4 ms·
This is indeed very interesting line of thinking, and if one agrees that there is no soul, and there is no quantum process essential to life that can not be mod
by chr1 8y ago
This is indeed very interesting line of thinking, and if one agrees that there is no soul, and there is no quantum process essential to life that can not be modeled on a classical computer, then this is the only remaining way of thinking.
But this is different from dictionary definition of panpsychism, because this doesn't need to assign consciousness to simpler computations (rocks, buildings, simple cells).
And this indeed opens really interesting questions. For instance if you have a simulation of many people, is it ok to continue the simulation when they are killing each other? Is it ok to ever stop the simulation? Is it ok to create a model of a person you do not like and torture him? What if your brain is augmented with a powerful computer, and torturing happens literally in your imagination?
- skosch 8y ago> this doesn't need to assign consciousness to simpler computations (rocks, buildings, simple cells). That necessarily follows, I think. The quantum processes in a rock are also a form of computation and, therefore, inhabited by some rudimentary form of experience we might call, dunno, "rockness". I don't see an easy way around it. Perhaps at absolute zero all experience stops? I have no answers, but your questions are precisely why I find this fascinating to think about!
- chr1 8y agoI would expect there to be very marked jump between the rockness and the computations with the simplest consciousness, that will allow to assign them to different classes instead of having a continuous spectrum going to zero with temperature. Kind of similar to the way how behavior of cellular automata changes between the predictable patterns and chaotic ones. (But i wouldn't bet all my money on it, only the half:)
- skosch 8y ago> Kind of similar to the way how behavior of cellular automata changes between the predictable patterns and chaotic ones. Hm, reminds me of Permutation City. That's an interesting parallel I hadn't considered at all.