Heeltap wrote paraphrasing Searle:

But if somebody asks what it feels like to be a shingle or a stone, there is no answer to that question because shingles and stones are not conscious. The point is also put by saying that conscious states have a certain qualitative character; the states in question are sometimes described as `qualia'.

I agree with the definition of qualia however I object that shingles and stones not being conscious implies that consciousness is all-or-nothing. Shingles and stones are not conscious but consciousness is gradually acquired by evolutionary categories of things according to their evolutionary status as labelled by biological complexity. Thus beetles are further along the road to consciousness than are stones, and ant colonies further still perhaps. We are at the summit of consciousness possibilites as far as we know but imagine, if you will, some anthropomorphic god who would experience infinitely more qualia than we ever could. Consciousness is relative as to both quality and quantity at any one spot of time and place.



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I doubt if potted biography adds anything to discussing qualia and consciousness. My selection of events from my long and daft life may be nothing like Heeltap's selection from Heeltap's intellectual career. For all we know Heeltap may have suffered from an overbearing wife and been a foot soldier but what difference this makes to his arguments about consciousness is moot at best. Now, if Heeltap or I were neuroscientists we could supply matters of fact to the arguments but we aren't so what does it matter what irrelevant stuff we did for our day jobs or our reading matter?

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To Martian Visitor: May we not change our minds, or learn variations on some foregoing version of our thoughts?

Wanabe, Searle is a published and respected philosopher!

ps: the courtesy of providing basic info like age and education by participants is not related to the topic. It is about being human to each other as you would in a face-to face situation like in a small class or like in a twelve-step support group meeting. I gave basics about myself so I would be recognized as having something worthwhile to contribute. The way this and other threads I have recently jumped into have gone after a 5 year absence make me want to leave. Too much negativity, too much cleverness and frankly too many bad attitudes which are devoted to the personality side of things rather than the topic posted for discussion

Okay. I am a dilettante who is trying to focus on an idea that I feel is important. I cannot isolate my intellectual life from the rest of my life.I think there may be a male/female difference of perspective here.