On Wednesday, September 5, 2012 6:38:07 AM UTC-4, rclough wrote: > > Hi Stephen P. King > > No, the stuff in our skulls is alive, has intelligence, and a 1p. > Computers don't and can't. Big sdifference. >
> Hi Roger, > > 锟斤拷� Please leave magic out of this, as "any sufficiently advanced > technology is indistinguishable from > magic<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke%27s_three_laws>". > The trouble is that the stuff in our skulls does not appear to be that much > different from a bunch of diodes and transistors. > > 锟斤拷� Our brains obey the very same physical laws! What makes the brain > special? I suspect that the brain uses quantum entanglement effects to both > synchronize and update sense content in ways that cannot obtain from purely > classical physical methods. Our mechanical machines lack the ability to > report on their 1p content thus we are using their disability to argue > against their possible abilities. A computer that could both generate an > internal self-model and report on it would lead us to very different > conclusions! > > I think you are both right. Computers qua computers don't feel anything because they aren't anything. The physical material that you are using to execute computations on does however have experiences - just not experiences that we associated with our own. There is a concrete experience associated with the production of these pixels on your screen - many experiences on many levels, of molecules that make up the wires etc., but those experiences don't seem to lead to anything we would consider significant. It's pretty straightforward to me. A stuffed animal that looks like a bear is not a bear. A picture of a person is not a person, even if it is a fancy interactive picture. Craig -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msg/everything-list/-/jQeAlMze5jAJ. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
