> "..*some subjective experience of personhood or* "being" *that we all
> share*,
> and each of us presumably experiences *something* like that."
>
> I emphasize the 'something': who knows if we experience (share?) the same
> feeling? The words we use to describe it are not more relevant than
> describing 'red'.
Yes, absolutely. Hence the use of the word "presumably". The fact that
people seem to share an experience we can't directly measure is interesting.
The evidence of mankind's obsession with the experience of consciousness
comes from the amount of philosophical discussion (like this) that exists in
literature, both scientific and recreational.
> Experience is an undefined mental marvel and conscious?
What I'm referring to is the fact that so many people believe in a "soul",
that we experience consciousness in a way where we feel like we are the
author of our own destiny, that we experience life as though we are
travelling through time and making decisions. The idea of "me" has a static
implication that persists throughout our lives even as we grow and evolve.
It serves both social and self-preservationist functions, certainly, but the
phenomenon also causes a lot of discussion. Something about these
experiences is remarkable enough that mankind has authored a great deal of
text on it, and it forms the foundation of much of our mythology and
understanding of self.
So the conscious experience I'm referring to is the commonality of the
experience of self-awareness as reported (orally and in writing) by human
beings...in particular the fact that most people are fully convinced that
their experiences are unique and an accurate reflection of the nature of
time, that they must either persist forever in some ephemeral form or else
the Universe ceases to be from their point of view when they die, those
sorts of things.
> A 'computer' (what kind of? the embryonic simpleton of a pre-programed
> digital machine
> as we know it?) to "...spit out a bunch of
> symbols related to the experience" of self- awareness itself." - ???
What I meant here is this:
It's not necessarily surprising that people would write a lot of things
about the soul, even if the soul does not exist in the same sense we
experience it. It's quite possible, scientifically speaking, that the
behavior of "write and talk a great deal about the experience of 'being' and
how magical it is" is a natural consequence of any self-aware system. A
common marker of self-awareness might be illogically rejecting the truth of
one's own automation.
Anna
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Received on Sun Dec 14 2008 - 21:59:06 PST