To: K-list
Recieved: 1999/10/05 11:26
Subject: Re: [K-list] Consciousness
From: Martin Thompson

18:31:42 Tue, 5 Oct 1999
Ville Vainio at Ville Vainio <vvainioATnospamtp.spt.fi> writes:
>Objectively: a creature functions better when it gives itself (and
>consciousness) a "special" value, something that helps it seperate itself
>from the things he is observing "objectively". Surely he can't be similar
>to those things (he sees their apparent simpilicity as an enslaving
>property). Ego is the thing that does just this trick. Also, ego gives one
>values to live by, reason for existence (even though the person may claim
>to be nihilistic), and gives a nice warm feeling of "me". Ego also
>insulates us from the objective reality, it "abstracts" all the complex
>things that are contained in this body to simple "me". This abstraction is
>not logical, therefore it must appear to be "natural" and "obvious" in
>order to survive our reasoning. And that makes it appear "special", and I
>assume this was the problem you were struggling with. Ego casts a shadow
>of doubt on the logical chain that would be quite obvious without the
>interference from ego.
>
This sounds vaguely like what Krishnamurti recommended one to consider
in his advice to young people: that the thinker and the thought are not
observer and observed, but are both the same thing. There is no thinker.
I get the impression that Marvin Minsky is moving in the same way with
his AI-style "ensemble" view of consciousness, i.e., that our "minds"
are made up from lots of subsystems (book: Marvin Minsky, The Society of
Mind).
--
Martin Thompson martinATnospamtucana.demon.co.uk
London, UK
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