Yes, it’s called genetic-mould. A baby carries the majority of its opinions from the get go.
The more it learns, the more neutral it becomes, but there are certain “no’s” and “yes’s” which continue through the neuter-mind.
The perfect shape, for neuter-mind, is Klien Bottle(or any Klien shape), that’s the result of becoming educated.
I appreciate your response, but I am not really able to tease much useful out of it.
For the record, I have raised two children from newborn (well, pre-new-born in one case) so my comments are informed by this plus what i know/have researched into psychology and behavioural anthropology.
I agree with what you are saying.
I was talking about facts driving the story.
As opposed to something like panpsychism that starts with an assumption.
Though it happens.
I agree with all that.
But, you must admit a lot of what passes for philosophy these days is quatsch exactly because it does not track what the science is showing us.
Bringing it back to this thread, think about the history of baby studies. All the declarations about infants incapacities and limitations. Stuff that any aware connected mother knows are nonsense based on her own real world experiences with said infant’s progression into a toddler, and on to child.
Thanks for the feedback.
Yeah, okay, I’m no academician, my observations are simpler.
Those of Napa (grandpa) full-time caretaking, because professional parents were busy working. No clinical background. I look forward to becoming more familiar with your perspective, lordie knows I’ve plenty to learn.
thanks
Revisiting the concept of worldview, it is not a simple pictorial view of the world, which might also appear to other species with different sense organs, but with no brain power to process the appearance any further than recognising and seeing their food for survival, the same species of different sex for mating, and place to gather and hide away from their predators.
The worldview is a concept of the world constructed with the experience being and living in the world with one’s own interpretations, thoughts, ideas, reasonings and inferences on the appearance of the world within the category of the human perceptual forms.
So you are simply talking about human’s highest thought processes - but is that all that’s going on, or of value?
Granted humans (the lucky ones at least) are the only ones who can spend their time writing or reading, or sipping scotch while “fixing the world” into the late hours of the night.
But does that justify jumping to the assumption that’s all consciousness and sense of sensing and experiencing and navigating life is about. That worldview seems to me about as empty as our human created religions.
That focus on our exceptional “worldview” traps us in a bubble of our own making. While science cuts windows into our mental bubble, so we can view the bigger reality we are embedded within. That reality is interwoven with time and other living creatures which I’ve found endless fascinating and worldview widening. Not just fascinating, but existentially and spiritually clarifying.
Information that has put me on a better footing with myself and dealing with the world I’m embedded within (Isn’t that something all humans long for?)
That is why I believe limiting one’s imaginings to our human conceptual "worldview’ blinds one to a half a billion years worth of evolving generations*, each new generation being born out of the current one, each generation distilling its cumulative life experiences into the next. Any stumble and failure to survive and create that new generation, stops the process.
I never said anything about which is better or worse, high or low.
If you somehow read it as “simply talking about human’s highest thought process that’s all that’s going on, or of value”, then it sounds like the misunderstanding is coming from your own negative mindset on human mind and society you are living in.
I was trying to describe and state the facts how human worldview is formed, and how human mind works from objective point of view. For that process, I mentioned other species with no linguistic capabilities and thinking power as humans for comparison purposes.
Why does it have to be read as one is better than the other, or one is the highest value, all that’s going on? That sounds an emotional statement based on prejudice and distorted view.
If you find other living creatures endless fascinating, then again that sounds like coming from your emotional attachments to those creatures. It doesn’t prove or tell anything about the possibility of existence of their worldviews.
Could be true.
I do believe philosophical self-indulgence carries a good deal of the blame for humanity’s dismal performance over the past seven/eight decades, since our self manufactured human existential predicament (crisis) was made plain for all intelligent humans to see - and we’ve done next to nothing to honestly face our own (admittedly biologically understandable) self-absorbed, self-serving nature. Which locked us into this self-destructive me,me,me dynamic, disregarding everything that was not of immediate self interest.
Whether mine is a misunderstanding remains to be seen.
But if the fact of our evolved origins (and its biological significance) is ignored, why should I be satisfied with incomplete concepts such an outlook is limited to producing?
Spoken as though you think those creatures are meaningless, beyond some sentimental attachment.
I’ve found them being of key importance to understanding why I’m like I am.
Mind you my main object is developing a deeper understanding of myself and my place on this miracle planet - which I always thought was philosophy’s prime objective. Though now that I’ve had a few discussions with real philosophers, “I’m told I just don’t it!”
So what is philosophy good for, if not to help us gain a better understanding of the mystery of one’s Self?
Well yeah. This is a casual discussion. To dig into what a creature’s worldview is like, requires some dedicated effort and can’t fit into a neat soundbite.
Though it seems straightforward enough to point out that we come from the mammalian lineage and that those were the original caregiver to children, so we have much to learn about ourselves through becoming acquainted with the details or their biology and origin. We can get insight into their world view by observing their behavior.
Same as being able to infer self-awareness from behavior - even if we can’t climb into someone else’s skin.
I agree “better” or “worse” is a wavy-gravy.
Sorry.
How about one being more complete, the other more impoverished.
Thanks for the feedback.
Where does that leave the half a billion years of evolutionary heritage each of us possesses?
Yes I have children and grandchildren and a mother with her teenage refuge experiences, in a war torn Hungary and German, that crept into my being by osmosis.
My body/brain is the cumulation of half a billion years worth of learning, producing a mind that registers the cumulative total of my living experiences.
Watching a new born I see a bundle of imperatives at work.
The initial birth sleep can seem like a blank slate, but that only lasts a couple days.
Then that body gets into the rhythm of living, and eyes that are intent on sucking in all the information they can. That infants day is busy with getting to learn it has limbs, then how to manipulate those limbs and watching that evolving process unfold, every day bringing new learning. An attentive nurturing caregiver starts developing a rapport with the infant pretty much immediately that turns into actually intentional aware communication in short order. Or course, fitted into the world reality of that little bundle of miracles.
By about a hundred days, the biological imperative starts getting squeezed by the child’s increasing Ego (not to be mistaken with egotism). As we watch the bundle of miracles blossom into a rambunctious self-willed little person intent on learning every single day.
Then one days flows after another like a cascade down a hillside for the fortunately healthy little one’s. The unhealthy have a more difficult path to navigate.
How is having or not having children supposed to make a difference in terms of understanding whether babies have a worldview when they come into the world ?
And what do you base your statement that they don’t have a worldview on?
Unless you can describe how memory would pass genetically (not "genetic memory " - that is quite different) then I can’t understand what this question is really asking me to say. It leaves it exactly where it is.
This seems to be non-relevant?
Sort of. Your mind isn’t, though. Your mind is yours. You do not have memories of other people’s “worldview”.
This takes months. And is what I’ve described as a baby attaining a worldview. I’m not sure where this coming from or going…Innate capacities are not a worldview, and I think it is that which you are describing. If i’ve got this wrong, please try to clarify - currently this is what it seems like you’re syaing.
I very much hope this doens’t sound condescending - i find hte question extremely elementary so forgive if it seems that way:
Because how else are you going to understand how a baby interacts with the world? By spending time with it. Deep, intimate time where you can attune to it’s behaviours and reactions to the world - and as an adult with a functioning brain, you can categorize these responses into sets like “capacity” “reaction” “expectation” etc.. etc. etc…
It takes months to see any real world->child->world activity (which goes to the second of your questions).
There’s nothing about a newborn that suggests a worldview. It’s not really on me to show why I think they don’t have one - they do not behave as if they do. I’d need something fairly important and unexpected psychologically to get to a stage where defending this seems needed.
Right, and yes, it’s genetic memory, mainly. Though recognize that biological “memory” happens on many different levels, not to be dismissed. After it’s all those “lower” subconscious levels of awareness and communication that are doing all the heavy lifting to make our ego* driven introspective mind possible in the first place. (* again not to be mistaken with egotism.)
But there’s also something happening between mother’s emotions and memories, leaving an impression upon the child. It’s certainly not “memory” per se. I imagine it’s on a more emotional level of “remembered” feelings. And how that in turn influences how said child processes interactions.
Our unique perceptual lens through which we process our experiences are the result of culmination of folds within folds. As it starts during conception and the vibs that mom and dad are setting up.
[Seems to me that desire to categorize and label—needed though it is—also often acts as blinders - disappearing the very real life nuances that people who actual engage with infants experience.
It reminds me of the cognitive conflict of having to answer personal questions on an A,B,C,D multiple choice questionary with no room for nuance. ]
From my Earth Centrist perspective, philosophers tend to be too fixated on the mind and the metaphysics, that they miss out on the fun biological stuff that is actually driving the production of this ability to produce metaphysical level introspective thoughts of increasing introspection and complexity.
Chalmers’ “Hard Problem” and the Living Moment of Now
A story and a challenge for the philosophically minded.
Addendum — A Philosopher Schools Citizenschallenge.
Considering Things Science Can Explain About Consciousness.
Sure. Although I don’t understand why you frame it that way:
“your mind is yours”
I can be more specific. I am an evolved biological animal, my mind is a reflection of my body communicating with itself as it is nonstop interacting with interior and exterior.
There is even a formula that helps clarify, remove a single element and awareness, sense of self disappears and death takes over.
Senses + Body + Brain + Interaction (interior & exterior) = awareness, sense of self, consciousness.
It’s on a spectrum, each according their kind and lifestyle.
It’s been fun. Good night.
Seems fair.
I’m sure you’ve already defined it, but it’s late, I’m new, and a lot has been written today.
Could you define this “worldview” ?
How would you go about catagorizing/defining the cognitive awareness and tools that infants do display?
But this post isn’t about how a baby interacts with the world, but whether he comes into the world with a worldview.
I explained in my post why I think he has a worldview when he comes into the world.
It doesn’t require raising children.
Raising children only lets you see how things work later on.
But shouldn’t it be on you to define what you mean with this “worldview”.
I’ve watched infants behave with intend and capable of interacting, what is that based on in your perception?
Or how would you category that suite of behaviors - including that those vacuum cleaner eyes taking it all in - that switch on (with shocking speed) in those first weeks and never stops developing?
The baby perceives the world through the relationships between these elements:
Proximity, distance, intensity, relief, continuity, disruption, response, and lack of response.
These are the components that his subconscious uses to understand what is happening around him (the world to which he is exposed).
And the way he receives the information constitutes a pattern through which his subconscious draws conclusions about how the world works, that is, creates a worldview.
There are diseases in which the patient can be seen responding to questions while he is in a state of almost complete loss of consciousness.
He answers and does not even know that he was asked a question, as far as his consciousness is concerned, this time did not occur at all.
Hmmm, we were discussing healthy babies.
I’m not trying to set up a gotcha. I appreciate my understanding is limited and I bet I can learn from you. Good faith here, I may understand what I’m thinking, but I want to learn about what you are thinking.
Thank you.
Yeah, for sure. I didn’t mean to be dismissive - but a “worldview” seems to be something largely empirical, and so isn’t actually able to be discussed as something a priori psychologically. Perhaps we’re thinking different things about worldview, because the way I see that concept, genetic memory is not relevant. Genetic memory covers things like predispositions, instinctual behaviours and the neural architecture required to form a worldview over time (think here things like time and space, in Kantian terms).
(fwiw, this is true for babies and fathers too, but I digress). I’m unsure specifically what you’re pointing to, though it seems true in a general sense that babies take on the energies, if you will, of those around them and at a ratio of like 10:1, it’s their mother’s rather than the rest of the world. However, when babies are first born they cannot even distinguish their mother from themselves in any sort of conscious way, but they do react differently to their mother, vs their interoceptive sensations. It’s probably worth taking a second to note I am using “react” very purposefully here, as “respond” intimates some conscious, world->person-> world process which I do not think is happening with new borns. Nor, it seems, does the literature.
I’m not qiute sure whether its relevant for me to go into the rest of this post. I agree that some philosophers fixate, but I think your position is one of looking over the fence for no real reason. That’s not mean negatively, I just think it’s a different conversation.
Beucase you seem to be suggesting that a baby is born with partial memories from other people’s minds? I can’t really understand that claim if not in these sort of terms. I’d be happy for an explicit statement of what you suggest causes a baby to be born with a “worldview” (let me know what you’re suggesting “worldview” entails too! 
)
I agree that minds, generally, and behaviour, generally fit this description. I’m unsure how this grounds a claim about the thread though.
So some of that categories I gave earlier seem to suffice. “capacity”, “architecture”, “reaction”, “reflex” etc.. seem to adequately capture new born behaviour. But I am not a scientist! This is just how, having read a bunch of Lit, raised two children, and a wife who works with babies daily (meaning, i have to as well - she works from home), I have come to understand the thread’s question and how I answer it.
I think a worldview must be deliberative. It must be an empirical taking in of information, jostling about internally, and an output in terms of the “picture” your mind draws of the world, in a large-scale, coarse-grained sense. I do not think even children necessarily do this, but they clearly have the tools. I don’t think newborns do (or, if they do, it’s in the form of potential - the same way a blastocyst is, in fact, alive and human, despite not being a person).
Your question was how would you know whether a baby has a worldview.
I answered it. This response ignores this process.
I do not think you did, no.
Careful - infants are not newborns. Infants can be three years old. A world of difference. I’d say somewhere around six months children start to develop those episodic memories that inform expectations.
That’s just eyes working, no? Nothing special about it.
Literal newborns cannot do most of that.
This example shows that a baby could theoretically be a philosophical zombie. I accept that P-zombies might exist, and so this is not relevant to the claim ad objection.