First, I didn't say "that you are wrong." When quoting me, kindly don't misquote me. At least not intentionally.

It is obvious that dispersing someone's particles kills them.

What if the process requires that the original remain alive for x seconds after the duplicate materializes elsewhere, then their particles disperse? Is it more obvious that the original is dead in that scenario?

If we can do it once, them we can do it multiples times. So we perfectly copy the quantum state of the original particles a hundred times. Do we have a hundred people who are all "one and the same"?


I disagree with the article. Any conclusions about this topic are opinions, not objective facts. Here's a problem right off there bat.

and then — just for an instant — it’s like you’re not really there. — Zia Steele

You're not there. Your particles have been dispersed. Why does the author think you have any sort of feeling at all? Why would anyone think non-existence feels like something?

In my photography scenario, there is no anger until I generate it within myself. I'm not sure it's different in your cafe. He didn't declare that he was angry, and wasn't yelling, muttering, or huffing & puffing. If he had done any of those things, you would not have wondered why you were angry yourself.

Although I wonder if, had he been loud about it, you would have been "drawn in". Knowing what was going on, maybe you would have only been annoyed at the guy with no self-control.

Apart from that, it seems again you're just asserting bodily continuity. What would take things further is an explanation or further elaboration. A couple of posts ago you suggested that freezing time would not end the self, but even a nanosecond of separation would. Why's that? What's lost in that nanosecond? — Mijin

The person's life is lost in that nanosecond. If you disperse a person's particles, the person is dead. That does not require explanation or elaboration. It's an obvious fact.

I was once sitting in a cafe and I found myself becoming agitated and angry. I couldn't pinpoint why. But I eventually realized what it was: without consciously registering it, I was looking at a man with an angry look on his face. I realized I'd experienced empathy that wasn't mediated at all by the intellect. There was just: anger, and I thought it was mine, but it wasn't. I was experiencing this other guy's feelings as if they were my own. — frank

Clearly, his anger caused your anger. But I don't think that's the same as experiencing his anger. Do you think you could become angry from looking at a photograph of someone who is obviously angry?

Heh

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/15877/property-dualism/p1

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/16075/consciousness-is-fundamental/p1

Chalmers has talked about pan-psychism as exemplifying the kind of theory we might start with: just accepting that consciousness is a property of our little universe, and go from there. — frank

Yes! Exactly.

Yes. Do you know Galen Strawson's book, Consciousness and Its Place in Nature? A very good argument for the plausibility of panpsychism. — J

I don't need convincing, but it certainly sounds like something I should read. Thanks.

So, to put it in your "continuum" terms, Napoleon's level of alive is 0.0. And, in the imperfect transporter, the proposition that we are interested in, that is binary, is whether the person stepping into the transporter will be 0.0 alive after the process. — Mijin

Yes, The person stepping into the transporter will be 0.0 alive after the process. Their atoms were dispersed. There is no way to disperse someone's items without them dying.

The person at destination is a copy of the person that stepped into the transporter. We could make any number of copies, either through other means, or by adjusting the transporter so that it makes multiple copies. All of those copies are copies. They are not all the person who stepped onto the transporter.

A scientist doing science is not going to worry about whether an atom of hydrogen is "really out there" or not. As you say, the working assumption is that, if we act as if the atom is mind-independent, we can learn what we need to learn about it. — J

Further, people from different parts of the world and cultures will agree on the details, whether or not they are "really out there". If you shoot someone who has never seen a gun, they are in trouble. People who have never seen a gun who examine the body will find the same thing we find, even if they can't imagine what it is, and their culture and history lead them to describe it in different ways than we would. And send them and me a box with something in it that neither of us has ever seen before, and ask each of us to draw or describe it, and it will be obvious that we saw the same thing.

It doesn't matter that the physical is not of the nature that people long thought it was, and what every child grows up thinking it is. Whatever it's true nature, it plays out as the physical that people long thought it was, and what every child grows up thinking it is. Knowing it's not "really" physical doesn't allow me to pass my hand through a solid object, manipulate solid objects telepathically, or treat anything in any way other than the way we've been treating it throughout history. People walk into very clean glass doors all the time. I'll bet quantum physicists aren't spared that fate because of their uncertainty. They either see the glass, or they get a swollen nose.

Now suppose the object of scientific investigation is the phenomenon of consciousness; not the experience, but the fact. What we want to know is, Can there be a shared, 3rd-person object of study here that is mind-independent in the same way, and not any more or less, than any other object of study? — J

If there is such a thing, we're sure having a difficult time finding it. Partly because it is undetectable by our senses and technology. Do you have any suggestions? Of course, so few people agree on what it is, and, therefore, on how to study it. What objective things can we say about consciousness such that everyone will agree that we should all study it?

That lucidity likely makes it impossible to say the person is no longer there. — AmadeusD

It's a difficult thing to figure out. I don't know much about it, but I assume the storage systems are still there, but access to it is very spotty, and sometimes gone for good. If the person no longer remembers anyone they knew, and acts different than they ever had before, then how do we judge them to be the same person? Yet I know I'd still go see my loved one, hoping they'd recover access to themselves. And wanting to be there to help them be less afraid if they did. It's all very Notebook, eh?

Sure, you (and not the photon) have experience of such things, but per your posts, those things are not what experience is — noAxioms

Correct. There are the things, and there are the experiences of the things. I don't understand how this is controversial.

"Yet somehow, for no reason whatsoever, consciousness just happens to emerge from particular arrangements."

Not for no reason whatsoever. Your biases really show here. Consciousness gives a distinct advantage, many of which are listed in this topic, with the exception of epiphenomenal consciousness, which nobody seems to be pushing. — noAxioms

Of course consciousness gives an advantage. That's not what I'm getting at. Let me try this way.

1) If consciousness is not present from the beginning, then there is nothing but physical. Physical things and processes, and evolution that occurs through purely physical mechanisms, and selects for arrangements that are advantageous only in physical ways.

2) Somewhere down the line, consciousness emerges.

Does it not seem like amazing happenstance that physical arrangements having nothing to do with nonexistent consciousness are selected for, and consciousness, which did not exist and was not selected for, just happens to emerge from those arrangements?

Panpsychism might assert that it's present from the beginning, but it doesn't constitute an explanation of it any more than does any other black box. — noAxioms

True. But if it correct, then pursuing it might lead to an explanation. Whereas pursuing a, for example, physicalist explanation never will.

I have never looked, but I imagine there are plenty of interviews with people with Alzheimer's, amnesia, and whatever else, as well as their families. I would have to assume that family eventually accepts that it's no longer the same person.

Inheriring memories is how the persistence of consciousness is accomplished. It's not an illusion. It's just not what people generally think it is if they haven't thought or read/heard much about it.
— Patterner

Are you totally sure? I've not read the proceeding conversation, but this seems to be a little bit off the mark to me.
We don't, generally, look at a person suffering from Alzheimer's or similar as lacking consciousness. Is that the take you go for? Not a problem if you say yes - legit position, I just don't see it. — AmadeusD

Without yet going back to look at what I was responding to, it sounds like I'm talking about the self. I don't think there's a soul-ish kind of thing inhabiting the body that is the true self, and it is why we have a feeling of a continuous self from our earliest memories. I think, for humans, consciousness is the subjective experience of all of our mental abilities. At least that's the most important part of what humans experience. What gives us the feeling of a continuous self is our memories. We have in our memories, some more clear and more detailed than others, a chain linking us to every part of our past. And what we do influences what we do next, and what we become. So we can look back on our chain and see how we came to be as we are.

Sufferers of Alzheimer's surely have consciousness. But a self? What is such a person's own feeling of self, with no memory of who they are, and no chain to see how they became who they are. Horrifying disease.

if I could freeze all neural activity in your brain and restart it, is that the same instance of consciousness?
— Mijin
Are you freezing it by freezing time?
— Patterner

Does it matter? What is the rule you're going by for deciding if there's continuity of consciousness? — Mijin

Yes, if matters. If you freeze the brain with cold, then you've killed it. There is no continuity of memory, or life, from one moment to the next.

If you freeze time, there is no "one moment to the next". No time during which the brain was dead, alive, or anything else. When you start time again, the very next instant comes without any break in continuity.

Consciousness is simply subjective experience. It doesn't have anything to do with thinking, or any mental activity.
— Patterner

Calling it experience is just a synonym. — noAxioms

No, it's clarification. It seems to me most people think consciousness means a lot more than subjective experience. Cognition, thinking, awareness, self-awareness, and whatever other mental activity people can think of, are usually part of someone's definition, i'm saying none of that is consciousness.

I realize my definition is at least as vague as most, because how can we imagine what subjective experience is without any of that. Nevertheless, I think it's necessary. I do not see any hope of physical processes giving rise to consciousness. Nobody can even suggest how consciousness can emerge from the physical. There is no apparent similarity. Also, it seems bizarre that there is nothing other than the physical, and evolution is a purely physical process, leading to purely physical arrangements for purely physical reasons. Yet somehow, for no reason whatsoever, consciousness just happens to emerge from particular arrangements.

I think we need something that can explain what we experience that is present right from the beginning.

I guess I'm asking how you know you're conscious, that you have this 'raw' experience? — noAxioms

For the first part, as they say, that I am conscious is the only thing I do know. For the second part, all consciousness is "raw". (I would like a better word than "raw" here. Chalmers used it, so I figure there's precedent. But it's doesn't say what I want. Problem being probably no single word does, so maybe just as well to keep it.) It's just experiencing whatever is there. I recently tried an analogy. Think of consciousness like vision. I can look at a blank sheet of paper. I can look at the Grand Canyon. I can look at my wife. I can look at a Monet painting. I can look at a bolt of lightning racing across the sky. I can look at a blade of grass. My vision does not change depending on what I'm looking at. The things being looked at are what's different.

I think consciousness is simply the experience of whatever it is we're talking about. In the case of humans, the experience is of neutral activity that is experienced as cognition, thinking, awareness, self-awareness, and whatever other mental activity people can think of.

The nature of particles, bacteria, plants, and any number of other things, is very different from the nature of humans. Therefore, the experience of any of those things is quite different from what we experience. But it's not because consciousness, itself, is different. No more than the vision in my analogy.

Great post, Dawnstorm.

But the transporter never seemed very interesting to me; it felt like a convenience device — Dawnstorm

I believe Gene said he came up with the transporter because he couldn't figure out how to land the ship.

Your continuity ends when your particles are separated, regardless of the scenario or any considerations.
— Patterner

OK, so you are retracting the point about memory being the critical thing. That's fine. — Mijin

It isn't as though there is no connection between the physical brain and memories. Continuity of memories is accomplished by subjectively experiencing information that is physically stored in the brain. If you disperse the particles of the brain, there is no information to subjectively experience.

if I could freeze all neural activity in your brain and restart it, is that the same instance of consciousness? — Mijin

Are you freezing it by freezing time?

You said the discursive intellect might be a better approach. I presumed you meant the discursive intellect alone. But does it ever work alone? — Janus

I don't see any reason it must work alone.

Can it generate its own material to analyze or are experiences and empirical data not required to provide the material? — Janus

I can examine things wherever it finds them. My general idea is that it we shouldn't be surprised if our physical science can't examine something that does not have physical properties. So examine consciousness with tools that do not have physical properties. Ideally, with tools that have the same properties consciousness has. But there is often disagreement over what those properties are.

Perhaps not measurable, but not detectable....? Can we not tell when people are conscious of something by observing their behavior or asking them? Can we not make a person conscious of something by drawing their attention to it? — Janus

Yes to both. But we cannot hook them up to anything kind off detector and see the consciousness that their behavior suggests is present. We can see the physical correlates of consciousness, but not there consciousness.

but of course one person's plausibility may be another's incredulity. — Janus

Indeed. Maybe we'll get definitive proof one day. But I doubt any time soon.

What evidence can the discursive intellect alone give us? — Janus

I don't know. I'm wracking my brain.

What do mean by saying that consciousness is not physical? — Janus

It is not measurable or detectable in any way. There is nothing about any or all of the physical properties of the universe that is in any way similar to consciousness, or that anyone can point to, and say, "There it is. X is the mechanism of consciousness. Because..."

What if discursive reasoning just is a certain kind of neural activity, and consciousness is also a kind if master neural network, a condition, that is necessary (or perhaps not?) in order that discursive reasoning be able to occur? — Janus

What if? What if it's not? As I said, this is what I think. When someone gives any kind of physicalist explanation, I'll check it out. Maybe I'll change my mind. Until such time, I'm concentrating on this idea. Everyone concentrates on the idea that makes sense to them until someone gives a reason to think it doesn't make sense, or shows why another reason makes sense.

1. You have previously said: "The continuity of self is due to the memories" i.e. taking the exact opposite position on the transporter hypothetical. This is a thing that I am struggling to make sense of.

2. It's easy to just assert a position on this. The critical thing is how you arrived at that position, and how you would go about answering follow-up questions e.g. "What if the transporter spits the original particles across space?" "What if I separate your particles for one nanosecond?" — Mijin

Your continuity ends when your particles are separated, regardless of the scenario or any considerations.

The reassembled person, or exact replica, will not feel other than the original. And anybody who knew the original will not know it's not the original. (Assuming they are not aware of what happened.) But, regardless of what happened next, the person ended when their particles were separated.


I really don't know how I can state it more clearly. And I really don't think you don't understand what I'm saying. I think you just disagree.

Well, I've read your first couple posts a few times. But I don't see that my comments would need different than what over been saying.

Now here's the problem: there has to be a line somewhere between "transported" and "not transported". Because, while "degree of difference" might be a continuous measure, whether you survive or not is binary (surviving in a imperfect state still counts as surviving). — Mijin

You do not survive. The "degree of difference" is not between you at the beginning and you at the end. It is between you at the beginning and the copy of you at the end. Maybe the copy of you will be perfect. Maybe it will be so flawed that it can't be considered a copy. Like if Lincoln appears at destination.

Remember I am talking about your own perspective. So if Picard uses the transporter, I am talking about the perspective of the Picard that entered at the source, not whether the rest of the bridge crew considers it to be the same Picard. — Mijin

The Picard that entered at the source no longer has a perspective, because he no longer exists.

Am I not addressing the original problem?

No problem. Forums can be like that.

I don't know what to do with this thread. This thread is meant to be about a variation of the transporter problem, but I just seem to be having to explain the original problem, over and over again.

It's like I have a theory of a new allotrope of carbon, but all the responses are questioning the existence of atoms. — Mijin

I came in after a few pages, and joined the conversation that was in progress. Thread drift is inevitable, as they say. I'll read your OP before posting again.

A reductive explanation of consciousness would not only show how it comes to occur, but also why it is identical, in some significant sense, to its physical components, just as water reduces to H2O. I'm suggesting that explaining consciousness may not fit this model. — J

I agree.

That's not true. Consciousness is not trying to explain itself―it is reason, the discursive intellect, that is trying to explain consciousness. — Janus

That sounds right to me. I don't think reason and intellect are parts of consciousness, so it's not even a case of something examining itself. Which I don't think is impossible on principle, as J just noted. I think consciousness is not physical, so it's not going to be explained in physical terms. Reason, the discursive intellect might be a better approach.

Ah. I misunderstood how you meant it.

An atom is organic? How is memory accomplished in an atom? How does an atom change what it does in a given set of circumstances the next time it encounters those same circumstances, in order to better cope?

I really can't tell from your post if you want to understand my position. If not, no worries.

If you are, you have a lot of it wrong. I'm not going to reply. I started, but it was too much. I figured easier to start over if you're interested. In case you are, here's a beginning.

I think a photon is conscious. But it is not subjectively aware of any kind of mental activity. It is not subjectively aware of anything that would allow it to act intentionally.
— Patterner
In what way do you mean a photon to be conscious if it lacks all that? — noAxioms

Consciousness is simply subjective experience. It doesn't have anything to do with thinking, or any mental activity. Mental activities are among our abilities, so we subjectively experience them. But, since they are the biggest part of us, what sets us apart from anything else we're aware of, and what we focus on, we came to think they are consciousness.

In Panpsychism in the West, Skrbina writes:

Minds of atoms may conceivably be, for example, a stream of instantaneous memory-less moments of experience.

This is good. He shouldn't have said "minds", though. Minds means mental activity. Thinking. Better to say;
Consciousness of atoms may conceivably be, for example, a stream of instantaneous memory-less moments of experience.
Of course they're memory-less, since atoms don't have memories. But the general ideas is there. There's nothing complex about it. Simple, "raw", experience.

ilding a replica of me means it has my memories, and everything else. But it's still a replica, and I am gone
— Patterner

But when I said that memories are irrelevant to determining whether something is the same instance of consciousness, you disagreed with me. And now you're making exactly the same point — Mijin

I'm not. Consciousness A can be identical to Consciousness B. But A is not B. Identical things are not the same thing. That applies to consciousnesses as much as it applies to mass produced items that are so precisely manufactured that they are indistinguishable. It's easy to understand this. You only need to count.

Once again: from the principled point of view, from my current best understanding of instances of consciousness, I may as well hop in, because persistence of consciousness does not seem to be a thing regardless of whether I take the trip or not.
Pragmatically, I wouldn't take the trip because I would want near certainty before doing anything life or death.

I don't think the question "What would you do in real life?" tends to be very helpful for these kinds of philosophical questions. In real life, we are cautious, and frequently default to taking no action...I'm sure that in real life most people probably wouldn't redirect a trolley towards killing fewer people, for example.
A "God's eye view" is better for drawing out our best understanding and principles. — Mijin

If you are looking at your duplicate, with a consciousness identical to yours, then there are two consciousness. When you are disintegrated, only one will remain. You will be dead.

If a "God's eye view" tells you otherwise, then perhaps philosophical questions are better answered by combining it with "What would you do in real life?".

No, the galley is not conscious as a unit.
— Patterner

I think it may be. — bert1

I'll tell you why I think not. I believe I define consciousness, and interpret everything we see and everything within us, differently than anybody else here. However, I don't think that matters for this particular question. However consciousness works, however it's defined, you and I can do some pretty serious communicating. We can discuss an amazing variety of topics. Philosophy, mathematics, women, comedy, the nonsense science behind various science fiction books or TV shows, time travel, favorite colors, on and on and on and on. We can talk about these things in person, or write messages back-and-forth here, or use pictures and symbols instead of letters, or act out what we want to say like we're playing charades, or phrase everything so it sounds like sarcasm, or phrase everything so it sounds like jokes, on and on and on and on.

If the galley, all the people and all the parts, is one consciousness, it doesn't make sense to me that it would not be able to communicate with us. A consciousness that is made up of, among other things, a bunch of pretty competent communicators should be able to communicate at least as well as any of its independent parts. A human communicates far better than any if its parts can.

And how would such a consciousness act? If the slaves are all part of this consciousness, why does this consciousness still have slavery? Why not a new conscious entity that behaves as one entity, rather than one entity that still behaves like the multiple entities that comprise it, which are so very opposed to each other?

Why is the conscious galley only doing what the humans wanted to do when they crafted the boat? Why does it not have its own goals and needs?

For millennia, people have debated whether or not this or that animal is conscious. Often whether or not a given action is evidence of consciousness. I think a photon is conscious. But it is not subjectively aware of any kind of mental activity. It is not subjectively aware of anything that would allow it to act intentionally. I would expect a consciousness entity that is made up of many parts that can each act intentionally on their own, to act intentionally. But we see no sign of that from a galley.

Inheriting memories is how the persistence of consciousness is accomplished.
— Patterner

The position is the argument. Source Kirk is killed. That's what happens when someone's atoms are dispersed.
— Patterner

Do you not see how those statements are in conflict? Because this conflict (and related issues) is exactly the point of the transporter problem. — Mijin

If my atoms are dispersed, I have no memories. Or life.

Building a replica of me means it has my memories, and everything else. But it's still a replica, and I am gone. The facts that the replica feels exactly like I would feel if I had not been disintegrated, and no conceivable test could tell the difference, don't matter.

I ask again. If you are the Source, and there is a 5 second delay between the duplicate materializing and you being disintegrated, would you do it? If the continuation of your memories and characteristics was all that mattered, you would. But I don't think you would go for it.

What does IIT say when there is no Φ?
— Patterner
There is always Φ for anything. It might work out to zero, but that's still a Φ. Zero I suppose means not conscious at all. — noAxioms

So that's a difference between (at least my) panpsychism and IIT. Zero consciousness does not exist. A photon subjectively experiences, though, obviously, without thought, emotion, memory, sensory input, and most other things that I believe are confused for consciousness. or maybe a better word would be things that are considered unnecessary part of consciousness.

Consider a galley, a ship powered by slave-driven oars during battle. Is such a galley conscious? Not asking if it contains conscious things, but is the boat system, fully loaded with slaves and whatnot, is that system itself conscious? More conscious or less than say you? I ask because it is obviously running many information processing systems. Even the barnacles contribute.

You seem to go with the panphychists, so the answer is probably yes (everything is), so the important question is if the galley is more or less conscious than you, and why. — noAxioms

No, the galley is not conscious as a unit. Many information processing systems make it up. But they don't have to be a part of the galley. They can all go their separate ways, and function as individual units.

An entity that subjectively experiences as a unity can't do that. Like people. Your visual system processes information. But it wouldn't, and would be skiver at all, if it was removed from you. None of your senses would. Nor your immune system. Which information system within you is a functioning, independent unit outside of you? That's what I think makes a unit, in regards to subjective experience.

A guy at another site caught Gemini inn a lie.

This time I decided to test its ability to create jokes.

I first made sure it understood the basic requirements of a Western joke - the 'turn' and what have you - and then gave it an example of the kind of thing I was after. "Two cannibals eating a clown. One turns to the other and says, "Does this taste funny to you?"

"Now it's your turn," I said, "but I want something that you have created from scratch."

It 'thought' for a moment. "Why was the scarecrow given an award? Because it was outstanding in its field," came back the response.

"That's not new!" I told it. "That's as old as the hills."

The AI returned with an embarrassed, "I'm sorry - I'll try to do better next time." — A guy

That seems pretty serious to me. Lying??

It's meaningless just taking a position. What's the argument? — Mijin

The position is the argument. Source Kirk is killed. That's what happens when someone's atoms are dispersed.

Destination Kirk is a duplicate. Destination Kirk doesn't even know he's not the original. But the original's atoms were dispersed, so...

But I'll comment on #3:

3. Nothing I do could possibly make my consciousness persist. Even if I don't take the transporter, consciousness doesn't have persistence, only the illusion of it, because it inherits memories. I may as well let the next guy holiday on Mars. — Mijin

Inheriring memories is how the persistence of consciousness is accomplished. It's not an illusion. It's just not what people generally think it is if they haven't thought or read/heard much about it. But even after all the thought, reading, and discussion anybody has had, it's still what defines us more than anything else, and it's the last thing anyone would give up. How many body parts would you give up before it's not worth it any longer, and you would give it up? Million Dollar Baby and Whose Life Is It Anyway? are both movies about people paralyzed from the neck down who want to die.

Put a delay of five seconds into the scenario. Five seconds after Destination Kirk materializes, Source Kirk dematerializes. Who's going for a ride?

Incidentally, the illusion is also confusing in the “Total Recall” scenario. If person X has the memories of person Y implanted, are they then the continuation of person X or person Y? — SolarWind

There's a fun show called Blindspot.

B: Killed -- The Kirk at Source is one and the same with the Kirk that was born 30 years prior, but he is simply killed by this process. The Kirk that emerges at Destination is a new human, with a new consciousness, that just happens to be qualitatively the same as the Kirk that died. — Mijin

This is the one. Except Destination Kirk doesn't "just happen" to be the same. He's a copy. Of course he's the same. But Source Kirk was disintegrated.

The issue of how, concretely, an instance of consciousness is determined turns out to be really problematic to answer. So, as I say, the simplest option right now is to question the assumption itself. If an instance of consciousness is merely an instant of consciousness, with no persistence, just the illusion of being the same person by virtue of inheriting the memories of the last guy, all the problems disappear. — Mijin

Is it not a problem that, despite there being no self beyond the instant, the "illusion of persistence" of more is the only thing none of us would give up? Is the end of the self, through death or lobotomy for example, anything anybody would try to avoid? If the self is the thing we all cherish above everything else, I'm not sure "the self is an illusion" is the way to look at it. I think maybe "this is what the self is" or "this is how the self comes about" makes more sense.

I suspect nobody would go along with my scenario of being disintegrated after seeing the copy come into being. Much less assuming or being assured a copy has come into being in some distant place. Despite the certain knowledge that their identity, their self, still exists and will continue.

I'd need to see a formal proof to even consider using it. — Mijin

Make up any formal proof, any scenario you like. What is it that would convince you?

Does IIT not say consciousness is information processing?
— Patterner
From what I can tell, consciousness is manifested in information processing. There's a complex computation of Φ that is dependent on six factors, so a huge computer cranking out teraflops for weather prediction probably doesn't qualify.

Still, it's a variant of panpsychism, asserting that consciousness is intrinsic, not emergent. But it is negligible for most things with low Φ. — noAxioms

What does IIT say when there is no Φ?

A computer that processes information may do so remarkably well, and at speeds we can't imagine. ... But that's all it does.
— Patterner
But that's all a biological information processor does as well. You've not identified any distinction. — noAxioms

My distinction came next, when I said even the simplest organism is running many information processing systems. If someone thinks consciousness emerges from physical properties and processes, particularly information processing, I wouldn't think the theory would say it emerges from just one such system. I would think the theory would say many information processing systems, working together as one entity, as is the case with living organisms, are needed.

And I think consciousness is always present, but information processing is what makes conglomerates of particles subjectively experience as units, rather than as individual particles. So the computer might be experiencing as a unit because it is processing information. But, despite how incredibly well it processes information in the one way it does so, it is not experiencing as much as the simplest organism is.

Frankly, though, I'm not sure the computer is processing information. I don't think manipulating 0s and 1s is processing information in an objective sense. It is in our eyes, because we programmed it to manipulate them in ways that are meaningful to us. But I'm not sure being meaningful in our eyes is sufficient. It doesn't do anything. The information in DNA is used to synthesize proteins. The information a retina (or a simple eyespot) generates and sends to the brain (or flagellum) has meaning that we did not assign it. These are naturally-occurring information processing systems that lead to something. A computer can calculate things all day long, and nothing is necessarily going to come of it.

How do I know that, if my atoms are separated, I no longer exist?
— Patterner

Yes. A significant problem within personal identity is whether my particles could be separated for T time interval and still preserve my instance of consciousness.
You have given your position of "no", but is there an argument / reasoning behind that? — Mijin

Would you willingly be transported if, for some weird reason of the technology, the duplicate came into being, and then you were disintegrated? You see your duplicate, so you know your identity survives. Then you wait some seconds, knowing you are about to be disintegrated. No problem with that?

I never heard of Parfit until you mentioned him in the other post. But I know what I think about the topic, so if such a device is built, I will avoid it at all costs. :grin:

Klingons are from this galaxy.

The OP vaguely mentions that its 'like star trek'. This thought experiment is from Derek Parfit. Including the problematic versions. — AmadeusD

The OP is about the transporters on Star Trek, and it doesn't mention Parfit.

This is a genuine question, are you just working through these intuitions as we go? — AmadeusD

No. I first started thinking of it when I read a Star Trek novel called Spock's World. McCoy didn't like using the transporter, because he was worried that the soul would be lost. Silly, because he had been transported many times, so, if that was a problem, it was already too late.

In a good episode of The Next Generation, they went to an uninhabited planet where Riker and a team had been doing some work many years prior. When they got there, they discovered another Riker. When he transported away those years ago, the beam had both gotten through and been reflected back to the surface. So two of him. Both were the result of the same transport. Neither could claim to be more the person that dematerialized than the other could.

Of course, the actual original Riker had dematerialized many years before that, when he was transported for the very first time. So, after the unusual transport, these two were identical copies of a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy... And years later, during this episode, the Riker we had known all along was many times removed from that.