Originally Posted by
Mario92
What you have got here is an ad ignorantiam fallacy, which is to say, a fallacy based on the principle of "we don't know, and you can't show it's false." And if I've ignored something, it's more likely that I missed it. Sorry my life is not devoted to debating with you. Now, if consciousness does not display emergent properties (and exactly how it does not, I'd be curious to know), there is a potentially valid explanation for that. When you look at the fossil record, you don't see a very smooth and clear transition all the time, and it is highly unlikely to see living ancestors of modern day species. Humans did not just spontaneously appear...we evolved. That point is often argued by some by the lack of living ape-people. In reality, you don't need living ape people. It's actually very unlikely to see that kind of thing in any species. So, if it seems there's a bit of a gap between chimpanzee consciousness and human consciousness, or whatever the case may be, consider we don't have the complete picture. We don't have the luxury of tracking its development across time. And if that still doesn't satisfy you, we are still dealing with an unexplained event. It is too early to draw conclusions. Could you be right? Sure. But the burden of proof is on your shoulders.
Yes I could be. Show me I couldn't be. Reality is relative. You could see a great nine-story beast loping down the street dressed in a business suit, but to everyone else, you're insane. It's your reality. Similarly, consciousness may very well be flawed, too. I perceive to exist in this universe, but I may not be. I could be being deceived my my senses or whatever fanciful hallucinations my penguin-brain have brought on. If you want to be technical, I don't really know anything. But what I do know is that I'm a tiny, insignificant speck of carbon on a tiny blue rock hurling through space on the outer limb of a massive galaxy. At least, I am in this world I perceive to inhabit. Give me one good reason why I, an imperfect meatbag, should be channeling some great conscious thing in the universe.
Okay, so I know of existence. Big whoop. What does that mean? Just because senses may be flawed is not a good reason to attribute consciousness to something beyond the human mind. It may very well be the one thing you absolutely know is true without a doubt, but perhaps that is only because you cannot conceive of being mistaken. You can't imagine consciousness being a mind-created hallucination.
I come from the realm of atheism...specifically, the flavor of atheism that contends that there is nothing mystical or spiritual going on in the universe...the branch that contends that everything can be subjected to logical thought and analysis and explained rationally.