Stathis Papaioannou wrote: > > > On 01/06/07, *Torgny Tholerus* <[EMAIL PROTECTED] > <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>> wrote: > > Stathis Papaioannou skrev: >> On 01/06/07, *Torgny Tholerus* <[EMAIL PROTECTED] >> <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>> wrote: >> >> I behave AS IF I am conscious because the natural selection >> has favored that type of behavior. >> >> >> Which implies you really are conscious, because otherwise why >> would evolution have gone to the trouble of making *me* conscious >> if it could have got away without it? > It did got away without it... ;-) > > > I assure you, at least one entity in the universe is conscious: me. If > evolution could have made me a zombie, it would have. Therefore, it > seems reasonable to assume that evolution couldn't help but grant me > consciousness as a side-effect or epiphenomenon, the real prize being > intelligent behaviour. There are some philosophers (eg. Daniel Dennett) > who would argue that consciousness is *nothing but* this intelligent > behaviour, and the idea of a zombie is logically incoherent, but I'm not > entirely convinced that this is right. > -- > Stathis Papaioannou
I'm with Dennett, except that I think logic is to weak a tool to rule out zombies. It would require proving a contradiction from "X acts like a conscious human" and "X is not conscious". But all you really need is to show it's nomologically impossible - i.e. would imply a violation of presumed scientific knowledge. I think that may be possible. Brent Meeker --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
