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Only if you agree with the standard extensional & reductive logic of modern science but even then it is known that all current explanations of reality are incom

Only if you agree with the standard extensional & reductive logic of modern science but even then it is known that all current explanations of reality are incomplete, e.g. the quantum mechanical conception of reality consists of incessant activity that we can never be sure about. It's not obvious at all why computer scientists & especially those doing work in artificial intelligence are convinced that they are going to eventually figure out how the mind works & then supply a sufficient explanation for conscious phenomenology in terms of their theories b/c there are lots of theorems in CS that should convince them of the contrary case, e.g. Rice's theorem. So even if we assume that consciousness has a functional/computable specification then it's not at all obvious why there would be a decidable test that could take the specification & tell you that the given specification was indeed capable of instantiating conscious experience.

dist-epoch 11mo ago
Rice's theorem also applies to the human/brain. Take whatever specification you want of the human, at the cell level, at the subatomic level, and (an equivalent) of Rice's theorem applies. So how is that relevant then? Are you saying you are not conscious because you can't create a decidable test for proving you are conscious?
- measurablefunc 11mo ago
  Rice's theorem only applies in formal contexts so whoever thinks they can reduce conscious phenomenology into a formal context will face the problems of incompleteness & undecidability. That is why I said it is fundamentally irreducible & can not be explained in terms of extensional & reductive constructions like boolean arithmetic. In other words, if you think the mind is simply computation then there is no way you can look at some code that purports to be the specification of a mind & determine whether it is going to instantiate conscious experience from its static/syntactic description.

dist-epoch 11mo ago

Rice's theorem also applies to the human/brain. Take whatever specification you want of the human, at the cell level, at the subatomic level, and (an equivalent) of Rice's theorem applies. So how is that relevant then? Are you saying you are not conscious because you can't create a decidable test for proving you are conscious?

measurablefunc 11mo ago
Rice's theorem only applies in formal contexts so whoever thinks they can reduce conscious phenomenology into a formal context will face the problems of incompleteness & undecidability. That is why I said it is fundamentally irreducible & can not be explained in terms of extensional & reductive constructions like boolean arithmetic. In other words, if you think the mind is simply computation then there is no way you can look at some code that purports to be the specification of a mind & determine whether it is going to instantiate conscious experience from its static/syntactic description.