xssve
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Joined: 10/10/2009
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quote:
ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
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ORIGINAL: xssve
quote:
ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
I"m sorry xssve, I've read your post 3 times and I still am unable to decipher what you're saying. You seem to me to be contradicting yourself eg."..... meaning can exist outside it's symbolic representation ..... [..] ....So overall, meaning cannot exist without a medium....". "Symbolic representation" is a "medium", a means of encoding and communicating meaning.
My suspicion is the origins of your confusion lies in trying to apply cogito-consistent approaches to this area. This one is one of the areas where the inadequacies of the cogito are exposed. Cogito non ergo sum. But that's probably another discussion ....
May I suggest that instead on focussing on the physics and biology of it, you take a look at what must actually happen whenever communication happens? What happens when you try to communicate a thought in your head to another party? What phases/elements must be present in order for successful communication to occur?
I'm not confused, I'm merely arguing both sides of the question, I do that a lot, dialectic with myself.
And what actually happens when communication happens is physics and biology, what else can it be?
We're actually engaged in communicating at the moment, xssve, and, I can assure you that there's absolutely nothing biological or physical happening nor any possibility of it happening between us. So there must be something else mustn't there?
You would be mistaken: I'm typing on my keyboard, after reading your words on my monitor - the words I type are being translated into binary code by my processor, signified by voltage differentials, traveling over wires to your processor, where it's translated back into symbols an displayed on your monitor.
That text is itself just a bunch of frequencies that your visual cortex translates into symbols that the linguistic areas of your brain recognize - so far, it's all biology and physics.
In order for communication to occur, you do need a medium, in this case, the intrwbz, a common language, or mode, the ASCII characters set, the Indo-Anglo/European language, letter/symbols (a set of meta symbols, eidetic memory) in mutually recognizable letter combinations that signify abstract concepts (word/concepts, a set of common lexical symbols, lexical memory), formed into readable sentences (syntactical memory) capable of being interpreted through analogous mutual experience (episodic memory).
Again, all pretty much biology and physics, that's the apparatus - fact is, I haven't ever expended much thought on "meaning" or consciousness - I think a lot about "value" and "0perception" which are much more easily quantifiable: value can be quantified in terms of exchange - "a bird in the hand is worth Two in the bush", perception can be described in similar terms: "an elephant is very like a tree", etc.
So, that's all background, but everything I say from here on is built on the foundation of that physical exchange of symbols - you also need a transmitter and a reciever, or in this case, two tanscievers, and their experiential sets have to be close enough to recognize not only the symbols, but the concepts they represent - basically, I'm repeating what you and Julia have already said - you cannot receive an intelligible frequency modulated signal on an amplitude modulated receiver, all you're gonna hear is static.
Your question was whether meaning could be divorced from symbolism - that depends on whether or not meaning is itself a symbol - if it is, it cannot be divorced from it's own substance, it would be like asking if symbolism can be divorced from symbolism - if it is not, then what is it?
So, the answer depends on how you perceive consciousness: I used the the example of the scent of frying bacon - if your stomach growls, it means you're hungry - no?
The question is now, is this basic involuntary autonomic response, the release of digestive juices into your stomach, a symbol, or is it non-symbolic meaning translated into symbolic form?
"Mmmm, that smells good", or "how aweful that you would that poor little piggy", etc., etc.
In short, between the time you experience something and it gets translated into symbolic form, if you can say later that that experience had meaning, then that meaning existed independent of it's symbolic expression.
Like I said, I deal with value more often, it's a much less nebulous concept - meaning is a subjective, emotional value, it can only be quantified and/or communicated symbolically, but unlike value, it doesn't necessarily always demand to be quantified or communicated.
To sum up, my current thinking is, that meaning is a symbolic quality of experience, but it is separate from experience, and I'm going to have to conclude that meaning is a symbol, and cannot be divorced from symbolism, but can be divorced from experience.
i.e., "that was a meaningful/meaningless experience, and this is mostly for the sake of clarity of language, I don't really consider the question definitively settled, not sure it can be settled, I'm pretty sure now I could argue it either way - it's more a matter of being on the same wavelength w/respect to the meaning of the word meaning.
< Message edited by xssve -- 6/26/2011 7:43:42 AM >
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RE: Human Consciousness - Meaningful or Meaningless? - 
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)? If so, how do you reconcile that meaning with the above? 
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