[FRIAM] Is consciousness a mystery? (used to be "mystery...deeper".T

[Prof David West]

I'm not  sure dusty Dusty was expressing 'love'—she seemed to be finding some sense of security and protection from the thunder and lightning. She was 'taking' something from me of value to her, not 'giving' something to me.

BTW, I do not believe that humans are egoistically, individually, and idiosyncratically 'conscious'. I do believe in **Consciousness***, *but that is an entirely different topic.

davew


On Tue, Jul 9, 2024, at 5:37 PM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:
> Frank
> 
> What you laid out is an abduction,,isn't it?;  I don[t think I am doing that in either of my syllogisms.  But I am no logician;
> 
> An induction is a valid inference, although a probabilistic one, at least on Peirce's account.
> 
> David,
> 
> If humans are conscious, I am pretty sure that animals are conscious, .
> 
> I am just not sure that humans are conscious.
> 
> I am not sure why the fact that your dog loves you, implies its consciousness.  George agrees with you that things like love are signs of consciousness, but he could never explain why. 
> 
> Eric,
> 
> Yes, I am pretty sure I am a worthless piece of Baconian Behaviorist Crap.  Stipulated.  Still, I like your questions.  So,  do you see any way of proceeding to develop those question in a such a way that we are roughly on the same page as we go?  If you do, I would love your help, here. 
> 
> All, 
> 
> Sorry, it is hot, here,  and I am cranky.  I resent you all sitting in your air-conditioned offices being paid huge sums of money to be cool.  I just thought it might be nice to have a conversation about consciousness in which everybody is not sitting in front of their own hut shouting.  Happy to abide by any method that isn-t like an explosion in a concept shop. 
> 
> Nick
> 
> Nick
> 
> 
> 
> On Tue, Jul 9, 2024 at 5:00 PM Frank Wimberly <wimberly3 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Nick, That is not a valid syllogism.  
>> 
>> All X have Y
>> x has Y
>> Therefore x is an X
>> 
>> Is that a correct formalization of what you said?
>> 
>> ---
>> Frank C. Wimberly
>> 140 Calle Ojo Feliz, 
>> Santa Fe, NM 87505
>> 
>> 505 670-9918
>> Santa Fe, NM
>> 
>> On Tue, Jul 9, 2024, 1:54 PM Nicholas Thompson <thompnickson2 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> While I find all the  ancillary considerations raised on the original thread extremely interesting,  I would like to reopen the discussion of Conscious as a Mystery and ask that those that join it stay close to the question of what consciousness is and how we know it when we see it.  Baby Steps.  
>>> 
>>> Where were we?   I think I was asking Jochen, and perhaps Peitr and anybody else who thought that animals were not conscious (i.e., not aware of their own awareness)  what basis they had in experience for thinking that..  One offering for such an experience is the absence of language in animals.  Because my cat cannot  describe his experience in words, he cannot be  conscious.  This requires the following syllogism:
>>> 
>>> Nothing that does not employ a language (or two?) is conscious.
>>> Animals (with ;the possible exception of signing apes) do not employ languages.
>>> Ergo, Animals are not conscious. 
>>> 
>>> But I was trying to find out the basis for the first premise.  How do we know that there are no non-linguistic beings that are not conscious.  I hope we could rule out the answer,"because they are non-linguistic",  both in its strictly  tautological or merely circular form. 
>>> 
>>> There is a closely related syllogism which we also need to explore:
>>> 
>>> All language using beings are conscious.
>>> George Peter Tremblay IV is a language-using being.
>>> George Peter Tremblay IV is conscious. 
>>> 
>>> Both are valid syllogisms.  But where do the premises come from.
>>> 
>>> Nick
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