Zelebg wrote: ↑November 10th, 2019, 12:06 am
Gee wrote: ↑November 9th, 2019, 6:47 pm
I would say that consciousness is essentially communication that can be internal or external.
Communication with self, like talking to mirror?
No. Not necessarily.
Zelebg wrote: ↑November 10th, 2019, 12:06 am
Let's get very concrete and very specific by making a process diagram of a _minimal_ personal computer software and hardware components in order to make it sentient. This should help us understand each other better so we can focus on finding the "missing link", or at least point to where it should be and what it needs to do, if anything.
Very specific is good. As Consul noted, there are so many interpretations of the word, consciousness, that we can talk in circles and never connect with any ideas. Do you remember when I asked you if you were interested in consciousness or in human consciousness? I don't believe you answered me. I study consciousness, the whole of it, while searching out simple truths that I can know are true. I do not study human consciousness because those studies are fraught with bias, beliefs, assumptions, and a hell of a lot of arrogance. I do not study computer consciousness because at this point in time, that study is speculation. Neither of these studies can give me simple truths.
Forty or so, years ago, I started studying theories of consciousness and did not differentiate between philosophy, science, or religion in my research. What I found is that every acceptable theory has some truth in it, but only some. There is no comprehensive theory of consciousness, it does not exist. So I set those ideas aside and started fresh with a few questions.
What is consciousness? Communication. But unlike radio waves, this communication only works within selves or between.
What form does this communication take? That question took years of study, but eventually I came up with six basic components of consciousness that all consciousness is based upon. These are knowledge, thought, memory, awareness, feeling, and emotion. Then I studied these components to examine how they work and eventually divided them into two divisions.
The first division is knowledge, thought, and memory, and this division is private and internal. You can not know my knowledge, thoughts, or memories, unless I tell you about them, and I can not know yours.
The second division is awareness, feeling, and emotion, and this division is shared and external. It actually works, and maybe exists, between things. There is nothing private about it, and we have to work to limit other people's knowledge of our feelings and emotions.
It was many years later when I realized that the first division corresponds well with Freud's Ego, and the second division corresponds well with the Superego. It also helps to explain Jung's collective and communal unconscious, bringing the divisions of mind into my considerations, although we still don't know the parameters of mind.
Then I decided I needed a premise -- a valid premise. I settled on something I read as a child: "Man is a physical, mental, and spiritual being". This is not disputed by Eastern philosophy, Western philosophy, Eastern religions, other religion, or even science, so I accepted it as the most valid premise that I would ever find. It is interesting to note that we have science that studies the physical, philosophy that studies the mental, and religion that studies the spiritual, complying with Socrates admonishment to "know thyself".
Eventually, I realized that all life is physical, mental, and spiritual, so I have expanded on this idea.
I am just looking for simple truths, but know of no other person, who studies consciousness this way.
Gee