If I were to ask you to describe what you know and how you came to know the understanding of the world around you, tell me what you would say. How did it all start from your initial point of knowing nothing, to knowing little, …then up to the point where you are now?
I think everything we know should be considered subjective to what we understand, until we are sure we understand everything, and this is why. Our eyes identify points of light and send these dots of information to the brain. Functions in our brain turn those points of light into lines, followed by spacial functions, object definition, color definition, face recognition, all these things give meaning to the information that is being processed. The PFC (pre-frontal Cortex) allows abstract thinking. That abstract thinking combined with the abstract thinking’s control over the brain, our ability to use that abstract thinking to construct things to fit our needs, and our ability to record the past has allowed us to gain the understanding we have of the world. Similiarly, I have used information that is already present along with my own ideas and perceptions gained from my belief in ‘naive realism,’ all eventually lead me to type the words you are reading now. As you can see, this is all based on my human perception. Depending on what meaning is derived from this perception corelates with the actions of the human. (an unavoidable truth IMO) Some say that reduction is present, although not only does that create an infinite regression there is no evidence to support such a theory. IF the meaning didn’t exist then I agree that everything would play out the same way. the only thing is, it does exist. Our conscious perception exist only with meaning.
Neurology is quite amazing. It accounts for all of the cause effects behind the actions of a human without accounting for the conscious. There is no more room in the brain for conscious. But as a philosopher once pointed out, knowing everything there is to know about a bat told us nothing about what it is like to be a bat. Doesn’t that suggest that there is something left to understand?
Our perception has gotting us everything to just short of the answer. I find that a little ironic. I think there is another way to look at this problem though. As Kant pointed out, it seems that quality is the only thing you can attribute to experience. if you think that without it, everything would stay the same, then you can see how it can be considered simply a quality, or Quilia. However quality alone does not account for it’s existence. At this point I would like to reference something that has already been referenced before on this thread by gib. mm-theory explains how you can think of the conscious as parallel to the determinism we see in the universe by explaining that every experience requires an action through necessity. If you think that there are an infinite number of possible experiences, then there could potentially be an experience for every physical action. It’s a little insane to think that it might work this way. Although, after looking at all the information Mr. gib has gathered I am compelled to agree.
When considering this theory you then realize that subjective realities are just a small reality. The accident of life is what created the subjective reality. But if you consider that experience is what causes the necessity of our actions then it is not only subjective, but real in the sense that it governs the actions of the individual. your conscious perception is the reason for your actions as well as the deterministic counterpart. This theory accounts for both without breaking any rules. It’s actually quite fascinating. I don’t fully understand the theory as I am not done reading all of the papers. But I understand where it is coming from so far.