On 8/19/2014 8:21 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:
On 18 Aug 2014, at 09:56, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
On 18 August 2014 15:20, meekerdb <meeke...@verizon.net> wrote:
On 8/17/2014 8:49 PM, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
Both consciousness and physics supervene on the computations, which exist
necessarily. Consciousness does not supervene on the physics.
Yes, I agreed to that. The question was can consciousness supervene on
computations that do not instantiate any physics? I think not.
I think that a sustained stream of consciousness will probably be part of a
computation that instantiates physics - instantiates a whole universe
complete with physics.
That's answering the converse question. So if the early universe was
instantiated by a computation (a computation that instantiated physics) then
you think that part of the early universe was a sustained stream of
consciousness. How do you conceive of this consciousness' relation to the
physics? For example might it be some structure in the inflaton field? Or
do you think of it as separate from physical structures?
I think of consciousness as a side-effect of, at least, the
computations that give rise to the type of behaviour we observe in
intelligently-behaving entities. It could also be that much simpler
computations have a much simpler consciousness, i.e. panpsychism, but
I don't know how to prove this; it's hard enough to prove that even
other people are conscious.
However, the point that I wanted to make was that if computation can
instantiate consciousness then there is nothing to stop a recording, a
Boltzmann Brain, a rock and so on from doing so; for these possibilities
have been used as arguments against computationalism or to arbitrarily
restrict computationalism.
Why is it arbitrary to say that a computation that is very simple, has not
possible branchings for example, cannot be conscious while some more complex
computation, one controlling an autonomous Mars Rover for example, may be?
What is arbitrary is to say that a computer that has unused components
inactivated, as per Maudlin or Bruno's MGA, is unconscious or
differently conscious.
Do you agree with Bruno that consciousness is all-or-nothing?
No, I think there are different degrees of consciousness.
Unless we have a vocabulary problem, this seems to contradict your fading qualia
argument. If you allow degrees of consciousness, it becomes unclear why we can't have
partial zombie. The guy would still say "I don't feel any change", but actually would be
less and less conscious, just unconsciously so.
When I say that consciousness is all-or-nothing, I just mean that either someone is
conscious, or is not. It does not mean that there are no consciousness state which looks
like, when we come back from them, as being slightly conscious. Those are only special
altered state of consciousness.
If your altered state of consciousness has no self-awareness, is it still
"consciousness"? And there's self-consciousness, i.e. being aware you are thinking. So
it's not 'fading' qualia, it different categories of consciousness. I'd say my dog has
self-awareness, e.g. he knows his name. But I'm not so sure he is self-conscious. The koi
in my pond are aware, but I doubt they are self-aware.
Brent
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