I think the nasty part of the Hard Problem of Consciousness is probably in finding a naturalistic explanation for how things come seem subjectively objective: for why the wavelength of red feels from the inside like a built-in quality of the world rather than a perception generated by a mind in response to a stimulus. I think the “social processing theory of consciousness” doesn’t quite explain this, at least not to my satisfaction.
Of course, the random thoughts I record in Open Thread are not liable to be high-quality.
for why the wavelength of red feels from the inside like a built-in quality of the world rather than a perception generated by a mind in response to a stimulus.
For any agent, self-reflection has to bottom out somewhere, since working memory and cognitive capacity are finite.
That said, some meditation practitioners report being able to notice “the arising and passing away” of individual sensations, so it may be that this is just a matter of training rather than an essential feature of consciousness.
for why the wavelength of red feels from the inside like a built-in quality of the world rather than a perception generated by a mind in response to a stimulus
That insight would be an additional layer of processing requiring energy that could be used for other things. How would such an insight increase the brain’s reproductive success? We don’t have insight to our outputs either, you don’t intuitively understand how your muscles work in response to stimuli, which is part of the reason why it feels like we have free will and are agents in the world instead of parts of the world.
The true quality of stimuli is already lost and grossly simplified at receptor level, in the case of light the photoreceptive rod and cone cells of the retina.
I think the nasty part of the Hard Problem of Consciousness is probably in finding a naturalistic explanation for how things come seem subjectively objective: for why the wavelength of red feels from the inside like a built-in quality of the world rather than a perception generated by a mind in response to a stimulus. I think the “social processing theory of consciousness” doesn’t quite explain this, at least not to my satisfaction.
Of course, the random thoughts I record in Open Thread are not liable to be high-quality.
For any agent, self-reflection has to bottom out somewhere, since working memory and cognitive capacity are finite.
That said, some meditation practitioners report being able to notice “the arising and passing away” of individual sensations, so it may be that this is just a matter of training rather than an essential feature of consciousness.
That insight would be an additional layer of processing requiring energy that could be used for other things. How would such an insight increase the brain’s reproductive success? We don’t have insight to our outputs either, you don’t intuitively understand how your muscles work in response to stimuli, which is part of the reason why it feels like we have free will and are agents in the world instead of parts of the world.
The true quality of stimuli is already lost and grossly simplified at receptor level, in the case of light the photoreceptive rod and cone cells of the retina.