Are You Conscious?

[AkuManiMani]

Pixi,

Thanks for the detailed response to my questions. It was extremely enlightening about your views and the way you think.

Frankly, I was floored by your response.

I've been trying to reason with it for almost two years now and its responses still amaze me. You'd be better off trying to argue philosophy with your word processor.

 

[FedUpWithFaith]

Deja Vu...

Some of my favorite Pixy claims:

- Car engines, washing machines, and toasters are conscious
- Anesthetized patients are unconsciously conscious
- Self-aware thermostats
- Consciousness IS self referential something something. I kind of tune out at that point. I know the acronym is SRIP.

Others can feel free to add more. It's all hilariously nonsensical, more so since Pixy actually believes this stuff.

I'm beginning to think that Pixy is David Chalmers, who I had an eerily similar exchange with once.

David, is that you???? Do you still think rocks might be conscious? If so, I promise I won't throw any. I wouldn't want to be a murderer.

 

[AkuManiMani]

Glad to hear it. Glad to know somebody found all that work entertaining.

I'm an odd duck.

I started as a nuclear physicist but moved to become a biophysicist and went into neuroscience in the 80s. I lived in the wet brain world awhile (I invented neat little machine for studying a type of neuronal processing) and then moved over to artifical neural networks and AI research. Then I had a bunch of inventions related to AI/pattern recognition and became an entrepreneur and founded a bunch of companies some very successful, some failures, and some still among the walking dead (a VC term for companies that employ people and do useful stuff but unlikely to ever yield a return to investors).

Awesumo! Good to know theres a qualified person in this discussion who isn't part of the strong AI cult. When I suggested to Pixy, et al., that the question of consciousness is more a matter of biophysics than computer science they acted as if I grew an extra head, or something

 

[AkuManiMani]

I'm beginning to think that Pixy is David Chalmers, who I had an eerily similar exchange with once.

David, is that you???? Do you still think rocks might be conscious? If so, I promise I won't throw any. I wouldn't want to be a murderer.

The ironic part is that Pixy often harps on about how ridiculous philosophers like Chalmers are yet he can't see that his own beliefs logically lead to the same absurdities.

 

[FedUpWithFaith]

I've been trying to reason with it for almost two years now and its responses still amaze me. You'd be better off trying to argue philosophy with your word processor.

I don't appreciate the subtle dig you're making about my word processor. She happens to be very conscious, intelligent, and she's got a great set of keys on her if you know what I mean.

As for Pixy, as I said in an earlier post, I enjoy seeing how people think even if, or especially when, there's an impasse. So my time's not wasted and I like talking to myself anyway. And frankly, haven't we all been there ourselves at one time or another? I mean even you and I would have to concede that there is at least some small chance that Pixy could be right and we are wrong and there is just some huge thing we're missing - like an incredible brainfart.

 

[AkuManiMani]

As for Pixy, as I said in an earlier post, I enjoy seeing how people think even if, or especially when, there's an impasse. So my time's not wasted and I like talking to myself anyway. And frankly, haven't we all been there ourselves at one time or another? I mean even you and I would have to concede that there is at least some small chance that Pixy could be right and we are wrong and there is just some huge thing we're missing - like an incredible brainfart.

LAWL!

Iono... At this point I can only conclude that hes either a self-deluded human who identifies with his toys way too much, or hes some kind of sophisticated chatbot programed to argue for S-AI.

 

[Robin]

So who were/are you at Dawkins? I don't recall a Robin either other than SciWoman's real name which she used for time to time. Plus I don't remember her posting in the Philosophy section much.

The username was Neuron, as I recall - although I was unable to reactivate this name later.

 

[FedUpWithFaith]

Awesumo! Good to know theres a qualified person in this discussion who isn't part of the strong AI cult. When I suggested to Pixy, et al., that the question of consciousness is more a matter of biophysics than computer science they acted as if I grew an extra head, or something

Thanks Aku.


I'm new here Aku so i don't know what you consider to be part of the strong AI cult. Who knows, we may butt heads too.

I do believe strong AI is possible and that mankind can create it. Furthermore, I believe we can do so on computers without creating a biological organism. We may have to supply an artificial (or human) society for it to interact with though to some degree.

I also believe, but this is where my degree of certainty goes down a little, that we can create strong AI on a universal Turing machine-type computers not too dissimilar from current computers. However we may have to implement (or at least simulate) information processes biophysicly discovered from wetware connectionist systems first until we discover alternative or isomorphic computational methods. However, it could turn out that we do this in reverse analogous to how we discovered how to fly via the principle of constructing airplanes before constructing bird or insect-like flight.

I don't believe, unlike Penrose/Hammeroff, that the basis for conscious computation is a quantum computer of any sort. Not only is the evidence lacking but there is also physical theory that directly contradicts it. However, I'm not sure the brain doesn't utilize a form of hypercomputation beyond Turing, as per the paper I cited in an earlier post. I wouldn't bet on it because it's still rather fringe. I simply have to say I don't know and leave it at that.

 

[Robin]

You were a mod there weren't you? I do remember you were treated quite fairly, even, in my opinion, rather favourably in one case where you suspended a guy you were having a disagreement with.

No, I don't remember that happening. In fact we had a policy whereby it was impossible for that to happen, so I'm not sure why you remember it either...

When you said this I thought maybe I had remembered wrongly, but no, here is the post in full:

The "God" proven by metaphysics is a neccessary being but has no other properties. It's not "infinitely good" or a perfect engineer or a moral theist or any of the other things most theists think God is. So the argument works, but the conclusion is useless for most of the people who try to use it. If anything, it undermines their position instead of supporting it.

Now go and read the article.

In short, metaphysics is bollocks so, no ... shove it :lol:

Kyu

You are suspended for 24 hours. You were repeatedly warned. If you behave in the same manner when you come back, I will suspend you again, for a week. You gave me no choice, Kyuuketsuki.

I have left your IP address unbanned. If you try re-registering as another user from the same IP address, you will be permanently banned for sock-puppetry.

So it was not, it seems, impossible.

http://forum.richarddawkins.net/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=5523&start=150

Later another admin took your side so I don't think anybody can claim you were treated in any way unfairly.

 

[AkuManiMani]

Thanks Aku.


I'm new here Aku so i don't know what you consider to be part of the strong AI cult. Who knows, we may butt heads too.

I don't mind a good argument. Most of my friends disagree with me on just about everything which makes our discussions so much fun!

I do believe strong AI is possible and that mankind can create it. Furthermore, I believe we can do so on computers without creating a biological organism. We may have to supply an artificial (or human) society for it to interact with though to some degree.

I my only objection to strong AI is that it confuses Artificial Intelligence with Synthetic Consciousness. The former is a relatively easy issue; I don't think enough science is in to achieve the latter yet, tho.

I also believe, but this is where my degree of certainty goes down a little, that we can create strong AI on a universal Turing machine-type computers not too dissimilar from current computers. However we may have to implement (or at least simulate) information processes biophysicly discovered from wetware connectionist systems first until we discover alternative or isomorphic computational methods. However, it could turn out that we do this in reverse analogous to how we discovered how to fly via the principle of constructing airplanes before constructing bird or insect-like flight.

I think that current AI research is a cargo cult approach to consciousness. Not only are there a lot of scientific requisites we haven't yet met with regard to consciousness, but there are still a lot of philosophical hurdles that have to be crossed before synthetic consciousness becomes a technically approachable problem.

[Just to be upfront about it, I'm just an extremely curious layman who reads too much and has a lot of opinions on the issue ]

I've made a lot of attempts in my time on this forum to frame the issue in a way that, I think, lends it more easily to being resolved. Here are a few posts I've made that might give you some general idea of how I understand consciousness:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=5426663&postcount=3318
http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=5431348&postcount=3342
http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=5432224&postcount=3347

I don't believe, unlike Penrose/Hammeroff, that the basis for conscious computation is a quantum computer of any sort. Not only is the evidence lacking but there is also physical theory that directly contradicts it. However, I'm not sure the brain doesn't utilize a form of hypercomputation beyond Turing, as per the paper I cited in an earlier post. I wouldn't bet on it because it's still rather fringe. I simply have to say I don't know and leave it at that.

I'm really not certain what the exact mechanisms of consciousness are, aside from some rough speculation based on my own introspection. Personally, I think that any physical theory of consciousness must relate to, or be, quantum mechanical. My reasoning behind this is that since QM is the only theory that we have that accommodates ontological indeterminacy, it must also provide some means of explaining conscious free will.

I've made some speculative arguments a while back to try and support this position. Maybe I can get some good critical feedback now that there is someone here with a solid background in this area

 

[Robin]

The username was Neuron, as I recall - although I was unable to reactivate this name later.

Ah, no, it was Positron.

 

[Gestahl]

Whatever consciousness is, we (meaning healthy, normal, awake, adult humans) certainly have it. So it's a silly question. Of course I am conscious.

Trying to use that statement, however, to prove anything else about me deductively is going to be problematic, because then you must, *by necessity* use a definition (deduction must have at least partial descriptive definitions to start from). And I think yours and mine differ significantly (as would most people's outside of this thought-community... I'm an odd fellow, but among like-minded people here).

It's analogous to you asking of me "is this water", when you think water is hydrogen minus phlogiston (this was actually a theory), and I think it's hydrogen plus oxygen. Yes, whatever water is, it's certainly what is before us: the clear, liquid, wet stuff we all like to drink and swim in on a hot summer day. So it is with conciousness.

 

[FedUpWithFaith]

I don't mind a good argument. Most of my friends disagree with me on just about everything which makes our discussions so much fun!



I my only objection to strong AI is that it confuses Artificial Intelligence with Synthetic Consciousness. The former is a relatively easy issue; I don't think enough science is in to achieve the latter yet, tho.



I think that current AI research is a cargo cult approach to consciousness. Not only are there a lot of scientific requisites we haven't yet met with regard to consciousness, but there are still a lot of philosophical hurdles that have to be crossed before synthetic consciousness becomes a technically approachable problem.

[Just to be upfront about it, I'm just an extremely curious layman who reads too much and has a lot of opinions on the issue ]

I've made a lot of attempts in my time on this forum to frame the issue in a way that, I think, lends it more easily to being resolved. Here are a few posts I've made that might give you some general idea of how I understand consciousness:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=5426663&postcount=3318
http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=5431348&postcount=3342
http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=5432224&postcount=3347




I'm really not certain what the exact mechanisms of consciousness are, aside from some rough speculation based on my own introspection. Personally, I think that any physical of consciousness must relate to, or be, quantum mechanical. My reasoning behind this is that since QM is the only theory that we have that accommodates ontological indeterminacy, it must also provide some means of explaining conscious free will.

I've made some speculative arguments a while back to try and support this position. Maybe I can get some good critical feedback now that there is someone here with a solid background in this area

Well, those all seem pretty reasonable positions to me. I guess it looks like we might not butt heads. Too bad, Pixy had me all warmed up for some good wholesome forum S&M.

 

[AkuManiMani]

Well, those all seem pretty reasonable positions to me. I guess it looks like we might not butt heads. Too bad, Pixy had me all warmed up for some good wholesome forum S&M.

Don't feel disappointed yet; Pixy might actually return with his usual canned responses. Don't go too hard on him, tho. From my personal experience, if you're too scathing he'll just retread under a rock or hide behind his 'Ignore' button

 

[Limbo]

Hey FUWF if you get bored maybe we can butt heads over post #656?

 

[FedUpWithFaith]

I actually replied to you Limbo and deleted it and then i found myself driven to respond to Pixy and I'm caught up in a few PM exchanges and before you know it it let my mind - sorry.

Ok. So let's use your iceberg analogy and see where we end up. There is a part of the iceberg above the water and a part below the water. The tip above the water is consciousness, we are aware of it. The bulk of the iceberg below the water is unconscious mental processes. Everything below the water is below the threshold of conscious awareness. Ok so far?

Yeah, but you got my knees shaking already with where I fear you'll be taking this.

Let's call the totality of the iceberg, both above and below the water the psyche. Unless you don't like that word either? I'm open to an appropriate word of your choice.

How about we just call it "mind"? It's simple and there are no psychoanalytic, mythologcial, or other potentially distracting connotations.

The center of gravity of the iceberg-psyche would be below the water, correct? Below the threshold of conscious awareness. After all, only the tiny tip is above water. So let's call the underwater center of the psyche the Self. Or the Atman, if you and UE don't object. Again I'm open to an appropriate word of your choice. I'm just trying to find common ground through your analogy.

Oh Christ, this is the sort of thing that drives me a little batty Limbo. I know you're being sincere but nested metaphors make one ever more vulnerable to self-delusion. Such is the power of metaphor to mislead as will as inform.

I begin with the iceberg metaphor because its a well-known useful cliche for indicating there's a lot more than meets the eye - the mind's eye in this case - to invoke another cliche metaphor. Now you're taking this metaphor and introducing additional metaphors based on its density, specific gravity, and whatnot. Just because a physical metaphor is valid doesn't mean it can be extended. I'm not aware that the center of mass for an iceberg offers any metaphorical analog to consciousness at all and I see no need of useful potential for knowledge acquisition for giving it any names yet.

Before I go on I'll wait to see if there are any objections so far.

However, I suspect you have a point in mind and there is a method to your madness (just another cliche - not an insult) so I'll play along and see what comes next.

 

[Limbo]

I actually replied to you Limbo and deleted it and then i found myself driven to respond to Pixy and I'm caught up in a few PM exchanges and before you know it it let my mind - sorry.

NP.

How about we just call it "mind"? It's simple and there are no psychoanalytic, mythologcial, or other potentially distracting connotations.

Mind it is.

I begin with the iceberg metaphor because its a well-known useful cliche for indicating there's a lot more than meets the eye - the mind's eye in this case - to invoke another cliche metaphor. Now you're taking this metaphor and introducing additional metaphors based on its density, specific gravity, and whatnot.

Just because a physical metaphor is valid doesn't mean it can be extended. I'm not aware that the center of mass for an iceberg offers any metaphorical analog to consciousness at all and I see no need of useful potential for knowledge acquisition for giving it any names yet.

However, I suspect you have a point in mind and there is a method to your madness (just another cliche - not an insult) so I'll play along and see what comes next.

I think it's legitimate to extend the iceberg analogy from the tip to the bulk. After all, the tip (consciousness) is only a small part of the total mind. The unconscious is vast and powerful. The tip tends to think it's running the whole show, but it isn't. The underwater unconscious center is.

Before I go on I'll see if you agree with that.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

So it was not, it seems, impossible.

You surprise me once again, Robin.

I lost.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

Ah, no, it was Positron.

That makes more sense...

 

[FedUpWithFaith]

I think it's legitimate to extend the iceberg analogy from the tip to the bulk. After all, the tip (consciousness) is only a small part of the total mind. The unconscious is vast and powerful. The tip tends to think it's running the whole show, but it isn't. The underwater unconscious center is.

Before I go on I'll see if you agree with that.

Yes.

I want to add a caveat however since though since i made the mistake of setting myself up as a neuroscience expert that I don't speak for the neuroscience community on this. I'm not sure most of my colleagues would agree with me (though I think they would) and I know several with far more impressive resumes than I who would say I'm full of crap.