--- Charles D Hixson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > John K Clark wrote: > > "Matt Mahoney" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > > >> It seems to me the problem is > >> defining consciousness, not testing for it. > > > > And it seems to me that beliefs of this sort are exactly the reason > > philosophy is in such a muddle. A definition of consciousness is not > > needed, in fact unless you're a mathematician where they can be of > > some use, one can lead a full rich rewarding intellectually life without > > having a good definition of anything. Compared with examples > > definitions are of trivial importance. > > > > John K Clark > > But consciousness is easy to define, if not to implement: > Consciousness is the entity evaluating a portion of itself which > represents it's position in it's model of it's environment. > > If there's any aspect of consciousness which isn't included within this > definition, I would like to know about it. (Proving the definition > correct would, however, be between difficult and impossible. As > normally used "consciousness" is a term without an external referent, so > there's no way of determining that any two people are using the same > definition. It *may* be possible to determine that they are using > different definitions.)
Or consciousness just means awareness... in which case, it seems to be located in the hippocampus. http://www.world-science.net/othernews/080219_conscious -- Matt Mahoney, [EMAIL PROTECTED] ------------------------------------------- singularity Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/11983/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/11983/ Modify Your Subscription: http://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=4007604&id_secret=96140713-a54b2b Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
