>If it is not present physically, then what causes a person to say "I >am imagining a blue chair"?
A sensorimotive circuit. A sensory feeling which is a desire to fulfill itself through the motive impulse to communicate that statement. >Could you please define this term? I looked it up but the >definitions I found did not seem to fit. Nerves are referred to as afferent and efferent also. My idea is that all nerve functionality is sense (input) and motive (output). I would say motor, but it's confusing because something like changing your mind or making a choice is motive but not physically expressed as motor activity, but I think that they are the same thing. I am generalizing what nerves do to the level of physics, so that our nerves are doing the same thing that all matter is doing, just hypertrophied to host more meta-elaborated sensorimotive phenomena. >There is such a thing as too low a level. What leads you to believe >the neuron is the appropriate level to find qualia, rather than the >states of neuron groups or the whole brain? I didn't say it was. I was just talking about the more similar you can get to imitating a human neuron, the more similar a brain based on that imitation will be to having the potential for human consciousness. >You would have to show that the presence of DNA in part determines the >evolution of the brains neural network. If not, it is as relevant to >you and your mind as the neutrinos passing through you. Chromosome mutations cause mutations in the brain's neural network, do they not? btw, I don't interpret neutrinos, photons, or other massless chargeless phenomena as literal particles. QM is a misinterpretation. Accurate, but misinterpreted. >> A digital simulation is just a pattern in an abacus. >The state of an abacus is just a number, not a process. I think you >may not have a full understanding of the differences between a turing >machine and a string of bits. A Turing machine can mimick any process >that is defineable and does not take an infinite number of steps. >Turing machines are dynamic, self-directed entities. This >distinguishes them from cartoons, YouTube videos and the state if an >abacus. A pattern is not necessarily static, especially not an abacus, the purpose of which is to be able to change the positions to any number. Just like a cartoon. If you are defining Turing machines as self- directed entities then you have already defined them as conscious, so it's a fallacy to present it as a question. Since I think that a machine cannot have a self, but is instead the self's perception of the self's opposite, I'm not compelled by any arguments which imagine that purely quantitative phenomena (if there were such a thing) can be made to feel. >Then, if you deny the logical possibilitt of zombies, or fading >qualia, you must accept such an emulation of a human mind would be >equally conscious. These ideas are not applicable in my model of consciousness and it's relation to neurology. >The idea behind a computer simulation of a mind is not to make >something that looks like a brain but to make something that behaves >and works like a brain. I think that for it to work exactly like a brain it has to be a brain. If you want something that behaves like an intelligent automaton, then you can use a machine made of inorganic matter. If you want something that feels and behaves like a living organism then you have to create a living organism out of matter that can self replicate and die. >Rejection requires the body knowing there is a difference, which is >against the starting assumption. If you are already defining something as biologically identical, then you are effectively asking 'if something non-biological were biological, would it perform biological functions?' >I pasted real life counter examples to this. Artificial cochlea and >retinas. Those are not replacements for neurons, they are prostheses for a nervous system. Big difference. I can replace a car engine with horses, but I can't replace a horse's brain with a car engine. >At what point does the replacement magically stop working? At what point does cancer magically stop you from waking up? >So it can use an artificial retina but not an artificial neuron? A neuron can use an artificial neuron but a person can't use an artificial neuron except through a living neuron. Craig On Jul 13, 9:16 pm, Jason Resch <jasonre...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Jul 13, 2011, at 7:04 PM, Craig Weinberg <whatsons...@gmail.com> > wrote: > > >> Again, all that matters is that the *outputs* that influence other > >> neurons are just like those of a real neuron, any *internal* > >> processes in the substitute are just supposed to be >artificial > >> simulations of what goes on in a real neuron, so there might be > >> simulated genes (in a simulation running on something like a > >> silicon chip or other future computing >technology) but there'd be > >> no need for actual DNA molecules inside the substitute. > > > The assumption is that there is a meaningful difference between the > > processes physically within the cell and those that are input and > > output between the cells. That is not my view. Just as the glowing > > blue chair you are imagining now (is it a recliner? A futuristic > > cartoon?) is not physically present in any neuron or group of neurons > > in your skull - > > If it is not present physically, then what causes a person to say "I > am imagining a blue chair"? > > > under any imaging system or magnification. My idea of > > 'interior' is different from the physical inside of the cell body of a > > neuron. It is the interior topology. It's not even a place, it's just > > a sensorimotive > > Could you please define this term? I looked it up but the > definitions I found did not seem to fit. > > > awareness of itself and it's surroundings - hanging on > > to it's neighbors, reaching out to connect, expanding and contracting > > with the mood of the collective. This is what consciousness is. This > > is who we are. The closer you get to the exact nature of the neuron, > > the closer you get to human consciousness. > > There is such a thing as too low a level. What leads you to believe > the neuron is the appropriate level to find qualia, rather than the > states of neuron groups or the whole brain? Taking the opposite > direction, why not say it must be explained in terms if chemistry or > quarks? What led you to conclude it is the neurons? Afterall, are > rat neurons very different from human neurons? Do rats have the same > range of qualia as we? > > > If you insist upon using > > inorganic materials, that really limits the degree to which the > > feelings it can host will be similar. > > Assuming qualia supervene on the individual cells or their chemistry. > > > Why wouldn't you need DNA to > > feel like something based on DNA in practically every one of it's > > cells? > > You would have to show that the presence of DNA in part determines the > evolution of the brains neural network. If not, it is as relevant to > you and your mind as the neutrinos passing through you. > > > > >> The idea is just that *some* sufficiently detailed digital > >> simulation would behave just like real neurons and a real brain, > >> and "functionalism" as a philosophical view says that this > >> >simulation would have the same mental properties (such as qualia, > >> if the functionalist thinks of "qualia" as something more than just > >> a name for a certain type of physical process) >as the original brain > > > A digital simulation is just a pattern in an abacus. > > The state of an abacus is just a number, not a process. I think you > may not have a full understanding of the differences between a turing > machine and a string of bits. A Turing machine can mimick any process > that is defineable and does not take an infinite number of steps. > Turing machines are dynamic, self-directed entities. This > distinguishes them from cartoons, YouTube videos and the state if an > abacus. > > Since they have such a universal capability to mimick processes, then > the idea that the brain is a process leads naturally to the idea of > intelligent computers which could function identically to organic > brains. > > Then, if you deny the logical possibilitt of zombies, or fading > qualia, you must accept such an emulation of a human mind would be > equally conscious. > > > If you've got a > > gigantic abacus and a helicopter, you can make something that looks > > like whatever you want it to look like from a distance, but it's still > > just an abacus. It has no subjectivity beyond the physical materials > > that make up the beads. > > The idea behind a computer simulation of a mind is not to make > something that looks like a brain but to make something that behaves > and works like a brain. > > > > >> Everything internal to the boundary of the neuron is simulated, > >> possibly using materials that have no resemblance to biological ones. > > > It's a dynamic system, > > So is a turing machine. > > > > > > > > > > > there is no boundary like that. The > > neurotransmitters are produced by and received within the neurons > > themselves. If something produces and metabolizes biological > > molecules, then it is functioning at a biochemical level and not at > > the level of a digital electronic simulation. If you have a heat sink > > for your device it's electromotive. If you have an insulin pump it's > > biological, if you have a serotonin reuptake receptor, it's > > neurological. > > >> So if you replace the inside of one volume with a very different > >> system that nevertheless emits the same pattern of particles at the > >> boundary of the volume, systems in other >adjacent volumes "don't > >> know the difference" and their behavior is unaffected. > > > No, I don't that's how living things work. Remember that people's > > bodies often reject living tissue transplanted from other human > > beings. > > Rejection requires the body knowing there is a difference, which is > against the starting assumption. > > > > > > > > > > > > >> You didn't address my question about whether you agree or disagree > >> with physical reductionism in my last post, can you please do that > >> in your next response to me? > > > I agree with physical reductionism as far as the physical side of > > things is concerned. Qualia is the opposite that would be subject to > > experiential irreductionism. Which is why you can print Shakespeare on > > a poster or a fortune cookie and it's still Shakeapeare, but you can't > > make enriched uranium out of corned beef or a human brain out of table > > salt. > > >> Because I'm just talking about the behavioral aspects of > >> consciousness now, since it's not clear if you actually accept or > >> reject the premise that it would be possible to replace >neurons > >> with functional equivalents that would leave *behavior* unaffected > > > I'm rejecting the premise that there is a such thing as a functional > > replacement for a neuron that is sufficiently different from a neuron > > that it would matter. > > I pasted real life counter examples to this. Artificial cochlea and > retinas. > > > You can make a prosthetic appliance which your > > nervous system will make do with, but it can't replace the nervous > > system altogether. > > At what point does the replacement magically stop working? > > > The nervous system predicts and guesses. It can > > route around damage or utilize a device which it can understand how to > > use. > > So it can use an artificial retina but not an artificial neuron? > > > > > > > > > > >> first I want to focus on this issue of whether you accept that in > >> principle it would be possible to replace neurons with "functional > >> equivalents" which emit the same signals to other >neurons but have > >> a totally different internal structure, and whether you accept that > >> this would leave behavior unchanged, both for nearby neurons and > >> the muscle movements of the >body as a whole. > > > This is tautological. You are making a nonsense distinction between > > it's 'internal' structure and what it does. If the internal structure > > is equivalent enough, then it will be functionally equivalent to other > > neurons and the organism at large. If it's not, then it won't be. > > Interior mechanics that produce organic molecules and absorb them > > through a semipermeable membrane are biological cells. If you can make > > something that does that out of something other than nucleic acids, > > then cool, but why bother? Just build the cell you want > > nanotechnologically. > > >> Again, not talking about consciousness at the moment, just > >> behaviors that we associate with consciousness. That's why, in > >> answer to your question about synthetic water, I >imagined a robot > >> whose limb movements depend on the motions of water in an internal > >> tank, and pointed out that if you replaced the tank with a > >> sufficiently good simulation, the >external limb movements of the > >> robot shouldn't be any different. > > > If you are interested in the behaviors of consciousness only, all you > > have to do is watch a youtube and you will see a simulated > > consciousness behaving. Can you produce something that acts like it's > > conscious? Of course. > > >> My point was that if you agree that the basic notion of "Darwinian > >> evolution" is purely a matter of organization and not the details > >> of what a system is made of (Do you in fact agree >with that? > >> Regardless of whether it might be *easier* to implement Darwinian > >> evolution in an organic system, hopefully you wouldn't say it's in- > >> principle impossible to implement >self-replication with heredity > >> and mutation in a non-organic system?), then it's clear that in > >> general it cannot be true that "Feature X which we see in organic > >> systems is purely a >matter of organization" implies "We should > >> expect to see natural examples of Feature X in non-organic systems > >> as well". > > > It's a false equivalence. Darwinian evolution is a relational > > abstraction and consciousness or life is a concrete experience. The > > fact that we can call anything which follows a statistical pattern of > > iterative selection 'Darwinian evolution' just means that it is a > > basic relation of self-replicating elements in a dynamic mechanical > > system. That living matter and consciousness only appears out of a > > particular recipe of organic molecules doesn't mean that there can't > > be another recipe, however it does tend to support the observation > > that life and consciousness is made out of some things and not others, > > and > > ... > > read more » -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
