>Stathis: I was using the term "information" loosely, to include what >is commonly termed qualia, subjective experience etc.
But I think this is where a subtle dualism creeps in, because you are ascribing something special to qualia, beyond mere existence, or so it seems. I agree >that if a physical system is fully specified, then that is all >you need in order to duplicate or emulate the system. The new >system will do everything the original one did, including have >conscious experiences. It's worth stressing this point again: >you don't need any special, non-physical information to >emulate or duplicate a conscious system; you don't need God to >provide it with a soul, you don't need to purchase a mind-body >interface kit, you don't need to meditate and wave quartz >crystals around, and you don't need to have 1st person >knowledge of its subjective experiences. All you need is a few >kilograms of raw materials, a molecular assembler mechanism, >and the data which indicates where each bit goes. Once the job >is finished, you automatically have a system which talks, >eats, and is conscious. Psychology and biology have been >reduced to physics and chemistry. Consciousness has been shown >to be just be an emergent phenomenon in a particular type of >biological computer. Agree so far? OK: having said all that, >and assuming at this point that we know the position and >function of every atom in this newly created system, I *still* >would wonder what it feels like to actually *be* this system. What it would be like to be a bat, as Nagel puts it. >My curiosity could only be satisfied if I were in fact the >duplicated system myself; perhaps this could be achieved if I >"became one" with the new system by direct neural interface. I >don't have to go to such lengths to learn about the new >system's mass, volume, behaviour, or any other property, and >in *this* consists the essential difference between 1st person >and 3rd person experience. You can minimise it and say it >doesn't really make much practical difference, but I don't >think you can deny it. I can deny that there is anything special about it, beyond the difference between A): *a description of an apple*; and B): *an apple*. I don't think anyone would deny that there is a difference between A and B (even with comp there is still a difference); but this "essential difference" does not seem to have anything in particular to do with qualia or experience. Jonathan Colvin > >--Stathis Papaioannou > >From Lee Corbin: >>Jonathan contrasts descriptions and what the descriptions describe: >> >> > > Stathis: Your post suggests to me a neat way to define >what is special >> > > about first person experience: it is the gap in information >> > > between what can be known from a description of an object and >> > > what can be known from being the object itself. >> > >> > But how can "being an object" provide any extra >information? I don't see >> > that information or knowledge has much to do with it. How >can "being an >> > apple" provide any extra information about the apple? >> >>Let's remember some naive answers here. First, for a fixed physical >>object, there exist infinitely many descriptions. It's a common >>belief that beyond a certain amount of accuracy, differences don't >>really matter. For example, one ought to be quite happy to teleport >>even if there is one atomic error for every 10^20 atoms. >> >>Second, a common interpretation of QM asserts that beyond a certain >>accuracy, there is *no* additional information to be had whatsoever. >>That is, that there exists some finite bit string that contains >>*all* an object's information (cf. Bekenstein bound). >> >>Still, the naive answer is that a description (or even a set of >>descriptions) of a physical object is different from the physical >>object itself: a physical object is a process, and a set of >>descriptions is merely a set of bits frozen in time (and here >>we are back again, you know where). >> >>However, I hold with these "naive" answers, as do a lot of people. >>And so therefore I proceed to answer the above question thusly: >>"Being an apple" provides *no* information beyond that which would >>be provided by a sufficiently rich description. Even if an >>emulation of a person appreciating the sublime, or agonizing to >>a truly horrific extent, or whatever----no information obtains >>anywhere that is not in principle available to the experimenters, >>i.e., available from the third-person. >> >>You could make the experimenter *hurt*, and then say, "now you >>know what it feels like", and given today's techniques, that >>might very well be true. But this is only a limitation on what >>is known and knowable today; it says nothing about what might be >>knowable about a human subject of 20th century complexity to >>entities living a thousand years from now. >> >>(We ignore the possible effects on the experimenter's value >>system, or possible effects on his incentives: we are just >>talking about information as bit-strings, here.) >> >> > Obviously there is a difference between *an apple* and *a >> > description of an apple*, in the same way there is a difference >> > between *a person* and *a description of a person*, but the >> > difference is one of physical existence, not information. >> >>Yeah, that's the way it seems to me too.
