On 2/20/08, Stathis Papaioannou <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On 21/02/2008, John Ku <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > By the way, I think this whole tangent was actually started by Richard > > misinterpreting Lanier's argument (though quite understandably given > > Lanier's vagueness and unclarity). Lanier was not imagining the > > amazing coincidence of a genuine computer being implemented in a > > rainstorm, i.e. one that is robustly implementing all the right causal > > laws and the strong conditionals Chalmers talks about. Rather, he was > > imagining the more ordinary and really not very amazing coincidence of > > a rainstorm bearing a certain superficial isomorphism to just a trace > > of the right kind of computation. He rightly notes that if > > functionalism were committed to such a rainstorm being conscious, it > > should be rejected. > > Only if it is incompatible with the world we observe.
I think that's the wrong way to think about philosophical issues. It seems you are trying to import a scientific method to a philosophical domain where it does not belong. Functionalism is a view about how our concepts work. It is not tested by whether it is falisified by observations about the world. Or if you prefer, conceptual analysis does produce scientific hypotheses about the world, but the part of the world in question is within our own heads, something that we ourselves don't have transparent access to. If we had transparent access to the way our concepts work, the task of cognitive science and philosophy and along with it much of AI would be considerably easier. Our best way of testing these hypotheses at the moment is to see whether a proposed analysis would best explain our uses of the concept and our conceptual intuitions. Sometimes, especially with people who have been in the grip of a theory, people can (often only partially) switch what concept is linked to a lexical item and not realize they are (sometimes) using the word differently from others (including their past selves). Then the debate gets much more complicated and may among other things, have to get into the normative issue of which concept(s) we ought to use. Chances are, though, unless the revision was carefully thought out and defended rather than accidentally slipped into, it will not serve the presumably important functions for which we had the original concept. ------------------------------------------- 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
