On Mon, May 2, 2022, 5:30 AM Russell Standish <li...@hpcoders.com.au> wrote:
> On Fri, Apr 22, 2022 at 09:38:40PM -0500, Jason Resch wrote: > > Artificial Life such as these organisms: > > https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLq_mdJjNRPT11IF4NFyLcIWJ1C0Z3hTAX > > ( https://github.com/jasonkresch/bots ) > > > > Have neural networks that evolved through natural selection, can adapt > to a > > changing environment, and can learn to distinguish between "food" and > "poison" > > in their environment. > > > > If simple creatures like worms or insects are conscious, (because they > have > > brains, and evolved), then wouldn't these artificial life forms be > conscious > > for the same reasons? > > > > Why or why not? > > Most insects can't be consious (see my paper "Ants are not > conscious"). Most ALife forms created to date are simpler than > insects, and probably even worms, so are unlikely to be consious either. > Hi Russell, Thanks for sharing. I had read this argument before, I believe in your book, and reread it again just now. It is compelling and a quite novel approach to the question. However, I do not see it as bullet proof. For example: The reasoning could be applied equally as an argument that we are living in a computer simulation where simulating minds of higher level organisms is more common than simulating simpler creatures, and so common as to outclass simpler minds. It could be used as an argument for Unificationism (the idea that instantiating same mind more than once does not ascribe more measure to the experience). Then the power law would reflect unique possible conscious states across reality, and human and higher level minds would dominate in that there are more ways for a human brain to create unique conscious states. It could also be that simple conscious states can jump or shift to equivalent conscious states until they stabilize on an experience that is less likely to stabilize. For instance, the question is sometimes asked "What is it like to be a thermostat?" One answer could be that it is like a person waking up in the morning. (Where the conscious state of a waking person intersects the state of a thermostat, and a thermostat's mind is equivalent to a wide class of many minds, it is not really like anything to be a thermostat). I don't know that insect consciousness is simple enough for this argument to apply though. Then there's the question of whether it is correct to divide minds, or whether something like universalism is true, which states there is only one mind, and all experiences belong to it. Then any experience is one I am 100% likely to experience. I am not sure what to think, but "why are we not ants?" is indeed a mystery that calls for an explanation. Jason -- 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 everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/CA%2BBCJUjo3puq-TbM5eRf8xWZ%3D2cU%2BDRUPQ5wzosZxqbtiDvgpw%40mail.gmail.com.
