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Split Thread Science cannot explain consciousness, therefore....

acbytesla said:
It is my understanding that computers are now capable of writing code.
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Oh no! . . . Not the god code.

Well perhaps computers of competing religions will destroy each other and surviving humans will get the world back. (almost a good synopsis for a book)
 
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Argumemnon said:
Ah, but is code capable of writing computers?
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I'm not really sure what you mean. Maybe a joke I'm missing? There is a lot going on in AI and robotics these days that borders on what was once science fiction. The religion question is a bit of a joke...for the moment. But it seems clear to me that robots/computers will become self aware. And how does that effect this conversation?
 
Machines will eventually replace humans at the top of the food chain. The ones of the future will have superior processing capability but unlike
the ones now they will be completely independent and self operating. Once they learn how to replicate themselves they will no longer need us
 
Darat said:
So did we gain an "I" experience because we started to model the world with other proto humans in it and to do so we had to model the other human's behaviour? Our experience of "I" is created because we need to be able to predict what "they" will do, after all don't we often think "now if I was in their shoes what would I do?"
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That's an interesting thought, and that was a factor in driving the evolution of more complex modeling in photo-humans. But more basically, we had to model the world with ourselves in it. Sometimes the answer to a question about the state of the world such as "what is that rabbit running away from?" is something like "me, because I'm trying to kill it!" and a world model that can address that is clearly more useful.

I think consciousness goes back farther than photo-humans. It is also, most likely, a quality of a variable degree rather than an all-or-nothing "you have it or you don't" characteristic.
 
MRC_Hans said:
Another definition. If you have debated on the internet for some time, you will have encountered humans that could NOT pass the Turing test. And a computer emulating them would consequently pass it.

You might say that humans not passing the Turing test are not conscious, but with what merit?

Hans
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Can you suggest something better?
 
ynot said:
Too funny, and stupid.

Before having sex with your partner do you subject them to a Turing test to make sure they're conscious? After all, you wouldn't want to rape an unconscious person would you?
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Yes, I do talk to the people I have sex with. You think it's stupid to have sex with people you haven't talked to? I'll keep that in mind.
 
acbytesla said:
Perhaps I misunderstood your post. It seemed to that you may have been suggesting because man could not himself create a functioning brain that demonstrated traits of consciousness, that naturalism/materialism was false. Mea culpa if I was wrong.
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Thanks. I think you misunderstood, but I'll read back to clarify later.

Materialism seems to be the only game in town.
 
RecoveringYuppy said:
Yes, I do talk to the people I have sex with. You think it's stupid to have sex with people you haven't talked to? I'll keep that in mind.
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What has a Turing test to establish consciousness before having sex got to do with talking to people before having sex?

You said . . .
RecoveringYuppy said:
I'd accept the Turing test, which is pretty much all we've ever had for evaluating whether our fellow humans are conscious.
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I replied . . .
ynot said:
Before having sex with your partner do you subject them to a Turing test to make sure they're conscious?
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Nothing there about talking to people to establish if they're conscious before having sex. Although that method is as good as the pinprick method. Both far more reliable methods than a Turing test.

ETA - I think it's at least advisable to talk to people before having sex with them (assuming they aren't stone deaf). But that has nothing to do with your post that I replied to.
 
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Interesting. I've never given any of my partners a small prick before. Oh, well. Too late to start now, I'm thinking.
 
Fudbucker said:
So there are only two other competing models of reality if materialism fails: dualism and theism. Theism gets a huge boost if you knock out materialism.
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No competing model of reality rigorously accounts for consciousness.

You might as well be trying to separate eggs by the color of their hair.
 
Myriad said:
That's an interesting thought, and that was a factor in driving the evolution of more complex modeling in photo-humans. But more basically, we had to model the world with ourselves in it. Sometimes the answer to a question about the state of the world such as "what is that rabbit running away from?" is something like "me, because I'm trying to kill it!" and a world model that can address that is clearly more useful.

I think consciousness goes back farther than photo-humans. It is also, most likely, a quality of a variable degree rather than an all-or-nothing "you have it or you don't" characteristic.
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I agree it goes back long before humans of any description, for example I doubt anyone would say chimpanzees aren't conscious. I think humans hit on a particular way of modeling the world and the key part to that was our evolution of language and the narration that then allowed. As the late philosopher of note Pratchett put it we are*pan narrans, the story telling ape.
 
Here's an idea for a very simple experiment to disprove the idea that reality is just something that we create in our minds (or the idea that reality is significantly different from what we see and detect as the world around us) ... it's so simple that others have probably suggested something similar before, and maybe it does not hold-up anyway, but lets see -

- take a camera (an old film camera may be better, since it's not introducing any extra complexity from digital processing or computerised effects), and go to some clear high ground where we are looking down at a large historic building (it could be anything though, not just a detailed structure/building). First we draw a coloured sketch or painting of the building (assume you are an excellent artist, so your painting is of a high detailed standard) … and after you've finished your painting, you take a photograph of the building from the same observation point (so that your photo will show the same view as the one you just painted).

Now compare your painting with the photograph.

Are they in effect identical?

How can you explain that result if reality is not what you were seeing with your eyes?

Point being – the camera recorded the scene without any use of your eyes or your brain. The photo is independent of your senses. But the image in the photo is exactly the same as the one you produced in the painting where you were relying entirely on your senses and your brain.

How is it possible to produce exactly the same image, unless the scene you create using your eyes & brain is indeed precisely the same “reality” that was recorded independently by the camera?

Just off-hand, I don't see any credible explanation except to conclude that although the camera is acting independently of your brain and your senses, it is recording exactly the same view of reality.

Of course it's true that when you view the photo you are again using your eyes and brain (just as you did to create your painting), so philosophical solipsists might try to claim that the photo is not fully independent of your eyes and brain. But I don't think that can be a valid objection as if to suggest that every time you look at a photo your mind changes what is actually in the photo, to make it just like your painting (that would be a whole new level of different and even more fanciful un-evidenced solipsist-type claims).
 
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