From: kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: What is consciousness?
Date: Sun, 08 Nov 92 04:00:24 EST
Reply-To: kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us
Organization: Kalki's Infoline BBS, Aiken, SC, USA

adpeters@sunflower.bio.indiana.edu (Andy Peters) writes:

> Hmmmm...  I have two requests for Kalki:
> 
> (1) Define "consciousness."
> (2) Explain how any reasonable definition of "consciousness" can be applied
> to plants, viruses, bacteria, protozoa, sponges, cnidarians...

Is this not what we asked?

We eat, plants eat.
We sleep, plants sleep.
We defend, plants defend.
We mate, plants mate.
We seek pleasure and avoid pain, plants seek pleasure and avoid pain.
We die, plants die. We are born, plants are born.

> 
> >Although there may
> >be little or no physical difference between a living body and a body
> >which has recently died, we intuitively know that there is a difference:
>                              ^^^^^^^^^^^
> >in a living body there is consciousness, or a soul, and in a dead body
> >there is not.
> 

> No.  The difference is that in a living body there is metabolic function,
> and in a dead body there is not.

> You will find that your intuition
> fails to impress us, or even to begin to convince us of anything.

Why this unnecessary remark? If you think we are insincere, or that we
are simply trying to inflate our false ego by "impressing" you, then why
do you respond to our posts?

You will be convinced when you consider your own consciousness
seriously. We ask the question "what is consciousness" because although
it is obvious to everyone that consciousness exists, there is no
universally accepted definition of consciousness within modern science.
Since science is seeking to identify and quantify all known phenomena,
the lack of an acceptable definition of consciousness is a serious
defect. Consciousness is not something that can be ignored by science.


> 
> >What is consciousness?
> >
> >Consider a body at the moment before and the moment after death. What is
> >it that is different between these two states? Except in cases of death
> >by massive trauma (such as being blown up), the structural integrity and
> >chemical constitution of the body are not very different at the two
> >instants. What, then, determines the instant of death?
> 
> The instant of death is determined by the instant at which metabolic
> activity ceases.  When my car breaks down as I'm driving it, the
> structural integrity and chemical constitution of the engine do not
> necessarily change.  Would you say that my car loses its consciousness
> at that point?

No, but if you want to reach your destination, you will have to leave
the car and find some other vehicle. In the same way, when the body of
the living entity ceases to work properly, the living entity must leave
that body and occupy another.

> Gee, Kalki titled his post "What is Consciousness," but failed to ever
> define the term.  Odd.

Why do you say this, as if your pride was offended? What can sarcasm
possibly contribute to this discussion, or any discussion whose purpose
is to arrive at the truth by sober analysis. This is our purpose.

Sincerely,
Kalki Dasa


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