The possibility of self knowledge

[Nick Thompson]

My apologies for reposting this, but I buggered the subject line the first time and I really am hoping for an answer from SOMEBODY.

Dear all,

All the time I was out there I never thought to ask you the following
question. As a behaviorist psychologist, I have always had doubts about
the notion of self knowledge, in the sense that we know the true causes of
our own actions (which we would have to do if "we" were the causes of our
own action, eh? ) One of the reasons I went out to SFE was to get the
answer to the question, what is it that a computer gives you when you ask a
computer to tell you about itself. On my understanding, what you learn
about is in fact the state of a specialisted subsystem designed to monitor
the whole which gets you an answer on the basis of reports from specialized
sub-sub systems...."cues" if you will. So in my gloom, I am sitting here
looking at my CP monitor in my task bar varying from 10 percent to 17
percent. So, that is not my CPU telling me about my CPU, right. If not,
who is it and on the basis of what incomplete knowledge is it telling me
what the CPU is doing.


Nick

Nicholas Thompson
nickthompson at earthlink.net
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson


Nicholas Thompson
nickthompson at earthlink.net
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson
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[Russell Standish]

Perhaps nobody really understood your question. AFAIK, computers be it
Windoze, Mac or Linux are not self-aware. Therefore question as you've
posed it has no meaning.

Perhaps you mean a formal system capable of introspection? You could
look at some of the stuff Bruno Marchal does, as it is all about
questioning a Loebian machine. I'm sure you could ask a Loebian
machine about itself, and it will be able to tell you something!

Cheers

On Sun, Nov 27, 2005 at 11:52:11PM -0500, Nicholas Thompson wrote:

> My apologies for reposting this, but I buggered the subject line the first time and I really am hoping for an answer from SOMEBODY.
>
> Dear all,
>
> All the time I was out there I never thought to ask you the following
> question. As a behaviorist psychologist, I have always had doubts about
> the notion of self knowledge, in the sense that we know the true causes of
> our own actions (which we would have to do if "we" were the causes of our
> own action, eh? ) One of the reasons I went out to SFE was to get the
> answer to the question, what is it that a computer gives you when you ask a
> computer to tell you about itself. On my understanding, what you learn
> about is in fact the state of a specialisted subsystem designed to monitor
> the whole which gets you an answer on the basis of reports from specialized
> sub-sub systems...."cues" if you will. So in my gloom, I am sitting here
> looking at my CP monitor in my task bar varying from 10 percent to 17
> percent. So, that is not my CPU telling me about my CPU, right. If not,
> who is it and on the basis of what incomplete knowledge is it telling me
> what the CPU is doing.
>
>
> Nick
>
> Nicholas Thompson
> nickthompson at earthlink.net
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson
>
>
> Nicholas Thompson
> nickthompson at earthlink.net
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at Mission Cafe
> Wed Lecture schedule, archives, unsubscribe, maps, etc. at http://www.friam.org

--
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[Jochen Fromm-3]

 
I am not sure what your question is. There are different meanings
of the term "Self". Sometimes it refers to your consciousness of
your own identity, sometimes to the idea of a unified being which
is the source of your own actions. In some contexts we talk of the
"self" as if it would be a unified entity or single thing, although
it is often only a (psychological) construct.

Is there such a thing as a unified being which is the source of your
own actions? Modern neuroscience tells us there is a constant neural
storm with millions of tiny electric discharges going on in each head,
but there is no mental analog to the physcial body, at least no central
entity or authority.

Basically I think Buddha was right in thinking that there is no
"mental self" at all. It is a construct or an illusion, partially
created by the knowledge of yourself as part of the environment.
I guess self knowledge is necessary for self consciousness, but not
sufficient.

A computer which shows your information about the CPU performance has
neither self knowledge nor self consciousness. If you ask a computer
to tell you about itself, the computer will not understand you. If
you command him to do it, i.e. if you write a program, this is of
course something different. It is quite a bit paradox:
- a computer has a central "self" in form of a central processing
  unit (CPU), but no self knowledge at all,
- a human has no central self and no central processing unit,
  but nevertheless extensive "self" knowledge.

-J.

________________________________


Dear all,
 
All the time I was out there I never thought to ask you the following
question. As a behaviorist psychologist, I have always had doubts about
the notion of self knowledge, in the sense that we know the true causes of
our own actions (which we would have to do if "we" were the causes of our
own action, eh? ) One of the reasons I went out to SFE was to get the
answer to the question, what is it that a computer gives you when you ask a
computer to tell you about itself. On my understanding, what you learn
about is in fact the state of a specialisted subsystem designed to monitor
the whole which gets you an answer on the basis of reports from specialized
sub-sub systems...."cues" if you will. So in my gloom, I am sitting here
looking at my CP monitor in my task bar varying from 10 percent to 17
percent. So, that is not my CPU telling me about my CPU, right. If not,
who is it and on the basis of what incomplete knowledge is it telling me
what the CPU is doing.
 
 
Nick
 

[Giles Bowkett]

> One of the reasons I went out to SFE was to get the
> answer to the question, what is it that a computer gives you when you ask a
> computer to tell you about itself. On my understanding, what you learn
> about is in fact the state of a specialisted subsystem designed to monitor
> the whole which gets you an answer on the basis of reports from specialized
> sub-sub systems...."cues" if you will.

I think that's pretty much what happens when you ask a human being to
tell you about themselves, too. Except under unusual situations, you
don't get the subconscious mind handing over every single relevant
memory the person has ever had; you get a context-sensitive report
summarizing relevant data. If I ask a casual acquaintance what's going
on their lives, they'll probably tell me something trivial; if you ask
somebody close, you get more data, some of it potentially quite deep.
If a doctor asks you how you're feeling, he doesn't mean "how's your
relationship?" he means "has your arm fallen off?"



On 11/27/05, Nicholas Thompson <nickthompson at earthlink.net> wrote:

>
>
>
>
> My apologies for reposting this, but I buggered the subject line the first
> time and I really am hoping for an answer from SOMEBODY.
>
> Dear all,
>
>
> All the time I was out there I never thought to ask you the following
> question. As a behaviorist psychologist, I have always had doubts about
> the notion of self knowledge, in the sense that we know the true causes of
> our own actions (which we would have to do if "we" were the causes of our
> own action, eh? ) One of the reasons I went out to SFE was to get the
> answer to the question, what is it that a computer gives you when you ask a
> computer to tell you about itself. On my understanding, what you learn
> about is in fact the state of a specialisted subsystem designed to monitor
> the whole which gets you an answer on the basis of reports from specialized
> sub-sub systems...."cues" if you will. So in my gloom, I am sitting here
> looking at my CP monitor in my task bar varying from 10 percent to 17
> percent. So, that is not my CPU telling me about my CPU, right. If not,
> who is it and on the basis of what incomplete knowledge is it telling me
> what the CPU is doing.
>
>
> Nick
>
> Nicholas Thompson
> nickthompson at earthlink.net
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson
>
>
> Nicholas Thompson
> nickthompson at earthlink.net
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson
>
>
>
>
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at Mission Cafe
> Wed Lecture schedule, archives, unsubscribe, maps, etc. at
> http://www.friam.org
>
>

--
Giles Bowkett = Giles Goat Boy
http://www.gilesgoatboy.org/