On Wed, Sep 24, 2014 at 07:05:43PM -0700, meekerdb wrote: > On 9/24/2014 6:53 PM, John Clark wrote: > > > >On Wed, Sep 24, 2014 at 5:52 PM, Telmo Menezes > ><[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: > > > > > > >>> John argues that consciousness has real world consequences > > in terms of > > being evolutionary selected > > > > > > >> Either that or consciousness is the side effect of something else > > that has > > real world consequences; if Darwin was right it can't be any other > > way. > > > > > > > You keep saying this. You also like to say things like "consciousness > > is how > > information feels when it's being processed". I like that idea. It shows > > that you > > can indeed consider alternatives to the binary choice above. In this > > case evolution > > created a very complex scenario for conscious to feel when being > > processed. But it > > did not create consciousness, > > > > > >Evolution is only interested in intelligent behavior because only > >that and not consciousness helps get genes into the next > >generation. So how did consciousness manage to produce at least > >one being (me) that's conscious? There are only 2 possibilities: > > > >1) Perhaps consciousness aids in producing intelligent behavior. > >If this is true then it would be easier to make a intelligent > >computer that was conscious than to make a Intelligent computer > >that was not conscious. It would also mean that the Turing Test is > >not only a test for intelligence but was also a good (although not > >infallible) test for consciousness too. > > > >2) The only way to produce intelligent behavior is to process > >information, and perhaps it's just a brute fact that consciousness > >is how information feels when it's being processed. > > > >In my opinion #2 is more likely than #1 but if Darwin was right > >then one of the two must be true, But either way consciousness > >must be a biological spandrel, and if you ever run across a smart > >computer you can conclude that it's probably conscious too. > > I think #1 is more likely, so long as we identify consciousness with > what we experience, e.g. imaging, inner narrative, language (does > anybody here think they could formulate and understand Lob's theorem > without language?). #2 is is probably true in the sense that some > kind of consciousness goes with intelligent information processing. > But I think there are probably a wide range of different ways to do > intelligent information processing and they may give rise to > different kinds of consciousness (e.g. the hive mind of the Borg) > that would be hard for us to recognize in interacting with them. > > Of course these are probably all equivalent under Bruno's idea that > consciousness is just being a universal computer and so babies and > trees and genome's are conscious too. But I think that's so broad a > concept of consciousness as to be obfuscatory. > > Brent >
My suspicion is also no. #1. Consciousness very likely is a strategy for being able to bring together disparate, and perhaps contradictory unconscious thought processes to make a decision for action - any decision is often better than making one at all. This is essentially Stephen Mithen's account of how the human mind formed (cathedrals of the mind and all that). It also accords with Toffoli's integrated information idea. The trouble I have, is that there are obvious ways of achieving the same ends that don't involves consciousness - eg voting (think of the three computers controlling the space shuttle). What makes conscious so much better than these other methods, or is it just an effective accident? -- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Prof Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile) Principal, High Performance Coders Visiting Professor of Mathematics [email protected] University of New South Wales http://www.hpcoders.com.au Latest project: The Amoeba's Secret (http://www.hpcoders.com.au/AmoebasSecret.html) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- 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/d/optout.
