• Can minds be uploaded in computers?

    If it walks like a.....squawks like a ......and talks like a......then it is a neuron.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    A computer uses an external voltage to push the electrons along. This voltage is programmed to push and pull. The spike potentials in the brain run autonomously. The follow the fractal shapes of the neurons, without an external voltage pulling them in a programmed way.Haglund

    I refer you to my previous response!
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    Nonsense. It's a fantasy which it will always stay. Can we construct a brain in a lab? No. The gods far more real.Haglund

    Who confirmed this viewpoint to you? god(s)?
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    In a computer the currents are pushed along by an external program running at clock speed. Every tick of the clock, a pattern of voltages is pushed to the next configuration on a linea recta grid on the micro chip. A zillion times per second. And you may have a zillion 1 or 0 voltages, changing a zillion times per second because an external program pushes them alongHaglund

    This is completely inaccurate! When you use terms like 'push' or 'external program,' you have to be very clear about the context. External to what? the clock line? the control bus? the processor? RAM space? the computer?
    How does your understanding of clock pulse relate to a home computer system which has a core of 8 processors? How exactly does a serial list of instructions 'push' bits along?

    You should familiarise yourself with the exact detailed step-by-step stages involved in low-level computer operations such as the fetch execute cycle. Get to know what the clock pulse is actually used for.
    Learn about the functions of the SPR's (specific purpose registers) and GPR's (general purpose registers). Learn about the Address bus, the data bus and the discrete lines of the control bus. Then you may begin to understand what's involved rather than just typing comments based on the random snap shots you are sourcing on the internet.
  • The Wall

    I like your OP, I think it's well balanced and I agree with the main points you make, especially regarding theism.
    I think many humans build many walls and help to build many others. Some they use to wall themselves in for their own protection' Their own walled garden, it helps allay their fears.
    Wall building is all about fear is it not?
    The hopeful note is that humans can also tare down walls just like the one that used to separate East and West Berlin. We can also climb over them or tunnel under them.
    One of our greatest strengths and also one of our greatest sources of conflict is the fact that we have such diverse viewpoints. I think each of us has access to powerful mental hammers and many mental bricks and supplies of mortar. So wall erecting and wall deconstruction will continue with gusto!
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    You're still not getting the point. To this day, what have been made possible by science have always been grounded in material reality. The DNA structure was once unimaginable. But now we do have the structure. But only because it is grounded in physicality.L'éléphant

    The future projections of transhumanism are grounded in material reality. Your comment on DNA is valid but there were many before DNA and RNA were discovered, who stated that it was folly to try to understand the fundamental structure of the human genome and that it would never and could never be done, as only god can know such things. How is that viewpoint any different from those who claim that we can never know the full workings of the human brain or how consciousness is created and therefore be able to replicate it.
    In my opinion, the majority of science dissenters do harbor theistic, theosophist or metaphysical belief tendencies.
    Having typed that, I do also recognise that such 'generalisations,' are flawed but I don't feel compelled to delete the sentence for now.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    So while we may not be able to conceptualize (or even agree on) the potential ability for computers to capture, hold, move and evolve human minds right now, the future looks bright for these kinds of technologies.

    This is especially true of transhuman technologies, which include whole brain emulation; as well as other high tech goals, such as super-longevity, super-wellness and super-intelligence. These innovations are the tools for our human transcendence.
    Bret Bernhoft

    Well said! :clap:
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    How can it be useful if a brain memory is not based on static information as in the static maximum information content in a volume of space, the maximum content being the number of planckian areas on that surface? That number holds for memory chips but not for brainsHaglund

    You just repackage the same points again and again. The brain contains static data at any time instant. static just means unchanged (yet). Based on that you can estimate brain capacity at 2.5 petabytes.
    You attempt to conflate that with the proposal that a neuron can be involved with more than one memory.
    and you 'throw in,' static memory media as another distraction and try to use that as evidence that the contents of computer memory cannot be changed. Computer memory IS NOT BASED ON STATIC INFORMATION. SDD's are dynamic. RAM is dynamic the full name of RAM is DRAMM (Dynamic Random Access Memory Module) an SDD and RAM space are the two main memory workhorses inside home computers. There are permanent programs such as the bios (basic input/output system) and the bootstrap loader etc held in ROM (read only memory) this is static memory in the same way that the brain used a static process on how it fires a neuron or communicates with your visual input sensor (eyes). The instructions involved are static.

    I'm not disputing the wonderful new developments in computing. It's the idea that by computing consciousness can be created that's a fantasy.Haglund

    Creating a new consciousness or self-aware android is not fantasy as it is projected from real empirical evidence, unlike your polytheism.
    The concept of extending human lifespan by placing the human brain in a new 'container' (such as a cloned or cybernetic body) after death or just before and the very distant future concept of 'downloading a human consciousness/wetware,' into a hardware emulation/replication of the human brain will never be possible unless we gain a full understanding of the workings of the human brain. If that is achieved then it will become possible to replicate it.
    You think like a person of your time as do others, you lack the pioneer spirit. Thankfully for the sake of the survival and progress of the human race, many humans do and will boldly go into the future while others regress back toward the caves or stagnate where they are.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?

    You offer me nothing new to discuss. You just reheat and repackage trivia.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    Yes, but it's still all computer generators have. All computing is done with 0 and 1. Even quantum computing. And whatever it's based on it stays computing by program, which ain't going on in the brain. Even not when you think up a program.Haglund

    Yet you dismiss transhumanism based on such an elementary current technological level in computing science and you ignore the tiny green shoots of quantum and biological computing.
    Biological computing is doing leading-edge research on being able to identify two or more states which happen within proteins that are stable and reliable enough to represent data states. If they find them, then the biological computer can begin to have traction. Proteins are not the only candidates.
    Consider a time when elements of electronic/quantum/biological computing are merged with genetic engineering. Today's computing science is an amoeba in comparison.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    Exactly. So the fact that computer memory exceeds an artificial number of brain capacity is uselessHaglund

    No because it provides a current guesstimated answer to the trivial question 'can the memory capacity of a computer equal that of a human brain?' that people will ask no matter how trivial you say it currently is.
    It's a far superior guestimated response to a difficult question compared to:

    Difficult question: What is the origin story of the universe?
    Guestimated answer: Gods
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    Which makes the comparison very non-trivial. In assigning a number to brain capacity, the usual definitions of information are used. But you can't use that as the brain memory functions differently. How did Wiki got that number of a pentabyte (bit) information? By counting static units.Haglund

    2.5 petabytes is a guesstimate based on input from neuroscientists.
    People ask hard questions, others do their best to answer them.
    Your comparison of future transhumanism with today's electronic, two-state, mostly still serial computer system remains absolutely trivial.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    The point is, I didn't see it consciouslyHaglund

    But your sensor system did, it just took a while for your processors to confirm the data input.
    Some people don't always say ouch or scream out, the instant they get stabbed. The shock value can interrupt the pain delivery messages.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    And a computer chip?Haglund

    Two transhumans would hopefully be as diverse in observation as humans are.
    Its hard to know for sure UNTIL THEY EXIST.
    I take it you are typing about a memory chip as opposed to a processor chip when you type 'computer chip.' A computer memory chip today is an electronic storage device, nothing more.
    Comparing how an electronic memory chip stores data and how a human brain stores memories is a trivial comparison. We know all about the former and very little about the latter.
    Such a comparison is of little value to future musings regarding transhumanism.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    No. Dreams are not remembered easily. They are just replays of memories, fantasies, etc. Even gods talking to you... Sometimes though you remember every night you dream. Sometimes no at all. Luckily maybe..Haglund

    So do you now withdraw your suggestion that 'all of your life is engraved on your brain?'
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    So what? It's understanding that counts. Not if you can into detail remember. What you put into a computer's memory is just a static view from a certain angle.Haglund

    Understanding is not objective it is subjective. An observer may see a particle's properties based on their reference frame and another observer will report a completely different set of results based on their reference frame. They may not even detect the particle.
    As detailed as you see it.Haglund

    Each observer reports a different emphasis for the exact same visual scene. Ask a policemen who asks honest observers, 'so what happened here then?'
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    I knew someone with such a memory. During my study, once in a while I studied together with a girl. You only had to show her a page for a small time and she could tell you what's on it.Haglund

    I have met similar people. How big was the page, how much writing was on it? etc.
    And even if she could memorise a standard sized book page of text quickly, could she still recal it an hour, day, week, year later and if she could then is that the end of the party trick? can she do it with two pages, a chapter, the whole book?

    All of your life is engraved in your brain.Haglund

    Does that include your time asleep?
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    What I mean is, that it was on the bottom of my visual field already when it popped up. So my brain saw it.Haglund

    So you have good peripheral vision, you were not 'unconscious,' perhaps your 'awareness,' functionality was not paying adequate attention to the results of processing the sensory input from your eyes.
    Always read the small print! Especially in adverts!

    The details all fittedHaglund

    Yeah, was it as detailed as a photograph would be? were the textures the same was every glint the same as in the photograph? Getting the number of windows correct is not that impressive. Are you sure he had no familiarity with the area? If you know how many windows are on one floor and you know how many floors the building has then.....or yeah he might have good instantaneous recall but ask him to do the painting a month or even a week later.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    Why?Daemon

    It a matter of the context in which you use the terms. No human can recall all sensory input they have received since birth. That's the fact that I am content with. Any ability short of that is interesting but meh!
    A way distant, future transhuman system may have such ability.
    the two terms are calmly and very briefly dealt with by a new scientist article at: https://www.newscientist.com/definition/photographic-memory/#:~:text=Photographic%20memory%20is%20the%20ability%20to%20recall%20a,people%20do%20have%20better%20visual%20memory%20than%20others.?msclkid=8004b108c18d11ec9c8257ece85ee5a3
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    Why is that not evidence of a photographic memory? Nothing you've said helps answer that question.Daemon

    My point is that it is not evidence of an eidetic memory. I don't accept that it's evidence of photographic memory either as the two terms are traditionally synonymous. Someone with a photographic memory has to have full detailed recall of every 'snapshot' their eyes have taken in since the day they were born.
    If they don't then they have something less than a photographic memory. They have a memory that can very quickly store the detail of a single, eye-inputted snapshot. You can train your brain to do that or you may indeed have a 'focussed,' ability but it is a quite limited ability that is not that impressive if you ask me. It's akin to advanced acrobatics or physical or mental olympic level ability.
    Genius or individual unusual ability is just so, it is always unwise to suggest it should be projected into the supernatural. The natural is super enough we don't need the BS projections.
  • Question regarding panpsychism
    You're just as dogmatic as Dawkins. There is no escape!Haglund

    I do not claim to be 100% atheist, neither does Dawkings but you claim to be 100% polytheist!
    You win the dogmatist award.

    But believe what you like! Thanks for the discussion!Haglund
    I do engage in belief systems, yes, but mostly, what I currently accept as true, is based on empirical evidence. I appreciate your permission to continue to do so even though I don't require it.
    I wholeheartedly return your thanks for the discussion!
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    It's said that he draws cityscapes after a brief glance, accurate down to the number of windows in buildings. Has that case failed?Daemon

    To answer with a little more detail. This is not evidence of an eidetic/photographic memory.
    Perhaps he has a snapshot capability at best. Espionage agents are put through training to be able to recall a description of up to 30 random items scattered out on a table from a box for 20 or 30 seconds only. Some people can get very very good at honing some impressive recall skills or mathematical skill.
    Some autistic individuals also demonstrate 'focussed,' brain ability.
    So yes the artist you cite would fail a test for eidetic memory.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    On a page with text, the word popped up. It was written low on the page. Before I consciously read it. An example how the unconsciousness works.Haglund

    Yeah :roll: and if you were thinking of a song and it suddenly comes on the radio then that's the gods, servicing your consciousness or perhaps not.
    Yes, that's true. But then you shift the problem to the backup chip.Haglund
    What problem?
    Well, I saw a kid flying in a helicopter over a town. When back on the ground he drew the the helicopter sight in minitious detailHaglund
    Not impressed, If he flew over a thousand towns, over a thousand days and could then draw the one he saw based on my random number choice between 1 and 1000 then I might be more impressed as long as it was scientifically controlled and he was not secretly accessing a photo taken on the day.

    It's said that he draws cityscapes after a brief glance, accurate down to the number of windows in buildings. Has that case failed?Daemon

    Equally not impressed for the same reason as above.
  • Question regarding panpsychism

    You are just confirming my view of your proposed polytheism.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    Yes you can overwrite. But then the other memory is gone.Haglund

    It doesn't have to be, you can save it in backup archival, external electronic memory if you want to.
    You can make as many backup copies as you like before you overwrite. Electronic memory can in fact be eidetic.
    Human memory is also overwritten, with no backups possible. Eidetic/photographic memory in humans is not scientifically proven. Every tested case has failed.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    It reflects what is tried to be done. Consciously, explicitly designing a program according to which a flow of current or no current is forced to behave, which is different from the processes in a brain attached to a body walking around in a world and resonating with that world, a process which developed freely, unforced by a program.Haglund

    You type as if you understand the full workings of the human brain and no one currently does.

    With transhuman I don't mean people with pacemakers. I mean life made by man and superseding man.Haglund

    People with pacemakers is a beginning. You are just saying you don't think a transhuman that equals and even supersedes the capabilities of today's individual human beings is or ever will be possible.
    I think you are wrong. I have found your arguments against to be very unconvincing. I am sure you will say the same of my arguments. We can continue the dance but I think progress is highly unlikely.
  • Question regarding panpsychism
    The difference being that if we make it happen the organisms aren't determining it for themselves and we are basically playing for godHaglund

    Yeah but unlike the, if existent, then totally vile, gods, we have to understand and accept that with great power comes great responsibility.

    I think I'm the toughest theist you have encountered.Haglund
    No sorry but you are the opposite. You have not even indicated that you engage in any particular theistic daily practices. Do you pray? do you congregate with like-minded theists, do you financially contribute? does your theism manifest or gravitate towards any organised religion? Do/have your god(s) intervened in your personal life? Your polytheism even includes dino gods. You seem to give space to every god ever invented by humans. So, yes, I think your theism is contrived but I don't think you have any malice aforethought. I think your primal fears have manifested in complex ways and you are attracted to passing on responsibility to imagined god(s). I know I am attempting to psychoanalyse you with no experience in the field other than my knowledge of people I have interacted with, in my lifetime.
    If my opinion is unwelcome then ignore it. I intend no offense but sometimes offense is inevitable if you wish to speak your mind. Feel free to psychoanalyse me right back!

    The other few responses you posted to me above do not add anything new to the dialogue between us and I have nothing more to add based on your addendums above.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    To make consciousness appear by programming a computerHaglund
    That is a very simple sentence and does not reflect the complexity involved. Its as simplistic and vague and meaningless as god made Adam from the dust and then breathed life into him (no halitosis involved I hope).

    Transhuman creatures can not be made by man.Haglund

    So I take it that you think a human, alive today, that is 100% dependent on a heart pacemaker for their 'alive' status could not be labeled 'transhuman,' I think that is NOT an unreasonable label to apply in my opinion in such a case. They are at least more than the 'traditional' human.

    A natural process unraveling, developing, is just different from a programmed process.Haglund
    So how does genetic engineering fit in with your view above? Is genetic engineering not a case of 'editing the program.' If we can edit existing 'natural programs' and we know the code of the human genome, I would not be so sure, if I were you, that given enough time and scientists in the field, that we will never be able to write our own emulations of 'natural programming.

    We can ask nature and she answersHaglund
    I don't anthropomorphise nature in this way.

    Which by the way exactly is the reason I consider science an art!Haglund
    Science is not an art, such statements are just fanciful.

    but the natural processes can't be known by definitionHaglund
    Yet we know the full human gnome! and we have cloned sheep and cattle and have genetically modified crops. We could not have such technologies if your statement above was accurate. You cant edit a process you don't know!

    The gods are no generally no help in getting to know what they created, but they give a reason science can't provide, and actually, thinking about it, if you know the gods you know the lives they made. And my cosmology is even inspired by them. One big bang is not enough for them.Haglund

    Again you role-play with the god posit.

    Yes, that's true. But I mean the dynamic memory. The memory in the brain is not a static one, like on chips. By the Bekenstein limit, every volume of space can only contain a maximum of information. But the brain can harbor as many processes as there are in the universe. Implicitely. You can engrave zillions of patterns in it and each neuron is involved in all of them.Haglund

    You can overwrite the contents of electronic storage devices. ROM chips are static memory RAM chips are dynamic. The concept that a single neuron can be involved in more than one memory does not mean it can be involved in an infinite number of memories or else a brain would only need one neuron.
    Superposition exists in science but that does not mean that the Universe is only made up of one fundamental unit in an infinity of superpositions and states.

    But can we do that at the expense of natureHaglund
    No, but we can achieve a better future in harmony with that which you label 'nature.'

    God is dead but the gods live!Haglund
    A = dead and A= alive ???
  • Question regarding panpsychism
    But the evolutionary narrative is not ‘survival’, as much as we wish it was.The reason humans are still here is due to a series of variably stable structural relations.Possibility
    Based on what convincing, scientific, empirical evidence?

    Agreed. So why configure it as a narrative of ‘survival’, except to allay our primal fears?Possibility
    Survival is the result of the process. The fact that a result or consequence occurs in the natural world is not evidence of intent.

    This makes it systematically ideal to maximise awareness, connection and collaboration with everything else.Possibility
    All you offer is your opinions which is fair enough as on some points I am not offering much more.
    I simply disagree with your imo generally pessimistic viewpoints. I think your 'scientific points' are trivial and incorrect.

    It just all appears to be moving in a particular direction, and we happen to be part of that.Possibility
    You type that you don't believe in a Universal intent and then you type that it appears there might be.

    Evolution, which we agree to be ongoing and without purpose, is also part of that. We can work with this direction, and in doing so maximise our survival with minimal effort, or we can insist that we’re inherently equipped to determine our own survival plan, and continue to wrestle with forces we’ve yet to fully understand.Possibility

    So, give us some actual examples of what you think we should stop doing and what you think we should do more of. Don't make any obvious suggestions such as 'stop hurting the planet,' or stop warring with each other etc

    When we understand that, it’s no longer so important that WE are the one to achieve anything.Possibility
    Well, you sound like you would be attracted to a more buddhist or tao type approach to life and living. Not for me. I am happy to be labeled anthropocentric in general but not to the extremes of fanaticism.
  • Question regarding panpsychism
    Yes, but that path isn't necessarily determined by genes accidentally mutating in a way that the organism changes and the best adapted survivesHaglund

    Yes it is 'necessarily determined,' we have shown how we can MAKE it happen in our genetic manipulation of dogs, sheep, cows etc.

    That's what the dogma of molecular biology tells, but there is zero evidence for that (which is exactly why it's a dogma).Haglund
    I think you are trying to constantly give the kiss of life to this limited and singular example of the use of the word 'dogma' in a science paper that you have found. You also ignore the fact that dogma is the foundation of all religions. I think the score remains scientific dogmatism:0, Theistic dogmatism: big BIG number!

    That's the same heliocentric (or geocentric) worldview all over again. Why should Earth be special wrt the evolution of lifeHaglund
    What??? Please quote where you think I was being helio/geocentric?
    We have had no contact from other lifeforms yet. We may be the first but I think that is highly unlikely.

    it's likely that dead matter contains the seed of consciousness. Not that the universe contains god, but it carries their imprint. Who knows what's the nature of the basic stuff they created? It's divine!Haglund

    You are one of the most unconvincing theists I have encountered. You are role-playing, for your own reasons. That's the only logical conclusion I can make. I think you just enjoy taking the more esoteric viewpoint. I can't help seeing you try to convince yourself with 'I do believe, I do I do I do believe, I Do I DO I DO. But I am not convinced you do.
  • What is the difference between absolute, contingent and relative identity?
    Not an area of interest for me but a quick internet search produced:

    https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/ergo/12405314.0004.031?view=text;rgn=main#:~:text=Leibniz%E2%80%99s+famous+Principle+of+the+Identity+of+Indiscernibles,the+coexistence+of+two+indiscernibles+is+metaphysically+impossible.&msclkid=9683d5e6c0e211ec8f3e28a1b7f22ea4

    Its a paper from Ohio state University that discusses the topic and refer's to it as PII.
    Might be of some use to you if you are not already aware of it.
  • Question regarding panpsychism
    If most scientists agree that survival is more luck than superiority, then the notion that they’re extinct because ‘they couldn’t do what humans can’ is unfounded.Possibility

    No it's not. Scientists often try to communicate with the public in less 'elitist sounding scientific terminology.'
    It's the same idea as saying the Earth is in the 'goldilocks,' zone.
    So yes, humans are lucky to be here and not be extinct but the reason they are still here is due to their evolutionary path.

    So, too, the notion that the purpose of evolution is survival, dominance and/or procreation.Possibility

    Evolution has no 'purpose,' it is what happens when vast variety combines in a vast number of ways.
    Evolution is ongoing and always will be.

    That, and ‘natural selection’ is a misnomer borrowed from the practice of pigeon breeding - the fact that some variations survived while others didn’t is circumstantial, not by deliberate selection (teleological).Possibility

    Pigeon breeding is deliberate selection yes, natural selection is not a deliberate selection it's a natural selection there is no misnomer. the natural world does entail 'circumstances' within which some survive and some don't so your point is trivial here. Would you prefer the term 'circumstantial selection?' is that the big point you are making here?

    And our relative ‘success’ in terms of dominance and procreation have come at the cost of this ecosystem that sustains usPossibility

    Don't blame the many for the actions of those few who nurture wealth, power and personal status over nurturing people, the planet and all the flora and fauna on it. Join the fight against the nefarious.

    If we do manage to get through this, do you honestly think it will be because of a focus on maximising our individual/species survival, dominance and procreation, or on maximising awareness, connection and collaboration - ie. with the ecosystem/cosmos and each other?Possibility

    I think we can and must do both. I don't advocate for an uncontrolled human population explosion that cannot be adequately catered to.

    And if we look at a broader, cosmic evolution of structures of existence, a slightly different pattern emerges to the one Darwin saw.Possibility

    What are you referring to here? stars forming from nebulous clouds of hydrogen? acretion disks producing planets? galaxy formation?

    A minority of collaborative, homeostatic systems with high variability arise as the foundation for cosmic development at every level, including atomic structure, a carbon basis to life, natural selection, DNA and sexual reproduction, neural networks, social value structures, etc.Possibility

    I think it might be easier to understand what you are typing about if you offer one or two real-world examples to illustrate the points you are trying to make rather than offer a list of generalities.
    For example, carbon-based lifeforms are all we know of yes but I don't see what that's got to do with your attempted downplay of the facts of evolution. There may be other base lifeforms in the vast Universe. That would not downplay the facts of evolution as they happened on Earth either.

    The high variability in each system enables awareness, which in turn enables connection, which opens the door to collaboration... it seems the cosmos has a trajectory with or without us. So, do we go with the flow, or stick with our own plan?Possibility

    So are these just words in support of a panpsychist viewpoint or are you trying to make some other rather esoteric or metaphysical point I am missing?
    I certainly don't think there is a self-aware, manifestation of individuality that we can assign to the word 'cosmos,' which has a 'plan,' or a 'trajectory,' that it's trying to ensure happens.
    What do you mean 'go with the flow?' Do you mean stagnate? wait for the 'cosmos' to demonstrate its plan whilst we just watch the pretty flowers grow? Is that the alternate choice to 'stick with our own plan?'

    While I do believe in speaking truth to power, my approach is not so much top-down, but more about encouraging a groundswell that leaders will eventually be unable to ignore, isolate or exclude - even if democracy fails. I can really only determine what I think, say and do, after all. If I can’t start there, what hope do I have to change the world?Possibility

    This sounds much more hopeful! I don't care whether you go top-down or bottom-up as long as you are part of the solutions rather than part of the problems. You sound a bit downhearted to me and a bit disappointed in your whole species. In my opinion, the majority of human beings are good and strive, damn hard, every day, to give, build, create, embellish, enhance and pass the baton, not take, destroy, control, indulge, use up and wear out, as the nefarious do. I think you are in the majority.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    The most probable future scenario will be that people start realizing, after failed attempts to program consciousness.Haglund
    What do you mean by 'to program consciousness?'

    which is bound to non-programmed natural processesHaglund

    Perhaps you could give an example of this future 'transhuman' system you are trying to describe here?
    Start with a human close to death. What transhuman scenario do you think would not be possible based on your vague description above?

    I am all for protecting the Earth and all the flora and fauna on it but I dont think that bans the human race from making technological progress. What it should ban is nefarious b******** who nurture profit, influence and power above all else.

    The atomic age, the computer age, the space age, the steam engine era, the radio- era, etc.Haglund

    What would you prefer the dark ages? the stone age? the age of kings? the age of empires? the age of stagnation?

    Saying everything will be accomplished and known in the future, as you do, is the easy way out and will lead to a self-fulfilling disaster.Haglund

    The situation you describe above is possible imo but will most likely take the lifespan of the Universe to achieve. I have only ever suggested a future situation when all questions have been answered as a comparator with the god omnis or an emergent panpsychism.

    The dynamic brain capacity is about 10exp(10ex20), a 1 followed by 10exp20 zeroesHaglund
    Human brain storage capacity has been estimated by neuroscience at around 2.5 petabytes.
    A single solid state drive can be bought for around £50 and can hold 1 terrabyte. 1024 of them is a petabyte. So 2560 current solid state drives connected together would have the same memory storage capacity as a human brain.
  • Can minds be uploaded in computers?
    It is ridiculous to think that our minds can be uploaded to computers, since they cannot even be "uploaded" to our brains, which are much more sophisticated systems than computersAlkis Piskas

    I started programming computers with assembly codes and then soon moved onto BBC BASIC.
    Late 1970's. I then moved on to writing compilers for a while. After Uni I started to get involved in real computing science. In those days, Programming was often called 'monkey work.'
    If your mind is not contained in your brain Alkis then where do you think it resides?
    In what way are you using the label 'mind?' Are you using it as a synonymous label for your consciousness or do you have something else......in mind?

    The brain has a dynamic memory capacity of 10exp(10exp20)! A computer chip, max 10exp25?Haglund

    The amount of memory that a particular electronic computer system can access is not limited. It's down to the number of processors you use, the amount of parallel processing you can employ and the ability of your low level and high level systems software to coordinate all of the hardware involved and provide an efficient HCI (Human Computer Interface)
    The memory capacity of a human brain can easily be accommodated by TODAY's electronic computers.
    We cant download the content of a human brain and emulate its workings because we have very limited knowledge of how a human brain functions. Object-oriented programming and heuristic programming are probably small increments on the correct path but as I have already stated, electronic two-state computing is not ever going to be able to download a human consciousness so you are correct in that but few people have ever suggested that it ever could but those who say it could NEVER be done despite the tiny green shoots popping through from developments in quantum and biological computing reminds me of the ancient mindsets who thought that leaving our caves was a bad idea.
    A few thousand years from now, you and I will be considered ancients as will your thinking.
    In a million years time (or maybe more,) I am sure the biological replicants containing one or more downloaded human consciousness which are traveling all over galactic and perhaps even intergalactic space will 'exchange information,' about the ancients that said this was all impossible.
  • Question regarding panpsychism
    That’s evidence of diversity, not of ‘survival’ as the reason for diversity. The question isn’t ‘why are all these other species extinct?’ It’s ‘why has evolution led to our particular arrangement of systems and structures?’ This myth that survival, dominance and procreation are the prime directives - you know that’s not true. I believe we will go extinct only if we keep insisting that this is the planPossibility

    This is a very skewed logic in my opinion and It makes very little sense to me.

    I respectfully disagree. Our prime directive is to ask questions - you said so yourself.Possibility

    So we both ask questions but we don't agree on the answers. We have a little common ground but not much.

    That all sounds noble, I’m just cautious of the attitude. There’s a lot of competing needs there, and it seems like all your confidence is placed in science tempered by common sense and democracy. I wish I had your confidence in this combination at the moment, but I don’t.Possibility

    Well I appreciate you giving me a little room as maybe having genuinely beneficent intentions.
    I applaud and approve of your skepticism. You would perhaps make a good scrutineer of those who have been trusted enough, to be given a position of power. I am an advocate of powerful checks and balances fully established and representative of the people who are being represented.
    You are right not to trust what people say, only trust what they do and demonstrate. We must insist that if a person holds a significant position of power and influence then their actions must be in the full view of everyone they represent. No autocracy/plutocracy/aristocracy/cult of personality/cult of celebrity/religious doctrine etc should ever be able to gain and hold power at any significant level of society.
  • Question regarding panpsychism
    A nice dream. But just look what technology brought us. What's so special about technology and its advancement? It's time humanity turns away from it and acknowledges the so-called scientific progress is a dead end road and looks for new more natural ways of life. Only like that we'll survive. And let's be honest. We know how the universe came to be, we know the particles in it, we know about evolution, and now it's time we should resume a path from which we digressed about 3000 years ago, to take the path of knowledge while not knowing shit. Except for some isolated pocketsHaglund

    Backwards is not our path!
  • Question regarding panpsychism
    Killing the planet, the natural world, getting rid of other species and cultures is not seen in the natural world.Haglund

    Yep we are capable of all of that but we are not responsible for the vast majority of the 99% of all species that have gone extinct. As I have said before, we didn't wipe out the dinos for example.
    Why are your god's such bad designers? The Universe seems to be filled with useless dead lumps of rock and pointless gas clouds that we 'intelligent,' lifeforms will never encounter or need. Why all the failed species and pointless superfluous space and material in the Universe. I wouldn't trust your gods to build a sandcastle they are incompetent idiots. If the Kuiper belt disappeared tomorrow it would have no effect of any universal significance so why did your dimwitted gods put it there?
  • Question regarding panpsychism
    There is insufficient evidence to assume that ‘survival’ is the purpose of evolution, just because it happens to be a result of natural selection. Natural selection explains how diversity occurs, not why it occursPossibility

    99% of all species that have ever existed on the Earth are extinct. This is an estimate but is based on fossil evidence etc. http://www.askabiologist.org.uk/answers/viewtopic.php?id=556
    Pretty strong evidence if you ask me. I think the why is simply 'they couldn't do what humans can,' but we can of course still go extinct due to our own behaviour or if we continue to exist only on this planet.

    all insufficiently explained by Darwinian evolution theory.Possibility

    Oh come on! did you really expect it to explain the list you mentioned? and for you, the fact that it does not explain the contents of the list you typed means it might be wrong about the events it does cover?
    Einstein didn't explain the origins of human altruism or unconditional love either does that devalue his theories as well?

    The notion of god or gods can just as easily develop from curiosity as from fear, even from a combination of bothPossibility

    Sure, you can combine primal fears with any other human emotion/intuition/instinct you like to get to the origin of the god posit but primal fear is the foundation.

    The point I make is analogous to claims that we should focus on prolonging life and getting off this planet, as if they’re the answer.Possibility
    What do you mean by 'THE answer?' I suggest that they are AN answer, a way to improve the range of human choice when it comes to our individual termination and a way to decrease the chance of going extinct.

    only pointing out that science is a tool, and our current interests are motivation - neither should be mistaken for a purpose or goal in itself.Possibility

    I have no problem with declaring my wish/purpose/goal to increase the pace of scientific breakthrough, discover new technologies, improve the human condition, and the range of choices each person has.
    I advocate for better/wiser/immune to nefarious ba******, global politics as well as much more focus and support of scientific endevours, without ignoring the everyday needs of people and planet and all flora and fauna on it.
    I declare it loudly and proudly but I don't advocate a 'blunderbuss' approach at all. I agree with a cautious approach which must have democratic majority mandate before it can be actioned.
  • The Penrose Bounce.
    Prayers won't help. And neither does the doctorHaglund

    Try the tune below. Professor Brian Cox was the keyboard player!