My take on why indeed the study of consciousness may not be as simple

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

This is a theory that becomes more and more mystical the more it's looked at. If the algorithm is run a billion light years away, then that somehow tells the next occurence here that it needn't produce consciousness. Unless one bit changes. A change of one bit makes it an entirely new consciousness, but running it a trillion times slower doesn't make any difference.

Huh? I admit I haven't been following the conversation about this, but what the heck?

Is someone saying that not every simulation of consciousness produces consciousness?

~~ Paul

 

[cyborg]

Humans think Oh **** when they make a bad move. Computers don't.

IBM not adding emotion to a computer designed solely for chess proves what now? The chess machine doesn't think, "you know what, after I checkmate this fleshbag I'm going out to get me a cheezeburger," either.

 

[Malerin]

IBM not adding emotion to a computer designed solely for chess proves what now? The chess machine doesn't think, "you know what, after I checkmate this fleshbag I'm going out to get me a cheezeburger," either.

A chess machine doesn't think at all. A human player can think about different moves, the state of the game, board position, etc. without giving anything a numerical value. Crunching numbers is all a chess computer does. These are two radically different ways of playing chess. Try it some time.

Now it's been alleged that crunching enough numbers somehow produces consciousness, but I don't think that idea is winning too many converts.

 

[cyborg]

A chess machine doesn't think at all.

You say that as if you know for certain; and yet a few posts ago you admitted the impossiblity of knowing whether or not another entity is experiencing things in the way you are.

A human player can think about different moves, the state of the game, board position, etc. without giving anything a numerical value. Crunching numbers is all a chess computer does.

I will ask the same question again: please point out the physical location of the numbers in the computer.

Thank you.

Now it's been alleged that crunching enough numbers somehow produces consciousness, but I don't think that idea is winning too many converts.

The computer is not crunching numbers - it is changing voltage potentials.

Please explain why this is so vastly different to the action of a synapse.

Thank you.

(Those objecting on physical grounds do sure seem to have a problem with straying into the metaphysical).

 

[Malerin]

You say that as if you know for certain; and yet a few posts ago you admitted the impossiblity of knowing whether or not another entity is experiencing things in the way you are.

Nobody knows anything for certain. But how far down the rabbit hole do you want to go? Do you think its possible an abacus thinks? A digital watch? A Commodore 64? Such agnosticism would be welcome around here. Do you think unicorns might exist?

I will ask the same question again: please point out the physical location of the numbers in the computer.

What point are you making? Numbers don't have a physical existence. What does a "2" feel like? "Crunching numbers" means each move has a numeric value assingned to it, mathematical operations are performed based on those values over and over again. Do you think this is how humans play chess?

Thank you.

Welcome!

The computer is not crunching numbers - it is changing voltage potentials.

So you're not thinking, your neurons are just firing?

Please explain why this is so vastly different to the action of a synapse.

I don't know if its much different all. Are you assuming consciousness comes from a bunch of neurons? I would submit if one thinks a toaster can think, then one should also be open to the possibility the brain doesn't produce consciousness at all, but rather the other way around.

Thank you.

Welcome again!

(Those objecting on physical grounds do sure seem to have a problem with straying into the metaphysical).

Conscious toasters and thinking chess computers aren't metaphysical?

 

[cyborg]

Nobody knows anything for certain. But how far down the rabbit hole do you want to go? Do you think its possible an abacus thinks? A digital watch? A Commodore 64? Such agnosticism would be welcome around here.

Have we come to a decision as to how one would determine whether a noun is engaged in the verb think?

. Do you think unicorns might exist?

A horsey like think with a horn in the middle of the head? They don't exist; although such a being is not totally preposterous. (Unless, of course, we move beyond morphology into the various mythologically assigned magical properties of unicorns).

"Crunching numbers" means each move has a numeric value assingned to it,

Hmm, no,I still only see a mass of changing voltage potentials. I don't see where this "assign" or "2" thing could be.

mathematical operations are performed based on those values over and over again. Do you think this is how humans play chess?

No. The act of a human playing chess occurs when nerves in the appropriate limbs fire in such a way that chess pieces can be said to have been moved according to the game of chess. The origin of these nerve signals is in the brain - which is a mass of changing synaptic potentials.

But you still haven't convinced me that a computer plays chess by performing mathematical operations - all I see is a mass of changing voltage potentials which eventually lead to photons being streamed out of an appropriate display device - with the patterns of photons changing in a way that could said to have changed according to the game of chess.

So you're not thinking, your neurons are just firing?

So the computer is not thinking, it's logic gates are just firing?

I don't know if its much different all. Are you assuming consciousness comes from a bunch of neurons? I would submit if one thinks a toaster can think, then one should also be open to the possibility the brain doesn't produce consciousness at all, but rather the other way around.

If one wishes to argue vitalism then presumably the only argument as to why anything doesn't have a conscious awareness would be the lack of the elan vital.

Presumably if one could bottle it then I could pour it over a rock and it would be conscious?

Conscious toasters and thinking chess computers aren't metaphysical?

Where does consciousness come from again? Could you answer that please? Or at least what it is?

Fundamentally if you just can't say what properties an object is supposed to have before it is conscious then I really fail to see how any sort of progress could ever be made here.

 

[westprog]

Huh? I admit I haven't been following the conversation about this, but what the heck?

Is someone saying that not every simulation of consciousness produces consciousness?

~~ Paul

I think it's that when the same algorithm runs, it's the same consciousness generated. But you'll have to ask Rocketdodger what it all means. It's rather too New Agey for me.

 

[westprog]

IBM not adding emotion to a computer designed solely for chess proves what now? The chess machine doesn't think, "you know what, after I checkmate this fleshbag I'm going out to get me a cheezeburger," either.

That's exactly it. The computer is emulating chess moves. It isn't emulating a person playing chess.

 

[westprog]

Hmm, no,I still only see a mass of changing voltage potentials. I don't see where this "assign" or "2" thing could be.

Exactly so. The mathematical operations of a computer are only mathematical in our minds. There isn't "mathematics" being performed. There are voltage potentials changing.

A theory that said that voltage potentials changing can produce consciousness would be more plausible that "doing mathematics".

 

[westprog]

That's interesting because it's very close to what we've been claiming.

And I don't think that if Banksy sprays "This wall is conscious" on his house that it is actually true.

 

[westprog]

You've never seen intelligence being simulated in computers ? Sometimes it's uncanny. At a certain point, how could you tell if the intelligence is "real" or not ? And if you can't, who are you to say that it isn't ?

I simply don't see "intelligence" as being relevant when dealing with computers. They are tools which can work well or badly. A hammer that is well balanced reflects intelligence every bit as much as Gary Kasparov's Grandmaster Chess.

I'm asking you for a summary by you. What, in your opinion, is so different; and why isn't it simply a matter of degree ?

I regard "intelligence" as something not possessed by inanimate objects. What tools can do is improve the capacity of human beings to exercise their abilities.

 

[cyborg]

Exactly so. The mathematical operations of a computer are only mathematical in our minds. There isn't "mathematics" being performed. There are voltage potentials changing.

A theory that said that voltage potentials changing can produce consciousness would be more plausible that "doing mathematics".

You seem to be missing the point here: it is the mathematics that unifies the concepts.

Physical instance of system, X -> Abstract description of system X, M
Abstract system M -> Physical instance of system, Y

Now, I don't believe ANYONE has said that M is conscious. That only leaves discussions about physical systems like X and Y.

 

[westprog]

And I think I have already replied that there is no reason, mathematical or otherwise, to think it can. It is a conjecture, that is all.

Well, it's a hypothetical. If we are in a simulation, and if the simulation is just the performing of an algorithm, then we can certainly assume that performing the same or similar algorithms would probably produce the same result. All we need to do is assume two things for which we have no evidence whatsoever.

Of course, if it's possible to produce experience by running algorithms, then we are almost certainly experiencing a simulation right now, since running algorithms is a lot cheaper than running human beings, for any sufficiently advanced technology. This means that we can know nothing of the material world, or even if it exists. This is a strange sort of materialism.

 

[westprog]

No, why do you ask?

I am one of those people who think that evaluating an arithmetic expression helps you find the answer and nothing else.

Mathematics is the way we describe physical reality. It doesn't "happen".

 

[westprog]

I know that. I was simply stating -- and you seem to have missed that -- that some things that are simulated operate precisely like the real thing.

I'm not aware of any simulations of real-world things that operate exactly like what they are simulating.

I'm saying that consciousness could be like that.

 

[westprog]

Indeed it is possible that the brain is not Turing machine compatible. But the argument appears to be that consciousness just can't be TM compatible because it just doesn't seem possible. But does adding an RNG or parallelism or other-nonalgorithmic-thing change the intuition? I don't think so. It's noninuitive unless you simply declare consciousness to be a fundamental existent that behaves the right way, thus finessing the issue.

~~ Paul

That's not what Robin, or Aku or Westprog have been saying. We've been saying that there's exactly as much evidence that the brain operates as TM+RNG as there is for pure TM. There is no reason to select one over the other apart from having a lot of handy theory for Turing machines.

We also have said that there is no reason to assume that what goes on in the production of consciousness isn't

voltage potentials

, or some other physical process or combination of processes, rather than something described in a purely functional way.

Given this rather limited assertion (and I will happily let Robin and Aku disassociate themselves from it, of course) I think the burden of proof is on those selecting the single option, and claiming that it is the only possibility.

 

[westprog]

Just your apparent inability to distinguish between a mathematical representation of a thing and the thing itself.

Yes, but you're disagreeing with Calculus, Statistics and Logic. Why are you doing this, Aku? These are good things.

 

[westprog]

This is the "running a program is simply proving a theorem" argument. But clearly there is some utility in actually running computer programs, or people wouldn't bother. So how can we describe concisely why it is that people run programs?

~~ Paul

People use tools for all sorts of things. They make things happen, or make them happen more than they otherwise would. That jump cut in 2001 says it all. They could have cut from an abacus to a computer and it would have meant the same thing.

 

[westprog]

You seem to be missing the point here: it is the mathematics that unifies the concepts.

Physical instance of system, X -> Abstract description of system X, M
Abstract system M -> Physical instance of system, Y

Now, I don't believe ANYONE has said that M is conscious. That only leaves discussions about physical systems like X and Y.

I think it's fairly certain that for any given M there will be aspects of X not described, and that these aspects may not be present in Y. If M perfectly described X then it could not also describe a different system Y.

 

[cyborg]

I think it's fairly certain that for any given M there will be aspects of X not described, and that these aspects may not be present in Y.

That is the point - to be an 'M' X and Y must at least be everything an M is. They can be more, but they cannot be less.

If M perfectly described X then it could not also describe a different system Y.

No it could not. But then since I presume that we are probably all willing to accept that the participants in the discussion are conscious whilst certainly not all being precisely the same then if M is consciousness then we can at least see that it can apply over distinct physical systems.