Qualia and the Mystery of Colors

Mind and brain are two different categories. If they were one and the same category, we wouldn’t be able to distinguish between the two, which is a contradiction, because we already do.

There is no question that mind is not the brain. Mind is simply not the brain. The question is what is the RELATION between them. And physicists will tell you – and I am no physicists myself – that mind is caused by the brain. I have no reason to doubt this. Sounds pretty sensible to me.

In other words, color (which is in the mind) is caused by neurochemical processes (which are in the brain) and these in turn are caused by the wavelength of the light that comes in contact with our eyes (which is in the physical world outside of the brain.)

You, on the other hand, appear to think that light has color and that this color causes the color in the mind. This is a matter of physics. Because I’m not a physicist, I can’t comment on it. But I can comment on your reasoning insofar you think that the fact that there is a difference between color and its physical correlates means that color must be physical too. It does not.

You ask “what is color?” I am not sure you know what you’re asking. We already know what color is. We know what kind of experience the word “color” refers to. You need to understand what you’re asking. Are you asking “what is the cause of color?” That would be a different question. But we have answers to that question too. What exactly are you asking?

Existence is a property that is given exclusively to the ideas of what might be real. It is not given to every object of experience. Observations of reality, such as seeing a horse running, do not have such a property. Observations are used to determine the value of this property but they do not have the property itself.

An idea that biological unicorns might be real is not real. But an idea that an idea that biological unicorns might be real might be real is real.

When you lie about what you dreamed last night, for example.

What is difficult to understand, or maybe simply to admit, is that it is us who judge whether something exists or not.

The word “exist” is nothing but a label that we attach to certain objects of experience, namely to ideas, using a certain method (defined by a certain set of rules) and with a certain purpose in mind.

The concept of existence makes no sense outside of judgment.

Many will say this is not true because “whether something exists or not is independent from human judgment”.

That statement is very popular and I have no doubt that it makes an important point. However, when taken literally it is wrong and those who take it literally make themselves stupid by doing so.

The statement does not communicate its point unambiguously.

People are addicted to this naive concept of objectivity which is entirely independent from every subjective factor including personal judgment. Such an objectivity is entirely imaginary, and therefore, not really an objectivity.

It’s also a symptom of paranoia.

Whatever is not judged as existent is quite simply not existent i.e. it is not judged as existent. Tautology is miraculous.

That’s quite simply what “not existent” means: it means you didn’t judge it as “existent”.

However, that does not mean that the judgement of something as being existent will persist infinitely through time. For example, depending on the method of judgment, it might change with the advent of new experience.

What ultimately matters is the method of judgment one is using. In other words, epistemology. Or how we know what we know.

When your method of judgment is basically “what I want to exist is judged as existent and what I don’t want to exist is judged as non-existent” then we say you are subjective.

When your method of judgment is highly dependent on evidence, i.e. prior observations, then we say you are objective.

Objectivity isn’t judgment-independence. Rather, it is evidence-dependence and preference-independence.

Most people misunderstand subjectivity to be mind- or brain-dependence so they think tastes are subjective. These folks are very annoying.

Subjectivity simply means that your judgment is dependent on your preference for its conclusion. It does not mean dependent on any kind of mental factor and/or preference.

When I say “God does not exist”, presupposing I have a clearly defined idea of God, I am simply saying that, using my method of judgment, whatever that method is, I judge the idea of God as being non-existent. I am not saying that my judgment will remain infinitely constant through time. Depending on the rules of my method of judgment, it might be possible to change my mind at some point in the future, say if new evidence appears. But my present judgment is that God is non-existent.

Agnosticism and “absence of belief” arguments represent an unwillingness to make a judgment call. Nothing more than that.

Most of these agnostics behave in a way that is very similar to the way that follows when you judge the idea of God as non-existent. They just don’t want to admit it. They are afraid of conflict.

Sorry about the physics stuff, but james was saying that light isn’t in the brain, or it sounded like he was anyway.

Its like software/hardware, the machine and what it produces are different yes, but colour qualia is composed by the brain and not some mysterious facet we consider to be ‘mind’. that’s why we can be tricked by optical illusions, you wouldn’t suggest that we are consciously doing that surely?

I am asking; ‘what is colour’ and by that I am not referring to holistic definitions. My answer is that colour is not an idea, pigment or material, it only occurs where light hits such a material and changes its frequency. Ergo for the brain to be creating colour it must be producing light, otherwise the ‘mind’ wouldn’t be able to see it. A blind person cannot see colour if they loose the physical ability, and a colour-blind person’s brain is composing colour relative to the incorrect information its getting ~ akin to optical illusions [which is light being changed by the brain.

I see your point, and its been a long battle in science and philosophy, but a physicist would say that information which is measurably out there exists. Information which doesn’t have physical form like meanings, stories dreams etc, are the products of the physics. One is the machine the other is what the machine makes.

That’s a whole topic in itself and I am inclined to agree, perhaps we could go so far as to say that only subjective things exist? If you consider what Einstein said which agrees with your position, a relative object is not objectively real or even exactly located.

I disagree however that existence itself is a matter of judgement, how we judge things only changes our subjective interpretation of a thing. You could judge that the mountain doesn’t exist, but it still does. Just because its particles cannot be located if you try to observe them, doesn’t mean that they don’t exist. They are a bit like a bee in a jar - so when there are collections of relative particles acting as information upon one another, the result is a substance and that isn’t relative. Otherwise we’d be saying that information does not inform, yet it measurably does, even our minds use info.

Epistemology is more a language [/meaning] problem, mathematics and physical information isn’t necessarily the same. No matter how we describe something, that doesn’t change what the thing is, it just changes our description of the mountain.

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When you say “something exists whether or not we judge it to exist” you are saying “something exists even if we judge it not to exist”. But how can we say something exists without judging that it exists? We cannot. So what you are saying is “we judge something to exist even if we judge it not to exist”. This is strictly speaking a contradiction because you cannot judge something both ways at the same time: that it exists and that it does not exist. However, you can say that “we can judge that something exists even if in the past we judged that it does not exist”. Basically, it is saying that our judgment can change with time. This is the true meaning of the phrase.

In other words, existence is a matter of judgment and if you have problem with this you have problem with facts.

Tell me, how can you say that the mountain does not exist and then say that it does exist even though you say it does not exist? Isn’t this a hypocrisy? Maintaining two contradictory beliefs, one deemed subjective (mountain does not exist) and another objective (mountain does exist or rather might exist.) The latter is better described as paranoid.

That would take it too far, I’m afraid. I don’t even know what “only subjective things exist” means. What is a subjective thing? How is it defined? Care to give some examples and counter-examples?

Mind isn’t mysterious. It’s simply a category, or a class, that includes certain events and excludes others. Feelings, for example, are in the mind. They are not in the brain. Their correlates – neurochemicals – are in the brain. There is a form of correlation that we call causation between physical events and mental events (e.g. neurochemicals causing feelings) but there is also, no doubt, such a correlation between mental events themselves (e.g. feelings causing other feelings.)

You have to understand that causation, and correlation in general, is established after-the-fact. It is not what is simply “out there”. It is a product of our judgment based on our need to fore-see, which is to say, to see before seeing.

Facts/particulars are fundamental/independent.

Interpretations/universals are not – they are built on top of, and are thus dependent on, the former.

That’s the age old question of whether classes and other abstract concepts are real (the position of realism) or not (the position of nominalism.)

What does “out there” mean?

More generally, what do words “inside” and “outside” mean?

Would you agree with the following:
“X is inside Y” simply means “element X is a member of set Y”.
“X is outside Y” simply means “element X is not a member of set Y”.

Basically, would you agree that these words indicate membership status of any given element in relation to any given set?

If so, you will agree that “out there” means nothing other than “not a member of some presumed set”. Possibly “within some set that is not the one that is presumed”.

It doesn’t say much, in other words. Not explicitly, at least. We need to know, to identify, what set we are speaking of.

Perhaps this set is three-dimensional space?
Is that what “out there” refers to?
Being a member of three-dimensional space?

I hope you will agree that three-dimensional space is a set. And nothing more than that. Other than perhaps an advanced type of set – perhaps we can say a structured set – because it has fixed slots, unlike plain sets that only have elements, into which elements can be inserted and because it can be addressed using three parameters (x, y, z.) Whatever slots are unused we call “void”, whatever slots are used we call “matter”.

Three-dimensional space is a mathematical structure – an abstraction – used to organize some preexisting information using certain set of rules. In other words, it’s not fundamental. It’s a high-level construct.

The set of raw (read: unorganized) information is what is fundamental. It is so because it precedes our sense of three-dimensional space. It is what is independent whereas our sense of three-dimensional space is what is dependent.

This set of raw (or unorganized) information is the set of all events we have experienced in the past and have memorized. Basically, it’s our memory.

The set that is 3D space is defined by some rules and these rules impose certain restrictions that determine what bits of raw information will be included within it and what bits will not. It generally does not include everything – it is not all-encompassing. This means that some raw information will be excluded. Some of it is simply outside of the scope of 3D space.

Most people have a strong attachment to the concept of three-dimensional space and most of them think that 3D space is what is fundamental. Thus, whenever some information falls outside of the scope of 3D space they deem it to be not real.

Qualities such as feelings cannot be included within the set that is 3D space without leading to Cartesian dualism and “ghost in the machine” situation that often leads to bizarre conclusions such as “everything is conscious”.

Do colours solely rely on light to exist?

Are colours a dormant entity… waiting for light to make them become what they are?

Does the universe work with us, or are we solely evolving to take advantage of what the universe has to offer?

Has anyone ever stayed long enough in a dark room/space to trigger their night vision, or when you close your eyes see colours/neon lights?

Amorphos,

But the mind is a mysterious thing, all facets of it, Amorphos.

Aside from that, the sensation (qualia) which we experience by viewing colors or particular colors, is ALSO brought on by the individual mind, in conjunction with the individual brain, I believe.
Any two people might experience color differently. I see qualia also as part of an emotional experience, so in this way we may even see and sense it differently, as a result of one’s mind’s perception in relation to how they view the world internally and have lived it externally.

If that were not the case, could we have favorite colors? Wouldn’t yours also be indigo like mine? Or wouldn’t mine also be yellow like Van Gogh’s?

Like Einstein said objects don’t exist, they are in relative positions which the act of measuring changes, that to me is akin to how in our minds we are subjective beings. Both things are in the detached perspective, and both things are not an object nor objective thing.
Or more simply; all existent things are observers.

I think emotions are entirely in the brain, it is not possible to think about something which is not information, everything that exists is information. There isn’t anything else happening in the brain but information being stored, transferred and compared.

  • what would you suggest thought is other than an experiencing of information? So is emotion not an experiencing of info? I’d say the emotion is more the experience than the info itself, I can agree there. Hmm I suppose there are kinds of holistic knowledge too [art, poetry, literature etc].

nope. Causation occurs where information informs, that’s what it is. I can’t see how that is after-the-fact. Neither can I agree that its a product of our judgment, us thinking about something doesn’t change causality? ‘our judgment’ is just us thinking and has nothing to do with causality except specifically the causality occuring in those thoughts [said judgment].

Inside and outside are nothing more than comparatives to me. By ‘out there’ I meant existent informations which are out there existing in the world.

I don’t see how the logic reasoning went there at all. ‘Out there’ existing in the world is all sets of all existent things. It is a representative abstract, for all info. I don’t wish to detract to much from qualia here, you are speaking of a more existential problem in philosophy [what is existence] and I don’t know how that help with our inquiry there. but to say…

Not being able to measure doesn’t mean there is nothing there, if there is anything that’s patently opaque about reality its that there is something there.

Arcturus

I think that reality is as marvelous as you are painting the mind to be, ~ I don’t see it at all like physicists do. Colour brought on in the mind is no different to a computer doing it, well it is obviously, but what I mean is that when something affects light to make its sine-wave into a colour, then you get the quality of colour.
Inside our brains as the above links show, there is tons of light and photons carry information and quantum entanglement also may occur. That’s what colour must be - I state. An imagined colour, if you are seeing it, surely is a faculty of light or some other magic???

Our emotional attachments are just that, added onto informations. How we feel about a colour is subjective yes, but what the colour quality itself is, is the same regardless. You may feel differently about red to me, but we could both be looking at the same picture, the same red.

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You are rather unwilling to define your terms which is why we’re going in circles.

I don’t even know what “us thinking about something changes causality” means. This already presupposes that causality is “out there”. I certainly didn’t say there is a causal relation between our thoughts and this imaginary form of causality that is “out there”. The phrase “out there” to me refers to the raw information. There is no causality in raw information. As David Hume said, there is only a sequence of events, among them our own judgments of causality.

Causality is a property of formulas. It refers to the process of calculation, or determination, where the value of one variable changes (i.e. determines, causes, etc) the value of another.

Formulas can be created any way you want, but in order to be of practical use, the best and the most common way to create them is by grounding them in evidence (i.e. raw information) that we possess.

You have an idealized notion of causality. As you do of other concepts, such as existence.

David Hume too was an idealist. Then one day he decided to confront reality, and though he did rather successfully, his emotional response was negative. He was disappointed the world isn’t the way he expected it, wanted it, to be.

That doesn’t say anything.

You’re stuck in this simplistic way of thinking.

Universe (which is what “out there” apparently refers to) is a set of ideas of events that the one owning this set thinks have occurred in the past or will occur in the future.

This means that every person will have his own set that is universe. It also means that the content of this set, the elements included within it, will vary between people as their experience and method of judgment varies.

Idealists don’t like this. Instead, they will argue that there is only one universe to which everyone and everything existent belongs.

This set must be outside of the subject. Otherwise, it will no longer be singular. But this means we can’t speak of it. And yet, we do.

I call it mystery set because we can never know what it is. It is forever “out there” in the sense that it is forever outside of our knowledge.

We cannot speak of its content because that would be putting in it our opinions of what is in it and not what is truly in it.

Whoever asks “is color real?” meaning “does color belong to this set?” must be told that we can never know.

We quite simply don’t know the membership rules of this set. It’s an undefined set.

It’s a classic case of paranoia, of being afraid that your judgments will turn out to be incorrect in the future.

The only thing we know is that we know nothing.

Everything is possible. You can never be sure of anything. I might in fact be a dragon dreaming I’m a man. How can I know that I am not? I can’t.

So let’s give up on our judgments and worship this undefined set.

…an element, created by other elements as a by-product of their activity, that the eye has the ability to take advantage of… just like we have with water to quench our thirst, and produce to satiate our hunger.

We have come to rely on the sun for our main source of vitamin D, just like colour relies on the sun(light) for its creation.

Colours don’t exist outside of the physical, external stimulus that creates them. If they did, I would know what they look like, when in fact, I have no idea.

Define “colour”.

It’s the same as color.

Need not be the case. It could be that your brain is simply not producing them because the condition to initiate their production is lacking.

Well yes. That’s what I said, isn’t it?

You said there must be external stimulus, presumably light, in order to experience colors. I said not necessarily. You might be able to see colors without light and eyes and yet not see them because the corresponding events in the brain are not taking place.

Why would they not be taking place?

Because nothing is causing them to take place (e.g. light hitting the eyes.) But that does not mean that light hitting the eyes is the only thing that can cause them to take place. I think it was Amorphos who mentioned earlier an experiment in which man was made to see via his tongue.