On 25-04-2021 22:29, Jason Resch wrote:
It is quite easy, I think, to define a program that "remembers" (stores and later retrieves ( information.It is slightly harder, but not altogether difficult, to write a program that "learns" (alters its behavior based on prior inputs). What though, is required to write a program that "knows" (has awareness or access to information or knowledge)? Does, for instance, the following program "know" anything about the data it is processing? if (pixel.red > 128) then { // knows pixel.red is greater than 128 } else { // knows pixel.red <= 128 } If not, what else is required for knowledge? Does the program behavior have to change based on the state of some information? For example: if (pixel.red > 128) then { // knows pixel.red is greater than 128 doX(); } else { // knows pixel.red <= 128 doY(): } Or does the program have to possess some memory and enter a different state based on the state of the information it processed? if (pixel.red > 128) then { // knows pixel.red is greater than 128 enterStateX(): } else { // knows pixel.red <= 128 enterStateY(); } Or is something else altogether needed to say the program knows? If a program can be said to "know" something then can we also say it is conscious of that thing? Jason
I think it's better to approach the problem from the other end, i.e. you consider a certain consciousness described in terms of the content of the consciousness, e.g. you have the conscious experience of reading this sentence, and here it's important that part of this conscious experience is that it is you and not someone else reading this. So, a lot more information is involved here than just processing the small amount of information for reading this text. Then for that consciousness one can ask what physical system could implement this particular consciousness. But this is then to a large degree fixed by the conscious experience itself, as that already includes a sense if identity. But this is not fixed 100%, there exists a self-localization ambiguity.
The simpler the system that generates a consciousness, the larger this self-location ambiguity will become. This will become too large for very simple systems (if they are conscious at all) to pin that conscious experience down to any particular physical device that is running the algorithm that supposedly generates it. The conscious experience of a spider in my house may not be sufficiently detailed to locate itself in my house, it's consciousness is spread out over a vast number of different physical systems, some of which may be located on Earth as it existed 300 million years ago.
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