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Consciousness as an object isn't even a scientific entity, - That's good news, not bad. If it's not a scientific entity, we don't have to worry about it or hold

Consciousness as an object isn't even a scientific entity, - That's good news, not bad. If it's not a scientific entity, we don't have to worry about it or hold it up to scientific scrutiny. Similarly we can stave off worrying about whether it has a soul, and which God it belongs to should it in fact have a soul--whatever that means. Ah, but this is the crux of the Chinese Room argument. You're saying that since we can't measure it or detect it, it doesn't exist, and therefore isn't important. When you have a brain simulation going and having a conversation with it, that's enough for you. It says it's conscious, and we can't measure consciousness, therefore it is conscious. I disagree. Strongly. That brain simulation is a zombie. The man in the room does not speak Chinese. But we'll see. I actually think we will, Kurzweil might be somewhat of a crackpot with his singularity, but his extrapolations of increases in processing power say that we'll have the power to simulate a human brain in a pocket-sized thing in 2030-something, and the power to simulate all of humanity in 2040-something. I'll be around 60 years old then, and hopefully still sticking around. :-)

henrikschroder 15y ago
(Brilliant, this is the second time I argue against strong AI here, and only received downvotes instead of comments. That's not how this place is supposed to work.)
gosub 15y ago
You're saying that since we can't measure it or detect it, it doesn't exist, and therefore isn't important If you can't measure it or detect it, how would you know it's there and it's the source of the phenomenon? If I tell you that it's not consciousness but magic pixie dust, invisible and non-detectable magic pixie dust, would you start searching for Neverland?
- henrikschroder 15y ago
  I am conscious. I experience being conscious every waking hour of my life. I don't know why, I can't objectively describe the experience of it, but I know it is there. I can't speak for you, but given that we're of the same species, I'm gonna assume that you are conscious like me. Conscious machines? No, that'll require a lot more convincing than a song and a dance.
  - gosub 15y ago
    I don't understand. Is consciousness a feeling or an external manifestation? It's something purely internal or something also visible on the outside? If it's only internal you cannot, by defition, say if a machine is conscious, but also every other human. If tomorrow we would discover an alien civilization and start a meaningful communication, would you question their consciousness? Personally, I don't think that all the discussion about consciousness is meaningful. Consciousness could be the human feeling of abstract reasoning, like cold is the human feeling of registering a lower temperature. A machine could reproduce abstract reasoning, and asking about its consciousness would be like asking if a thermostat feels cold.
smosher 15y ago
You're saying that ... No, you're putting words in my mouth. I'm arguing the scientific facts of the matter, and I believe I did a good job of making my personal beliefs and opinions separately. It's especially important to note that my treatment of the term "consciousness" was predicated on the given assumption that it is not a scientific entity. At the moment the term has a handful of scientific meanings, but none are what people are after. My argument is that you can't argue meaningfully about it until you can define it meaningfully. P.S. What do you mean by "zombie" -? Traditionally it means something different than what I think you mean by it.
- henrikschroder 15y ago
  No, you're putting words in my mouth. Sorry about that. My argument is that you can't argue meaningfully about it until you can define it meaningfully. Agree. The problem is that I think consciousness is inherently subjective. We experience qualia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualia) and you just can't objectively describe those. For example, could you describe the colour blue to a blind person? Every time you look at a blue object, you know it is blue, you experience that it is blue, but you can't describe it, and you can't compare it with for example my experience of blue objects. I have no idea if blue objects "look" the same in your mind as it does in mine. We can both agree that a certain object is blue, we both associate the effect blue light has on our eyes to blue objects, but that's it. So imagine now that we make an AI with sensory inputs, perhaps we make a robot, perhaps we simulate a human brain, and we teach it that blue objects are blue. If we then show it objects, it should be able to correctly tell us if they are blue or not. But does that AI experience blue? We don't know. We can't ever know. Imagine then that we "upload" your mind into a machine and put it in a humanoid robot. That thing would then walk like you, talk like you, remember like you, laugh like you, joke like you, cry like you, etc. But would it be you? Would it be alive? Would it have consciousness? In my opinion - no. It's moving, but it's dead, so it's a zombie, a philosophical zombie: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_zombie http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_zombie
  - smosher 15y ago
    I was curious about the mention of the zombie before because this line didn't seem right: That brain simulation is a zombie. The man in the room does not speak Chinese. I'm fairly certain that qualia--whatever it is--is not a necessary quality for the room to be capable of comprehending Chinese. It sounds like you would agree. The problem with qualia though is that there's no way for you or I to know whether the other participates in the phenomenon. I'd like to mention that Dan Dennett has done a wonderful job of arguing that qualia is a bad term. I disagreed at first, but by the end of reading his argument I could only agree that the term is hopelessly ruined. You'll see his name in the Wikipedia article you linked. If you read his Quining Qualia[1] (I believe that is the one, though it may have been a follow up that I found so convincing) you might see the problem with arguments about whether something has or hasn't qualia. 1: http://ase.tufts.edu/cogstud/papers/quinqual.htm http://ase.tufts.edu/cogstud/papers/quinqual.htm As far as I'm concerned, if my brain were adequately simulated in a computer it would be like a plaster mould of a plaster mould. They're not the same thing, but functionally they are. If qualia exists I'm happy to assume that it's the product of a physical process which can be simulated. If it does not then I am quite certain the thing people mistake for it can be simulated--and perhaps already has been. My attitude on the whole qualia matter is: how important can a thing be if no one can define it well enough to measure it? More importantly, I don't believe in magic. If something special is going on there I believe it's a product of natural processes, not a cause of them. "If it's there it can be reproduced."

henrikschroder 15y ago

(Brilliant, this is the second time I argue against strong AI here, and only received downvotes instead of comments. That's not how this place is supposed to work.)

gosub 15y ago

You're saying that since we can't measure it or detect it, it doesn't exist, and therefore isn't important If you can't measure it or detect it, how would you know it's there and it's the source of the phenomenon? If I tell you that it's not consciousness but magic pixie dust, invisible and non-detectable magic pixie dust, would you start searching for Neverland?

henrikschroder 15y ago
I am conscious. I experience being conscious every waking hour of my life. I don't know why, I can't objectively describe the experience of it, but I know it is there. I can't speak for you, but given that we're of the same species, I'm gonna assume that you are conscious like me. Conscious machines? No, that'll require a lot more convincing than a song and a dance.
- gosub 15y ago
  I don't understand. Is consciousness a feeling or an external manifestation? It's something purely internal or something also visible on the outside? If it's only internal you cannot, by defition, say if a machine is conscious, but also every other human. If tomorrow we would discover an alien civilization and start a meaningful communication, would you question their consciousness? Personally, I don't think that all the discussion about consciousness is meaningful. Consciousness could be the human feeling of abstract reasoning, like cold is the human feeling of registering a lower temperature. A machine could reproduce abstract reasoning, and asking about its consciousness would be like asking if a thermostat feels cold.

smosher 15y ago

You're saying that ... No, you're putting words in my mouth. I'm arguing the scientific facts of the matter, and I believe I did a good job of making my personal beliefs and opinions separately. It's especially important to note that my treatment of the term "consciousness" was predicated on the given assumption that it is not a scientific entity. At the moment the term has a handful of scientific meanings, but none are what people are after. My argument is that you can't argue meaningfully about it until you can define it meaningfully. P.S. What do you mean by "zombie" -? Traditionally it means something different than what I think you mean by it.

henrikschroder 15y ago
No, you're putting words in my mouth. Sorry about that. My argument is that you can't argue meaningfully about it until you can define it meaningfully. Agree. The problem is that I think consciousness is inherently subjective. We experience qualia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualia) and you just can't objectively describe those. For example, could you describe the colour blue to a blind person? Every time you look at a blue object, you know it is blue, you experience that it is blue, but you can't describe it, and you can't compare it with for example my experience of blue objects. I have no idea if blue objects "look" the same in your mind as it does in mine. We can both agree that a certain object is blue, we both associate the effect blue light has on our eyes to blue objects, but that's it. So imagine now that we make an AI with sensory inputs, perhaps we make a robot, perhaps we simulate a human brain, and we teach it that blue objects are blue. If we then show it objects, it should be able to correctly tell us if they are blue or not. But does that AI experience blue? We don't know. We can't ever know. Imagine then that we "upload" your mind into a machine and put it in a humanoid robot. That thing would then walk like you, talk like you, remember like you, laugh like you, joke like you, cry like you, etc. But would it be you? Would it be alive? Would it have consciousness? In my opinion - no. It's moving, but it's dead, so it's a zombie, a philosophical zombie: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_zombie http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_zombie
- smosher 15y ago
  I was curious about the mention of the zombie before because this line didn't seem right: That brain simulation is a zombie. The man in the room does not speak Chinese. I'm fairly certain that qualia--whatever it is--is not a necessary quality for the room to be capable of comprehending Chinese. It sounds like you would agree. The problem with qualia though is that there's no way for you or I to know whether the other participates in the phenomenon. I'd like to mention that Dan Dennett has done a wonderful job of arguing that qualia is a bad term. I disagreed at first, but by the end of reading his argument I could only agree that the term is hopelessly ruined. You'll see his name in the Wikipedia article you linked. If you read his Quining Qualia[1] (I believe that is the one, though it may have been a follow up that I found so convincing) you might see the problem with arguments about whether something has or hasn't qualia. 1: http://ase.tufts.edu/cogstud/papers/quinqual.htm http://ase.tufts.edu/cogstud/papers/quinqual.htm As far as I'm concerned, if my brain were adequately simulated in a computer it would be like a plaster mould of a plaster mould. They're not the same thing, but functionally they are. If qualia exists I'm happy to assume that it's the product of a physical process which can be simulated. If it does not then I am quite certain the thing people mistake for it can be simulated--and perhaps already has been. My attitude on the whole qualia matter is: how important can a thing be if no one can define it well enough to measure it? More importantly, I don't believe in magic. If something special is going on there I believe it's a product of natural processes, not a cause of them. "If it's there it can be reproduced."