231–240 of 604 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Human consciousness has logically to be a product of the physical structure of human beings.
Except the "physical structure" might extend into dimensions we don't know about.
"Is this thing we defined to make us feel special achievable?" What we define as "consciousness" is just an emergent property of large, dense neural networks w/memory. The human brain is a marvel of mechanical and electrical engineering, not a mystical, otherworldly device. Maybe there is something going on at a quantum level to explain the incredible performance our brains achieve, but that is still nothing that we…
1. "emergent property of large, dense neural networks w/memory "
2. "Maybe there is something going on at a quantum level"
3. consciousness is mystical, otherworldly device
A lot of people who oppose 1 and agree with 2 are unfairly lumped with position 3.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't see how we can learn to experience qualia. If the author means self awareness instead of consciousness that would make more sense.
any art or music class that is successful in reaching its students will probably change what you think, how you think it, and gradually should change what you feel, how deeply you feel it, and to what extent you can analyze and converse with those feelings you have. If that sounds like intellectual activity above the level of qualia, the same is true for something as simple as the taste of food. We learn what apples…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
People seem to imagine it like plugging a cable or getting an EEG cap and then they can't imagine the next step. Gradual replacement is a very radical idea to most people - a friend of mine recently described is as a horror movie.
In this book, I think: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/393899945799 - 108 Tips for Time Travellers by inventor and Professor Peter Cochrane, 1999, one of the essays is him asking his wife if she would still love him if he had false teeth, a false leg, etc. bit by bit until she stops the conversation saying "I'm not having you dying by installments!". When you replace a heart with a pump, you don't get a human heart. When…
The examples you listed are current technologies that don't remotely approach the primary nor secondary functions of the originals.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Any body of academic thought whose paradigmatic communication medium is video rather than text is prima facie suspect. Might you please link a written statement of the salient position(s) of any one of these gentlemen?
?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
We can't replicate something we don't understand. The mechanism for consciousness is not understood at all right now and could actually be based on quantum effects that we haven't detected yet. It's also possible that it is only achievable in an organic machine. Until we understand how consciousness actually arises, the best we can do is a simulacrum of it.
Why not? I can replicate a book in a foreign without understanding the language?
Write a new book without understanding the language? No way - not one that makes any sense. Not unless you're going with the "million monkeys" approach (and if you did try that approach, you wouldn't live long enough to succeed in writing one actual coherent book in the foreign language).
So, we could think about trying to simulate a human brain, neuron by neuron. That's the "making a photocopy" approach. But that's not the approach we're pursuing. We're trying to write a new book (create a new, non-human intelligence) in a language we don't understand (that is, not knowing what intelligence/consciousness actually is).
(Side topic: What would happen if you asked GPT-4 to write a full-length novel? Or even a story as long as the token limit? Would you get anything coherent?)
What is this obsession with making computers human-like? We can put those machine to better uses than forgetting, having biases, making subtle or gross mistakes (hello, ChatGPT) like we do. The AI that some apparently consider top-notch today is only good at powering NPCs in video games. The more serious the use-case, the more harmful it becomes. Moreover, achieving artificial consciousness is only good at fueling en…
> What is this obsession with making computers human-like? Replacement of human labor on the cheap, the most capital intensive part of many businesses. Alternatively as a productivity multiplier of human labor.
So, what I like about this is how consciousness (feeling—sensation-sentience) is distinguished from the soul. Further, it is precisely by the combination of the soul and body that consciousness arises. And note that the soul is, essentially, the same sort of material as number and mathematics — immaterial, eternal, etc.
I don’t know of other perspectives on soul like this.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What changes when they are known? I believr it affects yout consciousness, not the one being simulated. The latter does not have "I'm being actually simulated" input
"Actually simulated" is such an oxymoron. So which is it? Is the consciousness actual, simulated, or actually simulated? And does the resulting state of mind change the universe, or merely reveal its hidden structure? It's easy to get lost in these unsolvable paradoxes when you try reducing all of creation down to logic. Problem is, logic is not all of creation. Consciousness requires a soul. Otherwise you're confuse…
Any actual evidence for this is welcome.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's a pretty out-there idea that we're the only conscious animals. Along the lines of "animals don't have feelings" which seems to be mostly pushed by Christians.
> Along the lines of "animals don't have feelings" which seems to be mostly pushed by Christians. Can you provide any source for this claim? The historical Christian belief is that animals have souls and feelings and inner experiences.
https://www.christianforums.com/threads/animals-dont-have-fe...
I think that view has changed a lot over the last few decades but certainly 30 years ago it was pretty common.