The problem of color is the problem of anthropomorphism.
In reductionist materialism, the “qualia” and “experience” of color is merely an internally-consistent, self-reinforcing creation of the animal brain that assigned specific neural values to specific inputs sent by specific cells that react to specific light wavelengths in some reality-entangled manner.
In this philosophy, we only perceive “color” as a “special experience” because we do not realize that the same is true for all of our senses, and that the same would be true of any other physically-possible “sense”, and that some new incredible “qualia” would be literally created (gasp, you sinful blasphemer!) if we artificially created a new “sense” through modification of the human brain.
In summary: The “magical yellowness” qualia of yellow that feels like it can’t possibly be merely information is actually created by your brain. It is “real” in that without this the yellowness would merely be knowledge of wavelengths, not yellowness-experience, but it is still created wholepiece by the brain, not by some light shiny from outside the universe.
In addition, this hypothesis is definitely testable. I made a claim above. Create a new sensory input / type of stimuli, and we will perceive a “new” qualia that was never perceived before, just like colorblind people that have never seen color and don’t have any idea what you’re talking about who would suddenly be able to see colors.
Edit: I would stake out further and go so far as to claim, though this is not an easy hypothesis to test and falsify by any stretch and might not even be doable within my natural lifetime, that there is a tangible explanation for the particular properties (this is a magiclike unknown-explanation stopsign) of the experiences of our senses—of why sound feels and is experienced the way it does and is, why colors feel and are experienced the way they do and are. I would also posit a correlation between the feeling and the qualia-seeming experiences. All of this to posit the hypothesis that we could not only create new qualia, but even create new qualia with specific “kinds” of experience-qualia-ness, like creating a new sense that both feels and is experienced somewhere in-between colors and the 400hz sound in the n-space of “qualia”.
In addition, this hypothesis is definitely testable. I made a claim above. Create a new sensory input / type of stimuli, and we will perceive a “new” qualia that was never perceived before, just like colorblind people that have never seen color and don’t have any idea what you’re talking about who would suddenly be able to see colors.
There have been cases of people blind from birth who, by some medical treatment were enabled to see. No references to hand, but Oliver Sacks probably writes about this somewhere. They clearly get new qualia, which are moreover clearly different from those who were sighted from birth.
I thought to use this too, but I was once or twice given the argument that blind people who are made to see are only “accessing” a Given-By-External-Power-To-Humans-At-Birth qualia from outside reality—the argument Eliezer tried to take down in the metaethics sequence about morality being “a light shining from outside” that humans just happen to find and match, applied to qualia. It’s a very good stopsign and/or FGC, apparently.
Because of this, I looked for a more definitive test that these philosophies—those that would discard “creating” sight as a valid new qualia—do not predict (and arguably, cannot, in terms of probability mass, if they want to remain coherent).
I thought to use this too, but I was once or twice given the argument that blind people who are made to see are only “accessing” a Given-By-External-Power-To-Humans-At-Birth qualia from outside reality
Surely that argument is refuted by the fact that the newly sighted do not receive the same qualia as the always-sighted? Instead, they get pretty much the experiences you might predict given what we know about the importance of early experience for the developing faculties: confusion overcome only imperfectly and with difficulty, and with assistance from their more developed senses.
The idea that they received something at birth that they have difficulty accessing has the same problem as the idea that the brain is merely a physical interface through which the soul interacts with the world: all the data are just as consistent with the simpler hypothesis that the brain is the whole story. (That includes the data that there are experiences, which is a difficulty for both materialism, and materialism with the magic word “soul” added.)
Surely that argument is refuted by the fact that the newly sighted do not receive the same qualia as the always-sighted?
Yes, it is, when you accept the evidence you’ve given as valid and can weight arguments based on their probability logic. Denial mechanisms in place will usually prevent proponents of the argument from recognizing the refutation as a valid one. Lots of difficult argumentation and untangling of webs of rationalizations ensues (and arguing by the Occam’s Razor route is even less practical, because in their model, their hypotheses of soul or outer-light or what-have-you is simpler when other parts of their model of the whole world are taken into account, which means even more knots to untangle).
I seek to circumvent that debate entirely by putting the burden of proof on my own “side”, for several reasons, some of which are tinted a slight shade of gray closer to the Dark Arts than I would like.
(That includes the data that there are experiences, which is a difficulty for both materialism, and materialism with the magic word “soul” added.)
I dont’t think this is correct. The phenomenology of subjective exprience suggests that such experiences should be “simple” in a sense—sort of like a bundle of tiny little XML tags attached to the brain. Of course, this is not to argue that our brain parts literally have tiny little XML tags attached to them, any more than other complex objects do. But it does suggest that they might be causally connected to some other, physically simpler phenomena.
In this philosophy, we only perceive “color” as a “special experience” because we do not realize that the same is true for all of our senses
Indeed, all of our senses, by definition, have qualia, and colour is just a particularly striking example. It is interesting, though, to note that not all brain tissue produces qualia: the cerebellum operates without them. Our motor control (what the cerebellum primarily does) proceeds without qualia—we have almost no awareness of what we are doing with individual muscles. This is why all forms of teaching people how to move, whether physiotherapy, dance training, martial arts, sports, and so on, make a lot of use of indirect visualisation to produce the desired results. (These can easily be mistaken, sometimes by the teachers themselves, for literal descriptions, e.g. of “chi” or “energy”.) Golfers are taught to “follow through”, even though nothing that happens after the moment of impact can have any effect on the ball. It is the intention to follow through that changes how the club is swung, and how it impacts the ball, in a way that could not be achieved by any more direct instruction.
In this philosophy, we only perceive “color” as a “special experience” because we do not realize that the same is true for all of our senses
Ye-e-e-s, but the standard qualiaphilic take is that all the other sense are problematic as well. You think you are levelling
down, but you are levelling up.
In addition, this hypothesis is definitely testable. I made a claim above. Create a new sensory input / type of stimuli, and we will perceive a “new” qualia that was never perceived before,
That isn’t a test of reductionism, etc, since many of the alternatives make the same prediction. For instance, David Chalmer’s theory that qualia are non-physical properties that supervene on the physical properties of the brain.
That isn’t a test of reductionism, etc, since many of the alternatives make the same prediction. For instance, David Chalmer’s theory that qualia are non-physical properties that supervene on the physical properties of the brain.
True, it isn’t a particularly specific test that supports all the common views of most LW users. That is not its intended purpose.
The purpose is to establish that “qualia” are not ontologically basic building blocks of the universe sprung into existence alongside up-quarks and charmings for the express purpose of allowing some specific subset of possible complex causal systems to have more stuff that sets them apart from other complex causal systems, just because the former are able to causally build abstract model of parts of their own system and would have internal causal patterns abstractly modeled as “negative reinforcement” that they causally attempt to avoid being fired if these aforementioned “qualia” building blocks didn’t set them apart from the latter kind of complex systems...
… but I guess it does sound kind of obviously silly when you phrase it from a reductionist perspective.
The purpose is to establish that “qualia” are not ontologically basic building blocks of the universe sprung into existence alongside up-quarks and charmings for the express purpose of allowing some specific subset of possible complex causal systems to have more stuff that sets them apart from other complex causal systems,
But it doesn’t. It just establishes that if they, they covary with physical states in the way that would be expected
from identity theory. Admitedly it seems redundant to have a non physical extra ingredient that nonetheless
just shadows what brains are doing physicallly. I think that’s a flaw in Chalmers’ theory. But its conceptual,
not empirical.
“It just establishes that if they exist, they covary with physical states in the way that would be expected from identity theory.”
But thats not the whole problem. It establishes they covary with physical states in the way that would be expected from identity theory, and Chalmerserian dualism, and a bunch of other theories (but maybe not
Cartesian dualism).
Tests need to distinguish between theories, and yours doesn’t.
The purpose is to establish that “qualia” are not ontologically basic building blocks of the universe sprung into existence alongside up-quarks and charmings
Since qualia describe an event (in a sense), I think that if they’re ever found to have measurable existence, they’ll not be so much what a gluon is to “top-quark”, but more something like what division is to the real numbers...
That is exactly—if I interpret your comment charitably—what my hypothesis concludes and what I want to test with the proposed experiment in the grand-grand-parent.
Is there a short explanation of why I ought to reject an analogous theory that algorithms are non-physical properties that supervene on the physical properties of systems that implement those algorithms?
Or, actually, backing up… ought I reject such a theory, from Chalmer et al’s perspective? Or is “1+1=2” a nonphysical property of certain systems (say, two individual apples placed alongside each other) in the same sense that “red” is?
Is there a short explanation of why I ought to reject an analogous theory that algorithms are non-physical properties that supervene on the physical properties of systems that implement those algorithms?
Yes: algorithms are entirely predictable from, and understandable in terms of, their physical realisations.
Yes: algorithms are entirely predictable from, and understandable in terms of, their physical realisations.
Now I’m confused: what you just said is a description of a ‘supervenient’ relation. Are you saying that anytime X is said to supervene on Y, we should reject the theory which features X’s?
No. Supervence is an ontologically neutral relationship. In Chalmer’s theory, qualia supervene on brain states,
so novel brain states will lead to novvel qualia. In identity theory, qualia superven on brain states, so ditto. So
the Novel Qualia test does not distinguish the one from the other. The argument for qualia being non-physical
properties, as opposed to algorithms, is down to their redubility, or lack thereof, not supervenience.
Yes: algorithms are entirely predictable from, and understandable in terms of, their physical realisations.
This is not really true, at least without adding some pretty restrictive conditions. By using “joke interpretations”, as pointed out by Searle and Putnam, one could assert that a huge number of “algorithms” supervene on any large-enough physical object.
I mean, sure, the fact that a circuit implementing the algorithm “1+1=2” returns “2″ given the instruction to execute “1+1” is entirely predictable, much as the fact that a mouse conditioned to avoid red will avoid a red room is predictable. Absolutely agreed.
But as I understand the idea of qualia, the claim is that the mouse’s predictable behavior with respect to a red room (and the neural activity that gives rise to it) is not a complete description of what’s going on… there is also the mouse’s experience of red, which is an entirely separate, nonphysical, fact about the event, which cannot be explained by current physics even in principle. (Or maybe it turns out mice don’t have an experience of red, but humans certainly do, or at least I certainly do.) Right?
Which, OK. But I also have the experience of seeing two things, just like I have the experience of seeing a red thing. On what basis do I justify the claim that that experience is completely described by a description of the physical system that calculates “2”? How do I know that my experience of 2 isn’t an entirely separate nonphysical fact about the event which cannot be explained by current physics even in principle?
The problem of color is the problem of anthropomorphism.
In reductionist materialism, the “qualia” and “experience” of color is merely an internally-consistent, self-reinforcing creation of the animal brain that assigned specific neural values to specific inputs sent by specific cells that react to specific light wavelengths in some reality-entangled manner.
In this philosophy, we only perceive “color” as a “special experience” because we do not realize that the same is true for all of our senses, and that the same would be true of any other physically-possible “sense”, and that some new incredible “qualia” would be literally created (gasp, you sinful blasphemer!) if we artificially created a new “sense” through modification of the human brain.
In summary: The “magical yellowness” qualia of yellow that feels like it can’t possibly be merely information is actually created by your brain. It is “real” in that without this the yellowness would merely be knowledge of wavelengths, not yellowness-experience, but it is still created wholepiece by the brain, not by some light shiny from outside the universe.
In addition, this hypothesis is definitely testable. I made a claim above. Create a new sensory input / type of stimuli, and we will perceive a “new” qualia that was never perceived before, just like colorblind people that have never seen color and don’t have any idea what you’re talking about who would suddenly be able to see colors.
Edit: I would stake out further and go so far as to claim, though this is not an easy hypothesis to test and falsify by any stretch and might not even be doable within my natural lifetime, that there is a tangible explanation for the particular properties (this is a magiclike unknown-explanation stopsign) of the experiences of our senses—of why sound feels and is experienced the way it does and is, why colors feel and are experienced the way they do and are. I would also posit a correlation between the feeling and the qualia-seeming experiences. All of this to posit the hypothesis that we could not only create new qualia, but even create new qualia with specific “kinds” of experience-qualia-ness, like creating a new sense that both feels and is experienced somewhere in-between colors and the 400hz sound in the n-space of “qualia”.
There have been cases of people blind from birth who, by some medical treatment were enabled to see. No references to hand, but Oliver Sacks probably writes about this somewhere. They clearly get new qualia, which are moreover clearly different from those who were sighted from birth.
ETA: Wikipedia article on recovery from blindness.
I thought to use this too, but I was once or twice given the argument that blind people who are made to see are only “accessing” a Given-By-External-Power-To-Humans-At-Birth qualia from outside reality—the argument Eliezer tried to take down in the metaethics sequence about morality being “a light shining from outside” that humans just happen to find and match, applied to qualia. It’s a very good stopsign and/or FGC, apparently.
Because of this, I looked for a more definitive test that these philosophies—those that would discard “creating” sight as a valid new qualia—do not predict (and arguably, cannot, in terms of probability mass, if they want to remain coherent).
Surely that argument is refuted by the fact that the newly sighted do not receive the same qualia as the always-sighted? Instead, they get pretty much the experiences you might predict given what we know about the importance of early experience for the developing faculties: confusion overcome only imperfectly and with difficulty, and with assistance from their more developed senses.
The idea that they received something at birth that they have difficulty accessing has the same problem as the idea that the brain is merely a physical interface through which the soul interacts with the world: all the data are just as consistent with the simpler hypothesis that the brain is the whole story. (That includes the data that there are experiences, which is a difficulty for both materialism, and materialism with the magic word “soul” added.)
Yes, it is, when you accept the evidence you’ve given as valid and can weight arguments based on their probability logic. Denial mechanisms in place will usually prevent proponents of the argument from recognizing the refutation as a valid one. Lots of difficult argumentation and untangling of webs of rationalizations ensues (and arguing by the Occam’s Razor route is even less practical, because in their model, their hypotheses of soul or outer-light or what-have-you is simpler when other parts of their model of the whole world are taken into account, which means even more knots to untangle).
I seek to circumvent that debate entirely by putting the burden of proof on my own “side”, for several reasons, some of which are tinted a slight shade of gray closer to the Dark Arts than I would like.
I dont’t think this is correct. The phenomenology of subjective exprience suggests that such experiences should be “simple” in a sense—sort of like a bundle of tiny little XML tags attached to the brain. Of course, this is not to argue that our brain parts literally have tiny little XML tags attached to them, any more than other complex objects do. But it does suggest that they might be causally connected to some other, physically simpler phenomena.
Indeed, all of our senses, by definition, have qualia, and colour is just a particularly striking example. It is interesting, though, to note that not all brain tissue produces qualia: the cerebellum operates without them. Our motor control (what the cerebellum primarily does) proceeds without qualia—we have almost no awareness of what we are doing with individual muscles. This is why all forms of teaching people how to move, whether physiotherapy, dance training, martial arts, sports, and so on, make a lot of use of indirect visualisation to produce the desired results. (These can easily be mistaken, sometimes by the teachers themselves, for literal descriptions, e.g. of “chi” or “energy”.) Golfers are taught to “follow through”, even though nothing that happens after the moment of impact can have any effect on the ball. It is the intention to follow through that changes how the club is swung, and how it impacts the ball, in a way that could not be achieved by any more direct instruction.
Ye-e-e-s, but the standard qualiaphilic take is that all the other sense are problematic as well. You think you are levelling down, but you are levelling up.
That isn’t a test of reductionism, etc, since many of the alternatives make the same prediction. For instance, David Chalmer’s theory that qualia are non-physical properties that supervene on the physical properties of the brain.
True, it isn’t a particularly specific test that supports all the common views of most LW users. That is not its intended purpose.
The purpose is to establish that “qualia” are not ontologically basic building blocks of the universe sprung into existence alongside up-quarks and charmings for the express purpose of allowing some specific subset of possible complex causal systems to have more stuff that sets them apart from other complex causal systems, just because the former are able to causally build abstract model of parts of their own system and would have internal causal patterns abstractly modeled as “negative reinforcement” that they causally attempt to avoid being fired if these aforementioned “qualia” building blocks didn’t set them apart from the latter kind of complex systems...
… but I guess it does sound kind of obviously silly when you phrase it from a reductionist perspective.
But it doesn’t. It just establishes that if they, they covary with physical states in the way that would be expected from identity theory. Admitedly it seems redundant to have a non physical extra ingredient that nonetheless just shadows what brains are doing physicallly. I think that’s a flaw in Chalmers’ theory. But its conceptual, not empirical.
I… err… what? My mastery of the English language is insufficient to compute the meaning of the I-assume-is-a sentence above.
I meant
“It just establishes that if they exist, they covary with physical states in the way that would be expected from identity theory.”
But thats not the whole problem. It establishes they covary with physical states in the way that would be expected from identity theory, and Chalmerserian dualism, and a bunch of other theories (but maybe not Cartesian dualism).
Tests need to distinguish between theories, and yours doesn’t.
Hmm. I thought it did. I guess I need to review a few things.
Since qualia describe an event (in a sense), I think that if they’re ever found to have measurable existence, they’ll not be so much what a gluon is to “top-quark”, but more something like what division is to the real numbers...
That is exactly—if I interpret your comment charitably—what my hypothesis concludes and what I want to test with the proposed experiment in the grand-grand-parent.
Is there a short explanation of why I ought to reject an analogous theory that algorithms are non-physical properties that supervene on the physical properties of systems that implement those algorithms?
Or, actually, backing up… ought I reject such a theory, from Chalmer et al’s perspective? Or is “1+1=2” a nonphysical property of certain systems (say, two individual apples placed alongside each other) in the same sense that “red” is?
Yes: algorithms are entirely predictable from, and understandable in terms of, their physical realisations.
Now I’m confused: what you just said is a description of a ‘supervenient’ relation. Are you saying that anytime X is said to supervene on Y, we should reject the theory which features X’s?
No. Supervence is an ontologically neutral relationship. In Chalmer’s theory, qualia supervene on brain states, so novel brain states will lead to novvel qualia. In identity theory, qualia superven on brain states, so ditto. So the Novel Qualia test does not distinguish the one from the other. The argument for qualia being non-physical properties, as opposed to algorithms, is down to their redubility, or lack thereof, not supervenience.
This is not really true, at least without adding some pretty restrictive conditions. By using “joke interpretations”, as pointed out by Searle and Putnam, one could assert that a huge number of “algorithms” supervene on any large-enough physical object.
Are they?
I mean, sure, the fact that a circuit implementing the algorithm “1+1=2” returns “2″ given the instruction to execute “1+1” is entirely predictable, much as the fact that a mouse conditioned to avoid red will avoid a red room is predictable. Absolutely agreed.
But as I understand the idea of qualia, the claim is that the mouse’s predictable behavior with respect to a red room (and the neural activity that gives rise to it) is not a complete description of what’s going on… there is also the mouse’s experience of red, which is an entirely separate, nonphysical, fact about the event, which cannot be explained by current physics even in principle. (Or maybe it turns out mice don’t have an experience of red, but humans certainly do, or at least I certainly do.) Right?
Which, OK. But I also have the experience of seeing two things, just like I have the experience of seeing a red thing. On what basis do I justify the claim that that experience is completely described by a description of the physical system that calculates “2”? How do I know that my experience of 2 isn’t an entirely separate nonphysical fact about the event which cannot be explained by current physics even in principle?