Christof Koch - What Makes Personal Identity Continue?

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Personal identity seems so strong. We have the same sense of ourselves throughout our lives, even though everything about our physical bodies and brains is changing constantly. What then causes the continuity of personal identity? Some say personal identity is an illusion, but that seems like cheating. Others credit a nonphysical soul. That seems as though it’s cheating too.
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Christof Koch is an American neuroscientist best known for his work on the neural bases of consciousness. He is the President and Chief Scientific Officer of the Allen Institute of Brain Science in Seattle.
Closer To Truth, hosted by Robert Lawrence Kuhn and directed by Peter Getzels, presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.

Пікірлер: 83

  • @edo9106
    @edo910615 күн бұрын

    Wow Harrison Ford is really smart

  • @ingenuity296

    @ingenuity296

    15 күн бұрын

    😂😂😂

  • @hansolo6139

    @hansolo6139

    15 күн бұрын

    Now that You said it 🤣🤣🤣

  • @0The0Web0

    @0The0Web0

    15 күн бұрын

    Haha I can't unsee it now 😆

  • @cougar2013

    @cougar2013

    15 күн бұрын

    Best comment 🫡

  • @SBG172

    @SBG172

    15 күн бұрын

    Fr 😂

  • @TimJohnston911
    @TimJohnston91115 күн бұрын

    Not long ago I dropped my phone and cracked the display. I had it replaced and was amazed to find that all my apps continued working just the same as before. Then shortly after that, my battery died and again all my apps continued to run after it was replaced. Yesterday I traded in that old phone and was completely blown away when all my apps still worked just like on my old phone except faster and more efficient. I still don’t fully understand how my phone is able to produce all the content from all the apps. It’s a miracle.

  • @jarrilaurila

    @jarrilaurila

    15 күн бұрын

    Exactly

  • @Kritiker313
    @Kritiker31315 күн бұрын

    Someone telling me that the picture on the table is one of me when I was just a boy is an external sensory input that I may not relate to because over the years I haven't followed temporal changes in my appearance by comparing them to that picture. Of course, there's also an internal sense of self that we all have and carry with us through life. When I wake up tomorrow, I can remember many of my experiences from yesterday, including what I thought about, how I felt and what my senses told me because they happened such a short time ago. Yet, I know intuitively that I can't be same person I was yesterday. Aging has changed my body and experiences have shaped perceptions I have of myself and the world around me. My sense of self stays with me all my life but tomorrow I will not be the same person I was today.

  • @kadmann

    @kadmann

    11 күн бұрын

    " I know intuitively that I can't be same person I was yesterday." Define person. Define same. Define intuition. Define "I".

  • @btaranto
    @btaranto14 күн бұрын

    The best answer of this channel ever: we don't know.

  • @christophersinger9149
    @christophersinger914913 күн бұрын

    I really really really don't understand why this is considered to be a difficult question to answer. Our memories, personalities and pretty much everything that makes us who we are are defined not by individual atoms or molecules but by connections between cells. Replace all of the molecules in someone and the connections still exist. We lose part of who we are when connections are lost. This, to me, is self evident.

  • @miglena2s
    @miglena2s15 күн бұрын

    I just started watching it and before even continuing with it, I can say to myself there is more. To grasp the essence (of One) you need to go Beyond the computational power of the brain and its algorithms. I am sure of it. Can not even give a quantitative description as even though such can be found within the brain department, there is this limitation not been able to perform beyond its functional properties and it fails in giving quantitative values for things that lay beyond its department. It serves its function but there is more (lights) happening within the body, mind, and consciousness. Brain is not the composer (transmitter). It is just the receiver. But we do have a composing power within and this is where personal development comes. It is a personal responsibility to follow this pull/continuation (of unified consciousness).

  • @kadmann

    @kadmann

    11 күн бұрын

    Very interesting gobbledegook.

  • @XOPOIIIO
    @XOPOIIIO15 күн бұрын

    That's the most accurate description of the unified experience that I heard in the long time. It's said that so many people doesn't know the fundamental principle on which brain works.

  • @iain9821
    @iain982115 күн бұрын

    Resolved: That the momentary gestalt is too difficult to explain and that the transtemporal gestalt (in which the body completely regenerates, while the mental sense of unique selfhood is preserved) cannot be explained at all. What if we were to proceed (with Descartes) concerning this matter-by "assuming an order, even if a fictitious one"-, so as to advance Closer To Truth?

  • @HS-ho4gc
    @HS-ho4gc15 күн бұрын

    Excellent discussion. I'm in agreement with Christof's thoughts.

  • @darwinlaluna3677
    @darwinlaluna367715 күн бұрын

    Both of you have a great day

  • @TheSpeedOfC
    @TheSpeedOfC15 күн бұрын

    I can answer this - the state of the entire universe now, one planck time ago, two planck times ago and so on...

  • @r2c3
    @r2c315 күн бұрын

    the interval/range of functionalities and also structural units (that are necessary to maintain and therefore enable those functionalities ) is required to maintain a functional 'identity' but the concept itself seems to precede even the minimum required units that enable the expansion and duration of that particular idea 🤔

  • @piehound
    @piehound15 күн бұрын

    I would modify the title of this excerpt slightly as follows. *WHAT MAKES PERSONAL IDENTITY CONTINUE . . . IN LIVING ORGANISMS?* Clearly this discussion is not about the so called " after life. " In other words there's no reference to a soul or a personal identity that survives death. Thank goodness. Instead he mentions the " philosophical problem of free will." Bravo. I would go one step further and say free will is nothing more than a semantic problem.

  • @jamesruscheinski8602
    @jamesruscheinski860215 күн бұрын

    a sense of the present time could provide subjective unity for a physical entity or organism?

  • @PaulHoward108
    @PaulHoward10815 күн бұрын

    Every moment is a different body. The soul is the unifying principle for all the bodies, their parts, and their changes. The connecting force that selects the sequence of bodies, which are eternally existing as possibilities, is prāṇa. When prāṇa is understood, no other force is necessary to explain everything that happens.

  • @realLsf

    @realLsf

    15 күн бұрын

    It’s very easy to assert Indian mystical entities to explain the unknown parts of conscious experience but they have zero explanatory value. You may as well say it’s due to our souls. Unless there is an empirical way to investigate & quantify prana it’s worthless

  • @williamburts3114
    @williamburts311414 күн бұрын

    The reason your personal identity continues is because consciousness exists as an "eternal in the now" existence that knows only sameness of state of being. Your mind and intelligence just flow along the stream of consciousness and time may deteriorate their vitality as we age but time doesn't affect consciousness being that " eternal in the now "existence that knows only sameness of state of being.

  • @XOPOIIIO
    @XOPOIIIO15 күн бұрын

    The unified experience over the life explained by the fact, that change is happening slow.

  • @francescodefilippo190
    @francescodefilippo19015 күн бұрын

    If I think about that, the sense of self can't be just a matter of memory. I explain my point. Memory comes in various types, and as far as I know in this case we should address Autobiographical memory. But let's take for example a person with amnesia, so that I can't really associate things I did in the past with me. While I am oblivious, I claim that my consiousness has not changed all the same. The proof is that when we recover memory we don't experience like fading away of the oblivious one and the rising of the "old" one. It's like my brain can generate my and only my consciousness. What do you think about that? I have never experienced such amnesia, anyway

  • @spobleteo
    @spobleteo15 күн бұрын

    Autopoesis - clousure, structure and organization

  • @heresa_notion_6831
    @heresa_notion_683115 күн бұрын

    The aspiring humorist in me wants to say "a stable environment".

  • @Robinson8491
    @Robinson849114 күн бұрын

    The binding problem is a real problem. It is THE problem. I think universals and particulars are determined unconsciously, thereby eradicating the binding problem. Consciousness is the combination of those particulars and universals that are preselected by the unconciousness. Imo

  • @11-AisexualsforGod-11
    @11-AisexualsforGod-1115 күн бұрын

    The fear of slave retribution.. They where born in it........ our shadow

  • @jamesruscheinski8602
    @jamesruscheinski860215 күн бұрын

    does the brain have the ability to maintain a visual image, with changes to the surroundings being updated?

  • @stellarwind1946
    @stellarwind194615 күн бұрын

    Personal identity is encoded in memory.

  • @JohnSmith-wu6yx

    @JohnSmith-wu6yx

    15 күн бұрын

    Identity is tied to your experience and culture and upbringing and genetics…but has nothing in the development of consciousness. Consciousness is something beyond the sum of our parts.

  • @nusolog
    @nusolog16 күн бұрын

    Interview Žižek!

  • @jamesruscheinski8602
    @jamesruscheinski860215 күн бұрын

    might timing of neuron signals communicate a code?

  • @infividsgaming
    @infividsgaming15 күн бұрын

    Assumption

  • @adamkallin5160
    @adamkallin516014 күн бұрын

    I don’t think there is good reason to believe that our awareness would be the same from one moment to the next. It makes more sense that ”I” only exist in this moment and a new awareness is generated in the next. A potential solution would be that time isn’t actually real and that awareness exists outside it. This is supported by NDEs where everything is said to happen in the same moment, although that is something I can’t remotely wrap my head around.

  • @caricue
    @caricue14 күн бұрын

    These guys have such a deep and abiding commitment to reductionism that they will continue to look at the parts and wonder why they can't find the properties of the whole. The "binding problem" is just a statement of ignorance, and reductionism, of course. Just because you don't understand something doesn't make it a "problem." The "self" persists because we are physical organisms and the self is a physical phenomenon. It is the same reason why life persists over time since they are the same thing.

  • @Robinson8491
    @Robinson849114 күн бұрын

    Twitchy Christof Koch is the best 😋

  • @michaelboguski4743
    @michaelboguski474315 күн бұрын

    I think I have it... Neur-Ons and Neur-Offs... Switches of Krampus! 😮

  • @mickshaw555
    @mickshaw55515 күн бұрын

    Harrison Ford switched his career very late in life.

  • @user-tt4jz3tm6t

    @user-tt4jz3tm6t

    15 күн бұрын

    Unfortunately someone already did the Harrison Ford joke. Try again, please.

  • @mickshaw555

    @mickshaw555

    15 күн бұрын

    @@user-tt4jz3tm6t oh yeah!

  • @AJdet-2
    @AJdet-215 күн бұрын

    Harrison Ford with an Austrian accent after he just got out of biology 101 😮

  • @EmporerFrederick
    @EmporerFrederick15 күн бұрын

    split-case argument about philosophy of identity needs a consideration.

  • @nicholaswest9146
    @nicholaswest914615 күн бұрын

    Do people really walk around with a sense of self?? I've yet to know what this feels like...

  • @nicholaswest9146

    @nicholaswest9146

    15 күн бұрын

    @NotSoGullible That's fair. Maybe I'm so used to the sense that I don't really "feel" it. hm

  • @ansleyrubarb8672
    @ansleyrubarb867215 күн бұрын

    ...Wow how fascinating both of you gentlemen are. I am also aware that each person, all every and every all are so very special in their own way. Every fingerprint, identical twins, is unique. To me each possess gifts & talents is marvelous. Please allow me to interject my own overview It is GOD'S Breathe in our lungs that provides the wonderful Gift of Life & BREATHE within each and everyone of us. Yes we have detailed scope of how our parts function to allow us to Live Out Our Lives. I marvel at the Depth & Breath of Life, the whole Cosmos, the.accumulation of Knowledge, & the Mysteries of Life. How could there ever be, no GOD, humbly, respectfully, Chuck...captivus brevis...you tube...Blessings, Always, All Ways my gifted & learned Brothers...

  • @NataliaMariaAnastazja
    @NataliaMariaAnastazja15 күн бұрын

    What Harrison Ford or his twin brother is doing at this interview?😊 Hello from Poland 🇵🇱

  • @ingenuity296

    @ingenuity296

    15 күн бұрын

    😂😂😂

  • @Arunava_Gupta
    @Arunava_Gupta15 күн бұрын

    The conscious self is not generated by the brain. It's a completely different ontological category distinct from matter. It's what the ancient philodopher-scientists referred to as the "purusa," an immaterial person-like entity, by nature conscious and animating, that remains connected to the brain and is affected by sll its vicissitudes. It's the real personality. It's who we really are. An unchanging (non-evolutive), irreducible conscious first principle, endowed with certain essential features and powers that differentiate us from primal matter and all its evolutes. Some other names for this immaterial conscious personality is "brahman," "nous," "soul" and "atman." Without incorporating into our analysis this fundamental conscious entity, the hard problem of consciousness can NEVER be solved (due to the inherent ontological and functional limitations of the brain and the neurons). In other words, incorporating this entity is _necessary_ in order to solve the hard problem.

  • @simonhibbs887

    @simonhibbs887

    15 күн бұрын

    I agree that consciousness is not in the same ontological category as matter, or substance. No physicalist I know of does. I think it's a process or activity and conscious states are events. That still means it depends on the physical, by being an activity of it, without itself being an object or substance. If you want to talk to someone who does think consciousness is a kind of substance, you'll need to find a substance dualist, although in the recent episode on eastern traditions and the nature of the person some of the guests advocated concepts very similar to substance dualism. I also think the idea of consciousness as unchanging and irreducible sounds a lot like substance dualism.

  • @irfanmehmud63
    @irfanmehmud6315 күн бұрын

    Christof Koch's new book "Then I Am Myself the World" is out. Hopefully we will soon see him in the Chats.

  • @JohnSmith-wu6yx
    @JohnSmith-wu6yx15 күн бұрын

    We will always be more than the sum of our parts, and this is ok. We will never be smart enough to “capture” or “quantify” or “find mechanism of consciousness” because “I” is not contained in the physical.

  • @b.g.5869

    @b.g.5869

    15 күн бұрын

    Baseless assertion.

  • @darwinlaluna3677
    @darwinlaluna367715 күн бұрын

    I am me, what I know is what i say, for being a positive ,

  • @b.g.5869

    @b.g.5869

    15 күн бұрын

    With all due respect, there is zero information content in what you wrote.

  • @PhillipYewTree
    @PhillipYewTree15 күн бұрын

    It seems like he’s looking for corners in a circle

  • @S3RAVA3LM
    @S3RAVA3LM15 күн бұрын

    Just stick to the mathematics, fellas. All we need are the figures and not your sentiments. Leave the inquiries for the dialecticians and masters of Philosophy. Little materialist views are futile.

  • @tomjackson7755

    @tomjackson7755

    15 күн бұрын

    I get it we are instead supposed to listen your make believe and fantasies that you call "wisdom". SMH

  • @S3RAVA3LM

    @S3RAVA3LM

    14 күн бұрын

    @@tomjackson7755 what are you trying to say?

  • @tomjackson7755

    @tomjackson7755

    14 күн бұрын

    @@S3RAVA3LM Don't you have the "wisdom" to figure it out?

  • @S3RAVA3LM

    @S3RAVA3LM

    14 күн бұрын

    @@tomjackson7755 wisdom isn't episteme or intelligent sophistry. Wisdom is one with soul. A person doesn't have a soul. People have cars, money, problems, desires, and apparently, decietful jobs.

  • @tomjackson7755

    @tomjackson7755

    14 күн бұрын

    @@S3RAVA3LM Do you realize that you proved that you don't have any idea what wisdom is? I guess that can be added to the long list of other things you have gotten completely wrong.

  • @Maxwell-mv9rx
    @Maxwell-mv9rx15 күн бұрын

    Rambling gibberich. It is NOT neurosience because guys shows rambling than neurosience proceendings.

  • @MegaDonaldification
    @MegaDonaldification15 күн бұрын

    Christof, you are not being truth to yourself. Your science is extremely wrong.

  • @simiuciacia

    @simiuciacia

    15 күн бұрын

    that's not his science, there is only one science, and rules us all, meanwhile there are thousands of different religions and there's no reason to believe one instead of another, so we'll stick to science, thx anyway mr. Pascal

  • @S3RAVA3LM

    @S3RAVA3LM

    15 күн бұрын

    ​@@simiuciaciascience is endlessly revised. It's not principle as is truth. Science is an activity based on a faculty, that is, by essence. You're stuck at the activity part. You think existential happening and contingents surmounts the universals, and you're wrong. Science isn't something, hasn't being or essence, nor is principle, but you here, treat it as if it were. Science isn't the substratum of all. I know you're trying to put religion down and extol science. And even still, religous persons are better than you.

  • @deanodebo

    @deanodebo

    15 күн бұрын

    @@S3RAVA3LMexcellent response. Yes indeed, those that profess scientific theories as “true” are actually professing a faith - scientism. Quite common

  • @simiuciacia

    @simiuciacia

    15 күн бұрын

    @@S3RAVA3LM there is a very distinct difference between religion[n] and science, if science doesn't know and can't prove something then it accepts the answer "we don't know", religions meanwhile all have different answers for the unknown. Science is not the creed of the atheist by choice, but by consequence of reason. I am a very spiritual individual, and I respect every belief, but not when it condemns the non or different believers, and those very people like OP in this case are so eager to undermine and judge. And to answer your last statement, no I am no better than anyone else, there is no "better"

  • @juanferbriceno4411
    @juanferbriceno441115 күн бұрын

    this is so much bull shit....a word salad that says nothing