Self Awareness

[Cognisant]

Cogito, ergo sum.
I think therefore I am.

But we can't perceive ourselves directly, just as a snake eating its tail cannot eat itself out of existence, thus there needs to be something to keep this loop between self and self open, the ego, our perceived self. But if the ego is just our perceived self, an informational/behavioural construct, than what are we really, what is the real self?

Continuity, I believe.
Like the second by second ticking of a clock, every time the second hand moves it announces to the world that another second has past, but time is a constant flow, it doesn’t start or stop, so what are those moments between the ticking of the clock? They are the moments when the clock ceases to be what makes it what it is, this is why a clock's ticking is a simulation, a representation of time's flow, not the flow of time itself.

I think Da Blob once said time is god... he's right in a way.
Information doesn’t flow through us in a constant stream, it gets passed from one neuron to the next, that is to say we tick, we tick very fast but no matter how fast we tick we're still ticking, we're not the constant flow of time, our perception of it is merely a simulation, our simulation (self by neural processing) runs on the flow of time.

We have no absolute continuity.
Death is moot.

Or maybe we're the ego, but then, we're no different to fiction.

Is my avatar starting to make sense?

 

[loveofreason]

For some reason I thought he was one of the dudes from Mad Max

Can you name these pauses? Are you suggesting that time data spends in transit between neurons is analogous to the time between seconds ticking? A second is arbitary, we can make our units of measurement smaller and smaller and smaller... until? Is there anything arbitary about speed of neural processing?

At any given moment, within the fluids and structure of our brain, the totality of information being processed surely occupies all possible positions. I mean... neurons aren't all 'off' or all 'on' (errr... for want of technical terms ), information is being recieved, sent, in transit. There may be no real continuity between any two neurons, but the flow of data within the system overall is continuous.

What if you mind isn't a clock, but billions of clocks all ever so slightly out time? What if we experience continuity because all those neurons, between them, have every gap covered?

And... to suggest lack of continuity because a package of data is between neurons is to suggest that the gap between neurons has no function - that it isn't 'us'; that it is in some way void or not part of the system. Which I don't believe is the case at all. It is no less part of our biology, and no less functional to the exchange of information than the neuron.

Unless I've completely missed what you're saying?

As for being fiction - I like to imagine a fiction tree, our unconscious being the roots, our awareness in the trunk, our imagination branching out, leafing with possibilites, and flowering/giving rise to another generation of fiction.

It's entirely possible that we are nothing more than ego-fiction. It's hard to have a sense of self with no ego.

 

[EyeSeeCold]

There is no such thing as time. Time only becomes time when there is something to measure it, a finite perspective, mortality. Like the Dao, it can only be perceived through its effects, but never itself.

I think the Essence of the Self is bound to physical sensual reality by the complex workings of the brain. It provides a synchronization between two planes or dimensions that allow the Essence to work through the body. Consciousness may or may not end after death, separation, but surely sensational phenomena is nonexistent.

 

[Cognisant]

What if you mind isn't a clock, but billions of clocks all ever so slightly out time? What if we experience continuity because all those neurons, between them, have every gap covered?

You can cut a second in half, and that half in half, and that half in half, and that half in half, etc
2 - 4 - 8 - 16 - 32 - 64 - 128 - 256 - 512 - 1024 - 2048 - 4096 - 8192 - etc

A true continuity encompasses every moment, but time (as far as I know) can be divided up into an infinite number of moments, and we don't have infinite neurons, not even close.

And... to suggest lack of continuity because a package of data is between neurons is to suggest that the gap between neurons has no function - that it isn't 'us'; that it is in some way void or not part of the system. Which I don't believe is the case at all. It is no less part of our biology, and no less functional to the exchange of information than the neuron.

Biology means squat, I'm not saying we're not physically here, nor am I saying we don't have an ego, all I'm saying is that there's definable stages in the process of thought, that when a neuron fires it emits an electrical charge for a set period of time, then it stops, then it fires again, then it stops, etc.

It’s these definable stages that implicate we don’t have absolute continuity, not that this really affects the overall system in any way, from a purely philosophical perspective I’m dying millions of times between every letter I type, but from an everyday perspective I’m still here typing.

So what’s the relevance I hear you wonder.
(stop thinking so loud, geez)

It’s relevant because it means we’re not innately real, which means it’s possible to create an AI that is in fact no less real than any other person, which has huge implications for what I believe will be the legal battles that will define the 21st century.

 

[Cognisant]

It also totally fucks up the concept of a soul.

I love that.

 

[loveofreason]

True, we don't have infinite neurons - but why nominate the moment of firing of a neuron as the definitive instance of self-awareness?

What exists in the gaps and how can you discount it as being of no significance in the experience of being self-aware?

 

[Cognisant]

I think the Essence of the Self is bound to physical sensual reality by the complex workings of the brain. It provides a synchronization between two planes or dimensions that allow the Essence to work through the body. Consciousness may or may not end after death, separation, but surely sensational phenomena is nonexistent.

Wishful thinking imo.

True, we don't have infinite neurons - but why nominate the moment of firing of a neuron as the definitive instance of self-awareness?

Not self-awareness, just self.
Because if a not-firing neuron is a part of self, what isn't?

 

[loveofreason]

Wishful thinking imo.


Not self-awareness, just self.

Because if a not-firing neuron is a part of self, what isn't?

Indeed. Which brings us back to ego - the thing which delineates self from not-self. As you suggested - it may be that the self is merely the ego, and we are fictions. I'm personally very fond of this point of view, because I find it poetic, not because of any substantiated fact.

And I would certainly see AI as fictions of equal footing. Persons as much as you and I.

So, you choose to nominate a firing neuron as self, and a not-firing one as not-self. Making the self a phenomenon that blinks in and out of existence, yet retains a memory of its former position while it is 'out', and giving rise to percieved continuity from something which is not, in fact, continuous.

Is not the key to self then, this memory? Not actual continuity, but the capacity to preserve a memory of the former frame between frames? What is this memory and how does it function? Where is it preserved? How is it preserved?

Is this a matter of trajectory? How can something (self as firing neurons - thought) maintain momentum and trajectory while it ceases to be? Suddenly you're in the realm of quantum mechanics - is that where you intended this to go?

Why accept the proposition that we are thought?

(And if you wish to exclude biology, then this is more a philosophical topic than a matter of neuroscience.)

 

[Moocow]

We're nothing and everything. I consider myself the entirety of the experience that is constantly occuring, not just the physical viewpoint of that experience.
Trying to observe exactly what you are is impossible because as soon as you observe something you are no longer observing from it.
I believe that is the fundamental principle of the universe itself, and the reasons it exists as a constant state of change.

Think of your brain as just one of many mechanisms of the universe for continually observing itself. On a physical level, there's nothing dualistic about it. The "mind" in the mind/body problem is not the thoughts, the emotions, or any other aspect of the human biological machine, but rather the universal process itself of infinite physical change.

That's how I see it.

 

[IfloatTHRUlife]

1. Everyone has a soul, except amputee patients.

2. If you want to consider each nueron firing as ticking, then there is nothing that neccessarily flows, even the most smooth free moving things in the world are just molecules being pushed over each other, cramming into each other and pushing other molecules out of the way.

 

[Jesse]

When I was young I happened upon the idea that everything could be a lie. Our memory, body and senses can all be fabricated a second before we come into existence. So what is truth when that could be a reality? The only answer I came to is the stream of consciousness or thought. But later I discovered that the stream of conscious or thought could be an illusion of our actual mind. Great now I'm stuck in a thought loop where both could be false from a different point of view.

I guess I would say we are an everlasting idea in our own reality or an illusion that constantly creates itself to function. The ticking thing only works if you think of time in a series of A to B. I see it as an all encompassing series of events that work because there is no way to break time.

 

[Agent Intellect]

The self is an emergent property of the system. The system necessarily depends on the non-firing neurons - there would be no self if all neurons were in the "on" state at all times (even too many of them being in the "on" position causes seizures). Perhaps this is why neurons have inhibitory neurotransmitters as well as excitatory - because a neuron not firing at a certain time is just as important as a neuron firing.

Saying that only firing neurons count as the self would be like saying only the areas of a canvas that contain paint are part of the picture, or like only the walls, floor, and ceiling of a room constitute the room.

Thinking about the self on the level of neurons is like thinking about a game of chess only as pieces on the board - it has more to do with the interactions of the pieces and the rules of the game than it does the properties of the pieces. The continuity of the self is the continuity of a dynamic pattern in time.

Also, when a neuron isn't undergoing an action potential or exocytosis of neurotransmitters, it's doing numerous other functional activities.

 

[Lost until Found]

When I was young I happened upon the idea that everything could be a lie. Our memory, body and senses can all be fabricated a second before we come into existence.

Have you ever considered: what/who could've created the fabrication?

 

[Jesse]

Of course. But I immediately thought up of so much things and no way of knowing that it became moot.

 

[Pbuoy]

Is my avatar starting to make sense?

You're avatar is a picture of Joe Pantoliano aka Cypher. The guy from the Matrix correct?
I don't know how in the hell I knew that if I was right.

There is no spoon! Unless I think there is ?

 

[DaDaMan]

self awareness for me is about being aware\concious of the unconcious\instinctual motivations behind our actions and thoughts

 

[Cognisant]

Gir ftw!