On 4/2/2015 4:18 PM, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
I think the argument I present does not depend on any fact about the world (although going from the general case of what I call functionalism to what Putnam called machine-state functionalism and you call comp does depend on the physical CT being true). It depends on a very basic operational definition of consciouness: that you know it if you are conscious and you realise if there is a large enough change in your consciousness. If you don't accept this operational definition then I can find no meaning in the word "consciousness".
I don't understand how that applies to someone who, for example, is red-green colorblind. Aren't they partial-zombies by your definition? They may come to realize that they don't distinguish the full spectrum, just as we realize we don't see infrared. Supppose the colorblind person used to see colors but lost the ability (as my mother did after cataract surgery)? She realized it by noticing that things that used to be colorful weren't anymore. But like the person born colorblind, she didn't directly experience a qualia of being colorblind.
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