2013/2/8 Telmo Menezes <[email protected]> > > > > On Thu, Feb 7, 2013 at 7:12 PM, meekerdb <[email protected]> wrote: > >> On 2/7/2013 3:52 AM, Telmo Menezes wrote: >> >> On Wed, Feb 6, 2013 at 7:04 PM, John Clark <[email protected]> wrote: >> >>> >>> >>> On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 6:00 PM, Telmo Menezes >>> <[email protected]>wrote: >>> >>> >>> I'm not claiming that intelligence == mind. >>>>>> >>>>> >>>>> > Do you believe that your fellow human beings have minds? If so why? >>>>> >>>> >>>> > Yes (weakly). >>>> >>> >>> You believe that only weakly?! Do you really think there is a 49% chance >>> that you are the only conscious being in the universe? >>> >> >> I don't know how to assign a probability to that. I guess I believe >> it's in ]0.5, 1] because I would bet on it, but that's all I can say. >> >> I say weakly because the only thing I have to back this belief is an >> heuristic, which I find to be a weaker form of approximating the truth than >> mathematical proof or experimental confirmation. >> >> >>> By the way, I don't believe other people have minds when they are >>> sleeping or under anesthesia or dead because when they are in those states >>> they don't behave very intelligently. >>> >> >> But that is because you believe that intelligence == mind. I don't. >> Certain experiences that you can do on yourself might make you doubt that >> belief, but I don't know of any way to convince you except suggesting that >> you do those experiences. >> >> >>> >>> > Occam's razor. If I'm the only human being with a mind, then, for >>>> some mysterious reason, there are two types of human beings: me (with a >>>> mind) and the others (zombies). So heuristically I'm inclined to believe >>>> that all human beings have a mind, >>>> >>> >>> OK, but if you also believe in Darwin's theory of Evolution then you >>> must also believe that consciousness MUST be a byproduct of intelligence >>> because Evolution can't directly see consciousness any better than we can >>> and so cannot select for it, and yet you and probably other people are >>> conscious. Thus you must also believe that if a computer is intelligent >>> then it is conscious. Then you must also believe that intelligence == mind. >>> >> >> You are begging the question. You're assuming, to begin with, that >> intelligence == mind and then you claim to prove that intelligence == mind. >> >> By the way, for evolution to generate consciousness there has to exist >> a gradient to climb. Unless the evolutionary process just stumbles into >> consciousness, but in that case it is not a valid theory of it's origin. So >> you are implicitly assuming that there is some measure of consciousness, >> where you can say that entity A is more conscious than entity B. What would >> that even mean? My cat seems conscious to me (but I can't know for sure). >> Is he less conscious than me? Well I know stuff that he doesn't, but he >> also knows stuff that I don't -- for example he knows how it feels to be a >> cat. >> >> >> But that doesn't mean there's something magic about being a cat. I think >> it might be possible to change your brain, and your sensory organs, so that >> it implemented consciousness very similar to a cat's (it couldn't be exact >> because you'd need a cat's body for that). Of course it wouldn't be Telmo >> Menezes any more. >> > > I agree that this might be possible. But the paradox then is the > following: to make me feel like a cat you have to strip me of my memories > (read/write access), so when I'm back from the experience I won't remember > it. In fact I turned into a cat for a while and then back to Telmo Menezes. > Telmo Menezes still knows nothing about being a cat. >
Well, while going from Telmo to the cat, you're rigth that Telmo memories should be erased, the inverse is not true. Why couldn't you be back as Telmo + the memories of having been a cat ? Regards, Quentin > >> >> And yes I think there are degrees and kinds of consciousness and that a >> cat's consciousness differs in both respects. There's consciousness of >> being an individual and of being located in 3-space and in time. You and >> the cat have both of those (whereas a Mars rover only has the latter). But >> there's language and narrative memory that you have and the cat doesn't. >> There's reflective thought,"I'm Telmo and I'm thinking about myself and >> where I fit in the world". The cat probably doesn't have this because it's >> not social - but a dog might. >> > > But is this really a case of "degrees of consciousness" or is it just the > general property of "being conscious" instantiated in different contexts? > The fact that you believe you can turn me into a cat seems to indicate that > ultimately you believe that consciousness is all the same. > > >> >> Brent >> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "Everything List" group. >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >> email to [email protected]. >> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. >> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. >> >> >> > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. > > > -- All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
