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A new proposal for how mind emerges from matter

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Re: A new proposal for how mind emerges from matter

#141

Post by Joker_vD »

_1tem wrote: post #121

Here's an interesting thought experiment. Take any definition of consciousness or intelligence that is not based on biological components. For example "reacts to stimuli, exhibits anger". You can apply that definition to other entities like the United States. Does the United States react to stimuli (i.e. invasion) and exhibit anger? Yes (e.g. Pearl Harbor). Therefore the United States is conscious? If a person argues…

> "reacts to stimuli, exhibits anger".

Nitroglycerin comes to mind.

Re: A new proposal for how mind emerges from matter

#142

Post by foolswisdom »

crooked-v wrote: post #108
ggm wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. it nicely encapsulates why AI aficionados use words like "hallucinate" which become secret clues to belief around the G part of AGI. If it's just a coding mistake, how can the machine be "alive" but if I can re-purpose "hallucinate" as a term of art, I can also make you, dear reader, embue the AI with more and more traits of meaning which go to "it's alive" It's language Jim, but more as Chomsky said. or maybe…

The correct term isn't "hallucinate", it's "bullshit". I mean that in the casual sense of "a bullshitter" - every LLM is a moderately knowleable bullshitter that never stops talking (In a literal sense - even the end of responses is just a magic string from the LLM that cues the containing system to stop the LLM, and if not stopped like that it would just keep going after the "end".) The remarkable thing is that we e…

A la https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Bullshit.

Re: A new proposal for how mind emerges from matter

#143

Post by ilaksh »

Maybe the increased status management, self pattern persistence, or general problem solving abilities of intelligence comes from processes that integrate data from multiple colony members and use the integration, broadcast and storage of information over a series of immediate steps and long time frames to synthesize concepts and plans at a higher level than individuals can manage.

But the intelligent work is in the connections, exchange, and integration of information.

I think that security for human groups should be thought of in this context. Many strong communication links or maybe a holistic network are required for preventing sub-colonies from becoming "other".

Re: A new proposal for how mind emerges from matter

#144

Post by FrustratedMonky »

skissane wrote: post #61

Articles like this annoy me: it seems to want to comment on philosophy of mind, but shows zero awareness of the classic debates in that discipline - materialism vs idealism vs dualism vs neutral monism, and the competing versions of each of those, e.g. substance dualism vs hylemorphic dualism, eliminativist vs reductionist/emergentist materialism, property dualism, epiphenomenalism, panpsychism, Chalmers’ distinction…

Agree. This last couple years of AI has been a wellspring of people/articles re-inventing philosophy, like all these subjects haven't been debated and studied for a few hundred years. At least acknowledge them, even if we aren't going to try and build on what has come before.

Re: A new proposal for how mind emerges from matter

#145

Post by jcgl »

globnomulous wrote: post #81
skissane wrote: post #61

Articles like this annoy me: it seems to want to comment on philosophy of mind, but shows zero awareness of the classic debates in that discipline - materialism vs idealism vs dualism vs neutral monism, and the competing versions of each of those, e.g. substance dualism vs hylemorphic dualism, eliminativist vs reductionist/emergentist materialism, property dualism, epiphenomenalism, panpsychism, Chalmers’ distinction…

Is there a philosopher or philosophical school that identifies intelligence as a being's capacity to deploy a capability towards some end with intention? If so, what is this called? Or who is associated with it? Edit: I'd expect this thinker/school also to argue that the being needs to be able to experience its intention as an intention (as opposed to a dumb, inarticulate urge); in other words, intelligence would req…

This is _not_ about defining intelligence. But it's about supposing intentionality as a tool for explaining the behavior of a thing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intentional_stance

Re: A new proposal for how mind emerges from matter

#146

Post by FrustratedMonky »

geuis wrote: post #82
skissane wrote: post #61

Articles like this annoy me: it seems to want to comment on philosophy of mind, but shows zero awareness of the classic debates in that discipline - materialism vs idealism vs dualism vs neutral monism, and the competing versions of each of those, e.g. substance dualism vs hylemorphic dualism, eliminativist vs reductionist/emergentist materialism, property dualism, epiphenomenalism, panpsychism, Chalmers’ distinction…

[flagged]

"Propose hypothesis. "??

Where do you get the 'hypothesis'?

That is where philosophy comes in, it is pre-testing, thinking of the things to test.

(also, note. by your definition, string theory is an 'opinion', not science).

Re: A new proposal for how mind emerges from matter

#147

Post by causality0 »

And they believe that if we can bring ourselves to dramatically reconsider what we think we know about it, we will end up with a much better concept of how to restabilize the balance between human and nonhuman life amid an ecological omnicrisis that threatens to permanently alter the trajectory of every living thing on Earth.

Do we really have to resort to total bullshit claims like this in order to make people care about this subject? Knowing what is and is not intelligent has fuck-all to do with not destroying the environment we as a species rely on for survival. The people and forces at work care not one whit. You could prove that chickens can write symphonies and it would make no difference.

Re: A new proposal for how mind emerges from matter

#148

Post by garden_hermit »

teekert wrote: post #128
mcswell wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a linguist, article like this also annoy me by the claims that "X [whales, dolphins, parrots, crows...] uses language." We have known since 1957 that there is a hierarchy of "grammars", with finite state "languages" being near the bottom, and transformational grammars at the top. Human languages are certainly at a minimum at the context free phrase structure grammar level. My point is that by using the word "langu…

As a scientist, articles like this also annoy me. Because it, right off the bat, assumes that there are no degrees in consciousness. Just because we don't experience those degrees, and animals can't convey what they feel through language, we assume it is "emergent", or "suddenly there". I think we are too caught up in believing that consciousness must be something really special or some magic discontinuity of spaceti…

tbf, many materialists dislike the "degrees of consciousness" idea because a theory that posits "consciousness is on a spectrum" is one that starts to resemble panpsychism, which they consider magical woo.

Re: A new proposal for how mind emerges from matter

#149

Post by ffwd »

IsTom wrote: post #139
teekert wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a scientist, articles like this also annoy me. Because it, right off the bat, assumes that there are no degrees in consciousness. Just because we don't experience those degrees, and animals can't convey what they feel through language, we assume it is "emergent", or "suddenly there". I think we are too caught up in believing that consciousness must be something really special or some magic discontinuity of spaceti…

> assumes that there are no degrees in consciousness And I don't get why, it seems to me quite self evident that you yourself can experience reduced-consciousness states, be it being half-asleep or quite drunk.

The problem for me is that we haven't conceptualized what we mean by "reduced" consciousness. Reduced in what way?

If we create an analogy with audio - audio can have 2 properties: frequencies and volume. Frequencies are the content of the audio and volume is how "present" the sound is.

Well the same could be applied to consciousness. When we say reduced consciousness do we mean that the mind experiences less content (frequencies) or do we mean that all the frequencies are there but at a reduced volume?

Re: A new proposal for how mind emerges from matter

#150

Post by gizajob »

mcswell wrote: post #71
skissane wrote: post #61

Articles like this annoy me: it seems to want to comment on philosophy of mind, but shows zero awareness of the classic debates in that discipline - materialism vs idealism vs dualism vs neutral monism, and the competing versions of each of those, e.g. substance dualism vs hylemorphic dualism, eliminativist vs reductionist/emergentist materialism, property dualism, epiphenomenalism, panpsychism, Chalmers’ distinction…

As a linguist, article like this also annoy me by the claims that "X [whales, dolphins, parrots, crows...] uses language." We have known since 1957 that there is a hierarchy of "grammars", with finite state "languages" being near the bottom, and transformational grammars at the top. Human languages are certainly at a minimum at the context free phrase structure grammar level. My point is that by using the word "langu…

Yes, it's such a waffle. Instead of the unnecessary title "A Radical New Proposal For How Mind Emerges From Matter" – a more appropriate one would be "On plant intelligence (and possible consciousness)" given the entirety of the article is devoted to plant intelligence. We don't have anything radical, nor is it very deeply related to the mind/matter problem. If an author can't get something simple like that correct, then they don't deserve our time. Shame one has to get paragraphs deep into the article to find out we have a spiel about plants, not about mind.
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