You assert that there exists some difference between hallucination and reality that can be analysed to show the difference between the two.

I don't see why this difference must exist. I can see that it might exist. But as an a priori for a philosophical position I am deeply sceptical. — Treatid

Well, the most important difference is that the hallucinatory experience is not caused by the things that you experience (e.g. snakes). Instead, the experience is caused by malfunctioning brain processes (possibly evoking memories or imagined snakes) under the influence of drugs or disease or other extraordinary conditions.

The veridical experience, however, is caused by the presence of actual objects and states of affairs (e.g. real snakes). For example, they reflect light into your eyes' photoreceptor cells, which under ordinary conditions causes your brain to produce the visual experience (of the snakes).

Unlike the hallucination, the veridical experience has a continuous and non-detachable interplay with the object that you experience (the real snakes). So when you're looking closer at them, they appear closer in your experience. When you want to look closer at hallucinated snakes, you are not looking closer at anything, and the experience might suddenly disappear as in dreams.

I believe uninteresting phenomena are those that lack primary qualities such as bulk, figure, texture, motion, and so on. — javi2541997

Ideas and abstract objects lack "primary" qualities a la Locke, but can nevertheless be interesting. Many "secondary" qualities are interesting too, e.g. the qualities in music, coloured shapes, food etc.

(Isn't something like that exactly the conundrum that was thrown up by the observer problem in quantum physics?) — Wayfarer

The physics is way over my head, but if there is backwards causation in a block universe and such, then our current understanding of causation might require some additions.

However, scientific realism always pertains to the objective domain, that which can be made an object of analysis, measurement and observation. And the subject who performs that measurement is outside that scope. — Wayfarer

There's scientific knowledge about the subjective domain as well. For example, pains, itches, stress, feelings and thoughts are real phenomena whose mode of existing is subjective, and are therefore studied indirectly via language, analysis of reports, behavior, statistics, shared experiences etc. They are not outside the scope of objective knowledge in medicine, psychology, social sciences, linguistics, philosophy etc. From being ontologically subjective it does not follow that it is also epistemically subjective and outside the scope of objective knowledge.

Humans can name, make an object or thing out of, anything. — T Clark

Only Chuck Norris can do that. :cool: For example, make a fire out of ice, or make wood by rubbing two fires against each other.

There's a good definition - a thing is a phenomenon that holds interest for people. — T Clark

What then is an uninteresting phenomena?

I contest this. — noAxioms

A molecule is a compound of atoms bound by physical fields of force. The relations and structures that these words refer to exist regardless of the words or the social habits of natural scientists.

Money, however, is a social construct that exists only as long as we believe in and comply to conventions of an economic system. Without the conventions money doesn't exist.


A forest is a recognizable object that consists of trees. Neither is a random swarm of unrecognizable gunk from which we construct recognizable objects.

what constitutes an 'object' is entirely a matter of language/convention. There's no physical basis for it. I can talk about the blue gutter and that, by convention, identifies an object distinct from the red gutter despite them both being parts of a greater (not separated) pipe. — noAxioms

Some objects are socially constructed and exist only by conventions, other objects are physical and exist regardless of conventions. Talk of a gutter is conventional, but what it refers to consists of physical parts bound by fields of force into a recognizable whole.

Searle is arguing that two indistinguishable perceptions are distinct becuase... he says so?} — Treatid

No, when you see a tree or hallucinate a tree, some of the same brain processes are employed. Hence their possible indistinguishability as perceptions. You can, however, analyse the conditions under which they occur, which are different. Hence their possible distinguishability by analysis.

However, exceptionally attractive people are much less likely than average to have high goodness, specifically because in their life experience they've been able to skate by on their looks and develop a privileged and self centered personality that most define as very low on the goodness scale. — LuckyR

Hm, I must disagree here. Among the good looking people, some skate by on their looks while others get bullied for having good looks. For example, in our society there is still jocular contempt for blondes or pretty women in general. Being pretty at a work place means that it is easy for the envious or competitive to cast suspicion on your merits and position, because of the widely spread but false assumption that having good looks is almost always a privilege.

Noone observes solipsism, there's no available sensory data of solipsism to encounter, because a solipsist doesn't publish.

The assumption that we never experience objects and states of affairs, only our own sensory data, is based on a long tradition of bad philosophy of perception refuted by more recent philosophers, e.g. Searle.

How do we ensure those who need the medical or psychological treatments get them? — Truth Seeker

For example, by paying our taxes, voting, building and maintaining institutions for public health care and education.

How do we distribute resources evenly amid so much inequality? — Truth Seeker

Which resources? Many resources are unevenly distributed by nature, such as oil, gas, water, crops, knowledge, etc but we redistribute them more evenly by pipelines, vehicles, trade, education/research, adaptation, diversification etc.

How do we replace injustice with justice? — Truth Seeker

Justice doesn't replace injustice, it counteracts and reduces it. One easy way to reduce injustice is by not taking part in it, e.g. don't support bullies, unethical organizations etc

How do we get people to live healthy and peaceful lives? — Truth Seeker

By good examples, shared knowledge and opportunities.

How can we reduce suffering, inequality, injustice, and death? — Truth Seeker

I do not think it’s possible to minimise suffering on global or personal level. — kindred

Suffering is evidently reduced by medicine or psychology, inequality by distribution, injustice by justice, and death is reduced by healthy, peaceful living.

Do you agree that the philosopher must uphold, almost, a fiduciary duty towards the public, in terms of living a certain life? — Shawn

The kids who always talk about being fair and sharing," I recall him saying, "mostly just want you to be fair to them and share with them. — Davy

Help me understand why it is SPECIFICALLY Wittgenstein where I see this?? — schopenhauer1

I recently read an article that has the following quote (translated):

Nothing seems less likely than that a scientist or mathematician reading me could be seriously influenced in his way of working. At best, I can hope to stimulate that a significant amount of crap will be written, and that this in turn might contribute to something good coming into being. — Wittgenstein, 1947

Is AI a philosophical dead-end? The belief with AI is that somehow we can replicate or recreate human thought (and perhaps emotions one day) using machinery and electronics. — Nemo2124

What's a dead-end, I think, is the belief that an artificial replication of human thought is or could become an actual instance of thought just by being similar or practically indistinguishable.

The modern native populations of Europe largely descend from three distinct lineages: Mesolithic hunter-gatherers, descended from populations associated with the Paleolithic Epigravettian culture; Neolithic Early European Farmers who migrated from Anatolia during the Neolithic Revolution 9,000 years ago; and Yamnaya Steppe herders who expanded into Europe from the Pontic–Caspian steppe of Ukraine and southern Russia in the context of Indo-European migrations 5,000 years ago. — https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europe

The first creation story was probably expressed when languages emerged, say, 350 000 years ago, when it became practically possible to talk about causes and effects.

Exponential population growth has been made possible by the exponential growth in technologies, notably medical technology. — Janus

Yeah, more babies survive. But when the standard of living increases, women have fewer children. So initially the population will grow, but then stabilize and decrease, as the majority will be older people.

If the private use is within law and identical to what these companies do, then it is allowed, and that also means that the companies do not break copyright law with their training process. — Christoffer

You claim it's identical merely by appeal to a perceived similarity to private legal use. But being similar is neither sufficient nor necessary for anything to be legal. Murder in one jurisdiction is similar to legal euthanasia in another. That's no reason to legalize murder.

Corporate engineers training an Ai-system in order to increase its market value is obviously not identical to private fair use such as visiting a public library.

We pay taxes, authors or their publishers get paid by well established conventions and agreements. Laws help courts decide whether a controversial use is authorized, fair or illegal. That's not for the user to decide, nor for their corporate spin doctors.

Why are artists allowed to do whatever they want in their private workflows, but not these companies? — Christoffer

Noone is allowed to do whatever they want. Is private use suddenly immune to the law? I don't think so.

Whether a particular use violates the law is obviously not for the user to decide. It's a legal matter.

Is it possible to have a healthy economy which is 'steady state'? Not expanding and not shrinking? — BC

Expanding economies include parts which are steady state or shrinking. For example, corporate profits can be high at the same time as the amount of jobs is steady state or shrinking. Younger generations of the population remain in education or work with entertainment because no new job opportunities arise. They live with their parents until they're 30 - 40, and get no children. Populations are ageing, with increasing costs for society.

Would this change if we somehow limit the expanding parts of the economy?

socialism moot through Universal Basic Income? — Shawn

Not only socialism but also capitalism exploits the fact that we need a sufficient income or outcome for living.

A universal basic income means that there will be no more starving, homeless, uneducated or uninsured individuals to exploit.

However, there will still remain plenty of inequalities for the political interests to exploit in their pursuit of power.

Ok, if your opponent's arguments are also about the nature of the information processing, then they cannot say whether B is theft. No-one can from only looking at information processing.

The painting of Mona Lisa is a swarm of atoms. Also a forgery of the paining is a swarm of atoms. But interpreting the nature of these different swarms of atoms is neither sufficient nor necessary for interpreting them as paintings, or for knowing that the other is a forgery.

Whether something qualifies for copyright or theft is a legal matter. Therefore, we must consider the legal criteria, and, for example, analyse the output, the work process that led to it, the time, people involved, context, the threshold of originality set by the local jurisdiction and so on. You can't pre-define whether it is a forgery in any jurisdiction before the relevant components exist and from which the fact could emerge. This process is not only about information, nor swarms of atoms, but practical matters for courts to decide with the help of experts on the history of the work in question.

Addition:
When the producer of a work is artificial without a legal status, then it will be its user who is accountable. If the user remains unknown, the publisher is accountable (e.g. a gallery, a magazine, book publisher, ad-agency etc).

Regarding the training of Ai-systems by allowing them to scan and analyse existing works, then I think we must also look at the legal criteria for authorized or unauthorized use. That's why I referred to licenses such as Copyleft, Creative Commons, Public Domain etc. Doesn't matter whether we deconstruct the meanings of 'scan', 'copy', 'memorize' etc. or learn more about the mechanics of these systems. They use the works, and what matters is whether their use is authorized or not.

You ask "Why is B theft?" but your scenario omits any legal criteria for defining theft, such as whether B satisfies a set threshold of originality.

How could we know whether B is theft when you don't show or describe its output, only its way of information processing. Then, by cherry picking similarities and differences between human and artificial ways of information processing, you push us to conclude that B is not theft. :roll:

One difference between A and B is this:

You give them the same analysis regarding memorizing and synthesizing of content, but you give them different analyses regarding intent and accountability. Conversely, you ignore their differences in the former, but not in the latter.

They should be given the same analysis.

We already have free press under multinational dictatorships called 'corporations'.

Why is it irrelevant? — Christoffer

Because a court looks at the work, that's where the content is manifest, not in the mechanics of an Ai-system nor in its similarities with a human mind.

What's relevant is whether a work satisfies a set threshold of originality, or whether it contains, in part or as a whole, other copyrighted works.

There are also alternatives or additions to copyright, such as copyleft, Creative Commons, Public Domain etc. Machines could be "trained" on such content instead of stolen content, but the Ai industry is greedy, and to snag people's copyrighted works, obfuscate their identity but exploit their quality will increase the market value of the systems. Plain theft!

How does this prove we aren't a simulation though? — Benj96

So if a picture cannot become a duplication of what it depicts we have little reason to expect that an increased sophistication of the depiction (e.g. computer simulation) could change the logic (asymmetry) of their relation. Therefore we have little or no reason to believe that we are in a simulation.

A version of the argument might look like this:

Assume that simulations are not duplications.
Simulations of experiences are not duplications of experiences.
Therefore, our experiences are not simulations.

Some might want to add that our experiences are real, but the objects and states of affairs that we experience are simulations. But if we are in a simulation, then how could the word “simulation” refer to an actual simulation? If we are in a simulation, then the word 'simulation' doesn't refer to anything actual. Therefore, the claim “we are in a simulation” (i.e. an actual simulation) is false.

Again, I ask... what is the difference in scenario A and scenario B? Explain to me the difference please. — Christoffer

A and B are set up to acquire writing skills in similar ways. But this similarity is irrelevant for determining whether a literary output violates copyright law.

You blame critics for not understanding the technology, but do you understand copyright law? Imagine if the law was changed and gave Ai-generated content carte blanche just because the machines have been designed to think or acquire skills in a similar way as humans. That's a slippery slope to hell, and instead of a general law you'd have to patch the systems to counter each and every possible misuse. Private tech corporations acting as legislators and judges of what's right and wrong. What horror.

So, what are you basing your counter arguments on? What exactly is your counter argument? — Christoffer

If your claim is that similarity between human and artificial acquisition of skills is a reason for changing copyright law, then my counter-argument is that such similarity is irrelevant. What is relevant is whether the output contains recognizable parts of other people's work.

One might unintentionally plagiarize recognizable parts of someone else's picture, novel, scientific paper etc. and the lack of intent (hard to prove) might reduce the penalty but hardly controversial as a violation.

You're right, our bodies, sense organs, and interactions with frogs amount to our ability to identify them. The causal history, however, is what makes it necessary to experience the frog as a frog and not as a hopping constellation of colored shapes.

Another argument against the simulation hypothesis might be this:

A simulation is a representation, and a representation is selective and asymmetric relative to what it is a representation of. For example, a painting of Mona Lisa represents Mona Lisa, but Mona Lisa doesn't represent the painting. It is impossible to produce a complete representation of Mona Lisa in the sense that the representation becomes equivalent to, or a duplication of the real Mona Lisa. Photo copies of the painting represent the painting and perhaps also Mona Lisa, but they are only duplications of each other, as copies, not of the original painting, nor of Mona Lisa. Although this example only considers visual features, the argument applies to any of her features, e.g. sound of her voice, scent, feel of her skin etc. Therefore, it is impossible to produce a complete representation or simulation of Mona Lisa.

Yet many people seem to believe that the whole universe, or at least our experienced part of the universe, is or could be a simulation.

If a simulation exists, then there must exist at least one more thing (or set of things) which is constitutive for the simulation, e.g. a brain, a computer, their materials and properties and surrounding conditions of satisfaction. Therefore, everything cannot be a simulation.

Furthermore, if the simulation (e.g an emergent property within a network of electrical circuits) is about something (e.g. our world at the level of humans and mid sized objects), then we have at least three things to consider: the simulation (emerging from electric circuits), what causes it (a brain and computers etc), and what it is about (a part of our world). So, not only is it impossible for everything to be a simulation, the simulation is just one thing among many other things in our world.

To know whether the things that we experience belong to the simulation or to the non-simulated parts of our world we can investigate what's necessary for something to be experienced as a frog, for instance.

A frog is not just a constellation of coloured shapes that hop around for no apparent reason. Simulations, pictures, or descriptions of frogs are syntactically disjoint and detachable in a way that real frogs are not. Real frogs are continuous, recalcitrant, and seamlessly connected to other creatures and environments, which in turn are connected to chemistry, physics, astrophysics, cosmology or everything. Our ability to identify frogs, as frogs, has a causal history that arguably amounts to everything, but everything cannot be a simulation.

To expect life to be meaningless has its perks, because whenever life appears meaningless the expectation is satisfied, and whenever life appears meaningful you'll be surprised and enjoy the fact that you were wrong. An optimist who expects life to be meaningful does not enjoy being proved wrong. Therefore, I'd rather be the pessimist, but I wouldn't call it nihilism.

Regarding nihilism, I don't think there is good reason to believe that life is meaningless everywhere and always.

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If the user asks for an intentional plagiarized copy of something, or a derivative output, then yes, the user is the only one accountable as the system does not have intention on its own. — Christoffer

According to you, or copyright law?

But this is still a misunderstanding of the system and how it works. As I've stated in the library example, you are yourself feeding copyrighted material into your own mind that's synthesized into your creative output. Training a system on copyrighted material does not equal copying that material, THAT is a misunderstanding of what a neural system does. It memorize the data in the same way a human memorize data as neural information. You are confusing the "intention" that drives creation, with the underlying physical process. — Christoffer

If 'feeding', 'training', or 'memorizing' does not equal copying, then what is an example of copying? It is certainly possible to copy an original painting by training a plagiarizer (human or artificial) in how to identify the relevant features and from these construct a map or model for reproductions or remixes with other copies for arbitrary purposes. Dodgy and probably criminal.

You use the words 'feeding', 'training', and 'memorizing' for describing what computers and minds do, and talk of neural information as if that would mean that computers and minds process information in the same or similar way. Yet the similarity between biological and artificial neural networks has decreased since the 1940s. I've 'never seen a biologist or neuroscientist talk of brains as computers in this regard. Look up Susan Greenfield, for instance.

Your repeated claims that I (or any critic) misunderstand the technology are unwarranted. You take it for granted that a mind works like a computer (it doesn't) and ramble on as if the perceived similarity would be an argument for updating copyright law. It's not.

Sorry, below is Putnam's argument against global skepticism. The argument is based on the assumption that words don't magically have meanings, they have causal histories and constraints (CC) to things in order to have the meanings that they have.

1. Assume we are brains in a vat

2. If we are brains in a vat, then “brain” does not refer to brain, and “vat” does not refer to vat (via CC)

3. If “brain in a vat” does not refer to brains in a vat, then “we are brains in a vat” is false

Thus, if we are brains in a vat, then the sentence “We are brains in a vat” is false (1,2,3)

Ever since I watched the movie "The Matrix" I have been troubled by how to tell what is real and what is not. — Truth Seeker

Here's why we cannot be brains in a vat; https://iep.utm.edu/brain-in-a-vat-argument/

the way they function is so similar to the physical and systemic processes of human creativity that any ill-intent to plagiarize can only be blamed on a user having that intention. All while many artists have been directly using other people's work in their production for decades in a way that is worse than how these models synthesize new text and images from their training data. — Christoffer

What's similar is the way they appear to be creative, but the way they appear is not the way they function.

A machine's iterative computations and growing set of syntactic rules (passed for "learning") are observer-dependent and, as such, very different from a biological observer's ability to form intent and create or discover meanings.

Neither man nor machine becomes creative by simulating some observer-dependent appearance of being creative.

How can an argument for these models being "plagiarism machines" be made when the system itself doesn't have any intention of plagiarism? — Christoffer

The user of the system is accountable, and possibly its programmers as they intentionally instruct the system to process copyright protected content in order to produce a remix. It seems fairly clear, I think, that it's plagiarism and corruption of other people's work.

I don't even know what "I like Ice cream" means when I think it, let alone say it. It is expressed and heard as a process which will have an effect. — ENOAH

Hence, its meaning is expressed.

Epistemology includes criticism about the limits of our scientific knowledge and it warns us against the idea that we can get ultimately objective knowledge. — Angelo Cannata

I don't know about you, but some (e.g. postmodernists) refer to epistemological problems, not because they care about epistemology but because knowledge can be decisive, change beliefs, authority, privileges etc. Some fear knowledge more than death.

So what does it mean "epistemically objective"? — Angelo Cannata

In a general sense, it means that the knowledge is about something, i.e. that there exists some object that the knowledge refers to, is directed towards.

So, for example, my experiences exist in a subjective domain within the objective world, and their mode of existing is unlike the objective mode in which mountains and molecules exist. But our experiences are just as real as mountains and molecules: we have them, think and talk about them, and we express them in various ways, e.g..in the arts, theatre etc. Thus, accumulating objective knowledge about subjectivity, i.e. knowledge that refers to something that exists.

Pray tell, what is your opinion on the state of global education. For me, the critical thinker is resilient to rhetoric and propaganda, the fact learner is however....not. — Benj96

While many facts are results of critical thinking, critical thinking without fact-learning is anti-intellectual.

Lots of propaganda masquerades as "critical thinking" where the sole purpose of the "thinking" is to cast suspicion or doubt on the facts, e.g. to undermine the possibility to criticize false or nonsensical claims etc.

What do you expect from an expression? Expressing my subjectivity is to exemplify some property that it has, e.g. its first person point of view. So, I'll draw a perspective picture of what I see from my point of view, or describe it with words. Its subjective mode of existing doesn't prevent me from expressing it in epistemically objective ways.

Imagine that one day, you get the best idea in the world. You go to tell your friend, but then you realize something: You don't have any words to describe your idea. Is this scenario possible? — Scarecow

It's possible to forget words, stutter, or have a neurological disorder, paralysis, brain damage etc. that makes it difficult or impossible to express thoughts.

It is also possible that you feel that you get the best idea, but when you're about to express it, there is nothing to express. The feeling was just evoked by a wish or fantasy about what it might be like to have the best idea.

Theoretically, however, anything can be expressed.

How do we decide what is fact and what is opinion? — Truth Seeker

We might have different beliefs about the current market value of a house, for instance, but we can list the house for sale in order to find out whether our beliefs correspond to its current market value. What is fact and what is opinion in this case is not something we decide but find out.

There are more than 8.1 billion humans on Earth and our conflicting ideologies, religions, worldviews and values divide us. — Truth Seeker

There are many more things that unite us as living organisms than there are divisive ideas etc. The ideas of power mad ideologues, preachers, poets etc. are irrelevant compared to the wonders of nature.

I worry that we will destroy ourselves and all the other species with our conflicts. — Truth Seeker

Possibly, yet never before in human history has there been so much public attention on sustainability and global climate change. Many of us reduce damage by avoiding unsustainable products, food, and life styles, many businesses are desperately trying to green wash their unsustainable products or replace them with better alternatives.

I think that if we could work out what is fact and what is opinion, it would help us get on with each other better. — Truth Seeker

1 + 1 = 2 is a fact. Pizza tastes good is an opinion. What needs to be worked out here? Look at the philosophers who study the nature of facts, do they seem to get on with each other better? :cool: