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When we die, we are no more, and hence our conciousness is no more. If that is the case, how are we even able to think and be aware right now? Wouldn't it be the case that if we're going to die, shouldn't we not even know we ever existed or have any memories? When we die we won't know we died.
I'm not sure if that makes sense or not.
Order of Kilopi
Because we're not dead yet. At least, that's my theory.Originally Posted by OrionTheory
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.
Established Member
Berkeley Brethed was on top of this.
Member
Well yeah, but the point is you will be and at that point you won't remember anything whatsoever, so how do you even know you're here right now?Because we're not dead yet. At least, that's my theory.
Member
I'm not debating that you and I are here. I'm trying to figure out how we even have consciousness when we're going to die at which point you won't know/remember anything, including this, so how do you even know it now?
Order of Kilopi
I'm having a hard time understanding your question. It seems like looking at a pile of ash and asking how it could possibly have ever been a stack of firewood.
As far as I'm concerned, conciousness is just an emergent property of our brains. While we are alive, we (appear to) think. When we are dead, our brains are no longer doing what they did, so we don't think. Anything that we call "conciousness" is gone. The end.
The Universe appears to be full of cause and effect; there is an arrow of time. We are alive, then later we are dead. I don't understand why our later death makes you worry about conciousness when we are alive.
Get up, a get-get, get down.
Established Member
Until someone comes up with an explanation of how matter becomes aware of itself in the first place, I consider the question unanswered.
Order of Kilopi
On two occasions in my life I had credible cause to believe I was terminally ill. That's a lot different than when you are in a sudden life threatening one. Intelligence and hyper-awareness and all the other survival tools that go in our evolutionary kit bags are of no use. That sucks mightly.
My liver was crapping out hard and suddenly and I wasn't a transplant candidate because they didn't know why my liver was crapping out hard and suddenly.
I called it being on the exit ramp of the highway of life. Got as far as the hepatic coma. Drifting off into *that* is the point I thought I dying and soon to experience disolution*. Something we all must, I'm afraid. That's why I try to be nice to people.
Years later there was an error and I thought I had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's. For months. I was even taking end of life counciling**. This one diagnostician didn't know I was a past tramatic brain injury sufferer and mistook old scars in my left temporal lobe and a few other places for new lesions.
And yes, it IS a lot like the photon's apparent lack of time sense between being emitted and hitting its finally absorber. I recall during the alzheimer's scare thinking "Damn, it's that time again." The time to die thing, that is. Once you've had those things happen though you don't get the illusion of immortality back very easily. Even when you're perfectly healthy you know you're still a terminal case.
That's why I try to be nice to people. Honest to God, with the exception of the fist fights I get into with my older brother, every single person I've jacked up physically since leaving the service was somebody I caught playing rough with the girls in public like they thought they could. Or as the phrase goes, "What? You think you live on TV?"
Which some people consider being nice.
*Cessation of self-mediated brain chemistry.
**If I ever become King of the World I'm going to make it a law that end of life councilors have to spent one month out of three working in a kid's ice cream parlor. Half of them folk's seem to be a spilled cup of coffee or a bounced check away from suicide.
Order of Kilopi
I don't understand your reasoning either. Our consciousness (or the illusion of it, perhaps) comes from the collection of memories we have formed so far. Why would it be affected by something that happens in the future?
Established Member
One way to make sense of your question is as some version of Cartesian doubt. We (I) know at least that we (I) exist and everything else that we perceive, including that I'm here right now, is some kind of dream or illusion. In this interpretation of your question "dying" could mean awakening from this dream, either with or without any memory of the dream. Amnesia is possible with brain damage so I suppose that when we lose our brains we also lose all our memories, but perhaps there is another form of memory that's brain independent. The brain is after all an illusion in this dreamworld ...remember?
Established Member
The problem I see with your idea that consciousness comes from a collection of memories is consciousness appears present before any memories are collected. It seems the consciousness is what collects or attracts the memory, not the memory causing the consciousness. Furthermore, I think it possible to have memory and still have consciousness, not just as a newborn, but as an adult.
Order of Kilopi
I think what the original poster might be having a hard time with is the specialness of the time during which we are alive. The universe is 13.7 billion years old, and it has a whole lot longer than that left to go, yet somehow we get <100 years to be conscious, and what do you know, here we are. Many people aren't here now, many haven't been born yet, but you and I are here now. Why is that? Is there really anything different about us from those who have died, or those who haven't been born yet? I don't think there is, it is merely part of our perception that we only perceive these <100 years out of all that many. It doesn't make "now" anything special that we are here, it is just the time that we are perceiving. When we cease to perceive, we will cease to perceive this time also. In effect, for us the entire eternity of time is really just these <100 years, much like the only distance that applies to a meterstick is 1 meter. Time is probably just a story we are telling ourselves to make sense of what is happening in our brains, all we can say is that we live a finite existence. Maybe "I" am just a story I'm telling myself too-- Descartes was wrong, it's not "I think therefore I am", it's "I tell myself I am, so I believe myself."
Order of Kilopi
Because I'm not dead yet. It hasn't happened yet, and my body and the consciousness it supports are still intact.
Provided I live long enough, in a few hours I'll be hungry. I'm not hungry right now. I don't find this paradoxical.
So far as I can tell, you're asking how we know everything doesn't happen all at once or backwards. What in your experience has led you to expect future events to affect the current state of things? (I'm assuming you're not an early victim of reality unraveling due to CERN's violations of causality...)
Member
Some people in the thread are kind of seeing my point here, which is, when I die, there will be nothing. My brain won't function anymore, and I won't even know it, so I'm wondering how I even can think/exist now if one day that will all be black. I won't even know when it happens, which puzzles me as to why we CAN exist in a linear environment.
Member
I think you're following my logic in a sense, and that is if we're going to go black one day, why didn't it just appear to be black/gone the second we started being able to perceive anything?
Order of Kilopi
Does a line having an end mean you cant have a line?
Then is different from now. If you are thinking now, then the fact that you are not going to be thinking then is not really all that relevent.
Also, thinking that you are alive and interacting with an environment and actually being alive and interacting with the environment, are the same thing. There is no way that you can ever tell a difference between the two.
So you can accept that you are thinking now and alive now, or not. You can exist in a linear environment because it is a linear environment and different points on that line are, in fact, different.
Order of Kilopi
Think of it this way. We live a finite existence. We have a certain range of perceptions in our memories, and can conceptualize a person at the end of their life with even more memories than we have now. We have a brain to make sense of those finite perceptions. We find that ordering them in a certain way makes a lot of sense. We invent the concept of time to do that. We find all kinds of patterns and regularities. But a funny thing happens at some point in this processing-- we start to enter into our concept of time. We are not just using time to order our perceptions, we perceive ourselves as actually living in the order that makes sense to us. That's very strange, the concept has become the master. I think your question can be framed, "why now? What is so special about now, that we are perceiving it and the rest is memory or fate?" I have no idea, but there seems to be something about perception that must be alive in the now. If so, then "now" isn't something that we perceive, it is a part of perception. We have acquired the ability to perceive, and so with it comes a sense of "now", but note that every perception has its own "now". Maybe we are not just a person who moves through time, maybe we are only a person who is perceving whatever we are perceiving now. Take away our memory, and it becomes even more clear that this is indeed the bare essential of "what we are."
Member
Apologies for the vague descriptions, I wasn't sure how to word the question I was asking. I wonder how/if we know when the end is right there, because at one point you remember everything then you just are gone.
Established Member
Have you ever fainted, undergone anesthesia, or even fell asleep? I expect that (except for the permanence of death) the loss of consciousness is much the same - here today and now: gone tomorrow...
Order of Kilopi
I assume (we can never really know, for obvious reasons) that you wouldn't be aware of the moment of death. Imagine someone attempting to disarm a bomb: "Now all I need to do is cut the red wi".
But again, why would that affect anything in his life, memories or consciousness up to that point?
Imagine you are on a train, enjoying the journey, watching passing trees and houses, and stopping at stations. Will that change just because someone tells you that the line ends at New York or Paddington?
Order of Kilopi
Would you be willing to participate in an experiment?
Sorry, couldn't resist
I think BioSci says it well...
I have gone through various anesthetics on various surgeries. Whatever that knockout stuff is, is really amazing. No, there is no counting down from 100 even though they tell you to. And waking up is just as instant.
I think a lot of people think of dying as falling asleep where [evil voice]you are getting sleepy, very sleepy[/evil voice]. Yes; some people do die a horrible death where they slowly lose consciousness, but I don't think that's the norm.
Order of Kilopi
The world will still exist (unless you insist on solipsism), but the working, functioning "you" will not.
Why not? Why wouldn't personal existence end when the brain stops functioning? It wouldn't be "black" because that would require that you continue to exist to experience that.My brain won't function anymore, and I won't even know it, so I'm wondering how I even can think/exist now if one day that will all be black.
Because that's how our brains work. We process the information and commit it to memory. If the brain no longer functions no more experiences are processed and committed to memory. I don't see why there would be confusion on that point: Either your brain is functioning or it isn't.I won't even know when it happens, which puzzles me as to why we CAN exist in a linear environment.
Ever had conscious sedation? That's a mild sedation where you might still be able to respond to questions, but the medicine messes with your ability to create long term memories of the event.
To me, it feels like being switched off. One second I hear someone say that they are putting the medicine in the IV, and for about a second I feel odd, more relaxed, vision getting a little strange, it's a little hard to speak, and then *discontinuity* and I'm in the recovery room where there are different people and they tell me time has passed. Effectively "I" have been paused, the period under sedation does not exist for me.
It is different from going to sleep, which is usually a more gradual process and where you tend to have some memories. Effectively the "I" that was under sedation doesn't contribute to my identity, because I have no memory of it.
It is no harder for me to imagine a more complete and permanent switching off. And really, that seems to be all there is to it. Now, if you dislike the idea that your identity will eventually cease to exist and want to believe in a continuing existence independent of your body and the functioning of your brain, go right ahead. But it is a belief not supported by evidence.
I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?
The Leif Ericson Cruiser
Order of Kilopi
You could look at it as a sort of personal version of the anthropic principle. The universe is billions of years old, and you're conscious for only a tiny fraction of it. If you pick a random point in the history of the universe, you should be either not born yet or long since dead, so you shouldn't be conscious of anything. But this moment, with you consciously aware of the universe, is not just a randomly selected one. It has to be one of the small fraction of moments when you're conscious, or you wouldn't be around to be wondering why you're aware of things.
Conserve energy. Commute with the Hamiltonian.
Member
I definitely don't believe in any kind of continuation of my current conciousness. My question was if one day it is all going to be gone, how is it even here now.
I appreciate the responses and the patience with the questions.
Order of Kilopi
Because we don't experience everything from first consciousness to our deaths in a single instant. Again, the answer is the rather obvious "because we're not dead yet". Why should our state of consciousness once we're dead matter?
You may as well ask why your computer runs right now when it'll eventually get turned off. Whether it's a laptop or desktop, it'll eventually be unplugged and have dead batteries, but right now it clearly works. Do you really find this strange?
Order of Kilopi
If I am reading that statement right, there is no need to say about when it's gone.
Are you basically asking "how can I have conciousness when there was none before?"
Sounds like a philisophical question to me. But; I guess you can say that there is no function until you have that first synaptic connection being formed from that collection of genetic materials.
Established Member
What do mean by "one day it is all going to be gone" ? Do you mean the universe or your consciousness, both? You don't believe in ...continuation of current consciousness? Do you then believe in the continuation of a different kind of consciousness or don't you believe the continuation of any consciousness whatsoever?
I'm trying to determine the paradigm from which your question emerges. You're clearly puzzled about something, but that puzzlement must come from some kind of paradigm.
Puzzlement usually emerges when you expect something to be true based on your paradigm and it turns out to be false, or the other way around, you expect something to be false and it turns out to be true.
Let me see if I can parse your question:
Question: if one day it[consciousness] is all going to be gone, how is it even here now?
Puzzlement: how is it even here now?
Expectation: it shouldn't be here now.
Paradigm: If consciousness ceases to exist at at some time then it cannot exist at any time?
Is that your paradigm, if not, could you please clarify what it is?
Order of Kilopi
Yeah, I think I got your... trepidation. Earlier, you said....
Clearly it's the "no more consciousness" that you find troubling, or more contentiously, no more "spiritual energy" re-entering some eternal realm... After that, your question/argument kind of falls into one of incredulity. Your presentation to this forum is essentially, if I may paraphrase, "It's inconceivable that I'm not going to heaven."
I'm not sure if you'll find a lot of commiseration here or not.
Last edited by Cougar; 2011-Sep-29 at 12:40 AM. Reason: 4 word clause interjected
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.
Established Member
Definitely. But since no one here can offer any sort of explanation of how consciousness (by that, I mean self awareness---always good to try and define terms we are debating) arises in the first place, speaking authoritatively on the subject seems---specious at best. Or at least premature. Is there evidence for consciousness continuing after "death?" Not that I know of; but, likewise, there is no evidence it doesn't. So how can you be so sure? Seems to me that either position is pure speculation at this point.
Order of Kilopi
How do you define "self awareness"? How can you be "self aware" if you don't know how you are "self aware"? What exactly do you think needs explaining?
What we seem to be aware of are generally things that are useful for survival. It's useful to model the world, to pose "what if" questions in the model and use the model to gauge consequences of those what ifs. It is also useful to have an "I" as a point of reference in a model, so you can pose questions like "What happens if I walk over that cliff?"
But we aren't intuitively aware of how we build these models, or how our memory works, or how we walk or talk. There are, in fact, very many things we aren't aware of about ourselves. So certainly there is more, through objective research, to learn about the "how" behind our mental processes. But that just points out how unaware we actually are about ourselves.
Well, jokes aside, I see no evidence of people walking and talking or making pronouncements about their claimed "awareness" or "consciousness" without functioning brains. If you have evidence otherwise, you're welcome to present it.Or at least premature. Is there evidence for consciousness continuing after "death?" Not that I know of; but, likewise, there is no evidence it doesn't. So how can you be so sure? Seems to me that either position is pure speculation at this point.
I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?
The Leif Ericson Cruiser
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