.Consciousness is a loop of this reactions, it evolved because it gave better chance to survive. It doesnt have to have a meaning.. What is wrong with the concept that life just is. I dont like his logic. It is wrong.
He is making something from nothing,, it is just like he said,, a cascade of reactions. That's it. Qualia is chemicaly based.Consciousness is a loop of this reactions, it evolved because it gave better chance to survive. It doesnt have to have a meaning.. What is wrong with the concept that life just is. I dont like his logic. It is wrong.
I don't get why it's so irrational to separate qualia from self-awareness.
Why can a lower animal, say a toad, with no real understanding of 'itself', not still experience the qualia of hunger, or feel the subjective wetness of its pond. Why would you assume a toad in the sun goes through a process of its nerve impulses relaying information about its rising temperature to an impassive logic circuit in its brain that tells it to seek shade, without it ever 'feeling' hot? And if this is the case
Continued: ...if this is the case, what survival benefits did the ability to feel qualia grant the homo genus that nature selected for it, when every other animal had gotten along fine only appearing to be truly sensitive?
All respect to Ramachandran, though. A brilliant scientist. And what an accent!
Qualia as referred in the video is not a mental state or a mental representation of the outside world. Qualia is a meta representation - it is a symbol of the representation that can be disconnected from its real image and manipulated on it's own. A toad's representation of hunger probably cannot exist without it really feeling hungry. But, you and I can think of how it would be to be hungry.
@seanotube85, good question! And if they do, does that mean that sub-networks of a few neurons also have their own qualia? So would there be as many individual consciousnesses within a brain as there are possible combinations of neurons? That's a bizarre thought. How do you know whether your consciousness is the whole brain or are you just one of a great many consciousnesses in your brain each thinking they are in control but all suffering the illusion of free will?
@theinquisitor If there are other consciousnesses simultaneously within the mind of the same person they cannot all be conscious in the same way. Only one has the ability to act, operate the body, and interact with other minds. The others would be mute and impotent observers, like the mental voyeurs in Being John Malkovitch. Unless one takes the epiphenomalist view, wherein we think we act but really we get these reports second hand, after the brain has decided. This makes qualia supererogatory.
@BRussellspouts, well I think that free will in the contra-causal sense is an illusion. It would have to be unless there is some physics-defying force in the brain. So there could be a multitude of consciousnesses in one brain, all thinking they're exercising their free will, none truly in control, but being controlled. It's probably not true though, just mental masturbation. Or if there is a multitude, a mental orgy.
@theinquisitor Fair points, but our very understanding of science, what we see and don't see is inescapably marred by the evolution of our brain as well. Our brain works probabilistically, and so does science, it's a marriage of convenience that shouldn't be read as absolute.
@theinquisitor haha what a headache that old one is. I have a relatively uninteresting spiel on that, but I've had classes for the last 12 hours and probably would do little justice to it.
He says 'The qualia and sense of self are really two-sides of the same coin!' I have introspected and come to the same conclusion. If you imagine that there is nothing to be aware of thro any sensory organ (sight, hearing, smell etc.), you will also not be aware of yourself! It is like a mirror in a dark-room...once a light ray passes into the room and hits the mirror, one can see the mirror as well as the light ray!
But I think sense of self also requires memory,,,(contd.)
@Hassus Agreed, hence why scientists must depend on philosophers, rather than mingle their theories with the memetic hand-me-downs of philosophical schools long ago refuted by contemporary academia.
@BoStevoD All scientists are philosophers. Every experiment starts with a hypothesis and from there various theories form. They are philosophers of the utmost importance, because their philosophies are often BASED on FINDINGS.
@ericflynnster, yeah Dennett seems to be the exception rather than the rule though. I think scientists and philosophers should both have a proper understanding of the other, which is often lacking in both cases. Another example would be Massimo Pigliucci who is an evolutionary biologist and philosopher of science. He hosts a fascinating podcast called "Rationally Speaking" where he discusses philosophy of science among other things of a scientific / skeptical nature.
@BoStevoD I would respond to that comment by saying that philosophers, particularly the theorists of reductionism, shouldn't pretend to be neuroscientists. I think I prefer Ramachandran's scientific perspective.
@fairiebee I'm not at all against Ramachandran's contributions to his field of study. In fact, I'm a big fan of his work, especially his research into synesthesia, and I believe research like that in particular is helping to mend the gap between the so called hard and the human sciences. What I am against here is pushing his vocabulary into territory marked by talk of qualia and other notions that are absolutely useless to scientific method. It's pure philosophy, and bad philosophy at that.
@BoStevoD It IS a bad philosophy, I agree. I interpreted Ramachandran's reference to qualia as being merely that, a reference to the theory of mental states. I thought he was assuming he would build onthe assumption in a scientific way, proving that the states are the infinite permutations of logic in the brain, not abstract things like qualia. I thought he sort of commented against reductionism. I understand what you are saying however, and agree, it's a poor philosophy.
Nice upload. I saw him on a cable show describing how he thought language was synesthesia (sensation crossing, as in feeling colors, seeing scents) based Interesting man. Nice upload. What he calls Qualia is the part of consciousness, the ghost in the machine that I'm looking forward to us finally learning at a level that we can artificially reproduce it.
I'm enjoying the philosophy involved to. I'm suggesting ( and have made several videos about this ) that V.S.Ramachandran has got something very right here because of his brilliance and genius, and that he's got something very wrong for the very same reason (namely - that he's a genius and the inability to think like someone or something that's not a genius and to be other than that makes for a "blind spot" in his thinking).
as humans we created the concept of pain. it is just a helpful experience to keep us away from harmful stimuli. now society is tweaking our evolutionary drives making our existences more painful but we just need to understand what it is we are experiencing and why. education is the best coping strategy
oh well, you're right. I just don't want to believe, that life is pain or that there is no life without pain or that pain would be necessary for living or evolution? Is evolution and getting better about pain and connected to it? I Can't imagine, but i don't understand life completly yet.
I really wonder wheter there can be consciousnes without a brain and if so, what the brain is good for. I mean for example you need your brain to think somehow or to imagine. And it influences cons.
Well I was just being glib, but without a body to send pain signals to the brain, what would you feel? I guess you could have phantom pain of the kind Ramachandran describes in his amputee patients.
But there are people who have no physical sensation of pain. They end up hurting themselves and don't live long though. So it's not necessarily impossible to eliminate. Unless you're talking about mental or emotional pain, that's a different matter.
Sorry I knew what you meant, I was just being a dick.
I take your point, but I think that kind of pain could be overcome too. If we develop a proper understanding of the brain, we could learn to remedy pain of that sort too.
We can even alleviate it to some extent with drugs. It's temporary and just makes it worse in the long term, but it does create happiness and eliminate misery while it's working. But people without pain would probably not be motivated to do anything, even eat.
@theinquisitor Not quite. The reward mechanism of the brain (Nucleus Accumebens and VTA in particular obviously) don't function on the qualia of pain in the absense of action.
What do you mean by "as humans we have created the concept of pain". Specifically what do you mean by "concept"? And how could we have "created" it? Are you talking about pain being the physical sensation of tissue damage/increased firing of pain fibers? Or are you talking about the psychological concept, meaning something like having pain, i.e. struggling, in life? Or is there something else I'm missing?
i am merely saying that the word "pain" is something with a definition created by human beings and exists to make life easier for us. it wouldnt exist without humans.
When you said that "it wouldnt exist without humans", are you also suggesting that other mammals do not feel the sensation of pain in the way we humans define it?
Sorry to be a douche, he may have some intriguing questions or what not, but I truely believe he has no idea what he's saying, he's uneducated and his view doesn't have any actual scientific proof.
hmmm...I will definitely read more of Mr. Ramachandran notions, yet from a point of an immediate need to respond...he is using examples for us to consider that require more faith than fact. This, in turn, does not make for very good science. It makes for a wonderful story. If one looks at Patricia Churchlands' studies, there are ways of truly quantifying her observations.
"he is using examples for us to consider that require more faith than fact"
What examples are you referring to? He may cover some of the evidence in the other parts of the video. The full interview is nearly 2 hours long I think.
How can one prove wha is uniquely human about subjective experience?
Isn't there a limit to what you can ask other living creatues with brains experience as a subjective experince? I could see overcoming this if the animal has subjective experiences to share, but if they have no such experience wouldn't the question of these creatures who are not human remain an open question from a scientific point of view?
One possible direction of research is to look at people whose brains are damaged in such a way that they no longer experience certain qualia, and comparing this to the brains of other animals. So if an animal lacks that part of the brain that is damaged in such a person, that suggests a lack of that qualia in the animal.
The condition called blindsight involves unconscious visual awareness with no conscious visual perception. Ramachandran discusses this in this video:
The video is called "Ramachandran on how "blind-sight" gives us clues about the nature of consciousness" and is also in the related videos box to the right.
Qualia refers to subjective experience. For instance, we can talk about the colour red in terms of the frequency of light waves, which is an objective description of red, but there is also the sensation we experience when we see that colour, which is something different from the objective description of the light.
The internal sensation of redness is qualia. A blind person (from birth) could understand light as well as any physicist, but couldn't understand what it means to perceive redness.
He gets it. Without qualia there is no self and without self no qualia. These are interrelated phenomena, it might even be possible to describe them in a unified way as one single phenomenon.
Ramachandran is more than likely labeling any life form other than human a representation of Skinner's stimulus-response paradigm. Sadly, he tends to intentionally disqualify himself from seeing all life as self aware or containing "Qualia". In my opinion, qualia is inherent and evolves in every organism for it is simply an adaptive introspective mechanism (in conjunction with others) working to calculate the order and functions of the universe. Humans are at a higher degree, that is all.
So even an insect, a sponge (who doesn't even has a nervous system) or an amoeba are experiencing qualia?? And you said "all life", so has a leaf of grass or a tree self awareness?
The key word in his summation: Emergence. His parsing was kind of difficult to follow.
I have described a basic functional model that seems to fit what he is dancing around. I think it will be more useful for researchers and gives structure to "consciousness" and seems to be able to incorporate the characteristics that they define but cannot seem to model due to the number of bits and pieces.
This is the first time I've heard of specific brain structures attributed to human consciousness: the inferior perietal lobule which split into the angular gyrus and the supramarginal gyrus as well as werneke's area. These structures allow for "metarepresentation"...representation of the representation or symbolism...
I don't really understand this qualia thing. If I poke a dog with a pin, is he saying the dog doesn't really feel it? If so, I would have to disagree.
Nope. Qualia merely denotes the qualitative features of a person's experience. If you poke a dog with a pin, then the dog would have a qualitative experience of pain. The point is that the person that does the poking does not experience the pain (or qualia) that the dog experiences.
Isn't that rather obvious? He speaks of the qualia problem. I think I'm missing something. Of course, every person is going to have individual subjective experiences.
I think that Rama is suggesting that human consciousness is qualitatively different to the consciousness of animals like dogs. The main difference being the sense of self. The idea is that the dog isn't really self-aware in the way humans are. They experience qualia, but they don't have this meta-representation, the ability to inspect their own inspection of the world, the awarenes of the self.
"The idea is that the dog isn't really self-aware in the way humans are. They experience qualia"
What?
His WHOLE POINT was that qualia and the self are two sides of the same coin--in his own words: "two sides of the möbius strip" (NB: the möbius strip has only one side).
So, according to him, (non-human) animals don't experience qualia.
It's obvious yes... but what qualia refers to is the individuals experience. If you poke a dog with a pin, does the dog relate that feeling of pain to other examples of pain (and sorry that's a bad analogy). I'd rather go with, if YOU smell a certain fragrance, and I smell the same fragrance, we may both chemically/neurologically experience the same effect of smell, but what memories or thoughts it conjures will be unique to you or me. Look up Daniel Dennett's four qualia definitions. =]
What do you mean by "feel it"? React to it? Because the dog sure will react. But does it experience the ineffable quality of pain--in other words, does it possess qualia?
In Rama's opinion, apparently, it doesn't--and I see no reason to disagree other than unwillingness to admit Fido's a zombie.
If you poke the dog, the dog will feel pain. But he can't think about thinking about the pain.
The human being on the other hand can do that. He can plan ahead and think about the cause. Let's say you give the dog a shot of some medicine he needs. The dog will still feel the same pain and he'll dislike it just as much and he couldn't possibly understand that it's for his own good, not even if you could speak "dog".
I think the apple example explained that quite good...
How the hell do you know that the dog feels this or that? Have you ever been a dog?
The whole point of qualia is that, as of today, it's something ineffable and impossible to verify whether someone has it or just seems to have it.
Reacting to something is not the same as experiencing qualia. I can build a robot and program it to thrash about when someone "hurts" it, but it wouldn't mean it experiences the qualia of pain.
Again, the point of this video was: no self = no qualia.
test 1:31
krraa 1 month ago
rrrrrraw
HomuncuIus 1 month ago
The first 2/3rds were a bit rambly but the last 1/3rd was spot on and something really big in the pathophysiology of some strokes
mggentry 1 month ago
when my rrrrdrdrdrdrdrdrdred neurons fire :D
shakeyourdimsims 2 months ago
This has been flagged as spam show
israelsocratus 3 months ago
you 2 need to get a room or something.
bobby3424 4 months ago
In defence of the algorithm though. iot is quite hard for it to determine who is real and who is pseudo as it does not use human reasoning to make a decision when linking videos (with respect to suggestion). For example - take the creationism/ evolution debate. Because both sides use the same words and potentially almost the same science vocubulary (event though in widely different ways. The aklgorithm canno understand this and so link the videos. Shame but that's the limit we have currently.
oneki 5 months ago
Listen here...I dunno what all this science mumbo jumbo is...but here's some science for ya. Praise Jesus!
JBeezie428 5 months ago
@JBeezie428 Idiot. Religion is not a science, it's a man made thought to create comfort in fear.
falgorian1 2 weeks ago
@falgorian1 haha man lighten up! I was joking!
JBeezie428 2 weeks ago
@JBeezie428 In that case, you got me ha ha. I read it and just thought, wtf? This guy......
falgorian1 2 weeks ago
@falgorian1 haha yeah...say it with a southern accent....that's the effect I was going for...
JBeezie428 2 weeks ago
Love the rolling "R's!"
NateKirch 6 months ago
this gentleman is one of the most brilliant people on the planet.
andras48 6 months ago
GOD DAMN IT STOP INTERRUPTING HIM! LET HIM TALK!
Xshado2 6 months ago
This has been flagged as spam show
Meaning stop trying to better things by putting what you can't relate to below miscalculated standards.
Meaning validating what one sees to be intelectual by conforming to a prefered way of thinking is not progress.
Meaning dare to think for yourself.
OrganicComputer 7 months ago
Apologies. My wife recently left me/seperated from me and all I sense is divorce. And cant help but think it is because I didnt follow through enough of what I just stated. I don't mean to act like a dick.
OrganicComputer 7 months ago
hmmm...every human is capable of these type of thinking..
sujithgmale 7 months ago
Too much chaos in modern science. Not a very good place to find tranquiity. I'll stick with religion.
zatoichiable 7 months ago
typo error: Who wants to sane not same. sorry
amoralis123 7 months ago
Dear "Doctor",
The "subjective experience" is hidden within the structure of the brain, as the meaning of the gene is not in the double helix, BUT in the arrangement of base pairs. But psudo- is cool for the setting of your "talk"
mmikoff 8 months ago
I love this guys passion!
murchie85 9 months ago
He isn't alone here. Dennett also denies qualia.
Frutoses 9 months ago
@theinquisitor and @Keovar - thank you both for the constructive and informed comments. This is how YouTube could be.
Surfdcom 9 months ago 2
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OrganicComputer 8 months ago
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OrganicComputer 7 months ago
One thing I am conscious of is that the YouTube system for suggesting associated videos is fucked, since it says some Deepak Chopra quackery is up next. Yeah, no thanks, unless I get to see Dr. Ramachandran talk circles around Chopra while he's spouting misapplied jargon and fluffy vague platitudes. Unfortunately, Chopra is financially unable to recognize science without the pseudo- in front of it, even if he turned out to be mentally capable, so Rama would be wasting his time.
Keovar 10 months ago 16
@Keovar ironically Chopra has the same level of understanding of words like quantum and qualia as the youtube algorithms do. When he talks I just hear white noise. I find it reprehensible that in this time of unprecedented knowledge, people like Chopra commit intellectual vandalism and mislead people towards bullshit when real answers are available. I suspect that if we could quantify the damage he did to the education of the general public, his actions would be recognisably criminal.
theinquisitor 10 months ago 16
@theinquisitor
Yeah, I get the irony and know the tag and title comparison systems are blind, I just wanted to vent a bit. If scientific terms were too obscure and difficult to say (let alone make a sound-bite out of) it would have the opposite effect of Sagan's Cosmos series, pushing people away from science rather than making it approachable. Unfortunately, the psuedoscience quacks jump on the neat-sounding words and subvert then into their form of disorganized religion.
At least Rama is cool!
Keovar 10 months ago 2
@Keovar yeah I remember an interview Richard Dawkins did with Chopra where Dawkins got him to admit that his use of the term quantum theory was poetic rather than literal. Chopra then had the gall to accuse physicists of being the ones who "hijacked the word for their own use". I've noticed a tendency among professional bullshitters to project their own flaws onto those who criticise them. I think it's so when we say "no that's what you do!" it inevitably sounds weak and reflexive. Slimy fucks.
theinquisitor 10 months ago 6
@theinquisitor
To bring this back on topic, yet tie it into your projection observation:
When we criticise someone, fairly, cynically, naively, or even as a strawman, how much of the model of their mind and motives is actually based on out knowledge of them, and how much of it is us taking our mental model of ourselves and putting a mask of the target on it? Is every negative opinion we have of another a reflection of who we fear we might be in a different circumstance?
Keovar 10 months ago 2
@Keovar good question. I'm not sure what the answer is, but I suspect it's a bit of each. To take an extreme case, obviously we can say a murderer is a bad person without necessarily projecting our own homicides onto them. Regarding whether we fear we would do the same, if we accept that there is no contra-causal free will, we necessarily would do the same as the person we are criticising, given the same genetics and experiences. I do fear that me bringing up free will is opening a Pandora's box
theinquisitor 10 months ago 2
@theinquisitor
It's okay, I get both perspectives of the free-will argument.
I think society operates better when we do hold people responsible for their choices, but promote rehabilitation where possible. Perhaps all crime can be considered the result of a form of insanity, but all the same we have to keep those that have proven themselves dangerous away from safe, stable people.
Otherwise, it's a bit like the anthropic principle. This mind is all I know, and it /feels/ like I have free will.
Keovar 10 months ago
@theinquisitor
WRONG, Oh my look at the caps on that word... I must be sure of myself. Its a hijacked term because they understood the definition long before the label was applied. Plus you guys sound like your reading from a script. Is this your intention?
OrganicComputer 8 months ago
@Keovar Hi,I agree with you on Chopra ,but what do you make of some prominent theoretical physicists who theorize about consciousness to a similar effect.I am talking about people like Dr. Amit Goswami,Roger Penrose,Fred Wolf etc.,people with solid scientific credentials who seem to entertain the idea of non-locality?
pezata 6 months ago
@pezata
I'm not really familiar with their claims, but if it's conjecture without evidence and testing, that's a hypothesis, not a theory. I can't say whether I like their idea(s) without knowing what they are, but scientists are not immune from having bad ideas or confirmation bias. That's the purpose of peer-review, to run the ideas through many filters before they become accepted.
Keovar 6 months ago
@Keovar Precisely, it's a matter of distinguishing facts from unfounded claims which is the job of science but there's still too much room for bias interpretation( after all the scientific facts have been established) in the attempt to answer the most fundamental questions .And of course this is where speculation inevitably enters the discussion and it seems to me that you can't describe anything without the observer's own nervous system entering the description.Just like RAW used to say.
pezata 6 months ago
@pezata
I still don't know what claims you're getting at, but human fallibility is no reason to abandon scientific inquiry when you bump into a mystery. It's not perfect, but the concept of 'perfect' is an emotionally-driven thing that doesn't have anything to do with the real world.
RAW who? I'm not much into acronym soup.
Keovar 6 months ago
@Keovar RAW = Robert Anton Wilson
NateKirch 6 months ago
@theinquisitor - Deepak Chopra is doing great work in awakening people to their higher selfhood, otherwise most people live their lives without knowing why.
goldie0800 3 months ago
@Keovar I put him, Chopra, Uri Gellar, in the same category: Charlatans. ITo control, our rulers have stunted the learning of Masses, so such TWITs can get away with stupid words in the language like 'MIND', begetting Conciousness, Self, Inner Self, Subliminal to Rampa's Journeys. If I had a Magic Wand, I would make them disappear. But then the world would be a boring place. They bring colour & stupidity. Who wants to be same with such people around. Long live Insanity, the stupor state,
amoralis123 7 months ago
@amoralis123
Involved and interesting commentary amoralis123 and please know that I mean that. Though it is not insane to have a different persona than your own. Accusations of insanity because "they" dare to think abstract? The information these people are gathering (like the perceptions of the mind) are important because it suplements a greater understanding of subjective logic/emotional logic. Which is the only way you'll currently stand a chance against the best PC in a chess game.
OrganicComputer 7 months ago
@Keovar - All down through history any new ideas were greeted with skepticism, ridicule, or worse. It appears your conduct is only a repeat of the same behaviour. Let us hope the time will come soon when it will not be "Greek" to you and you are able to grasp the higher knowledge. Rude remarks do you no favors so learn to discuss the subject and not fall back on insipid personal attacks on those far above you in their insight.
goldie0800 3 months ago
@goldie0800
What are you even trolling about? It's been months since I commented here, and there's not any indication to which post you're replying. I don't think I've even replied to you before, let alone hurled any personal attacks your way... but you sure seem eager to use them yourself.
Keovar 3 months ago
@Keovar - You'll notice my post of "All down through history..." is nestled under the post above and I'm commenting on the disrespect shown to spiritual leaders in our world. When you cannot use sound logic it seems that insults are the best these offensive commentators can do. That is not how to conduct an educated discussion, in my opinion.
goldie0800 3 months ago
@goldie0800
That was the post I replied to, so obviously I saw it.
Where was I using personal attacks? Those so-called spiritual leaders are not here, so even if I'd expressed only unrelated ad-hominems, rather than frustration at their charlatanry, it still wouldn't be personal because they aren't in the conversation.
You're the one making it personal with attacks, as if your vain and pretentious posturing makes you better, when all you need is gullibility to attain your level of 'wisdom'.
Keovar 3 months ago
rrrrrrrr, He rolls his rrrrr's just to mess with us.
putteringpluie 10 months ago
I would have loved to see this guy interact with J. Krishnamurti. It would make for a very interesting talk and would help to clear up much about the consciousness confusion.
JazzyKat2009 10 months ago
There is one thing that sort of bothered me when I was thinking about consciousness a while ago. I was thinking, that, lets assume what makes you conscious is in both your right and left hemisphere (I may be wrong). But what would happen if you split your brain down the middle? what would the experience be? Would I find what I thought was my soul in the right hemisphere, or the left? Or would I still experience both simultaneously, even though the two hemispheres weren’t connected?
braveheart2013 11 months ago
@braveheart2013 interesting question. check out other talks and writings by ramachandran. he's done work specifically regarding split brain patients.
contracrostipunctus 11 months ago
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did anyone else try to watch this with google's subtitles? its sooo funny what google comes up with :D
doggystyle040 1 year ago
Who is the master who makes the grass green Rama? 3:05
youarebeautiful23 1 year ago
Nice. I love how he seamlessly integrates ideas from philosophy, psychology, and neuroscience into one discussion.
ArcadianGenesis 1 year ago 2
I love this guy.
He's so energetic and enthused...and I have to admit, I love his accent!
braydenbeautiful 1 year ago
I don't understand why this guy can't see the big problem with saying only humans experience qualia... The reason I know he's wrong is because we know that other animals experience pain just like we do, they have the same pain receptors and act just like we do when they're in pain... if you didn't have a conscious experience of pain then it wouldn't work.
braveheart2013 1 year ago
@braveheart2013 Oh but it would work. The actual experience of a qualia is not necessary for any of the circuitry of the neural system to work.
Of course, this applies to humans and nonhumans alike, and I completely agree with you that given that we do experience pain, and we know what circuitry is involved (which is seen in nonhuman animals), other animals do experience qualia. The big mystery is why qualia exist in the first place.
PBDPBD 11 months ago
@PBDPBD
I think the experience of pain is directly linked to qualia, same with pleasure and all of our other emotions... if we didn't have a conscious experience of any of it then those symbols, those feelings wouldn't mean anything. If a robot wasn't aware of its pain, why would it care? I don't know for sure, no one does right now unfortunately, but I believe consciousness is a prerequisite for pain/pleasure.
braveheart2013 11 months ago
@PBDPBD
Your right though, the big mystery right now is why do we have qualia? Personally I think that the brain is like a computer, and consciousness is the software that has somehow developed the ability to see itself through patterns and symbols... but, how can you make software become aware of itself? I do feel like we're missing something though... since consciousness seems to be derived from electricity, maybe electrons have some basic elements of consciousness that the brain works with.
braveheart2013 11 months ago
@braveheart2013 We don't know that animals experience pain. In order to know that, we would have to be an animal, and no human would remain to be able to give an account. Pain is first and foremost a sense, not a subjective experience. For animals, pain is simply "there". The suffering humans experience with pain is not the physical pain itself, but its psychological byproduct.
flockofseagulls87 11 months ago
@braveheart2013 For instance, I put my hand above a flame and admixed with the pain I experience such emotions as fear, anxiety, and impatience. In animals, there is no self to reflect on their pain psychologically. Ramachandran once said that animals "know", but they don't know that they know (self-conscious). Perhaps there are other ways of "knowing" besides consciousness. Though, as conscious humans we would be unable to imagine such a condition.
flockofseagulls87 11 months ago
@flockofseagulls87
Saying we don't know that animals experience pain, is like me saying I don't know that you experiences pain. And we are all animals, we're not special, we all evolved from the same self replicating RNA molecule. I mean, I know its bad to assume things, but in this case I think that we can. For example, I see that you are human, you look like me, and when your burned, you act the way I do. I can't KNOW that your in pain without having your experience, but I pretty much know...
braveheart2013 11 months ago
@flockofseagulls87
I highly doubt humans are the only species with consciousness. Pain is the same as an emotion or a color, it is a programmed experience, a horrible sensation designed to consciously teach an animal a lesson. I feel like it was built into consciousness, the sensation is almost primitive. Same with fear, one of the oldest emotions. I don't know how consciousness works, but I think its safe to assume that it evolved with emotions like fear, pain and sexual lust
braveheart2013 11 months ago
@hansquad : i have already told you. Conscious is the product of neuronal activity.. when these cease, you cease to exist. Simple as that. U are your experiences.. of course there is much to be found out, that is why this guy can say whatever he wants..
Djole0 1 year ago
This guy knows what he's talking about!
TheMirrorNeuron 1 year ago
he is making something from nothing,, it is just like he said,, a cascade of reactions. That's it. Qualia is chemicaly based.Consciousness is a loop of this reactions, it evolved because it gave better chance to survive. It doesnt have to have a meaning.. What is wrong with the concept that life just is. I dont like his logic. It is wrong.
Djole0 1 year ago
@Djole0
why it's wrong?
argument please?
hansquad 1 year ago
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He is making something from nothing,, it is just like he said,, a cascade of reactions. That's it. Qualia is chemicaly based.Consciousness is a loop of this reactions, it evolved because it gave better chance to survive. It doesnt have to have a meaning.. What is wrong with the concept that life just is. I dont like his logic. It is wrong.
Djole0 1 year ago
"But, you and I can think of how it would be to be hungry."
Because u have already experience it , that is why..
Djole0 1 year ago
Comment removed
Djole0 1 year ago
I don't get why it's so irrational to separate qualia from self-awareness.
Why can a lower animal, say a toad, with no real understanding of 'itself', not still experience the qualia of hunger, or feel the subjective wetness of its pond. Why would you assume a toad in the sun goes through a process of its nerve impulses relaying information about its rising temperature to an impassive logic circuit in its brain that tells it to seek shade, without it ever 'feeling' hot? And if this is the case
NihilFloods 1 year ago
Continued: ...if this is the case, what survival benefits did the ability to feel qualia grant the homo genus that nature selected for it, when every other animal had gotten along fine only appearing to be truly sensitive?
All respect to Ramachandran, though. A brilliant scientist. And what an accent!
NihilFloods 1 year ago
@NihilFloods
Qualia as referred in the video is not a mental state or a mental representation of the outside world. Qualia is a meta representation - it is a symbol of the representation that can be disconnected from its real image and manipulated on it's own. A toad's representation of hunger probably cannot exist without it really feeling hungry. But, you and I can think of how it would be to be hungry.
srs132 1 year ago
Do individual neurons have qualia of their own in the way that a fruit fly would?
seanotube85 1 year ago
@seanotube85, good question! And if they do, does that mean that sub-networks of a few neurons also have their own qualia? So would there be as many individual consciousnesses within a brain as there are possible combinations of neurons? That's a bizarre thought. How do you know whether your consciousness is the whole brain or are you just one of a great many consciousnesses in your brain each thinking they are in control but all suffering the illusion of free will?
theinquisitor 1 year ago
@theinquisitor If there are other consciousnesses simultaneously within the mind of the same person they cannot all be conscious in the same way. Only one has the ability to act, operate the body, and interact with other minds. The others would be mute and impotent observers, like the mental voyeurs in Being John Malkovitch. Unless one takes the epiphenomalist view, wherein we think we act but really we get these reports second hand, after the brain has decided. This makes qualia supererogatory.
BRussellspouts 1 year ago
@BRussellspouts, well I think that free will in the contra-causal sense is an illusion. It would have to be unless there is some physics-defying force in the brain. So there could be a multitude of consciousnesses in one brain, all thinking they're exercising their free will, none truly in control, but being controlled. It's probably not true though, just mental masturbation. Or if there is a multitude, a mental orgy.
theinquisitor 1 year ago
@theinquisitor Fair points, but our very understanding of science, what we see and don't see is inescapably marred by the evolution of our brain as well. Our brain works probabilistically, and so does science, it's a marriage of convenience that shouldn't be read as absolute.
endgiver 1 year ago
@endgiver, I probably agree with you. Nothing is absolute < except that.
theinquisitor 1 year ago 3
@theinquisitor haha what a headache that old one is. I have a relatively uninteresting spiel on that, but I've had classes for the last 12 hours and probably would do little justice to it.
endgiver 1 year ago
@theinquisitor The whole world all share information and we act upon it thinking its our own free will .
probably the same in neurons
doggystyle040 1 year ago
He says 'The qualia and sense of self are really two-sides of the same coin!' I have introspected and come to the same conclusion. If you imagine that there is nothing to be aware of thro any sensory organ (sight, hearing, smell etc.), you will also not be aware of yourself! It is like a mirror in a dark-room...once a light ray passes into the room and hits the mirror, one can see the mirror as well as the light ray!
But I think sense of self also requires memory,,,(contd.)
HariMSamy 1 year ago
@the inquisitor ::::::::i am a student of hypnosis, could u refer me some Ramachandra video which directly talks about hypnosis or near to it ////
suhayyl 1 year ago
I felt myself learning.
KaslarProductions 1 year ago
Scientists shouldn't pretend to be philosophers.
BoStevoD 1 year ago
@BoStevoD, I agree but what specifically are you referring to.
theinquisitor 1 year ago
@theinquisitor ...the entire 9 minutes of video above. First hint he's talking about philosophy would probably be the qualia.
BoStevoD 1 year ago
@BoStevoD Agreed. They simply have no grasp of paradigmatics, sometimes to include the paradigm of science itself.
wenaolong 1 year ago
@BoStevoD Studying the brain, wouldn't it be hard to avoid "philosophical" topics?
Hassus 1 year ago
@Hassus Agreed, hence why scientists must depend on philosophers, rather than mingle their theories with the memetic hand-me-downs of philosophical schools long ago refuted by contemporary academia.
BoStevoD 1 year ago
@BoStevoD I'm curious about your point of view. In your eyes, what should be the philosophers role in brain science?
Hassus 1 year ago
@BoStevoD and ppl dont like 'Mr/Ms know it all's
amannvig 1 year ago
@BoStevoD All scientists are philosophers. Every experiment starts with a hypothesis and from there various theories form. They are philosophers of the utmost importance, because their philosophies are often BASED on FINDINGS.
jessweetca 1 year ago
@BoStevoD Philosophers are scientists of a sort. Watch Daniel Dennett.
ericflynnster 1 year ago
@ericflynnster, yeah Dennett seems to be the exception rather than the rule though. I think scientists and philosophers should both have a proper understanding of the other, which is often lacking in both cases. Another example would be Massimo Pigliucci who is an evolutionary biologist and philosopher of science. He hosts a fascinating podcast called "Rationally Speaking" where he discusses philosophy of science among other things of a scientific / skeptical nature.
theinquisitor 1 year ago
@theinquisitor That podcast sounds really intriguing.
fairiebee 1 year ago
@BoStevoD I would respond to that comment by saying that philosophers, particularly the theorists of reductionism, shouldn't pretend to be neuroscientists. I think I prefer Ramachandran's scientific perspective.
fairiebee 1 year ago
@fairiebee I'm not at all against Ramachandran's contributions to his field of study. In fact, I'm a big fan of his work, especially his research into synesthesia, and I believe research like that in particular is helping to mend the gap between the so called hard and the human sciences. What I am against here is pushing his vocabulary into territory marked by talk of qualia and other notions that are absolutely useless to scientific method. It's pure philosophy, and bad philosophy at that.
BoStevoD 1 year ago
@BoStevoD It IS a bad philosophy, I agree. I interpreted Ramachandran's reference to qualia as being merely that, a reference to the theory of mental states. I thought he was assuming he would build onthe assumption in a scientific way, proving that the states are the infinite permutations of logic in the brain, not abstract things like qualia. I thought he sort of commented against reductionism. I understand what you are saying however, and agree, it's a poor philosophy.
fairiebee 1 year ago
If I understood everything he said, I agree with him, about qualia and self being examined together.
McAnkkuli 1 year ago
Nice upload. I saw him on a cable show describing how he thought language was synesthesia (sensation crossing, as in feeling colors, seeing scents) based Interesting man. Nice upload. What he calls Qualia is the part of consciousness, the ghost in the machine that I'm looking forward to us finally learning at a level that we can artificially reproduce it.
neoaeonian 1 year ago
I'd love to have this guy as a professor.
He's so enthusiastic, intelligent and I really like his accent -- nice plus.
braydenbeautiful 1 year ago
this guy can really explain!! extremely insightful!!
workaholic888 1 year ago
he rolls those R's almost like he's messin with us, hahaha.
Brom24 1 year ago 3
I know--a guy from my English class got a real kick out of how he pronounced "rasa" in another clip.
typacsk 1 year ago
I jizzed.
Esoparagon 1 year ago 2
Every lecture I watch from this dude it never fails to blow my mind.
AtheistKharm 1 year ago 5
Rama is so insightful, I love listing to him explain things.
devarkk 1 year ago 31
@devarkk rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrright !
salam14111 1 year ago
Is it only me, or does V.S. look like Dr Neil Degrasse Tyson?
geezzerboy 1 year ago
I don't know if it's *just* you but it certainly isn't me.
However he does look to me quite a bit like a psychiatrist acquaintance of mine.
I think he also kinda looks like Paul the bartender from pulp fiction.
Maybe even a far, far more intelligent Jesse Jackson.
polymath7 1 year ago
This guys awesome at explaining things. LOve the accent and the wild gestures. Really makes the subject interesting.
kennegun 1 year ago 3
Yeah, and the rolling "r's".
polymath7 1 year ago 2
i'm enjoying the philosophy involved
billyg89 2 years ago
This has been flagged as spam show
I'm enjoying the philosophy involved to. I'm suggesting ( and have made several videos about this ) that V.S.Ramachandran has got something very right here because of his brilliance and genius, and that he's got something very wrong for the very same reason (namely - that he's a genius and the inability to think like someone or something that's not a genius and to be other than that makes for a "blind spot" in his thinking).
Ramatganski 2 years ago
why is there always pain? when will the pain stop?
666jumpstyle666 2 years ago
as humans we created the concept of pain. it is just a helpful experience to keep us away from harmful stimuli. now society is tweaking our evolutionary drives making our existences more painful but we just need to understand what it is we are experiencing and why. education is the best coping strategy
billyg89 2 years ago
@billyg89
oh well, you're right. I just don't want to believe, that life is pain or that there is no life without pain or that pain would be necessary for living or evolution? Is evolution and getting better about pain and connected to it? I Can't imagine, but i don't understand life completly yet.
I really wonder wheter there can be consciousnes without a brain and if so, what the brain is good for. I mean for example you need your brain to think somehow or to imagine. And it influences cons.
666jumpstyle666 2 years ago
@jumpstyle, the pain will stop when we have robot bodies. Until then there are drugs. And soft cushions.
theinquisitor 2 years ago
@theinquisitor
pain arises from the brain not from the body......
666jumpstyle666 2 years ago
Well I was just being glib, but without a body to send pain signals to the brain, what would you feel? I guess you could have phantom pain of the kind Ramachandran describes in his amputee patients.
But there are people who have no physical sensation of pain. They end up hurting themselves and don't live long though. So it's not necessarily impossible to eliminate. Unless you're talking about mental or emotional pain, that's a different matter.
theinquisitor 2 years ago
@theinquisitor
so know you got, what I'm talking about. I'm talking about psychic pain
666jumpstyle666 2 years ago
Psychic pain? Is that the pain you get from being lied to by a fraud who says they can speak to your dead parents?
theinquisitor 2 years ago
@theinquisitor
I'm sorry, it seems as this is not correct in English. It's mental pain. But you are good in misunderstanding me..
666jumpstyle666 2 years ago
Sorry I knew what you meant, I was just being a dick.
I take your point, but I think that kind of pain could be overcome too. If we develop a proper understanding of the brain, we could learn to remedy pain of that sort too.
We can even alleviate it to some extent with drugs. It's temporary and just makes it worse in the long term, but it does create happiness and eliminate misery while it's working. But people without pain would probably not be motivated to do anything, even eat.
theinquisitor 2 years ago
@theinquisitor Not quite. The reward mechanism of the brain (Nucleus Accumebens and VTA in particular obviously) don't function on the qualia of pain in the absense of action.
TAz69x 1 year ago
@666jumpstyle666 pain arises from both having a body and a brain...
omarivero 2 years ago
What do you mean by "as humans we have created the concept of pain". Specifically what do you mean by "concept"? And how could we have "created" it? Are you talking about pain being the physical sensation of tissue damage/increased firing of pain fibers? Or are you talking about the psychological concept, meaning something like having pain, i.e. struggling, in life? Or is there something else I'm missing?
Just curious.
Spetsop 2 years ago
i am merely saying that the word "pain" is something with a definition created by human beings and exists to make life easier for us. it wouldnt exist without humans.
billyg89 2 years ago
in the way that the word itself signifying some wide variety of feeling makes it easier for us to communicate to each other
billyg89 2 years ago
When you said that "it wouldnt exist without humans", are you also suggesting that other mammals do not feel the sensation of pain in the way we humans define it?
Spetsop 2 years ago
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Sorry to be a douche, he may have some intriguing questions or what not, but I truely believe he has no idea what he's saying, he's uneducated and his view doesn't have any actual scientific proof.
bodmondude 2 years ago
Who are you talking about exactly?
Spetsop 2 years ago
hmmm...I will definitely read more of Mr. Ramachandran notions, yet from a point of an immediate need to respond...he is using examples for us to consider that require more faith than fact. This, in turn, does not make for very good science. It makes for a wonderful story. If one looks at Patricia Churchlands' studies, there are ways of truly quantifying her observations.
thedeeliciousplum 2 years ago
"he is using examples for us to consider that require more faith than fact"
What examples are you referring to? He may cover some of the evidence in the other parts of the video. The full interview is nearly 2 hours long I think.
theinquisitor 2 years ago
How can one prove wha is uniquely human about subjective experience?
Isn't there a limit to what you can ask other living creatues with brains experience as a subjective experince? I could see overcoming this if the animal has subjective experiences to share, but if they have no such experience wouldn't the question of these creatures who are not human remain an open question from a scientific point of view?
JonahTorn 2 years ago
One possible direction of research is to look at people whose brains are damaged in such a way that they no longer experience certain qualia, and comparing this to the brains of other animals. So if an animal lacks that part of the brain that is damaged in such a person, that suggests a lack of that qualia in the animal.
The condition called blindsight involves unconscious visual awareness with no conscious visual perception. Ramachandran discusses this in this video:
watch?v=RuNDkcbq8PY
theinquisitor 2 years ago
The video is called "Ramachandran on how "blind-sight" gives us clues about the nature of consciousness" and is also in the related videos box to the right.
theinquisitor 2 years ago
This guy is cool. :D
JoakimfromAnka 2 years ago 2
crick and cock?
gujjucheap 2 years ago
Francis Crick and Christof Koch
zakiechan 2 years ago
what is qualia
taby1975 2 years ago
Qualia refers to subjective experience. For instance, we can talk about the colour red in terms of the frequency of light waves, which is an objective description of red, but there is also the sensation we experience when we see that colour, which is something different from the objective description of the light.
The internal sensation of redness is qualia. A blind person (from birth) could understand light as well as any physicist, but couldn't understand what it means to perceive redness.
theinquisitor 2 years ago
He gets it. Without qualia there is no self and without self no qualia. These are interrelated phenomena, it might even be possible to describe them in a unified way as one single phenomenon.
gucker07 2 years ago
hes got a real hard accent even to our indo pak standards but its good
badboy2kool 2 years ago
Ramachandran is more than likely labeling any life form other than human a representation of Skinner's stimulus-response paradigm. Sadly, he tends to intentionally disqualify himself from seeing all life as self aware or containing "Qualia". In my opinion, qualia is inherent and evolves in every organism for it is simply an adaptive introspective mechanism (in conjunction with others) working to calculate the order and functions of the universe. Humans are at a higher degree, that is all.
thinkingman85 2 years ago
So even an insect, a sponge (who doesn't even has a nervous system) or an amoeba are experiencing qualia?? And you said "all life", so has a leaf of grass or a tree self awareness?
Robotnik777 2 years ago
"So even an insect, a sponge (who doesn't even has a nervous system) or an amoeba are experiencing qualia?? "
A group of anenome will repel intruders even though they don't have a brain between them. Or do they?
hehehe
jonesgerard 2 years ago
Yes, and a computer-firewall will block incoming computer viruses and trojans even tough the firewall is not self-aware.
So does the computer or the firewall itself experience qualia?
Robotnik777 2 years ago
without qualia there is no experience, machines have no qualia, no consciousness and cannot experience.
Machines are based on algorithms, human consciousness is not.
jonesgerard 2 years ago
You are wrong - the stimulus-response-reaction of microorganisms is no different from that of computer Chips. It's a simple input-output-mechanism.
Wheter the microorganism nor the the computer chip experience qualia.
The human brain is also complex computing device and consciousness and qualia are ermergent features of that reckoner.
Robotnik777 2 years ago
i love how manic and animated he is. He obviously really loves and enjoys this subject.
roidroid 2 years ago 33
The key word in his summation: Emergence. His parsing was kind of difficult to follow.
I have described a basic functional model that seems to fit what he is dancing around. I think it will be more useful for researchers and gives structure to "consciousness" and seems to be able to incorporate the characteristics that they define but cannot seem to model due to the number of bits and pieces.
earthpet 2 years ago
Great clip!
bamboo4tameshigiri 2 years ago
This is the first time I've heard of specific brain structures attributed to human consciousness: the inferior perietal lobule which split into the angular gyrus and the supramarginal gyrus as well as werneke's area. These structures allow for "metarepresentation"...representation of the representation or symbolism...
Awesome stuff. Rama Rocks.
jfooj 2 years ago
I don't really understand this qualia thing. If I poke a dog with a pin, is he saying the dog doesn't really feel it? If so, I would have to disagree.
Bberryman2 2 years ago
Nope. Qualia merely denotes the qualitative features of a person's experience. If you poke a dog with a pin, then the dog would have a qualitative experience of pain. The point is that the person that does the poking does not experience the pain (or qualia) that the dog experiences.
somor98 2 years ago
Isn't that rather obvious? He speaks of the qualia problem. I think I'm missing something. Of course, every person is going to have individual subjective experiences.
Bberryman2 2 years ago
I think that Rama is suggesting that human consciousness is qualitatively different to the consciousness of animals like dogs. The main difference being the sense of self. The idea is that the dog isn't really self-aware in the way humans are. They experience qualia, but they don't have this meta-representation, the ability to inspect their own inspection of the world, the awarenes of the self.
theinquisitor 2 years ago
theinquisitor:
"The idea is that the dog isn't really self-aware in the way humans are. They experience qualia"
What?
His WHOLE POINT was that qualia and the self are two sides of the same coin--in his own words: "two sides of the möbius strip" (NB: the möbius strip has only one side).
So, according to him, (non-human) animals don't experience qualia.
TheSockWithNoName 2 years ago
Yes, it is obvious. But the problem of qualia is that such subjective experience does not seem to be accesible from a scientific viewpoint.
somor98 2 years ago
It's obvious yes... but what qualia refers to is the individuals experience. If you poke a dog with a pin, does the dog relate that feeling of pain to other examples of pain (and sorry that's a bad analogy). I'd rather go with, if YOU smell a certain fragrance, and I smell the same fragrance, we may both chemically/neurologically experience the same effect of smell, but what memories or thoughts it conjures will be unique to you or me. Look up Daniel Dennett's four qualia definitions. =]
grofuss 2 years ago
Bberryman2:
What do you mean by "feel it"? React to it? Because the dog sure will react. But does it experience the ineffable quality of pain--in other words, does it possess qualia?
In Rama's opinion, apparently, it doesn't--and I see no reason to disagree other than unwillingness to admit Fido's a zombie.
TheSockWithNoName 2 years ago
If you poke the dog, the dog will feel pain. But he can't think about thinking about the pain.
The human being on the other hand can do that. He can plan ahead and think about the cause. Let's say you give the dog a shot of some medicine he needs. The dog will still feel the same pain and he'll dislike it just as much and he couldn't possibly understand that it's for his own good, not even if you could speak "dog".
I think the apple example explained that quite good...
thalamay 2 years ago
thalamay:
How the hell do you know that the dog feels this or that? Have you ever been a dog?
The whole point of qualia is that, as of today, it's something ineffable and impossible to verify whether someone has it or just seems to have it.
Reacting to something is not the same as experiencing qualia. I can build a robot and program it to thrash about when someone "hurts" it, but it wouldn't mean it experiences the qualia of pain.
Again, the point of this video was: no self = no qualia.
TheSockWithNoName 2 years ago 2
Excellent, I see what he's saying about language being linked.
TruthBeyond 2 years ago
Ramachandran FTW! Great post!
vonVlunt 2 years ago 3
Neuroscience is just fascinating
cthulhex 2 years ago
If you have a couple of hours, I strongly recommend watching the full interview. It's consistently fascinating.
theinquisitor 2 years ago
I will, usually try todevour TSN's videos as they come out. They are very good.
Nice vids!
cthulhex 2 years ago
great video
snarfeater 2 years ago