On 10/15/2018 7:34 AM, John Clark wrote:
On Sun, Oct 14, 2018 at 10:53 PM Brent Meeker <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
> /The reason for not doubting that other human beings are conscious
is that (1) I am conscious and/
But you know for a fact you're not conscious all the time, you know
you're not conscious when you're sleeping or under anesthesia or
before you were born and, although you don't know for certain, you
probably suspect you won't be conscious after you're dead. And you may
have also noticed a pattern here, you seem to only be conscious when
you have the ability to behave intelligently.
"Having the ability to behave intelligently" is not something I
can/*know*/. I can only know when I behave intelligently. But I
can/*know*/ when I am conscious.
> /(2) other human beings are made of the same stuff in
approximately the same way that I am/
There is a lot of wiggle room in that "approximately", what difference
is important and what is just incidental? Maybe men are conscious and
women are not, maybe white people are conscious and black people are
not, maybe right handers are conscious and left handers are not.
Maybe, but I doubt it.
Structurally the difference between you and you're recently deceased
twin brother is at only one point, your unfortunate sibling has a hole
in his heart and you do not, but you're still more similar to your
twin than you are to me, and yet I bet you believe I am more conscious
than your brother because one of us can still behave intelligently and
one can't.
Really?? You have a impoverished view of "structure". Ever heard of
decay? And why only "structure"? What happened to chemistry, neurons,
hormones,...?
I don't know what any of that has to do with my similarity to other
human beings providing evidence that they are conscious. Octopuses act
intelligently too, but this bit of evidence in favor of their
consciousness is missing. So I'm a little less sure that they are
conscious.
> /and (3) they behave the same way in relation to what I am
conscious of, e.g. they jump at a sudden loud sound./
As I said neither you nor other people act that way all the time,
No, what you said was they are conscious when they /*know*/ they can act
inelligently.
only when they have the ability to behave intelligently.
John K Clark
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