On Sun, Dec 30, 2012 at 10:17 AM, John Mikes jami...@gmail.com wrote:
Stathis, I am afraid you took the easy way out.
Let me interject in ITALICS into your post-text below
JohnM
On Sat, Dec 29, 2012 at 8:05 AM, Stathis Papaioannou stath...@gmail.com
wrote:
On Sat, Dec 29, 2012 at 9:41 AM, John Mikes jami...@gmail.com wrote:
Stathis!!! (See after your remark) - John M
On Thu, Dec 27, 2012 at 7:38 PM, Stathis Papaioannou
stath...@gmail.com
wrote:
It's possible to prove that computers can be conscious if it can be
proved that the physical movement of the parts of the brain can be
simulated by a computer.
Firstly: did we agree in a working identification of 'conscious'?
It's a mysterious thing you know you have when you have it. For the
purposes of this discussion that suffices.
Please do not denigrate THIS DISCUSSION! you THINK you know,
when you THINK you have it. I rather state my ignorance.
Are you unsure if you're conscious?
Secondly: is such 'conscious' phenomenon PHYSICAL?
It appears to be associated with or supervene on or be caused by
certain brain processes, since when those brain processes are present
consciousness (whatever it is) is also present, and when those brain
processes are not present consciousness is not present.
ASSOCIATED WITH, or SUPERVENE ON? that is our human addition to
ideas we generate. Caused by is totally imaginary.
Do you deny that there is even an APPEARANCE of an association or
supervenience or causation?
Thirdly: do we know ALL (even restricted to 'physical(?)') movements
of
(all) the parts of the brain involved in mental actiity to state ALL
their
movements can be simulated by a computer?
No, we can't be sure. There may be non-computable physical processes
in the universe. But the evidence is that physics is computable.
What I meant was different: in the present phase of our gathering of
information we must be sure NOT to know ALL movements of mental
activity so our (embryonic) computers cannot simulate them all.
Is your evidence based on our nomenclature of a computable physics?
In my (tentative) ID for Ccness (response to relations) non-brainfunction-
based responses (call them physical?) are also observable. Hence my
questioning of the adjective 'conscious'. - T H A T - may be PHYSICAL
(ha ha) - of course also 'mental' (=ideational).
That the brain is computable means only that the physics determining
the brain's observable behaviour can be simulated by a computer with
an arbitrarily large amount of memory. But nothing is implied about
the technical feasibility of this.
--
Stathis Papaioannou
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