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Feral Minds

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Re: Feral Minds

#21

Post by beezlebroxxxxxx »

hiAndrewQuinn wrote: post #16
beezlebroxxxxxx wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It may be that the tools we have come to rely on so much to define such terms are, almost by definition, inadequate to to define consciousness. And yet, we are confronted by the fact that we use the concept of consciousness in dozens of different contexts and we understand perfectly well (usually) what people are talking about. That's the basic insight of ordinary language philosophy. These aren't fundamental myste…

Mm, I'm still on the "by definition inadequate" side personally. I just don't see any unambiguous way to verify that another being even experiences qualia, to say nothing of actual consciousness.

> I just don't see any unambiguous way to verify that another being even experiences qualia, to say nothing of actual consciousness

That's actually one of the core parts of Wittgenstein's "Private Language Argument"[0]. The problem isn't so much that verification is "difficult", it's that certainty in the specific sense of intelligibly private is a logical impossibility. The implication is that "experiential qualia" have a specific intelligible meaning in language (or even more broadly in behaviour), which is to say that our "subjectivity" is personal but not private. Further implications tumble outward. For instance, Wittgenstein spends a lot of time discussing the "qualia" of pain. It was (and still is, obviously considering the rise of "AI" discussions lately) an enormously consequential argument in philosophy.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_language_argument#:~:t....

Re: Feral Minds

#23

Post by codeulike »

djoldman wrote: post #4

Unfortunately, the hype about LLMs has generated breathless ruminations on AGI and consciousness. Dig a little deeper and there doesn't seem to be much there, as one may find that these terms are not adequately defined. Here we see this attempt: > First, a disclaimer. Consciousness is a notoriously slippery term, if nonetheless possessed of a certain common-sense quality. In some ways, being conscious just means bein…

This is why the Turing Test gets talked about a lot (although I gather Turing's original 'imitation game' suggestion had slightly different emphasis).

If you can reliably reproduce a situation where a human can't tell whether they are conversing with an AI or a Human, then thats a kindof yardstick.

So yes we can't define consciousness but we've got a sortof yardstick for when we might consider something to have achieved it.

And people think the Turing Test is too easy but the point is that the 'tester' should ask difficult questions to try and probe the depth of thinking of their subject.

Re: Feral Minds

#24

Post by heckraiser »

Throwing out the definition of consciousness as “the inflection upon the potential of existential being.”

All matter in the universe is dormant consciousness and life technology animates this through electrochemical biotechnology.

By this definition quantum computers are more consciousness than an infinitely complex algorithm, yet consciousness is analogue (not qubits.)

We still understand so little and I accept your skepticism yet this is the definition that is not being discussed.

All those other messy details are yours to sort out (bacteria has bacterial consciousness.)

Our brains are vast by comparison, and like any holographic system (constructive and destructive interfering wave fronts) higher resolution.

Also subjective doesn’t mean some detached arbitrary thing, it literally means (and may be a direct synonym of) “a point of perspective.” In a non anthropomorphic way it means from the perspective of a specific instance of a thing (forensic referential interpretation.) In this way the angular corners of a triangle are subjectively relative to one and other, yet all exist on an objective plane.

Re: Feral Minds

#25

Post by Cacti »

heckraiser wrote: post #24

Throwing out the definition of consciousness as “the inflection upon the potential of existential being.” All matter in the universe is dormant consciousness and life technology animates this through electrochemical biotechnology. By this definition quantum computers are more consciousness than an infinitely complex algorithm, yet consciousness is analogue (not qubits.) We still understand so little and I accept your…

what are you talking about

Re: Feral Minds

#26

Post by heckraiser »

Cacti wrote: post #25
heckraiser wrote: post #24

Throwing out the definition of consciousness as “the inflection upon the potential of existential being.” All matter in the universe is dormant consciousness and life technology animates this through electrochemical biotechnology. By this definition quantum computers are more consciousness than an infinitely complex algorithm, yet consciousness is analogue (not qubits.) We still understand so little and I accept your…

what are you talking about

A perspective on the definition of consciousness. Sorry I didn’t respond in line to the comments I am actually addressing. I thought it overall relevant.

By all this I am saying consciousness is our echo chamber, something grounded in the quantum cloister of objective reality, not directly related to intelligence.

Re: Feral Minds

#28

Post by bumby »

082349872349872 wrote: post #19
ben_w wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great (although that's a hypothesis for a cause rather than a definition), but for any discussion with another person, you have to be sure in advance that they don't use one of the other 49 common meanings of "consciousness". What I care about when I ask if an AI is or isn't conscious, is if it has the kind of experiences of existing that I know I have. Why is there a feeling of sensations rather than just the sensat…

How do we know that other H sapiens have the same kind of experiences of existing as you have? Best I can do is that "I know, right?" is a fairly universal reaction, so we know that even if others' qualia are not identical to ours, they are at least isomorphic. As to "more than mere stimulus-response", much of me is pretty basic stimulus-response. Certainly the derivative controller, and arguably all the proportional…

>How do we know that other H sapiens have the same kind of experiences of existing as you have? Best I can do is that "I know, right?"

This was answered in a different comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39103099

I think the point is that we agree that I (as the individual asking) has consciousness, then we can infer that others have consciousness based on similarity. Another H sapiens is very much like me, so they are very likely to have similar experiences. Chimpanzees less so, but still similar enough to infer they are more likely than not to be have similar experience. And on down the line, through dogs, earthworms, plants, and bacteria...each getting potentially less likely the further from similitude they become.

Re: Feral Minds

#29

Post by Throw84949 »

codeulike wrote: post #23
djoldman wrote: post #4

Unfortunately, the hype about LLMs has generated breathless ruminations on AGI and consciousness. Dig a little deeper and there doesn't seem to be much there, as one may find that these terms are not adequately defined. Here we see this attempt: > First, a disclaimer. Consciousness is a notoriously slippery term, if nonetheless possessed of a certain common-sense quality. In some ways, being conscious just means bein…

This is why the Turing Test gets talked about a lot (although I gather Turing's original 'imitation game' suggestion had slightly different emphasis). If you can reliably reproduce a situation where a human can't tell whether they are conversing with an AI or a Human, then thats a kindof yardstick. So yes we can't define consciousness but we've got a sortof yardstick for when we might consider something to have achie…

Can some people even pass Turing test?

Re: Feral Minds

#30

Post by lebuffon »

djoldman wrote: post #4

Unfortunately, the hype about LLMs has generated breathless ruminations on AGI and consciousness. Dig a little deeper and there doesn't seem to be much there, as one may find that these terms are not adequately defined. Here we see this attempt: > First, a disclaimer. Consciousness is a notoriously slippery term, if nonetheless possessed of a certain common-sense quality. In some ways, being conscious just means bein…

In my layman's mind consciousness, at it's lowest level, is awareness, as mentioned in the article.

I think what humans have achieved is the next level which is "awareness" of our awareness. The ability to self-reflect. Perhaps it is even a form of "recursive consciousness" (?) And perhaps structured language is the secret sauce that makes this possible.

Without that next level I can't differentiate humans from other mammals.

This has caused me to ask: Is there a level above this? ie: Awareness of your awareness of your awareness. and... can humans achieve that next level with our current biological equipment?

:-)

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