David Lochrin wrote: Conscious minds attach meanings to symbols
Maybe in your case. My cat is certainly conscious - i.e. aware of and responding to it's surroundings - but doesn't do a lot of symbols. A self-conscious mind, which might be what you are referring to, does that, and, is aware of itself, located in time, separate from the environment and in an ongoing relationship to it. Symbols or some kind of internal modelling seems to be required, particularly if it's going to communicate with us. My cat doesn't do this much. The next step is being able to model other minds. This is an adaption for social living and produces the the complex, nuanced life we live. Cats pretty clearly don't do this, neither do young children and some disfunctional adults. If a machine can demonstrate awareness it is conscious, though (at this stage) this is likely over a more limited domain than you. Over time we can expect machines to be self-conscious and to model other minds. Obviously, it's subjective quality won't be the same as yours which has been honed by evolution for a particular purpose. Jim _______________________________________________ Link mailing list [email protected] http://mailman.anu.edu.au/mailman/listinfo/link
