que es ver?

Message-Id: <f00a.294.34@think.net>

<..>

My problem is this: The expression to 'bring forth a world', being what an
observer does in languaging, still remains fundamentally problematic for me.
It is as if there is a blind spot in the approach: We have the experience of
looking at a world of objects. Mat. argues that perception arises as the
description of an organism in congruence with its environment, so
perception, in this account, is effectively structural coupling.
None of this gives me a visual field in which I can observe the congruent
behaviour of an organism. I still don't see how recursions in acts produce
a visual field.

Let me suggests that your 'experience of a perceptual field' is in a different
REALM from the languaging related to 'structural coupling' or 'brain
functions.'
In other words, experience comes into being, then disappears. There's no
way to 'explain' them.

<..>

Do you see what I mean. Computers or Terminator 2, don't really need to see
anything.
My (and many others) "problem" which requires a new set of concepts is that
our current models of perception are unable to account for the world of
colour and form that we look at, and which is a _cerebral achievement_ that
appears as if outside of our heads but which is "in" our heads. (Some find

Once again. Our perceptions are not IN any physical place. They are 'in' a
different realm of existence. The most one can say is that certain
functioning of the brain is correlated with certain reports of experiences
of certain people. Confusion arise when one tries to 'explain' phenomena
in one realm with phenomena from the other.

this shocking but the logic is unassailable).
The difficulty of course is that when a brain is perceived from the
perspective of a 3rd person (imagine being able to lift off someone's
cranium {trepanation} and take a look inside. There's no show going on. In
fact, what we as subjects see as a visual field, has no extrinsic
localisable coordinates, altho its 'in' the brain, yet not open to viewing
by another.

You appear to be making a materialist assumption. Perhaps even a reductionist
one. It is not sensible to try to reconcile such assumptions with M&V's
views, which are much more in line with buddhist approaches.

<...>

Do you see the flower?

Sure, I see it. But not my brain.

P.s. I once heard Mat. talk about Penrose and microtubules and quantum brain
dynamics. Mat doesn't like this stuff at all. But I can't remember why.
Maybe cos it opens up the closure of the n.system. Any one familiar with
this esoteric stuff?

I don't like it because they seemed to be asking the wrong questions.
For example, some people try to use quantum probabilistic metaphor to
'explain' free will. For me, free will is a certain type of experience,
perhaps an illusion. No explanation is needed. However, to the extent
that these speculations can inspire and further a constructive approach
to AI, they are valuable. For me, that's the ONLY way to settle the
question of whether artificial beings can be made. It is no more
(and no less) mysterious than how a single fertilized egg can develop
under the right environment into a human which we call a 'being.'

Regards,

A. Chu

···

From: P.Bains@uws.edu.au (Paul Bains)
Date: Thu, 09 May 1996 12:48:46 -0800

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If we have a look at language then we see that the primary "engine" of
language is transparency. When I look at a symbol, I don't just see a

sequence

of letters, I see something which the symbol is pointing towards. For

instance,

when I look at the word "cow" I envision a quadrapedal moo-thing. I rarely

think

about the fact that I am looking at symbols that bring my attention to these
other things. In other words, symbols are transparent to me. I see through
them without noticing them.

What you call a symbol is a coordination. The coordination is transparent to
you because you do nothing to achieve it.

It arises through structural coupling, without intention; you don't perceive
it. This is just a problem of disjunct domains. To put it bluntly: can your
nerves feel perception? No, they just react to each other.

Later you _call_ the result of this coordination a symbol, because it
recalls something else than itself to you.

But think about it: isn't our perception symbolic then?

No!

Isn't the image
that appear on our eyes a _symbol_ representing the external world?

What external world?

The point is that the symbol is a coordination that you make. You coordinate
yourself with yourself.

This means that Maturana was right about perception being linguistic then,
right?

Hm... I think you are confusing Maturana's ideas.

In Maturana's view perception is linguistic because anything that you
distinguish, you can name. If you make a distinction, you can simply
coordinate the distinction with an act: saying a word, for example. That's
why you live in a linguistic domain: all the world that you distinguish is
exactly the same world that you can name.

Wrong! Symbolics is a crucial but unsufficient aspect of language. (Hence
perception is pre-linguistic.)

That's (more or less) the point that worries me, and I think worries Paul
Bains too. An ameba and a cat don't have language, so in Maturana's
explanation (as far as I understand it) the ameba and the cat would have the
same level of experience. They only exhibit behaviour congruent with their
environment. That does not seem reasonable to me. But I have no clear
argument to state that... I think have a lot to study before being able to
discriminate clearly on this issue.

By the way: did I get it right with your doubts, Paul?

JJ

PS: Onar, speaking of mirrors, have you read about the bubble of perception?
It's a model proposed by an indian in Carlos Castaneda's books. The indian
says that you live inside a mirroring bubble, and when you look outside you
are actually looking at yourself, looking inside. Another mirror model!

···

At 09:35 PM 9/5/96 -0800, Onar Aam wrote:

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