Nick, > Let's say we are in two dodgem's cars on an empty dodgem's > thingy. Let's say I am tryiing to collide with you. To > manage a collision I have to make all sorts of calculations > that involve facts about me as well as facts about you. For > instance, if I do not not know the ratio of turning of the > steering wheel to turning of my car (or the ratio of my > movement of my arms to the turning of of the steering wheel), > then I cannot manage the collision, can I? That is all > information about ME.
I couldn't figure out what this was about at first, something about setting a collision course with toy race cars... Then I thought of the response to discovering real danger and how a whole landscape of possibilities explodes in your mind, regarding a suddenly very important collision course. I'd sure rate it as a defining experience of self-consciousness. Say you're on a winter hike through a beautiful snowy woods, and you kind of loose track of time trying to get back to the trail, and with an unexpected shudder you find you're actually rather cold and don't really know which way it is or how far to the car. All your powers of physical analysis rush in as the dozen scenarios and many choices within each survival strategy suddenly take over your thoughts. One might say only minds using world models with self-images playing roles are self-conscious. I think there's more to what consciousness itself is though. Maybe the most primitive state of consciousness is simply having an identity, a presence as an individual, whether you have a brain for making 'pictures' or any other part of the multiplex theater that consciousness is for people. In-between is the kind of consciousness when you just behave coherently with a completely blank mind, perhaps the most normal kind of consciousness. We're completely unaware of most of our smooth executions of very complicated interactions with our world, and there's lots of amazing 'collision course calculus' involved too. Just a kiss is an amazingly complex orchestration of physical systems we don't need to pay any attention to. Are we conscious *of* something happening at the time, sure, but I think the consciousness experienced and displayed goes a lot deeper than what might dart through our minds. > I guess I have stipulated that I think that being self > conscious is the same as processing information about ME. > > Thanks for the oportunity to try and clarify. > > Nick > > Nicholas Thompson > [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson > > > > [Original Message] > > From: Russell Standish <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; The Friday Morning Applied > > Complexity > Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com> > > Date: 6/26/2006 12:55:42 AM > > Subject: Re: [FRIAM] RE Self consciousness and Passive Darwinism. > > > > On Sun, Jun 25, 2006 at 12:19:13AM -0400, Nicholas Thompson wrote: > > > I have never understood the idea that animals are not self > > > conscious in some useful sense. Heck, self consciousness is a > > > necessary part of any feed forward system, isnt it? > > > > > > > Why do you say this? > > > > -- > > *PS: A number of people ask me about the attachment to my > email, which > > is of type "application/pgp-signature". Don't worry, it is not a > > virus. It is an electronic signature, that may be used to > verify this > > email came from me if you have PGP or GPG installed. Otherwise, you > > may safely ignore this attachment. > > > > > -------------------------------------------------------------- > -------------- > > A/Prof Russell Standish Phone 8308 3119 (mobile) > > Mathematics 0425 253119 (") > > UNSW SYDNEY 2052 [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > > Australia > http://parallel.hpc.unsw.edu.au/rks > > International prefix +612, Interstate prefix 02 > > > -------------------------------------------------------------- > -------------- > > > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org > > ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
