Comment on ​My recent thoughts on consciousness

Richard_Kennaway
Wed, 24 Jun 2015 12:40:29 GMT

Our ignorance of how to test for something we insist exists is not proof of anything, but it is strong evidence of a conceptual muddle.

In the case of consciousness, we do not have to insist on anything. We can simply point to our internal experience, and say, "this is what we mean, when we talk about consciousness." That we have no explanation for how there could possibly be any such thing does not invalidate the experience, for even a faultily conceptualised experience is still an experience. No matter how the experience is reinterpreted, it obstinately remains an experience.

The conceptual muddle is in thinking that because we do not understand a thing, it therefore does not exist.

Descartes said all that in three words.

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