Donald Hoffman's search for a mathematical theory of consciousness

[AshvinP]

DH is thinking the headset is for evolutionary advantage - which ultimately is measured as a capacity for spawning. IOW, there is no evolutionary advantage to knowing and understanding any underlying patterns except as it gets us an advantage to breed.
JP needed to suggest the underlying patterns have an intrinsic\persistent\universal value (if this is what JP means) - perhaps then DH could have responded to this point.
I doubt DH could respond positively to the assertion there are intrinsic\persistent\universal patterns, as they've never been measured or found, nor believed except by a handful of people.

Right, but we should also see why that is an entirely unreasonable conclusion about the headset. Ultimately, it is not about criticizing DH and speculating on what he needs to do to 'get it right', but only using the dialogue as a tool to explore what we should do if we want to strengthen our intuitive orientation to reality. All it takes is to realize that our thoughts, feelings, and desires are also part of the headset experience, including the real-time thoughts that DH, JP, and we are using now to explore the structure of reality. It is such a simple thing, so simple that the intellectual commenting voice which seeks an ever-more complex arrangement of thoughts about reality, always seems to miss it.

If those thoughts we use to investigate the structure of reality are also part of the headset, then clearly knowing the structure of reality is also a part of the 'evolutionary advantage' in the Earthly sphere (whatever that phrase entails). Everyone believes in the archetypal patterns of meaning discerned by thought - otherwise, they wouldn't do scientific research and speak about their results, let alone write books and give interviews about them. So JP was trying to point towards this patently obvious fact of our real-time experience, where thinking perceives the functional meaning that is preserved across layers of reality, from the unmanifest layers to the manifest layers. But I agree he could have done it more effectively by a) making his words less like hammers and b) focusing on the real-time experience of the thinking perspective that DH and all other scientists use to formulate their theories and models.

We could use this metaphor for the structure of reality that Cleric has proposed before:





Our thinking consciousness is always in the middle and normally our gaze is fixed downwards towards what is already manifest and known, i.e. ordinary experience of sensations, thoughts, feelings, and desires. The higher structured potential flows from behind our current "I" perspective, implodes through our 'now' state, and becomes concretized into inner-outer perceptions as it recedes down towards the bottom. There is ongoing feedback as the manifest world turns inside-out and returns to the structured potential. Everyone acknowledges this upper domain of potential in some way or another, but they just imagine the "I" perspective is completely outside the torus, viewing the whole process from the side like we are doing with this graphic. Then they come up with theoretical frameworks to model the process from the side, the precise framing of which depends on their personal temperament, preferences, and inclinations. Note the only thing that needs to change here is for the "I" perspective to realize this is only a symbol and it is actually right in the middle of the torus at all times. The "I" really needs to inhabit that perspective to recognize its own true significance in the Cosmic telos.

DH knows many of these things at the abstract level, like BK and others, thus he says the telos of the One Consciousness is to know itself from many infinite different perspectives and through infinitely many conscious experiences. But, if the "I" thinking that telos inhabits the middle perspective shown above, it becomes self-evident that this telos must be intimately related to the evolutionary process of adaptation, selection, reproduction, etc., and the emergence of conscience, cooperation, and altruism within the sphere of thinking "I"-beings. He doesn't concretely connect that telos to the Earthly sphere of evolution experienced through the headset because that makes it too intimate, as Cleric suggested. It suggests a sacrificial responsibility to be the best 'avatars' we can possibly be in this evolutionary telos, i.e. to consciously and morally participate in the evolutionary unfoldment through our intimate knowing activity.

[lorenzop]

... Everyone believes in the archetypal patterns of meaning discerned by thought - otherwise, they wouldn't do scientific research and speak about their results, let alone write books and give interviews about them. So JP was trying to point towards this patently obvious fact of our real-time experience, where thinking perceives the functional meaning that is preserved across layers of reality, from the unmanifest layers to the manifest layers. But I agree he could have done it more effectively by a) making his words less like hammers and b) focusing on the real-time experience of the thinking perspective that DH and all other scientists use to formulate their theories and models.

I think very few people believe in 'archetypal patterns of meaning discerned by thought' EXCEPT possibly as archetypal patterns constructed and shared by conscious agents . . . which I believe is DH's point.
As far archetypal patterns being baked into reality - very few accept this.

[AshvinP]

... Everyone believes in the archetypal patterns of meaning discerned by thought - otherwise, they wouldn't do scientific research and speak about their results, let alone write books and give interviews about them. So JP was trying to point towards this patently obvious fact of our real-time experience, where thinking perceives the functional meaning that is preserved across layers of reality, from the unmanifest layers to the manifest layers. But I agree he could have done it more effectively by a) making his words less like hammers and b) focusing on the real-time experience of the thinking perspective that DH and all other scientists use to formulate their theories and models.

I think very few people believe in 'archetypal patterns of meaning discerned by thought' EXCEPT possibly as archetypal patterns constructed and shared by conscious agents . . . which I believe is DH's point.
As far archetypal patterns being baked into reality - very few accept this.

By "believe", I mean it is presupposed in everything they do. For ex., DH is trying to mathematically model the architecture of conscious agents beyond the headset. What is a mathematical model except an archetypal pattern of functional meaning? If there was no archetypal pattern of meaning to this structure of conscious agents, it would make no sense to try and mathematize it. Do you see what I mean? Remember, unlike the materialist, DH holds the fundamental reality to be conscious experiences - represented by colors, sounds, smells, etc. - and these are obviously meaningful.

And it is that reality - the correspondence between what thinking is implicitly doing and what thinking is explicitly perceiving - that bridges the 'constructed and shared' meaning within the headset (explicit) with the archetypal meaning beyond (implicit). But that bridge only manifests when the "I"-perspective doing the thinking becomes conscious of what it is doing, i.e. when it realizes the structure of meaning is preserved between the headset (manifest) and the non-headset (unmanifest) by its own activity.

[lorenzop]

Taking a step back for a moment - I don't buy DH headset theory. If we took a simple camera, like a pinhole, or camera with a len(s) and film, the image of a landscape gathered by any simple camera is very much like the image we perceive seeing that landscape - leading me to believe our experience closely matches reality.

Putting my (above) concern aside, a mathematical model is a tool, models and ' archetypal pattern of functional meaning' have different meanings and are applied in different contexts. A model is a simplified representation or abstraction of real-world systems, objects, concepts, or phenomena. 'archetypal pattern of functional meaning' refer to universal symbols or themes that are deeply ingrained in the human collective (unconscious).

An example of an archetypal pattern is the hero's journey . . . this archetype is useful to understand and describe narratives, behaviors etc.; but it's not a model in the traditional\mathematical\scientific sense.

[AshvinP]

Taking a step back for a moment - I don't buy DH headset theory. If we took a simple camera, like a pinhole, or camera with a len(s) and film, the image of a landscape gathered by any simple camera is very much like the image we perceive seeing that landscape - leading me to believe our experience closely matches reality.

Putting my (above) concern aside, a mathematical model is a tool, models and ' archetypal pattern of functional meaning' have different meanings and are applied in different contexts. A model is a simplified representation or abstraction of real-world systems, objects, concepts, or phenomena. 'archetypal pattern of functional meaning' refer to universal symbols or themes that are deeply ingrained in the human collective (unconscious).

An example of an archetypal pattern is the hero's journey . . . this archetype is useful to understand and describe narratives, behaviors etc.; but it's not a model in the traditional\mathematical\scientific sense.

This is exactly the issue, the thinking-perspective gets left out of the thought-content. We can break it down as follows:

Thought-content #1: The image of a landscape gathered by a camera looks like X-Y-Z
Thought-content #2: The landscape perceived by my conscious visual system looks like X-Y-Z
Conclusion: My conscious visual system perceives the actual structure of reality since it matches the camera image.

What is missing from #1? Exactly the thinking-perspective that takes the picture and looks at the image! We can only assert the camera image is some unadulterated snapshot of 'reality' if we forget that it was our thinking-perspective that devised the camera and also that perceives its result. We use the same visual system to perceive the camera image as we do the direct landscape without any camera.

Now this isn't usually the stumbling block for people like DH - he would readily admit the above but stumble a step more inward when we get to the domain of, not outer perception, but conceptual theorizing. He would forget the thinking-perspective in the act of formulating meaningful models of the ontological structure beyond the headset. But we can't ever hope to get a sense of what 'patterns of meaning', or any similar concept like simply 'meaning', is pointing to unless we rediscover our active thinking role in all perception and insight into what is perceived.

I know we have had this same discussion several times before. Perhaps it won't matter, but I would take this opportunity to bring back up the experiment Cleric suggested previously - viewtopic.php?p=18522#p18522

If you try the experiment again, how would you describe the inner activity you experience?

[lorenzop]

Re a simple camera . . . 1) a pinhole camera has no headset, has no design, and, 2) it's extremely unlikely a pinhole camera image is really chaotic and our headset instantly\simultaneously evolved to properly read this camera image nearly the same as we read the actual landscape.
Are you suggesting the camera image on film is patterns of meaning, and requires a human headset to see the landscape - and if we could turn off the headset, and looked at the image, we'd see patterns of meaning?
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Re 'patterns of meaning', I can't say for sure I know what you are talking about, or believe these exist . . . but let's say they do exist . . . if we could explore them, perhaps harvest a more splendid pattern of meaning, it's this just a higher class of enslavement, as I've referred to this in the past - an exalted pursuit of a Golden Calf.

[Cleric K]

Re a simple camera . . . 1) a pinhole camera has no headset, has no design, and, 2) it's extremely unlikely a pinhole camera image is really chaotic and our headset instantly\simultaneously evolved to properly read this camera image nearly the same as we read the actual landscape.
Are you suggesting the camera image on film is patterns of meaning, and requires a human headset to see the landscape - and if we could turn off the headset, and looked at the image, we'd see patterns of meaning?

Lorenzo, let me give another rendition of what Ashvin is pointing out. You walk with your friend along a seashore of very fine moist sand. You observe how your friend leaves footprints as she walks. Then you reason "These footprints look exactly like her feet (inverted of course)! In a way the sand 'sees' the shape of her feet and it is exactly the same as when I look directly at them. Thus I must be seeing her feet as they really are. If it was only a figment of my mind, the footprints would have to look differently. Nature wouldn't need to 'see' the same shape as me when I look at her feet."

Or we can make it even simpler: you look at your friend not directly but at her reflection in a mirror. Then you say "There! We perceive reality as it is because the mirror sees and reflects the same image as what I see when looking directly."

This is really the essence of the camera example. The fact that we're using camera and light makes it only a little bit more convoluted but in its essence there's no difference with what was described above (in a sense, the camera takes the 'footprint' of light as it impresses on the plaque/sensor and is then presented on paper/screen).

Now if DH would have to defend his desktop analogy, he might say something like this:

Reality is objectively real but is completely unlike the contents of our consciousness. Let's denote the true and unknown reality as Z. Our conscious experience is W. Then if we assume that our conscious experience is produced by certain transformation of true reality, we can write W = f(Z) i.e. we take Z, pass it through the transformation denoted as function f and we get our desktop experience W. Now every function is a mapping from one space to another (could also be the same space - then the function only morphs the input).



If the function is continuous then elements of Z which are close together will also be close together in W. For example W + Δ₁ = f(Z + Δ₂) where the deltas represent some very small variation. What does this mean? That the reality of the foot and the footprint in Z, which are very similar (close together in the plane), when transformed by f result into desktop experiences which are also similar (close together in the plane).

This is the explanation. In one case the light phenomenon is directly transformed by f (when we look directly). In the other, it takes a transformative detour. Light gets converted to electricity, then maybe to orientation of magnetic domains on the hard drive, then it is read out and displayed on a computer screen. Yet the whole process is devised in such a way that it produces light phenomenon Z + Δ, which is very close to Z when looking directly. When both are transformed they produce very similar icons W and W + Δ.

What I'm trying to show is that the fact that we see the photograph (or footprint) to be similar to the original doesn't in any way prove that this is how it looks in reality. As shown, what the real camera sees is also a process in the Z space, that is, the camera does not see what we experience in our W space. But when we receive the light from both the real object Z and its transformed light Z + Δ, they both transform into similar icons W and W + Δ.

All this is mentioned just as a fun exercise. The whole thing is that DH and others, assume that there's unbridgeable chasm between Z and W. We can never have conscious experience of Z or at least not while we're in the Earthly headset. And this is what we must challenge because otherwise we reach nothing but dead ends. Simply stated, the investigation of the depth dimension of our being, explores the conscious states and the forms of spiritual activity all along the transformation f - if we imagine that it consists of vast number of intermediate transformations. Something like:



We can take Z and W to be as extremes. Z is the fountainhead of ideal potential, while W is the collapsed perception. The whole idea is that we can find the modes of consciousness along these blocks and experience the Cosmos at its various stages of concretization, so to speak. Of course, the blocks are not connected in a simple unidirectional way - they also have feedbacks.

Anyway, I got carried away with this example. Obviously all this is an oversimplification and shouldn't be taken as literal model of reality.

What we have gathered is:
1. No, the camera example doesn't show that we perceive reality as it is (explained above)
2. There's no reason to conclude that Z and W are completely separate realms, just because we don't have consciousness of Z bestowed on us without any effort on our side.
3. When the appropriate effort is exercised we can indeed find that consciousness lives also along the gradient of f.

Re 'patterns of meaning', I can't say for sure I know what you are talking about, or believe these exist . . . but let's say they do exist . . . if we could explore them, perhaps harvest a more splendid pattern of meaning, it's this just a higher class of enslavement, as I've referred to this in the past - an exalted pursuit of a Golden Calf.

I think you purposefully want to see 'patterns of meaning' as nothing but a leisure time amusement of seeing faces in the clouds. If that was the case - sure, finding random patterns and trying to convince others that they are something real, is indeed a disturbing endeavor.

But to this day I'm not sure what your position is. From the way you speak, I would say that you see reality as inherently random. Any lawfulness that we observe is just coincidental temporary swirling of otherwise uncorrelated ripples. In that case, it is understandable that any interest in higher order patterns (resulting from intuitive intents at higher scales) is just a cloud face in our personal mind. Does this capture your philosophical outlook?

[AshvinP]

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Re 'patterns of meaning', I can't say for sure I know what you are talking about, or believe these exist . . . but let's say they do exist . . . if we could explore them, perhaps harvest a more splendid pattern of meaning, it's this just a higher class of enslavement, as I've referred to this in the past - an exalted pursuit of a Golden Calf.

On this topic, I would also point out that the above could be true only IF the patterns of meaning don't relate to our own higher potential, informing us precisely how to more effectively loosen our chains and grow into that potential. You mentioned the pattern of the hero's journey. If this was just some character arc we could watch in movies or read in books, like watching splendid patterns of faces in the clouds, and nothing else, then yes we would be effectively enslaving ourselves to another form of mindless comfort and entertainment, even if we call it 'religious' or 'spiritual'. Yet you mentioned it could also help us understand the behavior of others and our own behaviors in the world, and that's the key.

We don't resonate with the story of the hero's journey only on the basis of being entertained. Rather, it speaks to us of our own lives - the courage it takes to leave the safety of our familiar land and face the unknown, the trials and tribulations we meet along the way, the inner maturation we experience, the parts of ourselves that need to die and be transformed, the loving and redemptive ideals we strive for, and the possibilities for us to metamorphose into something new, beautiful, and divine. Although we are communicating here in prosaic concepts, the archetype speaks to us at a much deeper level. We can even sense it in the processes of Nature.





I realize the materialist or anyone else could say, "you are simply projecting man-made constructs of meaning onto natural processes", which is why Cleric's question is important. We need to be clear with ourselves on our philosophy and its implications for our living experience of reality. We all know the implications of materialist philosophy that denies ontological status to meaning. What about yours?

[lorenzop]

There are a few issues in this discussion, 1) How closely our perception of the world matches with the actual true world . . . I don't believe there is an actual true world independent of experience (ie there is no dream without the dreamer). A movie can exist as images on a roll of film, but a 'movie' does not exist without a viewer. The 'headset' is a red herring.
However if someone were to ask me how old is the universe, I would answer 13.n billion years as this is the best available answer in the context in which the question is asked.
2) Re 'patterns of meaning', I've admitted before and I'll do it again - - I do not know what you and Ashwin are referring to - - I am guessing examples like hero's journey, or cat-ness, or The Fall (of man), Redemption, etc.. In any case, if these patterns of meanings exist, there would be no end to them, and there is no freedom in the knowing of them - - there may be the promise of success in relative terms . . . promises of maidens in waiting, fine instruments of music, many sons and daughters, and more cattle than one can count . . .

[AshvinP]

There are a few issues in this discussion, 1) How closely our perception of the world matches with the actual true world . . . I don't believe there is an actual true world independent of experience (ie there is no dream without the dreamer). A movie can exist as images on a roll of film, but a 'movie' does not exist without a viewer. The 'headset' is a red herring.
However if someone were to ask me how old is the universe, I would answer 13.n billion years as this is the best available answer in the context in which the question is asked.

So just to confirm, would you say your belief matches that of Michael James in this interview (relevant clip below)? When Bernardo asks whether James believes there is something it is like to be Bernardo, he basically says Bernardo probably doesn't have a first-person perspective, it just 'seems that way' within the dreamscape.


[bbvideo]https://youtube.com/clip/UgkxmNQzqXNTbZ ... 67SxQkhWEF[/bbvideo]