A neurological riddle to solve

NO SENSES WERE EVER GIVEN TO THIS BRAIN!

I made this one up to occupy my brain from the pleasure of thinking.
Go ahead, I know I'm nerdy, but I don't care.

If a brain has all 5 senses completely deactivated before it has the opportunity to gain consciousness, and it stays that way until it dies, is it conscious?
Without any senses from creation, you have no knowledge to think about...
With 0 senses and no knowledge, is it possible to think?

Choose your thinking wisely...
Qualitative thinking or
Quantitative thinking?

Someone thinking "quality"
Will think...
one sense or five senses are both equal in terms of usefulness, infinitely far from 0 senses, as they both have some form of knowledge intake, while 0 doesn't.

Someone thinking "quantity"
will think...
1 sense is closer than five.

Remember, what may seem like a concrete answer may just be the roof of your thinking capacity.

Post your answers and reasons!

NO SENSES WERE EVER GIVEN TO THIS BRAIN!

I'd say no. It would be like a computer with no data to process, it would be idle all the time.

It is interesting that we process and consolidate into memory the events of the day during sleep, when the five senses may not necessarily be stimulated. Sleep is essential for learning. So, I guess I would reason that we can think and learn without activation of any of the 5 senses.

But then you're still processing data gathered by the senses at some time. In Dan's case the brain has never been in contact with the senses at all.

FineFriend wrote:It is interesting that we process and consolidate into memory the events of the day during sleep, when the five senses may not necessarily be stimulated. Sleep is essential for learning. So, I guess I would reason that we can think and learn without activation of any of the 5 senses.

What lucidor said.
If none of five senses were activated at all, how are we able to be woken up, whether we get freezing water on us, or have a loud stereo beside us?

I guess I'm not convinced that it would be possible to deactivate all the senses without causing death of the brain.

Its a hypothetical. Assume it is possible, FF.

Ok, whilst I am inclined to answer yes, I must evaluate. Is a brain which receives no sensory input conscious? The core of this question seems to be whether our consciousness is derived from external stimuli, or an inherent part of the brain. The difficult thing about this is the ambiguous notion of 'the consciousness'. As such it is extremely difficult to give any kind of decent reason behind a response.

Nevertheless, this would be my estimate. The consciousness is a function or mechanism of the brain, it serves it's esoteric purpose, whatever that may be. We know it to be so, due to the fact that we have evolved to have it. Much earlier on along the evolutionary path, our ancestors at some stage did not have a consciousness. Then at some stage they developed one. This simply tells us that the consciousness plays some kind of advantageous role.

Furthermore, the fact that all humans have a consciousness indicates that it is not simply a product of specific set of stimulus, but instead either a product of (a) stimuli in general, or (b) inherent to our mental faculties. Even in the case of (a), it is implicit that there remains some kind of latent template triggered by the stimulus, given the fact that virtually and variation of sensory stimuli can be fed to a brain with the same effective development of a consciousness thereafter.

So, from that rationale, I say the consciousness is something with which we are born, either in activity, or latent waiting upon activation by stimulus. Now, a prerequisite for a functioning mind and/or consciousness is definitely stimulus. A consciousness without ever having received sensory input will have nothing to 'output', though may or may not be capable of doing so anyway.

Thus, by my rationale, I would say that should a brain be withdrawn entirely from stimulus prior to the receipt of any in the first place, then it would still have a consciousness. However, the said consciousness would be latent in it's capacity, and completely indistinguishable from a mind without one.

Short answer "Yes, but effectively no".

How do you define 'mind'? To me it's a basic ruleset for how a person thinks. I don't think it is there to begin with, but that it is formed by how our senses are stimulated, much like rivers carve out their paths through a landscape. Conciousness would be the thoughts that flow through these 'riverbeds'.

Does that make any sense att all? :^)

It sounds nice. However, using the same analogy, let me explain how I see it. If the brain is the landscape (the context within which the consciousness is set and bound), the mind would be the intangible aspect of that. Let us say the mind is the ecosystem. Now let us say that thoughts (output from sensory input) are water. Which would make sensory stimuli, or input, rain (the source of the output, being water). Finally this brings us to the consciousness, which I would say is the river (that is the cohesive form to which the thoughts- water- are bound and led by).

Now the question was whether a brain would have a consciousness without any sensory input ever having been received by the brain. In terms of the analogy, the question is whether the landscape would ever have a river without it ever having rained before. My position was that the question revolves around the point of whether our mind comes with a template consciousness inbuilt, or whether it is formed by the very sensory stimuli itself. Or, whether the landscape was formed with a dry river bed already, or if the rivers are formed by the rain itself. Basically, do we start with an empty landscape (brain) which is sculpted by our sensory input and output, or is it already preformed to some extent?

My position was that the similarity of the trait of consciousness within our species, and its likely development in the evolutionary process to serve some kind of circumstantial advantage, suggests that our brains come with a latent template, or predisposition to developing a consciousness. In the analogy; the fact that all of our landscapes end up so similarly, and that the river was most likely formed for some kind of practical purpose (sorry evolution does not translate into this analogy as far as I can see), suggests that we most likely have some kind of predug river bed template, or landscape prone to direct the water into digging one out in a uniform manner.

The key to my final position lies in the classification of a predisposition toward, or inherent template of, a consciousness. I put it as an effective consciousness, though latent. The analogy serves well here. Imagine the dry barren landscape that has never received water (empty mind deprived of stimulus). If there in fact is a dug out river bed, that has never been used, then it is still a river- though an empty one (rationally and geographically, a dry river is still a river). One could say it's full potential as a river is latent, awaiting the arrival of rain. Nevertheless, it is undeniably there. Because there has been no rain, it has no output to direct, and supports no ecosystem (mind). So it is in practice no different to a dry barren landscape without a river. In theory, there is a river, though effectively there might as well not be one.

The alternative is the predisposition towards a consciousness, which is much the same story, though separated by one layer of abstraction in time. That is, if there is a dry barren landscape shaped in such a way (lets say, a basin or valley), that a river will form along an easily predictable path should it rain, then I still say there is effectively a consciousness. The strength of this argument does not match the one prior, as there is no river of reference, however, if it is such that stimulus guarantees a river, then one could reasonably argue that the river is effectively there, though not in theory. In ways it is a reversal of the previous scenario, wherein the river is not in theory present and effectively not, but the river is instead in theory not present, effectively via one abstraction present, and concurrently effectively in practice also not present.

But these are semantics not truly reaching toward the original question.

If a brain has never had any input from hearing, sight, taste, touch, or smell, it would be like a vegetable. How much sentience does a plant have?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Secret_Life_of_Plants
On second thought, even plants respond to sound waves, light, temperature, touch.
So a brain with totally no input of any sort from inception would probably die, as stimulus is required for growth, just as a plant (which has no brain) would die from lack of stimuli.
Very interesting question, Dan!