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> Why aren't we p-zombies one might ask? Because we are agents in the world and not being good agents means death, so we have to feel to exist. > P-zombies don
by cgmg 9y ago
> Why aren't we p-zombies one might ask? Because we are agents in the world and not being good agents means death, so we have to feel to exist.
> P-zombies don't fear death. Even if one existed, it would not have the drive to protect itself and it would be damaged or destroyed soon enough.
You missed the point, like many others who think they can 'explain away' consciousness in a 4-paragraph post on an internet forum.
What you described is a difference in external behavior (eating, death avoidance, reproduction, etc). That is not what the problem of consciousness is about, and it's a dead giveaway that you don't understand the issue you're pontificating on.
- visarga 9y agoExternal and internal are united - if you fail externally, you're dead 'internally' too. You try to separate consciousness from the external world and study it under a microscope (metaphorically), and that's wrong. The agent is part of the world, it can never be anything outside, it can never be understood on its own. By labeling my argument as "behaviorism" and rejecting it because of it's "external" argument, then you ignore the very source of experiences that create consciousness. Then we hear people searching for the "neural correlates of consciousness" like it's a kind of brain secretion that just needs to be found - it's the external world that correlates with consciousness, when you're an AI agent or a brain. Every sensation, every reward and the body itself come from the world, the structure of experiences encountered in the external world creates the contents of consciousness, and yet we search for its explanation just in our brains.