I hope you'll be discussing more on this. As a once reluctant but now sanguine non-physicalist I'd enjoy your explorations. I'm brewing something on the topic too.
Perhaps a fruitful playspace for you might be where these questions intersect with moral principles.
>2 There are not borderline cases where there is no fact about whether something is conscious or not.
Assuming dualism: you have your qualia/subjective character on the one hand, and your cognitive neuropsychological systems on the other. If your qualia never communicated with your cognitive systems, your physical self would never report that you're conscious. If your cognitive systems never communicated with your qualia, your subjective self would never experience anything.
Assume that your qualia are completely epiphenomenal (your cognitive systems communicate with your qualia but never receive any feedback from your qualia). Then your physical self will never know it is qualitatively conscious. Now start letting the qualia filter through the physical-nonphysical barrier - various cognitive structures will start to become excited, but most of this will be in the form of unconscious priming, not global broadcast/awareness. Eventually, once the barrier is completely stripped away, global broadcast of the qualitative info leaking in will occur .
Now, when did your brain gain the ability to report on its own qualitative consciousness? It can't have been at the first leakage of qualitative info because (by stipulation) this would not have activated global reporting in the brain. (Again, priming seems to be an established empirically tested psychological phenomenon that physically demonstrates this possibility). Your brain could definitely report on its own qualitative consciousness once there was complete unrestricted interactionist dualism taking place. But where's the cutoff point? Somewhere in the middle, somewhere vague it seems.
1. Vagueness is not a property of physicalism. Just because there is no gray area where my laptop is between being off and on doesn’t mean some non-physical essence explains the workings of my laptop.
2. Consciousness is not physical, it’s an experience. Just because I cannot see sound doesn’t mean some non-physical essence explains sound. However, consciousness “arises” from something physical. And these neural correlates of consciousness are publicly observable.
I hope you'll be discussing more on this. As a once reluctant but now sanguine non-physicalist I'd enjoy your explorations. I'm brewing something on the topic too.
Perhaps a fruitful playspace for you might be where these questions intersect with moral principles.
Anyway, keep going 👍
Imo this is one of your most doubtful opinions, borderline cases seem obvious and intuitive. Although I do need to read a lot more.
>The vagueness argument
>2 There are not borderline cases where there is no fact about whether something is conscious or not.
Assuming dualism: you have your qualia/subjective character on the one hand, and your cognitive neuropsychological systems on the other. If your qualia never communicated with your cognitive systems, your physical self would never report that you're conscious. If your cognitive systems never communicated with your qualia, your subjective self would never experience anything.
Assume that your qualia are completely epiphenomenal (your cognitive systems communicate with your qualia but never receive any feedback from your qualia). Then your physical self will never know it is qualitatively conscious. Now start letting the qualia filter through the physical-nonphysical barrier - various cognitive structures will start to become excited, but most of this will be in the form of unconscious priming, not global broadcast/awareness. Eventually, once the barrier is completely stripped away, global broadcast of the qualitative info leaking in will occur .
Now, when did your brain gain the ability to report on its own qualitative consciousness? It can't have been at the first leakage of qualitative info because (by stipulation) this would not have activated global reporting in the brain. (Again, priming seems to be an established empirically tested psychological phenomenon that physically demonstrates this possibility). Your brain could definitely report on its own qualitative consciousness once there was complete unrestricted interactionist dualism taking place. But where's the cutoff point? Somewhere in the middle, somewhere vague it seems.
1. Vagueness is not a property of physicalism. Just because there is no gray area where my laptop is between being off and on doesn’t mean some non-physical essence explains the workings of my laptop.
2. Consciousness is not physical, it’s an experience. Just because I cannot see sound doesn’t mean some non-physical essence explains sound. However, consciousness “arises” from something physical. And these neural correlates of consciousness are publicly observable.
> There are not borderline cases where there is no fact about whether something is conscious or not.
One can experience semi consciousness waking up and falling asleep.