Joachim, Thanks for what I reproduce below. This is the sort of thing I mean to preseRve in the noodlers' Corner when I get some time. Just too damn good to be allowed to be trampled down in the midden of friam posts.
You could, of course, do so yourself at www.sfcomplex.org/wiki/ComplexityNoodlersCorner which can also be approached via www.sfcomplex.org/wiki/NoodlersIndex. I would recommend that you start a new page ..., say htpp://www.sfcomplex.org/wiki/TheSelf... If you just type that into a browser window, the page will be created and then you can copy this stuff into a window and we're off. I am going to add a few comments below, IN CAPS, to distinguish them from your fine words. Owen says my caps will be itnerpreted as shouting. Think of them not as shouted but as written in my Amurrican Accent. Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology, Clark University ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) > If you were to go about programming a computer > to think about itself, how would you do it? Even if we program a computer to think about itself, the computer would be extremely bored, because he is as intelligent as a cash register or washing machine. He just follows commands, only extremely fast. SORRY ABOUT "THINK ABOUT"; VERY IMPRECISE. You can program a computer to behave like a complex adaptive system which acts, reacts and learns. Such a system or agent is able to act flexible, adapting itself to the environment, choosing the right action. It has a kind of "free will", because it can choose the action it likes. Here it makes more sense to develop software that thinks about itself, but if the system can only recognize a few categories, a sense of itself is not more than a faint emotion. To reach human intelligence, you need a vast number of computers, because the brain is obviously a huge distributed system. Then the interesting question is: can the system be aware of itself? YES. THE VERY QUESTION. THANKS FOR THE MORE PRECISE STATEMENT. It sounds paradox, but if we want to enable a system of computers to think about itself, we must prevent any detailed self-knowledge. If we could perceive how our minds work on the microscopic level of neurons, we would notice that there is no central organizer or controller. The illusion of the self would probably break down if a brain would be conscious of the distributed nature of it's own processing. EXACTLY. THANK YOU. In this sense, self- consciousness is only possible because the true nature of the self is not conscious to us.. SO SELF CONSCIOUSNESS IS LIKE PRECEPTION: OF ANYTHING, A CONSTRUCTION BASED ON CUES AND CONTROLLED BY ONE OR MORE APRIORI THEORIES CONCERNING THE NATURE OF THE WORLD. The complex adaptive system in question is aware of what is doing only indirectly through and with the help of the external world. To be more precise, the system can only watch its own activity on a certain level: on the macroscopic level it can recognize macroscopic things, and on the microscopic level, it can recognize other microscopic things - a neuron can recognize and react to other neurons - but there is no "level-crossing" awareness of the own activity. So you have to build a giant system which consists of a huge number of computers, and only if it doesn't have the slightest idea how it works, it can develop a form of self-consciousness. And only if you take a vast number of items - neurons, computers or servers - the system is complex enough to get the impression that a single item is in charge.. Quite paradox, isn't it? But there is something else we need: the idea of the self must have a base, a single item to identify oneself with. I HAVE ALWAYS FELT THAT THE NOTION OF SELF IS AT ROOT A LEGAL NOTION HAVING NOTHING TO DO WITH THE WAY BEHAVIOR WORKS. OTHERS DIRECT TOWARD US THE NOTION THAT WE ARE A SELF FOR THEIR OWN SOCIAL AND LEGAL CONVENIENCE AND SO OUR BEHAVIOR BECOMES SHAPED. BUT BEYOND THAT, THE SELF HAS NO REALITY. AND PARTICULARLY THE "INNER=" SELF HAS NO REALITYH. Thus we need two worlds: one "mental" world where the thinking - the complex information processing - takes place, and where the system is a large distributed network of nodes, and one "physical" world where a single "self" walks around and where the system appears to be a single, individual item: a person. This "physical" world could also be any virtual world which is complex enough to support AI. Each of this worlds could be be realized by a number of advanced data centers. rIGHT There are a number of conditions for both worlds: The hidden, "mental" world must be grounded in the visible, "physical" world, it must be complex enough to mirror it, and it must be fast enough to react instantly. Grounded means we need a "1:infinite" connection between both worlds. The collective action of the "hidden" system must result in a single action of an item in the "visible" system. And a single instant in the "visible" system must in turn trigger a collective activity of the "hidden" system during perception. Every perception and action for the system must pass a single point in the visible, physical world. If both worlds are complex enough, then this is the point where true self-consciousness can emerge. CAN YOU EXPLAIN THE PREVIOUS PARAGRAPH? ARE YOU BEHIND IT OR IS IT A REDUCTIO AD ABSURDUM. To summarize, in order to build a computer system which is able to think about itself, we need to separate the "thinking" from the "self": (a) a prevention of self-knowledge which enables self-awareness (b) a "1:infinite" connection between two very complex worlds which are in coincidence with each other When we think, certain patterns are brought into existence. Since a brain contains more than 100 billion neurons, each pattern is a vast collection of nearly invisible little things or processes. When we think of ourselves, a pattern is brought into existence, too. It is the identification of a vast collection of nearly invisible little items with a single thing: yourself. PART OF WHY THIS ISNT MAKING SENSE TO ME IS THAT I NEED YOU TO UNPACK THE METAPHOR IN THE WORD "VISIBLE". yOU ARENT REFERRING VISION. sO WHAT ARE YOU REFERRING TO? Except the abstract idea, there is no immaterial "self" hovering over hundred billion flickering neurons. The idea of a self or soul as the originator of the own thoughts is an illusion - but you may ask "if the self is unreal, then who is reading this?". So maybe it is more precise to say that the self is a confusing insight or an insightful confusion. The essence of self-consciousness seems to be this strange combination of insight and confusion. Self-consciousness is both: the strange, short-lived feeling associated with intricated patterns of feedback loops which arise if inconsistent items are related to each other: everything is related to nothing, real to unreal, inside to outside, material to immaterial, important to unimportant, etc. And it is the surprising insight associated with the continuous identification of the self in the ever-changing environment. -J. > > End of Friam Digest, Vol 61, Issue 21 > ************************************* ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
