On 2 March 2014 16:49, Craig Weinberg <[email protected]> wrote: >> You have too simplistic a view of what "function" means in the context of >> an intelligent being. > > > I think that you have too naive a view of what function means. > >> >> That is actually your whole problem: you look at machine, imagine that you >> can see how it works, then look at a human, can't figure out how it works, >> so conclude there must be something non-machine like in the human. > > > It has nothing to do with not being able to figure out how humans work. > Nothing to do with human consciousness or biology at all. I'm *always* only > talking about the bare metal basics of awareness itself. Sensation. > Detection. Signal. You take them for granted, but I don't. If you take them > for granted, then it is no great surprise that you can imagine consciousness > coming from function. > >> >> Yet the very examples you use demonstrate that even mysterious-seeming >> behaviours such as those displayed in ALH are generated by neural circuitry >> which can be easily disrupted. > > > It doesn't matter where they are generated, all that matters is whether > possession of one's own function can be defined as a computable object under > functionalism. I think that it is a clear double standard to say that the > 'mine-ness' of a hand can of course be detected, but the 'mine-ness' of a > human experience would require zombies to justify. You're looking at the > wrong thing. I don't care about the details of any particular machine or > organism, I care about the properties of awareness being incompatible in > every way to the properties of function unless awareness comes first.
The "mine-ness" of a hand cannot be directly detected but the behaviour can be detected. The behaviour is generated by the underlying processes, as is the consciousness. Although not immediately obvious, it turns out that if you can replicate the function you will also replicate the consciouness, even if you do it using a different mechanism. The use of the words "behaviour" and "function" can be confusing. Essentially, replicating the function of an entity involves replicating its behaviour under all circumstances, or to put it differently ensuring the outputs are the same for all inputs. -- Stathis Papaioannou -- 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. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
