It depends on whether your definition of “sensory input” and “acting on a plan” already require the concept of being conscious. Functionalists have definitions of those concepts which are just about relations of causality (sensory input = something outside the nervous system affects something inside the nervous system) and isomorphism (plan = combinatorial structure in nervous system with limited isomorphism to possible future world-states). And the point of the original question is that when you know you’re awake, it’s not because you know that your nervous system currently contains a combinatorial structure possessing certain isomorphisms to the world, that stands in an appropriate causal relation to the actions of your body. In fact, that is something that you deduce from (1) knowing that you are awake (2) having a functionalist theory of consciousness.
So, when you are awake (or “conscious”), how do you know that you are conscious?
When awake you are not necessarily transitively conscious of it—I think usually we are but there are times when we ‘zone out’ and only have first order thoughts.
OK. But it seems (according to your answer) that when I am awake and knowing it, it’s because I’m transitively conscious of something. Transitively conscious of what?
of being awake, as defined above: “I notice that I am taking audio-visual input from my environment and acting on it”. (The quote should be ‘noninferential, nondispositional and assertoric’ but I am not completely sure it is of that nature, if not, my mistake)
i.e. you know you’re awake when you have subjective experience of phenomenal consciousness. :-) Or something very close to this—that may not be the most nuanced, 100% correct way of stating it.
Would you say that only a functionalist can know whether they are awake, because only a functionalist knows what consciousness is? I presume not. But that means that it is possible to name and identify what consciousness is, and to say that I am awake and that I know it, in terms which do not presuppose functionalism. In this we have both the justification for the jargon terms “subjective experience” and “phenomenal consciousness”, and also the reason why the hard problem is a problem. If the existence of consciousness is not logically identical with the existence of a particular causal-functional system, then I can legitimately ask why the existence of that system leads to the existence of an accompanying conscious experience. And that “why” is the hard problem of consciousness.
You skated past the hard problem of consciousness right there. Why does “acting based on sensory inputs and a plan” correlate with “being awake”?
It’s just the term “awake” is defined that way, or is that wrong?
It depends on whether your definition of “sensory input” and “acting on a plan” already require the concept of being conscious. Functionalists have definitions of those concepts which are just about relations of causality (sensory input = something outside the nervous system affects something inside the nervous system) and isomorphism (plan = combinatorial structure in nervous system with limited isomorphism to possible future world-states). And the point of the original question is that when you know you’re awake, it’s not because you know that your nervous system currently contains a combinatorial structure possessing certain isomorphisms to the world, that stands in an appropriate causal relation to the actions of your body. In fact, that is something that you deduce from (1) knowing that you are awake (2) having a functionalist theory of consciousness.
So, when you are awake (or “conscious”), how do you know that you are conscious?
When awake you are not necessarily transitively conscious of it—I think usually we are but there are times when we ‘zone out’ and only have first order thoughts.
OK. But it seems (according to your answer) that when I am awake and knowing it, it’s because I’m transitively conscious of something. Transitively conscious of what?
of being awake, as defined above: “I notice that I am taking audio-visual input from my environment and acting on it”. (The quote should be ‘noninferential, nondispositional and assertoric’ but I am not completely sure it is of that nature, if not, my mistake)
i.e. you know you’re awake when you have subjective experience of phenomenal consciousness. :-) Or something very close to this—that may not be the most nuanced, 100% correct way of stating it.
Would you say that only a functionalist can know whether they are awake, because only a functionalist knows what consciousness is? I presume not. But that means that it is possible to name and identify what consciousness is, and to say that I am awake and that I know it, in terms which do not presuppose functionalism. In this we have both the justification for the jargon terms “subjective experience” and “phenomenal consciousness”, and also the reason why the hard problem is a problem. If the existence of consciousness is not logically identical with the existence of a particular causal-functional system, then I can legitimately ask why the existence of that system leads to the existence of an accompanying conscious experience. And that “why” is the hard problem of consciousness.
Thanks for your comment but I don’t understand it.