Stathis Papaioannou wrote: > Peter Jones writes: > > >>Stathis Papaioannou wrote: >> >> >>>Various people write: >>> >>> >>>>blah blah ...recording... blah blah... consciousness... blah blah >>> >>>But WHY can't a recording be conscious? How do I know I'm not in >>>a recording at the moment? >> >>The question is why you don't regard the recordings in your video >>cabinet as conscious. Well, if you do, you have probably murdered >>some people by taping over them. > > > I'm responsible for a misunderstanding if you thought I meant "recording" > in the usual sense of the word, i.e. a copy of a limited subset (sound or > video, for example) of a subject's attributes over a period of time. What > I intended was a copy of all of the subject's attributes, but constrained > so that it will run the same way over and over, like an automaton. For > example, if you have an elaborate computer game with characters with > whom you can interact so they pass the Turing test, you can record the > whole session, including your keyboard inputs, and "play" it a second time. > The computer goes through exactly the same states the second time around, > but it really has no choice: the recording constrains its behaviour as > rigidly > as a video tape constrains the behaviour of the video player and TV (actually > more rigidly, since there is always some variation between runs with analogue > systems). Would you say that the characters in the game are conscious on > the first run but not on the second? > > Stathis Papaioannou
I think this turns on the referent of "the characters". If it means the sequence of computer states that represents the characters in that game - no. If it means the programs that represent the characters, programs that would have responded differently had circumstances been different, then - yes. At least that's the theory that consciousness depends on counterfactuals. Brent Meeker --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
