Question
Is consciousness an emergent property of the brain or a fundamental property of matter? Isn't saying that consciousness is an emergent property of the brain just as much a non-explanation as saying it is a fundamental property of all matter?
Answer
This is a false dichotomy. It is like asking "is bird flight an emergent property of avian biology or a fundamental property of fluid and gas dynamics in a gravitational field?"
Consciousness (in the "hard problem of consciousness" sense of Chalmers) is a consequence within brains of fundamental properties of matter and space-time we don't yet grok or have the right categories for.
"Emergent" is a pure weasel word. Neuroscience has no explanatory gaps which consciousness is required to explain. Philosophical zombie neuroscience would be indistinguishable from conscious being neuroscience. Yet neural hardware is the only known context where we find consciousness. So there is a relationship somewhere.
Science is simply not metaphysically expressive enough yet to frame ideas about consciousness. We need whatever comes after science as a epistemological modality.
And finally is positing fundamental physics angles "pure ontological speculation"? Absolutely not. When a set of constructs fails to describe some part of subjective experience, you posit new constructs. Nothing we can say using the fundamental categories like mass-energy, space, time etc. seems to describe consciousness.
Need new categories. I am even reluctant to say "fundamental property of matter." The very category "matter" is suspect until we are able to define new categories covering both consciousness and what we now call "matter."
If/when we refactor our basic ontology adequately, I think the notion of "matter" will collapse.
This is a long-winded way of saying "we just don't know what the hell to think here, or how to think, or whether 'thinking' is even the right behavior to engage this phenomenon, since there is good evidence that trying to STOP thinking seems to shed more light on the mystery."
There are just a lot of people who have trouble admitting when they really don't know the answers. 99% of good work in the study of consciousness is simply persuading people who think they know something about the subject that they are mistaken.
Consciousness (in the "hard problem of consciousness" sense of Chalmers) is a consequence within brains of fundamental properties of matter and space-time we don't yet grok or have the right categories for.
"Emergent" is a pure weasel word. Neuroscience has no explanatory gaps which consciousness is required to explain. Philosophical zombie neuroscience would be indistinguishable from conscious being neuroscience. Yet neural hardware is the only known context where we find consciousness. So there is a relationship somewhere.
Science is simply not metaphysically expressive enough yet to frame ideas about consciousness. We need whatever comes after science as a epistemological modality.
And finally is positing fundamental physics angles "pure ontological speculation"? Absolutely not. When a set of constructs fails to describe some part of subjective experience, you posit new constructs. Nothing we can say using the fundamental categories like mass-energy, space, time etc. seems to describe consciousness.
Need new categories. I am even reluctant to say "fundamental property of matter." The very category "matter" is suspect until we are able to define new categories covering both consciousness and what we now call "matter."
If/when we refactor our basic ontology adequately, I think the notion of "matter" will collapse.
This is a long-winded way of saying "we just don't know what the hell to think here, or how to think, or whether 'thinking' is even the right behavior to engage this phenomenon, since there is good evidence that trying to STOP thinking seems to shed more light on the mystery."
There are just a lot of people who have trouble admitting when they really don't know the answers. 99% of good work in the study of consciousness is simply persuading people who think they know something about the subject that they are mistaken.