This is exactly the sort of non-explanation I was warning against. None of that goes any way towards explaining wetness. In fact, wetness is explained, nowadays, in terms of atoms.
The fact that you don't like the explanation doesn't make it a "non-explanation".
In fact, wetness is explained, nowadays, in terms of atoms.
Reductively, yes. But I defy you to find me an explanation of wetness written in terms of atoms. Which atom in H20 contains the "wetness" property, exactly? That's exactly my point: "wetness" itself is not a property of atoms. Nor even of individual molecules, nor even of small quantities of molecules -- but rather of the interaction of a large quantity of molecules.
We know how atoms combine into molecules; how forces exist between molecules which, under certain temperatures and pressures, result in the liquid state;
That is more a "description" than an "explanation".
Turbulence is less well understood.
Indeed. But what explanations we have for it do not depend upon the behaviors of individual quarks, and we never discuss it in those terms. That's exactly the point: even attempting to discuss turbulence in terms of quarks is failing to properly address the right scale.
So, too, with consciousness and neurons -- so goes the assertion which you reject out of hand as a "non-explanation". It states that there are intermediary levels of explanation which must be engaged between consciousness and neurons. Minsky's "Society of Mind" qualifies as this; neurons comprise individual components of select "agents", and those agents together manifest "consciousness" in the same way that atoms comprise molecules which in turn manifest "wetness" when present in the correct quantity.
A real explanation of consciousness as a physical process of the brain must go all the way down to atoms
Ahem. This is absurd. Nowhere in scientific endeavors is this done. Emergence (non-epiphenomenalistic emergence that is) is not a rejection of reductivism, but an assertion of it.
as surely as an explanation of how rats work must go all the way down to atoms
Find me an explanation of rats written in terms of atoms -- and I'll accept what you say. You must, for your rejection of emergent-phenomena-as-consciousness-explanation to be accepted as valid by me -- should this be your goal -- find an explanation of rats that has no shift in scale other than atoms. It must explain everything about rats in terms of their atoms.
The fact that you don't like the explanation doesn't make it a "non-explanation".
The causality is in the opposite direction.
neurons comprise individual components of select "agents", and those agents together manifest "consciousness" in the same way that atoms comprise molecules which in turn manifest "wetness" when present in the correct quantity.
"those agents together manifest "consciousness"" is not an explanation: it is a hole where an explanation should go. There is nothing in common w...
Inspired by What visionary project would you fund?, I'm wondering about whether there are known blank areas in our knowledge which might turn up surprising knowledge.
Once upon a time, the sun was a mystery. People had a pretty good idea of its mass, and how much chemical energy would be needed to keep it shining. I don't remember how long the sun could last running on chemical energy, but it didn't seem plausible that it could be so new.
It turned out that chemical energy wasn't the only possibility.
I don't get the impression that there was wide appreciation that most of the world was being ignored by scientists because the calculations were too difficult-- until the calculations were made easier.
Do people here expect to be surprised by whatever it takes to understand qualia?