On 5/1/2019 12:34 PM, Terren Suydam wrote:
I would argue for "pancyberpsychism" (I'm no good at naming - is there
a name for that already?) which is to say that there it is something
it is like to do information processing of any kind. However, the
quality of the consciousness involved in that processing is related to
its dynamics. So banging on a rock involves a primitive form of
information processing, as vibrations ripple through the rock - there
it is something it is like for that rock to be banged on. For ongoing
consciousness, some sort of feedback loop must be involved. A
thermostat would be a primitive example of this, or a simple
oscillating electric circuit. The main idea is that consciousness is
associated with cybernetic organization and has nothing to do with
substrate, which might be material or virtual.
In the Chinese Room example the cybernetic characteristics of the
thought experiment lack any true feedback mechanism. This is the case
with most instances of software as we know it - e.g. traditional chess
engines. There is something it is like to be them, but it's not
anything we would recognize in terms of ongoing subjective awareness.
One could argue that operation systems (including Mars Rovers) embody
the cybernetic dynamics necessary for ongoing experience, but I'd
guess that what it's like to be an operating system would be pretty
alien.
Yes, that's one of the things I find interesting about AI. Human-like
consciousness requires learning from memory, prediction and planning.
This means internal simulation of prospective actions. But even within
those conditions there could be a lot of variations. For example, human
memory involves a lot confabulation, as shown by many experiments. This
obviously conserves memory since only key things are actually stored in
a narrative and a lot of a memory is reconstructed. An AI Mars Rover
wouldn't necessarily work this way. Electronic memories can be much
bigger and still have reasonable access times. So an AI might simply
have everything recorded. So what would it be like to an AI Mars Rover
with many more kinds of sensory systems and eidetic memory?
Brent
With biological brains, it's all about feedback and recursivity. Small
insects with rudimentary nervous systems are totally recursive,
feeding sensory data in and processing it continuously. So insect
consciousness is much closer to our own than ordinary Von-Neumann
architecture data-processing.
As nervous systems get more complex, feeding in more data and
processing data in much more sophisticated ways, the consciousness
involved would likewise be experienced in a richer way.
Humans, with our intricate conceptual, language-based self-models,
achieve true self-consciousness. The self-model is a quantum leap
forward, giving us the ability to say "I am". The ego gets a bad rap
but it's responsible for our ability to notice ourselves and live
within and create ongoing narratives about what we are, in relation to
what we aren't. This explains why ego-dissolving psychedelics lead to
such profound changes in consciousness.
Terren
On Wed, May 1, 2019 at 3:02 PM Quentin Anciaux <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
Le mer. 1 mai 2019 à 18:13, 'Cosmin Visan' via Everything List
<[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> a écrit :
How is a computer conscious ? Magic ? Are you even aware of
the Chinese Room argument ?
Yes, and how is the chinese room not conscious ? Because you have
to associate it either to the dumb person acting as processor or
the rules ? The chinese room as a whole information processing
unit is conscious. If you ask it, it will tell you so... Prove it
is not.
Quentin
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