Subhash Kak - What is Consciousness?
Vložit
- čas přidán 26. 05. 2024
- Listen to audio versions of your favorite interviews with the Closer To Truth podcast: shorturl.at/hwGP3
Consciousness is what we can know best and explain least. It is the inner subjective experience of what it feels like to see red or smell garlic or hear Beethoven. Consciousness has intrigued and baffled philosophers. To begin, we must define and describe consciousness. What to include in a complete definition and description of consciousness?
Get exclusive subscriber-only benefits with a free Closer To Truth membership: bit.ly/3He94Ns
Subhash Kak is Regents Professor of Computer Science Department at Oklahoma State University in Stillwater.
Watch more videos on the mysteries of consciousness: shorturl.at/Edppt
Closer To Truth, hosted by Robert Lawrence Kuhn and directed by Peter Getzels, presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.
You cannot understand consciousness without Indian philosophies. It’s the correct and necessary route
False evolutionary biology is sufficient to explain human conditions based on the ability to survive in environment. Science is the best method.
Try listening to Nietzsche and Sadhguru channel.
A view of consciousness that I can accept. Thank you!
Nikola Tesla is a good example of having a connection to uncommon knowledge. He had his epiphany moment when he envisioned the rotating magnetic fields came to him in a flash. His concept of the rotating magnetic field changed our society globally.
What you say, “came in a flash”, psychologists back in the 70s and 80s at least would say, “came after an extended incubation period (ie, a period of not thinking about it), which was, however, preceded by an extended and usually exhaustive period of attacking the problem from every conceivable angle”.
In point of fact, it came to him while watching peaks of landscape lit by a setting sun, and thinking of a passage from Gothe’s Faust. This is a well-known anecdote, though perhaps not among psychologists back in the 70s and 80s.
I could never grasp the concept of consciousness until I had two out of body experiences, and numerous lucid dream states, whereby my consciousness was "non-local", so to speak. And now I am pretty confident when I say consciousness is not limited to brain. I would never have accepted such a concept until it happened to me.
Mind is to brain
as movement is to matter,
radically different yet utterly dependent.
Excellent... thanks 🙏.
The Sound is a Little Bit off… but quality content as allways! Keep up the good work
A wise man. Love from Sweden.
The Vedantic conception of consciousness makes more sense to me than any other. Pure physicalism is impossible to refute, and it seems that one day it will offer a picture of consciousness that is complete- an account of how it emerges from matter- neurons- and now quantum phenomena. But it has not even the barest beginning of a hypothesis as to how unconscious matter could arrange itself in ways that could give rise to consciousness.
In the Vedantic conception, consciousness can’t be known as an object, because it is only a subject. Therefore the attempt to understand it as we understand any object will never succeed. Consciousness will always elude the observations of our senses and instruments and remain tantalizingly outside of human understanding. It is not something that can be understood, it is that by which we understand everything.
Of course this assertion is strictly off limits in our current materialist paradigm. It’s magic, it’s “woo-woo.” At some point, however, I believe this paradigm, like all before it, will collapse under the weight of the anomalies it cannot account for, among which the primary is consciousness.
We are ONE.
Because hallucinogenics tell us so.. Anything else?
"We are ONE"
I, my self, am conscious.
Of that assertion I am absolutely certain.
I am also certain you are conscious too but
not absolutely and
that is because,
I am,
self evidently,
not you.
Firstly in my understanding consciousness is beyond words. It can only be experienced. Consciousness is the omnipresent energy fabric. Consciousness gets revealed through this body. It reveals itself to itself through itself. Consciousness differentiates the human mortal body with the immortal cosmic source. It is the link to our source of origin or the creator. It is not perceivable in the normal plane or spectrum of human intelligence or in the dimensions of space and time. When you go beyond space and time that is when you experience something that cannot be described in words.
Language is responsible for one's being conscious
because it was language that allowed the word 'self' to be introduced.
Since it is my self who is conscious
my self owes language for my self's existence.
The Dreaming is a better example of natural understanding from where we come from ... Because .. it maintained Australia and it's culture and practices for 10s of thousands of years... These lore extend from outside the reality we live
That's evidence that the Dreaming culture uses knowledge that connects to reality and consciousness
Great points: 0:52 - "There is also a binding" - Can definitely come on board, the idea of nonlocality of self. At 1:29 - "... superposition of all possibilities" resonates with quantum contextuality & phenomenology at the subatomic domain. At 5:42 "The Vedic view... associational knowledge" - Association (CS Peirce) as fundamental, absolutely.
Regarding Subhash Kak's references at 1:16 & 4:00 to Schrodinger (a Copenhagen Interpretation). We are going to have to confront the inconsistencies between Quantum Contextuality and the Copenhagen Interpretation. They can't both be right, and we're going to have to eventually bite the bullet on this.
A thought represents 'something' that a thought is not.
Representations are abstractions.
Abstractions are 'non local'.
The self-thought represents its self making it unique among thoughts.
(Self representation is of course why the self-thought is called 'The Self').
I know nothing with absolute certainty except that
it is my self who is conscious.
Even though in encoded form,
neural-discharge-timing-pattern seems to me
perfectly suited for and entirely capable of supporting representations
which is what all thoughts are
and of course,
mind and being conscious depend on thoughts for their existence.
Thus there is no need to fish around in the quantum realm
for an explanation of the being conscious process.
(Although of course such fishing may perhaps reveal
some mechanism for memory storage etc.
even though I doubt it will).
Wow super good! Please interview Dr. Edwin Bryant at Rutgers.
Highly interesting.
The human mind is capable of anything - because everything is in it, the whole past and the whole future. With help from feedback loops...
He keeps asking that question.
I suppose he hasn't yet had a satisfying answer.
Based on experience, I think consciousness is fragile.
This echo again is killing this interview
What ECHO echo echo echo? 😊
yeah there is noticeable echo; Natalia is probably using ear buds or other in / on ear device.....that would tend to emphasize echo.....
could human awareness of subjectivity be connected to consciousness of causation?
Yes. Evolutionary bio processes built for survival is sufficient I believe. All extensions of biosouls and biolife is coupled with the ability to survive in ones environment. All elaborations or extensions of material form are in essence survival oriented in disposition and as a function.
One's self is merely one more object of which one's self becomes aware.
Looking in a mirror tells one what one looks like to other people.
Other people are, indirectly, the reason we are conscious.
Civilization,
which protects us rather well from bloody nature and
allows for our tremendous reproductive success,
simply would not work if we were still behaving according to our instincts.
It was when culture and language evolved the concept of 'the self' that
human beings first became conscious.
Easy to understand in light of the fact that
it is your self who is conscious.
Right?
Conseusnness is that feel you get when you know you’re rite about something
Close but no. Its more about survival in material objects.
There is no 'consciousness' per se.
There is only your self, who is conscious.
Where does perception happen in the brain? How can an organ made of water, fat, and protein perceive anything?
That's the big question.
It needs to survive so it evolves new attributes over space time.
consciousness of causation? what might consciousness of causation imply?
Survival of material objects based on behaviour and participation in the survival process, all bits are survival of material substance in biosouls. Intelligence increases in brain waves increases the likelihood of that entity continuing. You are just an evolved biosoul.
Please bring on Francis Lucille
Schrodinger was not the creator of quantum reality.
You should also explore Jain philosophy and it's view of consciousness. It does not accept a universal or single consciousness. Rather it argues for, along with logical proofs, of independent existence of individual consciousness, each having the same perception of absolute knowledge and truths
Jainism is often overlooked, but I think the Jain philosophy is much more respectable. It affirms the reality of the many and the ethical principle of Ahimsa is something I deeply admire about Jainism.
@@anteodedi8937 glad you appreciate it. Very true, and the fascinating thing is how ahinsa is the central pillar to understanding nature and consciousness in its whole! The philosophy is so comprehensive, extensive and interrelates fields of physics, cosmology, fundamental nature of reality, ethics, day to day moral, lifestyle, law, and many other fundamental disciplines of nature.
Requires equal amount of effort to be put in to understand the deeper intricacies, as is with any other field of research :)
@closertotruth
First, observe that you, the consciousness is the witness of the cosmos, including this body and mind (thoughts, intellect, memory, and ego).
Then, realize that this same consciousness is present in all individual experiencers.
You will then understand that this cosmos, from all individual POVs, and all bodies and minds are appearances within that one consciousness.
Consciousness and souls are the confusion what you are is a representation of evolution based in material to survive in its habitat. Biosouls and bioconciousness or dinosouls and dinoconcious. Survival of material form is the correct postulation not biosouls.
@@MasterofOne-zl6ur What you are calling consciousness is the intellect, that developed with evolution. What I’m calling consciousness is the self-awareness of existence. Intellect helped us to reflect on the environment and the self.
“All that we are is the result of what we have thought. The mind is everything. What we think we become.” - Buddha. This describes the process or the mechanism, but not the cause. It is fairly self evident that if there was no "mind" or was no "thought", then it is pointless to say that anything exists AT ALL. It is that which enables "Awareness", "Self Awareness", "Knowing", "Understanding", "Perception" etc. But that does not answer the question of: "from what or where does thought arise"??? It appears that "thought" cannot apprehend its own source, so we just put a name on it and call it God. Or the various other names that the Hindus have for this. But "thought" appears to arise from within us, so then it can be described as "The God Within". Or, I AM, THAT I AM.
The real answer is “No one knows”
Vedic philosophy was derived by meditating-contemplating ancient Hindu minds. As such it is biased and limited in its comprehension of reality, yet it is not wrong it its realization of oneness as one key attributes of consciousness.
What is the proof or philosophical argument that oneness is one of the key attributes of consciousness?
@@longcastle4863 First "proof" is in deep meditation experience of only one emptiness. In science it is a concept of one energy. I don't care about philosophy.
@@edwardtutman196 So you just feel that way. Hmmmm. Surprising more people aren’t convinced by that.
@@longcastle4863 emptiness or oneness is not a thought or feeling. you need to meditate to experience it. if you don't want to meditate, then scientific explanation of one energy differentiated into various forms may offer you understanding.
@Amrit-ElixirOfLife yes, we as differentiated beings do not feel oneness, but we can experience it in the deepest state of meditation.
I would have liked to have been taught this rather than christianity growing up
You still would have been brainwashed into believing a myth. But considering the violence, division and intolerance that Islam and Christianity bring upon the world, I would agree it’s a less harmful religion. Not a helpful religion, though, just a less harmful one.
They just lacked the correct information about reality or cosmological understanding so they postulated man onto the cosmos.
The same with survival or evolution merely postulates of soul or survival into the unknown sphere but it was at least an attempt at reality combined with some nonsense about men and what they could achieve in stories. Most stories given enough time reach new levels of disingenuous nature. Evolution sealed the deal with survival of species. Not biosouls or dinosouls or bioconciousness or dinoconciousness. Survival is enough.
This does not take into consideration why creatures from a historical past had consciousness like a dinosaur and more is a consideration of human consciousness rather than a complete outlook of it with reference to nature, all biological life and historical factors in regard to survival and why it was needed for life to be a conscious agent to survive in its environment. It lacks substance.
The conscious agent is a survival agent to its core and it is needed for complex structures to exist in its environment so it may participate in the survival process, consciousness is an elaboration of this through evolutionary time and space and it is required for survival as a first protocol with latter evolution or elaborations coupled with brain functions. What the main function of the conscious mind is is that it is needed to best promote and contribute to survival of life by a simple takeaway or removal of it you soon recognise that survival itself would be impossible for biological complex life hence it is a structure or abstract postulate of survival itself through a complex material substance such as a brain.
This is why a dinosaur has and had a conscious mode to survive in its environment so it can collect items as such and it is why a alligator or crocodile still exist because it is conscious of its environment or awake to get items for survival. Its actually a manifestation of survival itself from the brain our best tool for survival but as an abstract idea or force by brain complexity.
Just different size of Atman buckets.
Great last name. I’m sure he’s a turgid supporter.
You will perish in your own hate.
@@kafiruddinmulhiddeen2386 my hate of what?
Brahman is Absolute, undifferentiated Being. Atman is relative, contingent, differentiated, localized being.
Words. You understand nothing.
Yada yada yada
They are only “words” to those who possess profound ignorance and pride. Try walking into a library one of these days.
@@Modus07 If you think a library has profound wisdom, you are confirming your ignorance. That you know nothing of what the words mean can be seen in the matter-of-fact way you express them.
@@kafiruddinmulhiddeen2386 If you knew anything about apophasis and cataphasis, you wouldn’t so carelessly mock people who are speaking of things that point to the ineffable reality they represent. A library card is a start.
Keep in mind complex consciousness so far is NOT figure It out in neurosience. Guys shows consciousness though Brahma It is NOT neurosience proceendings. Brahma pictures conscieusness without figure It out though neurosience It is rubbish rambling.
Moreover the very word brahma has different meanings to different people.
You are rambling rubbish. Learn to write before you vomit garbage here.
Integrated information theory is making a modality to measure consciousness... It also states that consciousness is the base level of reality
@@benbarkerdreaming neurosience doesnt know How figure out consciousness. So consciousness pictures real life It is NOT quite true.
@@Maxwell-mv9rx what mumble jumble is coming out of your mouth
He says many physicists ideas come to them in a flash. Really? Because does not four years of undergraduate study, six to seven years of graduate study, and then a total immersion of oneself in the literature in one’s post doctorate years, not come into play at all? As usual, the religious view is always an overly simplistic view.
Because does not 4 years of reading texts, 6 to 7 years of meditation and introspection, and then a total immersion of oneself in analysis and practice in following years not come into play at all?
Once again YOUR view is overly simplistic
Let me give this a try to explain.. mind is like a quantum computer trying to process many lines of thoughts. The moment a solution is arrived at , something recognises that solution and a Eureka moment is achieved. The conscious.struggle is important in creating that Eureka moment which can be at a much deeper level.
@@jacoblogan And gee, let’s compare the results of all those years of study. On the one hand, we have all the knowledge that science has given us, that has a proven track record of providing benefits for mankind. On the other hand we have religion, still fighting over same old theological arguments that have been going on for ages and which have never brought any tangible positive results to the human species at all. In fact, much the opposite is true in many cases.
@@longcastle4863 Yes indeed if Religious zealots can and have the ability as proven and shown to blow themselves up in the name of religion or to reach this higher plain of existence in death which is ironic then they sacrifice themselves in this world of survival of the fittest for an unknown quantity in the afterlife or take survival for granted in this life because of a Religious postulate of life after death. This is the extreme and lengths that Religion is willing to go to but more importantly it shows the falseness of the postulate with regard to evolution, consciousness as a historical survival mechanism lets say in a dinosaur or biological life form which was conscious for and to the ability to survive in its habitat, the Religions refuse to take into account this evolutionary history and postulate on human only conscious agents and disregard evolution theory as a whole.
If a dinosaur has a soul not just a conscious agency then it to is available for heaven as are all other biological life if they behave in a correct manner or are good dinosaurs or good animals they to may go to heaven as a soul agent. This is why soul is incorrect and conscious agent is the correct interpretations because it considers all considerations of history and all biological life where as soul is human orientated. This proves that all moral positions and all Religion is man made and is in a decline because of the false positions it holds with reference to evolution, survival, and conscious agency in all biological material entities. What they don't like is the postulate of survival in regard to conscious agency as it highlights the faults in the linguistics itself or the postulate of soul instead of conscious agency because the extension itself of soul must be extended to all life forms therefore lacking resolve or consistency as a subject of reference. Its bias to human cognition as is consciousness in this soul respect but more importantly it lacks vision to the integral whole of conscious agency in regard to survival as a function of itself.
We have two major issues to deal with we have abortion on demand or the destruction of human life or human future to deal with or it must be solved and we have the postulate of Religion and its disposition as a Hierarchy of knowledge to deal with. These two factors are what is colliding the two factions.
If we are going to survive and continue this world which is our main goal then we must consolidate these to abnormal quantities or subtract them from the equation to resolute an equilibrium. We wont make it we wont survive if we don't remain conscious and vigilante . The Asteroid is coming, hopefully we are smart enough to avoid it or have the technology to combat it. This could be reason why we have technology and our brains have developed. Religion cant help this one.
@@longcastle4863 Once you reach maturity its quite easy to see through the rubbish and false postulates of Religion and some of its weakness which need addressing. The example of dinosaur soul is a classic or animal soul is a classic example but more importantly its the lengths Religion is willing to go to to continue to remain ignorant with regard to evolution theory, survival in a Schopenhauer sense which is true, soul postulations of biological life in reference to behaviour and heaven availability and a general sense of wanting to continue life in death as a natural postulation of survival into the unknown sphere, which has proven to be very expensive for some poor conscious agents.
Chitta. .Akasha
Consciouness is all reality . Deal with it .
Why should someone deal with your breathtaking dogmatism?
No it is NOT. What you say is merely philosophical rumbling.
Technology comes from the mind, and religious technology also comes from the mind - yoga, mantra, yantra. Yoga means body postures, which can help you to go deep inside yourself; they are created by the mind. That is religious technology. That’s why Yoga is not part of any particular religion. There can be Christian yoga, there can be Hindu yoga, there is certainly Buddhist yoga, Jaina yoga - there can be as many yogas as there are religions. Yoga is just a technology. No machine is Hindu; no machine is Mohammedan. You don’t go into the marketplace to purchase a Mohammedan car or a Hindu car. Machines are simply machines. Yoga is technology. Mantra is technology; it is created by the mind. In fact, mantra comes from the same root as mind - both come from the Sanskrit word man. One branch becomes mind, another branch becomes mantra - both are part of the mind.”
Osho, Philosophia Perennis, Vol. 1,
It’s when you are awake - unconscious is when you are asleep.
False .. you can be conscious while sleep... What's Dreaming
Cociousness is in idle mode or hibernation when you sleep but if it exist you are still alive or awake. Basically if its true then it is not soul but survival itself existing in reality.
...a trap.
"What is Consciousness?"
The essence of Consciousness is the essence of God the Holy Spirit, this is why it is the Forbidden Fruit or forbidden knowledge... We are conscious because our aware immortal souls are free splits of the Holy Spirit..
...and the reason why we are here in this physical world, comming from hell, is because we fell from Heaven for trying to find this Forbidden Knowledge believing that we can be as powerful as God by knowing His essence... our lost souls were sent here for a chance of salvation through regaining our faith in a loving God freely without knowing Him...
... sadly for Robert Kuhn, his lost soul can not return HOME/Heaven because he is again emulating satan's greed who frustratedly want to know this forbidden fruit to be like God... pray for God's mercy for him..
No you have to explain why a dinosaur is and was a conscious agent built for survival and couple this with why a dinosaur or biological material substance has a conscious way of being or state and why this dinosaur soul was available to go to heaven or why it may not go to heaven lets say if it behaved like a good dinosaur then its soul could be available with God in heaven. You must also postulate this with consciousness of all biological material manifestations the need for its existence[ consciousness] in a dinosaur, its use or function and the ability of that entity to survive in its environment by being conscious of it.
You must postulate why all biological life have a soul and also be able to provide a reason why they have a soul to survive or you could just say that why is a conscious agent built for survival if having a conscious mode is relevant for survival . You must show why evolution is not coupled with survival and show that consciousness in relation to survival is a false postulate. Or you must show that Schopenhauer's postulate is untrue with regard to survival of the fittest and then show moral arguments why another biological life form may not be available for heaven if it is purely surviving in its environment.
These are basic evolutionary factors of conscious agents not souls surviving in habitats.
Your postulate just confuses the issue and does not account for evolution its historical relevance in biological life surviving by being a conscious entity and does not explain why most biological life is not available for heaven if it behaves in a correct way, its historically lacking in substance as you would have to show that it is soul in biological life not just being a conscious agent built for survival that is relative to the conscious agent. Its historically lacking in evolutionary biology.
@@MasterofOne-zl6ur it is NOT the physical body but the immortal soul that can return to Heaven or hell... and only human bodies have free conscious souls....
The radical monism of Vedanta. Only Brahman exists, declaring everything else as illusory.
The fact that people keep entertaining such views with a straight face is concerning.
Acknowledging that what is seemingly reality is only transistory, doesn't subsist on it own, and true reality can not be subject to time space and death. Therefore, what you think you see and experience is an illusion - everything is in change, nothing is what it once was.
And you think you're cute. Going around denigrating all the while you haven't a clue yourself. Your entire understanding here about this 'illusion' is but a trite 3 sentences of nothing.
@@codymarch164 I am aware about your dogma. No need to restate it.
@@anteodedi8937 so you admit then that you cleave to the illusion as reality. But you said you undetstood the monistic dogma. Too, you don't dare give your own explication, of anything ever, but enjoy taking shots at others.
@@codymarch164 I understand the content. I didn't say I agree with it.
All you do is stating it like a preacher. Nothing worth responding to.
I need more time to succeed. I need future generations to know the atheist logical fallacy. Am I asking much or too much? I don't want the greatest knowledge to be lost because nobody or almost nobody cares about the knowledge that saves most lives. I am talking about psychology and a different understanding of reality. The truth, is not the truth what you want?, is not the truth what you say you want?, the divine truth is atheism is a logical fallacy that assumes God is the religious idea of the creator of the creation to conclude wrongly no creator exists because a particular idea of God doesn’t exist. God is necessary and Spinoza was right, reality is eternal and created the universe from self. All is the same substance transforming. I need time to explain Spinoza's God. Humanity don't want to learn and censor the knowledge that saves their own children's lives. What are future generations going to think about how I was treated? I am mistreated like Spinoza was mistreated. History repeats self with the same protagonists trying to do the same for God's sake. Spinoza and I tried to end atheism and religion and we are censored. Spinoza is me. Regardless of when the universe was created God existed always before. I am talking about logic. Either the universe is eternal or what created the universe is eternal. You choose and your life is forever, like Spinoza's life. I am tired and I need to rest. Thank you.
If one person is reading is enough. Are you brave enough to not close the book and keep reading? My life is incredibly difficult and I am doing what I possibly can with what I got to survive. I don't want stress, I don't want to be misunderstood, I want peace and tranquility. I say I have discovered the nature of God and people don't know it is important. The Holocaust nazi happened after Spinoza discovered the nature of God and humanity still don't understand. Humanity are deceived, for real, because God exists and the intelligent creator of the universe is all reality, reality is infinitely important, the universe was created with a purpose. Future generations would not understand, so the greatest psychologist and person of many talents explained to humanity how they were eternally deceived to save their own children's lives and he suffered the most severe and devastating censorship in history? I can not believe you, I think you are lying. I am talking about reality that is happening in front of your eyes, here and now. To not waste this loving poem i say atheism is a logical fallacy that assumes God is the religious idea of the creator of the creation to conclude wrongly no creator exists because a particular idea of God doesn’t exist. Thank you.