Oh, and he'll quote himself. — bert1
But not before throwing a few invectives into it, just in case things don't go quite the way he wants them to, and then taking cover behind his supposedly intimidating selfie. — Apollodorus
Why doesn't the creation of new mental states violate entropy?
4 hours ago — RogueAI
they again don't know wtf he is — 180 Proof
Huge difference. In the pipes and water, much like in the human brain, there is a program, and the flow of water from the outside (data for the computer; outside stimuli for the brain) affect the program to react differently. The program is not changing; its response is changing to the changing data. Human reaction is different, too, whether the tongue senses sweetness, or a pin prick.If you're willing to believe in a conscious system of pipes and water, why not rocks being moved around in a certain way? — RogueAI
I think there's tension between the claim that matter can produce consciousness, but not vice-versa. For example, it is claimed by many that if you arrange brain-stuff a certain way and run a current through it, you can produce the feeling of stubbing your toe. But if you arrange the feeling of stubbing your toe with the beauty of a sunset while listening to a Bach symphony, you don't a working brain from that. You never get anything material from mental states. Isn't this a problem for physicalists who believe in matter/energy conversion? Why not mental/physical conversion? Why is it a one-way street? — RogueAI
It’s an interesting question, and I haven’t read the rest of the thread yet, but I think there’s a misunderstanding here. Both your descriptions here assume both consciousness and a working brain exists.
Producing a feeling is not the same as producing consciousness, and I’m not sure how you would ‘arrange’ feelings or experiences as you’ve described without a working brain.
The ‘feeling of stubbing your toe’ is a complex interrelation of ideas, including notions of ‘self’, ‘body’, ‘toe’, ‘movement’ and ‘impact’ as well as ‘unpleasant’, ‘sharp’ and ‘pain’. Potentially, it can all be rendered as a pattern of electric current through matter without understanding any of these ideas - provided that matter has sufficient experience to recognise and describe the pattern as ‘the feeling of stubbing your toe’. Otherwise how would you confirm this?
Conversely, one can theoretically arrange all of the above ideas in a particular way to construct a mental state that matches this pattern of electric current - without anyone ever actually stubbing their toe.
Do you believe it's possible to simulate a universe of conscious beings by moving a bunch of rocks around in a certain way? If not, where do you and that comic diverge? — RogueAI
t has to do with the fact that energy in and by itself can't exist. It is CARRIED by matter. — god must be atheist
1. Why should we assume that consciousness can arise from switches? Why is that not a category error? — RogueAI
3. How could you verify whether such a system is in fact conscious? — RogueAI
4. What other collections of switches are conscious? Phones? My desktop computer? — RogueAI
5. What other physical processes besides switching operations can produce consciousness? — RogueAI
I disagree. Photons are massless. Nothing at the speed of light can possess mass. And they are most definitely energy. Wavelengths don’t carry the energy they are a measure of the intensity of the energy and it’s ability to penetrate matter. For example the light you can see from the sun can’t generally harm you but the shorter wavelength UV (higher frequency) light can give you a sunburn as it is of higher energy. — Benj96
I never said you could build a functioning brain out of anything. Your question was regarding whether something with the same function as a brain would be conscious; my answer is yes. It doesn't follow that you can build a functioning brain out of rocks, liquorice or thin air: that is a purely technological problem. But _if_ you built something with the same functioning as a conscious brain out of rocks, then yes, that system would by definition be conscious.
:100: :up:Your question was regarding whether something with the same function as a brain would be conscious; my answer is yes. It doesn't follow that you can build a functioning brain out of rocks, liquorice or thin air: that is a purely technological problem. — Kenosha Kid
Anyway, suppose you built a machine that was functionally equivalent to a working brain. How would you test whether it's conscious or not? — RogueAI
I think the functionalist has to define 'consciousness' in such a way that a function can constitute it. For example, X is conscious if and only if X maps the world and can predict events. Brains can do that, therefore brains are conscious. The trouble is that's not the definition of consciousness that many philosophers are talking about (including me, and I think you). The problem is we can't agree on definitions before we start. This impasse has arisen dozens and dozens of times on this forum and the last. I don't think functionalism is really a theory of consciousness, it's a definition. Most of the time anyway. Sometimes it's a theory, I think, depending on how its forumulated. With the walking and legs analogy, it's definition. Walking just is how that action is defined. And that's not interesting.
Why should we assume that consciousness can arise from rocks? — RogueAI
This is the Hard Problem — RogueAI
How could you verify whether such a system is in fact conscious?
I think this is catastrophic to the physicalist project of explaining materialism. Functionalism won't help here. Functionalism is the problem! Suppose we make a metal brain that is functionally equivalent to a working organic brain. If functionalism is right, it should be conscious. Time to test it! So, how do we test whether it's conscious or not? — RogueAI
What other physical processes besides rock interactions can produce consciousness? — RogueAI
Why should we assume that consciousness can arise from rocks?
— RogueAI
I get the impression from later chat that this clicked: We should NOT assume that consciousness can arise from rocks.
This is the Hard Problem
— RogueAI
I don't think so. The hard problem allows for a bunch of rocks to be conscious, it just doesn't allow a complete third person description of that consciousness since it will not contain "what it is like to be a conscious bunch of rocks". And when I say "doesn't allow", I mean that Chalmers won't hear of it on grounds of taste.
How could you verify whether such a system is in fact conscious?
I think this is catastrophic to the physicalist project of explaining materialism. Functionalism won't help here. Functionalism is the problem! Suppose we make a metal brain that is functionally equivalent to a working organic brain. If functionalism is right, it should be conscious. Time to test it! So, how do we test whether it's conscious or not?
— RogueAI
This has nothing to do with non-organic conscious as far as I can see. This problem already exists for discerning if an animal or even a person is conscious.
I don't predict this will be the difficult part given a more comprehensive model of consciousness. The issues here (in my experience) relate primarily to language. The concept of "consciousness" is vague and therefore arguable. For instance, some people don't like the idea of observing anything non-human as conscious, and that vagueness gives sufficient wiggle room to be able to say, "but that's not quite consciousness" about anything. I think this is also partly why people like Chalmers retreat to the first person in these arguments. It's possible to claim that something is lost when you transform to the third person view, as long as that something is suitably wishy-washy.
But if you really want to test for consciousness, you have to define in precise terms what consciousness is, not what it isn't.
What other physical processes besides rock interactions can produce consciousness?
N/A
— RogueAI
Are you still assuming that consciousness arises from neurons? — RogueAI
I think that if you're going to argue that there's a possible world where consciousness arises from rocks, you're going to have to explain why that physical state is conscious rather than non-conscious. — RogueAI
Verifying consciousness has nothing to do with whether computers (which are non-organic) are conscious??? — RogueAI
You don't need a precise definition of consciousness to verify whether something is conscious. You can verify you are conscious, correct?
...
Do you need a precise definition of water to tell whether a glass has any water in it? — RogueAI
What do you mean here? — RogueAI
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