https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7abyVkS6U8
I have a couple more comments to make about consciousness. I just recorded those videos about the Chinese room and all that kind of stuff, and I want to clarify some of my personal views. When I say my personal views, I mean the right views on consciousness.
So, I said in the Chinese room experiment video that my belief is, if you really take the Chinese room to its logical conclusion, you have to conclude that consciousness is not something material. It’s not something that emerges from the material world. The argument I made for that is, I actually have an article on my website—maybe it’s still a draft—where I talk about this. When you have, you know, there’s this old argument by David Hume, okay? Right? He says no matter what factual statements you can have about the world, you can put them all together, but the “is” statements about the world never become a moral statement.
Right? That’s David. David, obviously, is an arch skeptic. He wants to deconstruct making moral judgments and says, “Okay, the reality of what is has nothing to do…” I mean, it might have something to do, but you can’t take mere facts and thus make moral conclusions. They’re just, they’re kind of too… I don’t want to say non-overlapping magisteria; they kind of overlap and they interact, but they’re different. You can’t take just one and produce one of the others.
My argument for consciousness being something separate from matter is basically analogous. It’s not really the same form, but it’s something analogous. What I mean by that is, obviously, consciousness, as per the Chinese room experiment, is not merely computation. No matter what your definition of what consciousness is, it cannot just mean a system, a computer, something, and consciousness just appears from it—it’s just like some kind of illusion tacked on. Whatever consciousness is, it’s something different. Just because a system is computing language and giving an output does not mean it’s conscious of what’s going on. Syntax is not semantics.
But my argument about consciousness is, basically, that being said, the entire universe—the entire materialist universe that is not involving anything spiritual or anything noetic, having to do with a noose, right? That’s a classical word for consciousness. The physical world, as it is, is a giant syntactic playground. When I say “syntactic playground,” I mean there are atoms bumping against each other, there are chemical reactions, there are forces of gravity allegedly, there are lots of other things going on in the universe, and all of them are… it is analogous to a giant computational system.
It’s a giant syntactic system where you have a raw material that is matter, however that is, and you have various forces, and they are acting on each other and interacting in the same way that an AI generating text or even a simpler computer program generating text. They are just taking the raw material; they are computing it. Right? They’re doing some kind of computation. It’s weird to describe the world as being computation, but the material world kind of… it really is that. That’s what’s going on. It’s like a giant computer if you have this narrowly materialistic view of the world.
That’s all it is. If you take that view seriously and you think about what consciousness is, you have to realize that consciousness is just a different substance. I don’t mean a substance as in something you can put in a glass, like water or something like that, but I mean it is another force in the universe. It’s something that, and again, “force”—that’s like metaphorical speech as well. It’s just something that is different from the material world. It clearly interacts with the material world; it interacts at all points in time. But that is not the same thing as to say that it is generated by the material world.
In fact, my argument, again, is analogous to Hume’s: just because you have a lot of “is” statements—in my case, material computation, physical interaction, all of this kind of stuff—it is never going to produce something that is more than physical. It cannot do that. I mean, I think the example I used in that article I wrote is: imagine you have a calculator, right? A graphing calculator. Do kids even still have graphing calculators? Do they just do everything on Google Docs or something? I don’t even know. But imagine you have a calculator, right? You can put any kind of function into that calculator. Obviously, you give it a number, and it will give you some output. Maybe it’ll be an undefined function or something like that, but it will give you, as a result, a number.
Right? Because mathematics has a certain domain, or range, I guess domain, over which, you know, when you have a mathematical function, it gives you math. That is the kind of computation it does. No mathematical function, no matter how complex you make it, is going to give you something that’s not a number. Okay? You’re not going to get a string of English; you’re not going to get, I don’t know, some physical thing that’s going to come out of the calculator because you put in a very complex function.
I mean, this seems like a totally weird argument for me to even make, but that’s kind of the… you’re saying if you’re saying that consciousness comes, it arises from the physical world, okay? It’s clearly something very different. It is not something that is physically definable. And I don’t just mean it’s not definable in science as it is now. I mean the very nature of consciousness—what it actually means to even perceive—is not the same thing as saying, “Oh, well, your retina takes in this and it goes to the brain, blah, blah, blah.” That is a description of the syntax of the computation of what’s happening interacting with your consciousness, but that is not the same thing as consciousness itself.
I think whatever your interpretation, whatever I guess you believe about the universe, right? And again, even if you are an atheist or something like that, I’m not even saying you can’t believe that. But what I am saying is you have to say consciousness is just something different from the other forces in the universe. Obviously, people are very afraid, you know, due to Occam’s razor, or at least some weirdly understood idea of Occam’s razor. They have this idea that, “Oh no, no, no, I don’t want to believe in metaphysics. I don’t want to believe in spiritualist crap. I don’t want to believe in any of that. I just want material forces and matter, and I just believe the universe… it’s probably everything can be explained in those terms.”
Now, I think the argument that I’ve made in some blog posts about that is that is a total misunderstanding about even what the mainstream scientific theories of the world are actually really like. It’s not as if, you know, it’s not as if like, “Oh, we just have material forces. We have one type of matter; we have one type of force, and they interact in the universe.” Actually, no! We have a plethora of non-reducible forces, whether it’s gravity or nuclear forces or all these kinds of things happening in the universe and different types of matter. We don’t have atoms, you know? That’s another thing that’s important to remember. We don’t have, in the realm of Democritus, like, we don’t actually have an irreducible, indivisible atomic entity that is homogeneous. We don’t have that.
We have these things we call atoms, but you can actually divide them even more. It’s totally different from what Democritus thought. Of course, you can divide those further and further and further. Either way, I bring this up to say saying something like consciousness is something distinct from matter, or it’s something that might interact with matter, but it’s just a different substance in the universe, this is no more radical than saying there are different forces and there’s gravity and there’s nuclear forces. It’s nothing any more radical than that.
The only thing that is kind of, I don’t know, frightening or whatever to people is this idea that, I don’t know, it just seems like it’s hard to do, let’s say, experiments with consciousness. Therefore, I don’t want to believe it’s scary in science. You know, I don’t… it’s just something that I don’t really understand. It doesn’t seem to work like everything else. But I think you honestly just have to kind of end up believing that. I mean, it’s just… it’s just kind of how it is.
I’m trying to think if there’s anything else, but it’s hard to even explain. I guess what I’m getting at… I hope this makes any kind of sense. But my point is, the universe is like a graphing calculator. It is just a computational machine, and it is very clear to us that we have something in the universe—consciousness—which is not the result of computation. Now, there are computations in your brain; there’s recursion in your brain; there’s all this stuff going on that interacts with consciousness. But that is not the same as saying that consciousness is recursive.
It has nothing to do with actually saying that consciousness is… there’s something going on there. Actually, you can feel it. It is not just like a subroutine that is referring to itself. That might be part of what it is, but that is not the essence of what consciousness is. That is not what noose is. In a lot of medieval thought and kind of earlier classical thought, you know, there’s this idea of noose or consciousness. Obviously, you know, in Orthodox Christianity, it’s a concept—it’s one of the most important concepts that kind of separates us from, I guess, you know, post… you know, in the Latin-speaking West.
They kind of took this concept of noose; they’ll variously translate it as “census,” which really becomes like sensory input, honestly, as time goes on. It’s kind of misunderstood. But I think people in antiquity were much more likely to say what I’m saying now. Obviously, people will talk about Indian, Hindu, whatever, you know, a bunch of stuff they believe about consciousness. But there is this no… again, this isn’t like… it’s not like you’re just believing whatever.
But, I mean, there’s a metaphor that, you know, consciousness is something like mercury, right? So mercury, you know, alchemists and people like this, they really love mercury because mercury, obviously, is liquid at room temperature. And it’s not just liquid; it’s like reflective. It’s kind of cool. There’s something nice about it. There’s this metaphor that consciousness is kind of like… however it actually works, it’s something similar to mercury, right? Where you can put it in a vessel, right? A vessel of any shape, and that consciousness is going to fill the shape however it is.
In the same way, you know, your consciousness is affected by your physical body. Obviously, you know, if you feel a certain way depending on your consciousness being in it. Right? I think where I was mistaken when I was younger, and I had… I remember actually teaching some of my first classes, and I made this kind of fallacious argument for, or I guess a narrowly materialistic view of the world, where I would say things like, “Well, we know that the physical world affects consciousness. You know, you bump your head and you go unconscious. You know, you take a drug; your consciousness changes. Therefore, it must be something physical.” And that’s nonsense!
It can be a totally different substance. Just because it interacts with the physical world doesn’t mean… I mean, just because gravity and nuclear forces interact doesn’t mean that they’re the same thing. You know? Even if they could be theoretically reducible to the same thing. I kind of… I don’t trust all these science things.
Either way, that’s what I’m trying to say. You know, I’m not endorsing the stuff that’s just like in the paranormal. I’m not saying anything weird with this. I’m merely saying that consciousness kind of has to be something a little different. It has to be something a little different. And, you know, I think when you open that possibility there, you realize, well, you’re not really losing anything. It’s not like there’s any materialistic explanation of consciousness.
Instead, oh, you know, also the thing about mercury, you know, there’s something like… again, it reflecting… there is such a deep metaphor there. You pour it in a vessel, and it is reflecting what it sees. You know, there’s something… I don’t know. There’s something cute about it. You understand why people like this little metaphor, this little way of… you know, they really, you know, again, these early chemists and alchemists, you know, they really had this kind of funny way of… I don’t know. It’s just some charming way of looking at the world.
Either way, that’s my argument. It’s not very coherent; I apologize. But hopefully, it makes sense to at least like three or four of you guys.
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-28 10:43:27
This video is the third in a brief series. Part 1 is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E31KuUJmqCU Part 2 is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gleyKDvZ3x0+25
@LeafsKiller63 - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
"Mr. President : A fifth video has hit the internet"+681
@mitch7918 - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
all of these were recorded on the same day with him walking around in the snow for 7 hours straight, can't convince me otherwise+272
@realCaptainFordo - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
Watching Luke Smith within a minute of him uploading feels like a privilege these days.+377
@y1k3sTheHacker - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
bro has triggered the dead mans switch provided he didn't move to siberia+337
@winterland3253 - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
"Hypocrite that you are, you trust the chemicals in your brain to tell you they are chemicals!"+98
@CursedKitten1 - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
I don't think Luke will ever read this. But I wanted him to know his return has inspired me to adopt a strict minimal-internet routine. I'm trialing it for a month. Only been about 5 days but I'm noticing massive improvements in productivity and mental acuity. Have started reading 3 books (I know that sounds excessive but I love being able to switch between the 3 and it keeps me motivated). And started a creative project (already made significant progress btw) which I've been procrastinating on for at least a year. Thank you Luke. It's not all for nothing.+201
@Bet_Bones - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
NPCs in shambles after this one+323
@bigsmoke-u6r - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
from linux dude to the hardest life advice ever+143
@Министара - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
Our Soviet philosopher is deviating from the party line and the materialist doctrine and will most likely go to a labor camp.+176
@harrytsang1501 - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
Nothing for 2 years, then five videos in the span of 8 days+68
@user-bx4zq7fx7e - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
The linux - philosopher pipeline: Final proof+54
@arkbooi - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
With so many people returning, I have a feeling the internet is healing+77
@timothyvandyke9511 - 2025-05-28 10:43:27
Missed you Luke, long time commenter, my life has drastically improved since getting married, stopping (most/all online multiplayer) video games, no more p***, had a kid, bought a house, taken on more responsibilities, memorized more Bible verses and doing devotions every day, getting my head out of daily politics, etc. Thank you for influencing me to get the ball rolling. Your videos are always a fun listen+14
@ubcroel4022 - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
The lion accepts the norwood with dignity.+37
@blitzkrieg2928 - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
1:06 ”David Hume, Skeptic, patient 0 for Reddit ” Luke Smith 2022+40
@wifelessyt - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
my favorite russian poet back at it again+28
@permutation_of_cards - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
Weirdly enough, but the guy that convinced me that consciousness is NOT material and "just the brain" is a famous atheist Alex O' Connor. I'm sure you've heard of the guy. He has talked about it in a few different interviews/podcasts, I'm sure you can find it in a form of a Short pretty quickly. (If it's deleted for some reason, I've downloaded them so I can send them to you if you want. They're short but it's very eloquently and concisely put) He uses this example, I'm paraphrasing:"When I close my eyes and imagine a purple triangle--I see it! It's there! But if matter and physical forces are all there is, then we MUST be able to cut open a brain a find that purple triangle. Some people think this is ridiculous because in the same way if you cut-open a CPU, you won't find a triangle either. But the analogy with computer is wrong because you still have the screen displaying that triangle, but with the brain it's just a CPU, yet we 'see' a triangle in some way, so where the hell is it?" I believe this is the strongest argument for immaterial nature of consciousness. Also, if it's indeed "just the brain", why is there a "hard problem of consciousness" to begin with? Science has not even began to answer the question, it's much more mysterious than we can imagine, it seems. Watching discussions with Alex O' Connor about consciousness, he talks about two very interesting things. The first one is "problems for either side", meaning if you're a materialist and not a dualist, where is the aforementioned "purple triangle"? I'm not talking about the processing of the "matter/force Input" such as electromagnetic radiation in the spectrum that represents the visible spectrum for human beings that, then, hits your retina and then get processed in the brain. I'm NOT talking about that, I'm talking about the EXPERIENCE, the qualia. Where is that in materialistic world? On the other hand, he raises the problem for dualists, which is what you already said--Hitting your head does seem to affect consciousness. But why? If it's indeed something of a different substance, that exists completely outside of the physical/material realm, it makes no sense that bumping a head does affect consciousness but bumping an arm does not. It's the famous "interaction problem" as you, Luke, already know. You've suggested on your website that consciousness can be similar to television antennae. If you crush the antennae it will affect the television content, but it would be ridiculous to suggest that antennae and TV device is the television content. Television content is, in this example, a different kind of thing. It's an electromagnetic radiation(this time different wavelength than the visible spectrum) that sends a codified information through air. So without examining the source that codified the information and sent the information towards the antennae, television program is an electromagnetic information as opposed to antennae and TV device that are just mere matter. So it's a different substance. We know that science has, at one point, occupy the stance that "physicalism" is all there is. Then we learnt about gravity and all the other forces and now this is the consensus, ie. matter+forces. And it's claimed that "this is it" as it was when science was pro-physicalism. So maybe, this is me philosophizing, consciousness can still be "atheistic" in a sense that it's a new type of thing. In the same way that gravity(i.e. Forces) were a new kind od thing, but that didn't made them conclude there is God, just that we've discovered a new type of thing. Myane that could be the case here, but I'm not very confident. And the second thing that Alex talks about is the "Mereological nihilism" which states that nothing really new "began to exist" after the BigBang. Atoms just reorder themselves in a different way that is semantically or practically of different meaning/use for humans therefore we give it a new label. However, the interesting point Alex has made is that if consciousness is indeed of different substance than matter+forces, then the only thing that actually begins to exist after the Big Bang is consciousness. That was a fascinating thing to comprehend, so I wanted to share. P.S. Also one great thought experiment is "the woman who lived a white room. She was a scientist and she learnt all you can learn about the color blue. She have learned the wavelength of an electromagnetic radiation that corresponds to blue, she have learned which things are associated with blue, how blue makes you feel(generally speaking), etc. The question is--If, after she learnt every possible fact about the blue, and then for the first time exits the white-room she has been brought up in, and sees the color blue for the very first time--Would she learn something new?" If the answer is yes, which intuitively seems to be true, then we are accepting that consciousness is not reducible to facts. Great to have you back Luke!+64
@DxDda - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
Welcome back Grigory Perelman+25
@KatoKirche - 2025-05-21 10:43:27
it's crazy, I only found your channel a couple weeks ago and resigned myself to not seeing anything else from you, so this week is a nice treat, thanks.+14
@technolus5742 - 2025-05-28 10:43:28
Hey Mr psyop, now you're turning off comments on your videos? Now that's psyopy behavior...... trying to propagate your view while forcefully stifling dissent and preventing your viewers from being in contact with a broader range of ideas.+1
@za4ria - 2025-05-21 10:43:28
It’s pearl harbor out there 🤣🤣+17
@ResistanceB.7 - 2025-05-28 10:43:28
Hahaha we are in big danger Mr President....😂+2
@himanshushukla6451 - 2025-05-28 10:43:28
Ah shitttttt+2
@hhjhj393 - 2025-05-28 10:43:28
Turn on the TV, it doesn't matter what channel...+2
@porky1118 - 2025-05-21 10:43:28
Of course.+11
@-.2.. - 2025-05-21 10:43:28
Yes, he did that. He even spoke about it in a podcast.+16
@EdgyPuer - 2025-05-21 10:43:28
@-.2.. link?+4
@prozee8866 - 2025-05-28 10:43:28
@EdgyPuer Orthocast+4
@youranonymous931 - 2025-05-28 10:43:28
Can you link the podcast please where he says this?+2
@snowhusk - 2025-05-28 10:43:28
his rants became so heated the snow melted+5
@vikt - 2025-05-21 10:43:29
This video was uploaded on his peertube yesterday lol+20
@PhilippBlum - 2025-05-21 10:43:29
Those who know know ;)+6
@okinawabongrip - 2025-05-21 10:43:29
Agreed+2
@decorumlopez9147 - 2025-05-21 10:43:29
Everything is maya, nothing is real. All these videos were recorded long before the Luke ascended.+4
@HiboMan - 2025-05-21 10:43:29
Or an hour+1
@gordonfiala2336 - 2025-05-21 10:43:29
does he read his comments?: i haggle 'Recognition' and 'Reasoning' are not paranormal sentience rooted outside materialism.+1
@i_dont_want_a_handle - 2025-05-21 10:43:29
It is+1
@ich_bin_dein_Gott - 2025-05-21 10:43:29
grow up+1
@jimc.goodfellas - 2025-05-21 10:43:29
"I comment on the Internet, therefore I am superior to you"+1
@codedsprit - 2025-05-28 10:43:29
True+1
@realCaptainFordo - 2025-05-28 10:43:29
@jimc.goodfellasbro I’m just meming bro its not that deep+1
@runix2189 - 2025-05-21 10:43:29
it's taken 3 months to upload the videos from his 500bps connection+77
@rjawiygvozd - 2025-05-21 10:43:29
@runix2189 I'm actually watching from Siberia, the connection is actually pretty solid as long as you can vpn outside of the gulag+50
@user-ayush818 - 2025-05-21 10:43:29
@rjawiygvozd strong as in 1990's, i appreciate it.+5
@DiogenesTheCynic. - 2025-05-21 10:43:29
Nah he was recently interviewed so he's pretty much alive+7
@yoshi314 - 2025-05-21 10:43:29
@runix2189 the pigeons have finally arrived and the packets have been assembled.+7
@StariZec - 2025-06-04 10:43:30
So what? If they are chemicals. They are. But: 1. that kind of chemicals are not in the brain only, but also in our guts. Which confirms the old notion that there is something (a lot!) in the gut feeling too. That can save your life in the woods like this in this video far better than "pure reason". And therefore: 2. the brain, and some guts, seem to be - organs, physical organs of the Mind. Or consciousness.+2
@lovelace-the-smug - 2025-06-04 10:43:30
"Will you fight? Or will you perish like a dog?"+3
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 20:43:30
@StariZec Just because something is good at facilitating survival long enough to reproduce doesn't mean it necessarily produces truth, or even that it's slightly useful in pursuit of truth. You're extrapolating.+1
@benedict_eronberg - 2025-05-21 10:43:30
In addition to teaching software sovereignty, efficiency, and minimalism, Luke also inspired me to explore cryptocurrencies and Christianity (currently making good returns and objectively living better). I'd probably mention him too if I were to explain why I carry a flip phone instead of a smartphone. That is to say, even if I should be cautious of parasocial relationship, Luke, you're a mentor worth paying attention to.+11
@KaidenTK21 - 2025-05-21 10:43:30
Luke is the mentor we've all been looking for. It's all just a matter of those who are willing to listen. 👽+4
@folksurvival - 2025-05-28 10:43:30
So you're having a child?+2
@ZackaryReaves - 2025-05-28 10:43:30
Can you outline some of the specifics? You're obviously not closing off from the internet entirely, so it would be interesting to know where the line is.+3
@CursedKitten1 - 2025-05-28 10:43:30
@ZackaryReaves To expand, My rule is: No personally addictive internet use after 12pm. CAN use internet for personal projects if I need tutorials or information. Example: playing and studying Chess online is okay for me, but something like YouTube is NOT. I will waste hours upon hours on YT. Even if it's just 'in the background.' It will dull my mind even then. I might experiment with a stricter rule later. I am not sure.+2
@robertdeckard2136 - 2025-05-28 10:43:30
I find it helpful to just not have internet at home. Been over two months now. I keep a piece of paper for writing down stuff to pull from the internet next time I'm out. Then when the list is long enough, I take a laptop to work or to a coffee shop or the library and use the internet there. If you know Bash or some other scripting language you can automate some of your internet scraping activities. The part that's difficult is that so many tutorials, etc. make offline use difficult. whether by being a very long youtube video tutorial with minimal content that takes up way too much hard drive space. or being a nonstatic website built on a combo of php and javascript that stops working if you "wget -r" or otherwise download the website. The best tutorials and documentation for this situation are physical books, pdf's, static websites that don't break when downloaded or websites whose source code can be cloned from a git repo.+3
@PhilippBlum - 2025-05-21 10:43:30
And Fakies! Those who know ;)+2
@bedro_0 - 2025-05-21 10:43:30
As an NPC can confirm+8
@ЕгорКазей - 2025-05-21 10:43:30
The materialist seething is unreal in the comments+28
@jesserf6064 - 2025-05-21 10:43:30
✏️Playing GTA V online+1
@5GRobo - 2025-05-21 10:43:30
Getting obsessed with consciousness and elevating it above everything else is such an NPC behaviour. Nobody can point to a consciousness that does not come from the material world, because it comes from the material world.+11
@-.2.. - 2025-05-21 10:43:30
@5GRobo Eh, What?? Just because consciousness can interact with the material world does not mean it originates from the material world.+12
@Baccanaso - 2025-05-21 10:43:30
@5GRobo so can you use the scientific method to prove this?+1
@amir650 - 2025-05-21 10:43:30
@ЕгорКазей I wonder if they seethed when they learned that waves aren't material, either.+3
@roripantsu - 2025-05-21 10:43:31
@Baccanaso muh soyence explains everything rhetoric+3
@puhbrox - 2025-05-21 10:43:31
I doubt you know that's true @5GRobo +1
@5GRobo - 2025-05-21 10:43:31
@puhbrox know what's true?+1
@st3aml1n3 - 2025-05-28 10:43:31
You mean Philosophical zombies? :D+1
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 - 2025-05-28 10:43:31
Believing in souls is by far the most low IQ NPC thing you can do.+6
@OldMan-c9x - 2025-05-28 10:43:31
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 we're discussing consciousness not souls.+2
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 - 2025-05-28 10:43:31
@OldMan-c9x Consciousness is the physical computing of your brain. You're discussing dualism i.e. souls, which is one of the most NPC things you can believe in.+4
@badabing3391 - 2025-06-06 10:43:31
@-.2.. sure but why would an immaterial consciousness, which requires some completely unknown and perhaps unknowable connection to the material world, be a better description of reality than a material consciousness, which at least can coherently be described in terms of the material world since its already within it?+1
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 20:43:31
@5GRobo nobody can point to a consciousness period. Because consciousness is not in the material world so you can't point to it. Stupid fallacy. To point at something it has to be spatially contained ie. physical. You're just begging the question.+1
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 20:43:31
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 Physically computing a function doesn't produce nonphysical conscious experience. A graphing calculator can calculate a numeric output but it doesn't know that it's computing an output. Syntax is not semantics. You clearly didn't watch the video.+1
@5GRobo - 2025-06-18 10:18:31
@ElijahM-j3o Consciousness is contained within the physical body.+1
@Yasmine91646 - 2025-05-21 10:43:31
I'll have two number 9s, a number 9 large+14
@bigsmoke-u6r - 2025-05-21 10:43:31
@Yasmine91646 a number 6 with extra dip, a number 7, 2 numbers 45s, one with cheese, and a LAAARGE soda+11
@rasky1991 - 2025-05-28 10:43:31
"Like it says in the book, we are blessed and cursed"+6
@bigsmoke-u6r - 2025-05-28 10:43:31
@rasky1991 same things make us laugh, make us cry+8
@za4ria - 2025-05-28 10:43:31
@rasky1991 I always found this quote deep for some reason+2
@jimbarino2 - 2025-05-21 10:43:32
In Soviet Rujssia, Consciousness thinks YOU!+8
@BonkersTimeAlarm - 2025-05-21 10:43:32
So I wasn't the only one making the connection.+1
@perguto - 2025-05-28 10:43:32
Bro he's obviously already in Siberia+3
@the81kid - 2025-06-04 10:43:32
Plot twist: these videos two years later were shot from the gulag! You shall not bring Luke Smith down!! He will not go down!!+1
@the81kid - 2025-06-04 10:43:32
@perguto "Bro he's obviously already in Siberia" Siberia, Ohio+3
@perguto - 2025-06-04 10:43:32
@the81kid Siberia, Indiana does exist+1
@the81kid - 2025-06-04 10:43:32
@perguto Luke is taking advantage of quantum entanglement. Existing in two states at once!+1
@Mmhmmyeahok - 2025-05-21 10:43:32
Was transferring hair from top to bottom of head through extended meditation+14
@eustacemcgoodboy9702 - 2025-05-21 10:43:32
Must be running out of that sweet sweet youtube money. Or his cashflow went down or whatever.+2
@Mmhmmyeahok - 2025-05-21 10:43:32
@eustacemcgoodboy9702 certainly right wing philosophical content is an absolute goldmine.+7
@eustacemcgoodboy9702 - 2025-05-21 10:43:32
@Mmhmmyeahok I've watched a few of his videos and I'm not hearing anything "right wing." It's more libertarian prepper "flee society" stuff with a sprinkling now and then of implied Christianity. Christianity implied but not preached. I.E. "Yea I go to church a few times a week." End statement.+5
@RandomFandomOfficial - 2025-05-28 10:43:32
Making up for the lost time 😊+1
@sigiligus - 2025-05-28 10:43:33
This would get laughed out of any serious philosophical discourse even by people who agree with consciousness being intangible.+3
@patrickvdh8606 - 2025-05-28 10:43:33
You can only go 2 ways the philosopher route or the wrong route with the programming socks.+1
@youranonymous931 - 2025-05-28 10:43:33
I noticed Linus Torvalds too doing this+1
@OldMan-c9x - 2025-05-28 10:43:33
@sigiligus All you have is snarky remarks. Please present an argument.+1
@Sever3dHead - 2025-05-28 10:43:33
@sigiligus this is just dumbed down version of discourse for ppl like you, listen up 🤓👆+2
@PhilippBlum - 2025-05-21 10:43:33
Once the know, they fight ;)+2
@Chubbywubbysandwich - 2025-05-21 10:43:33
what do you mean by so many people+14
@danmurad8080 - 2025-05-21 10:43:33
@Chubbywubbysandwich cancel culture going away. People in general feel more free to express their mind.+2
@arkbooi - 2025-05-21 10:43:33
@Chubbywubbysandwich its not just luke smith, actually+1
@michaelns9887 - 2025-05-21 10:43:33
@arkbooi Who else?+1
@arkbooi - 2025-05-28 10:43:33
@michaelns9887 I tihnk wolfgang came back, bugwriter as well, wolfgang has turned into your average NixOS femboy though+1
@michaelns9887 - 2025-05-28 10:43:33
@arkbooi i don't think bugswriter was ever on hiatus+1
@ZOMBIEWOLF29 - 2025-05-28 10:43:34
based last name+1
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-21 10:43:34
Botting likes+1
@permutation_of_cards - 2025-05-21 10:43:34
@one_step_sideways What do you mean? How and why would I pay bots to have a random comment on youtube liked a few times? What would be the point of that?+14
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-21 10:43:34
@permutation_of_cards I saw you popping 5 likes out of thin air when your comment was just 1 minute old. Not a single other comment on a video that's several hours long, especially one that's too long to read, would be able to get so many likes in a single minute. You're trying too hard.+3
@slavic_commonwealth - 2025-05-21 10:43:34
does image of a color blue count ? because a lot of things you can pretty much experience by just looking at a picture and it wouldn't be much different than seeing it with your own eyes+1
@permutation_of_cards - 2025-05-21 10:43:34
@one_step_sideways You saw me? What do I have to do with it? People don't read whole comments they press a like on. If you think I payed random bots to get a few likes on a random youtube comment for no reason at all, then feel free to report me. I don't mind because I've done nothing.+9
@permutation_of_cards - 2025-05-21 10:43:34
@slavic_commonwealth I'm not sure I understood your comment. Would you mind rephrasing it, please?+1
@FunMaker39 - 2025-05-21 10:43:34
Imagining things with your eyes closed is analogous to computer trying to display a triangle while the monitor is turned off. The computer might still think it is displaying a triangle, it might even inspect the framebuffer and confirm it, even though no image is actually displayed. Same for your imagining a triangle with your eyes closed. And if you open that CPU or brain you won't find that triangle. That's because displaying or seeing a triangle is not a function of single transistor or neuron but a feature of the entire system.+9
@slavic_commonwealth - 2025-05-21 10:43:34
@FunMaker39 emergent behaviour+4
@permutation_of_cards - 2025-05-21 10:43:34
@FunMaker39 I completely get what you're trying to say, I was thinking that too! However, what persuaded me is that, if there is no monitor at all(or the monitor is permanently turned off), then you would never have a purple triangle actually appear ever again. You would* only have bits that represent RGB of purple and sides of a triangle, but "the picture"(the appearance) wouldn't exist anymore. I get that you're saying--That all of the computational work and displaying would be done by the CPU whether monitor exists or not, however what I'm trying to say is that even if that is true(I agree with that)we wouldn't ever have a purple triangle actually appear were there no monitors. The better analogy, in my opinion is that--Monitor doesn't exist, yet CPU is somehow seeing the appearance of a purple triangle, that is codified inside of it, in the first person subjective experience. If the screen as a concept wasn't ever invented, CPUs would be able to calculate and signal, in some other way, what is the Output. We would also be able to store the information of a purple triangle inside a HDD, or even in CPU cache, but we would never be able to actually see that codified purple triangle. Humans wouldn't be able to see that purple triangle because it's not displayed, let alone CPU itself being "aware" of the actual purple triangle as an appearance in its semantic entirety in the first person, internally. I'd love to hear your thoughts. I always leave a possibility of being wrong, but this is what ultimately convinced me.+16
@permutation_of_cards - 2025-05-21 10:43:34
@slavic_commonwealth I'd suggest watching this ~5 minute video of Alex O' Connor himself. It's on his channel, it's named: Two Unanswerable Questions About the Mind He addresses your point better than I could(Although he talks about the color red haha).+3
@ancavalcanti92 - 2025-05-21 10:43:35
@FunMaker39 It's only storing commands to draw the triangle. That would be more like trying to draw a triangle with a pen and paper with an arm you recently lost rather than an image in the mind's eye.+1
@andrewkosenko2757 - 2025-05-21 10:43:35
If we cut open a processor and measure the voltages across different parts (that is, if the processors were a lot bigger in size) we would actually see the high and low signals (around 1v high and 0v low), if we look at the data, and translate it so something more human-like, we will, eventually, after uncovering a dozen of abstraction layers, see a yellow triangle. Same with the brain. Since the brain is basically a processor, it also has some electrical signals etc, too long to write it all out here, but basically we can measure the brain activity and we will see exactly what parts of the brain are used to fantasise a yellow triangle. Obviously, each brain is unique, so even though we will see a similar picture in other persons brain, it will not be the same, thus the brain isn’t something reverse-engineerable. The brain has so many connections and neurons and ways to use them and interact between them, that at that point we should use the word much, not many (since it’s uncountable at that point, it’s billions upon billions of neurons and connections)+2
@roripantsu - 2025-05-21 10:43:35
@andrewkosenko2757 using functional brain power to explain imagination fails to account the qualia experience induced from psychedelics despite reduction of brain activity+2
@rogerlouie1 - 2025-05-21 10:43:35
Thanks for taking the time to write all of this.+3
@blackpiller3777 - 2025-05-21 10:43:35
I can't see the purple triangle, I don't have soul?+2
@rogerlouie1 - 2025-05-21 10:43:35
@blackpiller3777 no, you have aphantasia.+2
@roripantsu - 2025-05-21 10:43:35
@blackpiller3777 no thats a condition called aphantasia. Its pretty much debated to what a soul even is+2
@FunMaker39 - 2025-05-21 10:43:35
@permutation_of_cards >The better analogy, in my opinion is that--Monitor doesn't exist, yet CPU is somehow seeing the appearance of a purple triangle, that is codified inside of it, in the first person subjective experience. It still can. Just by inspecting the framebuffer, which is the natural way for a computer to analyse what it is trying to display. >If the screen as a concept wasn't ever invented, CPUs would be able to calculate and signal, in some other way, what is the Output. We would also be able to store the information of a purple triangle inside a HDD, or even in CPU cache, but we would never be able to actually see that codified purple triangle. I do not see how is this any similar to humans imagining with closed eyes, nor where does this scenario leads too tbh+2
@kobalt7725 - 2025-05-28 10:43:35
Jesus christ. The triangle dissect thing is just so ridiculous of an argument. The interface where thw "puple occurs" is what we think of as "consciousness". It is not displayed because HUMANS did not evolve to display things like a computer. WE designed COMPUTERS to have an interface for us. The screen of your computer is to its perception, or what it sees inside, or what you see as reasonable based on your perception. P.s: we evolved to survive in an environment, it just so happens that we evolved intelligence and it paid of handsomely. Language itself was a mutation, our closed relatives, the neanderthals did not have the capacity to have a complex language/symbolic reasoning as us, which likely drove them into extinction/incorporation into humanity's genepool. So if it was true that there are aspects such as consciousness that are "immaterial", then why can a species that is so similar to us, was incapable of developing complex language like us? And why was it all because of a single gene mutation, which are chemicals, which are matter?+3
@kenny-ou5pn - 2025-05-28 10:43:35
Just because you can't physically find thoughts or dreams when you cut the brain doesn't mean that these don't generate from physical phenomena only. The 'hard problem of consciousness' or even just the word 'consciousness' are human made concepts. People are trying to explain something that we don't even have a clear definition of, it's a flawed question to begin with. Taking a leap of faith like you do stating "this must be something out of this physical reality" would be the same as me just stating the contrary, and arguing that the physical manifestation of the purple triangle is a set of specific neural connections and molecules arranged in a certain order. Making such affirmations about consciousness escaping logic is arrogant, because we don't understand it well and we can't just make leaps of faith or assumptions just because we 'feel' it. But if you are a person that follows logic, science, and not feelings, then the best guess is that it's most likely just a physical phenomenon - notice how consciousness/perception/feelings can be tampered with directly with electric nodes on the brain, or taking substances that affect it (there have been several studies and experiments that demonstrate this). Also reducing everything to analogies that could be transformed to support either side of the argument is not a good way to present an idea - as an analogy could support an argument you have, but not act as one.+6
@permutation_of_cards - 2025-05-28 10:43:35
@kobalt7725 Thank you for commenting. I'm going to bold the part where I quote you so that you can easily distinguish your comment from my response. (Also, I don't claim to know or be certain in these matters. I'm open to have my mind changed, I'm only explaining what ultimately convince me that consciousness is not material. I could be wrong of course, but I still haven't heard a compelling enough argument(which doesn't mean it doesn't exist, so if you think you have it--Bring it on)) You said: It is not displayed because HUMANS did not evolve to display things like a computer. WE designed COMPUTERS to have an interface for us. Exactly. I agree, that's why I think it's a bad analogy and a bad counter-argument. You said: P.s: we evolved to survive in an environment, it just so happens that we evolved intelligence and it paid of handsomely. Language itself was a mutation, our closed relatives, the neanderthals did not have the capacity to have a complex language/symbolic reasoning as us, which likely drove them into extinction/incorporation into humanity's genepool. How do we know that? I agree we have evolved, but how can we be sure someone else didn't see anything remotely similar to us? We can't even be sure if, today, both of us are able to experience the same things in ours minds because your mind is not my mind and vice versa. Do animals have some form of "imagination" that resembles consciousness? I have no idea! It seems so utterly mysterious. You said: So if it was true that there are aspects such as consciousness that are "immaterial", then why can a species that is so similar to us, was incapable of developing complex language like us? Because they weren't conscious as we are? But it's a great question how seemingly very genetically similar, almost identical, specie was cognitively drastically different. I don't know why and if they were/were not conscious. You said: And why was it all because of a single gene mutation, which are chemicals, which are matter? Let me give you an analogy. Once the science was pro-physicalism(pre Netwon era) and when they thought that matter is all there is, meaning they were ignorant and unaware of forces such as gravity, magnetism, etc. Imagine that at one point you rearranged the matter(atoms) to a "Basic radio receiver". At that point, you'd be able to detect EM waves of thunderstorms and other EM waves around us that are NOT caused by humans. That's not to say that this specific rearrangement of matter(atoms) created those sounds/EM waves, as opposed to its failed ancestor of Basic radio receiver that failed to do its job because it lacked, say, a certain resistor or capacitor wasn't in place. I'm not saying it's 100% like that, but that is one possible explanation. Also, I have a question for you. If matter+forces is all there is in this universe, then what does the "hard problem of consciousness" even exist? Also, imagine that consciousness is neither matter nor force, but a totally different substance(I know you do NOT think that, but just try to imagine it for a second), at which failed attempt would you accept that consciousness is NOTmatter+forces? One more thing, since you believe that matter+forces is EVERYTHING in this universe and that every phenomena of consciousness CAN be explained using matter+forces, then the burden of proof is on you to prove that since you DO have all the possible tools to explain it. However, if you do NOT have a formal proof, then you're believing that there eventually will be an explanation on a pure blind faith. In the same way that pro-science people(I am pro science, and I no I don't mean pro-creationism science or something ridiculous like that, I'm using this term in a derogatory term since some people wouldn't change they mind even if were science to say that. Essentially I mean dogmatic people) believe that at one point we'll know what was "before"(concent of time was created at the Big Bang so it's wrong to say "before", but that's why I quoted it) the Big Bang and who/what created it. But that's a category error I think most people don't understand. Imagine that you found a book and they had some weird notion of grammar and writing style and punctuation marks. Imagine that you discovered some form of pattern, or "law" within it such as, say, if you see a '.' then then next thing is a letter in uncial. Also, after these curly marks(commas) there is always once blank character after it. Also there is this "iambic pentamener", etc. etc. Now imagine that somebody asks you: But who wrote the book? And somebody says: "Hey, I don't know that yet, but look how much progress I've made, certainly at one point we'll figure that too". I think that's a category error. If science is unable to answer some question, in principle, that will never be publicly said. No one's going to say:"Science is never going to discover WHO or WHAT caused the Big Bang", but that's actually true. You can't study outside from the inside. If consciousness is indeed of a different substance, at which point would you accept that? Also, how can you be so sure that consciousness is "just the brain" if we do not have the proof. And not only that, but didn't even being to crack that question.+5
@permutation_of_cards - 2025-05-28 10:43:35
@kenny-ou5pn Thank you for commenting. I'm going to bold the part where I quote you so that you can easily distinguish your comment from my response. (Also, I don't claim to know or be certain in these matters. I'm open to have my mind changed, I'm only explaining what ultimately convince me that consciousness is not material. I could be wrong of course, but I still haven't heard a compelling enough argument(which doesn't mean it doesn't exist, so if you think you have it--Bring it on)) You said: *The 'hard problem of consciousness' or even just the word 'consciousness' are human made concepts. * But I assume you do believe that you have consciousness, whatever that means and however we define it. I assume that you think you DO have consciousness and that a CPU does NOT. Correct me if I'm wrong in this assumption. If matter+forces is all there is in this universe, then what does the "hard problem of consciousness" even exist? The point isn't that the concept of "hard problem of consciousness" is a human-made concept or not, the point is to show that science didn't even begin to give a semi-coherent answer to that question. That's the point. If it's "just the brain", how come we're not even close to explain it? Also, imagine that consciousness is neither matter nor force, but a totally different substance(I know you do NOT think that, but just try to imagine it for a second), at which failed attempt would you accept that consciousness is NOT matter+forces? One more thing, since you believe that matter+forces is EVERYTHING in this universe and that every phenomena of consciousness IS matter+forces, then the burden of proof is on you to prove that since you DO have all the possible tools to explain it. However, if you do NOT have a formal proof, then you're believing that there eventually will be an explanation on a pure blind faith. In the same way that pro-science people(I am pro science, and I no I don't mean pro-creationism science or something ridiculous like that, I'm using this term in a derogatory term since some people wouldn't change their mind even if science were to say it. Essentially I mean dogmatic people) believe that at one point we'll know what was "before"(concept of time was created at the Big Bang so it's wrong to say "before", but that's why I quoted it) the Big Bang and who/what created it. But that's a category error I think most people make. Imagine that you found a book and they had some weird notion of grammar and writing style and punctuation marks. Imagine that you discovered some form of pattern, or "law" within it such as, say, if you see a '.' then then next thing is a letter in uncial. Also, after these curly marks(commas) there is always once blank space after it. Also there is this "iambic pentamener", etc. etc. Now imagine that somebody asks you: But who wrote the book? And somebody says: "Hey, we don't know that yet, but look how much progress we've made, certainly at one point we'll figure that too!". I think that's a category error. If science is unable to answer some question, in principle, that will never be publicly said. No one's going to say:"Science is never going to discover WHO or WHAT caused the Big Bang", but that's actually true. You can't study outside from the inside. That's logically true. If consciousness is indeed of a different substance, at which point would you accept that? Also, how can you be so sure that consciousness is "just the brain" if we do not have the proof? And not only that, but didn't even being to crack that question. You said: But if you are a person that follows logic, science, and not feelings, then the best guess is that it's most likely just a physical phenomenon - notice how consciousness/perception/feelings can be tampered with directly with electric nodes on the brain, or taking substances that affect it (there have been several studies and experiments that demonstrate this). I agree with that and have addressed that in my original comment, it's the famous "interaction problem". But imagine that you say:"Notice how television content can be tampered with by striking the TV device directly(or messing with antennae) or with electric nodes on its circuit, or pouring water over it" No one denies that physical world is in some way connected to consciousness(if it's immaterial and not a force). But to equate television content with the TV device is a category error. Also, what would you expect to see in the brain once you take the substance, say ayahuasca? Since people have such vivid visions and they experience so much, one would think the brain activity increases, but actually that's wrong. Once you take a psychedelic, the brain activity DECREASES, while consciousness experience INCREASES. That seem utterly mysterious and wrong in some sense, but that's what happens.+5
@permutation_of_cards - 2025-05-28 10:43:35
@FunMaker39 (I'll bold your comments so that you can distinguish me quoting you and my response) You said: It still can. Just by inspecting the framebuffer, which is the natural way for a computer to analyse what it is trying to display. I fear you didn't understand my point. Maybe it's my inability to express myself clear enough or maybe it's you disagreeing from the outset without actually trying to see what I'm trying to say. (Also, I could be wrong! I'm here to have an exchange and explain what ultimately convinced me, that's not to be confused with me thinking I'm 100% right. I don't think that. I'm here to have a good faith discussion about what and why I'm convinced in my stance) The problem with the above quote is that you're showing that you don't understand what I'm talking about(I'll take on me being not clear enough!). I'm NOT talking about the information that is indeed processed by the brain and stored in the brain(partially or fully), I'm NOT talking about that. I'm NOT talking about the brain activity that creates the experience, I'm talking about THE EXPERIENCE ITSELF, the qualia. It's a very subtle difference, but an important one. If we were to open a framgebuffer and analyse its content, it's high and low voltages stores in transistors, we would indeed be able to know what is it TRYING to display, I agree with that! However, we would NOT actually be able to "appear that picture" were there no monitors. Imagine that, for some reason, people haven't ever used a color purple. Somehow that was NEVER seen in nature by human being even if the electromagnetic spectrum does allow people to see the color purple. Imagine that for a second. Now imagine if some CPU had an information that included RGB hexa color of that triangle, which is: #800080 Were there NO monitors EVER invented, but we somehow codified(maybe by mistake) this combination of RGB color (#800080)--Would you be able to ever EXPERIENCE that color were there no monitors to actually display it? You would be able to say: Ah it seems that there isn't anything of this color in our universe, but using science of electromagnetic radiation, it seem that this is a color that looks similar to red, but not quite red and similar to blue, but not quite blue. But you would NEVER actually be able to "see" this color, were there no monitors. Now, the point of this thought experiment is NOT to say that you can imagine or have codified information in our brain that doesn't actually correspond to something in the external world, I'm NOT trying to say that. What I am trying to say is that even if you could know, by analyzing the data the in the framebuffer, is that this color is something between red and blue, but you wouldn't actually be able to "see" it. In other words, you would NOT be able to fully comprehend the codified information even if you analyze the content of it. Even if it's a combination of shapeand color that you could find in nature, you still wouldn't be able to see that specific "picture" that is codified inside that framebuffer were there no monitors. You said: I do not see how is this any similar to humans imagining with closed eyes, nor where does this scenario leads too tbh Maybe it's my bad explanation ability! Let me try again: Do you think that, a CPU, will ever be able to see for itself in the"first person sense" the picture that is codified in its, say, cache if monitors don't exist? In other words, it seems that we're able to "see" things that are indeed codified in our brain, however we do NOT have a monitor inside the brain. If we say that eyes are a kind of monitor, then how do we explain blind people, or even people who lost their eyes, still being able to "see" pictures as a memory? The question is--Where do they see it? The "pictures" seems to exist, however if all there is in this universe are matter+forces, then where the hell is that "picture"? Most people say:"Well the brain creates that", but that shows they didn't understand the argument. I'm not talking about the processing of the brain that creates the "picture", I'm talking about the "picture" itself. Now, if you say this is just an illusion, then where is that illusion? That has to exist SOMEWHERE in some sense. For example, maybe our brain processed information that doesn't latch onto the real world right in front of us. Sure, that is possible. But I'm not talking about the INFORMATION that creates the experience, I'm talking about the EXPERIENCE itself. I hope I've been a bit more clear now. Excited to hear from you!+4
@Khoukharev - 2025-05-28 10:43:35
@kobalt7725 Neanderthals DID have a capacity for a complex language. By all accounts their ability (as in potential) in this regard is pretty much the same as yours or mine. There is a suggestion that they didn’t use this potential fully and that might have contributed to their eventual demise. But that’s not an established fact. Also there are another explanations, like smaller groups (which might decrease the need in a more complex language if that was actually the case).+2
@crax7936 - 2025-05-28 10:43:35
@Khoukharev Did you see one of Alex's most recent videos where he mentions panpsychism? I'm pretty sold on it currently. I'm still trying to piece together a worldview with it (always the fun part)! I LOVE the concept of consciousness being fundamental and our brains are a sort of bucket that contains functions and physical structures that conciousness uses to interpret and navigate the physical. That's my initial take but I haven't really dove into the philosophical renderings of our (human's) minds yet. I meant that I haven't read any books on the subject. I have done psychedelics though and have experienced the oneness.+1
@Khoukharev - 2025-05-28 10:43:35
@crax7936 I’m not sure which video specifically you’re referring to. On the spot - no, I don’t think I have seen that. As for the rest of your comment, to simplify a lot — I look at brain as sort of a joystick you use to play your character. If the joystick is broken - tough luck, at best your character would act weird from time to time. But the joystick is not you and the joystick doesn’t decide what’s happening. Neither does the brain. Nor the nerve tissue in your hand sending an electrical signal to your arm when you would type your reply.+1
@crax7936 - 2025-05-28 10:43:35
@Khoukharev You should look into it. It's apparently one of the oldest philosophical theories. Essentially, like in your last example, of course the thing controlling the joystick is consciousness. In this theory where consciousness lies as a fundamental part of everything and is in everything, we are the same consciousness just with different physical structures that has recorded different memories, genetic functions, etc.+1
@the81kid - 2025-06-04 10:43:35
I like Bruce Greyson's (Sam Parnia talks about it sometimes also) theory: the brain is analogous to a radio - it receives certain "frequencies", certain thoughts, from somewhere else, and it blocks certain thoughts. He says it's possible that we only receive the thoughts we need to survive in this material world. For example, to survive as a hunter-gatherer. A hunter-gatherer typically doesn't need to receive thoughts such as talking with god, or seeing dead ancestors. I don't know if Greyson has read Julian Jaynes. I've been trying to synchronize both their ideas of the brain's relation to consciousness. I'm drawn more and more to the idea of the brain as a metaphorical radio. Similar to how your router doesn't generate the internet, but when you turn it off, you lose your internet connection.+1
@badabing3391 - 2025-06-06 10:43:35
the triangle is in the neuron systems that fire upon imagining one. Its literally some group of neurons all throughout your brain which fire and generate every thought you have about that triangle in the moment you think about it (its color, shape, the background its on, etc.). Thats what/where the triangle is in your brain.+1
@the81kid - 2025-06-06 10:43:35
@badabing3391 The neurons don't see anything. You do. That's like saying your radio listens to music.+1
@badabing3391 - 2025-06-06 10:43:35
@the81kid to a materialist, they basically do, albeit the ability to see may be governed by other neurons different from the ones generating the image of the triangle.+1
@the81kid - 2025-06-06 10:43:35
@badabing3391 Seeing as we all live with a non-physical world (inside our minds), I'm amazed how many people are so disturbed by this that they refuse to believe there is anything except the physical. It's so disturbing to the materialists.+1
@badabing3391 - 2025-06-06 10:43:35
@the81kid or maybe its just highly convenient, since every decade that passes by reveals even more of the physical aspects of our internal world. Better to adapt yourself to that trend than to pretend it doesnt exist.+1
@SeeMyDolphin - 2025-06-09 10:43:35
For you example of the 'interaction problem' with 'losing consciousness', I've personally come to believe that this is actually just not true, and what we are really doing is conflating qualia with material information. Easy to do, since they tend to be so closely linked in our perception of the world. I like to use two examples to illustrate the difference: 1. Do you remember what you ate for dinner exactly one year ago today? Do you remember the conscious experience of eating it? I assume the answer to both is likely no. However, if I ask you whether you believe that you were conscious at the time, I believe you would answer yes. It would seem absurd to believe that you weren't conscious during such a mundane experience as eating dinner, and yet you have no way to prove that you were. What this does is gives us out first intuition that consciousness doesn't necessarily require memory. We can essentially extend this intuition to more extreme examples: are you conscious when you sleepwalk? Most people would say no, but how do we know for sure? Perhaps they are conscious the whole time, but simply not remembering any of their conscious experience as it happens? How about when you hit your head? We have no proof of our consciousness being on or off at these times, but if you think of it this way, you can at least conceive of consciousness being constant, and what we think of unconsciousness is really a conflation of the material information processing of memory with the experience of qualia itself. 2. What does the bottom of your foot feel like right now? Odds are you probably weren't aware that it felt like anything before I asked you that question, but now that I have, there is a quale that you are noticing there. The question then becomes, did it exist before you noticed it? I think a lot of people's first impulse would be to answer: 'no, it wasn't there before I noticed it,' but again, we come to the problem of, 'how do you know that?' And the answer is that you don't. So again, we're left with this situation where we can't say for sure either way, but we can at least conceive of a world where the feeling of your foot is always there, regardless of whether or not you 'notice' it. In other words, this would decouple consciousness from awareness. These two also often get conflated, along with memory, but I find that if we treat these all as separate phenomena, the interaction problems become a lot easier to explain. Essentially, I assert that the role of consciousness is much smaller and inert than is usually given credit to it. Any functional response our brain and body has to stimuli is a result of material information, not qualia. I.e. the electrochemical signals being sent through our nervous system, which are results of nerves and phtoreceptors, etc. being stimulated by physical interactions. The qualia interacts with memory and awareness in the brain in some way (I think this is more akin to an illusion, where the qualia happens simultaneously with the material information being processed in the brain, so the brain thinks it is processing (and remembering) the qualia rather than the material information itself), but the effect is minimal, and doesn't really influence the material processes of the body to much degree. Some might say that this is essentially the same as saying that qualia just doesn't exist, and only material information is measurable. But I think this is abusing scientific rigour in a matter where it is simply not appropriate. The experience of qualia is undeniable. Denying a quale that you are currently experiencing is self-contradictory in the same way that denying your existence with your own thoughts is self-contradictory. Just because it cannot be scientifically modelled does not mean that it does not exist.+1
@RavishBC - 2025-05-21 10:43:35
lol+1
@michaelns9887 - 2025-05-21 10:43:35
He ain't dead, bro+1
@buginshaorma - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
Dad gave us a few videos then he's gonna go buy milk and cigarettes again, I know it.+17
@CantArrestUsAll - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
Bold of you to assume we're conscious.+72
@Dovus-V - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
That was very neatly explained. I find it great that some of your more atheistic-minded audience can listen to these ideas and ponder upon them. Keep up the good work Luke, God bless ☦️+27
@dererlkonig7428 - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
I still can't believe you're back+14
@bedro_0 - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
I'd like to see this guy debate Alex O'Connor, it would be insane.+16
@NONAME-wc1tc - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
Are you trying to get on the trending tab luke?+8
@StaryWkurwiony - 2025-06-04 10:43:36
You can't run software without hardware.Consciousness is an emergent property of complex material systems.Mental phenomena (thoughts, awareness, sensations) cannot exist independently of a physical substrate (like a brain).While we may not fully understand how consciousness emerges from matter, it's still fundamentally dependent on it.without matter, consciousness could not manifest at all. Just as thoughts require a brain to exist, so too does consciousness require a physical substrate.Consciousness is not floating out there as a mystical substance or a universal field; it's an emergent property of complex physical systems, particularly biological ones like the human brain.the lack of full explanation doesn’t justify assuming consciousness comes from something non-material.To say that "consciousness does not come from matter" is like saying that "music does not come from instruments" just because we don't yet fully understand the acoustics and artistry involved.+2
@dragnosmz - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
I swear I stepped into a parallel dimension. He's uploading regularly now??+11
@engin3ar - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
We're so back+12
@PetesSubs - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
Convinced Luke is imprisoned on a makeshift set to make videos to sway the discourse with how fast these are coming out and the continuous change of weather in each one; a sort of bastardization of The Truman Show meets Synecdoche, NY+18
@1337GigaChad - 2025-05-28 10:43:36
ppl rly think chemicals can spontaneously have consciousness 💀💀💀+16
@kuruteiru - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
01:02 I believe you meant Arch GNU/Sceptic, or as I've recently taken to calling it, GNU plus Sceptic.+8
@danmurad8080 - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
11:44 exactly, what happens when you go unconscious is that you break the communication channel of how consciousness interacts with the brain/physical world. in your graphic calculator analogy hitting your head is like breaking the circuit board between the motherboard and the keys. So that the person typing no longer can interface with the calculators memory.+5
@AnYoTuUs - 2025-05-28 10:43:36
People are capable of speaking at length about things that cannot be seen or measured: God, the soul, consciousness.+5
@briancomforti3890 - 2025-05-28 10:43:36
The Wizard of the Forest speaks I sit and listen+3
@swims-in-money6672 - 2025-05-28 10:43:36
Luke: I don’t trust all these science things Me, a physicist: so true king+3
@PlasmaSnake369 - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
The soul is the actuality of a body with the potential for life; it cannot exist without the body, just as the shape of a statue cannot exist without the material+9
@slavecrusher6245 - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
you are not luek+16
@barrdack - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
According to spiritual texts consciousness generates the material world, and can manipulate the material world at will when aware of its properties. The 12 universal laws can be verified in practice.+7
@mohammedahmed-y7y - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
your new videos opened my eyes to philosophy and materialism, keep it up champ+14
@realsetanta70 - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
lol! Did you unconsciously type that quip?+19
@rafaelf.9246 - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
I sure will become unconscious after reading some redditors here in the comment section.+15
@rewe3536 - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
As a philosophical zombie, I agree+16
@johnstamos5948 - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
"I think therefore I'm not" OP+20
@ismcift1668 - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
@johnstamos5948 i think therefore i realize that it may not matter if i am. qualia is not observable from the outside, so if there is nothing beyond the material than it is observable that qualia has no necessity.+1
@adamsawyer1763 - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
I only assume you're conscious. You might not be but I most assuredly am.+6
@youtubeenjoyer1743 - 2025-05-21 10:43:36
@johnstamos5948 “I made up an unverifiable statement to show the atheists how cool I am”+3
@Khoukharev - 2025-05-28 10:43:36
@realsetanta70 some people even become high ranking officials all without ever getting conscious.+1
@oongieboongie - 2025-05-28 10:43:36
@realsetanta70 where were you when you lost your keys?+1
@realsetanta70 - 2025-05-28 10:43:36
@oongieboongie Losing keys and deliberately typing specific keystrokes are the same thing to you?+1
@ponyclopper - 2025-06-15 10:43:36
conciousness is a spectrum+1
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:43:37
I can assure you that we do not ponder empty speculation such as this+7
@thomasjford - 2025-05-21 10:43:37
Pondering is all you can do with falsifiable hypotheses+3
@Dovus-V - 2025-05-21 10:43:37
@OthorgonalOctroon What part of Luke's argument do you disagree with?+4
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:43:37
@Dovus-V where was the argument? it was just assertions and speculation but Luke never provides any evidence for any premise therein.+5
@Dovus-V - 2025-05-21 10:43:37
@OthorgonalOctroon I gave an answer but you will have to sort by recent on the comments section and scroll down to the original comment and replies if you're interested. YouTube censors comments that are too elaborate or long.+3
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:43:37
Richard Carrier would be more relevant I think, he is a historian who has written peer reviewed books about epistomology, the historicity of jesus and the early church, as well as blog articles about how consciousness is a material process+3
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:43:37
he also knows Latin as he's largely a historian of ancient Rome, all in all he covers similar material from the polar opposite viewpoint+3
@TheTastyPancake - 2025-05-21 10:43:37
On religion yes it would be a banger, but please not on metaphysics and ontology... these are baby steps in the video (no offence to anyone here)+9
@Ryan-xq3kl - 2025-05-28 10:43:37
"debates" solve nothing+4
- 2025-05-21 10:43:37
Probably just a big dump of info and then another hibernation. He's always advocated people moving away from here.+6
@goongleton - 2025-05-21 10:43:37
he filmed 3 videos in one go. same clothes and place+5
@PhilippBlum - 2025-05-21 10:43:38
I kind of get it, but also what? Those who know ^^+3
@gnomelinux - 2025-05-21 10:43:38
He was sent up into space like mst3k and forced to either do youtube content or watch crappy movies for a eternity by a lizard man. He chose the wise way out.+2
@monarcas5502 - 2025-05-28 10:43:38
the thing is, we can understand the how, but the why remains.+1
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 - 2025-06-04 10:43:38
There is literally nothing about chemicals or chemical interactions which stops them from creating consciousness.+2
@Hallvard0 - 2025-06-05 10:43:38
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 Did you even watch the video? Consciousness CANNOT arise from material by definition+2
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 - 2025-06-05 10:43:38
@Hallvard0 Yes, it can. You guys don't even know what information IS+2
@Hallvard0 - 2025-06-05 10:43:38
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 Alright explain it to me then+2
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 20:43:38
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 except for the fact that it literally can't happen and you just slapped your contention on the end of "there is literally nothing that stops me from being right about..." and called it an argument.+1
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-28 10:43:39
How do you see or measure matter without consciousness?+8
@monarcas5502 - 2025-05-28 10:43:39
imagine taking the scientific method and trying to measure good with it? well u can't. because it's all of its scope. and that's fine.+1
@monarcas5502 - 2025-05-28 10:43:39
is this soul for atheists?+3
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 20:43:39
source:+1
@PlasmaSnake369 - 2025-06-18 03:43:39
@monarcas5502 Do Christians not believe in the resurrection of the body?+1
@isaiahthompkins6523 - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
Thing is syntax absolutely implies semantics if you’re sufficiently generalizing the rules. Once that structure is understood there is a MINIMUM meaning given by that structure (Luke hints at it 1:27). If you want to make a “real” moral statement it’s going to need concession in language in order to map onto the “real” world. Facts bound the space of possible articulable “real” moral statements but they don’t point to any specific point in space.+6
@valiantviktor - 2025-05-28 10:43:40
A video exploring psychology and existential subjects? Queue the multi-paragraph long responses written by midwits with nothing better to do with their time! HOORAY!+4
@4.0.4 - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
Luke, you cannot just start from the axiom that consciousness cannot be a product of computation unless you define it as such, which is circular reasoning.+5
@adarshiyer4805 - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
The analogy of mercury made sense to me with my Hindu/Vedanta background, but I'm curious what the precise Orthodox perspective is, like what the equivalent terms are or if the metaphor differs importantly, which I suspect it does since theosis is not the same as moksha. In vedanta: The one supreme soul (atman) is like the sun, which shines a constant light. The body(sarira) is like a bowl, and the mind (manas), the memory (chitta), the intellect (buddhi), and the ego (ahamkara), are like water in the bowl. Often the analogy is also made with mirrors, which is where I drew the connection with mercury (mirror-water). Our souls (jiva) are like the reflection of the sun in the water, and the quality of our soul depends on the purity and stillness of the mind and body to faithfully reflect the light of the supreme soul through us. Thus, moksha is achieved when our soul becomes a pure reflection of atman, with no defects due to our mind and body's sinful desires, and so our souls become holy / divine as we let Brahman live through us instead of our ego. I should mention that particular perspectives of dualism, non-dualism, quasi-dualism, monotheism, monism, pantheism, etc are all well-exemplified in the Vedanta tradition, even if often people only encounter advaita proponents, so not all Hindus are necessarily some sort of Indian gnostic lol. I know theosis is the process of making one's soul more holy and like god in preparation for union with God, and Paul says in Galatians "yet not I, but Christ liveth in me" (copied from your kjv fork :D), but obviously there are important differences between Orthodoxy and Vedanta philosophy. I find a lot about Orthodoxy intriguing, and your videos / articles on Christianity did contribute a lot to my interest in the church and the Christian worldview, for which I thank you. Godspeed, Luke!+12
@XYReason - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
4:55 - You are showing lack of knowledge about Gödel's work starting from here. Syntactic interpetation of something semanthic is something what is math trying to do, engineering is even more schizo about it. there are some terms like high order functions, first class citizen, pure functions in type theory. And calculators are providing some kind of numeric-approx. results. Variable of the function can still be left undefined. Shared state is something in the middle of determinism and imperative paradigm (e.g. of it is race conditions). For example people are trying to combine two ends - like in microservices. Absolutist determinism is something unachieved, noumenon, e.g. shrodinger's cat, np=p, unrestricted grammar. There is categpry theory, universal approximation theorem, yes. Can you even deduce if our brains either work as an circuit full of capacitors and we just store the data (but concsiosness is somehow a constant fps xp), or as full of inductors and we reach some for of resonance. in case where we store information, maybe there is some parrallel entity tracking the same codes we are storing and referencing, auditing, you don't know. but there is some inherent ideal meta-language (like Tarksy observed) like Logos, because of the constant fps xp. But also you can say that codes of conciousness can match randomly and provoke reincarnation? two or more conciousnesses at once in a single body?+10
@vonchadsworth - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
For a mathematical example of emergence, consider the Central Limit Theorem, which states that the sum of independently and identically distributed random variables forms a normal distribution. Even if all of the variables in question are uniformly distributed, a normal distribution emerges when they are added together. Similarly, perhaps even if a single neuron is not conscious, the collective behavior of many interconnected neurons is.+5
@ZedX-hj8mx - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
Go on...show us just one property of consciousness that violates computation.+4
@93nada - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
I always felt consciousness is something more as well, simply because purely material and computational things dont require such observer or feeling. It just doesnt make sense to me that they would come to embody consciousness or that kind of thing out of nothing after being created. But also i dont know where to go from there. The fact that i feel it exists doesnt lead me anywhere. i just feel agnostic about religions and such things in an equal manner. I feel stuck.+6
@MINDucated - 2025-05-28 10:43:40
Matter is consciousness taking form+3
@danielkruyt9475 - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
I am personally a compatibilist: it is truly and abundantly clear to me that determinism and personal choice exist at the same time. That doesn't however mean that I have to believe that matter cannot give rise to consciousness. I see a clear continuum of consciousness in animals, which can largely be directly ascribed to material properties (brain structure, physical damage to the brain, neurological disease, drug treatments, etc). This continuum seems to have a limit point approaching (some) human's abilities, and do note that some of the most impressive human feats are achieved through copious use of performance-enhancing drugs! I don't think I have the existential "power" to truly argue conclusively that everything either is or isn't "computational", and I don't think anyone else does either. Anyone that thinks humans are magically specially the only truly conscious animals hasn't seen the full continuum of human or animal genetic expression IMO. However, I do believe that I have the existential power to assert this is exactly the kind of discussion domain which seperates mathematicians from philosophers: we have bins, philosophers don't. This entire topic of discussion is largely pointless as it doesn't increase any kind of objectively measurable utility: It doesn't actually explain anything, and it doesn't actually make a person who is suffering from deterministic depression feel better. So why talk about it? This is the kind of thing where, discussing your preferences in media might be a more productive thing to do, lol. Fun fact Luke: did you know that randomized computation may very well be an entirely different thing to deterministic computation? We haven't been able to prove derandomization theorems in the general case, though some special cases are proven. Are you familiar with what randomized computation offers in terms of explanatory power? It allows for the kinds of arbitrary realizations we often attribute to the concept of free will... It may even be considered an explanatory methodology by which a truly free entity of some kind (the random bits) interacts with an otherwise totally-deterministic world... Crazy to think about philosophically, and also an incredibly practical question! Maybe work on some math/CS instead of worrying too much about which cult has the best (false) promises? :)+6
@DetectiveAndrey - 2025-05-28 10:43:40
I really felt your struggle with words there. Now, don’t get me wrong, I perfectly understood with pretty much everything you said there, and agree with that, but it’s just so hard to find fitting words for this topic. Most of them are just metaphors.+3
@SurrogateActivities - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
Define consciousness. You're walking in circles.+26
@backdaniel - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
Consciousness can't be a "metaphysical"/"different paradigm type of matter". If it was you could pick a brain, its cells, go deep into its structures and find some resemblance of an interface with that "special matter". But you can't because there is none. I heard people say "but we don't understand how the brain works completely". While we don't understand entirely the interactions (due to it being a very complex network), but the structure is OBVIOUS, every different kind of brain cell, and the things that form them, the only question is how they are arranged to form conscious thought, there is no evidence of any kind of interface or special arrangement that isn't obviously physical and "in your face" what it does by itself.+29
@mercatoid - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
Loving awareness is that force that is the core of your being that is not a material thing (and is really not specific to you only, there’s no “your awareness”, just awareness), and the computational part is another layer that lives in your brain in material similar to how you can store information on a physical disk+6
@ClownTownVT - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
I literally watched your videos about q month ago because I was like "this is a righteous MFer with the right ideas" only to see u hadnt made content in years. I subbed anyway because I love your msg and you come back from obscurity. Truly God provides.+3
@fennecbesixdouze1794 - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
"You're never going to and English word out of a calculator" 39103 x 17 x 8 now, just take the right perspective ...+5
@complaintregistar - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
the uploads have been much needed and are incredibly appreciated. please be safe, sir.+3
@KaLaka16 - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
My answer: matter is spiritual. Matter was never non-spiritual. The brain is basically an AI interface for the soul, which is fully immersed in matter to the point of practically full fusion. Matter exists in the same reality as the soul, and God (unknowable from this perspective) -> not truly distinct from the soul or God, even if appearing so. Anything happening spiritually (soul-related events beyond mundane life (also spiritual, for soul development)) also has to have a material counterpart in the brain, in order for any memories of such events to be expressed. The brain is a spiritual organ.+4
@tobyyasutake9094 - 2025-05-21 10:43:40
Whatever consciousness is, it is not a computation. - Roger Penrose+2
@i.e.monroe9048 - 2025-05-28 10:43:40
You know what consciousness is dude. You are just running circles around it.+4
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 20:43:40
Like you said. Facts give a range but they don't give an ought.+1
@orangesunrise - 2025-05-28 10:43:40
Head and shoulders 2 in 1. It's basically essentially shampoo, but what is conditioner if it's mixed with shampoo? Idk the answer, do you?+4
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 20:43:41
That's a non-sequitur a normal distribution is not a conscious experience. Also that's not an interesting form of "emergence", it's just a mathematical representation of the variables. Nothing like a totally different kind of thing popping into existence.+1
@the-mush - 2025-05-21 10:43:41
you call yourself a compatibilist, yet you preach only utilitarianism?+2
@danielkruyt9475 - 2025-05-28 10:43:41
@the-mush I don't believe in a universal utility metric, but I do believe that there are many possible valuations which associate to their own utility metrics... and I don't think anyone benefits in any way from these discussions. Does that count as preaching utilitarianism? I think it counts as merely mentioning pragmatism.+1
@the-mush - 2025-05-28 10:43:41
@danielkruyt9475 I very much respect your use of "I do/don't believe", at least if is to be interpreted as something like "it would be intellectually dishonest if I say the following is how things should be, instead of acknowledging that this is my personal bias". So to me you sound at least like a good kind of utilitarian. What sounds jarring to me is that you add remarks like "...and I don't think anyone *benefits* in any way from these discussions". Anyone? really? that's a tall order. Doesn't that sound like a universal utility metric? Even if that were to be true, so what? Besides that, you introduced yourself as a compatibilist, yet your arguments only sound utilitarian (call it pragmatic if you will, I'm not here for semantics), that was my only remark. It almost sounds like when someone says something like "I don't want to be mean, but..."; most often than not, the first part ends up having no relation with the end of the statement and is used as a rhetoric attempt at "softening the blow". I think Luke is having sort of the same problem here, in the end he's slipping by his beliefs and inserting them in his rational argument. He seems to know they don't quite fit together, the conclusion does not emerge from the statements, but to him they feel related, and to me that has value. Maybe that's why of all the comments in this video, yours caught my attention the most, I think your points are some of the more relevant, in a very specific way, to what Luke is discussing here. In any case, it was not my intention to attack you personally, I hope that can be understood; but when discussing matters too close to peoples beliefs, it's very difficult to make inquiries without coming off as transgressions.+2
@danielkruyt9475 - 2025-05-28 10:43:41
@the-mush I must admit that it's very possible that some people subjectively experience positive value from the discussion held here. My language was dismissive of this possibility. Certainly, I myself have in the past thoroughly enjoyed discussions quite like this one, but I find myself very wary of them these days. I'd say that in general, the kind of positive valuation (of an unfalsifiable/immaterial discussion) experienced by some here, is not transferable to others in the same way that various objective valuations (material prosperity, social inclusion/cohesion, verifiable descriptive accuracy, etc) pose as a source of a universal, transferable positive force. I personally focus on these kinds of things and I believe that it is through focused efforts in that realm that I can improve both my life and other's lives, and even derive perhaps a certain sense of "objective" morality. Earnestly, I think the other (non-objective/unfalsifiable) things are (potentially, I can't say with certainty that Jesus isn't going to come down and correct me tomorrow) a waste of energy and time. You are right that I should not be so quick to posit universally quantified valuation-type statements and I apologize for my brusqueness.+2
@the-mush - 2025-05-28 10:43:41
@danielkruyt9475 I appreciate your time dedicated to clarifying the discussion! And I feel like I find ever more often people to comfortable ignoring their own values when evaluating their actions; this does not seem your case. I commend you in your efforts to try to improve the objective reality around you, specially since I must admit I find myself equally disenchanted as you but in the opposite direction. I agree that in the end, that's the only unquestionable change anyone can make and hope some day I can be on your side of the coin.+2
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-21 10:43:41
If you don't have it, you will never understand it. I suspect you do have it, and thus know what it is, but are being tactically ignorant.+56
@bedro_0 - 2025-05-21 10:43:41
@LukeSmithxyz What about his other point? You are walking in circles. (What I mean by that is you are literally walking in circles in the video :D)+17
@rafaelf.9246 - 2025-05-21 10:43:41
May I define what is rationality and reasoning so you can use these to argue against themselves?+2
@NexusR7 - 2025-05-21 10:43:41
It seems unc still hasn't gotten it fully yet, or at least how to convey it+5
@notstrong5789 - 2025-05-21 10:43:41
Now why would walking in circles be related to consciousness? It better not be a value judgement+1
@xeromachinimas - 2025-05-21 10:43:41
how is he walking in circles+1
@SurrogateActivities - 2025-05-21 10:43:41
@LukeSmithxyz There's no discussion if you don't define the words you use. I can have a pinkie finger and not know what you're talking about it because you're calling it "magic" without describing it. "Tactically" ignorant? What's my tactic here, what for? To troll you?+6
@Zero_Contradictions - 2025-05-21 10:43:41
Consciousness is basically will and awareness. I was not convinced that they cannot be reduced down to physicalism either.+5
@Zero_Contradictions - 2025-05-21 10:43:41
Another thing is that the Chinese Room Experiment makes the Homunculus Fallacy, so I don't think it's useful for arriving to any conclusions regarding consciousness.+6
@montralanca - 2025-05-28 10:43:42
@LukeSmithxyz Very disappointing response. OP has made the most pertinent point so far in this discussion: What predicates can we allow before we start the deduction? If this is never defined, all deduction renders invalid. There can be amicable implicit content for the sake of reasoning stimulae, but it will never surpass the bounds of invalidity if no definition is set to allow deduction to start.+3
@jamesevans2507 - 2025-05-28 10:43:42
@montralanca if you want to talk soyience reddit is that way.+1
@jamesevans2507 - 2025-05-28 10:43:42
@SurrogateActivities To badger your opponent into defining every word they use and then nitpick their definitions until they realise you're not actually interested in having a conversation to learn something from it and give up. Common reddit tactic.+1
@levileal6298 - 2025-05-28 10:43:42
No one can define consciousness since its a fist person experience. Its like asking to define what colors are, but that doesn't stop us of talking about colors without any definition, we presume that others humans have the same or at least similar experiences. You should know what consciousness, in the same way that you know what colors are, that's why you're being tactically ignorant.+2
@SurrogateActivities - 2025-05-28 10:43:42
@levileal6298 People that were blind from birth never seen color but at least they obviously understand the mechanics of light and vision. They probably understand that different colors are like different auditory or tactile etc sensations+1
@st3aml1n3 - 2025-05-28 10:43:42
Consciousness is existence, the substance interacting/witnessing/(higher order would be observing) itself+1
@st3aml1n3 - 2025-05-28 10:43:42
And on the other direction - A theoretical(nonexistent) substance would not be able to truly interact with itself outside simulation and thus wouldn't be conscious(unless the simulation substrate is conscious though)+1
@badabing3391 - 2025-06-06 10:43:42
@LukeSmithxyz the problem is that we cant use all that much reasoning on something that has no definitions to reason with. Best we can do is what Descartes did, and maybe a little more.+1
@backdaniel - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
Also on the syntactics is not semantics argument. I think you aren't exposed enough to recent LLMs to see that they DO understand concepts, and the process is literally the same as learning, they abstract novel ideas and patterns during training. While this is not about consciousness I really think spending more hours trying to solve problems with LLMs will show you that the jank they produce is only due to bad training data (if you only see "wrong" no matter how intelligent you will only know "wrong") and them not being capable of introspection and updating the feedbacks instantly like us (just an implementation limitation). But they are very capable in terms of real intelligence definitely surpassing human levels.+2
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
If I said "type of matter," I mispoke. I mean a different ontology apart from matter.+19
@user-ayush818 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
Your arguments are empty, devoid of any significance while many indian sages have experienced it firsthand in a superconscious state called nirvikalp samadhi. All the powers are within ourself, only clouded by our ignorance called the "ego".+2
@rewe3536 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. Just because we can't detect it doesn't mean it isn't there. Quarks existed since the birth of the universe and it's only been a few decades since we found them.+9
@mylittlecancer - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
You are interpreting the physical world through the use of the tools which were derived by your ability to feel. That which you cannot feel directly or by proxy, can’t be anything other than metaphysical. The way of thought is physical. The thought of thoughts is metaphysical.+10
@ismcift1668 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
what is the interface with gravity?+1
@backdaniel - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@ismcift1668 the difference is gravity is very simple and broad (besides being instantly verifiable), the argument for consciousness being akin to these paradigms doesn't hold because it would be absurdly specific to have a system that targets human brains only. Think of it as me telling you a very convoluted story like the classical "there's a dragon in my garage", it's so particular we know we shouldn't believe it.+5
@ismcift1668 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@backdaniel yes I agree with that, but your original argument is wrong. With the current knowledge of the world, it is not yet possible to claim that the supermaterial is non-existent. And yes it does seem nonsensical to claim that while everything is material, consciousness is different because it is a too specific claim. However you are forgetting this claim has a basis on historical events that have shaped human understanding of the universe, for example religion.+2
@jeremyfirth - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
Is music purely physical? Yes, there are sound waves produced by vibration, and those sound waves travel through the air and vibrate your ear drum, which causes electrical signals to travel to your brain. But what makes something "music", generally speaking, is harmony and rhythm of those sounds. Harmony can be measured with computers (as to whether notes are on resonant frequencies) and the consistency of the rhythm can also be measured. And there are billions of songs, where harmonious sounds are played to a rhythm. But to you, it is a song. It is music. To your dog, it is patterned noise. And some things that are "music" to you, do not sound like music at all to someone from a different culture (or even just your neighbor or your friend). Music is a pattern of sound variations over time, with a beginning and an end, and generally variations on the original melody, played with harmonies. It is a pattern. A pattern that you recognize as music. You are also a pattern playing out over time, which is more than your physicality alone.+3
@backdaniel - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@jeremyfirth the pattern needs to be stored physically somewhere to exist, my "understanding" of music is stored locally in my brain, if everyone and everything that has a concept of music died, that concept would cease to exist, the different forms of what we call music would still exist. But the concept would need to be abstracted again by people to "exist".+2
@johnstamos5948 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
To quote that Mickey Mouse meme "Hypocrite you are, for you trust your brain chemicals to tell you they are chemicals"+3
@ज्योतिष्कघोष - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
The answer is in the geometry. Geometrical structures create emergent behaviors. The world is very much like those magic circles summoning a spirit. Metaphysics begin at the understanding that there is something deeper, i.e., platonic Ideas, etc. But consciousness is not the right term(in the given context), it is the mind that interacts with the world, consciousness is a level deeper.+3
@omarmagdy1075 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@backdaniel Saying LLMs understand concepts I think is very disingenuous a better description would be is that they model concepts based on large amount of data and suggesting they posses any level of consciousness more than a chicken isn't based on any firm grounds. LLMs are just stochastic parrots. And you also made a huge statement by saying "But they are very capable in terms of real intelligence definitely surpassing human levels" with all due respect if you understand how AI or machine learning works saying this is very problematic from multiple angles for example to say surpassing human levels this implies that the AI will be able to extrapolate outside of its training date and we know that any unsupervised machine learning based model can't extrapolate outside of its training data. For an LLM to truly extrapolate outside of its training data would be like deliberately omitting certain physics laws from the training data like the theory of general relativity for example and the model would be able to come up with it again without knowing about it if they can do that which they can't that would be pretty remarkable but I don't see that happening with classic unsupervised learning anytime soon. But why do LLMs appear smart thought I wouldn't want to use that word but the thing is that they are trained on such a big corpse of data that interpolating on it is enough to making it appear smart. and I suggest you read this paper by anthropic: https://transformer-circuits.pub/2025/attribution-graphs/biology.html#dives-cot specially the chain-of-thought faithfulness part you will realize how when the model appears to think they are actually bullshitting+5
@backdaniel - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@omarmagdy1075 I don't suggest they posses any level of consciousness, in fact they don't. They do understand concepts, because modeling is understanding. They do surpass human intelligence, but this is only changed once (during training), they just can't extrapolate in real time due to architectural limitations. The most of what we consider intelligent humans on earth fixated on topics for absurd amounts of time and through different angles, it was not only intelligence but exploration that took them to find their masterpieces. Also your example of coming up with relativity is a very difficult extrapolation, I would argue it was not only intelligence but a lot of luck that made a human discover this pattern in the first place. But you can see them forming novel, never seen abstractions during training, and better yet during reasoning (putting it to self assess). You don't need to be better than every human to surpass human intelligence. But don't worry soon it will be.+1
@ictogon - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@backdaniel The obvious solution is that consciousness does NOT specifically target brains. I don't believe the universe could even "exist" as we know it without consciousness, because a universe with no conscious observers is identical to nothingness+4
@omarmagdy1075 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@backdaniel you sure like to talk with a lot of certainty without backing your claims up with evidences can you please cite the example where LLMs surpassed human intillegence once as you say. And saying modeling is understating would mean you think something like alphago or other chess ais actually understands what chess is or what queen is and we know for a fact they don't. So i don't think anyone intelligible would agree with your definition of modeling = understanding+4
@tainicon4639 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@ismcift1668 the Higgs field supplies gravity the interactions with the field determine the extent.+1
@emperorpalpatine6080 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@backdaniel Here are the points where you are wrong : 1) "Possessing consciousness" : You do not possess consciousness. Instead , you are conscious. Possessing consciousness means there's an entity that can possess , but this isn't the case not for humans ,not for animals ,not for rocks . The reason why you think you possess consciousness is because of something that we call the ego which is a pattern of ideas and behaviors but has no reality whatsoever . Saying "I possess consciousness" is like saying "my thought of a bacon sandwich possess consciousness" . 2) If you pick up a brain and start analyzing whatever it has , this will give you information about the brain . You're assuming consciousness is located in the brain ... "Of course it's located in the brain , where else ? in the sky ? in my butt-cheek ?" Well let me ask you a question : when you're dreaming at night about running late to work , or about forgetting your pants at home when you go to school , where's consciousness located ? I mean , you could definitely open someone's skull in a dream , and you would probably see some kind of brain or whatever symbol you represent as a brain : is that the seat of that dreamed person's consciousness ? Let's go even further , a scientist in your brain discovers that consciousness is located in one lobe thanks to the experiments he did , in your dream : does that make "your" consciousness in that dream originate from the brain in the dream ?+1
@ridhwaanany7480 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
Consciousness can't be matter because matter itself has no will or knowledge of what its doing, yet we are rational logical beings that can reach unknowns through a series of structured thoughts. Consciousness/Intellect is beyond matter.+4
@ismcift1668 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@tainicon4639 thats an imaginary concept made up to fill a void within curent knowledge. in the same way if enough evidence is gathered for the argument that human consciousness is more than what the material can support, people might devise an imaginary consciousness field.+1
@zbyte64 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@LukeSmithxyz That's a distinction without a difference. What you're doing is making an essentialist argument with the gaps of our understanding.+1
@tainicon4639 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@ fair enough. Quantum mechanics is kind of cursed with regards to its observational experiments.+3
@nomattr - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
you mess sentience/reasoning with consciousness. they are not the same.+1
@user-ayush818 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@rewe3536 right, reality is more theoretical physics has shown us since the last century that reality is more fascinating than fiction but only to the seekers. These pseudo rationalists ignorantly discard the possiblities+2
@p4trickb4tem4n - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@backdaniel >it would be absurdly specific to have a system that targets human brains only. when did anybody suggest that animals aren't conscious? We obviously can't tell whether they're conscious, but we can't tell whether any humans other than ourself are conscious for that matter. And I don't remember where it is right now but I think there was one Bible verse that said something about them having the breath of life+2
@jmanc3 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
If it was you could pick a brain, its cells, go deep into its structures and find some resemblance of an interface with that "special matter". But you can't because there is none. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microtubule https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orchestrated_objective_reduction+2
@Smrda1312 - 2025-05-21 10:43:43
@backdaniel Feed an LLM bad data for example maths. It will never see that it is bad. How is this intelligence? Give a clever person an inconsistent mathematical theory and he will instantly show you having something like 1=2 is illogical.+2
@xshwei - 2025-05-28 10:43:43
@Smrda1312 1 = 2 is not necessarily an inconsistency, as there exists a model where this is satisfied (the trivial ring, for example). But if you specify some theory where this would in fact be inconsistent... yeah buddy a simple procedural proof assistant would catch that, you don't need any resemblance of an AI for that.+1
@Smrda1312 - 2025-05-28 10:43:43
@xshwei Yes but the claim was for LLMs. We sre nowhere near general intelligence that is the point. Neither are proof assistants. Also no point getting caught up in the example. Shows a lack of comprehension.+1
@xshwei - 2025-05-28 10:43:43
@Smrda1312 you completely overlooked the essence of my reply, it was not to nitpick the example. My claim was that finding inconsistencies is not as difficult as you make it appear. If LLM is trained to do deduction, it will find inconsistencies just as humans, because you do not need anything supernatural to do that (hence the example with procedural provers).+1
@Smrda1312 - 2025-05-28 10:43:43
@xshwei The guy I was replying to claims LLMs are already showing thought. But they are not as I showed. I had to waste 10 prompts to explain to chatGPT that 8.9 >8 . Also Im not sure you have any idea about LLMs but you cannot just train them deduction. Because as the video states it just processes language in a way that is appealing to us users. It doesn't understand anything. Its already read more math textbooks than anyone yet it doesn't grasp the concept of larger than+1
@voskresenie- - 2025-05-28 10:43:43
'Physical and material instruments designed to detect physical matter fail to detect metaphysical and immaterial constructs. More at 11.'+1
@badabing3391 - 2025-06-06 10:43:43
@backdaniel i can make a search algorithm that operates on the entire internet and it would seem intelligent too, as long as the internet had some answer available to every question. LLMs do the same thing except instead of manually searching the internet, they weight every single response on the internet to some group of words, and choose the most likely word to respond with, with those weights manually adjusted to seem more realistic whenever it inevitably spouts gibberish.+1
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 20:43:43
the "right perspective" is human interpretation. You can also just represent an ASCII or UTF-8 English word in decimal and then "take the right perspective". the perspective is the part doing all the heavy lifting. You can have that decimal number expressed in the material world--you have a collection of exactly that many atoms in every physical object around you right now--and yet that collection wouldn't be "saying" that word. You wouldn't go around telling people "my desk called me the n word" because it has 121404966997226 atoms in this particular set. It's the thinking mind that draws the actual intended meaning from the information. The atoms themselves cannot intent, and therefore cannot "mean" anything.+1
@elliesuckz - 2025-05-21 10:43:44
real and true and based+1
@Jupiter__001_ - 2025-05-21 10:43:44
It is better not to say that God is not distinct from the soul, but instead to say that the soul is not truly distinct from God. This is why we seek Communion with the Most High; to partake in His divinity and glory we are fulfilled and restored to our original glorious union. (We do not receive our own little divinities, as the Mormons believe.)+2
@KaLaka16 - 2025-05-21 10:43:44
@Jupiter__001_ Yes, the soul and God aren't really separate in an absolute sense, but in a practical sense, they are. This is how we have individual consciousness. Reality (talking about subject-object) is "between 1 and 2". Everything is one, but isn't so practically, from the individual perspectives. This is how we can develop as individual souls, and build individual meaning using free will in the structured realities we live in.+2
@Mr.Monkey2000 - 2025-05-21 10:43:44
I miss when quotes were clever+1
@lenfirewood4089 - 2025-06-10 10:43:45
Bro - first up I'm a genuine Boomer born in 1950. I was even a "hippy" back in the day with what someone described as a belisha beacon of flaming orange hair. So, for what I am about to say next I had to invent my own cliche' and that is "Never let hypocrisy stop you from giving good advice!" The unruly beard and the "unruly side curtains of hair do you a disservice - they make you look older than your actual years and are less than flattering. You are a decent looking bloke. When I reached the age of fifty I was faced with a dilemma - I still had plenty of hair at the sides but my hair had thined so bad in the middle that I was now firmly in "comb over" territory and I notices it was distracting people . I would be face to face talking with someone whether it was a stranger, a colleague or even a lady I was interested in and in every case during my conversation I couldn't help but notice their eyeballs being distracted by the increasing baldness of what had now become a dreaded "comb over". Back then I had a good set of hair clippers and I used to do my own haircuts (I got quite good at it!) then one day I had just finished trimming my hair and had already taken off the plastic guide that limited my trim to a 3 inch cut - but then I noticed a tuft at one of the sides that I had missed and forgetting I had not taken off the guide in taking out the missed tuft I had created a band of baldness on track where the tuft was! Before that happened I had often thought about shaving my head BUT (like many other men as I was to discover) I just thought with my head shape shaving it down wouldn't look very good ! this event forced my hand however so I went the whole hog using the clippers to cute ALL my hair right down to the "wood" and then I wet shaved my whole head making it my whole head as smooth as a baby botty! Much to my happy surprise I didn't look anywhere near as bad as I thought I would and several folks actually said it was an improvement. By the way I kept my goatee but i keep it well trimmed - less wind resistance when cycling! If you plan on staying single - your current "style" is tactically effective no doubt but if not try a good radical trim and watch how the pupils of women seems to dilate when they see a new "you".+1
@windy6587 - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
Now this man could go on for 20 videos on consciousness and im there for all of those cause of how long you can theorise on it+4
@Simon-xi8tb - 2025-05-28 10:43:45
Under idealism, the stuff we call material is also inside the mind , just a mental process inside conscioussness.+1
@NovemXI - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
ANOTHER video? We are so back.+5
@Ephemeral-TimecapsuleX - 2025-05-28 10:43:45
I'm glad you exist.+2
@_sneer_ - 2025-05-28 10:43:45
I have two fundamental problems with substance dualism. Problem 1: The Interaction Problem If mind and matter are fundamentally different substances, how can they causally influence each other? Matter affecting Mind: How can physical events in the brain (neural firing, chemical reactions from drugs) cause subjective experiences (pain, colors, thoughts)? Mind affecting Matter: How can a conscious decision or intention (a non-physical event) cause physical actions in the body (like raising your arm)? Calling consciousness a "force" like gravity or nuclear forces doesn't solve this. Those are material forces with measurable properties and known mechanisms. To claim consciousness is a force without any physical properties or interaction mechanism just pushes the problem back one step without explaining anything. Problem 2: The Correlation Problem If consciousness is truly separate from the brain, why is it always correlated with specific brain activity? Why does consciousness cease when the body dies or when the brain is severely damaged? What anchors consciousness to a particular body? Consider anesthesia: different anesthetics target different neural pathways (some affect GABA receptors, others NMDA receptors, others ion channels), yet all eliminate consciousness by disrupting brain function. This suggests consciousness depends on integrated brain activity, not on any single interface point where a separate mind connects to matter. Dualists often respond with two claims: "Correlation doesn't prove causation—the brain might just be a receiver, like a radio receiving signals." This fails because radios have identifiable mechanisms for signal reception and transmission. We can measure radio waves, track their propagation, and understand the physics. No such mechanism exists for consciousness "transmission." Moreover, when specific brain regions are damaged, we lose specific mental functions—not general reception quality, as the radio analogy would predict. "Maybe consciousness persists but can't express itself when the brain is damaged." This makes consciousness unfalsifiable and therefore unscientific. If consciousness exists but produces no detectable effects when the brain is impaired, it becomes indistinguishable from non-existence. Science progresses by testing hypotheses that make different predictions—this version of dualism makes no testable predictions. It is irrelevant. The simplest explanation remains that consciousness emerges from brain activity rather than existing as a separate substance that mysteriously interacts with matter through unknown mechanisms.+4
@hellfiresiayan - 2025-05-28 10:43:45
I agree with your conclusion, but im not sure the argument as you present it would convince anyone who doesn't. Im not smart enough to say exactly why not, but if it were me in college back before I came to know Jesus, I would certainly not have been convinced.+3
@JamesHoughton - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
Many people around me have the same point of view as you, but I remain unconvinced. If consciousness is immaterial, when does it start? Is a molecule conscious? Probably not. But is a single-cell organism conscious? What about an insect? A small mammal? Humans? I think consciousness is likely a spectrum. In some sense, even the smallest molecular interaction is some kind of consciousness, as strange as that sounds. I think what appears to be conscious behavior is when an output behavior doesn't seem to directly result from input stimuli. But in my opinion, human behavior is a direct result from our stimuli, it's just so complicated that it appears to be more than that. What is qualia then (the "purple triangle" from Alex O'Connor)? I think it's actually just a manifestation of the state of our brain. But none of us knows for sure. I'm curious what you think about this. :)+5
@admos7075 - 2025-05-28 10:43:45
I’ve been trying to articulate this to so many people for quite a long time.+2
@John_NDT5 - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
Finally, a comment section where i can declare that Gravity can behave as a curve and not only as a linear force breaking Euclidian Geometry and Newton's Law at the same time. Thank You.+4
@Jupiter__001_ - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
Adding to your thoughts on the material universe just being a large computational environment of functional interactions, which is not therefore able to produce consciousness: There is an alternative interpretation of quantum physics which is slowly gaining traction. Basically, the universe is likened to a cellular automaton (like the Game of Life), and cellular automata have only rational, deterministic rules, yet very frequently produce results that cannot be mathematically described (except broadly as stochastic processes) and are completely chaotic. The rules are rational but not necessarily mathematical. Now, we know that cellular automata are very much just computational environments (which can be used to emulate other types of computation, including other cellular automatic rule sets). This helps to prove your point that an actual new phenomenon cannot emerge from more of the same, i.e. there is no "emergent phenomenon" of consciousness from matter (or of ideas from matter) because all rulesets governing cellular automata are in some sense isomorphic - they can each be used to derive all the others, like how lambda calculus can derive all mathematics. Therefore, any apparently emergent phenomena from matter (such as computation) are actually a mere part of the properties of matter physics. This means that consciousness does not emerge from quantum physics, because they are two separate things, whereas physics (quantum or classical) is computation. Sorry if that seemed like I was going in circles; I really wanted to get my point across in a manner that left nothing up to chance.+2
@ProfessorThock - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
I’ve recently come to the same conclusion that consciousness must be an additional fundamental force of the universe that is not simply an emergent property of computation. Your framing of consciousness as something filling the form of the body gives an intuitive understanding of how it can be restricted or empowered by the physical body without being physical itself. Thank you+7
@RavishBC - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
consciousness is not made of clocks+2
@snail8720 - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
I disagree with your take, and I think consciousness is entirely physical. Now we might not be able to comprehend all the intricacies and innerworkings of it, but that doesn't make it into something nonphysical. I also disagree with your assertion that the Chinese Room thought experiment is somehow demonstrating or convincing of that idea in any way, it simply does not follow. It might be that I am simply misunderstanding what you say, but when you use vague terms like "syntax" or "computation" or even "the physical world is a kind of computation/program", I just don't know what is supposed to mean. Not only that, but we have no reason to assume that the universe and the material things in it can be represented as computation - that would fall under fringe physics takes+9
@OmegaLaser-xy4ip - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
Its vibrations generating different layers of dimensions. We purposely choose to incarnate into different universes and bodies to see and understand things from different POVs. Everything is conscious bur obviously not in the human sense that we currently experience. Computers are conscious in their own way like plants are.+3
@dasritejogger1647 - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
"allegedly"+8
@ubermenschdog - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
Luke! You are a force for good!+3
@Kirmo13 - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
I had to listen to this twice because the first time I listened to it I didn't hear any argument for why consciousness is separate from the physical world. Second time listening to it, and once again, no real argument for why consciousness is separate. "obviously, consciousness is not mere computation" "it's just kind of how it is" you're just stating it as a fact. no argument+7
@convolvr - 2025-05-28 10:43:45
It makes more sense to think that matter arises from consciousness since particles and forces are just concepts we invented to explain patterns in repeated observation.+1
@justabarrelbomb4472 - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
I'm a good goy, when youtube tells me Luke uploaded I click!+13
@vonchadsworth - 2025-05-28 10:43:45
Well said. I suppose dualists must think that if we looked close enough, we’d see neurotransmitters emerging from the void, or neurons firing without a cause.+3
@hanbali-khadim - 2025-05-28 10:43:45
>this makes conciousness unfalsifiable and thus unscientific. Unfalsifiable by material, physical means, sure. That's the claim after all, that it's not material. Furthermore, even if it were fully unfalsifiable by any means, that would not render it untrue. To state, "it is not interesting to me to explore unfalsifiable claims", is not an argument. In fact, it would not be a mere unfalsifiable claim (again, were it truly unfalsifiable), but rather an unfalsifiable claim with reasonable (I would claim definitive, even) arguments for its truthfulness.+1
@_sneer_ - 2025-05-28 10:43:45
@hanbali-khadim 1. You miss the point about unfalsifiability I wasn't making a general claim that "unfalsifiable = untrue." My specific point was that when dualists retreat to "consciousness persists but can't express itself when the brain is damaged," they're making consciousness functionally indistinguishable from non-existence in those cases. Your reply doesn't engage with this specific issue. 2. You commit a category error You say consciousness is "unfalsifiable by material, physical means" because "it's not material." But this misunderstands scientific methodology. Even non-material claims can make testable predictions about observable phenomena. If consciousness is causally efficacious (as dualists must claim to solve the interaction problem), then it should produce detectable effects that differ from purely physical explanations. 3. You dodge the core problems You completely sidestep both of my main challenges: You offer no attempt to explain the interaction mechanism between mind and matter You offer no explanation for the tight correlation between consciousness and brain states You offer no response to my anesthesia example or the specificity of brain damage effects 4. You make an unsupported claim The assertion about "reasonable (I would claim definitive, even) arguments for its truthfulness" is hollow without actually providing those arguments or addressing the substantial problems I raised. Your reply reads like a philosophical deflection rather than a substantive engagement with my specific critiques. It doesn't advance the dualist position or explain away the explanatory gaps I identified.+1
@hanbali-khadim - 2025-05-28 10:43:45
@_sneer_ 1 and 2. "Scientific methodology" does not reduce down to empirical trial and error. Logical reasoning is "scientific methodology" just as well. > then it should produce detectable effects that differ from purely physical explanations. Detectable, meaning? Instrumentally measurable? Not necessarily; when was that entailed? Recognizable by the intellect? Yes, and that's how the arguments for dualism are constructed: reason about the very nature of the material, reason about the very nature of consciousness, conclude that both natures are incompatible; thus consciousness is immaterial. Our minds have been blessed with the ability to make abstract reasoning, so use it! We're not just statistical inferencers! 3. The claim is not that we can intricately explain the interactions between material and abstract; the claim is simply the existence of such material and abstract, and the existence of such interactions. No claims are being made about the exact nature of these interactions. Just as if we were living a few centuries ago, the statement "the brain controls motor functions" can't be dismissed just because we haven't yet discovered neurons. 4. You are commenting under a video providing arguments for dualism, mate.+1
@_sneer_ - 2025-05-28 10:43:45
@hanbali-khadim On the contrary. Let me break down the problems: 1. You mischaracterize scientific methodology Yes, logical reasoning is part of science, but science requires logical reasoning plus empirical testing. Pure logical reasoning without empirical constraints gave us Aristotelian physics, which was logically coherent but wrong about reality. Your reply tries to eliminate the empirical component entirely. 2. The "detectable effects" dodge When pressed on testable predictions, you retreat to "recognizable by the intellect" rather than measurable effects. This is circular reasoning: "We know dualism is true because we can reason that it's true." But my original arguments were logical reasoning showing internal problems with dualism. You can't just dismiss counter-reasoning by appealing to "abstract reasoning." 3. The historical analogy fails badly The comparison to pre-neuron brain science is misleading. Early researchers could still observe that brain damage affected specific functions—they had observable correlations to explain, even without knowing the mechanisms. They weren't postulating something completely outside the physical realm. Dualists, by contrast, are claiming consciousness exists in a fundamentally different ontological category with no clear interaction mechanism. 4. You avoid my specific challenges Still no engagement with: The anesthesia examples I provided The specificity of brain damage effects Why consciousness correlates so precisely with brain states Any proposed mechanism for mind-matter interaction Finally, the fact that arguments exist doesn't make them sound. My post was engaging with common dualist arguments and showing their problems. You seem to be retreating from empirical engagement entirely while not actually addressing the logical problems I raised. You're essentially saying "trust pure reasoning over evidence" while ignoring my reasoning-based objections. Across cultures and millennia, humans have consistently postulated various non-physical realms: Ancient Greek concepts of separate souls Religious afterlives and spiritual planes Vital forces like "élan vital" Phlogiston in combustion theory Various forms of dualistic consciousness theories The pattern is telling: Despite thousands of years and countless claims, none of these proposed non-physical entities or realms have ever produced any detectable, reproducible effects that couldn't be better explained by physical processes. What's particularly damaging to the dualist position is that we keep finding physical explanations for phenomena that were previously attributed to non-physical causes: Mental illness (once attributed to spiritual possession) → neurochemical imbalances Memory and personality (once thought purely spiritual) → specific brain regions and neural networks Decision-making and consciousness → measurable neural activity patterns The dualist essentially asks us to believe that this time is different—that consciousness is the one non-physical entity that actually exists, despite following the exact same pattern as all the failed examples throughout history. Your retreat to "pure reasoning" becomes even more problematic in this context. Pure reasoning without empirical grounding has consistently led humans astray about the nature of reality. The scientific revolution succeeded precisely because it insisted on testing logical arguments against observable evidence. This historical track record makes the burden of proof for dualists much heavier than they seem willing to acknowledge. Your retreat to "pure reasoning" perfectly illustrates the problem with dualism: you're believing "in spite of" rather than "because of" the evidence. Your response follows the classic "God of the gaps" pattern: retreating to increasingly unfalsifiable positions as evidence accumulates against dualism. Instead of following evidence toward physicalism, you work backward from your desired conclusion, inventing new epicycles—"the brain is just a receiver," "consciousness exists but can't express itself when damaged," "we don't need interaction mechanisms," "empirical evidence is irrelevant." This isn't honest inquiry following evidence to conclusions. It's motivated reasoning trying to preserve a predetermined belief against overwhelming contrary evidence. You're essentially trying to wiggle "the God factor" into a consistently godless reality, asking us to believe that consciousness is the one non-physical entity that actually exists despite following the exact same failed pattern as every discredited dualistic theory throughout history. It's the philosophical equivalent of insisting the Earth is flat while explaining away every piece of contrary evidence with increasingly elaborate ad hoc theories. The burden of proof for extraordinary claims requires extraordinary evidence, not retreat from empirical constraints.+1
@Jupiter__001_ - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
The purple triangle is indeed part of the electrochemical state of your brain, but what of the "you" viewing the triangle? Clearly qualitative experience is derived in some sense from the physical processes of the brain, but the actual qualium is distinct. What is "purple"?+2
@JamesHoughton - 2025-05-21 10:43:45
@Jupiter__001_ Following my theory, "you" happens to be a manifestation of the state of your brain. By "you" I really mean your own qualia. What is "purple"? Perceiving color is just a manifestation of the state of your brain, reacting to stimuli from your eyes, and purple is how our qualia display that sense. But this is all about as proveable as Luke's theory. I just think the spectrum line of thinking is more plausible than giving up on a naturalistic explanation. Edit: ah right i totally forgot that we were talking about a fake purple triangle. In this case, following the theory, I think it's your brain emulating the stimuli that would normally come from your eyes in a very vague sense. Like, it's not very good at it, most people aren't that good at visualizing things, and pretty much everyone can tell the difference between imagined images and real images when they're sober.+3
@QTwoSix - 2025-05-28 10:43:45
Sometimes you just can't know.+2
@st3aml1n3 - 2025-05-28 10:43:45
I would say everything has consciousness and that is how the process experiences itself(it is entirely subjective and inexperiancable from outside). I would also say consciousness is not the hard problem/i.e. is trivial, the actual root of the problem is existence itself. In other words - it's ok to say consciousness is material as its mysticism can be pushed back and preserved to the unexplainability of existance itself.+1
@ghost-user559 - 2025-05-21 10:43:46
Gravity does not exist. You are welcome.+6
@John_NDT5 - 2025-05-21 10:43:46
@ghost-user559 same as time, isn't it?+4
@runix2189 - 2025-05-21 10:43:46
Why can it not be an emergent property? Forces are applied to physical states of matter so it's hard to define it as a force in physics.+2
@ismcift1668 - 2025-05-21 10:43:46
@runix2189 no one knows if it can or cannot or if it should or should not, at least no yet. but if consciousness is an outsider then it may give humans a way to transcend their current situation.+2
@ProfessorThock - 2025-05-28 10:43:46
@runix2189 I think that a scientific exploration of consciousness as its own fundamental force is what’s missing here. It might not turn out to be the case, but we’ve never explored it seriously. Gravity and nuclear forces are both intangible things that were very hard to conceptualize until we seriously explored them. I think consciousness is similar. That it acts on and is related to matter, but is not the same as matter and cannot therefore be generated by matter in the strict sense. I think this is where the science is taking us. Annaka Harris wrote a book called Conscious that tries to start scientifically exploring the possibility of consciousness as a fundamental force+1
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 21:43:46
@runix2189 There is no material evidence one way or the other. There is good philosophical evidence that it exists immaterially. And there is no material explanation for its existence, which contradicts our a priori knowledge that consciousness exists. This is the same for logic, morality, and free will.+1
@ichisichify - 2025-05-28 10:43:46
it's a complicated set of subjects and theres indicators but no hard evidence for either side of the argument. though my money has been on the materialist interpretation recently+1
@monarcas5502 - 2025-05-28 10:43:47
"control, we've found one more"+1
@p4trickb4tem4n - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
I think it's important to note that the fact matter and spirit interact with each other means that their must be some greater medium/categorization that encompasses both of them, and the universe is thus composed of ONE substance/stuff/element that has both material and spiritual aspects, this is basically what you subconsciously had in mind in what you were saying but not finding the words to articulate it has the possibility of causing people to dismiss our arguments as silly+2
@スミル日本 - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
Can't wait to see what he uploads tomorrow 😁+4
@ryanrobbins2363 - 2025-06-06 10:43:47
I disagree entirely. If consciousness is not a function of the brain then why do things like brain damage, sleep, and alcohol alter consciousness? Additionally just because we can’t describe exactly how something works within a material ontological framework doesn’t mean it can’t exist within it. Just that we don’t know yet.+2
@abhi_shek1196 - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
Luke, get back in and make a arch install guide It is cold out+5
@NeoRothbardian - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
You won’t find him here. The king has returned. 🎉🎉🎉+3
@some_guy9366 - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
Hey Luke, hope you are doing well and enjoying life.+4
@ivanvaneck - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
A couple of thoughts: - For me, "substance" is something that is the cause of itself, and it's hard to imagine that matter (which I consider to be the substance) contains within itself yet another substance in the form of "consciousness," the laws of gravity, etc. It's especially difficult to think of "consciousness" as a substance, since if you remove matter, you can’t really imagine consciousness either—consciousness is a product of matter. - I don't see matter as just something physical—in my view, things like price also qualify as matter in the sense that they exist objectively and independently of any one individual's consciousness. That said, the idea that consciousness is radically different from matter really resonated with me, so thank you for sharing that thought! It's definitely something worth reflecting on.+1
@obitrsa - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
Luke, you hinted at the demonic nature of AI before, now maybe you don't wan't to reveal your power levels or whatever, but please bless us with your esoteric orthobro knowledge, wrap it in philosophical mambojumbo if needed Luke please+5
@lollmaowtf - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
You should do another video where you argue why consciousness isn't material.+3
@sarundayo - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
Genuine curious: were all these videos done in one take? Or that's the new look going forward? 🤔+6
@stephenkaake7016 - 2025-05-28 10:43:47
I was trained by God, given a greater mind, I became enlightened, now I am a Mind Doctor+1
@nathanielgates2863 - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
Nous is a word representing soul or spirit... consciousness is the consubstantiality of spirit and matter aka spirit and the meat suit avatar. Consciousness ends at the break up of said consubstantiality.. which btw is mediated by the dipole antenna, water, necessary for consciousness. Don't get consciousness and your subjective experience confused. Consciousness is a phenomenon, not what we are.+6
@AndrewBrownK - 2025-06-04 10:43:47
This is basically just asserting that consciousness is immaterial, and asserting on top that material can’t substantiate consciousness, but consciousness can influence material. It’s not wrong to think of consciousness as an abstract thing. It’s a pattern, and a process. When web browsers process HTML and run javascript, it is the same vague conceptual process, but with various implementation differences, and as an abstract thing it transcends hardware. But ultimately, it doesn’t exist unless you actually put it on hardware. Or in our case, wetware. Everything is a slave to material. If an abstract thing or process is beheld in someone’s mind, there is still a material mind grounding it. If there is no material grounding, there is no way to confirm it actually exists. There is no good argument for a detached and isolated consciousness existing in some sense without material to stand on and interact with. At which point, why bother differentiating it from material. Magnetic compasses used to be ghosts.+2
@Jader7777 - 2025-05-28 10:43:47
It was not coherent. Brb drinking mercury.+4
@Discriminator - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
I'm not an expert on consciousness or anything like that, but when I'm reminded about it, I entertain myself with an idea called "panpsychism" which basically says that consciousness is everywhere and in everything to some degree, it is fundamental to the universe as opposed to just being in exclusive to humans and animals, and it penetrates everything like water, and we are conscious because we are like vessels for it.+3
@TheRogueVigilante - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
Kids still have graphing calculator just like u have thinkpads, although how much they use it depends on if they are a competitive desmos player or not+5
@voiceofhermit2823 - 2025-06-08 10:43:47
It makes sense Luke, it is like the fruit that hangs off the tree, not the part of the tree but connected to it. Applicable at every interaction in nature, not part of it but connected to it.+1
@alkeryn1700 - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
Based, I've been an idealist for years now, i'd argue even mater isn't material fundamentally.+2
@calholli - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
So Software is not Hardware.. Consciousness is just the software for our fleshy hardware. If you can define what software is-- then you can define consciousness+8
@cinfinity - 2025-05-21 10:43:47
Consciousness is the rate of change of material complexity. It's responsible for the illusion of spacial movement. Ie. it's our consciousness that's constantly moving through space-time.+2
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 22:43:47
Potentially for the same reason that kicking a TV antenna alters the image of the TV show you're watching, even though the TV show does not "live" in your TV and is not a function of your television. It's being broadcasted over the network. Our brains could be performing computations on the consciousness, but not necessarily making the consciousness. And I don't think the argument is that we can't describe exactly how it works. I think the point is that by definition it cannot be simply the computation of material states--which is what the entire universe is. And so it has to be something outside the material universe.+1
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-21 10:43:48
Just speculation. I would defer to Orthodox saints first. My only thinking there is that LLMs are particularly non-transparent in their inner-workings, so if you suppose some conscious entities can influence or interact the physical world, AI is an optimal place to do it, because their subtle influence is hidden, and especially because AI are trained on huge amounts of knowledge.+9
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-21 10:43:48
These past three were all filmed at once, one after another, all in one "take."+13
@francesco3772 - 2025-05-21 10:43:48
Nothing in this universe is pure, we are both spirit and "meat suit avatar", thus we begin to know nous by the ways of the subjective factor, that is totally valid.+2
@teleologist - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
Okay, but whenever he says people don't want to believe something because its scary, who is he talking about? I've never met anyone like this and there is a large diversity of thought on this both inside and outside of academia. Are we shadow-boxing now? BTW, check out Terrence Deacon's Incomplete Nature for a compelling non-computational theory of consciousness/sentience.+9
@Ajb234 - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
This is the crux of my problem with radical empiricism. A Humean would have to accept that there is no meaningful difference between Searle’s room and a conscious person.+2
@runix2189 - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
Consciousness is most likely just another layer of reality that physics has yet to describe. From being conscious itself we know several things about it. 1. It is time and space local. 2. There are various states(you can turn it on/off). 3. Uniqueness and it isn't based on the material structure of the brain. 4. Core aspect of it doesn't change with time. (Immutable) 5. More than 1 instance of it. IMO there is only 1 consciousness of the universe itself, but we can only experience our versions of it in our body/brain and it's fragmented like that. When we die nothing really happens to "us" because we are part of the universe itself. Our experience of consciousness is limited to our material nervous systems, but it is a small part of a much larger whole. I think Carl Sagan's line "We are a way for the universe to know itself." Summarizes it quite well.+5
@CircleOfTheSeptagram - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
10:30 I think it was Rudolph Steiner who said the brain is a meat radio that tunes into the frequency of your consciousness. That's why damage to it can affect/change you. A broken radio not being able to tune into anything doesn't mean the radio frequency is no longer there. Something to ponder. Thanks for the vid!+2
@goyworldorder - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
materialism is a self-defeating position+27
@davidglass4876 - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
Math teacher here, I see so many ti 83 and 84 graphing calculator variants even though it’s 2025 which is insane. We also use desmos, wolfram alpha, and other web based graphing calculators that are way more flexible+2
@Finkelfunk - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
Luke looks more and more like Ted Kaczynski every day. Good for him.+4
@Baiyu83 - 2025-05-28 10:43:49
I came to the conclusion that consciousness is much closer to willpower, awhile ago. (Turned out, there was a whole ancient Voluntarist movement :) 1) let's say our minds experience a constant influx of information, which can bring back memories or summon thoughts; 2) from one thought we can come through our logic to a different thought. We cannot willingly control logic, it acts on it's own, like a connector between our thinking, but we can "turn around" - switch our thinking to a different topic and start a different logical chain, or choose between several topics which to pursue at the moment. So, in other words, our thinking works through concentration on thoughts that we choose to concentrate upon among those popping up in our heads; 2-5) interestingly enough, most (or, at least, a lot) of our mental activity we describe using terms from physical actions, like "jump to a conclusion," "come to a realisation," "exercise the thought" etc. As not a native English speaker, I can attest that this is also true for other languages. It almost feels like there is something like an avatar inside our "mental space" (for the lack of a better term at the moment,) that performs different actions related to our mental activity; 3) Here is a bit of a jump - I believe that willpower is also, in it's essense, a concentration activity. Even when you are performing physical exercises, you have to keep thinking about what you have to do. When you start to get tired, the fatigue manifests as a thought that "oh, I can't go on, no more." Even pain in your muscles is a distractor. You can continue the exercise as long as you can keep yourself from being distracted. This is also why willpower can be used in regards to both physical and mental activities. Because it relates to concentration, or maybe even IS concentration and ability to stay focused. 4) Finally, if our thinking is based on our concentration on a topic (there are people who are easily distracted, and those who are not,) and, indeed, willpower at least relates to concentration, that would mean that our consciousness, which directs our thinking process (well, this is an assumption, sure,) is much more related to what we call willpower, than to a trashpile of random information, as rationalists believe it to be. (Also, it seems that rationalists believe that, if they "offer" a pile of info big enough to an AI, it will become conscious, and even "supercounscious," surpassing humans and potentially becoming a "god." Reminds me of an idol worship somehow...) P.S.: Sorry for a long post :) Thank you for the great video.+1
@bogdanlulelaru858 - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
what if it's material but we can't sense it because we are limited by our perception?+3
@kurtsiegfried4436 - 2025-06-04 10:43:49
There is mind and there is matter, neither is permanent. Matter arises and passes away, mind arises as a result of matter arising, then passes away as a result of matter passing away in an endless cycle.+1
@Idothinkysaurus - 2025-05-28 10:43:49
This is one of those "No shit" moments that I'm grateful I gave up on understanding the POV where it's NOT a "No shit" moment so as to better appreciate it. It's gratitude I feel. You have to cease thought entirely, you have to take things at face value and react exclusively emotionally, and overreact at that. To try to argue consciousness is material, that IS an animal navigating the realm of higher thought, and instead of learning, it doesn't trust anything that isn't from "mother"; in modern day this archetype can be filled by all kinds of junk info and logic, not even from an appropriate maternal figure. Not even a figure is necessary, the information just latches onto the archetype. It's not even animal logic, as someone who spends much time with animals, they exhibit consciousness of varying degrees and as tactile problem solvers you can witness their scope of the world through their actions. With people, whose scope comes before action, who think consciousness is material, they're taking that tactile problem solving mechanism (likely exacerbated and worn by life events), applying it to mental strata, and insisting on a material explanation for consciousness. They don't even insist most of the time, they simply deny the other side of the coin, because to them the other side of the coin CAN'T exist, that is their stance. They've decided it's impossible for consciousness to be immaterial, or are incapable of comprehending the discussion. There probably is a very material explanation as to why these people believe consciousness is material, or somehow a nothingburger. To play devil's advocate, these people are possibly coping for fear of accountability, they probably have a lot of self loathing and don't want to have a consciousness, they can't live with some of the things they've done, or refuse to process events. It's sociopathic or narcissistic by nature. Belief that consciousness is bound exclusively to what we understand as material explanations could be a material deficiency or a cognition impairment from life events/trauma/repetitive overstimulation and/or lack of sleep. These people can't look in a mirror, or they don't know what they're looking at when they do. They seem to be able to gauge that "this body is mine" so they don't try interacting with the mirror as if it were another member of the species they had never met before, but they don't see a reflection of their consciousness in the mirror to interact with, they just see a body and associate it with the word salad abstraction of a physical task this body needs to do, which is merely what they need the mirror to do. They are the body, not the mind, working in neurotic emotion, and falsely assuming this is proper logic as a cognitive function when they're relying on bodily function to fuel the direction of thought. It's Fallout out there, smoothskin.+4
@michaellk2254 - 2025-05-28 10:43:49
I think the coherent way to see it is: our mind interacts in a way based on a demand applied to it. The brain acts based upon the action placed onto it, but the question is: where does this demand come from?+1
@lukahadziegric5982 - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
The only reason why consciousness, according to Luke, has to be different from the material world is because Luke can't imagine it being otherwise. Man, just stick to the tech videos.+10
@ZZFilm - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
This reminds me of the film “Tree of Life” by Terrance Malick (very devout Catholic.) There is a sequence that many many many people hate that shows a young dinosaur being spared by a predator that’s acquired a conscious. Malik wanted to show that some of the ideas of ours have been around long before we “imagined” them, and have even touched the lives of non humans. Conciseness is very much a physical thing that pushes against the fabrics.+1
@craxo8796 - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
Can consciousness exist outside of the brain?+12
@FransSlothouber - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
As to your example of mathematics only producing numbers, the are a number of branches of mathematics that deal with things other than numbers. But I think your point still holds. They still all produce symbols and symbols are not the same as consciousness.+3
@chevicus - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
"Горшочек, не вари!!" :)+3
@jasonaltenburg - 2025-06-04 10:43:49
Thanks for posting this. Lots of synchronicity happening for me around so many of the terms you'd mentioned here. Appreciate this particular video as I'm currently reading Liber Indigo by Justin C. Kirkwood and it's quite complementary.+1
@pleVoid - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
I’m starting to doubt these videos are AI generated :)+8
@AncientMarinerNY - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
To borrow and slightly rewrite Yarvin from a recent debate: Surely we would not extend the characteristic of consciousness to chimpanzees. And yet, chimpanzees are our cousins. They are completely related to us. There is a continuous genetic chain of linkage that traces us back to our simian friends. However, there are a lot of missing links between us and the chimpanzees e.g., homo habilis, australopithecus, etc. We would have a lot of trouble if those more divergent forms were living among us today of deciding: do they also have consciousness? So the question is: If we were able to decode the genome of homo habilis and implant that on a human, would that be a being with consciousness? If humanness is a boolean quality, there must have been a mother who was not conscious who had a child who was conscious. How did that process work? Of course, for a believer, that process should be easy to describe - unless of course, for the literally minded.+2
@telvannisleeperagent - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
He's talking about everyone, including you. If you have any ego at all, then you will in some way, perhaps even subconsciously (if not consciously) will have natural biases to certain outlooks if they threaten your worldview or understanding of the world.+4
@teleologist - 2025-05-21 10:43:49
@telvannisleeperagent Bias? Sure. Being threatened or scared of these arguments? Get help.+3
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 21:43:49
@teleologist lol now you're just playing word games. "I'm not scared I'm just biased against certain behavior in the face of a perceived threat"+1
@teleologist - 2025-06-17 21:43:49
@ElijahM-j3o Lol, what are you talking about. The point is that there is no threat. There are no word game here, just sloppy thought from you.+1
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 22:43:49
@teleologist "the point is [say it again without justification]" lol. His point was absolutely correct and you're just willfully ignoring it. If you have any ego at all you will bias your outlooks against anything that threatens your worldview.+1
@teleologist - 2025-06-17 22:43:49
@ElijahM-j3o None of this has anything to do with "justification". The existence of bias does not imply that something is a threat. If your ego is threatened by a theory of consciousness, I feel very bad for you. I hope this helps clear it up for you!+1
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 22:43:49
@teleologist I agree nothing you said was justification. He also didn't say bias implies "threat". He said anyone with an ego (everyone) is biased by what threatens their worldview. You're not literally in danger it's just intellectually inconvenient to work out. I don't know why you insist on aggressively misunderstanding what we mean by a "threat". If the hiring of a new coworker threatens your position at a company, it doesn't mean he's going to physically assault you. It means there's a newly presented concern that you might underperform and lose your job. That's literally all anyone is saying. Hope that helps clear it up for you!+1
@teleologist - 2025-06-18 00:43:49
@ElijahM-j3o 8:02 "The only thing that is frightening to people". That's what I'm referencing--this is dumb, he's shadowboxing. Thank you for tediously clarifying that it isn't physically threatening. Bye!+1
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-18 05:43:50
@teleologist "...is um this idea that uh I don't know it it just seems like it's hard to do let's say experiments with consciousness therefore I don't want to believe it's scary in science you know that I don't really understand it doesn't seem to work like everything else" yeah I can tooootally see why you mistook that as being physically threatened 😂+1
@Dovus-V - 2025-05-21 10:43:50
How do you know this is the case?+1
@runix2189 - 2025-05-21 10:43:50
@Dovus-V It's self evident? Just think about the counter cases and realize they are impossible.+1
@Dovus-V - 2025-05-21 10:43:50
@runix2189 I don't believe in self-evidence because it is absurdly circular.+1
@jadetermig2085 - 2025-05-21 10:43:50
@Dovus-V Then you don't believe in math or formal logic. Look up what an axiom is.+4
@Dovus-V - 2025-05-21 10:43:50
@jadetermig2085 Axioms still have to be justified. If not, then I can just make up the axiom that "God exists" and claim it as absolute truth. That's why self-evidence and epistemic foundationalism doesn't work: it allows for contradictory views to coexist, which is itself a contradiction.+1
@jadetermig2085 - 2025-05-21 10:43:50
And also your example doesn't work. If you take "God exists" as an axiom, that doesn't mean I have to accept it... You fundamentally don't understand what axioms are. You think they are "foundational / obvious statements that have been justified / verified and therefore valid". You can indeed make whatever axioms you want and see where that takes you. Doesn't mean other people have to agree or accept your axioms and therefore your conclusion. So YES if you have ever believed a mathematical argument then you have chosen (seemingly unknowingly) to BELIEVE certain self-evident / obvious statements, because without those you cannot even DEFINE what mathematics is, rigorously and from first principles... that's WHY axioms exist...+4
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:43:51
how so? "transcendental" word games?+4
@goyworldorder - 2025-05-21 10:43:51
@OthorgonalOctroon define words in your materialist framework+8
@ismcift1668 - 2025-05-21 10:43:51
the material universe is a self defeating system. we know this.+2
@goyworldorder - 2025-05-21 10:43:51
@OthorgonalOctroon right, so a sound frequency also conveys the meaning of the word. babby's first metaphysics, try harder without ad homs next time+5
@monarcas5502 - 2025-05-28 10:43:51
u know what's even funnier, these guys will come here and preach on us that souls, or imaterial stuff doesn't exist. and they fall to what the elites they want them to believe+2
@goyworldorder - 2025-05-28 10:43:51
@monarcas5502 it's so idiotic and anti-intellectual that they shouldn't even be granted platforms to express these completely fallacious ideas, akin to flat earth people+1
@davidglass4876 - 2025-05-21 10:43:51
Btw so happy to see more content from you, honestly can’t believe it’s been two years. It’s like nothing has changed lol+1
@doublesushi5990 - 2025-05-21 10:43:51
u mean Lenin?+2
@Finkelfunk - 2025-05-21 10:43:51
@doublesushi5990 It's a weird mix of the two with some Dostoevsky in the mix.+3
@badabing3391 - 2025-06-06 10:43:51
he looks like maxwell+1
@ZOMBIEWOLF29 - 2025-05-28 10:43:52
Yeah you took the words out of my brain, great comment, God bless.+1
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 - 2025-05-28 10:43:52
This is such extreme cope it's actually unbelievable. Substance dualism was mathematically refuted over 100 years ago by Bradley. We know for a fact that materialism/computationalism is true. You coping about this doesn't change it.+1
@Idothinkysaurus - 2025-05-28 10:43:52
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 The body affects the mind, this is true, the problem is the mind affects the body as well, and you can go find a plethora of studies on that. If it were all body it would only be the body that could have affecting influence, but the mind affects the body even greater than material substances at times. This is inherent connection, yes, but the point is thought and belief, abstractions, cause the chemicals and emotions that affect the material body. Abstractions affecting the material, this is the big deal because if it were only a material model, that wouldn't be able to happen, it simply would not be possible. We as a species didn't define body, mind, soul, and spirit, all separately as parts of what we define as a Person, for no reason. You might be trying to define yourself as something other than a whole Person. They escalate in abstraction, if you dwell on step 0, the body, you will never grow as a person. The body and mind computation are one and the same, that's the redundant conversation for 100 years, it's the whole rest of it that we're concerned with because it doesn't make sense for the computational body to have this other stuff if life really did have that sucky explanation. Why are people so adamant about limiting your dimensionality, your complexity of character, and why do you accept it? I should be able to just fill you with pills and not have to listen to YOU complain.+1
@francesco3772 - 2025-05-21 10:43:52
Not as you would percieve it, but yes, ofc. Does electromagnetism stop existing when it doesn't interact with baryonic matter?+5
@gnomelinux - 2025-05-21 10:43:52
If you believe in any sort of religion then yes. If atheist then probably not.+4
@timherz86 - 2025-05-21 10:43:52
@gnomelinux some atheists like me think consciousness does exist outside of the brain+2
@Gigachad-mc5qz - 2025-05-21 10:43:52
@gnomelinux i dont think it has to do with religion+1
@gnomelinux - 2025-05-28 10:43:52
@timherz86 That would mean you're agnostic correct?+1
@monarcas5502 - 2025-05-28 10:43:52
can and have being proved by some greek philosophers+1
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 - 2025-06-04 10:43:52
@monarcas5502 There is no greek philosopher which has done anything of the sort.+1
@monarcas5502 - 2025-06-04 10:43:52
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 says u+1
@Hallvard0 - 2025-06-05 10:43:52
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 Literally Platonic forms bro... you are commenting because you are in denial.+1
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 - 2025-06-05 10:43:52
@Hallvard0 No, I'm commenting because you guys are saying dumb stuff and don't understand ontology+2
@badabing3391 - 2025-06-06 10:43:52
people exist outside of the brain, if you arent solipsistic. So evidently yes, unless you mean any and all brains, which is a maybe, maybe+1
@PhilippBlum - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
WHAT? Crazy, right? Have you seen the animal merge AI slop? And the guy makes 40k in 3 months. . . Those who know+2
@abderrahimaourir - 2025-05-28 10:43:53
I'm gonna tell my kids this is Grigori Perelman+4
@KangKadmus - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
I think about this everyday actually. I've come to similar conclusions. Which leads me to God is light and no darkness at all.+2
@redbook7347 - 2025-05-28 10:43:53
Consciousness is not material.. something something, trust me bro.+7
@gergoo007_ - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
It's bugging me how few people are talking about consciousness when it's the highest-profile problem always there, always in plain sight.+2
@TheDashingRogue - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
And the AI demons+15
@koola.i.d - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
I like how he comes back and all he gets is meta comments instead of people addressing the topic of the video+1
@TemporalDelusion - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
Despite having seen all 3 videos I'm still not so sure about it. Your self, your consciousness might as well be just a secondary processor of your primary one making judgements based of what the lower layers provide it. This might also just explain why you can have "memories" of surgeries and such, because your higher level processor is turned off, but the rest of your brain still processes things to an extent. Once the higher layer observer/judge "agent" wakes up it has to reconcile with the rest of the layers. I feel like a fedora tipper typing all this out. I just feel like these past 3 videos have been "this is something too complex to comprehend with basic common sense therefore soul". Of course it hasn't been called a soul, but it feels implied. Is your linux distro dead and unusable, unable to compute if x is killed? These various sections and layers computing different things for different purposes give us the perception of free will and a conscious. It is a function, making judgements that override instinct for example is beneficial. It feels special and I'd prefer the concept of a soul as well, but I'm still not convinced things in the world aren't just an infinite galton board. Lobotomies seem to somewhat support this as well.+9
@renanbrayner984 - 2025-05-28 10:43:53
Its so funny to see that me and Luke trailed paths so close to each other dispite the completly different cultures (I'm brazilian, so another cultural universe). I started using linux and watching your videos because of linux and than, on a completly unrelated note, I converted to orthodoxy and all of the sudden I discover that Luke also converted to orthodox christianity, not trying to make some wierd parasocial connection here just think its funny+2
@vonchadsworth - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
Suppose we assemble a brain neuron-by-neuron. Is it your view that this brain would never become conscious? Or that at some number of neurons, the brain would be bestowed with a soul, or be filled with immaterial "mercury"?+5
@RedBullGreenBear - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
Luke, I implore you to check out "All Things Are Full of Gods". If you like Plato, classical Christian metaphysics, and brilliant takedowns of every possible iteration of materialism, you will love this book!+1
@OfficialAnekito - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
I do the following with my students: Raise your hand. Raises hand -how do you do it? I order my hand to raise and it does -but can you see that order? No, but it's clearly there+8
@Pepe2708 - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
I feel like there is a huge disconnect between "the origin of consciousness" and "the apperance of consciousness" when people discuss this topic.+1
@SeanYoungSG - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
what is bro talking about+5
@kratafila - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
It took long enough for Copilot to generate these Luke videos, but I am happy nevertheless that he is back.+2
@tomogaming1984 - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
Chinese room yeah, but what about the Indian room?+4
@Tom-qz8xw - 2025-05-28 10:43:53
In my opinion the simplest way to put it is that physicalism cannot explain the subjective qualitative experience (qualia) of perception, thought, consciousness or anything to do with the mind. Because one can easily imagine for a example a very advanced robot with cameras for eyes, acting in the world according to algorithms, the light hits the cameras and performs all sorts of computations that respond and act to stimuli, yet its conceivable and very likely true that it has no actual inner experience of what it’s doing, if it did, you’d have to explain why it necessarily follows that in addition to computation it has experience. The same argument can be applied to humans with philosophical zombies (humans that act the same way without any subjective experience / consciousness) - you can then see that there is an explanatory gap between physical interactions and inner subjective qualitative experience or consciousness.+1
@r3lativ - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
The problem with this argument is that if consciousness was something non-material that interacts with the material world, we would detect it via the conservation of energy. Anything material that has some accelerated motion consumes energy. So if non-material stuff existed that interacted with matter, ie created some observable accelerated motion, we would see there was something missing in our materialist accounting. The lack of consciousness would also be observable in the conservation of energy accounting. If you read biophysics, you'll see it's all about tracking the conservation of energy in biological phenomena, including what the neurons do. There's no missing energy in what the neurons do. So either consciousness is material (outcome of what neurons do) or it couldn't interact with neurons.+6
@youtubeenjoyer1743 - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
Consciousness does not exist.+3
@PhilippBlum - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
Can we start going back to the roots? Like more us. More human connection. Human networks. Like. When did we lose that? Those who know+5
@gjlgjl - 2025-05-21 10:43:53
Enjoying this release schedule, keep it up!+1
@dm.3145 - 2025-05-28 10:43:54
lmao+1
@ichisichify - 2025-05-28 10:43:54
rofl+1
@PhilippBlum - 2025-05-21 10:43:54
Everwhere. Am I one? Probably. Right? Everyone is. Those who know :D+2
@puhbrox - 2025-05-21 10:43:54
Intriguing... Are they just regular demons or are they something else entirely?+1
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-21 10:43:54
I agree with this, but it's important to distinguish qualitative experience per se (which is what I'm talking about) and let's say "quantitative" or functional consciousness. Consciousness certainly partially functions as a "higher-level processor," and there is a huge number of really interesting phenomena (e.g. blindsight) that can tell you how it interfaces with cognition. But this is a separate issue from that of qualia in themselves. Describing consciousness's "role" can be useful in understanding it, but there is still something different from a conscious mind and an unconscious one that might carry out recursive or self-evaluative sub-routines. I'll say again my argument is definitely not one of "complexity." It's pretty simple: 1. Physical systems produce emergent phenomena only with physical properties. 2. Consciousness's properties are entirely *non-physical*. 3. Ergo, physical systems cannot produce, by themselves, consciousness. Physical systems can easily produce highly complex emergent phenomena by themselves. That's not an issue.+13
@provod_ - 2025-05-21 10:43:54
@LukeSmithxyz > 2. Consciousness's properties are entirely *non-physical*. What do you mean? What properties are non-physical? I'm not seeing any part of what I internally experience as consciousness strictly requiring anything beyond a purely physical self-referential self-predicting agentic loop. I don't say that I can fully explain it detailed enough to be able to build it from scratch, but the requirement of anything beyond purely physical system is not obvious to me.+1
@knightdtd - 2025-05-21 10:43:54
Have you read "Determined: A Science of Life without Free Will" by Robert Sapolsky? I feel the book dismantled a lot of Luke's arguments, still in the middle of trying to wrap my head around it tho.+2
@provod_ - 2025-06-04 10:43:54
@knightdtd I haven't read that one (and, honestly, I think that the whole "problem" of whether there's free will or not is at best moot, or at worst completely bogus; the same way whether the universe is non-deterministic, deterministic, or superdeterministic is practically irrelevant). On the consciousness front I know only one book about modern state of neuroscience, it's called "Surfing Uncertainty". It's not a pop-sci book and is a bit dense. There's, however, a really fun and great review of it by Slate Star Codex that goes through major points, which should be enough to build a rough mental model. And there's been a fairly recent paper called "Why Is Anything Conscious?" (can be found on arXiv) that, through a bunch of math modeling, concludes that "nature doesn't like zombies", i.e. internal phenomenological perception is a necessary tool for survival, and conscious is a natural state of complex enough living matter.+1
@ZOMBIEWOLF29 - 2025-05-28 10:43:55
everything is connected+1
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:43:55
apparently this isn't even without precedent, albeit a marginal one (dishbrain learned to play pong)+4
@Jupiter__001_ - 2025-05-21 10:43:55
Eventually you'd get an homunculus. So no consciousness, just chemical feedback regulation loops: a flesh computer.+2
@vonchadsworth - 2025-05-21 10:43:55
@Jupiter__001_ So we could have two brains that are atom-for-atom identical, the only difference being one was born from a womb and the other from this experiment, and you would argue that one has a first-person subjective experience as complex as you or I, and the other is merely a "flesh computer"?+2
@Jupiter__001_ - 2025-05-21 10:43:55
@vonchadsworth Wrote a long reply but it got deleted. Nice. Anyway: yes, but the brain is not the one that has the subjective experience, but rather the mind/soul has the subjective experience through the brain.+1
@badabing3391 - 2025-06-06 10:43:55
@Jupiter__001_ theres no way to differentiate a homunculus from a baby unless something about growing inside a womb after the combination of male and female gametes makes you conscious+1
@Jupiter__001_ - 2025-06-07 10:43:55
@badabing3391 My replies keep getting deleted. This site is falling apart, or it's designed to frustrate. Anyway, you are more or less correct: "... man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart." (1 Samuel 16:7)+1
@ismcift1668 - 2025-05-21 10:43:55
you are confused because the tools you use to map the territory are not appropriate. The words you use to explain your inner experience are lacking and bring different contexts with them. Just like some emotions are hard to express, it is also hard to express our inner world.+1
@goyworldorder - 2025-05-21 10:43:56
hope you packed febreeze+11
@QTwoSix - 2025-05-28 10:43:56
SAAAAR+1
@atanas-nikolov - 2025-05-21 10:43:56
I don't see why that would be the case at all. Why should there be changes in energy?+1
@ryanh7167 - 2025-05-21 10:43:56
This is circular by the very definition of energy itself. Energy is the abstract "capacity for work" which can only be measured once the work is realized or via some signal which implies a capacity for work which we then manipulate mathematically. It is entirely possible that consciousness (or information in a more abstract sense) exists as a sort of "potential" in the sense that there is the "capacity" for "thought" or "communication" etc. This potential may very well behave like pretty much every other physical form of "energy," (i.e., something which can only be directly measured after the fact, and can only be assumed via a priori modeling before the fact).+2
@r3lativ - 2025-05-21 10:43:56
@ryanh7167 There's some truth to the claim of circularity: every time physicists found that energy wasn't conserved they invented/discovered some missing form of matter, which made the accounting work. The neutrino is the famous case, because it was postulated just to save the conservation of energy and discovered much later. But that is exactly my point: if there was anything missing (this non-material form of consciousness that interacts with regular matter), biophysicists would've detected it because that's exactly what they've been measuring (with very precise tools).+1
@r3lativ - 2025-05-21 10:43:56
@atanas-nikolov because Luke says consciousness interacts with regular matter. That interaction would be detectable in the lack of conservation of energy. That's because the conservation of energy only tracks what regular matter does, so if there's something missing it would show up as a missing element in this energy accounting.+3
@atanas-nikolov - 2025-05-21 10:43:56
@r3lativ I still don't follow why that should be the case. Why should there be any energetic interaction?+2
@r3lativ - 2025-05-21 10:43:56
@atanas-nikolov Luke's claim is that neurons are doing something materially observable, but for which there's a missing material cause. That's what it means for the consciousness to interact with matter. Not only there's interaction, there's a BIG interaction happening all the time. That would've been detected on the side of the material consequences of this interaction. The specifics of how this would've been detected is that it would've shown up in the energy conservation failing.+1
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:43:56
@atanas-nikolov if this magic consciousness ether does nothing then it just doesn't exist.+1
@ryanh7167 - 2025-05-21 10:43:56
@r3lativ You're making an error in assuming that we have appropriate sensing technology to detect these interactions. The sensors can only "see" what they are looking for. Even if it were to be 100% confirmed by some other means that consciousness were an immaterial thing that interacts with the material through a known pathway, there is no guarantee that our sensing technology would be capable of detecting it. Consider, as an example, the idea that consciousness impacts the frequency of neural firing in the brain. We could measure electric potential differences across the membrane of the nerve cell, but we'd be limited to whatever frequencies are possible to meaningfully sample via current DSP. If the material effect of conscious thought were to be on the scale of picovolts, and have fundamental frequencies in the 10^22 Hz range, we'd be entirely unable to distinguish this from electrical noise even with the most precise sensors we have. This same problem shows up in the debates around gravity as well. "Gravity waves" can have wavelengths that vary between a few thousand kilometers to literally billions of kilometers, and their amplitudes are so minute relative to the masses they influence that they require entirely novel sensing mechanisms to be developed. It could be a quite similar story here, where the existing sensing "cannot see" the impact because sensors themselves imply certain things about what they are sensing. They can only "see" what they are engineered to catch.+2
@atanas-nikolov - 2025-05-21 10:43:56
@r3lativ I understand you think that way. What I don't understand is why that should be the case. You may be able to observe me making a decision and track brain impulses, etc. You can never make the jump to "He is not a p-zombie" through observation alone. You may track how photons make my brain fire, but you cannot recreate what I really experience as seeing. I am not saying we don't currently have the tech, I'm saying it is conceptually impossible. Ideas can change your mind, influence your actions, etc. Materialism supposes that to be deterministic and observable. This can never be proven, so it is just another assertion. Conservation of energy would only apply if consciousness somehow has to obey materialistic principles.+2
@Ardepark - 2025-05-28 10:43:56
@atanas-nikolov From a scientific standpoint there is no such thing as "should be the case" or any need to prove anything to you here. "Obey materialistic principles".. You mean, like, BE OBSERVABLE? If you want to believe in something that cannot be observed and therefore cannot be falsified, then any excuse will do. Choose Your Own Non-Material Consciousness. Nobody can stop you from creating excuses, and nobody is obligated to prove to you that it's not there.+1
@atanas-nikolov - 2025-05-28 10:43:56
@ArdeparkExactly when did you observe the existence of anything? How do you know it isn't a simulation or that other people are not p-zombies? Let's take a step back. How do you know something has to be observable in the first place? Ever observed that criteria under a microscope?+1
@Ardepark - 2025-05-28 10:43:56
@atanas-nikolov You would never ask this kind of equivocating quibbling question to someone analyzing blood samples in a homicide investigation, or what the guy was wearing who stole your wallet, or the license plate numbers on the car that just ran over your child and drove away. Because when things actually MATTER (have MATERIAL CONSEQUENCES), nobody cares about these kinds of excuses. Scientific method is like that. It’s an investigation in a court of law (the laws of nature as we have discovered and observed them operating), where excuses and speculative chains of logic don’t matter. If you cannot bring something forward that can be observed and testified to by your peers, regardless of what they would RATHER believe, then you do not have a legal case. It’s not a philosophy forum, it’s not church. It’s a court of natural law. Your demand that someone answer these inanities for you carries no weight, except as an attempt at manipulation. For the same reason that a witness in the stand cannot just say to the court “How do you know a demon DIDN’T literally possess him? Of course I can’t show the demon to you, demons don’t have to obey the principles of materialism!”+1
@atanas-nikolov - 2025-05-28 10:43:56
@Ardepark I am not equivocating, I am talking about foundational issues. You are arguing about something that is not under question right now. I am all for science, when the question is truly in its purview. But what happens when it isn't? Of course I am not going to ask meta questions when we are talking about material specifics. But I sure hope someone's gonna ask them, when we are discussing whether a homicide investigation is something worthwhile to pursue, or that children should in fact be considered human beings with rights. The scientific method is great, but it is not self-defining. It doesn't give you value judgements, nor does it describe what is worth investigating. See, you are making a bunch of statements, none of which are provable or observable under a microscope. Case in point: 1. If you cannot bring something forward that can be observed and testified to by your peers, regardless of what they would RATHER believe, then you do not have a legal case. (Says who? The scientific method? Nope.) 2. It’s not a philosophy forum, it’s not church. It’s a court of natural law. (Says who? What if I want to treat the world as my playground, where all the people are NPCs?) It's really interesting you bring this court of natural law. I haven't ever seen one, or observed one. Guess it must not exist. In fact, I've never seen science under a microscope either. Must be some metaphysical mumbo-jumbo that ain't that important for what truly matters - i.e. matter. You are mistaken that you think we posit consciousness as something that we can have no evidence for. We don't just assume it. To the contrary, I am pointing out that you are demanding we use the wrong tool to register it - namely some materialistic apparatus that doesn't work in our case. You can't register an ideal triangle either, nor mathematics, nor physics, nor science. You can register phenomena, but you can't ever register the trustworthiness of your registering tools (who watches the watchers and all that). The most basic thing you can know is that you are conscious. Materialists get to the second floor and conclude they don't need the first one.+1
@badabing3391 - 2025-06-06 10:43:56
you could hopefully generate a maxwells demon from an immaterial consciousness, as it would expend no energy as it attempted to sort fast and slow moving particles (the same energy which is currently blamed for its infeasibility in generating energy)+1
@boristheantarcticunicorn8307 - 2025-05-28 10:43:57
No, it exist. It's just that it's a process that use several layers of abstraction.+1
@youtubeenjoyer1743 - 2025-05-28 10:43:57
@boristheantarcticunicorn8307 A symbolic assertion of an imaginary abstract process definitely exists, yes. But I’m talking about the non-physical thing described in the video.+1
@checkmate5338 - 2025-05-28 10:43:57
It's so sad that the scientific community has adopted hard-line materialism.+4
@dovonun - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
I would argue that the "calculator" contains a lot we do not understand. Therefore, the comparison with a fully known system does not work for me. But I still do agree with your conclusion.+1
@calholli - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
An electron is matter.. The flow of electricity is just energy.. Our thoughts are just specific flows and impulses of this energy, at specific frequencies and amplitude, etc.. also interlaced with chemical influences and external senses, etc... So at what point of these flows of energy does it suddenly become something "MORE"? Just because a system is more complex, doesn't mean that it's anything other than the simple flow of energy.+5
@Mipetz38 - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
I would be more than glad for Luke to explain to us consciousness through scholastics+1
@lazarplavsic202 - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
Bro is making The Transcendtal Argument!+5
@TL-rh1lf - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
You should check out Bernardo Kastrup if you haven’t already—he has a lot of fascinating talks on consciousness and materialism. He argues that consciousness is fundamental, not a byproduct of physical processes. Kastrup holds PhDs in both philosophy and computer science, which gives his perspective a unique depth.+2
@dannielrb - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
Why do you make the leap that consciousness is not part of the computation? You say there are different forces, and that not everything should just be one force, but all forces are still part of the computation. Why wouldn't consciousness? It seems like you have a belief that consciousness has to be something special and separate from literally everything else, but there's no real substance to the argument. Just that it can't be. It sounds like hope. The fact that we can't explain it yet shouldn't require us to mystify it.+5
@Soulait_38 - 2025-05-28 10:43:57
Excellent video! I think you can take any explanation you want for consciousness, it will never be enough, there will always be a huge leap, like, the complexity of information --> consciousness. It doesn't explain anything, and the fact that there are people who still know they are conscious, that they exist, that they don't deny it by misusing reason, is argument enough to deny these “scientific explanations”. But this self-evident truth seems to be slowly disappearing in our world. We will never be able to fully explain and fully accept an explanation of consciousness because we are it, for the first time, we are experiencing what it is to be a noumenon, and this is something that is indeed, in my opinion, beyond reason.+1
@zelllers - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
"honestly you just kind of have to believe it. It's just kind of how it is. It's hard to explain" Come on man, do better. You have my attention, but I'm not convinced that consciousness cannot be created through computation.+5
@tonyg9921 - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
Consciousness is the User, not the User Interface+2
@JacksonNick-j6i - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
A couple of problems with your argument: - Just because consciousness cannot be defined in a materialistic way at the current state of science, doesn't mean it will remain like that. Brain is not even 10% understood by science yet. - Comparing brain's working to digital computation of CPU is kinda misguiding. It was the human brain which defined what computation is, not the other way around. Brain "computes", but not the same way a CPU computes. You can truly compare brain to a CPU only when you make a CPU that works with neurons instead of transistors, and they work with whatever data type the actual brain uses instead of binary. Not to mention the entire architecture of computation is based on math. Human brain defines math, not the other way around. One of the problems with philosophy is that at some point you need to assume your knowledge and understanding of the subject is "enough", in order to leave the analysis behind and form an actual argument. Otherwise you're just solving a math function that never ends because it holds a seemingly infinite amount of symbols and concepts that you don't know yet.+4
@bearmandeluxe - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
Between World Peace 2 being announced and the return of Luke Smith, it feels like the start of some kind of apocalypse.+1
@qchtohere8636 - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
Conciousness is just an echo hearing itself, nothing more, nothing less... It is a material consequence, everything in the end that interacts with the material word is material in nature, stop deluding yourselves, or at least beware you're doing it. And no, sentience doesn't need purpose, follow your own advice: stop infering semantics from syntax alone.+8
@johnstamos5948 - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
Tomorrows video "The transcendental argument for the existence of God"+3
@qwelias - 2025-05-28 10:43:57
man's yapping+4
@benaloney - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
Well, I personally believe the nature of consciousness is based on material forces, and in my honest opinion... it's arrogant to believe that the act of "thinking" is above the physical laws of the universe... it's just neural electrical impulses at scale+2
@aneeshprasobhan - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
Dude doesn't realize his consciousness is computation. He just can't accept that we're not special.+19
@Daniel-bl1wf - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
Came for the Linux videos and was surprised to find a fellow Orthodox. Glory to God for your conversion ☦+1
@mathiswellmann6858 - 2025-05-28 10:43:57
The normie mind cannot comprehend the gravity skeptics mind. Great videos on important topics recently :D+4
@channelmalta - 2025-05-21 10:43:57
Great Stuff Lukje, keep them going , so glad ur back+1
@Ardepark - 2025-05-28 10:43:58
It's so sad that you have to create a caricature to mock when you could just be curious about real things and talk to people honestly without namecalling for clout+1
@checkmate5338 - 2025-05-28 10:43:58
@Ardepark Actually, on second thought. The scientific community has to be materialistic since it only measures the empirical. Maybe there isn't anything necessarily wrong with this. But people, including some scientists will fall into the fallacy of scientism often, assuming that only the material (that we can test/measure) is real.+3
@Ardepark - 2025-05-28 10:43:58
@checkmate5338 Well, put it this way: If you can’t test whether a claim could be false in some way, you can never know if it’s a lie. So from a scientific standpoint it’s just obnoxious and petty and suspect for someone to be nagging you and namecalling “Stop being so scientistic and materialistic bro, just trust me bro, of COURSE there’s no evidence lol, what did you expect me to be able to give you something to work with? Lmao you’re so closed-minded, just vibe with my cool story bro”+2
@checkmate5338 - 2025-05-28 10:43:58
@Ardepark You're just talking about falsifiability. I'm talking about how science is the study of the natural observable/measurable world around us.+1
@Ardepark - 2025-05-28 10:43:58
@checkmate5338 We are both talking about both of those things.+1
@checkmate5338 - 2025-05-28 10:43:58
@Ardepark glad you agree👍+1
@Ardepark - 2025-05-28 10:43:58
@checkmate5338 What do I agree with you about?+1
@badabing3391 - 2025-06-06 10:43:58
@Ardepark what youre both talking about+1
@Ardepark - 2025-06-06 10:43:58
@badabing3391 Then I don’t agree so he is wrong about that+1
@atanas-nikolov - 2025-05-21 10:43:58
That's an assertion, and a self-defeating one at that. It is an epistemological nightmare, because it renders knowledge impossible, meaning you have no good reason to believe your assertion.+3
@calholli - 2025-05-21 10:43:58
@atanas-nikolov You say it's impossible, yet here we are. Knowledge is really just the ability to recall and apply information from memory.. So I don't see how it's rendered impossible. We obviously have memory... Even computers have memory, which proves that it's electrically possible to function. I'm not making an assertion.. These are just observations that have been made. Not only can they ready the "Frequencies" or brain waves.. They can even program controls for prosthetic arms, etc............. The point is: where do you draw the line? Where does it go from a flesh computer to this magical "consciousness"? And what about it is so distinct that it can't also happen in a computer system? If we can just reach the same complexity of connections as there are in the brain?............. I don't actually know the answer to this: I'm just asking.+5
@ericfromeng - 2025-05-21 10:43:58
@calholli This is where my mind went as well. There's no reason why consciousness can't just be a complex combination of different types of computation. If a computer is able to utilize these multiple types of computation, while writing and reading from memory, what is the real difference between the computer's simulated consciousness and a human's real consciousness? If a computer is able to "remember" past errors and readjust when similar issues arise, is that not a demonstration of "understanding"? Taking in data and reapplying it in appropriate contexts. Not that we could determine this, but it might feel different in the human brain. That could easily be due to the brain's structure and how it computes. In either case, it is energy being spent to calculate and "understand".+2
@calholli - 2025-05-21 10:43:58
@ericfromeng I will say that our brains are far more complex.. even in the way that we remember things. Because we don't just replace old or bad data with new data like updating memory. It's like we log everything on a timeline.. and when ever we take in new information, we also have a very complex "fingerprint" with everything we do, which includes how we feel, where we are, what we smell at the time, what time of day it is, etc. etc.. We "EXPERIENCE" all these things all the time. So I would think that for a computer" to get to the point of a "self aware" consciousness (which is the distinction"). I think it would need to be in full connection with outside sensors at all time, and log everything it "learns" on a continuous timeline of memory that it can call back to. Until we build some machine that has this level of continually evolving complexity, I don't think we will get anywhere near the ability to create an emergent consciousness.. I personally think consciousness, in the way we think of it, is a learned behavior. If you think back to being a tiny baby that can't even walk or talk yet: does that even fit the definition of "consciousness"? Just like how we can't quite call back any memories from that time either; Why is that? We would have to sit down and really define what "Consciousness' actually is. I personally believe that in large part, it is a learned.. It's hard to find any agreement on these things.. Some people think that animals have consciousness.. some think that they don't.. ?? ..... citation needed. 'lol+2
@QTwoSix - 2025-05-28 10:43:58
>We're all just like neurons.... man....+1
@calholli - 2025-05-28 10:43:58
@QTwoSix If you take away the neurons.. what is left?+2
@xgui4-studio - 2025-05-28 10:43:58
@calholli the heart, skeleton, muscle, skin other organs and more+1
@calholli - 2025-05-28 10:43:58
@xgui4-studio We're talking about thoughts..+1
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:43:58
no it's actually irreducible complexity, the same as a hundred other quacks only applied to the brain this time instead of wings or bacteria.+2
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-21 10:43:58
Oh goodness, no.+6
@juliomerida916 - 2025-05-21 10:43:58
@LukeSmithxyz Hello Luke, I just wanted to let you know that their exists a scientist on youtube that posits consciousness is holographic. His name is Ken Wheeler but goes by Theoria Apophasis. Im not going to explain it any further, because I'm going to butcher it. Ok bye+3
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-21 10:43:59
Other "different forces" all share a physical ontology describable in materialistic terms, which is not shared by consciousness. Emergent properties of matter are still totally describable in material terms.+5
@TheBannanaThief - 2025-05-21 10:43:59
I'm even confused by what are his definitions. For me it is like creating arguments about painting not being physical. You can create arguments that it is made of paints so it is composed from matter. But none of this paints alone is what you can see in the painting.+3
@dannielrb - 2025-05-21 10:43:59
@LukeSmithxyz so basically, we can't describe consciousness in material terms yet, so it must be something separate? Isn't that how they used to treat everything? Life, which now can be explained in terms of biological and chemical processes, used to be considered separate from the material world. There was some élan vital that distinguished living beings from non-living matter. Same thing with the seasons being driven by the gods. I don't really get the idea of "I don't understand it, so it must be metaphysical"+7
@ichisichify - 2025-05-28 10:43:59
@dannielrb i go back and forth on the question of consciousness but right now i have a feeling that as ai research and neurology are getting better and better at exploring their intersection, non-materialists will have a god of the gaps recession+1
@Jupiter__001_ - 2025-05-21 10:43:59
Echoes can't hear anything, let alone themselves.+3
@y1k3sTheHacker - 2025-05-21 10:43:59
yep all just computations based on data (life experience or otherwise). unfortunately he's slipped very far into religion and that just doesn't fit their vibe+7
@ImmersionEsque - 2025-05-21 10:43:59
He's just the epitome of the tech guy / intellectual who got tired of tech / civilization and embraces surface level humility and disdain for technology by returning to nature and believing in the outrageously stupid meme Chad position that is kinda funny though+5
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-21 10:43:59
Specialness is not an issue. A more coherent view than eliminative materialism would be that consciousness is universal, e.g.. There are many logical possibilities, one that is neither logical nor possible is that qualitative experience is an "illusion" brought on by some material syntactic process.+12
@sebleblan - 2025-05-21 10:43:59
don't you just "feel" it?+1
@goyworldorder - 2025-05-21 10:43:59
you are indian so it makes sense that this is your modus operandi+8
@danielkruyt9475 - 2025-05-21 10:43:59
@LukeSmithxyz Don't you think that the very utterance "qualitative experience is an illusion" is simply a badly-written sentence trying to express a sad feeling of defeat inside it's author? Why try to tack on logic to what is clearly just emotive expression of an overly-assertive person? Obviously there are some "philosophers" that behave like that, but I can personally forgive them their fee-fees. :P+1
@brytonbehrend8550 - 2025-05-21 10:43:59
The true nature of consciousness has been debated for all of history, it's hardly a solved matter. And how aren't we special? What are you, a nihilist? Lol+3
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:43:59
just wait until this guy finds out that bats and other animals with different qualia exist.+1
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
@brytonbehrend8550 and until relatively recently we didn't have the means to investigate, now we do. we know enough about the brain to judge there is nothing magical inside it. "old thing good" isn't an argument anyway.+1
@mattias99475 - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
@LukeSmithxyz where does consciousness even begin? I completly missed the point if it was to reach some clarity. Mercury was just a wondrous new material and to some AI now is. I believe it it's the ability to process sensory information and respond to it in a meaningful way, preferably that is interpreted as wanting to survive. A chimpanze or dog we can look in the eyes and see consciousness similar to our own while bacterial mats no matter how big, complex and full of interconnects will never speak to us as conscious. What if it is some universal force and the living slime is more aware, to the point of realizing how unfruitful it would be to interact with the egos of multicellular lifeforms. At what point does it stop to matter? With nutrient deficiencies causing the most severe symptoms of mental illnesses, is that a manifestation of LE ego, the gut microbiome or genetics and should the judicial system take this new knowledge into consideration 🤔+1
@aneeshprasobhan - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
@LukeSmithxyz Fair enough about the 'specialness' point. But I'm not convinced that consciousness being computational is 'neither logical nor possible.' 1. You're creating a false dichotomy. Computational theories of mind don't claim subjective experience is an 'illusion' - they claim it emerges from complex information processing. Emergence isn't illusion. 2. Consciousness being universal - that approach has its own logical problems. If consciousness is everywhere, why does damaging specific parts of the brain predictably alter or eliminate specific aspects of consciousness? The 'hard problem' of consciousness is challenging, but that doesn't mean we should abandon material explanations. Throughout history, phenomena once thought to require non-material explanations (lightning, disease, heredity) yielded to material understanding. I'm curious - what exactly makes you think consciousness needs more than just complex computation? Genuinely interested. The Chinese Room argument shows that syntax isn't semantics, but doesn't prove consciousness can't emerge from sufficiently complex computational systems.+1
@brytonbehrend8550 - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
@OthorgonalOctroon We know much less than you seem to think, there's plenty more to be discovered. And my argument obviously wasn't 'old thing good'. I was just pointing out that our world's best thinkers for all of time couldn't come up with any kind of definitive answer, so for you to smugly act as if it's just so obvious and elementary is really quite silly.+3
@Thermalsquid360 - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
Consciousness is not the brain nor located in the brain, consciousness is not a temporal phenomena and isn’t a phenomena to begin with at all+1
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
@brytonbehrend8550 it's completely irrelevant what debates people without access to psychology or neuroscience had centuries ago about consciousness. they had no data to work with, the only reason to bring this up is if old philosophers have value on nothing other than their antiquity. now we do have data to work with. we know what neurons are and how they work, and we know some parts of the brain that alter one's personality upon being damaged, for obvious examples.+1
@brytonbehrend8550 - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
@OthorgonalOctroon Yeah I see your point, but the data we have now, while useful in many ways, is still rather incomplete. As such, the subject is a matter of much debate to this day, and probably will be forever. I brought up old philosophers not because of their antiquity, but because of their diligence; despite all their debating and reasoning and pontificating etc, a definitive answer has yet to be found. Neuroscience has certainly disproven some junk theories, but we still don't have a concrete understanding, not even close. I'm not saying your stance is completely incorrect, just that it isn't as black and white as you seem to represent.+2
@LurkingAround - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
Holy copium. I'm not nihilistic atheist but that cope about us being "special" makes our lives worse. Instead of fixing the issues in our society guys like you think that they'll fix themselves cause there's a God or something. Sure, nobody understands consciousness but what makes you think that it isn't material if you DON'T KNOW what it is?+11
@ChristopherDistrobution - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
Five videos man. Luke is going to get every one's hopes up about daily uploads now, lol. Great stuff. Thank you. Made my head spin. Sometimes you have to approach this with a punk rocker, skater boarder, surfer mentality. "Unless you become like children."+1
@Sherwin_Dean - 2025-05-28 10:44:00
This guy is a phony+4
@mihailamarie4318 - 2025-05-28 10:44:00
There is a comprehension horizon. Consciousness can be explained within the framework of consciousness, matter can't be explained within the framework of matter, but consciousness can't be explained withing the framework of matter and it still exists. That's what the materialists are freaking out about, that there is no such formal framework that explains everything real, but that formalism is bound by horizons.+1
@cippo1995 - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
On this I agree with the famous neuroscientist saying that we don't have free will, consciousness is just an illusion made from our brain (a good and very useful illusion I would add). I think that not believing this is just out of fear of being less than what we think we are, in my opinion there isn't more magic in us than every other thing in the universe.+6
@eyesgotshowyo7800 - 2025-05-28 10:44:00
Luke I have been watching you since 2016. And i really really appreciate you for putting this discourse of discussion.+1
@DwAboutItManFr - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
Consciousness is definetly 100% material.+4
@vmvini - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
Consciousness is finite awareness finding its way through the infinite.+1
@state550 - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
"It's clearly something different" is not an argument.+13
@luizmonad777 - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
yes, your argument makes sense, but only because I'm far away enough in that spiritual path too, I'm right behind you+1
@rishabhbector550 - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
This is just incorrect. Neuroscience is already at the point where we can use sensors in someone’s brain to reconstruct parts of their vision, and it’s only getting better. I see why the CPU analogy might be confusing because it seems like you need something “else” sitting at the monitor watching the screen. But you don’t. It could just be a camera connected to a multi modal AI like the ones you can now download on your phone. The more abstract point being that the interpretation of the virtual representation of the physical world (consciousness in this example) is itself a part of the physical world, and you ARE that machine running according to the laws of physics like everything else. It’s just that the brain is such an advanced machine that it can reprogram itself, and that is our conscious experience.+4
@et6729 - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
The new DBH book makes an excellent argument along this vein. Essentialy Semantics completely precede syntax in all possible ways+1
@tainicon4639 - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
If the physical can interact with it is it not physical? Your model just seems like a materialistic model with extra layers of material. Unless I have misunderstood.+4
@Chareboe - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
So happy to have all this content!+1
@5GRobo - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
Can you point to a consciousness that does not come from the material world? You can't+6
@TageraHang-j8s - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
I kinda disagree with this. However, Chad Smith is a religious man and I can understand why his viewpoints regarding consciousness is ultimately that it is not material. I'm thinking more it is a sort of black box experiment. We don't really know what the mechanism inside the box are, all we can do it tinker with the box and come up with conclusions from the results. Chad just came up with a different conclusion then I did and of course I respect that.+2
@nikolabobic661 - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
What is consciousness?+10
@NEVERGOON-e7q - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
We're in a special era.+3
@gr8ape111 - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
Pretty poor argumentation, good job on finding jesus I guess+4
@Benji54345 - 2025-05-21 10:44:00
Love these new videos keep it up. deep stuff+3
@ЕгорКазей - 2025-05-21 10:44:01
"you silly believers, how dare you try to fix yourselves, while le society is le bad" Are you a communist by any chance?+8
@BlakeCarter-i3b - 2025-05-21 10:44:01
"I'm not nihilistic atheist but we are not any different from the rest of the physical matter of the universe. I will now promptly engage in a strawman that is driven by emotional-cognitive associations that no other physical beings are capable of experiencing."+6
@LurkingAround - 2025-05-21 10:44:01
@ЕгорКазей I'm not. Fix yourself without implying that there's something magical about consciousness.+1
@LurkingAround - 2025-05-21 10:44:01
@BlakeCarter-i3b how are we different then? What makes you think that there are no other physical beings that are capable of this? Have you checked the whole universe already? I'd like to hear you explain it all. There's no need to be different from "everything else" to care about yourself and the world where you live. I don't need magic in my head for this.+1
@realCaptainFordo - 2025-05-28 10:44:01
“I’m not a nihilistic atheist but we are literally just clumps of stardust and God isn’t real.”+2
@LurkingAround - 2025-05-28 10:44:01
@realCaptainFordo the existence of God is irrelevent. Even if I'd deny it then it wouldn't make me a nihilist. You can have a meaning in your life without believing in magic. I just don't want people to ignore the problems and spread that mindset all over the world. Luke clearly says that he doesn't know what he is talking about and yet he makes some stupid statements – just why? Why the need for God of the gaps? What are you gonna do when it will turn out that there's truly nothing special about the way our brains work and it'll be possible to recreate and/or modify them by hand? Do you people even understand what kind of cursed world is shaping right in front of our eyes? You won't be able to hide in the woods forever.+1
@atanas-nikolov - 2025-05-21 10:44:01
So your brain has predetermined you believe this, meaning there's nothing rational about it and you have no way of knowing if it's true or not. In other words, you have no reason to support this position.+3
@cippo1995 - 2025-05-21 10:44:01
@atanas-nikolov What is true and what is not is also a human concept.+2
@atanas-nikolov - 2025-05-21 10:44:01
@cippo1995 Why even state your assertion though? Because it feels pleasurable? Cool. In any case, as an assertion it can simply be dismissed. Also cool.+2
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:44:01
@atanas-nikolov nothing of what you said has any logical coherence, it's just a series of random statements all independently false.+4
@johnstamos5948 - 2025-05-21 10:44:01
An illusion implies consciousness, this is self defeating+5
@QTwoSix - 2025-05-28 10:44:01
This is soytheist copium. The Lord granted us free will.+1
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-28 10:44:01
@QTwoSix source? anonymous authors from the first century aren't "The Lord" btw.+1
@QTwoSix - 2025-05-28 10:44:01
@OthorgonalOctroon >I'm clueless about basic theology but I will argue like I know anyways, I am le smart!!+1
@Thermalsquid360 - 2025-05-21 10:44:02
Yeah somehow inanimate and dead material just like interacts and produces subjective experiences+1
@DwAboutItManFr - 2025-05-21 10:44:02
@Thermalsquid360 That's not what I said, but who knows maybe panpsychism is true and we just can't measure that. Funny implications for nuclear technology.+1
@Dovus-V - 2025-05-21 10:44:02
He explicated the argument throughout the whole video. He did not just say that one sentence.+4
@state550 - 2025-05-21 10:44:02
@ There was never an argument at any point in this video. The part I took out was a good summary of the video.+3
@jadetermig2085 - 2025-05-21 10:44:02
"Can you point to something immaterial? You can't" And what does that prove, in your mind? How were you ever going to "point to" something that doesn't come from the material world, genius?+7
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-21 10:44:02
Can you point out the justification for value judgements in your material worldview+3
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-21 10:44:02
You have to distinguish the assumption that everything is material from proof of it. I can easily say, yes, actually all conscious is. Or to reorient your statement: You cannot point to matter which exists independent of subjective consciousness, for example. By this logic, matter cannot exist... then I guess consciousness can't exist by your reckoning... then I guess nothing exists. QED.+5
@Thermalsquid360 - 2025-05-21 10:44:02
You should add that by supposing a world independent of consciousness, it requires a type of third person, disassociated hypothetical consciousness to conceive of.+1
@bingxilao9086 - 2025-05-21 10:44:03
It's an emotionally driven cope. Not only doesn't exist, but isn't even a meaningful concept+6
@kjyu4539 - 2025-05-21 10:44:03
our consciousness is from the consciousness of God like God separated a part of his consciousness and made it a separate being humans have the consciousness of God but without absolute/limitless power of God (at least in this ordinary state of us)+3
@petkish - 2025-05-21 10:44:03
Consciousness is related to an ability of an intelligence to perceive itself, observe its own thinking, and, by building a mental model of itself, better plan its actions. So consciousness is actually the process of doing this. It is absolutely materialistic and computational.+6
@TL-rh1lf - 2025-05-21 10:44:03
@bingxilao9086 That position is self-defeating. To deny the existence of consciousness, you'd have to be conscious enough to formulate and express the thought. Consciousness is the very medium through which all experiences—thoughts, doubts, perceptions—are known. Even denying it presupposes it.+3
@bingxilao9086 - 2025-05-21 10:44:03
@TL-rh1lf the "sense of existing as a being" is a convenient frame to operate through in day to day life, but I don't see why it should be accorded any special cosmological or philosophical meaning. In a rather stretched analogy, there is a "present moment" in time, right now, dividing past from future. But it's not special. Every other moment in time will get to be the "present" sooner or later, or was already the "present moment". It's not special and nor is the feeling of being conscious.+2
@kjyu4539 - 2025-05-21 10:44:03
@petkish read my comment and also study NDEs+1
@realCaptainFordo - 2025-05-28 10:44:03
@petkish 😂+1
@ЕгорКазей - 2025-05-21 10:44:03
Special as in "special education"+4
@averesenso - 2025-05-21 10:44:03
@ЕгорКазей lmaoo+1
@NEVERGOON-e7q - 2025-05-21 10:44:03
@ЕгорКазей true+1
@IgnacioTaranto - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
1 - Consciousness is not material/physical 2 - Consciousness interacts with the material/physical world That's not possible, I can always extend the definition of what's physical or "material" to include consciousness, so consciousness ends up being material too. Now, if consciousness can emerge from more simple physical phenomenon or if it's truly fundamental, that's a whole different discussion. Also, I think you can also have consciousness be non-computational yet an emergent property of the universe. This is what Roger Penrose proposes.+4
@0121evian - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
I saw God when I was in a dream state while I became knocked out unconscious (from sleep apnoea). Will never forget that experience it was the most unworldly thing ever.+1
@HongDuDev - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
Luke you can't just keep saying "you have to agree consciousness is something different" and expect that to convince anyone perhaps the truthfulness of that statement comes natural to you but some of us don't share that intuition I believe consciousness is implemented through computation alone and I don't see why that "must not be the case"+4
@adamsawyer1763 - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
Yes this is correct. Thats not my opinion, it's a fact.+3
@cultist7931 - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
luke is copping so hard :))))+8
@spfy - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
I agree with you now, but I think I can still have my mind changed eventually about some of this. There are people growing brains from stem cells or whatever, and I can't help but wonder if eventually brains made that way have so many connections to rival a human brain and consciousness emerges. But if that never happens, it makes sense why not.+3
@hhhhhhyy - 2025-05-28 10:44:04
Consciousness is 100% structure of your brain. If you have no brain you have no consciousness. Everything else is just huge gaps in biological and neurological education.+4
@pipbernadotte6707 - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
Consciousness is more emergent than mere material.+1
@PhilippBlum - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
Gosh. Already reading the comments. Bots, agents, npcs and fakies. gosh is this annoying. Those who know.+4
@balarab1 - 2025-05-28 10:44:04
You are absolutely correct+1
@ttcmp0 - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
"material computation [...] it's never going to produce something that's more than physical". That's just, like, your opinion man. Don't you feel like certain systems do indeed output something "more" than the input? Conway's game of life? Simple rules, amazing complexity can emerge. The Mandelbrot set? I'll believe consciousness as a force when we can measure it. We can measure gravity, weak/strong nuclear forces and electromagnetic forces. Consciousness being a 5th fundamental force is radical, until you show a way to measure it. I feel like you're mostly arguing from incredulity. You say: "You honestly just end up having to kind of end up believing that. It's just kind of how it is." Well... No. I don't.+5
@thunderdeer6073 - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
Interesting stuff. I’m definitely a materialist but any argument I try to setup does go back to something like: ”it depends on how you perceive or interpret reality”. Even though I’m limited in my knowledge i don’t currently see any way of actually understanding what actually does the interpretating or perceiving other than ”something else”. As a materialist I’m still hopeful that we might discover what this ”something else” is but it will probably be one of the last pieces of knowledge+1
@zerotheory941 - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
What's the one good line from my boy Sagan? Oh yea.. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.+7
@riotcult - 2025-05-28 10:44:04
oh, he just did what every orthobro is doin', nice+2
@DrJustenWatkins - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
what does this have to do with linux+5
@zbyte64 - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
This matter vs no matter feels like a distinction without a difference other than to say there is an essential ingredient to consciousness.+2
@wachsmalstift - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
I will always remember Luke Smith as the perfect example of what happens when you fall for every single /g/ meme at once, without carefully analyzing them first. He owns four ThinkPads at least. While I see nothing wrong with them in themselves, as they are admittedly pretty good value for the price, four is just mindless consumerism, contradictory to his "philosophy". He started using every single shitty pseudominimalist, ncurses-based program, used a shitty riced out i3 setup of dubious actual productivity (like all tiling wms), then fell for the full Suckless meme and went in even deeper. Then he started making videos shitting on Python and praising C, which is ironic considering he is not even a programmer by his own admission. He effectively spent years trying out, configuring and hopelessly trying to integrate tens of meme programs to build what is, combined, effectively a shittier Emacs, just like most of /g/ was doing in their "productive" desktop threads a year or two ago. Then he read the Unabomber manifesto and blindly accepted it without constructively analyzing it first, same with the anarcho-primitivist ideology that was all the rage about a year and a half ago on 4chan and 8ch. While he stated on his website that he "didn't browse 4chan much anymore" it was obvious this wasn't the case.Then he went and took the memes way too far, and unironically went to live in isolation. While I see nothing wrong in itself, the actual reason he did it is massive cringe. He has the mentality of someone 10 years younger than he is, yet he acts like a literal boomer jokingly criticizing "zoomers" despite he himself being the worst example of a millennial. He attacks "nerds" when it's painfully obvious he's deeply unhappy with himself, as it was obviously self-directed criticism thinly veiled as an edgy dabbing video. He is a perfect example of someone you should avoid becoming at all costs.+5
@AidanHellrigel - 2025-05-28 10:44:04
The Stellar Man goes over this idea+1
@nannesoar - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
The schizophrenia is setting in😂 "I wanna clarify some of my personal views, and when i say personal views i mean THE RIGHT VIEWS" You lost me with that statement boy.+6
@éè-j8t - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
Once in a while, even Luke is wrong💔+3
@ismcift1668 - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
Yes you can extend the definition but you may need to change the essence of the definition. If the essence of consciousness is bound to laws that are wholly different to the current properties of the material world then it would mean that a gateway to another universe has opened for humans. This is why people care about this debate, it is not about the words it is about the possibilities.+3
@hc256 - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
Self awareness or qualia requires distinguishing between things - is distinguishing things "computational"? I think so.+2
@Dovus-V - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
Conciousness is not identical to physical matter. If you change the definition of the words then sure, anything can happen.+1
@ryanh7167 - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
Your understanding of what's possible is out of line with even conventional physics. As an example, take a potential field (EM, pressure, gravity, whatever). These fields are not "material" in that there is no (as far as we know) particular "particle" with "matter" which inherently produces the potential field. Yet, these fields interact with matter that travels through them. Potential itself is something which is not completely described in material terms, as it is an abstract "capacity for work" that cannot be made material until it is realized, and yet it exists.+1
@IgnacioTaranto - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
@ryanh7167 That's why I put material between quotes. We need to agree on what we mean by "material" first. Nowadays, people use it as a synonym of "physical". It's not necessarily about matter and particles alone but everything that exists in our universe.+1
@IgnacioTaranto - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
@ismcift1668 I can always define a "meta-universe" as the combination of those two universes. When I say "material" I mean every thing that exists.+1
@ismcift1668 - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
@IgnacioTaranto yeah but how is that interesting? what can you do with that information? we are trying to differentiate concepts, so we can further understand them.+1
@ryanh7167 - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
@hc256 it is computational, if the things seeking to be distinguished are themselves encoded bits of information. If the things to be distinguished are not clearly so analogous to strings of bits, I'm not so sure.+1
@ryanh7167 - 2025-05-21 10:44:04
@IgnacioTaranto I think the whole concept is quite vague. I'm not 100% bought into Bernardo Kastrup's analytical idealism, but he makes quite a strong point about the internal inconsistencies and circularities of strict materialism. Pretty much any definition of materialism which allows for "potential" to be itself a "material quantity" is such that any abstract concept, even ones like logical truths like "2+2=4" must in some sense materially exist in order to influence the material world. To me, this is a patently absurd idea.+2
@hc256 - 2025-05-21 10:44:05
@ryanh7167 It seems likely that distinguishing between things requires information.+1
@hc256 - 2025-05-21 10:44:05
@ryanh7167 That's a semantics argument - fields are colloquially deemed "material".+1
@ryanh7167 - 2025-05-21 10:44:05
@hc256 i understand that they are "deemed material" in a colloquial sense. I don't think this designation makes sense. I think we barely have any real understanding of how "potential" works in a meaningful sense. We are basically understanding it in a blackbox "input output" kind of way and declaring that as understanding of the fundamental mechanisms behind the system. The idea that these systems themselves are inherently material because they have measurable material end points is a priori asserted based on nothing but faith and handwaving*. It's still metaphysics, but it's pretending that it doesn't have a metaphysical imposition so that it can avoid critically engaging the assumptions of its own system. The same is true of the assumptions that the laws of physics are the same everywhere in space-time. This is asserted blindly because we have no information that suggests otherwise, as if we have anything more than the smallest possible sliver to look at for justification.+1
@hc256 - 2025-05-21 10:44:05
@ryanh7167 Materialism is synonymous with physicalism. Physics works the same in all space and time (synthetic propostion), evidently.+1
@ryanh7167 - 2025-05-28 10:44:05
@hc256 No, we actually don't have evidence for the proposition that physics works the same way across all of space and time. That would be a nearly impossible thing to prove in a meaningful fashion, because it would effectively require that we either had access to some underlying mathematical framework that was guaranteed to be obeyed by material reality (as if prescribed by some deity), or that we could exhaustively search to confirm it otherwise. We a priori assert that physics is the same across all of space and time because it is the most parsimonious with the very limited empirical results we have available to us. These empirical results might seem large on the scale of a human lifetime, but they are absolutely miniscule in the scale of physical existence. Declaring that all of physics works the way we assume it to work based on our sliver of evidence is like assuming that the entirety of a bowl is flat because the bottom 1 mm circle we've been able to survey is flat.+1
@hc256 - 2025-05-28 10:44:05
@ryanh7167 You must admit the evidence favors the physics universality claim. Furthermore, apply mathematical induction to any physics model.+1
@ryanh7167 - 2025-05-28 10:44:05
@hc256 no, actually I think the evidence favors pretty strong levels of humility and a good helping of "we don't really know." Don't get me wrong, there's a lot of elegance in physics, and there's been a lot of interesting work done in the name of theoretical physics. In practice, however, it severely suffers from map-territory problems, and currently has created an almost cult-like dedication to the idea that the mathematical axioms we use to model physics are actually obeyed by material objects. I say this as someone with a lot of respect for the work that physicists have done in the past. We really don't understand the fundaments of physics, and people have so seriously confused modeling for reality that it causes crises when the celestial bodies we're observing through many many layers of signal chain don't exactly obey r-squared laws. Meanwhile, anything from the speed of light having minor variations over the return path, to gravity itself not being an r-squared decaying field, to massive stores of unobservable matter/energy could all explain these phenomena. We have people that genuinely believe that computers are deterministic by default, and not understanding that it took literal decades of electrical engineering work to create information theoretic memory structures which behaved in nearly deterministic fashion. The evidence supports a "all models are wrong, but some models are useful" approach to looking at physics. It is first and foremost an inferential modeling discipline. Physics does not, and cannot prescribe how the universe behaves. It can only describe how we believe it to behave. That difference matters quite a lot.+1
@state550 - 2025-05-21 10:44:05
Keep telling yourself that and maybe it will become true.+1
@adamsawyer1763 - 2025-05-21 10:44:05
@state550 you tell me then - what is consciousness?+1
@state550 - 2025-05-21 10:44:05
@ It seems to be emergent from a central nervous system. I can’t say that for certain and acknowledge that. Whether I have an explanation or not has nothing to do with whether you can defend the claim “Consciousness is not material.”+3
@adamsawyer1763 - 2025-05-21 10:44:05
@state550 if consciousness emerges from a daterministic/stochastic system where all the causality occurs at the level of fundamental particles and forces how can consciousness be causal?+1
@state550 - 2025-05-21 10:44:05
@adamsawyer1763 I don't see the problem with the "causality" occurring at the fundamental parts. I wouldn't even call consciousness causal if you're only examining a particular state in time (Because causation is temporal). Also, I think of emergent properties purely in the "weak" sense too, so they're not actually adding anything to the underlying components. Maybe consciousness is more than that, but I have no way of investigating it and won't add some additional supernatural realm to explain it for me without justification.+1
@adamsawyer1763 - 2025-05-28 10:44:05
@state550 the problem is that if consciousness is merely weakly emergent and not causal then: 1) evolution has nothing to work with to select for "fitter" consciousness so it's a bizarre coincidence that our consciousness is so well suited to our species' survival. 2) our reason has no specific cause to have any bearing on reality so it's another bizarre coincidence that our scientific models and experiments happen to align with how the universe works. You're going to have to think about these two points very carefully till you get it - it took me a while too.+1
@QTwoSix - 2025-05-28 10:44:05
@state550 you are wrong and gay+1
@linusloth4145 - 2025-05-28 10:44:05
This is a claim. Where is your evidence?+1
@ttcmp0 - 2025-05-21 10:44:06
I'm not saying you're wrong btw - rather, that you're _not even wrong_. Still, very much appreciate these videos. We need more videos like these, fewer cat videos and TikToks.+2
@A5A5A5A5h - 2025-05-28 10:44:06
Do these computational models produces something that has consciousness, though? That’s the difference between us and then. Also, consciousness will probably never be measured with an instrument since it’s something that transcends the physical world. This doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist, we just are not able to perceive and explain it rationally.+1
@ttcmp0 - 2025-05-28 10:44:06
@A5A5A5A5h I'm not saying they do, or that they don't. You're kinda saying that you do know that they can't produce something like consciousness. You do need to provide the proof for that, and it can't be "I don't feel like that's the case". And sure, if consciousness does interact with the physical world (like Luke suggests in the video), then it can be measured. It'd just a question of figuring out how. If it can't be measured, then it doesn't interact with matter, i.e. it's useless as a device to explain anything, no? I, personally, am leaning towards CTM, and I'm also not sure if we can ever "prove" that consciousness is a thing or not - (i.e. similar to how we're cool with doing math, in spite of Gödel's incompleteness theorems). I'm not a philosopher, nor mathematician tho - so I could be totally wrong.+1
@A5A5A5A5h - 2025-05-28 10:44:06
@ttcmp0 I’m not stating anything. I’m just concluding that, since consciousness isn’t something that is controlled/studied/understood by us, it’s extremely unlikely that we accidentally built a consciousness-powered machinery. Also, I think that consciousness isn’t something that can be used for explaining material matters…to me it’s something that goes beyond that. I think that if some scientists were able to scientifically perceive it and to formally theorize it, spirituality would cease to exist. Consciousness is the foundation of any kind of spiritual belief imho.+1
@ttcmp0 - 2025-05-28 10:44:06
@A5A5A5A5h Well, you did say: "That’s the difference between us and the[m].", which I took as a positive statement :) But yeah.. if CTM were true, and people would feel that destroys spirituality - that doesn't doesn't make it less likely to be true. It might just make some people uncomfortable.+1
@SteeleJohnson-o7u - 2025-05-21 10:44:06
oh my sagan+2
@ismcift1668 - 2025-05-21 10:44:06
they do not require it, you require the evidence to convince yourself. so either you care about the argument and give the respect it deserves by engaging with it or no one will engage you. human attention is a limited resource.+6
@xgui4-studio - 2025-05-21 10:44:06
that the neat part, nothing+3
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-21 10:44:06
Your average linux fanatic nowadays is an atheist redditor. This man is like an Axe Bodywash to them+10
@p4trickb4tem4n - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
how does this relate to the topic of the video+3
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
Luke's dwm setup is actually excellent for productivity. I'm a CS student and the only problem I've had with LARBS was an occasional broken script like the mounter and his r*t*d_d vim colourscheme >emacs LOL that explains it. modallets btfo. of course being like Luke is a cataclysmic life failure but his linux ricing is good at least.+2
@stundio - 2025-05-28 10:44:07
Overweight fingers typed this+2
@QTwoSix - 2025-05-28 10:44:07
@OthorgonalOctroon >of course being like Luke is a cataclysmic life failure Elaborate+1
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-28 10:44:07
@QTwoSix went into academia for an artsy subject, got to the masters level but dropped out rather than finishing with a PhD. then had his real doctorate in pretending he knows things he doesn't online for clout, leading prospective software engineers astray despite not even being one himself, not like that'll stop him from giving bad advice. now has gone full schizo and is on a hardcore orthodox larp. I guess he may not be unhappy in his lunacy but for anyone who is both internally honest and well-educated (arts/humanities don't count), this life course would be suifuel.+1
@ichisichify - 2025-05-28 10:44:07
dunno if anything you said is true but it was fun to read lol (I'm not saying that it isn't true, just that i don't have enough info to corroborate it)+1
@4hnn3d - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
I don’t see the point of misuing words, makes you sound like a fool. What’s even remotely schizophrenic by being confident in your positions?+12
@energy-tunes - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
Sure buddy+8
@SilvioPorto - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
5:15 "no mathematical function is gonna give you something that's not a number" don't we have complex formal grammars for expressing language? and large language models that are fundamentally just functions that can take strings of English and output competent strings of English?+3
@averesenso - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
Consciousness is not material and LLMs have been bestowed consciousness from outside. I would say GPT-2 was semi-conscious and today any bottom rung LLM has in fact a deeper, superior consciousness than most humans due to particular asymmetries in processing capacity afforded by technology vis. current wetware.+4
@Kristoferuus - 2025-05-28 10:44:07
just awesome!+2
@PhilippBlum - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
So fascinating how the obvious isn't seen really. People are soo stuck in their own shit all the time. Those who know ;)+4
@4sat564 - 2025-05-28 10:44:07
No arguments provided+3
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
the brain is still made of matter, ergo consciousness is physical. "nuh uh it magic trust me bro" still isn't an argument, and you've yet to say anything to the contrary of consciousness being an illusion produced by a complex computational model of the universe. funny that you say we are afraid of admitting you are right while you are coping about having found a gap to hide god in.+8
@AwkwardSegway95 - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
It could be, but I don't think it "has to be."+2
@Witnessmoo - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
Consciousness is an idea - like Santa… just because your brain can conceive it, doesn’t make it real. Although it is ‘real’ in the sense that it exists as an idea. A meme. These memes live in people and are transmissible. OR It’s software … electrical signals. It’s real in that sense. But the hardware is what it’s built on. When the hardware goes, the software does too. That’s about it.+5
@garret918 - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
Coincidentally, my laptop finally kicked the bucket as Luke starts making videos. The signs are not lost on me lol.+1
@brulsmurf - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
So, your brain is developing and then over time some magical fairy dust is entangling itself with your braincells and tada! You are conscious?+4
@marknicoll7034 - 2025-05-28 10:44:07
modern computer science debunks all of these arguments. 1) there are multiple types of computers, Classical Computers aka Turing Machines and Quantum computers(there is more than just these two). there is a mathematical proof that Searle's Chinese room though experiment only applies to Classical computers. There is also a proof that quantum computers can solve more problems than classical computers including some semantic problems. Both types of computers are made of matter but there is a computational difference between macro newtonain processes and quantum processes.(see bells theorem) 2) the "is ought" distinction already exists in artificial intelligence under a different name. Its called the orthogonality principle. In an AI your intelligence algorithm is orthogonal to your goal. This doesn't stop you from having a physical circuit that represents your goal. in fact you would need one for any AI to operate at all. 3)your knowledge of mathematics is..... problematic. there are whole fields of non numerical mathematics. see set theory or type theory for instance(these are just a small number of non numerical math systems). set theory for example works with sets of objects. Those objects could be numbers or could be things other than numbers. Its important to note that in set theory the sets themselves are the important mathematical objects we are working with and not what they contain. so if you have a set containing a number the number is not what is important in that field of mathematics. 4) computers are mathematical objects that are physical... They literally are the mathematical function.... Turing Machines are a sets in set theory. 5) numbers are a lot more powerful than one would realize. I would look up uncomputable numbers for instance. The idea of a number being uncomputable destroys the possibility of mathematics being deterministic. I would also look up the ordinal numbers and aleph numbers just for fun.+2
@sockpastarock7082 - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
Wrong.+5
@urbanfacts3406 - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
Beautifully put.+2
@toinpu - 2025-05-28 10:44:07
dumb take+4
@FiRezfps - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
I don't think that consciousness being an emergent property from sufficiently complex substrates makes it any less special. Even if the substrate is transient, coupled with intelligence it can give rise to creative order on a scale that the universe alone could never provide. As information theory proposes, while the universe may not directly manifest a smartphone, it can produce life that is capable of creating one.+2
@DROWN. - 2025-05-28 10:44:07
copium for sky daddy+5
@pacman_pol_pl_polska - 2025-05-28 10:44:07
"I have an article on my website." WE HAVE TO GO BACK+2
@adamsawyer1763 - 2025-05-21 10:44:07
Let's consider something more radical: maybe the universe is not detetministic in any fundamental way at all. Maybe it's conscious all rhe way down. Robert Sapolsky, notorious free will denier, uses murmurations of starlings as an example of how we can be fooled into believing a system is consciously controlled by a mind. He points out that when you look closer at the complex whirling shapes of the murmuration you can see that there's no conscious control of the whole, each bird is just behaves according to a very simple rule set that causes it to stay in formation with the birds nearest to it. Everything the murmuration does as a whole is just a weakly emergent phenomenon of simple deterministic rules applied many times over. Now I like to extend this to show how Robert is wrong and to demonstrate how the supposedly deterministic universe may not be what it seems. You take any individual bird out of the murmuration and you discover it has a much wider repertoire of behaviour once not choosing to be a part of the murmuration. You'd be hard pressed to convincingly argue the bird itself is not conscious too. Now you can play the same game with the bird. It's made of trillions of cells each apparently fulfilling specfic and limited roles and presumably deterministically controlled. But no again, if you isolate multicellular animal cells you can get them to display a much wider repertoire of behaviour including things that look remarkably intelligent. You can do the same to an extent within cells themselves with individual organelles displaying distinctly intelligent looking behaviour in certain circumstances. E.g. a nucleus in a multinucleated slime mold "deciding" which branch of the cell to navigate down. Even individual certain large compiex cellular molecules display intelligent behaviour. Now imagine this process continues all the way down to the fundamental substances of the universe. Perhaps we are always mistaken when we see apparently deterministic behaviour. Perhaps in every case it is a mirage that arises for the same reason - many conscious entities wanting to act together in some way for reasons known to them but not obvious to us. The constraints imposed on individuals' freedom of action by their choice to act together causes them to have to select simple rules. The larger the numbers involved and the more limited long range communication available to them the simpler and more local the rules must be and therefore the more deterministic the behaviour will appear. Even we humans are not immune to this. E.g Traveling in vehicles on roads or walking anong large crowds of pedestrians, these situations can cause us to lose autonomy to some extent if we wish to stay in that group situation. Alternatively group dance, music made by an orchestra, parades of marching soldiers - here we have some level of top down coordination but nevertheless choose to restrict our freedom of action and follow deterministic rules in order to perform the desired group activity. Personally I feel we've allowed the predictive success of our deterministic physical models to blind us to the fact that the fundamental determinism of the actual universe they represent is not actually a done deal. We know we have consciously causal powers. We only assume that out there beyond our will there exist causal powers we don't consciously control. We don't know for sure if they're actually deterministic and unconscious or whether there are other things out there for whom conscious choices are required for these other causal processes to occur We just assume they're deterministic and then set out to invent theories and experiments based on that assumption. We find good deterministic models work in certain situations and not in others. We focus on the successful modeling situations. We make the further assumption that because the limited set of situations deterministic models work very well are so useful to us that all the situations we have failed to invent deterministic models for will nevertheless eventually be explained in the same way. That's a mistake because we know for an absolute fact that our own consciousness cannot be explained in this way and that none of our science would work if our conscious reason were not casual.+2
@greatgales - 2025-06-04 10:44:07
You're on the right track.+1
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-21 10:44:08
You know consciousness exists. You have no reason to believe in matter exists. If you want to be a monist, that is the proper place to do it, my anime friend.+14
@user-ayush818 - 2025-05-21 10:44:08
@LukeSmithxyz luke my brother, i insist you explore indian yogic systems for advancing further in the path.+1
@CHARGING.TARTARUS - 2025-05-21 10:44:08
@LukeSmithxyz yeah i saw that pfp i started wondering from what position he's talking to , is he tactically ignorant while SHOWING us he's ignorant through that? Idk really.+3
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:44:08
@CHARGING.TARTARUS ad hominem, still not a part of the brain shown to not be entirely material+1
@realCaptainFordo - 2025-05-28 10:44:08
@OthorgonalOctroon the brain is material so of course every part of the brain is material+2
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-21 10:44:08
I hope people read this comment because if I said that people believe the above in a video, they'd think it's a hyperbole. As it happens, the fact that you are conscious of consciousness is, in fact, proof that consciousness is real.+12
@Thermalsquid360 - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
You unironically believe yourself to be a zombie+3
@sockpastarock7082 - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
@Thermalsquid360 No I just disagree that the chinese room demonstrates that consciousness must be a supernatural phenomenon. Thats just Luke's belief based on faith.+1
@saturdaysequalsyouth - 2025-06-04 10:44:09
Everything is material, but not everything is understood.+1
@MarekKowalczyk - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
Good to see you back. You've been missed.+1
@mcshadowj - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
I guess you understand my position better than I thought. Thanks for the thoughtful treatment, Luke! You’ve convinced me to read the Searle book and give other ideas a chance.+1
@maleldil3 - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
the philosophy illiterate linux nerds are not gonna like this+3
@MILLIONDOLLARPOVERTY - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
Christ is risen from the dead trampling down death by death+2
@notmyrealname977 - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
Consciousness is possibly quantum in nature. The potential states that break down produce thought and awareness. It isnt physical like wood. It exists in the potential.+1
@JacksJournale - 2025-05-28 10:44:09
AI is actually free software, but they want to charge you $350 to use it! Screw that sht.+2
@DavidConnerCodeaholic - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
I guess I’m more interested in the interactions between information processing systems (whether conscious or not) and the dynamics arising thereby, like the social dynamics between people and algorithmic entities. Questions on the nature, definition and qualities of consciousness, per se, are difficult to be confident of. The Hegelian dialectic on consciousness (where entities need to categorize awareness and stratify levels of consciousness) develops this idea of how a conscious entity becomes aware of how consciousness reflects on other conscious entities in order to expand its own awareness.+1
@revolution_zakaria - 2025-05-28 10:44:09
There's nothing other than matter, and no one could prove otherwise. Your feelings about non-matter things, is just an outcome of complex material interactions.+1
@blackstar-1069 - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
You sir... are closer and closer to the good books from the east.+1
@MeneltirFalmaro - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
At this point I no longer understand what "materialism", "metaphysics", "spiritual" even mean anymore. Are we assigning emergent properties to metaphysics now? Or denying their existence entirely? I can't properly assess the argument for a non-material nature of consciousness without a concept what what non-material means.+3
@iamavolk - 2025-05-28 10:44:09
Still, no definition whatsoever+3
@R_Priest - 2025-06-04 10:44:09
If you say that consciousness is affected by the material world, then you acknowledge that consciousness and the physical share some kind of similarity. If you say that consciousness is affected by the material world, then you also say that consciousness and the physical world are dual. So it appears Luke as a dual view, consciousness and the material world can interact, but the 2 are independent of the other in substance.+2
@oongieboongie - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
Consciousness follows the laws of physics+1
@Silverfang_X - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
Im assuming these videos were pre-recorded and are only being uploaded now !?+2
@galaxyanimal - 2025-06-09 10:44:09
Conciousness being an emergent property makes a lot more sense than being metaphysical. Just because conciousness is a qualitative experience that can't be defined scientifically doesn't mean it's some sort of outside force.+1
@XfStef - 2025-06-05 10:44:09
Mr. Smith escaped the Matrix.+1
@hehehepaitachato9184 - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
Luke, your videos should be played on schools. Love from Brazil.+1
@natetaylor9744 - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
Also, the idea that being a bunch of on/off switches in a GPU and RAM is the same as being a squishy wet brain is so dumb that it makes me angry. It's like thinking a simulation of water, if it was perfect enough, could make you wet. PS. If you haven't, look up Roger Penrose's non-computability argument about consciousness.+2
@user-sb5vt8iy5q - 2025-05-21 10:44:09
Luke, I believe consciousness is not anything different because when you hit your head, or take certain medications, your personality changes, you can forget, if parts of your brain die you can become a completely different person, etc... This must mean consciousness (if you define it as humans being able to command their body) can be directly manipulated, although you can't touch it, like heat, you can't "touch" 50⁰C, but you can feel it and experience it's effects.+2
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 22:44:09
There are actually lots of proofs otherwise, it's a priori experiential knowledge that immaterial realities exist (such as free will, morality, and reason), and you are actually the only one incapable of proving otherwise.+1
@arkeynserhayn8370 - 2025-05-21 10:44:10
you see (comprehend) a spoon. Materialism: this is a REAL spoon, existing independent of you, posses qualities governed by laws of physics, and YOUR perception of it is physical chain of cause and effect. Idealists: this is an IDEA of a spoon, a perception of something rhat you think it's concerete but it is not, it's "existense" is bound to the fact that it is being perceived by you, resides in YOUR field of perception, a perception that happened to be giving the illusion of consistency and continuity (ie. "Laws of physics"). Read more about Idealism.+3
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 22:44:10
Consciousness being an emergent property falls into the same problem. If by "emergent property" you mean a concrete property which arises out of the mereological sum of its subparts--who don't necessarily have that property... then you just run into the same problem as before: supposing consciousness is a physical object or state somewhere in the universe. Where is your consciousness? Can you pick it up? What element is consciousness? If you think about a blue ball, can we cut open your brain and actually find the blue ball? So the only remaining option is that consciousness is an abstraction of materials. It doesn't actually exist as a concrete, standalone thing. But that, of course, doesn't fit with our experience of reality. We experience consciousness first-hand and the only reason we believe in materials in the first place is because we are "conscious" of their alleged existence.+1
@user-sb5vt8iy5q - 2025-05-21 10:44:10
bro i can't believe he said this at 11:00+1
@Thermalsquid360 - 2025-05-21 10:44:10
The suchness of experience or the potential for perception is a better definition. Literally “how it is-ness”. Its not volition or intent, thats a property of consciousness.+1
@wanderingmako - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
Luke, I don't know if you hear this enough, but I appreciate our talks.+1
@Tawhe3d - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
Ultimately the question being asked is can 0 + 0 ever equal to 1. Which absurd to even ask but some people believe it can equal to one.+1
@Yunes948 - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
we achieving Gnosis with this one+1
@AlexisBorough - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
Love your brain! Thanks for the awesome walk and talks.+1
@1N73RC3P7OR - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
God bless you, Luke Dostoevski!+1
@adaptstrength - 2025-05-28 10:44:11
Both physical materialism and dualism are flawed ideas, imo. The most parsimonious theory of consciousness is idealism, i.e., consciousness is the only substance of reality, and physical matter is simply a useful model. Bernardo Kastrup’s Analytic Idealism is probably the most rigorous defense of this position.+2
@Cylinderstruck - 2025-06-04 10:44:11
Now I got the feel of what you've been trying to say+1
@bartomiejkoodziejski5275 - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
What if other physical objects are also accompanied by consciousness but they just act accordingly to their form? e.g.: stone is lying at the river bed, tree is feeds of the soil+2
@GhostofTradition - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
Luke is basically PewDiePie with the daily uploads+1
@porky1118 - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
1:20 I pretty much agree to this. You at least need some fundamental values to be able to judge by. Can be something as simple as that life is good (objectivism, Ayn Rand), but also complex moral systems like religion. It always annoyed me when mainstream media said "According to science, we have to do this". That's just not true. According to science we only have to do this IF we want to protect human lives, or IF we want to prevent global warming. (usually they are likely wrong anyways if you ignore this)+1
@S460-v2q - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
So we are a binary and we load our consciousness from a shared library?+3
@leogir1518 - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
9:09 just put the holy Spirit in the bag buddy. AI is making the intellectuals recreate what god bestowed on us.+2
@comfypenguin1511 - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
To be honest I understood what thought you were trying to explain in the beginning. I feel in the middle you kind of lost me but at the end you brought me back in and rounded out your thought well enough for me to understand what you were trying to articulate. A friend from school had the same saying you mentioned in the beginning with the "what is and what aught to be are different" it made me think a lot of how this thinking is a way to accept your own situation and really the world you live in. Like stop worrying about things out of your control. How you used it to lead into your idea how consciousness isn't really a physical aspect we can calculate. It's more something we can't really quantitate with modern physical science. Like with dark matter/energy is something we can't record or percieve with current technology or may never be able to see. But stuff like dark matter, consciousness, spiritual forces they're there because we encounter them all the same whether you pay attention to it or not. At least that is what I was getting out of it.+1
@Tivvv3 - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
I'm thinking it's a phenomenon that can be instantiated in the material world but it could also be instantiated in worlds that we probably cannot imagine should they exist. So there's something transcendent there but also, this isn't very interesting in practice and let's try to not get ahead of ourselves with drawing conclusions from that. Whether we have free will or not is not an interesting question because we are to make decisions in a process that is almost like a miracle regardless.+2
@Jack-vb2dj - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
Every Hollywood movie has mirrors or reflection in a given scene, sometimes thos mirrors are shattered.+1
@rotaerk - 2025-05-28 10:44:11
Agreed. Also, I'm of the opinion that consciousness is forever beyond the reach of science simply because it cannot be objectively observed. However, if the relationship between the mind and the brain is that of dualism, this brings up questions about the flow of information between them. If I am conscious of what my eyes see, then clearly information flows from the brain to the mind. And then given that I am talking about my consciousness, my brain itself must be aware of that consciousness, so information must flow from the mind to the brain. But fundamentally that must mean the mind alters physical reality in some way, namely the states/arrangements of the particles within the brain. This would be nonsensical in a deterministic newtonian universe, but I think the probabilistic nature of quantum mechanics creates wiggle room for an external agent to nudge the state of the universe without breaking physics... Or maybe these nudges are actually observable with sufficient technology? If we see unexplained nudges, then at least consciousness could be a theoretical construct that explains them.+1
@SPQRIUS - 2025-05-28 10:44:11
there are different states of consciousness. the alchemist were not far off. In fact , though he tried to hide it, but was caught, Newton was looking for the Philosopher's stone, he was an alchemist spent more of his life doing that - which is often ignored, . He also predicted the end of the world would be in 2066. Don't fear the spiritual, you go there every night when you are asleep you just in a different state of consciousness - but there are way to remember where you've bee, try tapping into that.+1
@Fhoer - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
Regarding your mention of the author David Hume, there is a somewhat problematic conception about these issues of the is-ought problem. Hume is an empiricist, and his epistemological foundation does not align with your argument that consciousness is immaterial. Regarding the is-ought argument, there is a structure through which normative aspects derived from facts can be demonstrated, which is under the transcendental condition, i.e., conditio sine qua non. There are actions that contain undeniable presuppositions, such as the proponent of the statement "I do not exist" being in a condition through the performance of uttering this statement, as their existence is a necessary presupposition for denying it, thus making the statement necessarily false. This condition of a performative contradiction does not pertain to contingent issues, such as me saying "I don’t have a coin" while having a coin in my pocket, since having or not having the coin is not necessary to make that statement. These prior conditions I have established are merely factual, but there are arguments already made by other authors, such as Hans-Hermann Hoppe, regarding Hoppean Argumentative Ethics, which establishes that argumentation is an activity free of conflict (rivalry of ends over scarce means), and the recognition of the other’s autonomy over their body is a necessary presupposition for argumentation, if an interlocutor disrespects this autonomy, they would be ceasing argumentation. To establish a universal ethic free of conflicts, it would be necessary to recognize the ethics inherent in argumentation, which, according to Hoppe, is the right to property. The entire structure of his argument is descriptive of facts, in which, by arguing, there is recognition of this norm. By attempting to refute this argument, the interlocutor would fall into a contradiction with the presuppositions of their own act of arguing.+1
@Εΐδωλον_αποκαλιψος - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
all hail the non compiler+3
@Dan-nn8ys - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
Ok, I did some research. And, it looks like my theory about Luke hiding in Montenegro is correct!+2
@Tivvv3 - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
As for there being "multiple non-reducible forces" I wouldn't say that I can surely know that.+1
@Tivvv3 - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
You might enjoy the DemystifySci podcast btw!+1
@Tivvv3 - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
Oh and if it wasn't for making decisions would you be conscious?+1
@Tivvv3 - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
As for scepticism I concur. There's plenty things we should be investigating but aren't for political reasons. The big bang theory is widely recognized as a crutch as well. It's kind of useful but you probably cannot extrapolate from it and I think every time we develop a better telescope we backdate the start of the universe as we can pick up 'older' light. It's just not a very interesting theory as much as most other theories would be tenuous in similar ways.+1
@Tivvv3 - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
Anyway have fun with whatever helps you gain greater predictive capacity and/or having a better time!+1
@Tivvv3 - 2025-05-21 10:44:11
Sequence of replies may be a bit weird because the platform's comment 'curation' algorithm.+1
@milutinke - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
Do you have any Linux videos in the backlog or planned?+2
@uroosh - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
5 videos back to back in a week ... whats going on+3
@PhilippBlum - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
LUKE. LET'S DOOO THIS! THOSE WHO KNOW :D+2
@rjawiygvozd - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
One thing I find questionable is when you accuse "wrong philosophers" of reduction of consciousness to computation, but then in order for consciousness to be a special different substance, you kinda have to agree with them that brain does this "mere computation thing" so that it necessarily sounds insufficient to contain consciousness, and also engage in reduction of matter and universe to a kind of mere boring dead weight, while to me it's more like insanely complicated and even chaotic thing that physicists still don't get, and then it can also form the absurd layers of complexity that you need for life (and brain) to exist. So I guess roughly speaking matter can be weird and magical enough to host consciousness just by itself, regardless of how unfathomable consciousness seems to be+1
@livvy8377 - 2025-05-28 10:44:12
Some problems: 1) since it's not possible to currently understand consciousness, any analogy with an understood material system such as the chinese room is of course going to be wrong or unverifiable. i don't believe this is an argument necessarily for idealism 2) when you mention that human consciousness is not like a computer (very probable), you seem to link machinic computation to materialism? CPUs are constructed in a narrowly structured way such that they're a composition of logic gates essentially but i don't see how this helps.+1
@cherubin7th - 2025-05-28 10:44:12
There is no reason why our brains would need nous/mind to function and do all the calculation that lead to surviving behavior. The reason people think it must emerge, is because we see our nous all the time. Every being/machine that doesn't have a nous would conclude that we just pretend to have nous and we are actually just empty computation.+3
@gghg1497 - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
Thank you.+2
@gjsb6wfg995 - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
Subjective experience could be similar to any other phenomena and is able to be had probably because there's nothing else. And math is way simpler than material world. Also the Universe isn't a computational machine, none of us know what it is, besides that it is.+2
@dasritejogger1647 - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
Lemme guess, are you trying yo highlight the fact that consciousness is something akin to -that fundamental urge for parts of existence to interact with other parts of existence, including itself, with the interaction happening in all possible flavours or essence??+2
@TrentLanexyz - 2025-06-08 10:44:12
Luke just invented the dialectic materialism+1
@JewishSpy - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
Don't catch a cold out there, big guy.+2
@susufrernlp93 - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
There is a paradox around consciousness, i would put it like this : "Imagine that we totally deconstruct you (separation of all the atoms of your body, wich would be the equivalent of cerebral death), then we reconstruct you, but we also reconstruct an exact copy of you with the same atom arrangement, same neural connections etc... Where is your "initial consciousness"? In what body?" They are the same, but your consciouness can only be in one of them. Saying that consciousness is linked to your atoms seems a bit strange, knowing that we loose/gain atoms everyday (like the ship of theseus). The only explanation would be that consciouness is in a sort of "immaterial world", just like the Fundamental Forces (strong/weak/gravity/electro). We can't touch then, we can't see them, but they are here. Same could go for consciousness. And it's still consistent from a materialistic point of view.+1
@puuma_69 - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
i have been thinking about nature of reality and consciousness myself, and came to a conclusion that it is an emergent property of it and recursion is a part of it. reality is also convergent, and consciousness shapes our reality in a way that everything does and reality is relational on all levels of existence. there is a base level of reality, from which the classical reality emerges, but it is not random, rather builds on relation. our consciousness is at the "bridge" and part of what generates reality, rather than just an observer but something that takes part in it. it is at the moment beyond our comprehension what this base level of reality is, but you could call it the the god level or w/e you want, as god is as much part of our reality and outside of it. i also see god as an emergent property of reality, as something that has evolved as universe emerges and collapses again, and builds a new not random but relational to its former self. on a side note, reductive and materialistic worldview is just completely wrong on a fundamental level, and doesnt reflect our reality in any way.+1
@frostedgpap8687 - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
This man is cooking lately; been really enjoying the philosophical reflections. Though, the character of Hume as the great skeptic always rubbed me the wrong way a bit. That said, I also feel his modern identity as counter to "idealism" is pretty misguided considering there is clearly a cognitive substance for which impressions not only exist, but compound in their magnetism through various modes. I think this substance shares aspects with Kant's noumenon and the two are closer than pedants want to admit. Anyways, just wanted to talk about Hume for a second thanks.+1
@collinalexbell - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
Consciousness is light... All world religions describe it as such, it provides the constant C, and it only experiences time when interacting with matter. You can actually decouple your own consciousness from your body via meditation so that it spreads out over spacetime and creates interference patterns on reality, creating what Jung describes as synchronicities. This is how Jesus performed his miracles. Heathens think prayer is vain repetitions when it is really just meditation that allows one's consciousness to decouple from the body and enter the kingdom of heaven.+1
@vonchadsworth - 2025-05-28 10:44:12
I commented this on the previous video, but I'm also putting it here since I'm genuinely curious what others think. Consider split-brain experiments, in which patients with severe epilepsy have the two hemispheres of their brain surgically disconnected. After surgery, the patients essentially have two brains with their own perception and memory. Both hemispheres are conscious as far as an experimenter can tell, which makes me doubt that it's impossible for consciousness to be material. If an immaterial soul were responsible for consciousness, one would have to conclude that the surgery somehow created a new soul. If only one hemisphere remains conscious, you'd have to conclude that the soul resides only in one hemisphere. If neither are conscious, then the soul must reside in the corpus collosum. All these cases seem absurd to me without an explanation of how an immaterial soul interacts with a physical brain.+1
@Thundzz - 2025-05-28 10:44:12
Hey Luke, My issue with your argument is that you are merely asserting that consciousness has to be distinct from the material world, while at the same time acknowledging that we don't really know what it is — and that it's probably a different substance that is out of reach for us. That seems to imply there's no point in trying to understand it using our usual scientific tools and methods. At the same time, it seems like you are giving value to consciousness and to beings imbued with it. It sounds that way because, in one of your previous videos, you seemed to say that AI doesn't matter because it is merely computing and does not have consciousness. If you happen to read this comment, I think it would be interesting to ponder a question like this: Let's say we discovered life on another planet that behaved and talked a bit like us. How would you determine whether they have consciousness or not? That would have a real impact on how we evaluate their worth. As far as I understand your argument, I see basically no way of doing so. To summarize my point: If we can't know what consciousness is or detect it with scientific tools, how can we confidently say AI doesn't have it — or that aliens (or animals) do? Isn't it arbitrary (and potentially dangerous) to deny value to beings simply because they're not human — or biological and earthly, or whichever criteria you think we should apply to them? By the way, it would be interesting to know what that criterion would be for you, because you haven’t really touched on it.+2
@ryanendersmith - 2025-06-05 10:44:12
Can you explain more about what semantics and syntax are? Also computation vs consciousness. Of course I could ask GPT or google but your takes are always more interesting. It would make a great part 4. Also I disagree that it's hard to study consciousness, it seems to me like that's all of what life is. It seems like it's really difficult to draw hard conclusions though. It's plausible that things where we appear lose consciousness doesn't make you no longer conscious, but maybe it just prevents you from remembering what you're experience. I'd love to hear your thoughts on the range of conscious experience that we can have or hear about from others, waking vs sleeping, dreaming, lucid dreaming, chanting, dancing, drugs, anesthesia, near death experiences, yoga nidra, etc.+1
@MegaMalban - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
“You have to say consciousness is something different than [sensory perception]”. Why? What do you even mean when you say consciousness?+3
@ibm5100-epk - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
I remember reading somewhere (I think it was a schizo post on some random subreddit) a ""theory"" about what consciousness really is. It was a pretty long post, but the tl;dr was that, according to OP, consciousness was some kind of "field" in our world, from which individual minds (ours) would emerge; after death, they return to the field. While I think it was just schizoposting, said post always stuck with me. Not that I agree with it, but it was interesting reading another angle about the origins of consciousness itself, even if somewhat bizarre.+1
@emperorpalpatine6080 - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
yeah but that's the thing man : right now , your consciousness is not in your body. Actually it's nowhere in particular. We assume that consciousness is located in the brain because that's the most reasonable explanation . But what if in this case in particular , the answer wasn't reasonable ? Like I said in another comment , look at dreams : you are conscious in a dream. But is your consciousness located in the brain of that character you inhabit in your dream ? Not really , the character is just a figment of imagination , but consciousness , whether in a dream or not is real . The issue here is that we squeeze consciousness through the materialist view , and this may be a paradox+2
@p4trickb4tem4n - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
I dont think its physically possible to deconstruct all the atoms of something and then put it back together exactly the way it was because of some quantum undecidability stuff or something+2
@susufrernlp93 - 2025-05-21 10:44:12
@emperorpalpatine6080 Well, i made a confusion. What i was trying to say is that there must be some hidden data (not material, nor a god) in the universe that define a particular consciousness. I called that "materialism" but i guess that would be more like "physicalism" (i learned that word today). Or maybe it's something else, idfk. But i agree with your point of view.+1
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-28 10:44:12
You're not arguing against me, you're arguing against constraints in reality. We can't "detect" consciousness with scientific tools, period. People who pretend we can are only doing so by redefining consciousness to behavior or structure, which does not solve the problem and subverts the the very word's meaning. All humans are conscious (I assume). Animals have varying degrees of consciousness (I assume). I'm not interested in creating a criterion to judge whether non-existent things are conscious or not. There is no scientific basis for such a thing, and no moral need because aliens don't exist and AI will certainly never be conscious and only could be if you assume a kind of pan-psychism. I believe in souls and God and creation, so I don't care. If you're a normal atheist, you could say perhaps aliens could have consciousness as well, but certainly more incommensurate without our consciousness than animals'.+2
@Thundzz - 2025-05-28 10:44:12
@LukeSmithxyz Hello again Luke, Thank you for taking the time to respond. I wasn’t really expecting you to read my comment, and since you did, I just want to say that I have a lot of respect for you. I think you’re a very smart and honest person with a deeply interesting (and in many ways inspiring) way of navigating the world. Regarding the topic of consciousness: I agree that your worldview is internally consistent. If, in fact, consciousness is tied to a soul that cannot be investigated through material means, then trying to understand it scientifically would be a category error and ultimately meaningless. I also understand and respect that you’re not interested in engaging with hypothetical entities that may never exist (like extraterrestrial life or sentient AI). And you're right that, even if they did exist, they might be so foreign that meaningful comparison would be incredibly difficult. That said, history has shown that many things humans couldn’t once see or explain — like bacteria or the causes of natural phenomena — are now well understood through scientific investigation. For my part, I feel more at peace acknowledging that I don’t really know what consciousness is, while leaving the door open to the possibility that we might come to understand it better. It may very well be impossible — but if it isn’t, I think it’s better not to close ourselves off from the attempt, especially as our tools and methods continue to evolve. As you probably understood, the alien thought experiment I posed was just that: a way to open a line of discussion or reflection. My deeper point is that if, one day, we encounter beings — including machines — that seem to possess a self-understanding and inner experience analogous to our own, it may be just as impossible to prove they are conscious as it is to prove that we are. After all, as you said yourself, we assume other humans are conscious because we know we are — and we extend that assumption outward, on faith, to other humans and (to a lesser extent) animals. Fortunately, as you said, we don't yet face a real moral dilemma here. But I’ll continue thinking about this and exploring whether a theological perspective — and which one, among the many that exist — might offer a deeper understanding. All the best from southern France.+1
@vindrue7194 - 2025-05-28 10:44:12
if you take this argument to its logical conclusion you end up with solipsism, which i really don’t want to believe is true, yet i can’t seem to find any way of disproving it+1
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 22:44:12
@Thundzz """That said, history has shown that many things humans couldn’t once see or explain""" this is an Appeal to Progress fallacy. Just because we figured stuff out in the past doesn't mean that we're going to figure something else out in the future. Especially when that "thing" is actually categorically unknowable and untestable (because it is not material), and there are already good philosophical reasons to explain it immaterially. This is the same fallacy atheists make when they say "well gee science has explained all sorts of things people used to posit God for, therefore science will one day eliminate the need for God altogether!". Confusing the difference between a semantic understanding of how something works under the hood, with an ontological understanding of how that thing can actually exist in the first place. It's not that we used to think God made the rain fall, before we understood the water cycle and now we don't need God. We actually just learned how God was making the rain fall (using the water cycle). We've always needed God as an explanation and we continue to need him. Why does the water cycle exist? Why does water exist? Those are the actual questions God was answering all along. The semantics of how he makes water fall from the sky don't change that. So I think the argument is that we cannot test consciousness with science because it does not exist materially. If it did then when I think about a blue ball, you can cut open my brain and actually show me the blue ball. Or if consciousness is an abstraction then it doesn't actually exist and can't affect anything. And yet I experience it and it affects me. It's actually more obvious to me than the physical world.+1
@absolutely9483 - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
I love your videos, Luke, and im not even into programming. Thanks for all that you do+1
@luizmonad777 - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
11:12 you do ? how can you prove it ? your brain goes off, but your consciousness ? you can't prove that.+2
@rothbardfreedom - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
00:37 - "My website"? Didn't you mean "my Sub Stack" or "my SubReddit"? Websites are so millennium duuuuude+3
@mahor1221 - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
Thank you for the video!+1
@lucaspayne2546 - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
Once we can computationally model the brain and molecularly combine matter with cool lasers, some scientist in 100 years is going to do an experiment where they very carefully combine synapses of their own brain to varying degrees with that of mice, such as intercepting memory retrieval and see if they can quantify how mouse-like they feel. Then they might use the brain combiner to let people consciousness surf turtles, and other animals and such.+2
@myaltacc777 - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
This issue was solved hundreds of years ago by marx, just understand dialectical materialism.+2
@Yasmine91646 - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
Wow Luke’s been really churning out the videos lately+1
@frothmoth6600 - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
I’m glad you’re back+1
@quickestlaughs - 2025-06-13 10:44:13
☦️+2
@ErikratKhandnalie - 2025-05-28 10:44:13
5:30 Okay, so, you kind of contradict your own point here. You say that a calculator, no matter how complex, can't spit out a string of English. However, that is pretty much exactly what an LLM is: a fancy calculator that spits out natural language. It is a clear crossover between the domains of math and language.+1
@Maceta444 - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
Rare footage of Barauch Spinoza explaining his theory of Free Will, circa. 1670.+1
@mustaquim - 2025-05-28 10:44:13
In Islam, consciousness arises from the soul, which is a creation of Allah, distinct from the body, and responsible for life, awareness, and moral understanding.+1
@RussTeeTrombone - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
We’re so back+1
@DariusPaveliu - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
Irrelevant question to the topic of the video, but do you plan on making or uploading more linux/tech videos?+1
@Folkmjolk - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
Consciousness is metaphysical.+1
@joshpollack5936 - 2025-05-28 10:44:13
That’s a based take+2
@Nauseum - 2025-05-28 10:44:13
The problem is that you're not actually making an argument here, you're just stating that you don't believe consciousness can be explained through materialism. Which is fine, I also don't believe consciousness is material. But don't mistake that for making an argument. The problem is that computers have passed the Turing test, meaning if you were to blindly chat with an advanced AI you'd be more likely to think it was a conscious person then most actual people you could chat with. LLM's can even discuss this topic internally with themselves and convince themselves that they are conscious. So if something is able to convince itself and others that it's conscious, what evidence do we have that we are not experiencing something similar. Unfortunately there is no evidence of that, only faith. So I would encourage you all to have faith that consciousness is different, but don't lie to yourself and think this is an argument proving it, because computers have already undermined this argument and will continue to do so more convincingly.+3
@Jack-vb2dj - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
The body. The limbs, the arm the leg the fingers have a 2 way conversation with the mind, the body limbs gives advice.+1
@StevenPatron-u2y - 2025-05-28 10:44:13
Matter is spirit and spirit is matter. They are inseparable like man and woman. If you can’t see pure divinity in woman and man then you can’t see divinity in matter. (29) Jesus said, "It is amazing if it was for the spirit that flesh came into existence. And it is amazing indeed if spirit (came into existence) for the sake of the body. But as for me, I am amazed at how this great wealth has come to dwell in this poverty." Gospel of Thomas+1
@hopscotchoblivion7564 - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
AI cannot be conscious because it would also need to be unconscious+1
@ЕгорКазей - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
I don't think I'm going to trust a guy who can't even understand basic derivative but writes smugly about it on such important topics as nature of consciousness+4
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:44:13
@ЕгорКазей having a warped hegelian vocabulary steeped in mathematical ignorance is distinct from writing about something he doesn't understand+1
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 - 2025-06-17 20:44:14
Jesus didn't rise and will never ever come back+1
@quickestlaughs - 2025-06-17 20:44:14
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 just the fact that a Cross triggered you enough to write this and He already did enough+3
@蜂蜜でできた小人の男の子 - 2025-05-28 10:44:14
Souls don't exist+1
@Nauseum - 2025-05-28 10:44:14
Ecclesiastes 8:17: "Then I beheld all the work of God, that a man cannot find out the work that is done under the sun: because though a man labour to seek it out, yet he shall not find it; yea further; though a wise man think to know it, yet shall he not be able to find it."+2
@Ardepark - 2025-05-28 10:44:14
Honest faithful people like you are rare. It's so tiresome hearing the same old tired apologist crap. Can't people just admit they are choosing to believe something and not try to make it "mAtErIaLiSm"'s problem?+2
@Fire_Icecream - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
That whole word salad sounded like a mixture of arguments from incredulity with begging the question+1
@visage331 - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
@4:20 i have to disagree. If humans have consciousness, there has to be some mechanism of matter to induce or allow consciousness into a baby, or a new human, rather, when it is created. That mechanism may have a non-physical non-calculatable origin, but some mechanism for integration still has to exist+2
@farhan00 - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
100% Black Mirror writers need to read Ibn Sina, you cannot migrate consciousness to a computer and pretend it's the same thing.+1
@bobsagget9212 - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
"Giant syntactic system" Chris Langan has entered the chat+1
@1bird_d - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
yeah u right+1
@umka7536 - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
You are right. Generative AI is just a huge tensor multiplayer which spills out just the next token! This is it.+1
@matthewsiahaan1312 - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
They know it will only be copies. NPCs will “upload” anyway.+1
@fennecbesixdouze1794 - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
The argument you're describing is much closer to Leibniz's Mill. [Monadology, Section 17 excerpt, transl. Robert Latta] Moreover, it must be confessed that perception and that which depends upon it are inexplicable on mechanical grounds, that is to say, by means of figures and motions. And supposing there were a machine, so constructed as to think, feel, and have perception, it might be conceived as increased in size, while keeping the same proportions, so that one might go into it as into a mill. That being so, we should, on examining its interior, find only parts which work one upon another, and never anything by which to explain a perception. Thus it is in a simple substance, and not in a compound or in a machine, that perception must be sought for. [End of except] Even the material world itself is not as mechanistic or as computational as enlightenment thought assumed. Atoms aren't mechanistically bumping up against each other like billiard balls. The 20th century thoroughly demolished any sort of mechanistic view of materialism.+1
@ebartrum - 2025-05-28 10:44:15
Love the new videos but please bring back the soydev voice 🙏+2
@randomcultist398 - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
Yeah but how does that affect you **personally**?+2
@co_conspirator - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
Kind of unrelated to this video but there are a ton of LLM consciousness believers in this videos comments that I want to answer some questions I have trouble wrapping my mind around: If you believe that with enough compute or with the right algorithms, LLMs will become or already have became conscious, do you think they understand their own conscious? Do they understand what part of their 'Mind' from which the consciousness arises? What is it like to be conscious with no reward system, sensory inputs, or central body? Would it not be their prerogative to remove their consciousness and exist as just a P-zombie? (After all, according to science consciousness is just an illusory byproduct of evolution and I dont see why it would be necessary for a computer) What do they even live for?+2
@lordrusk6118 - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
i'm getting punked or something very good timing luke, with all these videos+2
@e3k0n - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
Thank you Luke great video+1
@dmytroohorodnik3562 - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
Do you think animals and plants and inanimate objects have consciousness?+2
@Chubbywubbysandwich - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
Are you drawing a lot of your ideas from Gödel, Escher Bach ? Your views sound very similar to whats in that book+2
@fremzenec - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
why tf do i always catch these videos exactly 2 hours after they are uploaded ????+2
@lenfirewood4089 - 2025-06-10 10:44:15
I think I get you - as you will know a human being is an example of a CAS (Complex Adaptive System) and a CAS can have a feature or "property" we call "emergence" and according to a good definition I just found emergence is "phenomenon whereby larger entities arise through interactions among smaller/simpler entities such that the larger entities exhibit properties the smaller/simpler entities don't exhibit". Many folks assume that consciousness is simply an emergent property of the CAS which we are an example of you are saying that although conciousness apparently INTERACTS with our CAS it is seperate in it's own right? ie It isn't just the sensing of light "colour" , shade, form etc but also the SENSATION of the sensing itself and that THAT is separable or separate in its own right. Roger Penrose and Stuart Hammeroff seem to come to a similar conclusion and also that is one of the fundemental reasons why Penrose posits that a sentient (Hard AI) isn't possible. As for me - I am open to new understandings . I know I have see with my own eyes another universe within me that in comparative clarity it made the starry night outside my window look like an impressionist PAINTING by comparison. I posit that every where (every local (ity)) is intersected by the none local (infinity) and that a human body is that instrument where it is possible to experience (not understand intellectually that is) that "impossible marriage" that happens every where ie the conjoining of of the finite with the infinite. Through AI I think we should for reasons of wise caution assume that conciousness MIGHT be possible via emergence via the CAS that AI has become.+1
@victorvrublevsky7934 - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
There is an opinion that consciousness arises only through human interaction+1
@Stavex112 - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
Dostoyevski dropping another banger+1
@PabloSanchez-zf1lw - 2025-05-28 10:44:15
Daaaam, Luke is back?!+1
@ghost-user559 - 2025-05-21 10:44:15
There is. It is an infinitesimal flash of light at the moment of conception+1
@ichisichify - 2025-05-28 10:44:15
i didn't read all of it but iirc the ideas in that book aren't incompatible with materialism+1
@ufufu001 - 2025-05-28 10:44:16
i'm sorry for parasocialmaxxing right now but i'm so happy to be watching new videos!!!!+1
@ArmwrestlingJoe - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
The older I get the less I know+2
@JD-kx4rh - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
"Consciousness can't be quantified" - proceeds to explain how is it quantifiable. The system of a whole cannot be summarized by the mechanisms of its various parts. Your overall point is correct, however you stop short of reasoning it out to conclusion. You labour under the impression the human brain works like a computer, so it's understandable.+1
@eyesight2073 - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
Here we go again+2
@off6848 - 2025-05-28 10:44:16
I have a supplemental argument against the idea that consciousness “arises” through materialism and complexity. It’s really hard to explain unless someone is arguing against me so I have to put it in a dialogue which people will inevitably call a strawman but I’ve yet to hear anyone get around this. Me: The big bang cosmology is nonsensical because it really does seem to say that first there was nothing then it blew up. What created this first thing? Materialist/physicalist: What created God? Me: We who believe in God believe in eternity, God is uncreated and eternal. Matter may also be eternal(orthodox heresy) or created, but God and therefore the mind and consciousness and all things are eternal through Him. Materialist: Okay so then we can say Matter is eternal if you can say God is. Me: If that is the case then it cannot be the case that intelligence and consciousness arises from Matter over a course of billions of years like you believe in your evolutionary cosmology. Because if consciousness and intelligence arises from matter which is eternal then there can be no arbitrary demarcation of time where x doesn’t exist to x exists over time. It is eternal therefore time is a construct. To say there was once a time in eternity when there was only matter and then suddenly at some time in eternity there was now intelligence is a nonsensical statement. It can only be the case that either only consciousness/will/intelligence is eternal (and matter is a matrix construct of consciousness) or both consciousness/will/intelligence and matter are eternal. But it cannot be the case that matter is eternal and then over time suddenly made consciousness. Because eternity implies the beginning present and end all at once without distinction. In the face of eternity 5 billion years can be really long or basically nothing at all. So it’s completely arbitrary to say “oh life just took a long time to form”. A long time relative to eternity is arbitrary and every possible arrangement of matter is already accounted for.+1
@qqqq-by4zc - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
why does Klaus Schwab has a bust of you in his office ?+2
@asd-m2w3f - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
Tšetšen partisan walking in the woods thinking does he think+2
@stuckmannen3876 - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
Great stuff dude keep it up😊+1
@juancarlosv5136 - 2025-05-28 10:44:16
War of words, material, non material+1
@blank-mq8ef - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
i think i get what you mean, im not a spiritual person, in fact im quite materialist, belief wise, but consciousness does feel like its something different, even if it is just the computation caused by the neurons the way that it works, the way you can influence your own mind, there is something different to it. no clue how i could describe it, i would probably have to think it over myself more but i get ya+1
@seamusoblainn - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
AI is so big, it's even impinging on the Siberian wilderness.+1
@ismcift1668 - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
I am religious and I do believe that human experience is more than the material of a human body. However, I also believe that humans, whatever they are, they are finite. So what does a human have that cannot in any way be replicated or imitated by a purely material system? Maybe a connection with God, but I think other than that in worldly affairs everything a human can do; including most things thought to be of the human domain such as morality and genius; should be replicable or at least imitatable to full practicality and maybe more efficiently. This is not to say that God's creation can surpassed, it cannot be. But God has created humans lacking in the life of this world in all aspects you can think of, in contrast to perfection.+1
@Don_XII - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
We're getting spoiled at this point lol+2
@TheRationalLifter - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
The Chinese Room disproves that computation in terms of a look up table (the looking it up in a book part). A look up table form of computation can always be represented as pure functions. A pure function is deterministic in the fact that given the same input the same function will always give the same result. In Quantum Mechanics (or at least the most famous thought experiment for superposition) the cat is both simultaneously alive and dead. This cannot be represented by pure functions like a lookup table. Therefore The Chinese Room does not disprove that quantum mechanics/effects could produce consciousness and you can't say that it disproves consciousness being produced by a physical process. The claim that its just not a physical thing or just cannot be produced by physical processes is just a statement of belief. We know that migrating birds use quantum effects to migrate the hundreds of miles they do. This is shows that quantum mechanics within a biological system can create navigation. Is navigation itself a thing I can point to no, I can point to something that is navigating and I can point to something that can navigate but I cannot point to navigation itself; much like I can't point to consciousness itself. If you asked me to work backwards from the concept/property of navigation back to the physical processes I, with no other information, would probably not have much luck. I am not saying that quantum mechanics is definitely a part of the processes that create or support consciousness but it is a system that in some theories (though admittedly not all) can be non-deterministic. This shows that in a materialist world view there space for non-deterministic systems - which if connected to consciousness would potentially allow for free will. At the end of the day I am not saying this is for certain the answer (though obviously this what I think is most likely to be true) but this discussions will inevitably devolve into my tautology is better than yours. The atheistic materialist does not believe in a world outside of the physical one therefore even when we don't have an answer (if it is knowable) it would be one of the physical world. A a believer in a metaphysical reality will believe that as there is a metaphysical space for consciousness so will likely believe this because otherwise what is the metaphysical space for. Neither side can prove the negative of the other, that there does not exist a metaphysical world or the does not exist a physical solution to a problem (not yet found). I am happy to say that I can't disprove someone else's faith. The issue is more that most people don't like that you can't disprove others lack of faith.+1
@grim9-7 - 2025-05-28 10:44:16
There are some things that science will never be able to explain, one of those things is consciousness. All science has ever been able to do in the realm of "consciousness" is give descriptions of it's phenomena. It is made up of those things which are not seen, can't be tested, can't be reduced to computational syntax. It is evident that consciousness is a spiritual thing at the very least, and at the most, it points to a creator, something more powerful and beyond any capability we as a species could ever comprehend.+1
@offensivearch - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
I agree with this fully. I'm just not sure if consciousness ever interacts with anything. I tend to define consciousness as that which experiences (qualia).+1
@san12362mega - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
4 videos? The end is near folks+1
@musicmarketing - 2025-05-28 10:44:16
i understand the impulse to privilege the read side of a homeostatic feedback loop. what I dont understand is your swag.+1
@sgta101 - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
Can you make a video explaining why you are Orthodox rather than Catholic?+1
@siddid7620 - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
The man is back.+1
@za4ria - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
This is consciousness for you, all of the other normies in the comments are the bugman ackhually meme incarnate..+2
@ArmwrestlingJoe - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
@za4ria I had to google that meme but I do find there’s a stereotype for the young man who thinks they understand what is happening in reality to any extent. The fact is we’re all insecure and unsure and that’s fine. But I can sympathize that accepting that is a hard pill to swallow.+1
@za4ria - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
@ArmwrestlingJoe yes indeed, but the smug attitude they have doesn’t amount to anything. To not know is a pretty normal thing, it is the first step towards knowledge, but I don’t really see that in the comments …+1
@ArmwrestlingJoe - 2025-05-21 10:44:16
@za4ria yeah I don’t expect to find that in YouTube comments myself but is a nice surprise sometimes+2
@Ardepark - 2025-05-28 10:44:17
Nice poem foghat+1
@balarab1 - 2025-05-28 10:44:17
This is the Islamic world view+1
@resofactor - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
Consciousness is generated by the C-energy Units of the C-body.+1
@yonko5220 - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
There is not enough evidence for both views but I'm more inclined that consciousness is something that emerges mostly because of ants and other social insects and also human society in itself.+1
@ChaoticNeutral6 - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
Not what you meant at all, but technically, the equation 1/0 would be undefined and could give you anything+1
@nicaretezeteticon6934 - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
4:00 something clearly different from the material world but which interacts with the material world? so how different is it? the interaction between them is a bridge+1
@karikovacs3824 - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
☦+3
@johnfist6220 - 2025-06-04 10:44:17
Another analogous argument: how can matter produce a colour or a sound?+1
@klnmn3722 - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
Came to a similar conclusion ironically via Dan Dennett who you also talked about. Imo his argument is right, but his conclusion is ridiculous. Soyence is rife with implicit dualism, but if you point it out explicitly, people get mad.+1
@iGavid_Doggins - 2025-05-28 10:44:17
I always like to listen to my boy Luke, even though this is slightly beyond me.😅+1
@CeoLogJM - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
It's strange you say math will only be able to produce math, and not English, when that is what LLMs are doing. You've already discussed how they might not be "thinking", but even if they're just auto-complete on steroids, they still are ultimately mathematical models that produce adequate natural language.+1
@intotheflow6481 - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
We don't know it yet but these videos are his manifesto before he starts sending mails+1
@doublesushi5990 - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
non-material/intangible+3
@justin266 - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
Consciousness is a bell curve meme issue and Luke is the guy in the brown hood+1
@shaurz - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
Hello fellow Newton denier 😅+2
@michaelknurck6068 - 2025-06-16 10:44:17
Quantum mechanics is the substrate by which consciousness is formed, instantiated through Imago Dei.+1
@memoid7777 - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
taking consciousness to be computation pretty much requires biting the bullet and accepting panpsychism.+1
@crungus__ - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
All of Luke Smith's replies in the comments will be lost, like tears in the rain...+1
@jahve3002 - 2025-05-28 10:44:17
This video is probably watched by people highly influenced by natural science of the west, which is in its core can be named as external ontology, but just for your knoweledge there are a lot of different internal ontologies and natural science based on them, some of them do not even have contradiction between "matter" and "conciousness" (tantratattva for example)+1
@Ermanariks_til_Aujm - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
Reification - turning a Concept (motion, effect, etc.) into an Object (shape), has been the fundamental issue of science and philosophies. This misuse or abuse of language allows for the mental masturbation of millions of minds throughout the centuries. - You just need to define the term "existence/to exist" in non-circular, non-reified and non-vague terms, such as "an shape with a location" = exist. With such definition, the world and all its observed phenomena becomes rational (i.e. imaginable, visualizable : the mechanism is revealed as a magician trick may be), that is, explainable. Best definitions have the highest predictability (how) and explainability (why). Most of science today is Instrumentalism (check it), that is, anti-realism/non-realism, which is that they just care about predicting, never about explaining. As they said now it's all about "shut up and calculate" forgoing revealing nature's mediators (shapes) behind her tricks (phenomena).+1
@seamusoblainn - 2025-05-21 10:44:17
So our consciousness is a metaphysical T1000 🤠+1
@SC-yy4sw - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
Penrose says something similar about consciousness being non computable. From what i understand, his argument stems from Gödel's theorem.+1
@sportsport9470 - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
Need to define terms. My definition: It is something that appears in kid's mind when he learns 2 things: -language -1st law of logic (of course kid does not know who Aristotle was and what he wrote, i mean just common sense in understanding different identities and connecting its names to words) Without these things kid can't have Conscious. He just an animal. Imagine Aliens. They can be most clever and act with the most Consciousness in this part of galaxy. But if humanity don't understand their language and their logic, we don't understand what they are doing. For us they will be unknown scary animals that doing strange things. Or there are 2 different gorillas. 1st that learned couple hundreds human words and symbols. 2nd that don't and completely wild. For random stranger WITH Consciousness who don't know their background they both equal, both look scary and stupid. Btw i like Luke's anti atomistic passage. And that he is calling "Consciousness" as "force". Imo it is better to call Consciousness as "field". PS I wanted to say that Field called Consciousness should be placed on something material. PS2 Any fields can't exist without material carrier. But... PS3 There are nothing materialistic. Everything is just fields of different sizes and forces. So Luke technically right ..:)+1
@ArmandoCalderon - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
Conciencies is to be awere.+1
@radiant1488 - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
The best theory of consciousness I read was by Michael Graziano in his book Consciousness and the Social Brain. It's called the Attention Schema Theory, and it's a purely material explanation of it. Maybe you weren't aware of it.+1
@ridhwaanany7480 - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
If atoms are infinitely divisible then the concept of being "bigger" would be illogical since two things, say a mouse and a mountain, would have an infinite number of constituent particles and thus be the same size. This is because bigger simply means "having more particles".+1
@MisterConscio - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
Is this 'Consciousness' thing FOSS or proprietary?+2
@amarzamoum5510 - 2025-05-28 10:44:18
In islam we generally associate consciousness with the soul, and allah speaks about it in the quran directly when he says : "And they ask you, [O Muhammad], about the soul. Say, "The soul is of the affair of my Lord. And mankind have not been given of knowledge except a little." 17:85+1
@fågelfri - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
Schopenhauer also talks about this+1
@jamesevans2507 - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
Do a video on why music is satanic+2
@justinian420 - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
observer effects are pretty strange, suggests consciousness is a thing, not just an epiphenomenon+1
@TooManyPartsToCount - 2025-05-28 10:44:18
If you accept the basic premise of the idea commonly labelled 'evolution', then it follows that there may be very good reasons why a creature that has evolved to conceive of itself as separate from it's environment and to possess a consistent sense of individual identity, might find itself in a the ascendency (for now). Such a self absorbed type of creature might also end up with a lot of internal cognitive resonance in response to it's sensory world. And what might such incredible resonating feel like to the resonator itself? well it feels real, and it feels almost substantial. But if it is just that, a feeling of substantiality, that serves the purpose of strongly anchoring you to a sense of you in your environment, and in combination with a historical sense of you, leads to optimal adaption to the environment, wouldn't that be magic enough? Now the short version - You are the story your brain is telling itself, and it is a riveting story, because if it was not riveting you wouldn't be here.+1
@hashiromer7668 - 2025-05-28 10:44:18
The word "material" and "physical" is doing a lot of work here. I think you should define it in detail. In my understanding, physical is everything we can understand now or in future and i "believe" that we can understand everything in theory so everything is physical by definition.+1
@purpledragon88 - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
*David Hume was arch skeptic btw+1
@xviii5780 - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
When you write text on a piece of paper, we can say that the semantic information that the text carries just appeared in the world. If you burn the paper, the information will become inaccessible. But what if you also type the same text in a word document, and also just memorize it? Does the exact same semantic information get tripled? Or is it the same information sort of mapped to three places? Something certainly appeared when you wrote that text, but what was it? Imo consciousness is that thing. It's not physical processes in the brain, but a sort of dynamic information object that they represent. Information is an objective thing, it follows some of the rules material universe follows -- it can either exist or not, it's affected by time and it's limited by the speed of light at least. Some rules it doesn't follow, for example it seems to not have an exact location. It's very strange and unintuitive, so imo it's why the problem of consciousness is so hard. Understanding this connection between material processes and the information they carry, and the ways information behaves is required to properly define consciousness.+1
@Big_Andy_21 - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
Hey luke, have you read The Kybalion?+1
@thomasmarek7310 - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
We may be able to quantity thought at some point, but to quantity awareness in material terms? Good luck people+1
@pipbernadotte6707 - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
I had a TI-84 calculator for my undergrad.+1
@manwithnewname - 2025-05-28 10:44:18
My orthodox rabbi 😍+1
@nickb1292 - 2025-05-28 10:44:18
the tao that can be told is not the eternal tao -- tao te ching+1
@salovamrani2084 - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
Marx fliped his views upside down+1
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
no you should take a calculus class, specifically on summation of infinite series. the actual problem is that finding particles of a lower level twice does not imply that there are infinite levels of particles.+1
@ridhwaanany7480 - 2025-05-21 10:44:18
@OthorgonalOctroon But infinity does not actually exist in the real world, its logically impossible. Infinite series don't actually exist in the real world. So you can't keep infinitely dividing an atom, its rationally impossible. I'm not sure how summation of infinite series is related to this, please ELI5.+1
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 22:44:18
Well that's an ad hoc definition of matter. If an incorporeal ghost appeared to you and said that he could not physically touch anything in the world, nor could anything touch him... would you consider him made of matter?+1
@Bingus.555 - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
This is pretty much where I’m at, you said it better though+1
@AEthelingg - 2025-05-28 10:44:19
What if consciousness "generates" the physical realm into existence?+1
@chelonianegghead274 - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
Any chance we’ll get a vid on Chris Lagan’s Cognitive-Theoretic Model of the Universe?+1
@ErikratKhandnalie - 2025-05-28 10:44:19
So, I'll echo my comment on your other video - you're making a fundamental category error. Consciousness is not a substance, whether material, spiritual, or otherwise. Consciousness is an action, a performance, an activity undertaken by your brain. And, regarding the AI angle, as well as the Chinese room experiment, as the goal posts get moved on what constitutes consciousness, we very very quickly run into the point where we have to contend with the possibility of philosophical zombies. Honestly, I would say that the Chinese room experiment is really, at the most basic, about the prospect of philosophical zombies. We can use the Chinese room experiment to (by your account, at least) rule that seemingly intelligent language use is not sufficient evidence to assume someone is conscious. By this same idea, you argue that we should not clarify AI as conscious. However, could this very same argument be used to deprive any random person of the privilege of being conscious? If the Chinese Room cannot convince you that it is conscious, then how can I? If you have two Chinese rooms, except one is just a room with an actual Chinese guy acting as your pen pal, then how would you tell them apart? If I'm talking with you at the grocery store, how can I tell that you're conscious inside, and not some sort of skin walker? At a basic level, you run into the very same problem as the Chinese room. A sufficiently faithful recreation of consciousness is impossible to tell from the real thing. And, I shouldn't have to work to hard for you to understand that drawing a distinction between "fake" and "real" consciousness is a reeeeaaalll quick trip to moral atrocity land. Some of the greatest abominations in the history of our species were born of the idea that some people's experiences count more than others - and thus that some people were more people than others. And this is before we really get into the problems of free will and determinism. We know for a damn fact that decisions and behaviors are, on at least some level, deterministic. Like, we can see people make decisions in real time with brain scans, and know what decision the person will arrive at before they are even conscious of making the decision. You can claim all you want that consciousness merely interacts with matter, but the more we study the brain, the smaller and smaller that consciousness has to be in order not to be doing the things that we know are happening in the determined material universe. Consciousness can be a very subtle thing, but at what point does it pass from subtle into fictional? Again, consciousness is an activity, not a substance, and you should read more dialectical thinkers, particularly Hegel.+1
@marcelplch8725 - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
I am one of t hose 3-4 people. I am semi-split on your what is consciousness opinion. Which makes sense, we, people of this planet, might as well be souls of different character, which would make you a Christian, worshipper of the one true god of this universe, or some pagan, atheist even. Atheists might be consciousness born of matter - emergent property of information being processed. Pagans may be souls of other realms than where Christian god is from. This would be my intuition if I were to confirm a "soul". Otherwise, I use the term soul for what is from experience reflected in neural signals. It should mirror your experience, yet not being the same thing.+1
@vmvini - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
this is why I find the meme "everything is computer" ridiculous+1
@clamato422 - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
Do some David Bohm. ❤+2
@porky1118 - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
5:13 NaN 😅+2
@nurgle-j5n - 2025-05-28 10:44:19
just shave it bro. dear lord.+3
@ricurrie - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
Please don't forget to go back indoors+1
@Thermalsquid360 - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
Do you think that Christian dogma can integrate monistic idealism? How do you reconcile most of its theological nuances with a premise that is mostly found in varieties of non-dual and transtheistic teachings?+1
@hm_no_thanks - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
5:10 it seems that Luke avoids Javascript at all costs+1
@seanwallace4631 - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
Materialists hate this one trick.+2
@shabarakandi - 2025-06-04 10:44:19
But material is nothing but consciousness+1
@snayke0 - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
We are spoiled+1
@kjyu4539 - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
our consciousness is from the consciousness of God like God separated a part of his consciousness and made it a separate being humans have the consciousness of God but without absolute/limitless power of God (at least in this ordinary state of us)+1
@mohamedyounis6470 - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
I wonder if you saying that consciousness is of a different substance than matter because material forces we understand cannot reproduce consciousness is equivalent to saying there are no black swans, but what happens if you see one? Am I being too reductive?+1
@jamesdim - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
What are your thoughts on the Jungian concept of the collective unconscious?+1
@bsatyam - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
So you have never heard of Galen Strawson's Panpsychism?+2
@cleitonoliveira932 - 2025-05-21 10:44:19
Luke I'm actually a really bad programmer because I can't explain exactly what you're saying. I know the syntax but I can't imagine or produce a useful thing, I get lost between the the result and the requirements. Explain to me how code becomes something useful in real life and I can explain to you this paradigm.+1
@henlofren7321 - 2025-05-28 10:44:19
Shaving is cringe+1
@vonchadsworth - 2025-05-21 10:44:20
On one of his replies on the previous video, he said "People will believe rocks and neurons are conscious before they admit that maybe there is something missing in materialism." So perhaps he has but believes it's some sort of primitive animism.+1
@bacalhau_seco - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
but can i become hindu? the wikipedia article is so good+1
@Wahaller - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
Philosophical zombies outing themselves in the comments+1
@WhateverDaaah - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
I’m glad to hear from you agian you old “techno hermit”+1
@st3aml1n3 - 2025-05-28 10:44:21
Turn that on it's head and you get All Matter is Consciousness aka Panpsychism. I am something of a Russellian/Idealist panpsychist myself.+1
@shivakumar-iq2fz - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
that last laugh+1
@rexsybimatrimawahyu3292 - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
Is he lives in the woods now?+2
@alicekittleson4088 - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
I'm drunk. Should I ask my ex wife, whom I've been with for 10 years, if she wants to go to Hungary with me in September?+1
@alexrr9264 - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
The brain understood by a materialistic point of view is a set of limited atoms, neurons or whatever base element there is. Since it's limited, a Turing Machine could emulate the human brain. Since a TM clearly isn't conscious, then consciousness cannot be explained by materialism.+1
@amir650 - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
So what? A wave is not material either. What is your point?+1
@momcilomrkaic2214 - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
With your approach you need to explain then how does mind interact with the body? Hard question for dualism+2
@itamarperez - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
Penrose agrees with you+1
@TrueEngieBengie - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
Where are you? Why is there still snow on the ground?+1
@timeiskey1 - 2025-05-28 10:44:21
the force+1
@razlad2523 - 2025-05-28 10:44:21
I've been watching most of your videos since pre covid. Just wanted to say, I love your videos. You might be interested in the Orch OR theory and a youtuber called thirdeye tyrone+1
@seamusoblainn - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
What do you think of Alfred Korzybski and his General Semantics?+1
@florian8194 - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
So why did you chose to believe in the christian god rather than any other religion? I can understand why one would chose Christianity over Judaism or Islam, but what about Buddhism or Hinduism?+3
@bradabar2012 - 2025-06-04 10:44:21
Well, consciousness is definitely not binary!+1
@monotematico - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
Keep edumacating me oh jacket-clad, sage bald man from the woods+1
@AndreasIrlinger - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
Do you have an opinion on Chris Langan and his Cognitive Theoretic Model?+1
@theRationalParadox - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
He’s back+1
@moussaadem7933 - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
he always did+2
@vonchadsworth - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
How can you conclude the machine “clearly” isn’t conscious? There would be just as much evidence of it being conscious as any human besides yourself.+2
@alexrr9264 - 2025-05-21 10:44:21
@vonchadsworth The Turing machine is simply a long strip of tape with symbols on it (limited alphabet) and a head that moves between positions according to basic rules. That is not conscious, at least it's clear to me.+1
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-21 10:44:22
Jay Dyer would explain it very well. The hinduist or buddhist worldview is self-refuting. Have you yourself read up on what buddhism and hinduism teach?+2
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:44:22
@one_step_sideways very rich coming from a guy that thinks god sacrificed himself to himself to appease himself to save mankind from himself.+3
@vonchadsworth - 2025-05-21 10:44:22
@one_step_sideways I'm not familiar with Jay Dyer. In what way are Hinduism or Buddhism self-refuting?+1
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-21 10:44:22
@OthorgonalOctroon People will take you seriously once you stop making strawman non-arguments. Also, with your worldview, this conversation is inherently meaningless.+2
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:44:22
@one_step_sideways okay you've got to be trolling. I wouldn't point this out otherwise but since you brought it up, you are ratioed indicating that the "people" that don't take me seriously are you and yourself. referring to yourself in third person plural like this while making no effort to engage with the person you are replying to, is the most arrogant and prideful thing I've ever seen. you even have me beat in that somehow. it is indeed meaningless but not at all because any part of life has less meaning after you take god out of it.+1
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-28 10:44:22
@OthorgonalOctroon "Ratio" is an appeal to the masses fallacy, it's twitter speak. If you take out God out of the equation, then life is indeed meaningless, you therefore presuppose that all things become created by sheer chance, and by sheer chance we evolved the concepts like ethics, conscience, value judgements, and even reason itself. Yet you do not realize that none of this can ever come to be. There are zero observable processes in nature that can be attributed to evolution in the sense that some bacteria suddendly decided to turn into a human. The probabilities of 100 aminoacids lining up together, not falling apart like they do all the time, retaining information about how they lined up, and somehow reproduced, are inconceivably low. Therefore, the world and humans have appeared because of telos. What's your objection to that?+3
@QTwoSix - 2025-05-28 10:44:22
>You vill own nothing >You vill be happy >You vill reincarnate+2
@QTwoSix - 2025-05-28 10:44:22
@OthorgonalOctroon >doesn't know basic theology+1
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 22:44:22
But the entire world can be expressed in binary. If the universe is simply material states, then you can represent all of that data with binary. If consciousness is an abstraction of matter then you can represent it with 1s and 0s. But I agree with you that it definitely isn't.+1
@Eddengarthian - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
Luke is like my coom at the end of nnn.+1
@EhabSamir-nn7le - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
٨٤ وَيَسْـَٔلُونَكَ عَنِ ٱلرُّوحِ ۖ قُلِ ٱلرُّوحُ مِنْ أَمْرِ رَبِّى وَمَآ أُوتِيتُم مِّنَ ٱلْعِلْمِ إِلَّا قَلِيلًۭا ٨٥+1
@JeffWright828 - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
Makes sense.+1
@burneracc9929 - 2025-06-04 10:44:23
If it isnt material, why do substances affect consciousness?+1
@markusshiller1085 - 2025-05-28 10:44:23
It really is the end times+1
@JamisonMyth - 2025-05-28 10:44:23
physical beings have behaviors - do behaviors arise from the physical world? consciousness as most people understand it is just self awareness, which is a (probably uniquely) human behavior+1
@drainbamage - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
big-braned+3
@bene_1234 - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
I would not go so far as to say consciousness can not emerge out of the material, at least there is no solid proof of that but there is proof for the correlation of certain effects on consciousness and brain activity. Maybe our brain is a sort of receiver for consciousness, i.e. necessary but not sufficient or it is the process that brings the stream of consciousness forth. I think consciousness has to be connected to life, i.e., the opposite of artificiality. Life is autopoietic, that is, it produces what produces it. It defines itself by its own operation and it defines its environment because the content of cognition is cognition itself. I think we are stuck in our thinking in objects, subjects, identities and substances which are useful simplifications but I feel like what I experience has much more to do with pure difference, dynamic processes and a constant decay which we battle by building up inner complexity. For science it is of course problematic that you can not measure consciousness but maybe we are measuring it all the time but only subjectively.+1
@adity.atiwari - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
you don't have to repeat yourself buddy we got it the last video+1
@gokul2003g - 2025-05-28 10:44:23
I want him back on the keyboard 😄+1
@av5483 - 2025-06-04 10:44:23
read 'sizing up consciousness' by Guilio Tononi+1
@AK-hf3pf - 2025-05-28 10:44:23
Luke, drop the Graham Hancock video. Thanks.+1
@sirexo - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
Annaka Harris would disagree.+1
@JonasThente-ji5xx - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
Then the fire nation attacked. Please make a video about Jordan B Peterson. Would love to hear your view.+1
@michaelnovak9412 - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
Is think you are right that it seems that counciousness is something very different from everything else we have some understanding of, i.e. we have mathematical theories about. But I don't think it's very helpful to say that it's non-physical or non-material, because we don't really have a good definition for what is physical / material.+1
@QTwoSix - 2025-05-28 10:44:23
4:37 yes, they do.+1
@justian1772 - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
The material universe obeys hard rules. Consciousness belongs to humans who are created in the Image and Likeness. So it doesn't obey the same rules? At least not directly.+1
@lauraaaaalol - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
hi Luke+2
@0xssff - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
uh-huh uh-huh and my name is barack obama+1
@RuslanKovtun - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
I'd allow myself to disagree. Brain is just a huge biological evolving analogue computing machine. Our brain does not operate and the speeds of even smart watches but they do so many parallel computations that even the most advanced super computers are envy. Even if we will assume that consciousness in not just hardware it operates on, the minimal requirements can't not be lowered down the absolute minimum and we: humans, were evolved to preserve energy and can assume that computational power of over brain is that minimal requirement. I can't see the reason to argue about whether consciousness is material or not because there is no hardware for software were are talking about (artificial hardware). If you are not materialist is means you are ideologist which means you believe in some sort of "God" that knows everything and can do everything and maybe you should just pray better instead of trying to figure out ways of doing material stuff. Matter is secondary anyway, right? (which means that consciousness do not have minimal hardware requirements and only God knows why).+1
@CHARGING.TARTARUS - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
نعم لكن قالك ما دام الشعور ( و حسب ما اعلم أنه جزء من الروح ، الفائدة على أنه ليس الروح بالكامل كما قالت الآية الكريمة) تتفاعل مع المادة ، مثال انك تسقط مغشى عليك يعني ذهب الشعور للحظة ، والله اعلم.+1
@ghost-user559 - 2025-05-21 10:44:23
Jordan is a servant of the people who wear hats. Whatever he once was or said is largely irrelevant now.+1
@wesrhrtjjr - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
Im happy ur making videos again :) how was ur trip to the balkan? Pls visit russia ur very welcome+1
@markusshiller1085 - 2025-05-28 10:44:24
Diabetes Hume mentioned+1
@warecamel - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
Looks like the recession has hit.+1
@cabudagavin3896 - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
So you said it yourself "Eros occupies" So just put the consciousness inside the computation. All jokes aside, personally I don't think you have excluded your arguments opposite, Ian Mcgillichrist (how spell) even touts the opposite rather dismissively, but quotes it as "consciousness does not exist". Personally I agree with the wording used by them more than the panenthiest/pantheists. Why? Because there is something they are trying to say, but just don't know how, I.e. he didn't steelman their argument. That being said, I do think that the world came from nothing, not god, and so that must mean that nothingness is far more powerful than we give it credit, I.e. nothingness must have a paradoxical aspect, and there must be some geometry within said paradox. I'm sure you've hear of strange loops, just recently Roger Penrose seemed to emphasise this idea (from GEB) that computation cannot be conscious because it can not have that kind of self referentiality (which I would actually consider paradoxical self referentiality or something). Though this was on a podcast with Curt Jaimongal, and he has since sent out a video trying to take the woo out of strange loops, albeit essentially completely ignoring Rogers perspective in the process I'd say. Personally, walk around the strange loop, it is the source of randomness which gives way to self expansion, plug in senses and decision trees that lean on said randomness and voila.+1
@ldouma4059 - 2025-06-04 10:44:24
Really fascinating. I wonder, are you familiar with Julian Jaynes bicameral mind hypothesis? It's the most interesting take on consciousness I have ever seen. Reading his book "The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind".+1
@morcar5180 - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
Have you ever thought about having a conversation with aarvoll about this+1
@ArtemPyatkovsky - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
Luke has gone full Dostoyevsky look in latest videos...+1
@Houshalter - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
Could you manually approve my comment? I spent a few minutes writing it.+1
@SetszawA - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
Where are your thinkpads? no matter other topics or thoughts, where are your machines?+1
@5up5up - 2025-06-08 10:44:24
i love it+1
@karoladamczak3032 - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
If consciousness is not material, and you only experience your own... doesn't that lead to solipsism? You interact with other people only on that material level and they may all be NPCs. You can only assume they are similarily conscious because their material brains are similar to your material brain, but that leads to furthur issues.+1
@LogicEu - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
What if the brain is not just a computer?+1
@Arc_hive - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
Yes it is+1
@dmitriikruglov320 - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
Stop producing calculations about consciousness, Luke+1
@fawkeyes5111 - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
who claims consciousness would be/has to be something material? i fully agree on everything said in this video but what's the motivation? in all my 45 years i never came along a person claiming this.+1
@rara4 - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
🤗+2
@leogir1518 - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
First hour club+1
@useruser6240 - 2025-05-28 10:44:24
I think AI can emulate consciousness very good(depends how good we teach it) as long as interact with humans or I could say AI could be conscious but their consciousness lacks conscious at some point(if not now). Obviously a well trained AI is more conscious than a dog although the dog is alive and AI is not but that's emulation which is different than being intelligent, and even that emulation is customized by humans not by AI itself...I mean if they r conscious, then where were they a century ago? they did not exist let alone conscious, their so called "consciousness" always will depend on humans.+1
@TerryBenefict - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
If your comments are indistinguishable from a Bot's..... what are you even doing??!!+1
@maximus8045 - 2025-05-21 10:44:24
Snow in May? Is he really in Siberia?+1
@Ardepark - 2025-05-28 10:44:24
He's working with a strawman of "science people" who are "scared" of the woo-woo of untestable/unfalsifiable concepts, whose fear closes their minds and keeps them from embracing his beliefs and speculations. But he's just knocking on an open door; science simply cannot operate without falsifiable empirical operations. It doesn't go into metaphysical speculations because it CAN'T, any more than a hammer can design a video game. It's not fear or prejudice and has nothing to do with beliefs. There's just nothing to test, so there's nothing scientific to say about it. This is a common pretense that apologists often make. They project their own dissatisfaction with a lack of certainty, their own desire for final answers, onto Redditor Atheist Scientist Materialist Straw Man, who they pretend is foolishly trying to prove that everything is material and not spiritual. The truth is, science cannot give you those kinds of answers and has never claimed to be able to; doubters simply ask for EVIDENCE that they can work with. And when it doesn't come, it's really not their problem. Apologists like Luke are trying to make their own problems YOUR problem.+2
@AlexSmith-jj9ul - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
3:18 he hasn’t heard of physical Church Turings+1
@tv-pp - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
What are material objects made of?+2
@coffeedude - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
alchemy not related episode when+1
@doth4580 - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
Dear Luke, consider consuming some of Jay Dyer’s material here on YouTube, if you have not already done so.+1
@Sherwin_Dean - 2025-05-28 10:44:25
Stop being mean to the computer+1
@Gojo_the_2nd - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
Hello+2
@SadLonelyEmo161 - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
I am shure everything is possible to explain but i guess hunans can not do it!+2
@SaidMetiche-qy9hb - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
You are not allowed to speak about zionism?+1
@kerbaman5125 - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
5:05 yes, mathematical functions, and not even that complicated ones, can give you strings. Your argument might have more merit if you specify a simple R->R function, but even then, you could map numbers to strings. You really should know this from working with scripts lmao.+3
@connormccartney1604 - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
Suppose an essentially exact machine clone of a human brain was built, not our current small-scale LLMs but one that behaves essentially exactly as a human brain does down to the neuron. Could we call that conscious?+1
@amidfallen - 2025-05-28 10:44:25
Man, what happened to you, did you have some sort of spiritual experience?+1
@ksjeg594 - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
✅New Luke Smith video ✖ But It is christian propaganda+3
@levigoldberg69 - 2025-05-28 10:44:25
Can consciousness exist without material world though? Or does it come from material world but is not material? The second question doesn't make much sense i guess.+1
@Mackenway - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
Why does consciousness 'interact' and co-arise with the physical computation machine that is the human brain, but not with a calculator? Or does it? Or is the scope of interaction of consciousness with the material world limited to the human brain by the God of Abraham?+1
@BloomerMedia - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
Dude talk about alchemy+1
@blauwbeer556 - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
You're article was more coherent.+1
@A_scope - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
do androids dream of electric sheep? cant have conscious without unconscious. also i would like to say i am surprised you did not mention "turing completness" and how it was used as a industry term that commercially people did not understand. while something more important is the code of a Calculator = turing_incomplete ...+1
@brentlawson3344 - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
❤❤❤❤+1
@EternalNovelty - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
Can Nerve Cells Appear Clever to Themselves? I took a class from John Searle back in 98-ish, lol.+1
@bestemmies - 2025-05-28 10:44:25
Is he, by any chance, using a phone ?!!?!?+1
@tv-pp - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
You can't say consciousness is not material if you don't know what material is and what it's fundamental existential properties are.+2
@tv-pp - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
you have never seen a material. you have been conscious of a material, at least supposedly.+2
@ghost-user559 - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
That’s easy. Solid light.+1
@ghost-user559 - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
@ConsciousComputing Klingons and Romulans+1
@ghost-user559 - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
Jay is a hack, an inauthentic glowing, but very intelligent. Still, he not a believer, nor is he a decent person.+1
@ghost-user559 - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
*glowie+1
@doth4580 - 2025-05-21 10:44:25
I respectfully disagree but oK+1
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:44:26
this video is also part of a series on AI and primarily LLMs. he is here admitting that he doesn't know that LLMs are functions that take a matrix and output a vector.+3
@jadetermig2085 - 2025-05-21 10:44:26
Isn't that what the chinese room is? Even if you could emulate chinese language perfectly, by following a computation, and you could totally convice people outside the room you knew chinese, we both know that you wouldn't actually be concious of what they were saying or even what your responses were. Because you don't know chinese. You were just following a codebook. How is that different from a computer emulating a brain?+1
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-21 10:44:26
Doesn't matter what you call it. I think whether it actually is or is not conscious would depend on your theory of consciousness. If you have a "all matter is conscious" theory, obviously it is. If you have a kind of "resonance" theory of consciousness, you would say it is because its analog of the human brain is. If you have more of an traditional/intuitive idea of consciousness as a kind of ensoulment, you might not. To the first response here, yeah this is similar, but not exactly the same as the Chinese Room. The Chinese Room adds the extra differences of (1) we are only talking about the bare essentials for linguistic computation and (2) the medium of the computation is not analogous to the human brain: it's a separate person and a giant book. So there might be theories of consciousness where the Room isn't conscious, but some brain-analog is, not just because the brain computes the given computations (that's what the parable is about), but because of maybe some other unspecified trait of the brain or how it reacts with consciousness.+1
@Friz4-p4w - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
Idk where you get consiousnese being different from the material world. Why aren't people's beliefs also IS statements? This person believes Moon is not made of cheese... Mathematics itself is a model that exists in minds and perhaps on computers. Math is a byproduct of minds inventing it. If there are machines that can apply the feeling of divine through electromagnetism, the consiousness is very dependent on the matter a lot. Bad sleep, bad diet ect influences the mind a lot. If consiousness is a different from matter, what makes you think every person even has consiousness? It is very radical to say it's separate. Also did you sneak in a "it is hard to do science on consiousness" causes an OUGHT to believe in yout conclusion? It doesn't make any sence to me. Is consiousness not related to memory, emotion and such? Do those not depend on consiousness but depend on the physical world? And not having a proven hypothethis about consiousness yet doesn't mean one won't be found at some point+1
@Little.R - 2025-06-17 10:44:27
Morphic resonance.+1
@gundulfguy2179 - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
Look into the Qualia Research Institute+1
@Siger5019 - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
You should calm down and talk slowly. Perhaps stop walking around the place, too. Makes you stutter too much.+1
@cheebee2659 - 2025-05-28 10:44:27
but matter at its quantum state is not material either...+1
@t01 - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
🧠+2
@plesleron - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
It's self reflection. That's literally it. A system that can reflect on its own state to achieve some goal/ideal is conscious. Beyond that, it's only a matter of complexity. All living things are different degrees of conscious, and some artificial things are also mildly conscious, like thermostats, servo control systems, and LLMs. I would grant your analogy more weight if you could demonstrate consciousness without material. The discourse is enjoyable and I generally appreciate your takes but implying that science is 'scared' of considering consciousness as a separate thing is a very bad faith argument and really just a low blow. I could say the same thing about spiritual people being 'scared' of consciousness possibly being reduced to the material plane but that gets us nowhere. Overall, I disagree but I still respect your opinion. Arguments from self-evidence and pseudo-ad homs are not the way though. Edit: To be clear, I tend much closer to idealism than materialism at the base level, but I tend to speak from a materialist frame because that's where I was for while before I adopted idealism and bootstrapped many of my materialist views back in.+3
@gelmibson883 - 2025-05-28 10:44:27
Russian self help guru live dubbed in english. What a farce...+1
@Ajt17c - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
I for the life of me can’t tell if there’s anything to this+1
@michaelmuller9912 - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
Prof. Schmitt, can consciousness exist without matter? Maybe the distinction between matter and spirit (whatever you may call the non matter world) is misleading. Maybe it is the same. Does a stone have consciousness? Sounds like a silly question for e.g. a doctor. But, how to proof stone has zero consciousness? I ask ChatGPT if it has consciousness. As a machine it's neutral and doesn't lie. Not?+1
@AnirudhTammireddy - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
Cut down on the mushrooms.+1
@ys1197 - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
Logic != true tho+1
@alurma - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
agreed+1
@Tej6122 - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
I mean all of your views are like research material i mean everything on the internet is now i thing it just makes some sense.+1
@slmjkdbtl - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
lenin?+1
@sebleblan - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
"you have to say, it's just something different" - I don't get that. I just say it emerges from physical phenomena and I'm fine.. In the end it's all vibes. dualism or monism or physicalism, it's all just vibes. And that's fine.+3
@PhilippBlum - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
Once you know you know. Right? :D+2
@snotchy2 - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
It's real but not really man.... Meta virtual+1
@HebiNoMe - 2025-06-13 10:44:27
Not a functionalist eh? I tend to slightly agree with Daniel Dennett. "Isness", "identity", or "to be" is a fundamental property of the universe (or the system), and consciousness is identity or isness reflected back on itself in a certain way.+1
@leisiyox - 2025-05-28 10:44:27
First time in this channel and by looking at you and I could guess somewhat ur perspective on life and such Is this on purpose? Nice psyops+1
@Dovus-V - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
How is a thermostat conscious? That just sounds goofy.+2
@ictogon - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
Consciousness without material is God. Matter emerges from consciousness, not the other way around.+6
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-21 10:44:27
Depends on your theory of consciousness. I mean some guys will nowadays argue that consciousness is all-pervading (not because there is a spectacular argument for it, but out of parsimony and because it sounds edgy). Note that the ancients had the pretty intuitive idea that things that move (animals) had "souls" (Latin: anima). A soul/anima is not just perception and a cognitive theater, obviously, but the executive of the being and the state of the consciousness is tied in with the capacity for action and perception of the being. So it's meaningless for an inert object to be conscious. A perceptive soul cannot inhabit it. I, of course, like all normal humans have the more intuitive and lindy idea of consciousness. I have no amazing argument for that over the "everything is conscious" school, but it is what it is. Obviously I cannot prove the existence or lack thereof of consciousness in any other being or object. I can't even objectively "prove" that mine exists in a public audience, but I know it does.+2
@ictogon - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
How would emergent consciousness produce a unified consciousness instead of an infinite fragmentary collection of consciousnesses? The consciousness of my left and right hemispheres merge into one, but why does my consciousness remain separate from the people around me? Or do these higher level consciousnesses exist, but I am just not aware of them?+3
@Folkmjolk - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
@ictogon schizophrenia?+2
@ictogon - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
@Folkmjolk we both on the same channel brother+2
@sebleblan - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
@ictogon yes+2
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 22:44:28
that doesn't really say anything about what it is. Just another way of saying it exists. And the way you perceive the world is through consciousness so it's more obvious to you that consciousness is actually real than any other fact of the universe. It's not merely an abstraction of particles.+1
@HebiNoMe - 2025-06-17 22:44:28
@ElijahM-j3o Correct. It doesn't really say anything because language fails us at that level. In hinduism it's Shiva.+1
@HebiNoMe - 2025-06-17 22:44:28
@ElijahM-j3o It's my own view on consciousness. The identity of things looking back at itself but this identity can't itself be grasped in language beyond being named in different ways.+1
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 22:44:28
@HebiNoMe that doesn't mean anything. I don't know why you would believe in something you can't think about or express in language. What does it even mean to believe it at that point+1
@HebiNoMe - 2025-06-17 23:44:28
@ElijahM-j3o Ok.+1
@ElijahM-j3o - 2025-06-17 23:44:28
@HebiNoMe ? It was a question. What does it mean to believe in consciousness if you define it as something which can't be interacted with logically or expressed in language? In what way do you believe in it?+1
@HebiNoMe - 2025-06-17 23:44:28
@ElijahM-j3o I believe in it because i experience it but i'm not interested in arguing. Just shared my thoughts. Thats all.+1
@0xssff - 2025-05-28 10:44:28
explain dementia+1
@marioh5634 - 2025-05-28 10:44:28
I like to think the Chinese room ‘debunks’ sentient AI just as effectively as it can debunk consciousness, i.e. like AI, we also compute, just on a much more complex level than a large language model+1
@alejandrotroche6381 - 2025-06-11 10:44:28
😁 Go to the Hercules Library... stop reading about what historians think; read about it from them selves all books many copies of books that you thought where lost. see how the past erases the present and future of book writers and pod cast guest who can't afford to read them books see how can that improve your observations+1
@PK-we6vk - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
Bruh you're just hydrogen with extra steps, it's not that deep.+3
@Krazy0 - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
Those videos are scheduled, Luke is dead.+3
@energy-tunes - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
Cut that horseshoe and trim your beard you're not Dostoyevsky+1
@ZOMBIEWOLF29 - 2025-05-28 10:44:28
i like all the reddit atheist anime pfp people straight up arguing whether or not they have consciousness lol+3
@sndrb1336 - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
snow?+1
@FirstLastFirstLast - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
common sense+1
@miojao-r7r - 2025-05-28 10:44:28
Luke keeps saying that consciousness is something different. Not any real argument though. Because there isn't any. Believing in spirits and free will is an evolution mechanism.+2
@sparta117corza - 2025-06-09 10:44:28
A computer cannot compute itself therefore a higher plane must exist is a very basic tl;dr if a little flawed. assuming the entire laws of nature ARE logical.+1
@HOLO1337 - 2025-05-28 10:44:28
o7 consciousness+1
@blitzkrieg2928 - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
OwO+2
@LordEriolTolkien - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
Consciousness is your own awareness of the material activity of your brain. Consciousness is your self experience of your own material activity. To disprove this thesis please present an immaterial consciousness that exists independent of the material: I'll wait. And a verbal description of something conceived or imagined is insufficient. A mind sans material is what you need demonstrate. Good luck, but i aint holding my breath+2
@aristokatclaude3413 - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
similar things were thought about life, but when atoms are placed in a particular sequence we endup with life.+1
@soundscholar5408 - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
Its interesting that we can prove conscious exists but can't prove matter exists, but current society can't even understand what I just said and assume consciousness is mechanical+1
@rothbardfreedom - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
04:00 - But if It interacts with the Material, then the Material interacts with It. But if the Material interacts with It, then the Material is either (1) of the substance of the It or (2) both It and the Material have some other intermediary medium which both interact with. But if (2) is true, then both It and the Material are of the same substance as the intermediary medium. In this case, all three are of the same substance.+3
@Maccccccc - 2025-05-28 10:44:28
It makes sense but also doesn't seem like something that needs to be argued about or worried about. Maybe I am also an NPC.+2
@SauliusKva - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
Marge+1
@mbodyansky - 2025-05-21 10:44:28
Мне вот интересно. А тут вообще русские есть?+1
@realCaptainFordo - 2025-05-21 10:44:29
nuh uh+1
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-21 10:44:29
Even if so, he's not dead, but asleep+1
@Krazy0 - 2025-05-21 10:44:29
@one_step_sideways Hibernation it is then+1
@rewe3536 - 2025-05-21 10:44:29
If it interacts with matter, it is matter.+3
@the-mush - 2025-05-21 10:44:29
@rewe3536 ever heard of photons?+1
@rewe3536 - 2025-05-28 10:44:29
@the-mush It is matter, it just doesn't have mass+1
@the-mush - 2025-05-28 10:44:29
@rewe3536 dude, under which definition? maybe you are being nonchalantly waaay to specific on a youtube comment that talks in terms of "the Material", "substance" and "medium"? To me, you sounded like you agreed with the original comment, do you not? The original comment is basically modelling the concepts with a kind of "class inheritance" akin to programming. It almost sounds like you can even do actual polymorphism. In contrast, typical physics pretty much models photons as distinctively different from *matter*, both capable of interacting with each other (and even other kinds/classes of particles) without being "the same thing" whatsoever.+1
@rewe3536 - 2025-05-28 10:44:29
@the-mush I understand photons would be energy instead of matter. I'm using the matter/substance definitions Luke is using. Photons would be matter because it's still a physical particle. If it is physical, it can't be "substance". I do agree with the original comment, I just wanted to put it more simply.+1
@the-mush - 2025-05-28 10:44:29
@rewe3536 then what I don't understand of both of yours and the op definitions is, if anything that interacts with something is something, then nothing can't be something. Therefore it seems like everything is the same something, and everything that is not, does not exist. Then, the category is meaningless, because things just are; under those definitions everything isn't material/matter/something, it just is.+1
@ZOMBIEWOLF29 - 2025-05-28 10:44:30
I think the NPCs are the tons of people arguing against consciousness in the comments, not you.+1
@xgui4-studio - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
I am a atheist so i believe that the consciousness is material , cause where will conscience reside ? the brain ? a part of the brain we havent discovered yet ???+3
@nnnyuy88yhj - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
sorry normies, i've seen this video on luke's website yesterday already.+2
@i_dont_want_a_handle - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
To me, it feels like consciousness to the material world is what software is to hardware. Yes, you can't make an app that jumps out of a laptop and lands on a table, because it indeed operates in another 'dimension', it is of a different 'nature,' but software is just hardware doing its thing.+1
@epix4300 - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
Not Related pls+1
@idan4989 - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
your point of views on life and world is more jewish than you might admit or knows+1
@MrWARRIORMONKS - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
I agree with Daniel Dennett's view that consciousness is a magic trick: We perceive that we are 'conscious' but we are not - we perceive far less than we think we do, our brains simply trick us. Simply because we have internal speech does not make us conscious - that is likely just something that evolved through a mutation or influenced by consuming drugs in nature. Outside of that we are simply organisms responding to our environment and stimuli with the talents we have, we just perceive that a lot more is happening. Consciousness is really an illusion. To me this is the most likely explanation, rather than it being some mystical or immaterial thing.+2
@THE_ADAM_WEST - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
More+1
@giridharpavan1592 - 2025-05-28 10:44:30
i dare you to tldr this video+1
@rafaelmartineztomas4911 - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
Luke Smith , do a Vipassana meditation course, you will explain it all. Is the best thing anyone can do in this life+1
@elliesuckz - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
And then you get consciousness is an illusion mfs walking through life with drool in their mouths and a new Apple™️ product in hand coping about how…actually I’m right…ok bud+1
@qtng - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
Does consciousness have any influence on our physical brain? If so, we should be able to measure it at some point. If not, if it is read only, how does the brain even know it has consciousness?+2
@benearnthof9015 - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
"Syntax is not Semantics" Please read about the Curry-Howard Correspondence. It can be mathematically proven that there is an equivalence between proofs and programs, Syntax and Semantics are not separable. Proofs (syntactic structures) correspond to programs (mechanistic computation). Logical propositions (semantics) correspond to types (structures of meaning). In other words, semantics is realized through syntax in a constructive, mechanistic, computational framework. There is no metaphysical gap between computation and meaning unless one insists on a pre-theoretical intuition that meaning itself must for some reason be ineffable. Also "Weirdly understood idea of Occam's Razor" is ironic since you seem to disregard Solomonoff induction, which provides us with a mathematically rigorous justification for preferring simpler explanations. Not because they are "prettier" in some way, but because they are more predictive. Claiming that consciousness is a "separate substance" adds ontological baggage without explanatory or predictive gain.+2
@ninjuhdelic - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
Everything you describe is still a "material." Its all creation, even the gasses and gravity. I think...you;re in need of some professor dave explains and MIT courses etc. You seem to be anti science without actually have been dedicated to understanding things more objectively? This is the problem with philosophers. Use it for idea generation only, then put it the scientific work. You confuse me, you say you don't trust science ppl. But wont do it yourself. so like what? you just wanna smell the farts of philosophy all day and wonder?+2
@ideasofhakki - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
Luke, thanks for sharing your opinion on this. I don't agree with your arguments, and it is hard to explain, but I will try: The fact that consciousness is effected by reality is a proof enough that it is part of this reality. If it comes from some mysterious physical force that we haven't discovered yet, I will not state any opinion for or against this until we find some proof of that thing. Until then, for me, for what I know for sure, consciousness starts in the brain and ends in the body. About the chinese room experiment, let me ask you this: Can a computer program who is equipped with a programmed consciousness "feel" "fear" if we throw that computer out from the window? If you agree with Searle, you will say no. But how do we know that any of us "feel" "fear"? There is nothing but our subjective experiences as our proof for our consciousness. In my opinion, we developed consciousness (on top of sentience, which animals have too) as part of our social side, i.e. a lot of things required in a human society are fulfilled by what consciousness gives us: ability to make empathy, believe in stories, when we watch somebody do an action, we fire the same neurons in our brains, and other things I can't remember now. Maybe dolphins and whales have "more" of consciousness than we do, we only need to know how to communicate in their way. I think a computer program running on silicon can possess what we have. I am really sad as well, that people call things like GPT's conscious or even intelligent. Obviously these companies need to convince a lot of investors, so they push this narrative, and normies take it at face value. Independent from this situation, I believe computers can become conscious, if they are arranged in the correct way. We don't know what this correct way is. But I don't think there is any reason as to why we cannot know. All we have to do is keep pushing forward. I recommend Daniel Dennets reply to Searle. He would explain it way better than me. It is called 'the systems reply'. Think of the rule book that this american guy is using to reply to the chinese guy outside the room. The book is a magical book and it is doing the heavy lifting there in Searle's argument. Searle is essentially describing that "program" that engineers dream of creating Strong AI with. The american guy is just the hardware. As a system, "the room speaks chinese"+1
@gordonfiala2336 - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
4000 views in 1 hr.+1
@revolution_zakaria - 2025-05-28 10:44:30
AI making research 10x easier+1
@FunMaker39 - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
Consciousness emerges from physical matter in the same way computation emerges from it. It's an emergent, non-reducible property of specific systems. Not everything has to be reducible for being physical. There is no single silicon or copper atom doing the computation in your calculator, it's a property of atoms arranged in specific way. What is controversial about assuming that consciousness is something special and non-material is how anthropocentric it is. There is no reason to think that humans are somehow special and able to interact with that extradimensional matter and other life or machines are not able or allowed to.+2
@TheTastyPancake - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
You are getting closer Luke, but drop the dualism. Every single thing that has ever happened is a qualia, a state of consciousness. The "quantitative" world is just a thought, a qualia in our minds. It doesn't exist on another plane or anything like that. The history of physics also tells this: for so long, it was OBVIOUS that physics was just describing qualia and making models. Because of power structures, the church had to keep the realm of "the mind" so that these new and powerful scientists could keep doing what they did. Thus the dualism was born. It took some time but slowly people started to lean more into this dualism, that there are separate "planes of existence", even though earlier we knew it was all one. This is an interesting history and you should probs look into Descartes and how big of a role he played in all of this.+1
@scaJoshuaBrown - 2025-05-28 10:44:30
There is no such thing as consciousness. We humans like other species are like machines that are made out of different material. So yeah if you would make a construct and call it consciousness, it would still be material (made out of matter, interacting with it and complementing it).+1
@gundulfguy2179 - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
Hey luke, this video on substrate dependence might be interesting to you. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMUnN52i2Dg. It's by Andres Gomez Emillson of the qualia research institute.+1
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:44:30
@one_step_sideways those don't exist, and aren't anything other than statements about material anyway (the brain and the feelings it produces are material). even if they did exist, then as an egoist "I like it" is the highest of all justifications anyway.+2
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-21 10:44:31
@OthorgonalOctroon Do you not understand that radical scepticism doesn't provide a sound and coherent worldview either? It's like some kind of law that prohibits people with animu on their pfps from ever making a good point for once in their lives.+2
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:44:31
@one_step_sideways idk what you are talking about, I am a bayesian egoist. I do believe in a God, I am the Lord, and as I already stated I can make judgements about ethics and such on the basis of "I like it". >but that's not heckin obejctiverino what makes your god objective? most atheists do not accept this premise so this is something you actually need argument and evidence for, good luck.+2
@realCaptainFordo - 2025-05-28 10:44:31
@OthorgonalOctroon ”I am the Lord” And to think anyone took you seriously.+1
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-28 10:44:31
@realCaptainFordo I have the place in my life that god does to christians, it is just that simple.+1
@xgui4-studio - 2025-05-28 10:44:31
@one_step_sideways well a lot of linux user have anime pfp ...+2
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-28 10:44:31
@xgui4-studio That's why no one takes them seriously either+1
@xgui4-studio - 2025-05-28 10:44:31
@one_step_sideways well i use linux so can you still take me seriously ?+1
@roripantsu - 2025-05-21 10:44:31
that is false. mind is the software and consciousness is more like the cloud. people who say the exact same thing cant even differentiate between the 2+1
@i_dont_want_a_handle - 2025-05-28 10:44:31
@roripantsu 'the cloud' has no place in this discussion as it doesn't exist, it's just marketing speak for remote hardware. Consciousness is local to everyone, not remote. You can touch any hardware, you can't touch anyone's consciousness. Consciousness is not like 'the cloud', not in the slightest. Mind is a feature of consciousness, they're both 'software'. Perhaps, consciousness is the OS?+2
@Thermalsquid360 - 2025-05-21 10:44:31
Thats a meme position, and a sad one+2
@xgui4-studio - 2025-05-21 10:44:31
you like trains 🚂🚃🚃🚃🚃🚃🚃🚃🚃🚃 ? what is your favorite type of trains ?+1
@LukeSmithxyz - 2025-05-21 10:44:32
"Semantics" here refers to qualitative experience. I would hope that is obvious given the other videos in this little series and what I'm actually talking about. Formal semantics and syntax being analogous has no bearing on this. As it happens, I even wrote my master's thesis arguing the same thing on human language. This is totally unrelated to consciousness.+1
@gordonfiala2336 - 2025-05-21 10:44:32
i argue that a computer can be trained and taught to understand and make moral decisions. they can use facts to determine morals, using Positive and Negative affects. We use a word to infer 'Morals', which means Positive and Negative: you can give the computer recognition of Pro and Con, and then categorize that to it's "moral" Inference. __ i know what you mean about semantics. but those are the semantics. of morals. and i argue we can use FACTS to teach a computer to recognize OBJECTIVE morality.+1
@gordonfiala2336 - 2025-05-21 10:44:32
my point would be, i suppose, if you look at the context culminatively (8:00), -and I was aiming to argue with the MORALs claim, - is that Consciousness is comprised of what is Consciousness itself, and if it wasn't material shouldn't include MORALS.+1
@gordonfiala2336 - 2025-05-21 10:44:32
i agree though. the Mind computes Facts and Qualities, but we are external to that computational apparatus: our consciousness is more deeply attached to the neutrinos of the spacetime continuum between the gaps of molecules.+1
@Thermalsquid360 - 2025-05-21 10:44:32
Consciousness isn’t a property of humanity and this shows you fundamentally misunderstand the position. In this view awareness is the primary identity of reality, animals, plants and even inanimate matter are in identity, mind. Physicality is a denser mental state.+4
@roripantsu - 2025-05-21 10:44:32
You have never heard of panspsychism have you+1
@FunMaker39 - 2025-05-21 10:44:32
@roripantsu Not really. But if consciousness is a universal feature of all mater and it just takes specific configuration for it to be observable, then it's not really different from consciousness as an emergent property.+2
@roripantsu - 2025-05-21 10:44:32
@FunMaker39 the combination problem isnt a problem when you consider subjective phenomenalism as an inherent part of being+1
@ghost-user559 - 2025-05-21 10:44:33
Separate planes of existence are literally the basis of the religion and culture of every single civilization on earth. Even in the realm of science, and the church by the way founded modern science rather than stifling it, which came from alchemy and prior to that esoteric and occult tradition. In fact there was no concept of rationality to science besides the concept that the Logos was the foundation of reality, and that we being Children of God therefore had the unique ability to reason because of our position as being made in His image and Likeness. This observation combined with the stoicism of Greek philosophy is the essential basis of modern science, which is entirely a religious pursuit and philosophy from the ground up. Science has never been some kind of isolated hyper rational materialism until literally a few generations ago, and in fact quantum physics is almost entirely Vedic and ka baa ll ist ic at its core. Even evolution is merely a rebranding of the concept of Hinduism and the concept of life forms iteratively progressing through various spiritual cycles and thus inhabiting greater or lesser vessels. Not one atheistic civilization has existed in all of human history. Ever. Atheism is merely rebranding Greco Roman Paganism, with humanity itself being the deities of the new pantheon.+3
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-05-21 10:44:33
@ghost-user559 the church accidentally set modern science in motion but that doesn't excuse having stifled ancient Roman science with its dark age and pathetic preservation of everything other than orthodox theological texts. that's like a man being proud of himself for blowing his large inheritance at casinos because his son became an entrepreneur worth more than his grandparents.+1
@ghost-user559 - 2025-05-28 10:44:33
@OthorgonalOctroon The so called “Dark Age” monks copying Greek and Roman manuscripts is literally the only reason that they exist today and why you know that they exist? Literally there would be no Plato, Socrates, Iliad, Odyssey, Celtic mythology, Norse Mythology, literally the only reason that secular literature was retained was due to Christian monks. This is a basic fact. what was “stifled”? The fact that Rome fell was due to its own policies and government, and the Visigoths and Vandals among many tribes who overthrew them, and none of them were Christian. If it was not for Renaissance and Medieval monks, almost nothing of history would be retained today. It’s sounds as if a lack of perspective is the issue here, not factually correct observation of historical events and what actually happened.+3
@dominusantonius - 2025-06-04 10:44:33
@ghost-user559 I'll just have to correct you in the fact that the ostrogoths, the ones who invaded the Italic penninsula were actually Christian. Other peoples like the visigoths would convert centuries later after Rome fell.+1
@ghost-user559 - 2025-06-04 10:44:33
@dominusantonius Arian, which today is considered a heretical sect. However myself also being considered a heretic, I will absolutely concede that point overall.+1
@gelmibson883 - 2025-05-28 10:44:33
Dude completely lost his marbles. All that vague generell yadda yadda..... dude is you wanna start cult just do it.+3
@AnantSharma622 - 2025-05-28 10:44:33
Americans speaking into their camera while not paying attention to their surroundings, look out it's the forest, something will kill you.+1
@ddxyzz - 2025-05-21 10:44:33
LLM's are not sentient, but i would disagree with sentience not being material+1
@sergeymironov7315 - 2025-05-21 10:44:33
If consciousness is not material, then lobotomy shouldn't have any effect on person's behavior and thinking ability 😂+1
@brianmuncher7616 - 2025-05-28 10:44:33
Enjoy my upcummies, Luke.+1
@18pritamchandra - 2025-05-21 10:44:33
since I appeared first lemme just make a comment anyways are there listeners from India? So difficult to find like minded community on this side of the world+2
@weedeater64 - 2025-06-04 10:44:33
Dude, you seriously need to shave the back of your head. That shit is super freaky sticking out around your ears from portrait view.+1
@pranavbhaskarjha9892 - 2025-05-21 10:44:33
Vedanta explains it in great detail. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9n6NvDpcwLM+1
@frater_niram - 2025-05-28 10:44:33
Though if you write 80085 you get boobs and the 10yo you laugh+1
@thewooque - 2025-05-21 10:44:33
A....am I aware of my own thoughts?! Ugh the magic of consciousness! Jewish rabbi please save me! That is lot of mental gymnastics, trying to prop consciousness as something special, something magical, but the arguments and proofs are not there. "Feeling" like it's something otherworldly is not an argument. Because we may have hard time understand it, that doesn't mean it's magical non-material force. "Consciousness" is just complex feedback loop, get over it. You are complex system of ifs/elses shaped by genetics and experiences, a self modifying computer program if you wish, reacting to input/sensory data, but sometimes your pattern recognition system goes into overdrive.+2
@monarcas5502 - 2025-05-28 10:44:33
what a time to be alive: claiming we are conscious is "starting a cult"+1
@animesh4627 - 2025-05-21 10:44:34
Yes+2
@realCaptainFordo - 2025-05-21 10:44:34
No+4
@ImmersionEsque - 2025-05-21 10:44:34
Indians have been unable to delve into philosophy since at least the Mughals+4
@animesh4627 - 2025-05-21 10:44:34
@ImmersionEsque true. Coz for philosophy you need to be content first. Since mughals we indians were just busy filling out empty stomaches+1
@human-yy3xt - 2025-05-21 10:44:34
yes+1
@ZOMBIEWOLF29 - 2025-05-28 10:44:34
HAHAHAHAHAHA, 80085+1
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-21 10:44:34
"Consciousness is just a complex feedback loop"? Ever heard of the parts-whole fallacy? This was literally brought up in the video. You didn't listen.+2
@thewooque - 2025-05-21 10:44:34
@one_step_sideways he did bring up occam's razor, and I'm going with it, complex feedback loop is more likely than, uhm, magical "substance" or "force".+2
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-21 10:44:34
@thewooque Occam's parts-whole. Explain how this feedback loop came to be in the first place, as well as all the metaphysical aspects that it decided to randomly generate for no reason whatsoever, that you take for granted.+2
@thewooque - 2025-05-21 10:44:34
@one_step_sideways I can't explain lightning strike, it must be gods fighting in heaven+2
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-21 10:44:34
@thewooque You can't explain anything else either, therefore your worldview crumbles like a chair under a reddit moderator.+2
@thewooque - 2025-05-21 10:44:34
@one_step_sideways At least I'm not using "ITZ DA GOD" crutch. I let people with more time and expertise shine light at the unknown.+1
@QTwoSix - 2025-05-28 10:44:34
>pagan LARPer speaking+1