uaeaaie's recent activity
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Comment on Why anime is on the rise even though the industry is so poor in ~anime
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Comment on There is no ‘hard problem of consciousness’ in ~humanities
uaeaaie Link ParentHow trustworthy a proposed methods would be will hinge on how accurate the conclusion we could draw from it, right? Did Newton's definition of mass fully capture the true essence of matter? Most...How trustworthy a proposed methods would be will hinge on how accurate the conclusion we could draw from it, right? Did Newton's definition of mass fully capture the true essence of matter? Most certainly not, it captured one aspect that's measureable. Did it actually describe anything real at all or was it nothing more than mathematical fiction? Well the mathematical fiction worked well enough for long enough that we're no longer bothered by thinking of mass as he conceptualized it as a "real" property.
People are welcomed to be sceptical (it's worth mentioning that his theory was questioned on philosophical grounds at the time as well). Maybe eventually someone else would propose a better theory with different assumptions and we could all move to adopt it as well. But no theory was ever without assumptions, and evidence, if observable, is necessarily indirect. If we hold to the standard that any such theories are not worth considering, then the entire scientific pursuit is pointless. Which, sure, maybe that's why science and philosophy are separate departments I guess.
If the only answer we're ever allowed to arrive at is that it's impossible to answer, then what's the point? Should we just close shop and go home? Maybe proponents of the hard problem can start suggesting what they think an answer to their question could look like if they actually want an answer here. Because if they really believe a true answer is impossible, then they should accept that approximate answers are all we'd ever get.
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Comment on There is no ‘hard problem of consciousness’ in ~humanities
uaeaaie Link ParentYep. There was no reason to revisit until there was reason to (discovery of constant light speed). And that's how it will continue to be, a theory works well enough for long enough that we'd...Yep. There was no reason to revisit until there was reason to (discovery of constant light speed). And that's how it will continue to be, a theory works well enough for long enough that we'd assume it as true, until new evidence comes that requires a new theory, which with enough time we'd then accept as more true, and the cycle repeats.
Of course no theories were or will ever be "true" and the underlying philosophical question always remain. Trying to find "the" solution (not just for nature of reality but also consciousness and other philosophical questions of similar kinds) is a fool's errand but that's why it's worthwhile. Of course the solution is impossible to find but imo that isn't the point, the useful theories we develop in our attempts to find it is.
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Comment on There is no ‘hard problem of consciousness’ in ~humanities
uaeaaie (edited )Link ParentAll physics started out as metaphysics. We take it for granted but concepts like force or mass, at least in the way we currently understood them, were pretty much invented by Newton. If you think...All physics started out as metaphysics. We take it for granted but concepts like force or mass, at least in the way we currently understood them, were pretty much invented by Newton. If you think about it, the only actually physical phenomena that could be measured were duration and distance. Mass as an inherent property of matter cannot be "directly" observed, only indirectly through its effect on changes in motion. Yet we feel confortable considering it as good as real without worrying about any explanatory gap.
The p-zombies equivalent would be like asking to imagine there being an object with no mass but still behaving in accordance to Newton's laws.
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Comment on There is no ‘hard problem of consciousness’ in ~humanities
uaeaaie Link ParentIt's amazing that you managed to convey pretty much all the points I wanted to make with way fewer words! I need better self-control hahaIt's amazing that you managed to convey pretty much all the points I wanted to make with way fewer words! I need better self-control haha
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Comment on There is no ‘hard problem of consciousness’ in ~humanities
uaeaaie Link ParentSide comment here, let me know if I'm violating any norms of the community. A few responses in this thread feels teetering on personal attack and I'm a bit uncomfortable with that. If the idea is...Side comment here, let me know if I'm violating any norms of the community. A few responses in this thread feels teetering on personal attack and I'm a bit uncomfortable with that. If the idea is weak, please attack the idea directly and not the people who voiced the idea.
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Comment on There is no ‘hard problem of consciousness’ in ~humanities
uaeaaie Link ParentSure we can! By investigating what processes give rise to entities that behave in ways we associate it being conscious, which we can observe. One may object that this is just answering the easy...But how can we ever truly discover what specific physical processes give rise to consciousness when we cannot directly observe it?
Sure we can! By investigating what processes give rise to entities that behave in ways we associate it being conscious, which we can observe. One may object that this is just answering the easy problem of consciouness, and that the hard version is different and then still unsolved, which I agree! The trick is that, I'd argue, as we learn to answer the easy problem with ever more substantial details, accuracy and predictive power, its distinction to the hard problem would get less clear over time, and eventually we would no longer mind their difference as much (some may even mistaken it as solved). In fact, that's how we human has come to terms with other similar philosophical questions in the past.
What is matter made of? One theory suggested that matters are made of smaller bits of matter. Philosophically, this theory is particularly weak because anyone could then ask what those smaller bits of matter are made of, and what of those bits, etc. The theory either just pushes the can down the road, or requires an infinite hierachy of buidling blocks to account for what appears to be a finite object (seems like a paradox). Yet that's what physics later suggests to be the case. We observed point-like entities inside material with measurable properties like mass and charge, and that in the space between these "atom" there seem to be nothing. Then we found out those atoms are made of smaller particles still. So now we more or less take the atomic theory as a given. Notice how the original rebuttal to the atomic theory still hold, we don't have an definitive explanation of whether the smallest particles that we currently know of (quarks) are truly fundamental or themselves made of smaller bits still. If you subscribe to the idea that the entire universe is one giant wave function, you might even be tempted to say that the atomic theory is incorrect! But as far as general understanding is concerned, atomic theory is good enough.
What is life? How can we distinguish between something being truly alive vs an inanimate objects that merely move and act like living creatures, is there a "life force" behind it all? Well we still don't know what the true 'essence' of life is, but we discovered that life as we know it are almonst always made of these self-replicating units comprised of DNA, phospholipids, proteins, etc. So we created a definition based on what we know of how these units behave. Notice that outside of biology, the question is still very much open. Is it possible that there's alien life out there that are made of entirely different ingredients and follow entirely different rules? Certainly, but we won't know until we have first contact so that'll have to do for now.
Where did human come from? It's such a nagging question that pretty much every societies in history have come up with a myth of creation of their own. Then Darwin came along and now we more or less accepted that human evolved from an earlier species of primate. Of course this answer did not fully resolve the "true essence" of the question, which now becomes 'how did the first life form evolve'. The fact that evolution theory could not provide an answer to this question is a point theists can often make. But the theory works well enough for the rest of biology so the question, while still open, doesn't feel as existential as before and is relegated to merely another research topics.
What's the origin of the universe? This one is still a bit existential to me personally but I think you get the point.
Back to the article, color perception is the typical example for this topic. How can we ever know if 2 people's experiences of color are the same, since all they have access to are each other's discription? Well, we may never know if they can truly be the same, but we sure can know when they're different! We know about color-blind people, how color perception works biologically, how to design tests to distinguish people with color-blindness vs those without. The subject is now a bit less mysterious. People could run the test on themselves if they want to interrogate their internal experiences for a bit.
Take "Mary's room" as another color example, suppose a person is only allowed to see black-and-white for their entire existence growing up, if that person is then let to observe red apple for the first time, what would be their experience? The wiki page for this thought experiment has an interesting section mentioning actual colorblind people (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_argument#The_neural_basis_of_qualia). I'll quote it here:
We believe we've learned the answer from a colorblind synesthete subject. Much like the theoretical Mary, our colorblind synesthete volunteer cannot see certain hues, because of deficient color receptors. However, when he looks at numbers, his synesthesia enables him to experience colors in his mind that he has never seen in the real world. He calls these "Martian colors". The fact that color cells (and corresponding colors) can activate in his brain helps us answer the philosophical question: we suggest that the same thing will happen to Mary [She has the "Wow!" response from subjectively experiencing the color for the first time.]
Of course that's not enough to say qualia exists, but that sure is an interesting example of someone reacting in a way we'd expect people having qualia to react. As the author themselves pointed out:
they note that "this still doesn't explain why these particular events are qualia laden and others are not (Chalmers' "hard problem") but at least it narrows the scope of the problem"
I believe as we learn more about the color experiences, there'd come a point where we could describe most of the phenomena that we needed the concept of qualia to explain, then we'd no longer need to ask what "really" is qualia anymore. The way we no longer need the concept of "ether" to explain behavior of light (though that does not necessarily mean what "ether" was meant to represent is no longer real, we could argue that its role was just taken over by "the fabric of spacetime").
And I believe a similar process would go for our understanding of consciouness as well. The article touched on what I think a probable theory of consciouness could look like, instead of trying to find the difference between subjective and objective experiences directly, we could be one-step-removed and study "the same brain phenomenon as experienced by that same brain itself, or by another". Once we have a sufficiently robust framework to describe most scientifically-relevant consciousness-related phenomena (the easy problem), the question of what consciouness truly is would become less salient. We likely won't ever be able to give a definitive reason why the distinction between subjective and objective experiences exists, but it's useful enough if most observable phemomena involving experiences, be it subjective or objective, could be accounted for by our theory. And then we move forward to whatever the next frontier would be.
Of course even if it's possible, reaching that stage of understanding could still be monumentally difficult. We speculate about atoms for probably nearly thousand years before our scientific progress reach the point where we could detect it. It may be the case that we won't be able to improve on our understanding of consciousness before we come into contact with another "believably conscious" entities to compare. Someone else had post about how no one truly knows and everything is fog, and I do agree how that'll likely be the state of things for a while. I just think it's possible to get to a point where we'd know enough to feel comfortable and the problem'd no longer appear so mystical.
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Comment on There is no ‘hard problem of consciousness’ in ~humanities
uaeaaie Link--Chalmers claims that experience cannot be accounted for by science. But scientific understanding is not extraneous to experience; it is entirely about experience. [...] It is misleading to see science, as often naively portrayed, as a direct account of an absolute and objective world, observed and described from its outside. If we think in this manner, we introduce dualism. No surprise, then, that we find dualism down the road: an irreducible gap between subject and object of knowledge. We have introduced it upfront.
Experience is not over and above the processes that happen in the brain, as Chalmers assumed upfront. The dualism between a first-person description of experience and a third-person (or scientific) account of the same is a normal perspectival difference: the same brain phenomenon as experienced by that same brain itself, or by another. Experience for both — not evidence of two different kinds of reality.
“Red,” as a qualia, is the name of the process we generally undergo when we see or remember or think about the color red. We do not need to explain why it looks red for the same reason that we do not have to explain why the animal that we call “cat” looks like a cat. Why should we have to explain why “red” looks red?
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Chalmers asks us to contemplate what he calls a “philosophical zombie.” This is a hypothetical entity that looks and behaves like a human in all respects, including reporting emotions, feelings, dreams and experience, yet it has no consciousness. [...] The very fact that a philosophical zombie could be conceived, Chalmers argues, shows that inner experience is intrinsically distinct from observable natural phenomena.
But the argument is weak. A philosophical zombie would claim to know what subjective experience is; otherwise, it would be empirically distinguishable from a human. Chalmers’s point is that the existence of the hypothetical, irreducible consciousness of which he speaks is something we can be convinced of only by introspection. During introspection, physical processes in my brain convince me of my consciousness. The same would theoretically happen in the zombie brain, convincing it of having consciousness as well. If this is true, can I believe my own conclusion of having this mysterious non-physical experience, knowing that if I were a zombie, I would be convinced of the same without actually having it? The argument is self-defeating.
My hypothetical, physically identical zombie twin would be exactly like me — including in experience. In other words, philosophical zombies are distinguishable from ordinary people only by those who assume upfront what Chalmers seeks to prove: that there is something non-physical going on in the world.
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There is no ‘hard problem of consciousness’
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Why anime is on the rise even though the industry is so poor
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Comment on Avatar: Seven Havens | Official teaser in ~tv
uaeaaie LinkThe original series drew heavy inspiration from East Asian cultures, while it looks like they might have leaned more South Asian this time. Something about a pair of children twins going on a...The original series drew heavy inspiration from East Asian cultures, while it looks like they might have leaned more South Asian this time. Something about a pair of children twins going on a spiritual and magical journey feels very Indian mythology to me, but I don't know enough about that to guess. Anyway I'm excited!
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Comment on Midweek Movie Free Talk in ~movies
uaeaaie LinkWatched Obsession the other day and it kinda reminded me of The Substance. One is about 2 people being trapped together in a single body and the other is about the same person switching between 2...Watched Obsession the other day and it kinda reminded me of The Substance. One is about 2 people being trapped together in a single body and the other is about the same person switching between 2 bodies.
Interestingly, each also has an alternative (if minor) interpretation that flips this around, where the supernatural plot points are taken more metaphorically (or more literally, depending on how you look at it I guess).
//spoiler//
For The Substance, if we think of Sue and Elisabeth as 2 different people, then the film can be seen as a conflict between mother and daughter. The rebellious child desires to be free but is still constrained by her dependence on the parent for survival, while the mother only sees her daughter as an extension of herself and pins all her hopes and desires onto hers.
For Obsession, if we think of Nikky as the same person the whole time, the film could be seen as about (from Bear's position) the shock of discovering your romantic partner having an almost entirely different side to their personality in private, or (from Nikky's position) the desire to suppress your true thoughts and feelings when being around your partner.
//end spoiler//
Also watched Backrooms but my thoughts on it is a bit more conflicted, probably write something later when I have the time.
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Broken Reality 2000 | Release trailer
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Comment on The Amazing Digital Circus - Ep 9: Remember in ~tv
uaeaaie Link ParentThere's one instance where a character yelled "I want to the ability to have sex!", with the intended comedic effect is for the other characters to be all 'how could you say such a thing!', and it...There's one instance where a character yelled "I want to the ability to have sex!", with the intended comedic effect is for the other characters to be all 'how could you say such a thing!', and it doesn't go any further than that - so basically like how a bunch of 12-year-old would joke about saying "sex". I consider that age-appropriate but ymmv.
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Comment on Virtual Riot - I heard you like polyrhythms (2024) in ~music
uaeaaie LinkThis is the best visualization (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsAlFKXAMjM)This is the best visualization (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsAlFKXAMjM)
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Virtual Riot - I heard you like polyrhythms (2024)
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Comment on Tildes Minecraft Weekly in ~games
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Comment on Tildes Minecraft Weekly in ~games
uaeaaie Link ParentAny chance we could see some screenshots? It's both a way to entice people and also a kind of personal record for your progress.Any chance we could see some screenshots? It's both a way to entice people and also a kind of personal record for your progress.
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Comment on What have you been watching / reading this week? (Anime/Manga) in ~anime
uaeaaie Link ParentThey say "war is development in reverse". Seeing the gap between some African countries that are still under conflicts nowadays compared to just other developing countries and I can buy it.They say "war is development in reverse". Seeing the gap between some African countries that are still under conflicts nowadays compared to just other developing countries and I can buy it.
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Comment on Introductions | July 2026 in ~talk
uaeaaie Link ParentIs Canadian copyright law stricter than US? Seeing that there aren't many episode/chapter discussion threads in ~anime, I wonder if there is any restriction to posting links to fan translations.Tildes is obliged to operate under Canadian copyright law.
Is Canadian copyright law stricter than US? Seeing that there aren't many episode/chapter discussion threads in ~anime, I wonder if there is any restriction to posting links to fan translations.
Business policy stuff is way over my head haha, I just hope someone over there is working on it. The thing that got me the most is how under this system, more funding doesn't result in higher quality shows, only more shows with equally strapped budgets. Explains so much