Mr. Sammi

If I can survive in your environment and you can survive in my environment, then you and I, have some identical relationships. If it has been identified that you in your environment posess identical attributes to me in my environment, then, you and I posess identical attributes, each in our own environment.

Because we are truly dependent on our environment for survival, it would seem as if another qualifying attribute for identical behaviour, would be environment switching.

Can the virtual exist as a real?

Sammi Na Boodie ()

Amen-Moses

Define non-standard then!

Or to put it another way if I make an exact duplicate of a Frog, an atom by atom copy, what is stopping the copy from being as conscious as the original?

Now tell me what is stopping a simulation of the same thing, again atom for atom, being similarly conscious?

Amen-Moses

tronvillain

As far as I can tell, anyone who argues against the possibility of artificial intelligence is arguing for the existence of unspecified undetected properties in biological machines which cannot be reproduced by non-biological machines. Since there is, as far as I can tell, abolutely no evidence for the existence of such magical properties, I see no inherent obstacle to artificial intelligence or conscious machines - it is simply a matter of complexity and organization.

Has anyone here read Steve Grand's Creation: Life and How to Make It?

[ October 07, 2002: Message edited by: tronvillain ]</p>

elwoodblues

Oh, sweet Reason, thank you!

Vogelfrei

Amen-moses:

"Non-standard" is simply there to indicate that you can have biological machines that aren't organized according to principles that we see in animals.

The difference between a real frog and a simulated frog might just be that simulated frog is based on a different substrate than an actual one, and the different substrate may not support consciousness. Again, no one knows how consciousness arises, and when viewing a system in purely computational terms, consciousness doesn't even need to exist. There's a great big gap between the fact that consciousness isn't accounted for, computationally, in a system, and the fact that the system (the human brain) gives rise to consciousness anyway.

If you can't account for this "oversight", there's no place for you to argue that some novel condition would or wouldn't be sufficient for it.

tronvillain:

1) I've already specified a potential physical property which cannot be replicated in a machine: animal-type neurons with animal-type biochemistry.

2) If you mean to say that I'm arguing that there's some property that animal neurons might have which nothing else does, which gives rise to consciousness, and such an assertion is unscientific, here are the problems with your view:

A) You claim that there are REASONS behind causes. The problem is, the only type of reason that wouldn't require another reason to explain it is a reason that's "behind the apparent world" in the realm of noumena. Not only is this view incoherent, but it's unwelcome in scientific inquiry. If you drop it, however, there's no way to argue that an additional, hidden property is needed for an animal neuron to cause consciousness in a way that other bits of matter can't, any more than you can argue that an additional, hidden property is necessary for any other causal process to work; you're stuck with "maybe things just work that way". If you don't accept that, provide me with the properties that give causes their natures, or at least say why those properties necessarily exist, whether we know them or not.

B) You're appealing to a computational explanation of consciousness, but the problems are: 1) computation is in the eye of the beholder, 2) there are multiple coherent interpretational schemes for any particular system, but only one seems to be in use for the brain (and advocates of this explanation of consciousness conveniently overlook all the alternate interpretational schemes for ALL systems), and 3) if you think humans are conscious because of some computational process, then you must think the universe is conscious (which is probably equivalent to believing in God), since at the very minimum, it includes all humans within it, and probably does a hell of a lot more computation than you can imagine, in addition.

And, gratuitously:

3) As Searle asks, is your digestive system conscious? It instantiates computational processes, albeit in a nontraditional manner. If you think not, because it's not "complex" enough, specify which hidden magical cause it is that allows a system to jump from non-consciousness to consciousness once some particular threshold is passed.

Edited to say: The way it looks from here, computation = a system + an interpretation, and that's how I've intended the term, above. Feel free to disagree, but make sure you do it explicitly.

[ October 07, 2002: Message edited by: Vogelfrei ]</p>

Amen-Moses

What "oversight"?

I have been involved for most of my career in programming large complicated real-time systems which do things like; fly planes, guide munitions onto target and control airspace. These systems have "senses" usually multiple senses like radar , inertial navigation or infrared ranging, they have a sense of "self" in that their objective is to remain "alive" for as long as possible and they have a sense of "purpose" in that they have some ultimate objective in "mind".

As to how these systems differ from similar biological systems I would be at odds to specify. My operational flight software is at least as complex as that employed by birds to navigate (using such diverse "senses" as sat nav, inertial systems and passive triangulation) and when under test the systems were "unaware" that they were on the ground, as far as they were concerned the inputs to all their "senses" were mimicking "real world" inputs to the extent that they would complete their objective in exactly the same way that they would if they were airborne.

In what way are these systems not "conscious"?

Amen-Moses

Vogelfrei

Amen-moses:

Here's what I wrote about what consciousness means:

"I define consciousness as mental experience of any sort."

All you're doing is equivocating between being conscious and acting "as if" a thing is conscious. For instance, thermostats act "as if" they feel the temperature, and "as if" they choose to turn up the heat when it gets cold. However, no one believes thermostats have minds, so it would be dishonest to say that they're actually sensing or choosing anything; all a thermostat is, is a bunch of physical reactions that are apparently quite easy to anthropomorphize.

(If you deny that you're equivocating, and that "as if" consciousness is what we mean when we talk about actual consciousness, then you're claiming that no one has mental experience. My first-person experience tells me that I do indeed have mental experience, so I reject that idea immediately.)

So the question is, do you think your programs have minds?

If you think so, where's your proof? If not proof, where's your evidence? Equivocation between senses of "consciousness" count as neither proof nor evidence. Neither does chanting simplistic functionalist dogma...

If you don't think so, that's the way in which your programs aren't conscious.

P.S. Do you think there's any difference between a sleepwalker, and a person with a bad sense of humor and a penchant for slapstick comedy? [sarcasm] Clearly, judging only by the person's actions, the sleepwalker must be of the latter sort, because they BEHAVE like they're of the latter sort...and what other relevant criteria could there be? Nothing besides unobservable, unparsimonious, unscientific properties that some rather confused people keep talking about... [/sarcasm]

Amen-Moses

Originally posted by Vogelfrei:
Here's what I wrote about what consciousness means:

"I define consciousness as mental experience of any sort."

Fine, now explain why these complex real time systems are not exhibiting "mental experiences".

All you're doing is equivocating between being conscious and acting "as if" a thing is conscious.

Agreed, what exactly is the difference?

For instance, thermostats act "as if" they feel the temperature, and "as if" they choose to turn up the heat when it gets cold. However, no one believes thermostats have minds, so it would be dishonest to say that they're actually sensing or choosing anything; all a thermostat is, is a bunch of physical reactions that are apparently quite easy to anthropomorphize.

How does this differ from a similar biological syatem?

(If you deny that you're equivocating, and that "as if" consciousness is what we mean when we talk about actual consciousness, then you're claiming that no one has mental experience. My first-person experience tells me that I do indeed have mental experience, so I reject that idea immediately.)

And so would my real time systems. (If I gave them the voice to do so!)

So the question is, do you think your programs have minds?

I can't see any reason to deny such!

If you think so, where's your proof? If not proof, where's your evidence? Equivocation between senses of "consciousness" count as neither proof nor evidence. Neither does chanting simplistic functionalist dogma...

How could I differentiate? What evidence would you require?

P.S. Do you think there's any difference between a sleepwalker, and a person with a bad sense of humor and a penchant for slapstick comedy? [sarcasm] Clearly, judging only by the person's actions, the sleepwalker must be of the latter sort, because they BEHAVE like they're of the latter sort...and what other relevant criteria could there be? Nothing besides unobservable, unparsimonious, unscientific properties that some rather confused people keep talking about...

Now I'm confused, are you saying that a sleepwalker is not a conscious being?

If so then my real time systems when in standby mode are somehow less conscious then when active?

Amen-Moses

[ October 07, 2002: Message edited by: Amen-Moses ]</p>

Vogelfrei

That's a category error. Mental experiences aren't exhibited. Behaviors are exhibited, and we either assume that mental activity accompanied them, or not.

There are three possible claims here:

1) There is no consciousness, only "as if" consciousness.

My response is, I have mental experience, so your assertion is disproved.

2) There is no difference between the ideas of "as if" consciousness, and actual consciousness.

My response is, equivocation. Further, I claim that this position fails to distinguish between people who sleepwalk and people who imitate sleepwalkers, etc. etc.

3) "As if" consciousness, and actual consciousness are distinguishible in principle, but in practice they always accompany each other and are inseparable.

My response is, there is no evidence for or against this supposition; thus it's akin to religious belief. If you invoke 1) or 2) as evidence, you're equivocating by changing the way "consciousness" is interpreted mid-sentence.

Well, let me talk about myself as the biological system in question. Clearly all my physiology displays "as if" consciousness, but on top of that, I know I have actual consciousness. Assuming an epiphenomenalist take on consciousness, there's no distinction between me and the thermometer, in that you can't see consciousness in the workings of the system, but for some reason or other, consciousness is present in me, and (assumedly) not in the thermometer.

Equivocation. Behavior /= consciousness.

I see neither a reason to deny it nor to affirm it.

That's just the point: assuming epiphenomenalism, there isn't any evidence that would differentiate. Therefore, there can be no proof, and therefore, assertions like yours are totally baseless. Consciousness can't be tackled by science, because consciousness can't be seen by others. Unlike other unscientific issues, however (eg ad hoc definitions of God), it can be known for certain that consciousness exists, simply by introspecting.

So we have this situation:

-Consciousness is
-Science can't determine anything about consciousness

Hmm, looks like we're stuck with supposition!

I was suggesting that the upshot of some of the ideas you've espoused suggest that you don't believe there's a difference. The sleepwalker has "as if" consciousness, and if that's regular consciousness, then there's no difference between a sleepwalker and a person who's imitating one. But if we assume, as we do, that there is one, and we want to know what that difference was, and invoke your paradigm to help us figure it out, your paradigm isn't answering the question at all; it needs to be dismissed on that account.


Edited to add: I meant to write that science can't determine anything about the necessary and sufficient causes of consciousness which would allow us to extrapolate its existence to machines (or not). Science can, however, determine certain things about consciousness, having assumed that consciousness exists already (i.e. "assuming that humans behavioral responses reflect consciousness, what happens if we adminster a drug/observe a patient with brain damage/etc.?")

[ October 07, 2002: Message edited by: Vogelfrei ]</p>

Amen-Moses

All you have is assumptions, on what do you base them?

You keep accusing me of making assertions when I have yet to make any, all I am doing is trying to ascertain what exactly you are using as evidence that what you perceive as "consciousness" is in any way different from what a Harrier GR7 flight control system perceives.

Amen-Moses