Information is the key. Conscious agents are defined by precisely that
information that specifies the content of their consciousness. This
means that a conscious agent can never be precisely located in some
physical object, because the information that describes the conscious
experience will always be less detailed than the information present in
the exact physical description of an object such a brain. There are
always going to be a very large self localization ambiguity due to the
large number of different possible brain states that would generate
exactly the same conscious experience. So, given whatever conscious
experience the agent has, the agent could be in a very large number of
physically distinct states.
The simpler the brain and the algorithm implemented by the brain, the
larger this self-localization ambiguity becomes because smaller
algorithms contain less detailed information. Our conscious experiences
localizes us very precisely on an Earth-like planet in a solar system
that is very similar to the one we think we live in. But the fly walking
on the wall of the room I'm in right now may have some conscious
experience that is exactly identical to that of another fly walking on
the wall of another house in another country 600 years ago or on some
rock in a cave 35 million year ago.
The conscious experience of the fly I see on the all is therefore not
located in the particular fly I'm observing. This is i.m.o. the key
thing you get from identifying consciousness with information, it makes
the multiverse an essential ingredient of consciousness. This resolves
paradoxes you get in thought experiments where you consider simulating a
brain in a virtual world and then argue that since the simulation is
deterministic, you could replace the actual computer doing the
computations by a device playing a recording of the physical brain
states. This argument breaks down if you take into account the
self-localization ambiguity and consider that this multiverse aspect is
an essential part of consciousness due to counterfactuals necessary to
define the algorithm being realized, which is impossible in a
deterministic single-world setting.
Saibal
On 18-06-2021 20:46, Jason Resch wrote:
In your opinion who has offered the best theory of consciousness to
date, or who do you agree with most? Would you say you agree with them
wholeheartedly or do you find points if disagreement?
I am seeing several related thoughts commonly expressed, but not sure
which one or which combination is right. For example:
Hofstadter/Marchal: self-reference is key
Tononi/Tegmark: information is key
Dennett/Chalmers: function is key
To me all seem potentially valid, and perhaps all three are needed in
some combination. I'm curious to hear what other viewpoints exist or
if there are other candidates for the "secret sauce" behind
consciousness I might have missed.
Jason
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