motivation, consciousness

Rob Harris (rob@hbinternet.co.uk)
Tue, 30 Nov 1999 16:41:57 -0000

Rob wrote:
>> All base rules, and therefore motivations are out of our control. The
only
>>"freedom" our "intelligence"gets is to come up with the plans that fulfil
>>this predetermined motivation set.>>

Glen wrote:
>I don't think this is strictly true.

Rob added:
What you wrote was exactly what I meant. You just put it across better! The "plans" I speak of represent the secondary desires that you mention.

Rob wrote:
>>I could go further and mention that we don't control our intelligence
>>either - in fact, that the consciousness is not a control device at all,
but
>>that's another subject.

Glen wrote:
>Please do continue; I would be interested to hear what you believe is
>consciousness.

Ok, Ahem......I've got about 3 minutes left, but I'll whack what I can down....
If someone put a gun to my head and asked me to guess correctly the function of consciousness in relation to the rest of the brain, I would say that it is a conceptual clipboard. Conceptual common ground between the output from the emotive systems and the intelligent systems and the senses and so on. As the raw output generated by the various systems is conceptually incompatible with output from other systems, the data must be translated to a common conceptual denominator - one that captures the "essence" of each form of data, without losing data resolution.
For instance, imagine a brain experiencing the triggering factors of fear. The related system would output it's data - that data would end up in the consciousness as the effect that we perceive as fear. The other brain systems are also listening to the consciousness - for data from other areas that require this conceptual bridge. Next, the intelligence grabs the data - aggh, fear - it's time to leave it thinks, and off you go. The side effect is the "you" that actually experiences this fear. You ARE the qualia, the consciousness, the conceptual clipboard from some backwater somewhere within eternity. You are here to provide that service to the host organism - and that's where "your" job ends. Give us your comments on this little bit - I'll get back to it tommorrow.....gotta go!

Rob