Quote: Original post by Kwizatz
I think you're taking the discussion too seriously, my question was meant to elicit thought, not to argue a position, I initially though yours was too.

It was. But if I have to state a position, it's this: We have far too few datapoints, and a far too anthropocentric viewpoint, to make the question "is the earth alive and/or conscious" at all meaningful, let alone the answer to the question.

As I see it, restricting our conception of entity-ness to a single level is the first of many anthropocentric, and not necessarily defensible, assumptions that are made. I'm the independent creature me, and the me consists of parts which make up me but do not have independent and alive me-ness of their own. A single cell in my body isn't an organism while it's in my body, and once removed from my body it dies so I don't have to worry about whether it's an organism then. Since the human is the me-level, an organization of humans has no me-ness, and organs have no me-ness, and organelles certainly have no me-ness.

But a glance down the evolutionary tree suggests that this is far too simple a view. In the interface between the unicellular and the multicellular you find uncomfortable semantic questions about what makes something from a colony into a creature. Unlesss we're willing to draw a wholly arbitrary line in the sand, we'll have to agree that something can be an organism and yet also be a part of an organism, a dual me-ness which opens the door to considering things like societies and planets as life-forms. Shutting that door again, as I see it, requires discovering other limits on how you can put living things together and have the result not have any sort of me-ness.

Sneftel makes avery good point.

That's exactly why I introduced the notion of the Earth as a system. As long as we're in that system, the Earth is conscious. From another perspective, as a species we can't live apart from the Earth. Maybe someday, but right now and for the foreseeable future, we can't. Therefore, to the extent that we are permanently attached to the Earth, the Earth is conscious through us. Does that mean that our consciousness extends beyond us and into the inanimate-inorganic components of the Earth? No. My claim isn't supernatural. By extension, I wouldn't say that the moon was conscious, even though it could be thought of as part of the Earth system. So too with the sun (although with the sun, it's the Earth that would be part of the Solar System).

From this perspective, the response to "saying the earth is alive through us or the life in it, is like saying a rotting corpse is alive because of the maggots and other organisms on and in it," is to point out that as far as the system comprised of decomposing corpse, maggots and bacteria goes, the system contains life and could be judge to be alive. Remove the corpse and the maggots etc perish. Remove the soil from a potted plant and it dies. Remove the plant from the soil and the soil bacteria remain. Remove the bacteria from the soil and the potted plant dies. Life is much more pervasive than consciousness.

As I wrote before, we are conscious, we are made of Earth, we take in the Earth with every breath. We are part of the Earth system, thus, the Earth system is conscious to the extent we are conscious.

Quote: Original post by Sneftel

Quote: Original post by Kwizatz
I think you're taking the discussion too seriously, my question was meant to elicit thought, not to argue a position, I initially though yours was too.

It was. But if I have to state a position, it's this: We have far too few datapoints, and a far too anthropocentric viewpoint, to make the question "is the earth alive and/or conscious" at all meaningful, let alone the answer to the question.

As I see it, restricting our conception of entity-ness to a single level is the first of many anthropocentric, and not necessarily defensible, assumptions that are made. I'm the independent creature me, and the me consists of parts which make up me but do not have independent and alive me-ness of their own. A single cell in my body isn't an organism while it's in my body, and once removed from my body it dies so I don't have to worry about whether it's an organism then. Since the human is the me-level, an organization of humans has no me-ness, and organs have no me-ness, and organelles certainly have no me-ness.

But a glance down the evolutionary tree suggests that this is far too simple a view. In the interface between the unicellular and the multicellular you find uncomfortable semantic questions about what makes something from a colony into a creature. Unlesss we're willing to draw a wholly arbitrary line in the sand, we'll have to agree that something can be an organism and yet also be a part of an organism, a dual me-ness which opens the door to considering things like societies and planets as life-forms. Shutting that door again, as I see it, requires discovering other limits on how you can put living things together and have the result not have any sort of me-ness.

Well, I find myself mostly agreeing with you, an organism made of organisms is a super organism, and there seems to be dispute as whether such super organisms can in the whole be considered individuals, which is a different matter I presume.

Quote: Original post by LessBread
Sneftel makes avery good point.

That's exactly why I introduced the notion of the Earth as a system. As long as we're in that system, the Earth is conscious. From another perspective, as a species we can't live apart from the Earth. Maybe someday, but right now and for the foreseeable future, we can't. Therefore, to the extent that we are permanently attached to the Earth, the Earth is conscious through us. Does that mean that our consciousness extends beyond us and into the inanimate-inorganic components of the Earth? No. My claim isn't supernatural. By extension, I wouldn't say that the moon was conscious, even though it could be thought of as part of the Earth system. So too with the sun (although with the sun, it's the Earth that would be part of the Solar System).

From this perspective, the response to "saying the earth is alive through us or the life in it, is like saying a rotting corpse is alive because of the maggots and other organisms on and in it," is to point out that as far as the system comprised of decomposing corpse, maggots and bacteria goes, the system contains life and could be judge to be alive. Remove the corpse and the maggots etc perish. Remove the soil from a potted plant and it dies. Remove the plant from the soil and the soil bacteria remain. Remove the bacteria from the soil and the potted plant dies. Life is much more pervasive than consciousness.

As I wrote before, we are conscious, we are made of Earth, we take in the Earth with every breath. We are part of the Earth system, thus, the Earth system is conscious to the extent we are conscious.

So, you're saying the Earth is conscious by proxy, I can accept that line of thought, what bothers me to some extent and why I do not share the idea, besides slayemin points, is the lack of a unique shared consciousness between the individuals serving as proxy.

Quote: Original post by LessBread
Therefore, to the extent that we are permanently attached to the Earth, the Earth is conscious through us.

I can't totally get on board with this statement. The idea of consciousness jumping between levels seems awfully "supernatural". If a conscious entity can be built from pieces (like protons) that are not themselves conscious, then it stands to reason that unconscious (at least as a whole) things can be made from things that are more conscious. Consider a variant of the Chinese room experiment where instead of formulating chinese conversations, the guy is simply adding numbers that are fed to him through a slot. If one accepts (as I do) the "systems reply", that the standard Chinese room derives its consciousness not from the man but from the rules and actions being carried out, then it stands to reason that the equivalent Adding Machine Room would not be conscious, despite the consciousness of the man inside the room.

Quote: Original post by Kwizatz
Well, I find myself mostly agreeing with you, an organism made of organisms is a super organism, and there seems to be dispute as whether such super organisms can in the whole be considered individuals, which is a different matter I presume.

You can certainly argue back and forth whether specific examples like termite mounds and utopian movement collectives can be considered individuals inasmuch as they display certain behaviors intrinsic to individuals (self preservation, self regulation), but I can't think of a way to argue that no such super-organism could ever exist.

Quote:
"You are witnessing the completion of the saga about amoeba, which figure that it is God. Leaving the ocean depths,superamoeba,naming itself a man, decided that once it has gray matter called the brain, it is above all. And when it came to this conclusion, amoeba kills marine fish and forest beast, kills without an account or drops, without thinking about the purpose of Nature. It drill a hole in the mountains, and a denial of suffering ground heavy cities, and hides the green grass under a concrete crust. Then, multiply billion,
over any action, space amoeba rushes to the other worlds and there demolishes mountains,iron plains, reduces forest, alters river, dissolves the polar caps,shape continents and defiles the planet. Nature is old and sluggish,but it is relentless. And now it's time inevitably comes when the nature of annoying amoeba with its claims to be a God. And, therefore, comes a time when the planet, whose surface is plagued amoeba, rejects her, spit.On that day, to complete the surprise, amoeba finds that lived only on the patient indulgence of lying outside its imagination, along with the creatures of forest and wetlands, not worse than flower,no the better than seed, and that the universe is not the case before it died or dead, that all its vainglorious achievements nothing more than a trace of the spider on the sand. "

Sorry,I can't find it in English,-this is Roberth Shekly,"The mountain without a name"

[Edited by - Krokhin on March 14, 2009 4:59:27 AM]

Quote: Original post by Kwizatz
So, you're saying the Earth is conscious by proxy, I can accept that line of thought, what bothers me to some extent and why I do not share the idea, besides slayemin points, is the lack of a unique shared consciousness between the individuals serving as proxy.

It seems like the biggest distinction in a brain vs. a culture is that the neurons in a brain are connected MUCH more densely than the individuals in a culture, and there is a much more noisy signal between individuals than neurons.

I generally agree with the ideas behind a conciousness-by-proxy point of view, but that it's got a completely different behavior at its scale which makes it hard to classify as "a" conciousness.

Quote: Original post by Nypyren
I generally agree with the ideas behind a conciousness-by-proxy point of view, but that it's got a completely different behavior at its scale which makes it hard to classify as "a" conciousness.

But why do you assume that densely connected, non-noisily-signalling neurons are the only model of connectivity under which "a" consciousness can occur?

Quote: Original post by Kwizatz
So, you're saying the Earth is conscious by proxy, I can accept that line of thought, what bothers me to some extent and why I do not share the idea, besides slayemin points, is the lack of a unique shared consciousness between the individuals serving as proxy.

Proxy suggests two separate things. I'm saying we are the consciousness of the Earth system.