Well, it depends on what you mean by conscious. There are various meanings
to the word. One is to be cognizant and aware of something by thinking
about it or having a representation of it in short-term memory.

Another meaning is simply subjective or phenomenal, first-person
experience, thought to be made of qualia.

I contend that pain is necessarily an experience, and when pain is not
felt, it doesn't even count as pain.

However, one can be in pain, truly feeling it, but not be cognizant of it,
and not have the idea in their head that they're in pain.

Meditators often realize that when they started meditating and paying
closer attention to their experience, they became cognizant of pain they
hadn't been paying attention to.

To me, this means that the pain was felt but the idea hadn't dawned on the
person that they were in pain. So they were conscious in terms of feeling,
but not in terms of cognizance.

Do you contend that there can be pain that isn't even felt?

On Sun, Aug 12, 2018 at 4:14 PM, [log in to unmask] <
[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Jamie:
>
> I’m interested in what Gregg and others have to say.
> I contend that there is indeed unconscious suffering.
>
> Best regards,
>
> Waldemar
>
> *Waldemar A Schmidt, PhD, MD*
> (Perseveret et Percipiunt)
> 503.631.8044
>
> *Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.* (A Einstein)
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On Aug 12, 2018, at 2:04 PM, Mathew Jamie Dunbaugh <[log in to unmask]>
> wrote:
>
> Gregg,
>
> I understand that Skinner discovered the natural selection of behavior,
> that basically reward selects for and reproduces behaviors, and punishment
> eliminates behaviors.
>
> The psychological term for well-being and suffering is valence. The
> pressing question is what are the physical determinants of valence?
>
> Even the smallest single-celled organisms respond to reward and
> punishment, so how can we say that nervous systems are required for
> behavioral selection? I suppose the behavior of single-celled organisms
> can't diversity or vary that much, but they do have aversive and attractive
> responses to stimuli.
>
> I can't imagine a more pressing concern for ethics than to solve the
> mystery of valence.
>
> The theory that I most agree with is that suffering is a form of
> attentional capture. One might ask, does the feeling of nausea cause more
> attentional capture than a warm shower? I don't think so.
>
> Behavioral investment theory talks about how suffering inhibits behavior
> and pleasure leads to behavioral investment.
>
> The problem of valence also boils down to the mystery of consciousness.
> I'm inclined to believe that Jesse Prinz's AIR theory is very close to a
> theory of consciousness, but I'm not sure if it encompasses all of
> subjective experience. Prinz argues that qualia is based on attention, and
> his book The Conscious Brain provides a theory of consciousness based on a
> theory of attention:
>
> ‘AIR’ (‘Attended Intermediate-level Representation’) theory of
> consciousness. According to this theory, consciousness arises when
> intermediate-level perceptual representations (representations of the world
> at a certain stage in the brain’s processing) undergo changes that allow
> them to become available to working memory.
>
> Here is a summary of his book The Conscious Brain
> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__philosophynow.org_issues_104_The-5FConscious-5FBrain-5Fby-5FJesse-5FJ-5FPrinz&d=DwIFaQ&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=HsR9gv6gGseFjUrmrQlYVo55DOLahSh20a4WjB5VTSU&s=t_VQAuuxAdpA3n0NM_q76FJ72bu0xJfPv4WyPI7EBV8&e=
> <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__philosophynow.org_issues_104_The-5FConscious-5FBrain-5Fby-5FJesse-5FJ-5FPrinz&d=DwMFaQ&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=jhRNOUW91nRKJ_UC-cdIpp_TR7xhasRUtKegjK3j2Dk&s=jlsmOFAkDZ1v07vPrJSW9Dneot6RNoV_jRW9lCdGLVo&e=>
>
> So, I believe that suffering is attentional capture, and this at least
> relates to the idea of a sort of "behavioral capture" as punishment. The
> question is, what is the relationship between attention and behavior?
> Clearly we have unconscious behavior, but I don't agree that we have
> unconscious suffering. Suffering, in my understanding, doesn't occur unless
> it occurs in awareness (which is a broad form of attention; and attention
> is concentrated awareness)
>
> Suffering is used by evolution to inhibit behavior and it does this by
> capuring attention.
>
> A problem here is what do I mean by "capture" of attention? I do mean
> something like a mosquito buzzing in your ear, and I think a screaming
> broken leg is just an increased version of that.
>
> I'm confident that attentional capture at least has a strong relationship
> to suffering. There's a reason Buddhist call the cessation of suffering
> "liberation". But I can't explain why it should feel the way it does, and
> this is perhaps the most important question to solve for ethics.
>
> Jamie
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