Explain consciousness to the layman.

[Piggy]

Your usage of the term "dualism" baffles me. From my POV, you folks are trying to push a backdoor dualism, if you think there is something special about consciousness that cannot be emulated or simulated, in a computer, at all.

You just have to keep in mind that flight simulators don't cause any flying to happen in the real world.

For precisely the same reason, simulations of brains don't cause any actual instantiation of consciousness (as happens when a new human being is formed).

It really is as simple as that.

You have to be a dualist to believe that the matter and energy which makes the flight simulator change its physical states also does anything else in the real world.

If you're not a dualist, you understand that the physical behavior of the simulator is the only thing that's really happening.

The "world of the simulation" is literally imaginary -- it is created only when a human being is exposed to what the machine is doing (which is not flying).

Without a human being in the system, the only thing the simulator is doing is what you can observe it doing in real space and time.

The laws of physics demand that this be true.

The "world of the simulation" literally is a brain state.

 

[westprog]

Not to mention Physics because that argument shows a total lack of understanding what the theory of relativity is about.

I'm amazed by that one because when it was first put forward, a good while ago, I just assumed it was a one-off combination of misunderstandings. I didn't expect it to resurface.

 

[Beelzebuddy]

Two points....

One, we're talking about planes, not sims of planes. Remember, the computational literalists claim that consciousness is the result of logical computation alone! Which means that the brain could be slowed down to an arbitrary speed and still be conscious.

Which we know is false, because it's been proven in the lab.

It's like saying you can run a plane engine at any speed and still fly.

Two, try your music experiment with a CD player, and see if your laser works.

As always in conversations with you, I end up puzzled at the seeming randomness of your thought processes. It's like you flip a coin each time to decide if you're going to post something which I 95% agree with, and probably can reason with, or something full of strawmen and ridiculously over-literal interpretations of everything you'd like to disagree on, like this post.

It makes it hard to reply because the two sides merit different responses, and I'm never quite sure what the next flip will bring.

RE: slowed-down music

 

[yy2bggggs]

Piggy:

Arth was moving from artificial neurons to slower artificial neurons, so we're talking about fundamental limitations, not biological ones.

Stall in this case means either a bug or rejection of a prior accepted premise.

 

[calebprime]

...

RE: slowed-down music

I'm sure you're joking, but that's not "slowed-down music" in anything like the sense that Piggy intended.

Sounded pretty good, though, for the twenty or so seconds I listened.

carry on.

 

[Leumas]

RE: slowed-down music

That is hyper extended music not slowed down music.


A musical note has a SPECIFIC frequency which is oscillation per second.

If you slow down a musical note it means you change the frequency which will change the note itself.

But if you EXTEND a note it means that you repeat the note at the right frequency but have more oscillations of that which means over an extended time.

In a SLOWED music the rate of oscillation is affected in an extended music the oscillation rate remains the same but more of it is repeated.

BUT..... what matters is the VIBRATION RATE or frequency.

An MP3 player that cannot produce the amplitude wave form of the right frequencies because it is playing everything slower would change the harmonic notes and if it is too slow you might not even hear the notes altogether since they are at the wrong audible frequency.

An Mp3 player that is producing the SPECIAL EFFECT of hyper-extension of the music is still doing its work at the APPROPRIATE speed as if it is playing the music normally....but what it does (I think… I have not tried this fx) is copy each sampled time interval over and over to EXTEND the play. In other words it makes extra copies of the sampled time interval as many times as required before it goes on to the next sampled time interval which it also copies x-times and so on.

An MP3 recorder that cannot sample the music in real time will produce totally different music because it is not sampling the music at the right rate to capture all the harmonics.

An MP3 player that plays back a piece of music at slower than the recording sampling rate will change the frequencies of the harmonics in the play back and thus will affect the notes of the music.

Think of this analogy with writing….. take the word BOX.

A Hyper extended version say to three times would be ……. BBBOOOXXX

A slowed down version say to one note down would be …. AANNWW ..... notice the double letter due to the longer interval it took to play the note that is now slower frequency but with actual music it is not necessarily one note down it could be an utterly wrong scale that does not fit the proper octave etc. It all depends on the difference between the original recording sampling rate and the playback sampling rate.

Can you see how the slowing down analogy has garbled the word while the hyper extension is still comprehendible.

 

[punshhh]

The computer. That's what computers DO.

So a computer detects a process occurring outside and comes up with an abstract representation of that process. Perhaps it can perform this feat*, but it doesn't know in any way what that process is, what its doing, how it relates to other processes, or any subjective interpretations relating to it.

It is in fact oblivious of the existence of a subjective aspect, even if it did have some kind of self referential awareness, it would encompass an entirely objective physical realm.

* Care of a large body of programing provided by a human, belying the true identity of computers as reckoning tools.

In my line of work I use a computer which provides me with accurate readings/abstractions of my environment, its called a tape measure.

 

[westprog]

In my line of work I use a computer which provides me with accurate readings/abstractions of my environment, its called a tape measure.

It's ridiculous to suggest that a tape measure is conscious. A tape measure with a laser levelling device, sure.

 

[Leumas]

RE: slowed-down music

Have a look at this WAV file with a 6 seconds of music playing at the proper rate.

Have a look at this WAV file which has the same piece of music played at 7 times slower rate.


Have a look at this WAV file which has the same piece of music played at 20 times slower rate.

 

[punshhh]

Exactly.

Sorry, did you think those two statements were somehow contradictory?

Piggy went over this with you regarding the marble adding machine.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metamorphosis_of_Narcissus

The computer observing the hand in Metamorphosis of Narcissus can only compare the physical configuration its viewing with configurations it has been programed to compare and only in ways it is programed to do. Perhaps a computer can be programed to recognise what the other hand shaped form in the painting can be compaired to.

Would this same computer be aware of the subjective phenomena invoked by the two forms in the painting? unless specifically programed to do so.

Computers are perfectly capable of forming inferences and testing them, without the inference or the test being pre-programmed.

Do they exhibit subjective appreciation?

But it's not subjectively modified with respect to whatever it is they're not paying attention to - by definition.

I repeat, the unconscious mind is subjectively modified. Some aspects of instinctive behavior may be regarded as objective. But all activity including the mind is exposed to subjective contact.

Fixed that for you.

So computers hold opinions of their own, I see.

No, and no.

Any point at which one draws the line and says this indicates monism, cannot deny that it may be an aspect of a more fundamental dualism and visa versa. The distinction is entirely relative, material monism is a blatant assumption.

 

[westprog]

Have a look at this WAV file with a 6 seconds of music playing at the proper rate.

Have a look at this WAV file which has the same piece of music played at 7 times slower rate.


Have a look at this WAV file which has the same piece of music played at 20 times slower rate.

I don't accept that a computer will produce sound running twenty times slower if it runs twenty times slower. It will quite probably produce nothing at all, or a continuous screech.

A real time system is not a computer that happens to run fast enough to respond to events. Computers built to deal with real time events are not typically especially powerful. It's a matter of architecture.

In fact, just about every computer actually in existence has some form of real time interaction. The non-interactive, time-independent Turing model is a bad way to describe computers. It can be quite a good way to describe programs of a particular kind.

 

[Leumas]

I don't accept that a computer will produce sound running twenty times slower if it runs twenty times slower. It will quite probably produce nothing at all, or a continuous screech.

A real time system is not a computer that happens to run fast enough to respond to events. Computers built to deal with real time events are not typically especially powerful. It's a matter of architecture.

In fact, just about every computer actually in existence has some form of real time interaction. The non-interactive, time-independent Turing model is a bad way to describe computers. It can be quite a good way to describe programs of a particular kind.

As long as the computer can read the sample data and send it to the DAC within the sampling rate then that is enough.

The above normal WAV has a sampling rate of 44100 Samples per second or 44.1 KHz.

So a computer that can do the operation of reading a sample data information from the storage medium and send it to the DAC at the rate of 45 KHz would suffice.

A computer of course will need quite a few clock cycles to complete the task per sample. So let's say 1000 cycles.

So we will then need a computer that runs at the very least at a 45 MHz rate assuming it can do all the required I/O within a 1000 clock ticks.

Of course that also means that the computer won't be able to do anything else.... that is why most computers use dedicated Sound Cards that can do all this in parallel with the normal cpu and also has direct memory access. This is why computers in the old days of 20 MHz could still play music quite well.

But as you can see.... to play the above file we would need a system of 45 MHz. A slower system would of course play the music at slower than the sampling rate and start producing distortions.

But as you can see from the third WAV if the system is as slow as 2.25 MHz it will play back the sampled data as you can hear in the file.

 

[Piggy]

Piggy:

Arth was moving from artificial neurons to slower artificial neurons, so we're talking about fundamental limitations, not biological ones.

Stall in this case means either a bug or rejection of a prior accepted premise.

Well, I think to understand the problem, you have to begin with the premise of the comp.lits, which is that consciousness literally results from logical computations alone, irrespective of the physical substrate.

(I'll note here that neurobiology has proven that this is false, as even Dennett now admits, but we'll leave that fact aside for the moment.)

In other words, they believe that as long as you have enough matter and energy to "run the logic" (and no more) you get two results: You get to run the logic, and a real instance of conscious experience is created.

(This causes another problem, namely the violation of the laws of conservation of matter and energy. Any real event which has a duration in time and is locatable in space -- as all real events do and are -- requires some involvement of matter and energy. This is why my truck has to work harder to turn the wheels and move down the road than it does simply to turn the wheels on a lift, for instance. It is impossible that you can cause real events A and B with only enough matter and energy to cause either A or B. But we'll leave this aside, as well.)

OK, so if it's true that consciousness is the result of logical computation alone, then this has some serious implications about the possible impact of time on the system.

Logical computations run the same every time, no matter what speed they're performed at. You can take 10 seconds to add a column of numbers or 10 years, the result won't change.

Physical computations do not behave like that. Running them at different speeds often produces very different results.

This means that if the comp.lits are right, consciousness will be maintained regardless of how fast or slow the physical substrate "running the logic" operates. In fact, they insist that this would be true of a conscious "robot"... it would be conscious at any operating speed because its conscious awareness is not the direct result of physical computations, but rather is exclusively the result of some kind of logical overlay (the nature of which is quite murky) on those computations.

But of course, what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. Human beings are biological machines, and our brains are producing the physical computations which the biological model sees as the cause of consciousness, but which for comp.lits are merely the "substrate" which is being used to "run the logic" which is the actual cause of consciousness.

So if the comp.lits are right, as long as the physical systems of the brain are operating at all, you must be conscious. The only way to make you unconscious would be to stop the physical computations underlying the logical computations altogether, or at least to stop enough of them to skew the results of the computation. Because if those physical computations are operating at all, you'll be conscious.

 

[Piggy]

But in order for a symbol to exist, there must be some sort of object paired with someone who decides what it means and interprets that meaning. Which means, if consciousness is a symbol &/or the brain is a symbol system, you need a mind somewhere outside of the brain to decide what those symbols are and what they mean.

Not necessarily.

If we built a robot capable of consciousness, then all of a sudden every human on the planet died, that robot would still carry on its life as a conscious entity, even though there was no one else around to "interpret the meaning of its symbols". (Even if it only felt depressed and lonely.)

From my usage of terms, you would be introducing a form of dualism, if you argue this is somehow fundamentally impossible.

Uh... what symbols?

What are you talking about?

 

[westprog]

I am not talking about the freakin' Turing stuff anymore!

I don't intend to leave it alone. You are under no obligation to follow, though.

(I still think you are wrong: A standard PC is based on the Turing model,

No, sorry. A PC is designed to run programs according to the Turing model - or at least it was, back in the days of DOS. The PC itself isn't built according to the Turing model. The Turing model is a way to think about programs, not computers.

 

[yy2bggggs]

Ah, now that I'm not filtered through a 2 inch screen and compiler breaks, a correction--it was dlorde who was running through this line of artificial neurons.

Well, I think to understand the problem, you have to begin with the premise of the comp.lits, which is that consciousness literally results from logical computations alone, irrespective of the physical substrate.

Again, sure, but all comp.lits that I know of certainly agree that a physical substrate is required.

(I'll note here that neurobiology has proven that this is false, as even Dennett now admits, but we'll leave that fact aside for the moment.)

I'm still convinced you're misunderstanding what Dennett has admitted to, and what neurobiology actually has proven false. The particular quote you cited has to do with models of neurons, not the ability of logical computations to model the brain. In fact, we are modeling brains on computers.

In other words, they believe that as long as you have enough matter and energy to "run the logic" (and no more) you get two results: You get to run the logic, and a real instance of conscious experience is created.

(This causes another problem, namely the violation of the laws of conservation of matter and energy.

Are you claiming that consciousness has mass? Or energy?

Any real event which has a duration in time and is locatable in space -- as all real events do and are -- requires some involvement of matter and energy.

Symbolic manipulation is a real event. The comp.lit's your attacking are saying that the very act of manipulating those symbols is what produces consciousness. Nobody but you is claiming that consciousness adds more work to the system than is needed to manipulate the symbols.

It is impossible that you can cause real events A and B with only enough matter and energy to cause either A or B.

This is not true if A and B are the same thing. And that's all that's needed for the comp.lits to be safe.

But it's also not a physical principle anyway--it is not implied by the conservation of mass, nor the conservation of energy. If B is a glass breaking, for example, and A is shoving the glass off of a table, then I can cause B with only enough energy to perform A. Mass is neither introduced nor consumed by this action; and energy is neither produced nor consumed by it, so it's perfectly consistent with the laws of conservation of energy and mass. And it's a good thing too, because it's possible to break a glass by shoving it off the table, so if it did break either conservation law, we have a problem with our current understand of the laws of physics.

OK, so if it's true that consciousness is the result of logical computation alone, then this has some serious implications about the possible impact of time on the system.

Logical computations run the same every time, no matter what speed they're performed at. You can take 10 seconds to add a column of numbers or 10 years, the result won't change.

Abstractly, yes. But you need a physical substrate that can carry out the logic. The marble adding machine wouldn't work too well on time scales where wood rots.

Physical computations do not behave like that. Running them at different speeds often produces very different results.

Logical computations are physical computations. It's impossible to perform a logical computation without a physical substrate; it's also impossible to perform a logical computation without specifically using properties of a physical substrate.

These are not two different kinds of things.

This means that if the comp.lits are right, consciousness will be maintained regardless of how fast or slow the physical substrate "running the logic" operates.

Correct, providing that the physical substrate can support the logic at that speed. But we can get really slow.

In fact, they insist that this would be true of a conscious "robot"... it would be conscious at any operating speed because its conscious awareness is not the direct result of physical computations, but rather is exclusively the result of some kind of logical overlay (the nature of which is quite murky) on those computations.

What's specifically is murky about it?

But of course, what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. Human beings are biological machines, and our brains are producing the physical computations which the biological model sees as the cause of consciousness, but which for comp.lits are merely the "substrate" which is being used to "run the logic" which is the actual cause of consciousness.

So if the comp.lits are right, as long as the physical systems of the brain are operating at all, you must be conscious.

Does not follow. It has to do particular things. You may as well say that as long as my car is running, it is being driven.

 

[Piggy]

In fact, we are modeling brains on computers.

Is there anything you can't model on a computer?

 

[Piggy]

Are you claiming that consciousness has mass? Or energy?

It had better.

Why do you doubt it?

Do you think football games don't have mass and energy?

Do you think that thoughts don't have mass and energy?

If mass and energy are irrelevant to consciousness, how in the world can it be real? How can it be locatable in space and have duration in time?

 

[Piggy]

Symbolic manipulation is a real event. The comp.lit's your attacking are saying that the very act of manipulating those symbols is what produces consciousness.

Bootstrapping problem here.

Without consciousness in the first place, how can symbols even exist, much less be "manipulated"?

There cannot be any "symbols" until someone somewhere decides that a real object somehow stands for something else (real or imagined).

There can be similarities between systems, but that's not the same as saying that one is a "symbol" of the other.

 

[yy2bggggs]

Bootstrapping problem here.

There's no bootstrapping issue. You're just reacting.

Without consciousness in the first place, how can symbols even exist, much less be "manipulated"?

Exactly how I said they can. This is, by the way, a description of a system, not a thing. But the system doesn't have to be a conscious entity.

It can simply be a machine.

There cannot be any "symbols" until someone somewhere decides that a real object somehow stands for something else (real or imagined).

Why not? And why does it have to stand for anything? It's just a symbol.