Conciousness

Jeff Hawkins

  • Theory of mind
  • 7 levels of interaction
  • Perception input – filtered by expected input
  • Differences – filtered by expected differences
  • Ditto up to level 7 where we become “aware”
  • Humans are “predictive” machines
  • Your brain is predicting...

Daniel Dennet's take

  • We aren't as conscious as we might think
  • Unaware of changes – illusions vs perception
  • Built-in bias, “being conscious, I know what it is … and it can't be that simple”
  • The brain seems to be quite happy will the illusion of completeness
  • The “prediction” is assumed

Six Impossible Things

  • We seek explanations – Stories
  • We will fill in the missing parts
  • Explaining “Memes” are sticky
  • Which is why we hold “Beliefs”

Nova Science Now

  • Emergence
  • Ever increasing complexity
  • yields structure – order
  • Design “emerges” – Big Bang to Galaxies
  • Organic chemicals to cells
  • (Comets have both amino acids & water)
  • Complex cell structures to consciousness

Jill Bolte Taylor

  • Stroke of insight
  • Internal experience of losing ½ her mind
  • Practical differences between left and right brain
  • Scientific American Oct. 09
  • “Pills to make you smart”
  • Cognitive Enhancement ----> H+
  • “Speculative Ethics”
  • What if there is a pill that
  • Makes you smarter?
  • Helps your memory?
  • Etc … like steroids do for athletes

“Listening to Prozac”; Peter Kramer