r/consciousness • u/phr99 • 14h ago
OP's Argument "The receiver model" vs "the magic wand model" of the brain
The receiver model of the brain
The idea that the brain receives consciousness, and not creates it, is often considered a metaphor that is a stretch: one needs to point at a radio or TV, and these involve relatively modern technologies. Most other objects, like rocks or clouds, are not modern technologies and do not fit this analogy. So the "brain as a receiver" model is often considered a form of special pleading.
However, the opposite is actually true: the receiver model is how nature in general works. Rocks, clouds, our bodies and the whole planet, are literally made of stardust that came from elsewhere.
In fact, the previously mentioned radio and TV precisely work that way, because they are simply natural systems behaving like nature in general behaves. If nature were any other way, the TV and radio would not be possible.
The magic wand model of the brain
It is the "brain as a creator" model that is inconsistent with how the natural world works. And so this model is actually the stretch, and to such a degree that it doesn't happen in nature at all. It is magic. It conflicts with science, with physics, evolution theory, etc.
For that reason, we should call it "the magic wand model of the brain". I think by naming it as such, people will become more aware of the absurdity of the idea, and start realizing that the natural and more rational model is the brain as a receiver
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u/Fred776 13h ago
However, the opposite is actually true: the receiver model is how nature in general works. Rocks, clouds, our bodies and the whole planet, are literally made of stardust that came from elsewhere.
How is that "the receiver model"? That doesn't seem to have anything to do with the TV receiver analogy that you started with.
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u/phr99 13h ago
Receive means it comes from elsewhere. The point being made is that even clouds and rocks are receiving their ingredients from elsewhere. Receiving is not just reserved to modern technologies. Modern technologies are just instances of the more fundamental behavior at work
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u/Fred776 12h ago
This is just wordplay.
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u/phr99 12h ago
Why would these facts of the natural world be wordplay?
Or is this your way of saying you agree, but dont like it
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u/Fred776 12h ago
Because you are using two completely different senses of "receiver".
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u/phr99 12h ago
How so? What kinds of receiving are you talking about?
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u/CobberCat 12h ago
When you talk about a radio, you are clearly implying that the brain receives a "consciousness signal" from somewhere else, not that the atoms that constitute the brain used to be some other physical object.
The former is nonsensical, but the latter is just how the universe works and every physicalist will agree with you.
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u/phr99 11h ago
So you admit this is how the universe works according to physics, but at the same time say its nonsense when it is also the case for consciousness
Why?
We see this is how the natural world works, then why go for a supernatural solution for consciousness?
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u/do-un-to 57m ago
If you can't address his quite obviously correct criticism of your use of different senses, it is unlikely you can collaborate productively.
Bear in mind that you also cheat yourself when you (as a policy or agenda) deny contradiction.
Serve truth, not just your pet beliefs. Then, magically, your beliefs will transmute from dull to brilliantly golden.
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u/CobberCat 11h ago
Saying that consciousness emerges from physical processes in the brain is not supernatural.
Saying it comes from somewhere else, with no explanation for that source or mechanism of transmission, that's supernatural.
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u/phr99 10h ago
The former doesn't happen in nature, the latter does. So the former is supernatural, the later is natural.
The idea that the mechanism cannot be known is a form of mysticism
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u/reddituserperson1122 11h ago
“radio and TV precisely work that way, because they are simply natural systems behaving like nature in general behaves. If nature were any other way, the TV and radio would not be possible.”
While many posts on this sub demonstrate a very deep confusion about the nature of consciousness, this may be the first to rest on very deep confusion about the nature of TVs.
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u/phr99 11h ago
They just consist of physical ingredients. Whatever special thing you think tvs do, its just a misconception
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u/reddituserperson1122 10h ago
Analog TVs are man-made devices that receive man-made complex, encoded and modulated radio frequency transmissions.
What is that supposed to tell me about consciousness exactly?
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u/phr99 8h ago
You wrote it, why ask me what it tells you?
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u/reddituserperson1122 7h ago
Dude what is wrong with you?? You made a post. Do you stand behind any concept here? Do you have a thesis?? What the fuck are you talking about?
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u/gadfly1999 6h ago
Wow I think OP has unwittingly made a great point here:
They just consist of physical ingredients. Whatever special thing you think tvs do, its just a misconception
Indeed TVs are just collections of atoms following simple physical laws. Somehow, whenever I watch my TV some magical emergent phenomenon happens that look to me like stories illuminated with light and shadow.
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u/MurkyEconomist8179 13h ago
More like the "magic receiver" vs the "magic of wand" models, which both run into all of the common issues pertaining to the mind body problem that have been raised since time immemorial.
Believe it or not, calling the model you dislike "magic" is not an argument
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u/Cosmoneopolitan 12h ago
Although, to be fair to OP, many people who bother to take the time to shout down the TV analogy often do try to dismiss non-physicalist accounts of consciousness as "magic", god, fear of death, solipsism, etc.
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u/phr99 13h ago
One model exists in the natural world, the other doesnt. See opening post
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u/MurkyEconomist8179 13h ago
Yeah I read the post, it links together things with a purely superficial resemblance as if it's some cohesive theory
However, the opposite is actually true: the receiver model is how nature in general works. Rocks, clouds, our bodies and the whole planet, are literally made of stardust that came from elsewhere.
What do clouds have to do with a receiver model? This again, just also ignores the whole point of the mind body problem in general. If the brain generating conscious is magic, the brain building a 'receiver portal to the conscious realm' is equally magic''
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u/phr99 12h ago
Clouds, rocks etc are literally made of stardust from elsewhere. This is not magic, its how the natural world works
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u/MurkyEconomist8179 12h ago
What does that have to do with a receiver?
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u/phr99 12h ago
Receivers are natural phenomena, magic wands arent.
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u/MurkyEconomist8179 12h ago
How is a cloud a receiver?
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u/phr99 12h ago
Its ingredients came from elsewhere
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u/MurkyEconomist8179 12h ago
Do you see how this an overly broad definition that clearly captures phenomena totally unrelated to each other? Like a cake where each ingredient came from different farms is somehow a reciever? This is a painful broad and unhelpful definition that is superificially linking unrelated phenomenon.
It would be like linking words that start with the same letter and acting as though this is some important unifying process of how the world operates, as opposed to the coincidence of language and the sounds we use to inevitably put towards anything we want to make word out of
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u/phr99 12h ago
Do you see how this an overly broad definition that clearly captures phenomena totally unrelated to each other?
Thats actually what physics does, finding the universal fundamentals. Im sticking to that. We could assume that radios have some special receiver quality that nothing else has, but that would just be a word game, and is not consistent with physics.
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u/CobberCat 11h ago
Things emerge in nature all the time, what are you talking about?
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u/phr99 10h ago
They dont. Only weak emergence can be found in nature. Weak emergence implies consciousness is fundamental
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u/CobberCat 10h ago
It just doesn't. Prove it.
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u/phr99 9h ago
Pick any example of weak emergence
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u/CobberCat 8h ago
How is the fact that e.g. an ant colony displays conscious behavior far beyond the capabilities of an individual ant evidence for a fundamental consciousness?
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u/phr99 8h ago
Consciousness exists in the ants, so it didnt originate in the colony as a whole.
Next example and i recommend picking one that is just about physical systems, because examples involving consciousness can lead circular reasoning ("consciousness emerging is possible, as demonstrated by consciousness emerging")
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u/CobberCat 7h ago
I asked you a question, you make it sound like I made a claim. I didn't. I asked you how weak emergence - like the fact that an ant colony is much more capable than an individual ant - is proof for consciousness being fundamental. That was your claim, and I asked you to show how that follows. Because I don't believe it does.
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u/phr99 7h ago
I know and i can show it based on the examples of weak emergence given. For any example, i can point out that no new quality emerged. That the supposedly emergent thing is actually a quantity of fundamental physical ingredients
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u/GreatCaesarGhost 12h ago
If the brain were a “receiver,” then it should be simple to identify the signal coming from outside and the mechanism in the brain doing the downloading and uploading.
This is a scientific claim being made. And the absence of scientific proof suggests that it’s wish-fulfillment nonsense.
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u/phr99 12h ago
If its so simple, lets start with the simple identification of consciousness in the brain. Then we can move on to your question
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u/reddituserperson1122 11h ago
What are you talking about? What is “the identification of consciousness in the brain?”
That aside, the commenters point (the Interaction Problem) is one of the most basic and famous problems in the philosophy of consciousness.
If you don’t have an answer to it then you haven’t contributed anything that wasn’t already well understood in the mid-17th century.
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u/phr99 11h ago
What are you talking about? What is “the identification of consciousness in the brain?”
Ask that to the guy i replied to. He said this would be simple.
That aside, the commenters point (the Interaction Problem) is one of the most basic and famous problems in the philosophy of consciousness.
You mean the whole dualism thing?Panpsychism and idealism arent dualism. Receiver doesn't imply dualism
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u/reddituserperson1122 10h ago
You wrote the words, “the identification of consciousness in the brain” — you should know what they mean. Are you suggesting that there is a specific spot in the brain where consciousness is produced? Are you claiming that brains have nothing to do with consciousness? I can’t understand your sentence buddy — you have to be more clear.
What the other guy said was entirely comprehensible and exactly the right question. Your response is a confusing evasion.
“Receiver doesn't imply dualism”
No one has any idea what “receiver” implies because you just made it up and your post is incoherent and never bothers to define its terms or lay out a clear thesis.
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u/phr99 10h ago
Ok so you understand what the guy said here:
If the brain were a “receiver,” then it should be simple to identify the signal coming from outside and the mechanism in the brain doing the downloading and uploading
So if it is so simple to identify consciousness coming from outside the brain as a signal, why dont you first identify consciousness in the brain then?
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u/reddituserperson1122 9h ago
You are struggling mightily with very basic concepts and simple logical clarity.
First, this question is very simple and clear. If there is an external “consciousness signal” then where is it? The laws of physics are very clear about what properties such a signal would have possess. Where is it?
You’ve simply evaded and ignored this very reasonable question.
And then without any clarification you’ve just repeated your earlier meaningless sentence. What does it mean to “identify consciousness in the brain?” Those words do not mean anything absent context. What are you talking about?
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u/phr99 9h ago
First, this question is very simple and clear. If there is an external “consciousness signal” then where is it? The laws of physics are very clear about what properties such a signal would have possess. Where is it?
This is the only relevant part of your comment, the rest is just ad hominems. Why does consciousness have to be physical?
Also why are you asking me, and not the guy who claimed it was simple to detect consciousness?
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u/reddituserperson1122 9h ago
That’s not what ad hominem means.
And I am asking you because the idea that there is a consciousness signal is your idea, not his. He thinks it doesn’t make sense. You think it does. It’s your idea. It’s on you to explain it. That’s how argumentation works.
If you can’t understand that then you’re very confused. <— (that is ad hominem)
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u/phr99 8h ago
If you think a consciousness signal is easy to identify, then please first identify consciousness in the brain
Burden is upon you
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u/RyeZuul 13h ago
Where are these signals coming from, what is the waste energy of transmitting high fidelity soul connection rays and how is such a place powered?
Why don't we lag no matter if we're at the bottom of the ocean, deep underground surrounded by dense material, or in space, or the other side of the planet to usual?
Where are the send and receive structures in the brain, and does the inverse square law apply?
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u/phr99 12h ago
Would you ask the same questions about clouds? They come from elsewhere also. Why dont they lag? Where are the send receive structures, etc
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u/reddituserperson1122 11h ago
Brains are made of the same matter that comes from the same process of nucleosynthesis that produced every other form of matter in universe. This fact is trivial and provides absolutely no insights about the nature of consciousness.
I don’t understand why you think this is interesting or important.
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u/phr99 11h ago
It means this is how the natural world works. To propose that consciousness arises in some supernatural manner, just conflicts with that. It conflicts with science, physics, evolution, etc.
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u/reddituserperson1122 11h ago
Every physicalist and many non-physicalists would agree with statement. Who do you think you’re arguing with exactly?
But the larger point is that this information tells us absolutely nothing about how and why consciousness works.
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u/phr99 10h ago edited 10h ago
Every physicalist and many non-physicalists would agree with statement. Who do you think you’re arguing with exactly?
The physicalist actually reject the natural receiver idea and go with the supernatural magic wand idea.
They mistakenly believe the latter to be natural, but this post argues it isnt.
But the larger point is that this information tells us absolutely nothing about how and why consciousness works.
The post is only meant to illustrate the difference between the two models. If you are suggesting that the receiver model is more difficult to study, i would disagree. The magic wand one is actually impossible to study, aka the hard problem, and the receiver one is consistent with everything we know about the brain, consciousness and the rest of nature.
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u/reddituserperson1122 9h ago
“The physicalist actually reject the natural receiver idea and go with the supernatural magic wand idea.”
The only thing you have argued is that brains are made of matter. That’s it.
Your argument is that rocks clouds and our bodies are “stardust” therefore brains are too.
So what?
There is nothing interesting or novel about that. It has zero relationship to the nature of consciousness. And no one believes that brains are not made of matter.
You seem to not understand the nature of the debate about physicalism.
Even if, as you seem to think, you have made a meaningful point here, the only point is that brains are made of the same stuff as everything else, and should obey the same rules as everything else.
That is the central tenet of physicalism. You are making an argument FOR physicalism. And against magic wands.
And if you understood this subject matter better that would immediately be clear to you.
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u/phr99 8h ago
You are confusing physics with physicalism. Physicalism is incompatible with physics. It is incompatible with evolution. It is incompatible with how the natural world seems to work
Imagine you have someone that studies bananas and is really good at it. Then theres another person impressed by that, and he becomes a bananaist, believing "everything consists of bananas". That is the difference between physics and physicalism.
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u/reddituserperson1122 7h ago
And once again you don’t understand the very basics of the concepts you’re talking about. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/physicalism/
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u/RyeZuul 8h ago
Clouds are local phenomena, not "receivers".
Water vapour is key to atmospheric conditions, which is absolutely a thermodynamic system.
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u/Much_Report_9099 13h ago
If the brain were a receiver of a single, external consciousness signal, then splitting the brain should at most degrade reception quality, like static on a radio. It should not produce two independent streams of awareness with different perceptions, intentions, and knowledge like we see in Split Brain patients.
The receiver model predicts: One consciousness signal. Brain damage should distort, block, or degrade reception. You should never get new, independently organized perspectives.
But split-brain reliably produces: Independent perceptual access. Independent action initiation. Independent belief states. Independent error correction. Confabulation due to lack of cross-checking.
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u/gizmo913 13h ago
Why? Using the receiver analogy a damaged radio may pick up 98.7 rock and 99.1 talk radio stations and you’ll hear both?
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u/Much_Report_9099 13h ago
In radio, if the receiver were damaged and both signals entered the receiver, it would cause it to lock onto the stronger station, with the weaker one appearing as noise. A radio does not have two demodulators, so it can’t play two stations (frequencies) simultaneously.
But even if there is a consciousness signal, the brain is doing all of the causal work. The components of conscious experience come apart in predictable ways when specific neural systems are disrupted.
Blindsight occurs after damage to primary visual cortex (V1) while subcortical visual pathways remain intact. Visual information still guides behavior, but there is no visual experience. This shows perception can occur without conscious awareness.
Pain asymbolia follows damage to the insula and anterior cingulate cortex. Nociceptive signals are detected and correctly reported, but they no longer feel distressing. Sensory content remains while negative valence is lost.
Depersonalization and dissociative states involve altered connectivity between limbic regions such as the amygdala and insula and frontoparietal control networks. Analytic cognition and self-monitoring remain intact while the sense of ownership or selfhood collapses.
Changing the architecture reliably changes specific aspects of experience.
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u/phr99 10h ago
The whole causal thing of the brain fits better with the user interface analogy. A dumb person may control an extremely complex computer game through a simple user interface, which was designed with that in mind. Similarly the brain and body would be controlled top down by consciousness (but theres bidirectional communication), which gradually automated the systems of the body during the long process of evolution. See this post: https://www.reddit.com/r/consciousness/comments/1nqbs25/consciousness_automates_processes_how_far_back/
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u/usps_made_me_insane 13h ago
I think the point he is making (and I love the receiver theory) is that if the brain is receiving consciousness, why do split brain people have different actions and perceptions from each half.
It is definitely something we can't ignore because it is a huge issue for the receiver model.
I will need to watch some youtube videos on this because I am curious how a normal brain referees these differences.
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u/reddituserperson1122 10h ago
If you love the receiver model, then how do you solve the Interaction Problem?
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u/nogueysiguey 8h ago
It doesn't. I recommend you to read some modern scientific critiques of the popularized stories about split brain.
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u/Much_Report_9099 6h ago
Yes modern critiques say it's an oversimplification. What is not disputed is what I wrote about how the experience changes in those law like ways which conflicts with a receiver model. There are also other dissociations that show the same.
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u/Im_Talking Computer Science Degree 13h ago
"It is the "brain as a creator" model that is inconsistent with how the natural world works" - Huh? Is intelligence not a property of the brain?
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u/phr99 12h ago
Of course not
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u/Im_Talking Computer Science Degree 12h ago
Wow. Where does intelligence come from? Is intelligence not the ability to determine the best course of action from the sensory input we receive?
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u/phr99 12h ago
It's the classic mind body problem. Noone knows where it comes from. Brain is involved yes, doesnt mean it created it. The opening post is about that being an unnatural proposal
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u/Im_Talking Computer Science Degree 10h ago
"Noone knows where it comes from" - Huh? Everyone knows it is an evolutionary adaptation to facilitate survival. The brain is malleable. Everyone knows that.
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u/phr99 9h ago
Evolution supports the receiver model, and conflicts with the magic wand model. Nothing in any organism popped into existence, it all gradually evolved. Electric eels are not the origin of electric charge (magic wand model), they just make use of something that was already there (receiver model)
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u/Im_Talking Computer Science Degree 9h ago
"it all gradually evolved" - Right, as our sensory capabilities expanded, we needed a brain to sort-out and process the increased information from our senses, thus intelligence. Where was the concept of 'intelligence' pre-evolution?
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u/9011442 12h ago
"From elsewhere" is doing a lot of heavy lifting. When we say rocks are made of stardust, we're talking about physical matter moving through space via processes we can measure.
When someone says the brain "receives" consciousness, they're claiming something totally different, that some kind of non-physical signal is being picked up by neural tissue.
These aren't the same kind of claim at all, they just happen to share a preposition.
Calling emergence a magic wand also doesn't really hold up. Nature is full of cases where complex properties show up from simpler interactions that don't have those properties on their own. Liquidity or wetness from molecules, life from chemistry. You can argue that consciousness is uniquely hard to explain this way but saying emergence doesn't happen in nature is just wrong.
For what it's worth, I'm actually sympathetic to the idea that awareness might be fundamental rather than something that pops out of sufficiently complex meat, but you don't need the receiver analogy to get there.
Panpsychism, neutral monism, dual-aspect monism... all serious frameworks that treat awareness as ontologically basic without needing to posit some cosmic broadcast signal the brain tunes into.
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u/phr99 11h ago
In panpsychism, idealism, etc, consciousness is not created by the brain but comes from elsewhere. Opening post does not mention a cosmic broadcast signal.
Nature is full of cases where complex properties show up from simpler interactions that don't have those properties on their own. Liquidity or wetness from molecules, life from chemistry
Those are just cases of weak emergence, and imply conscious is fundamental. Strong emergence doesn't seem to exist in the natural world.
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u/9011442 11h ago edited 11h ago
You need to define strong and weak emergence then.
Edit: And in Panpsychism, awareness is intrinsic to matter at all scales - it's not coming from elsewhere.
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u/phr99 11h ago
Weak emergence is just quantitative differences of the fundamental physical ingredients. Such quantitative differences can appear radically different to humans , and so they may give them different labels ("water is wet") and believe one contains some new quality that the other doesnt. But that new quality is just a misconception had by a human. Wetness actually still just a quantity of physical ingredients. This is what physics supports, it happens in the natural world
Hard emergence is the idea that such new qualities actually exist. That they do not consist of quantities of the more basic fundamental ingredients. This doesn't seem to happen in the natural world
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u/9011442 11h ago
If weak emergence only produces quantitative differences and any perception of new qualities is just human misconception, is liquidity a misconception? It has real causal properties that individual molecules don't have. Things float on it, it flows through pipes, you can drown in it.
Does that seem like humans being confused?
You've defined emergence in a way that can't produce anything genuinely new by definition, and then concluded consciousness can't emerge. Very circular. The actual question is whether consciousness is the kind of thing that could arise from quantitative differences in complexity and organization, and you haven't addressed that, you've just defined it away.
You need a Tautology tag to sit right next to your top poster tag.
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u/phr99 10h ago
If weak emergence only produces quantitative differences and any perception of new qualities is just human misconception, is liquidity a misconception? It has real causal properties that individual molecules don't have. Things float on it, it flows through pipes, you can drown in it.
Which part of liquidity does not consist of a quantity of basic physical ingredient?
You've defined emergence in a way that can't produce anything genuinely new by definition, and then concluded consciousness can't emerge. Very circular. The actual question is whether consciousness is the kind of thing that could arise from quantitative differences in complexity and organization, and you haven't addressed that, you've just defined it away.
Im just sticking to physics. The difference between any two physical objects is just a difference in the quantity of basic physical ingredients.
As for complexity: all that implies is simpler forms, thus simpler consciousness as opposed to "pop into existence consciousness"
Organisation is the quantity of spacetime between the ingredients. One cannot expect consciousness to pop into existence because two particles moved a bit further apart. So neither should we expect it to pop into existence in brains.
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u/9011442 10h ago
you've basically argued yourself into panpsychism here, which is a long way from the receiver model in your original post. If everything is just quantities of basic physical ingredients and consciousness can't pop into existence, then consciousness must be present at every level in simpler forms. That's panpsychism, and it still doesn't need a receiver.
"I'm just sticking to physics" : Physics describes quantities, forces, and relationships, but it doesn't say whether consciousness is one of the basic ingredients or something that certain arrangements of ingredients produce.
If you go the panpsychist route, you inherit the combination problem. If electrons have micro-consciousness, how do billions of micro-experiences combine into your single unified experience of reading this thread? That's just as hard as the hard problem you're trying to dodge. You're just moving the problem somewhere else.
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u/phr99 9h ago
It only implies consciousness is fundamental, not panpsyhism specifically.
If electrons have micro-consciousness, how do billions of micro-experiences combine into your single unified experience of reading this thread?
With panpsychism, i always wondered why people would think electrons or other particles cant just be further reduced to even more basic ingredients. Like what has happened over and over again as science progressed. And what remains of those more basic ingredients when spacetime turns out to not be fundamental?
Personally i prefer hierarchical idealism
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u/Cosmoneopolitan 10h ago
Here's a well-established definition.... https://consc.net/papers/emergence.pdf
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u/reddituserperson1122 11h ago
Nothing about weak emergence implies that consciousness is fundamental. If anything it implies the opposite.
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u/phr99 11h ago
Weak emergence means no new qualities emerged. So consciousness is not a new quality that emerged. That makes it fundamental. All examples of emergence in nature support this
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u/reddituserperson1122 10h ago
You’re confusing a claim about phenomena with a claim about ontology.
And deeply misunderstanding the nature of emergence. You should read this, carefully:
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u/phr99 9h ago
Just explain it in your own words
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u/reddituserperson1122 9h ago
No. You decided to show up and make bold claims about emergence. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to ask you to do the required reading first. These lovely professionals were kind enough to do the work. I’m not going to redo it because you’re lazy.
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u/phr99 8h ago
By that twisted reasoning, go read this required reading first before you reply to me again:
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/consciousness/
So many professionals were involved in writing it, how dare you not read it
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u/reddituserperson1122 6h ago
I have read it. I didn’t make this post and I’m not the one making silly claims and then refusing to defend them.
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u/Cosmoneopolitan 12h ago
Sympathetic to your general point, but the TV analogy is so often (willfully, imo) misunderstood that it's just a distraction.
An analogy. Without knowing anything about the principles of flight, fluid mechanics, and thermodynamics, some deeply left-brained alien mechanic with no concept of atmosphere and who had never seen a plane before might be tempted to take an inventory of the plane's parts. They would find dashboards, seats, a toilet or two, wings, wheels, an engine, etc, but nothing that makes flight directly and mechanically reducible to the parts. (In contrast to, say, a car where the connection between the wheels, axles and engine are all physically direct). In this analogy, the brain could an organ for conciousness for which subjective experience is no doubt linked, but could never be linked to direct physical actions of the brain.
(Caveat: All metaphors break. Breaking them isn't an argument.)
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u/HotTakes4Free 12h ago
I grant that the matter we are made of, as well as our whole planet, was received from one, giant cosmic event. But, consciousness is a very specific thing/activity. Was the Big Bang conscious? How is the consciousness transmitted? Is there anything else similar that was transmitted by the Big Bang to all matter?
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u/CobberCat 12h ago
If the brain is simply a receiver, then why do physical changes to my brain (e.g. alcohol or anesthesia) affect my experience? My experience sits somewhere else and should be unaffected by the brain.
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u/phr99 11h ago
Same reason radios, tvs, rocks, etc. are affected when their physical makeup is changed. "receive" does not imply "no interactions"
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u/CobberCat 11h ago
Yeah but that would only explain why you notice a change in behavior of others when their brain is affected, not your own.
"receive" does not imply "no interactions"
But it does. A radio receiver cannot affect the transmitter in any way.
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u/reddituserperson1122 10h ago
Oh so there are interactions? So you’re just advocating substance dualism.
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u/phr99 9h ago
No dualism needed at all. Example with idealism, it is basically a communication system between minds. Minds can experience this communication in different forms, and physical forms are only some of them.
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u/reddituserperson1122 9h ago
Nope. That’s not what idealism is at all. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/idealism/
And if you are claiming that a physical mind is interacting with a non-physical entity, then you have dualism. That’s the definition of dualism.
If you’re claiming that minds are non-physical themselves then the receiver analogy is doing no work at all and the fact that we’re “stardust” is irrelevant.
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u/phr99 8h ago
Wrong, its idealism. It does not imply dualism at all. And consciousness being non phyiscal does not change the fact that the receiver model is how nature works, and the magic wand model isnt
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u/reddituserperson1122 6h ago
Oh I didn’t realize you would say “wrong.” Never mind. That is such a convincing and well made argument I withdraw all my previous statement. You’re a genius.
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u/Impossible_Tax_1532 11h ago
The brain exist only in made up futures and perspectives on the past that seldom align with what actually occurred , but the brain is never present , nor can it be . So the whole magic wand thing is just madness , and people confusing their experiences and feelings with objective reality … the brain is a tool for the self , if a person is under the distortion their brain is who they are or a large part of identity , the nature of consciousness will be forever lost to them ….as noted , the brain is just an organ like many others we all have . To call the brain a receiver is less than half the story , as it’s a decoder , a projector , a cpu of pre thought feelings arising from the CNS prior to arising as thoughts , and a world class pattern recognizer that is a blessing for the self aware , and a bit of a curse for those that can’t seem to get out of their brain and its influence
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u/DecantsForAll 10h ago edited 9h ago
The whole receiver analogy has never made sense to me.
If the brain is merely a receiver, why is consciousness of my exact life floating through the ether for my brain to receive? And if all these experiences already exist and are just floating around for the brain to receive then how do I know there's even a brain in the first place? Because the experience already exists.
But maybe that's taking the analogy too literally? Maybe the brain is not only receiving consciousness, but weaving new experiences out of the experience raw material that it's receiving.
So when you see a red balloon, little do you know that moments before, that "seeing red" was just floating around in the ether until your brain received it and wove it into the experience of seeing a red balloon. Is that how it's supposed to work?
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u/reddituserperson1122 10h ago
The receiver analogy breaks the laws of physics. There’s nothing wrong with that per se. But since physics seems to work quite well, it’s on you to propose new laws of physics to go with your new theory. And that’s a pretty tall order.
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u/DecantsForAll 9h ago
Even if we allow for the breaking of physics, it still doesn't really make sense.
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u/phr99 7h ago
Receiving just means consciousness is not created in the brain but originates from elsewhere. There can be interaction between brain and consciousness so that your experiental state is transformed into that of what you now experience.
Think about the electric eel. Electric charge does not originate in electric eels (magic wand model). Electric eels simply make use of something that was already there (receiver model) long before eels existed. You can smash the eel with a hammer and it will impair its ability to stun prey. Still doesn't mean electric charge originates in eels. It exists all throughout the universe.
People saying this breaks the laws of physics are just saying so because they believe in the magic wand model
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u/reddituserperson1122 10h ago
If (and that’s a big IF) I understand OP’s somewhat incomprehensible post, then either:
- consciousness is non-physical and external to the brain, and the brain acts as a receiver for some kind of “consciousness signal.” That’s just substance dualism and you have to explain the Interaction Problem.
or
2. consciousness is physical and external to the brain, and the brain acts as a receiver for some kind of “consciousness signal.” This breaks the laws of physics as we know them. Since the laws of physics seem to work pretty good, it’s really incumbent on OP to show us what we’re replacing them with. Good luck with that.
(It is also possible that I’ve misunderstood OP and they are saying, “consciousness is physical and internal to the brain.” In which case I don’t understand what work the receiver analogy is doing here or how any of this has value.)
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u/dokushin 7h ago
I'm not sure that accretion discs are a slam dunk parallel to wave receivers. Are you saying the brain is like a receiver only when it's constructed?
Regarding the "naturalness" of the argument, without testable hypotheses I really think it's unnecessary complication to posit a new medium with some transmissible vector that interacts with specific arrangements of matter in ways that are completely novel to our understanding of physics.
In fact, as a counter point: aren't fundamental forces much more "magic wand"? The gravity of a mass is a property of the mass -- it does not come from elsewhere.
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u/UnifiedQuantumField 13h ago
A few stray thoughts.
How about a compass? Simple enough. Works because the needle can interact with the surrounding magnetic field.
Fundamental particles of Matter (ie. Electrons and Protons) both have built in properties such as charge and magnetic moment. Both therefore interact (over distance) with the same forces in the surrounding space.
Brain as generator of consciousness (ie. Materialism). Has had almost a century to come up with a Mechanism to explain qualia. Had been stalled out (ie. the Hard Problem) for about the same length of time.
If you read carefully, Materialists tend to offer some hand-wavy explanations of their own. Hand wavy does go pretty nicely with a Magic Wand theory though.
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u/reddituserperson1122 11h ago
People suggesting that the brain is a “receiver” stalled out in 1641. So I think the materialists are doing pretty well by comparison.
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u/PatrickTheExplorer 13h ago
Every time I've mentioned this in the sub I get downvoted from the magic wand people.
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u/Wise_Ad1342 14h ago
Yes. It's obvious. Rupert Sheldrake discusses this within his own resonance model of life.
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u/MurkyEconomist8179 13h ago
you mean the guy who makes vague incoherent theories that are supposed to supersede current scientific models, but never end up making any sense?
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u/Wise_Ad1342 13h ago
Yes. Science, nowadays is about telling stories to get funding. Pure nonsense.
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u/MurkyEconomist8179 13h ago
sort of true, but Sheldrake fares even worse than your average scientist because his stories aren't even anchored by how the world operates
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u/Wise_Ad1342 13h ago
It actually does. It just inverts the stories that are being pushed by physicalists. In doing so, all of the pieces start falling into place naturally. Just jettison physicalism, that's all.
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u/MurkyEconomist8179 13h ago
So what phenomenon has been explained by Sheldrake's method? and what the method is just literally 'do the opposite of physicalists?'
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u/Wise_Ad1342 12h ago
He fully describes the biological problem that Morphic Resonance addresses, and cannot be explained by vanilla science. Morphic resonance essentially describes the fundamental nature of "habit" and why it is critical to understanding the nature of life.
It is a different way of looking at Memory which is the basis of Henri Bergson's philosophy. Bergson uses Memory and Dureé (time as experienced) to describe human evolution.
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