On Aug 10, 9:55 am, Stathis Papaioannou <stath...@gmail.com> wrote: > Yes. Suppose your right hemisphere is replaced with a machine that is > functionally identical at its boundaries but has a qualitatively > different consciousness.
To me this is like saying 'suppose the Eastern United States is replaced with a machine that is functionally identical at it's boundaries but has a qualitatively different culture. >The left half of your left visual field will > then look different, by definition if the visual qualia are different. > But your left hemisphere receives the usual signals through the corpus > callosum, The diplomatic relations with Europe will then be different, by definition if the diplomatic culture is different. But the Western U.S. receives the usual traffic across the Mississippi River, >so you state via the speech centres in that hemisphere that > everything looks exactly the same. so the Eastern media reports the news that the diplomatic situation with Europe has not changed. > In other words you can't notice any > change in your consciousness due to the functionally identical > replacement. I would say that if you continue to behave normally and > you notice no change in your consciousness then there *is* no > difference in your consciousness. In other words Americans can't notice any change in their culture due to the functionally identical replacement. You would say that if the US continues to behave normally and it notices no change in it's culture then there *is* no difference in it's culture. Can you see why that's a rather oversimplified and misleading thought experiment? If you replace a civilization of living organisms with a machine, you have changed it's culture already. The intelligence of the system isn't limited to the physical relations between the neurons, it's millions of nodes of sensitivity all corroborating experiences about the interior and exterior worlds. Craig -- 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.
