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You're having experiences right now. It's that. You're paying attention to these words. It's that.

pixl97 3y ago
You keep saying stream of experience, but you don't actually have a stream in the sense of a continuous uninterrupted experience. Your mind let's you believe that though.
- vidarh 3y ago
  That's a good point. We appear to have no way (and probably can't have) to discern passage of time from a static experience of a single infinitesimally short moment, as our only experience of time is through memory that we can't know whether is a static snapshot or dynamic.
- TaupeRanger 3y ago
  Since we don't understand its nature, we actually have no idea whatsoever whether it's a continuous stream or not. I mean obviously we sleep, but I take it you didn't mean that kind of interruption, which is beside the point. But either way, it doesn't matter, because "stream" can simply mean "the quick succession of experiences that seem to be continuous to the experiencer". And none of this really matters at all for the discussion at hand, the answer is the same either way.
  - pixl97 3y ago
    Consciousness is not a continuous stream at all, the fact you fall asleep or can be given medication to turn it off is an obvious example. Nova/PBS recently did a number of episodes on the number of tricks your brain is playing on your at anytime. Once you start seeing the shortcuts the brain takes in action the entire process is far less magical.
vidarh 3y ago
And which measurable, enumerable qualities of those things set them apart from not having experiences or not paying attention so that I can determine whether or not an AI, or a camera, or an animal, or another human, is "having experiences" or "paying attention"? Because it's still equally nebulous.
- TaupeRanger 3y ago
  That wasn't the question - we don't know how to determine whether an AI or camera has it. But it's not nebulous - it's what you're experiencing right now. That's simply what we mean by the word - that's it - no nebulosity to it. Figuring out whether a computer has it is a separate question, and difficult.
  - dragonwriter 3y ago
    > it’s what you’re experiencing right now. No, its not. Its the quality of “experiencing”. Which is impossible to define in objective terms; it is the essence of subjectivity on which all other subjectivity rests. It’s not merely “we don’t know how to determine whether an AI or camera has it”, it is categorically impossible to determine if something has it. The popular narrative about which things in the natural world have it has evolved radically over time, but in no case has there been, or could there be, any empirical basis for this; its all just vibes.
  - vidarh 3y ago
    It became the question when you tried to define the original terms that way, because a definition that can not be used to discriminate what it defines from what ot does not define is inherently nebulous. And your definition is now circular and can not be used that way. Hence the claim that the original definitions were nebulous.

You keep saying stream of experience, but you don't actually have a stream in the sense of a continuous uninterrupted experience. Your mind let's you believe that though.

vidarh 3y ago
That's a good point. We appear to have no way (and probably can't have) to discern passage of time from a static experience of a single infinitesimally short moment, as our only experience of time is through memory that we can't know whether is a static snapshot or dynamic.
TaupeRanger 3y ago
Since we don't understand its nature, we actually have no idea whatsoever whether it's a continuous stream or not. I mean obviously we sleep, but I take it you didn't mean that kind of interruption, which is beside the point. But either way, it doesn't matter, because "stream" can simply mean "the quick succession of experiences that seem to be continuous to the experiencer". And none of this really matters at all for the discussion at hand, the answer is the same either way.
- pixl97 3y ago
  Consciousness is not a continuous stream at all, the fact you fall asleep or can be given medication to turn it off is an obvious example. Nova/PBS recently did a number of episodes on the number of tricks your brain is playing on your at anytime. Once you start seeing the shortcuts the brain takes in action the entire process is far less magical.

vidarh 3y ago

And which measurable, enumerable qualities of those things set them apart from not having experiences or not paying attention so that I can determine whether or not an AI, or a camera, or an animal, or another human, is "having experiences" or "paying attention"? Because it's still equally nebulous.

TaupeRanger 3y ago
That wasn't the question - we don't know how to determine whether an AI or camera has it. But it's not nebulous - it's what you're experiencing right now. That's simply what we mean by the word - that's it - no nebulosity to it. Figuring out whether a computer has it is a separate question, and difficult.
- dragonwriter 3y ago
  > it’s what you’re experiencing right now. No, its not. Its the quality of “experiencing”. Which is impossible to define in objective terms; it is the essence of subjectivity on which all other subjectivity rests. It’s not merely “we don’t know how to determine whether an AI or camera has it”, it is categorically impossible to determine if something has it. The popular narrative about which things in the natural world have it has evolved radically over time, but in no case has there been, or could there be, any empirical basis for this; its all just vibes.
- vidarh 3y ago
  It became the question when you tried to define the original terms that way, because a definition that can not be used to discriminate what it defines from what ot does not define is inherently nebulous. And your definition is now circular and can not be used that way. Hence the claim that the original definitions were nebulous.