Awareness requires representing

About: representation and representing

A representation is a thing standing in one context meaning something else in another context.

Thoughts form in our mind, and we become aware of them. This happens before the thought is represented in words and internally voiced. If the representing in words and the voicing never happens, then it is highly probable that the thought will be forgotten.

Every person that i have talked to about this has observed that same phenomena, i believe it is a common experience, and we can probably find it documented by a cognitive science study.

I think this phenomena is evidence that those representations are mind. Or said differently, if things don't get represented, then there would be no mental awareness of them. Awareness requires representing ... i think we can say, awareness is representing. In other words to represent is to be aware. Not to represent is not to be aware.

So, were my conjecture factual, then to be aware that one is aware and simultaneous be aware one is not representing is just to be deluded.

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Mark de LA says

Einai 2014-05-31 07:18:07 17432

... not always .. try sports, dancing, music ... martial arts ... somethng where action is intuitive.

.. & real-time.

Seth says

Einai 2014-05-31 07:18:49 17432

Einai 2014-05-31 07:18:07 17432

... not always .. try sports, dancing, music ... martial arts ... somethng where action is intuitive.

.. & real-time.

good point ... those are not mental ... they are trained. the intuition that motivates the action is trained. so saying it the same way as above ... the intuition (the training, the habit) is the representation.

Mark de LA says

seth 2014-05-31 07:57:17 17432

Einai 2014-05-31 07:18:49 17432

Einai 2014-05-31 07:18:07 17432

... not always .. try sports, dancing, music ... martial arts ... somethng where action is intuitive.

.. & real-time.

Yeah .... I don't hold your definition of represent (or representation) in my ontology the same way you do or munge it with the notion of training. One does not need training to dance.

Online Etymology Dick: ...
represent (v.)

late 14c., "to bring to mind by description," also "to symbolize, serve as a sign or symbol of; serve as the type or embodiment of;" from Old French representer "present, show, portray" (12c.), from Latin repraesentare "make present, set in view, show, exhibit, display," from re-, intensive prefix (see re-), + praesentare "to present," literally "to place before" (see present (v.)). Legislative sense is attested from 1650s. Related: Represented; representing.

... even close to yours, embodyment of is a kind of copy of what IS -

.. getting recycled?
Very nice try, though

Seth says

Einai 2014-05-31 08:28:26 17432

seth 2014-05-31 07:57:17 17432

Einai 2014-05-31 07:18:49 17432

Einai 2014-05-31 07:18:07 17432

... not always .. try sports, dancing, music ... martial arts ... somethng where action is intuitive.

.. & real-time.

Yeah .... I don't hold your definition of represent (or representation) in my ontology the same way you do or munge it with the notion of training. One does not need training to dance.

Online Etymology Dick: ...
represent (v.)

... even close to yours, embodyment of is a kind of copy of what IS -

.. getting recycled?
Very nice try, though

Well, well, well you say you don't hold "represent" the say way as do i ... yet you talk as if you do ... so i am at a loss to comprehend how you are at odds with this if you even are

.

Though, i must admit, that my use of the same concept of representation (of embodiment, of a copy ... er a symbol) is a stretch when used also to apply to effortless deed that needs of no pre meditation. But there is something a priori to the deed that comes from the actor involved. In many cases it is habit and training. In some cases, like dancing or laughfing or shouting for joy, those might be hard to recognize but that does not mean they are not there. But, yes, it is a stretch (er a munge) to point to those and call them the same kind of representation as the speaking or writing down of a thought. I think here once i already likened them to representation arrows where the length of the arrow was almost zero and the experience was directly in the WORLD.

Incidentally you are not obligated to disagree

Seth says

source: mark
Representing happens after one is aware of something.

I can become aware of something without any representation of what it is or cognizing or signing or language at all.

now if I want to play with it a while I may need to clothe it in language or draw pictures of something like name it.

Well there are degrees and kinds of representation. Take for example the simplest, a tactile sensation. If you don't feel it, you are not aware of it. If you do feel it, then whatever caused that sensation got represented in your brain. It first stood within the context of a physical change, and then got represented by your nerves within the context of your brain. That matches my model exactly. It does not match yours, unless you can demonstrate that the physical change is the same exact thing as the experienced sensation ... or alternatively that you can become aware of a touch sans your brain. Yet either possibility is easily disproved.

Now we can take a more advanced degree ... pattern recognition.

... then we could examine the even more advanced drgree of voicing a thought in language.

... but i will leave that for now, and see if you are at least on board with tactile sensations.

Seth says

Einai 2014-06-02 14:05:15 17432

It is actually the converse of your topic:

Representation requires awareness (or consciousness).

Well we can think about this in language as follows.

My conjecture is: "If I represent, then i am aware." AND "if i do not represent, i am not aware."

Yours appears to be: "If I am aware, then I represent" AND "If I am not aware, I do not represent".

So I think that representing causes awareness, and you think that awareness causes representing.

Not that very different if you think about it. At least we both seem to be saying that representing and awareness always come together as a pattern ... er, like two sides of the same coin ... eh?

Mark de LA says

It is actually the converse of your topic:

Representation requires awareness (or consciousness).

Mark de LA says

Frankly, I don't see what you are going to do with this anyway. Try the sense of speech or language - it is not so convenient to your viewpoint as touch.
So what?
Some representations are better than others depending upon the senses used & the person doing the representing & the quality of the vehicle used to sense & represent with.
Translating a representation into language is yet a third problem.
(so what? ((so what?)so what?)))

Seth says

source: mark
Well you have munged representation into almost anything. I hold it more to the dictionary version below:
i.e. something becomes present & then you re-present it some how with pictures , words etc.
The brain shit is all speculation. Dreams are proof of much of that.

representation (n.)

c.1400, "image, likeness," from Old French representacion (14c.) and directly from Latin representationem (nominative representatio), noun of action from past participle stem of repraesentare (see represent). Meaning "statement made in regard to some matter" is from 1670s. Legislative sense first attested 1769.

There is very little likeness of a turd beheld outside your brain which is in your brain unless there IS !

(PML)

Mark, we are not arguing about the definition of a word here. I gave my term a very precise meaning at the top of this item in bold blue. The question is not what the English word "representation" means to you, or how that differs from how i am using it. That is just a semantic argument best had in some class in writing technical descriptions and is quite off topic here.

The question is whether John's awareness of X (existing in context1) happens if, and only if, a mutated copy of X gets put in John's awareness (context2). That is a clumzy way, without using the word "represent", of saying that the thing first stands in its own context and then gets represented in the context of your awareness. It is far easier to show that pictorially than to use words... see one picture to the left. The simple arrow contains all the information necessary ... the tail of the arrow stands in the context of the person's awareness, and its head points into the context of the actual object.

Awareness requires representing

About: representation and representing

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