Hacker News Reader

Comment by tomhoward | Hacker News Reader

It's a complex topic that's really one of philosophy not science, and to try to discuss it in depth in an HN thread is to risk going down a very unedifying rabbit hole.

But in short, we can study matter to the extent that we can observe it from the outside using established scientific techniques. So we can form reasonably objective observations of the nature and behaviour of matter, because (at least for the sake of this argument), it is separate from our consciousness.

However, science is system of techniques and tools developed out of the consciousness of humans, so to study consciousness, you need to use science, which was created by consciousness, which we're trying to study using science... and so on.

So, short answer: we can use science to objectively study matter because it's separate from consciousness. It's harder to objectively study consciousness with science because that thing very we call science is a construct of consciousness.

View on HN

>for the sake of the argument

That's begging the question. There's researchers writing a 18 page report about a 100 manyears of development and you stumble in here without really reading it, saying it's wrong on account of it not being right. Well, your circular logic leaves me unimpressed.

I think the uncertainty principle makes pretty clear, assuming for the sake of the argument that it is correct, that we can't observe matter without interfering. Ofc that's a matter of believe

The whole presumption of the article is that consciousness is related to matter. You are, if anything, changing the subject. You probably don't have a clue what consciousness is, no offense, I really don't. Sadly the quoted papers are not open access and I can't figure out sci-hub. Also, they are from a philosophical faculty, while I tend to the hard sciences.

Where would the inability to figure out conscioussness leave us, anyhow, do you just give up?

Hi there, I think you've read too much into what I was trying to say (which was my concern before I started answering you).

I'm not saying the research isn't useful, but rather that the way it was described in this article raised doubt about just how far the findings go in answering the deepest questions about consciousness (at least compared to what was implied in the headline).

I agree with you that I'm in no position to refute the countless hours of work by people far more more educated on the topic than me.

And I'm not saying we have no way of understanding consciousness, just that there's a limit to how deeply we can ultimately understand it, as at some point you'd have to step outside of your own consciousness. But if your position is that the same may be true for matter because fundamentally matter and consciousness may be inseparable, well I'm very open to that.

The comment of mine that you responded to was just answering someone else's question on the issue of whether the brain generates consciousness, or carries it in some other form.

I have no strong opinion on the matter; I take great interest in reading various hypotheses and philosophies and research studies, and the outcome is that just as you say, I don't have any idea what consciousness really is, because nobody else seems to either (though Roger Penrose's hypothesis about "quantum microtubules" is kinda cool, and seems to have some evidence to support it [1]).

Also, I'm with you on the uncertainty principle and the inability to observe matter with complete objectivity. But I resisted going there in the comment because, like I said, it's a rabbit hole.

But I really do look forward to more being discovered and debated about it.

[1] http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/01/140116085105.ht...

You keep speaking of "the outside", implying that there is any outside that's inaccessable to us. This's not scientific. It's not mumbojumbo either, but it's just not provable. It's glaringly obvious, too. It's tedious to still try to derive any insight from that. What you want maybe is an outlook, so to speak, to expand your horizont.

Consciousness is binary in my mind. To say that there is an understanding of consciousness sounds redundant to me, although understanding carries a notion of direction.

I don't disagree with you, and I think we're more on the same page than not.

In case you're interested, a writer (and scientist) whom I've found very insightful and thought-provoking on this topic is Bernardo Kastrup:

http://www.amazon.com/Bernardo-Kastrup/e/B004OFGCA4

Reply on news.ycombinator.com