4 ms·

Until we solve the hard problem of consciousness, the door on p-zombies is wide open. It's arrogant to assume that just because you are conscious, everyone else

by xamuel 7y ago

Until we solve the hard problem of consciousness, the door on p-zombies is wide open. It's arrogant to assume that just because you are conscious, everyone else must be conscious like you. Maybe consciousness is caused by a particular benevolent parasite living in your gut, and whoever lacks that parasite lacks consciosness.

MaxBarraclough 7y ago
> It's arrogant to assume that just because you are conscious, everyone else must be conscious like you. It's far more arrogant to assume you're the odd one out. There's a reason we never use that kind of thinking. The following reasoning is clearly absurd: I think I'm immune from radiation sickness. I know we have no evidence that anyone in history has been immune, but I've never been exposed, so I'm going to assume I'm immune. > Maybe consciousness is caused by a particular benevolent parasite living in your gut, and whoever lacks that parasite lacks consciosness. You could go with that explanation, but it's far more complex than necessary, which is a good indicator that it's not true. A physicist won't be able to disprove the suggestion that gravity will only exist for as long as the Invisible Pink Unicorn wills it to exist. So what? We can be pretty confident that consciousness arises from the normal activity of the brain. We can temporarily shut it down with anaesthetics, and see the diminished activity in parts of the brain.
- xamuel 7y ago
  >It's far more arrogant to assume you're the odd one out. I didn't say you should assume that either. You shouldn't assume either one until you have some reason to do so. >A physicist won't be able to disprove the suggestion that gravity will only exist for as long as the Invisible Pink Unicorn wills it to exist. So what? If I had some way of knowing which people are conscious, and I observed that everyone currently living and everyone in the past was always conscious, then it would indeed be silly for me to suggest that tomorrow many non-conscious people will be born --- as silly as your Invisible Pink Unicorn example. But the fact is, I do NOT know that anyone other than myself is conscious. I assume they are for the sake of adjudicating ethical dilemmas, but I only actually have that empirical data for myself. >We can temporarily shut [consciousness] down with anaesthetics, and see the diminished activity in parts of the brain. Here you seem to be assuming consciousness is identified with certain brain activities, but that's begging the question. For example, that would rule out computer simulations from being conscious, since you couldn't detect said brain activity in said computer. But it's far from settled whether or not consciousness is impossible in a computer simulation, in fact, many people think it IS possible. So unless you know something a lot of experts don't know, there isn't enough evidence to equate consciousness with certain brain activity.

by xamuel 7y ago

MaxBarraclough 7y ago

> It's arrogant to assume that just because you are conscious, everyone else must be conscious like you. It's far more arrogant to assume you're the odd one out. There's a reason we never use that kind of thinking. The following reasoning is clearly absurd: I think I'm immune from radiation sickness. I know we have no evidence that anyone in history has been immune, but I've never been exposed, so I'm going to assume I'm immune. > Maybe consciousness is caused by a particular benevolent parasite living in your gut, and whoever lacks that parasite lacks consciosness. You could go with that explanation, but it's far more complex than necessary, which is a good indicator that it's not true. A physicist won't be able to disprove the suggestion that gravity will only exist for as long as the Invisible Pink Unicorn wills it to exist. So what? We can be pretty confident that consciousness arises from the normal activity of the brain. We can temporarily shut it down with anaesthetics, and see the diminished activity in parts of the brain.

xamuel 7y ago
>It's far more arrogant to assume you're the odd one out. I didn't say you should assume that either. You shouldn't assume either one until you have some reason to do so. >A physicist won't be able to disprove the suggestion that gravity will only exist for as long as the Invisible Pink Unicorn wills it to exist. So what? If I had some way of knowing which people are conscious, and I observed that everyone currently living and everyone in the past was always conscious, then it would indeed be silly for me to suggest that tomorrow many non-conscious people will be born --- as silly as your Invisible Pink Unicorn example. But the fact is, I do NOT know that anyone other than myself is conscious. I assume they are for the sake of adjudicating ethical dilemmas, but I only actually have that empirical data for myself. >We can temporarily shut [consciousness] down with anaesthetics, and see the diminished activity in parts of the brain. Here you seem to be assuming consciousness is identified with certain brain activities, but that's begging the question. For example, that would rule out computer simulations from being conscious, since you couldn't detect said brain activity in said computer. But it's far from settled whether or not consciousness is impossible in a computer simulation, in fact, many people think it IS possible. So unless you know something a lot of experts don't know, there isn't enough evidence to equate consciousness with certain brain activity.