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Explain consciousness to the layman.

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punshhh said:
You realise that the electron in the sim would not be the same as the electron in the piece of hardware outside the universe running the sim, don't you.
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Yes, thank you, we do understand that. But it would, by definition, exhibit the same behaviours with respect to its environment.

The former is only a simulation of the later and the later may not even be an electron. It might be something else beyond our comprehension.
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Twaddle.
 
Belz... said:
As I said, you don't know how computers work. Either that, or you refuse to admit that there's a difference between computers and other systems.
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Tell me what the difference is and I'll see if I agree. Of course computers are different to other things that aren't computers. Everything is different to what it isn't the same thing as. The question is the nature of the qualitative difference. It's up to the proponents of such a difference to indicate its nature.

Still, keep going with that "you don't know anything about computers" bit. It must be very reassuring.

That sounds remarkably circular. The use of the word "inanimate", meaning non-alive, used to mean "non-conscious" ?
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And now it means non-alive. That's not to say that all life is necessarily conscious - but there's no reason to suppose that anything not alive is conscious in any way. Which some people will think is a perfectly reasonable demand for evidence for a proposition, but others will insist is a religion-based need to make human beings special.
 
The difference between what we consider a conscious thing and a non-conscious thing can be found in the occurrence (or not) of symbolic reaction. The non-conscious thing reacts entirely to direct physical input. The conscious thing filters physical inputs according to sense organs and selectively translates these to symbols. For example, the eye and the plastic-adapted parts of the brain receive light of a certain wavelength and symbolically translate it to the colour (symbol) red. Different sentient beings have different sense organs and different symbolic interpretations, but whatever these are they create a subjective, incomplete, and tautological map of physical reality. Rocks don't have such a problem. However, it's worth remembering that whilst the subjective mapping is going on, we continue to be rocks underneath. The objective physical 'thinking' and being still occurs, it's just our 'conscious' selves are not 'conscious' of it.
 
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PixyMisa said:
More like argument from twaddle. Argumentum ad twaddlum.
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Saying we do not know is a thousand times more commendable than using "monumentally simplistic" claims of knowing it all and be "of no practical value" to anyone..... that is twaddle and claptrap thinking....saying you know when you do not.

Little knowledge is more dangerous than no knowledge because it drives one to make "monumentally simplistic" hogwash.
 
!Kaggen said:
Meaningful relationships with other humans has nothing to do with the time spent with them. Wanting to live forever is purely a selfish pursuit.
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Try telling that to all the children and grandchildren who don't understand why their beloved parents and grandparents had to die so soon.
 
punshhh said:
You realise that the electron in the sim would not be the same as the electron in the piece of hardware outside the universe running the sim, don't you. The former is only a simulation of the later and the later may not even be an electron. It might be something else beyond our comprehension.
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Yes.
 
Frank Newgent said:
Soory, don't know what that has to do with what I posted.
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It is exactly the same argument. Penrose/Lucas argue that since humans have access to mathematical truth that cannot be gleemed using any algorithm, our brains must not follow an algorithm.

And it fails in exactly the same way -- we don't have intuitive access to mathematical truth, we have access to what we think is mathematical truth, and the latter can certainly be gleemed using an algorithm.

Frank Newgent said:
But by disagreeing with me are you saying you believe "a brain in a vat" questioning whether it's a brain in a vat might still be only a brain in a vat?

If so... from where does such knowledge of an external reality (outside the vat) originate?
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But it isn't knowledge of an external reality, that is what I am telling you. It is knowledge about the reality of the vat ( which is the reality the brain perceives ), combined with some imagination/extrapolation, to form what the brain thinks an external reality might be like, were there to be an external reality outside of its own.

Think about it -- you are in a space the shape of a cube with no exits. In the space with you is a dollhouse, except there is no roof on the dollhouse and no ceiling to any of the rooms in it, so you can see inside. There is also a room in the dollhouse with no doors, and a little plastic character that looks like you. We can throw in a mirror as well, so you can see what you look like.

Do you need to have any knowledge of what is outside your space, or whether there even is more to your reality besides your space, to just look at the dollhouse and notice the similarities? A space in the dollhouse, which you immediately notice is a room, has the same shape as the space you are in. There is a representation of a humanoid in that space, which you notice looks sort of like you ( because you know what you look like thanks to the mirror we provided ). No -- you don't need any knowledge of what is outside, you can simply look at what you have in front of you and extrapolate.

Furthermore, any conjectures you make have no relationship with what is actually outside your space. Zero. Because you have no access to what is outside your space. If one of your conjectures happens to match what is outside your space, that is just luck, and you don't even have a way to confirm it, because you have no access to what is outside your space.
 
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Leumas said:
Little knowledge is more dangerous than no knowledge because it drives one to make "monumentally simplistic" hogwash.
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Yeah but I think you are taking this way out of context.

It isn't like we using this stuff for a billion dollar grant proposal and tricking world leaders into buying into the idea that we can make conscious robots with a few hundred transistors because of how "simple" consciousness is.

The reality of the situation is that pixy and myself and all the other supporters of the computational model just prefer to focus on and discuss the *actual* complex issues, like *how* certain aspects of consciousness arise, rather than sit around all day arguing on the very basic ideas of subjective experience in isolation.

If someone asks "where does redness come from" I am much more interested in the specifics than some obscure philosophical musing about whether machines can experience "redness," or even "experience" at all.

Sorry, if I end up modelling the neural activity responsible for redness on a computer, and understand the specifics, I am done -- the quibbling over whether the computer "actually" sees red is pointless to me.

The problem is, the approach people like piggy and westprog want to take is to first nail down just whether simulations and computer models are valid in the first place, so instead of discussing the details we have 100+ pages of quibbling. My opinion is that such an approach is utterly stupid.
 
rocketdodger said:
Try telling that to all the children and grandchildren who don't understand why their beloved parents and grandparents had to die so soon.
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No need I am one of those and my regrets are not spending quality time not quantity. I had plenty of that. Too much in fact.

Put that in your pipe.
 
punshhh said:
Perhaps folk watch the matrix and think how easy it would be for reality to be like that. It would require some mother f***r of a piece of hardware to run that I tell you.:D
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You don't have to generate fully detailed information for everything. Only the objects the subject interacts with need fine detailing from the physics engine, and only while the interaction is occurring; the graphics engine only need process the area within an individual's view, and all of that, bar the tiny area viewed by the 'spotlight' of the fovea, can be low resolution. IOW you generate the fine detail only where and when necessary. This makes generating a virtual environment (for a limited number of participants) much less onerous. The size of a pre-modeled world would need to be limited, but could be made to appear much larger using pre-modeled 'islands' connected by travel routes without significant lateral extent (and a perhaps selection of 'library' mini-models to cater for detours, off-road, etc).
 
dlorde said:
You don't have to generate fully detailed information for everything. Only the objects the subject interacts with need fine detailing from the physics engine, and only while the interaction is occurring; the graphics engine only need process the area within an individual's view, and all of that, bar the tiny area viewed by the 'spotlight' of the fovea, can be low resolution. IOW you generate the fine detail only where and when necessary. This makes generating a virtual environment (for a limited number of participants) much less onerous. The size of a pre-modeled world would need to be limited, but could be made to appear much larger using pre-modeled 'islands' connected by travel routes without significant lateral extent (and a perhaps selection of 'library' mini-models to cater for detours, off-road, etc).
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There's a point of view that the Uncertainty Principle is an indication that we're living in a simulation. It makes the processing so much easier.
 
!Kaggen said:
No need I am one of those and my regrets are not spending quality time not quantity. I had plenty of that. Too much in fact.

Put that in your pipe.
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So you have regrets regarding how you spent time with your loved ones, yet don't think helping people live longer is a valid goal.

You don't see the obvious contradiction in those two sentiments?

It doesn't occur to you that if your loved ones were still alive, you could change your ways and spend quality time with them?

*shakes head sadly*
 
rocketdodger said:
So you have regrets regarding how you spent time with your loved ones, yet don't think helping people live longer is a valid goal.

You don't see the obvious contradiction in those two sentiments?

It doesn't occur to you that if your loved ones were still alive, you could change your ways and spend quality time with them?

*shakes head sadly*
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Dude they needed to die for me to come to this conclusions.

It's called being human.

Try it sometime it's interesting.
 
!Kaggen said:
Dude they needed to die for me to come to this conclusions.

It's called being human.

Try it sometime it's interesting.
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Lets just get to the heart of the issue -- would you, or would you not, rather they were still alive?

That is really all that needs asking.

And I don't even need to see your answer to know that the vast majority of people on this planet will always say "I would rather they were still alive."

So to sit there and proclaim that extending life isn't a noble cause is just so disingenuous as to be comical. Anyone that says that, I would like to see them repeat it when their loved ones are about to die, or when they themselves are on their deathbead.

"Yeah, if I had a choice, I wouldn't want even an hour more out of life" Nonsense. Utter nonsense.
 
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