/sci/ - Science & Math

#include <consciousness.h>
int main(void) { return consciousness_main(); }

Before sure to link necessary libs

python master race here
...
import conciousness
apples= new conciousness()
apples.solveworldproblems()
...
much like cancer, world prollems can be solved

creating actual consciousness in a computer is like creating actual cancer in a computer

it's just retarded, why do comp sci majors think its possible? because they never took a philosophy course

>>4245690
this.
Philosophy tells us that consciousness is located far away from the brain, and that the brain is just a dummy variable.
You can prove this with math.

>>4245690

this ^

people don't understand the difference between a simulation and the actual thing itself.

a hurricane simulation isn't an actual hurricane

>>4245711
this
An emulation of a hurricane is not a real hurricane.
You should go out and buy the real hurricane.

A piece of biological machinery that follows a set of deterministic physical laws can't be recreated algorithmically? Really?

>>4245940
Yes

ITT: anons who don't understand philosophy and an OP who doesn't understand computer science

>>4245697
>makes outrageous claim
>doesn't back it up

LOOK MOM IM DOING SCIENCE

>>4245940
>biological
First error (materialism).
>machinery
Second error (reductionism).
>that follows a set of deterministic physical laws
Third error (determinism).
>can't be recreated algorithmically
Fourth error (Chinese Room problem).

Four strikes, you are so very out.

>>4245952
>Fourth error (Chinese Room problem).
Chinese Room summary:
Computer does Chinese by executing instructions on some piece of hardware
Human could do Chinese by executing the same instructions with their brain and hands
Therefore neither the computer nor the human is intelligent
Wait... I mean
Therefore the computer doesn't really know chinese, and is not intelligent...
But the human, he is intelligent because he could know chinese if he really wanted to

>>4245962
Basically the CR is a rebuttal to the Turing standard, saying that since symbolic manipluation can occur with semantic understanding, symbolic manipulation is not a sufficient test for sentience.

>>4245942

Tell me why the consciousness that would emerge from such a simulation wouldn't be exactly the same as ours.

OP: No one uses the hardware-software metaphor to describe the relationship between the brain and consciousness, that would just be incredibly naive.

>ITT: Letting philosophy stand in the way of science.

I can't tell how many of you are trolling, but wth? Fuck your chinese rooms!

>2012
>Chinese room
suppose we just hooked some blobs of meat to some receptors and those blobs of meat could exchange electrical signals among themselves and produce certain responses in response to certain stimuli, wouldn't it REALLY SILLY to believe such a thing could possibly possess awareness and understanding?

Sure is dualism in here

>>4245968
>2012
>not understanding the Chinese Room argument
>irrationally avoidant of dualism

everyone here is a stupid idiot.
and OP is a fagot idiot.

Theory of Mind niggers.
We can never know if something else is conscious, only our selves. We are trapped inside our own minds. We don't know if anything else is conscious, we only assume other people are because they are so similar.

We can also elephants are self-aware, and I think dolphins. But thats just according to some rudimentary observations.

Also
learn to behaviorism and learning theory fags.

it could go something like this

>>4245952
Materialism is likely true.
Reductionism isn't a scary word.
Determinism - meh.
Finally - Oh noes - another dualist who claims that consciousness is magic without evidence, and even contrary to known evidence.

We can take apart your mind piece by piece by taking apart your brain. Damage one area of the brain, you lose the ability to do basic mental math. Damage another and you lose the ability to recognize faces. Consciousness is the result of material processes in the brain.

How do material processes cause consciousness? Dunno. How do magnets work? Dunno. The evidence says it does, and that's good enough for me.

>>4245977
Does that put consciousness in the same arena as god when it comes to science talk?

>>4245977
Assuming you're not a complete post modernist, you accept that you arose through evolution by natural selection, and if we also accept the "I'm not special just because I say so" argument, then it follows that other humans are conscious too.

>>4245981
>Materialism is likely true.
Materialism cannot be true. Ontological reality of consciousness prohibits this.

>Reductionism isn't a scary word.
It's also not a panacea.

>Finally - Oh noes - another dualist who claims that consciousness is magic without evidence, and even contrary to known evidence.
No, the known evidence is for dualism, sorry.

>>4245983
Inference is not evidence.

>>4245986
Again, how do you justify your silly stance given what we know of how damaging the brain damages the mind? No - really? The evidence is quite clear cut.

>>4245987
Mind=/= brain. One is subjective, the other objective. I really don't understand why you have such trouble with this.

>>4245986
>Materialism cannot be true.
Then we're using alternative definitions. The definition I like is that all observable phenomena (maybe minus first person experience) is perfectly explainable in terms of physics. That seems perfectly plausible, though we can debate whether it's supported by evidence later.

>>4245988
I don't understand why you are having such trouble with this either. I agree the brain isn't the mind. And yet, we can destroy the mind piece by piece by destroying the brain. This suggests that the mind is a creation of the brain, a side effect if you will. If certain pieces of the mind cannot exist without certain pieces of the brain, then it follows that the mind does not exist without the brain.

>>4245982
Its more like love.


Right now just thinking about it. consciousness is really just the ability to receive and process information.

which is the whole purpose of any program/algorithm.

humans just do this in very novel ways

>>4245994
Do you believe in a soul that can exist without the body as well? Or maybe the soul just vanishes when you die? Because really, that's what your bs about love and mind boils down to, that there is something "magical" that doesn't exist in physical form.

Imagine looking as creamer in a cup of coffee as it swirls around the center. One may see the swirl and become entranced by its perpetual movement. Of course the swirl doesn't really exist if you admit the reality of the creamer particles - it becomes an emergent feature of a more complex underlying world.

But if one was to ponder how the motion of the swirl originated he can imagine it came from the forces of his stirring spoon. But what provoked the spoon to stir the coffee? The hand of the man, the control of which is completely under him. It was always him.

>>4245991
Ok, what you call materialism I'd call physicalism. In any case:

>The definition I like is that all observable phenomena (maybe minus first person experience)

If you have a substance theory that covers everything in the universe *except one thing* then technically you must have two substances. Thus, dualism.

>>4245993
I'm not arguing against the mind's emergence from the brain. The question is one of substance. The mind is ontologically substantial, and it is qualitatively different from matter. Therefore, if matter is an ontological substance, there are at least two ontologically real substances.

>>4245995
No, >>4245977 was correct. That you do not understand the philosophy is not our problem.

>>4245995
The term consciousness is an empty term like love because the definition is too vague.

>>4246002
Whatever. Long as we agree consciousness is merely the results of physical processes in the brain, more or less explainable entirely in terms of reduction to the laws of physics.

And as long as we agree that reductionism is a beautiful world, magic doesn't exist, and science is awesome.

>>4246006
or God

>>4246007
Well, we don't agree on much, but as you said, whatever.

>>4246002
I assume you pose that these two substances are not independent of one another, and in fact must mirror each other all the time. Does that not eliminate one?

>>4246002
Technically there are four substances: fire, air, earth, and water. The debate is whether we should count heart.

>>4246012
No no, I thought we were getting somewhere. The mind does not exist without the brain, aka the mind is the result of the brain. This is good headway. Whatever stupid philosophical labels you want to apply to it - I don't care - but I do care about falsifiable predictions and people making empirical claims on bullshit evidence.

>>4246014
Property dualism is still dualism. Essentially it then boils down to a problem of the concepts we have of each substance/property. Given that the concept of matter is something objective, it cannot cover the subjective aspects of reality, and therefore it is because of the characteristics of the conception of matter that dualism becomes a necessity. If we have a conceptual entity which covers both objective and subjective experience, this would resolve the problem. But whatever that concept ends up being, it's not matter (or, in simplistic modern terms, mind - although idealism can theoretically stretch to cover the ground).

>>4246015
much lol

>>4246016
We're not getting very far.
>The mind does not exist without the brain, aka the mind is the result of the brain.
The first does not follow from the second. I am the "result" of my parents, but I can exist without them.

>>4246030
But unlike your parents, you die when your brain dies - as evidenced by you losing pieces of your mind when you lose pieces of your brain.

hey guys, fun fact
dualism is bullshit when it comes to the mind
it's one of those rocks religious people cling to because science has taken the sun, moon, tides, and creation from them and made them its own.
"The moon used to belong to lovers, now it belongs to science"
-idk too lazy to google

>>4246030
>Property dualism is still dualism. Essentially it then boils down to a problem of the concepts we have of each substance/property. Given that the concept of matter is something objective, it cannot cover the subjective aspects of reality, and therefore it is because of the characteristics of the conception of matter that dualism becomes a necessity. If we have a conceptual entity which covers both objective and subjective experience, this would resolve the problem. But whatever that concept ends up being, it's not matter (or, in simplistic modern terms, mind - although idealism can theoretically stretch to cover the ground).

I don't think it's a language handicap. You argue that the properties we associate with matter (perhaps, say, deterministic movement which we now know is not the case) do not extend as foundations for subjective human experience. I argue differently, mainly because science has overcome this deficit by extending theoretical meaning outside vocabulary. For instance wave-particle duality does not require us to conclude reality has two forms of the same thing, actually quite the contrary. We are talking about a singular objective reality, which does something, that something which we have no description for except to describe its constituent behaviors - that of wave and particle.

This type of duality is not the same as brain/mind. With the latter the mind can be terminated while the brain functions. The reversal cannot be done. We also cannot coerce a particle to kill off its particle quality. Consciousness appears to be emergent from an objective reality and requires no appeal outside the materialist's view in light of modern evidence for the workings our cosmos.

I thank you for your indulgence

Here's why you can't: a computer is not alive.

Period /thread STOP THE END

>>4246057
But you can. A computer could be alive. From another angle, you /are/ a computer.

>>4246058

Silicon and transistors aren't living cells. Get out of /sci/, retard.

>>4246057
Who are we to declare that?

>>4246060
I never said conventional desktop computers /are/ alive. I said we could make a computer which is alive.

Case in point - we could artificially construct a human cell and a full human DNA strand from rocks, put it in a woman's womb, and wait. Highly inefficient process to get a computer with questionable dependability, but we have a computer.

Oh wait -- you still think your mind goes on after your brain stops, that your mind isn't merely the manifestations of your brain. We should focus on this problem first.

>>4246060
>mfw silicon has the same properties as carbon
0_0

>>4246067

We are sentient because we're alive, our intelligence was acquired after years of evolution and being ALIVE. You can't code sentience.

>>4246071
>You can't code sentience.
Yes you can. You just agreed with me (I think) that our sentience arose through evolution by natural selection. Evolution is an algorithmic process - aka code. It just took a rather roundabout way of getting there.

> be OP
> say ITT: morons

0/10

>>4246072

You're a retard and I am gonna stop talking to you.

>>4246076
Are you going to say that evolution by natural selection is magic and is not-computable?

>>4246077

Being virtually alive is not the same as being alive. Virtual existence is not the same as existence. Hence, you can't make computers alive. He's right and you're wrong.

>>4246079
>virtually alive not same as alive
First, you're going to have to define your terms. What is "virtually alive" vs "alive"? I suspect while doing so, you'll realize that you're doing a form of circular reasoning aka begging the question.

>>4246081

A virtual, or logical, environment is a mere simulation that holds absolutely no influence on reality.

>>4246084
Ok, so we take my hypothetical programmed intelligence, and give it a robotic arm. Voila - no longer virtual.

Try again?

>>4246084
Virtual reality does not affect real reality?
Facebook called..

>>4246087

Yea, and telephones create black holes. Don't be an idiot.

To make an apple pie you have to first make the universe.

ITT: Equivocations

>>4246085

If you have to "give" the AI an artificial arm, it doesn't make it alive, it doesn't give it any influence, no matter how much you try it will never be a living thing, just a thing.

>>4246092
So, I believe this is an admittal that you have no argument, and you assert it nakedly, despite the evidence and counter-arguments I've made in this thread. Is that a fair statement?

>>4246088
Does a picture of you snorting a line off some random hookers abdomen residing virtually on a server somewhere in Utah available to anyone on the globe with a search engine not influence your future career opportunities in reality or doesn't it?

>>4246094

My argument is that computers aren't living things and you say they are, which means you're fundamentally wrong and I am fundamentally right. You want to create life? Get laid.

>doesn't realize consciousness is an abstraction

>>4246096
>My argument is that computers aren't living things and you say they are,
No no, that's not what I said. I said you /are/ a computer. Big difference. I never claimed conventional desktops are alive. I claimed your necktop is both alive and a computer.

>>4246099

If you're telling me I am a computer then you're wrong in so many ways I can't even count them.

>>4246100
>wrong in so many ways
Such as?

>>4246077
Not that guy, but deterministic doesn't imply computable. This is one of the major tenants of computer science (complexity theory).

>>4246101

No, you have to tell me why I am a computer. not me. That's like asking me to prove god when I don't believe in such a thing.

>>4246102
...
I'm also a CS guy. I make my professional career at it. Ok, so determinism doesn't imply computable.
...
what?

It's the Church Turing thesis. Of course a finite algorithmic process has no more computing power than a Turing machine.

The fun part is that while evolution by natural selection may not be deterministic, it is still a collection of bits being acted on by the unambiguous describable laws of physics, whose results are computable for our planet Earth (or at least one possible path is for non-deterministic physics).

>>4246104
A computer for the purposes of this conversation, and in general, is a device that takes input, applies some rules - possibly deterministic rules or possibly nondeterministic rules - and produces output. Usually self contained. Usually deterministic (but in practice any computer with a temperature probe may exhibit non-determinism).

You necktop (brain) is an enclosed computing device, nothing more special than the standard desktop. And as we know the mind is merely the manifestation of physical processes in the brain, it's not a bad stretch of language to call you a computer.

>>4246107

The funny thing is, I already knew you were a CompSci faggot just from your argument of "humans are computers lol i can code in java". A desktop computer is not nearly as complex as a human, you cannot compare the two based on the superficial, so your argument is invalid.

>>4246111
Uhh, I don't see how any argument I made relies on an analogy between desktops and necktops. Could you point out where you're disagreeing, please?

Also, I'm more of a C++ fan myself.

>>4246104
A computer is a stateful machine that takes input, alters states depending on such input, and outputs depending on state.
How are you not a computer?

>>4246112

Computers aren't alive. If you don't let this sink in, then you will be wrong forever.

The fact that we have neither proved or disproved determinism implies the possibility for AI that is humanly indistinguishable from non-artificial intelligence. Centuries of debate between the best minds and we have no consensus.

>>4246117
Oh, we've advanced to No True Scotsman from Begging The Question as well.

Whatever. I think you're getting hung up over the word "computer". Do you at least agree that your mind is merely the result of physics in your brain, and that if you brain dies your mind ends?

>>4246120

Obviously.

>>4246121
Then our quibble is over the definition over "computer", and I don't care.

Am I the only one who think the system human-dictionary KNOW how to speak chinese in the chinese room problem?

>>4246123
I do.

>>4246105
"A career out of CS" reads as programming to me.
Just because someone uses the word deterministic, doesn't mean he automatically refers to P v NP. I was observing the fact that existing deterministic processes may exhibit non-computable behaviour. An example on an abstract level, we have a deterministic automaton, in an unknown state. We have observed a sequence of actions. What are it's potential next actions?
On a more concrete level: We have three planets orbiting each other, what does their orbit look like on the long term?
Our brain is non-computable in the same sense. That is to say, our brain cannot be accurately modelled by a computer. That is not to say their cannot be a self-aware computer.

>>4246124
Yes but we've already established the fact that you're a retard.

>>4245638
>2012
>still thinking you can prove even you yourself are a conscious being
>somehow thinking you can make judgments on whether anything else is truly conscious

>>4246123
I do too.
The only consisten way to go.

>>4246122

A computer is a tool. Humans are animals that evolved over millions of years. If you want a true AI, it will have to evolve, but even then it will just be a virtual thing, a simulation, living in a world comparable to ancient human mythology, in which humans are made of clay and blood and there's gods with personal lives living in a different realm of existence.

>>4246125
>I was observing the fact that existing deterministic processes may exhibit non-computable behaviour.
Then you would be taking issue with the Church Turing Thesis. Luckily you aren't stupid, and you don't really mean what you say.

>An example on an abstract level, we have a deterministic automaton, in an unknown state. We have observed a sequence of actions. What are it's potential next actions?
This is not a conclusion that you have a deterministic non-computable function. It's a conclusion that you have incomplete information about the system, and thus you cannot compute it.

>On a more concrete level: We have three planets orbiting each other, what does their orbit look like on the long term?
Not even quantum? Man this is easy. Of course the Newtonian orbits (or General Relativity orbits) are both deterministic (within measurement error) and computable. That we could never practically compute it is another matter.

Do you even know the first thing about the theory of computation?

>>4246130
Your hidden assumption is that tools cannot be self-aware. You are a tool. Therefore

>>4246130
And if we take that into the physical world by giving it a brain-like hardware, why won't it have a mind? You keep going back to this "humans are special" untenable bullshit. You must see this.

>>4246135

Even living things aren't sentient, how can you expect an AI to be?

>>4246137
Did you mean "not all living things are sentient" or "all living things are not sentient"? I think we agree humans are sentient, otherwise I've been missing your point entirely.

If we agree to that, then again I will argue that the human mind and brain are perfectly explainable in terms of physical processes only. That is, all observable phenomena of the human from the outside is purely explainable in terms of physical processes only. In fact, it's more than just plausible - the existence of such a model is supported by the evidence.

>>4246132
Fuck, I typed a big response and it wasn't allowed to be posted, for some reason.
In short; you're talking about intractibility. That's not the same as non-computability. If we have a problem with imperfect information, and we cannot find the (probabilistic) solution (because it's intractible), the outcome is non-computable.

>>4246139

You want to know how hard it is to achieve sentience? We're the only ones on Earth with that attribute and we don't know of any other living thing that is or was sentient.

What I feel we need, is a few gifted geniuses who know their stuff, applied to the field, who are well funded, supported, and free to work and collaborate without restriction.

How complex can carbon/animal intelligence/sentience really be?

I hope to see it replicated in electronics before I'm senile, grey and near death. Where are my micro-scale home robotics dammit. Where the fuck is my robot waifu. What the hell Japan...

>>4246142
No, I actually had two replies.

Your first example is still computable. It's that we lack sufficient information to compute it because you constructed the example to deny the information to the computation device.

The second example of the 3 body problem is computable in the sense that we can compute to a arbitrarily high degree of confidence for a certain time lapse T. This problem is intractable, as you say, because it's not big O polynomial in time.

>If we have a problem with imperfect information, and we cannot find the (probabilistic) solution (because it's intractible), the outcome is non-computable.
Now, let's be clear about our semantic quibbling. In the first example, let's take quantum theory. Quantum theory may be deterministic (and non-local). However, Heisenburg's still rules out the possibility that it's computable with the information available to us. However, it's still a computable process. Do you see the important difference here? It is a computable process, but we lack means to gather sufficient information to start the computation. That's a big difference.

>>4246142

You know if you click on the browsers "Go Back One Page" button, it will have all your text saved there.

>>4246143
Yes. I agree it will probably be hard. I fail to see how that's relevant to anything I've said.

>>4246152

You can't hope to build a tall building without good foundations. It will ultimately fail before it reaches the intended height.

>>4246158
Care to mention which foundations of mine are bad? Or continue with the nondescript impossible to refute accusations?

>>4246159

You believe that non living things can be sentient.

>>4246167
Now, exactly which definition of alive are we going to use? The biological one of homeostasis, metabolism, grow, react to stimuli, and reproduce?

I fail to see the connection between that and sentience. Could you explain, please?

>>4246172

You do? Are you not aware of yourself? Why do you think you're aware of yourself? It isn't magical.

>>4246173
What? I ask again, what does metabolism, homeostasis, react to stimuli, grow, and reproduce have to do with sentience? Or what definition of "life" are you using?

Downloading SWG right now to try out SWGEmu. Tips about the game? I am prepared to find out what I wish to do by myself.

Not letting me delete.

>>4246173
... Ok, I think I see what you're saying. Are you trying to say "I'm self aware because I'm alive"? Then, a self aware artificial computer would also be alive, by your definition.

Ok. Looks like this won't go anywhere soon due to lack of cooperation by the anon, and I'm tired. Night /sci/

Urge to troll with spiritual insight rising.

>>4246055
>This type of duality is not the same as brain/mind.

You make a good point about how the conceptual understanding of matter has been changing, but as you say the wave/particle duality is not like mind/body duality. The latter is a duality of self/other, rather than other(1)/other(2). Self/other or subject/object duality is more fundamental to our way of thinking, and seems not to be bound by language at all. It is, in a way, the prime dualism, which most mystical traditions were adopted to try to deal with.

>Consciousness appears to be emergent from an objective reality and requires no appeal outside the materialist's view in light of modern evidence for the workings our cosmos.

It may well be concluded that consciousness is emergent from objective reality (from an objective viewpoint), but materialism - as a monism - does not account for the existence of subjective perspective. Idealism would, so it's not that monism is out, it's just that a monism based on objects is out.

>>4246107
>the mind is merely the manifestation of physical processes in the brain

Understandable that you would say so as you call yourself "reductionist", but no, mind is not reducible to physical processes.

You can, but it will be fact-based and extremely understanding of processes. It will not have opinions, since they're developed through raising, where right and wrong will be determined by the input of positive or negative consequences after actions fueled by human curiosity.

>>4246298
Go back to /x/.

>>4246317
Go back to school.

>>4246307
you don't think a computer program can do that?

>>4246322
hahaa wtf piece of shit school told you mind body dualism had a shred of evidence behind it?

>>4246322
Which course, other than religion, favors dualism?

>>4246340
Yes, but it would be a really tedious task to implement it.

>>4246355
>>4246342
Read the thread, guys.

mind = brain stuff

In my language there is not really a word for mind
when it's translated it's simply translated as brain.

when you're not indoctrinated by your language that there are two separate/coexisting entities this entire dualism debate is sort of humorous

As I have yet to see any evidence for it, the assertion that a mind exists as something else than a brain is baffling.
could someone point me somewhere where evidence for this is presented?

>>4246383
upthread
also, lack of discriminatory facility in language is not a feature

this is what you people believe

>>4246387
>A=notA
This is what you believe

>>4246386
yeah, we should also have a word that distinguishes
lungs from the thing that 'actually' oxygenates the blood in your body

wait, why would I assume such a thing exists

>>4246394
because it does. the organ is not identical to the function of the organ.

>>4246396
No, but the organ is the source of the processes that you call the functions of the organ. Unbelievable that one needs to even state such a tautology, by the way.

>>4246396
I wish trolls would come up with something new or interesting to troll sci with but you guys make this shit too easy for them constantly taking the bait.
OP explain how if I give myself brain damage I become a very different person, So now we agree that self awareness and personality are functions of the brain what are you saying also if I'm born with a certain disease I cannot "feel" pain anymore so feeling pain the sensation of it is a bodily function aswell, there goes qualia.

>>4246405
>No, but the organ is the source of the processes that you call the functions of the organ.

Kind of, but not solely. The organ in its proper context is the source of those processes. Without oxygen coming in through the trachea, the lungs cannot oxygenate the blood. Likewise, a brain without proper stimulation will produce minds we would consider deficient. Organs alone are not the source; contextual relationship is.

>Unbelievable that one needs to even state such a tautology, by the way.

First of all, it's not a tautology. Second, I agree that it is quite ridiculous that I should have to point out something so plainly obvious to someone old enough to use a computer.

OP delivers
fucken troll of the year

>ITT morons.

this is correct.

you can't replicate a continuous dynamic biological process using discrete binary algorithms and some shitty programming language,

are you guys seriously this stupid?

we can't even define consciousness or DETECT it in the brain...all we can is sort of correlate some VAGUE brain activity with being awake vs being asleep...lmfao

>>4246407
1. I'm not OP.

>explain how if I give myself brain damage I become a very different person
Do you? Depends on what you mean. Your persona/personality may well change, but your selfhood? Are you a different person when you're mad? When you're orgasming? When you have heatstroke? Different behaviors and characteristics, but the same identity.

>if I'm born with a certain disease I cannot "feel" pain anymore so feeling pain the sensation of it is a bodily function aswell, there goes qualia.
No, qualia having their origin in physiological processes does not make them "go" away. They're still there, still not matter.

>>4246407

conscious sentience and personality aren't the same thing

I grant conscoiusness has something to do with the brain, but it isn't reproducible in a computer program anymore than a hurricane is reproducible in a computer program

consciousness is a continuous dynamic real time process, while a program is discrete and binary, so at best you can only approximate a shitty simulation of it, never the real thing

how would you program a hurricane in a computer? wtf does that even mean--same goes for consciousness

two different levels of abstraction

>>4248251
>doesn't know what a simulation is

Herpin' and derpin'

>>4248251

this ^

computers can run simulations, they can't actually recreate real life processes

>>4248251
misunderstands "whole brain emulation" as a "computer simulation" rather than a "computer emulation"
youareanidiot.org

http://lesswrong.com/lw/p9/the_generalized_antizombie_principle/

>>4248251
Where to begin with this one, brain damage isn't just a shit in personality it is a shift in perspective it is an entirely new sentience if you like depending on the severity you might just be a vegetable capable of responding to sense.
Consciousness is not a real time dynamic it is very much something that takes time to be processed, There have been various studies in determining information processing etc.. etc. and it is not instantaneous.
Can you simulate a hurricane in a computer easily It obviously wouldn't be made of the same stuff hurricanes are (fundamentally the atoms are that make up the computer) But it would simulate in the virtual world the actual hurricane.

>>4248209
> Do you? Depends on what you mean. Your persona/personality may well change, but your selfhood? Are you a different person when you're mad? When you're orgasming? When you have heatstroke? Different behaviors and characteristics, but the same identity.

You're defining identity as some abstract intangible that means nothing, I'm not the same me when I'm mad now as I was when I was mad when I was 5 my body has gone through changes where I've produced more testosterone so what you're saying is wrong not only on a level of consciousness but on a more fundamental biological level.
There is no identity that is purely you, everything about you is constantly changing due to your environment and your body every situation moulds how you define you it may be negligible changes it might be something drastic as brain damage and arguing you respond the same even after brain damage is ridiculous.

>>4248311
>the philosophy is complicated
should be
>the philosophy is stupid

>>4248326
>the philosophy is stupid
should be
>I don't understand the philosophy

>>4248326
reported for ban evasion enjoy your ban

>>4248332
>durr i don't know that EK left forever and gave out her trip

>>4248324
>You're defining identity as some abstract intangible that means nothing,
No, I'm not. It's not abstract at all, it's very concrete (albeit not materially concrete). Identity (in this case) is the continuity of the unique subjective perspective.

>I'm not the same me when I'm mad now as I was when I was mad when I was 5 my body has gone through changes where I've produced more testosterone
so what you're saying is wrong not only on a level of consciousness but on a more fundamental biological level.
I don't know about you, but I have had a continuous unique subjective perspective since I was 5. At no point in my memories can I recall anything which was not experienced by me. My personality and various characteristics have certainly changed since then, and details in memories have been lost, but the self has been the same all along.

>There is no identity that is purely you, everything about you is constantly changing due to your environment and your body
Yes, but the "you" is the thing that is continuous throughout. It is like the momentum which is conserved in a collision. All the details of the materials have changed, but the overall momentum of the system is the same.

>arguing you respond the same even after brain damage is ridiculous.
I argued no such thing.

>>4248346
> "Your persona/personality may well change, but your selfhood? Are you a different person when you're mad?"
That is an exact quote of what you said, you said you're the same selfhood when you're mad and you're not.
You're description of a static unchanging you is bull shit, your opinions change the way you react changes everything about you changes and yet you're saying there is still an intangible immaterial you that doesn't change and I'm saying remove your presupposition that such a thing exists and you still have a fully functioning human with nothing changed about them.
The problem with the cartesian theatre is an infinite regress if theres a little man in your head then whats functioning his meta brain in his meta head. It's not an answer it's a place holder just like god.

>>4248346
And just so you know the You I'm talking about is just a collection of specialist perceptual functions inwardly communicate probably evolving simultaneously with the communication of primates which would explain the limited conscious skills of other primates. As we learned to communicate and respond to each other we learned to inwardly ask questions that we would then answer.

>>4248367
>That is an exact quote of what you said, you said you're the same selfhood when you're mad and you're not.
Yes. I don't see your point.

>You're description of a static unchanging you is bull shit
So you think I'm a philosophical zombie? Ok. I'm not, but it's not like I can prove that to you.

>your opinions change the way you react changes everything about you changes and yet you're saying there is still an intangible immaterial you that doesn't change
Yeah, you know why? Because there has been an intangible immaterial me that hasn't been discontinuous throughout all of those changes.

>and I'm saying remove your presupposition that such a thing exists and you still have a fully functioning human with nothing changed about them.
It's not a presupposition. It's an observation. And if you don't have it, you may appear to be a fully functioning human from the outside, but you will be a philosophical zombie.

>The problem with the cartesian theatre is an infinite regress if theres a little man in your head then whats functioning his meta brain in his meta head.
The point of subjective experience requires no meta-brain or meta-head.

>And just so you know the You I'm talking about is just a collection of specialist perceptual functions inwardly communicate probably evolving simultaneously with the communication of primates which would explain the limited conscious skills of other primates. As we learned to communicate and respond to each other we learned to inwardly ask questions that we would then answer.
Well we're talking about different things, then, because my central point of consciousness is not linguistic in nature.

>>4248390
Philosophical zombies don't exist because we are all philosophical zombies It's an invention of a term to say there is something more to life without any evidence of it, There really are no arguments for them.

>>4248288
We're still at the same point. Your brain /is/ a computer. It is a physical device with inputs, state, and outputs. Your mind is the manifestation of physical processes as indicated by overwhelming evidence of brain damage causing changes in mind.

Funny how /sci/ loves philosophy implicitly and argues philosophical issues all the time.

yet explicitly they all pretend to love science, never are there any interesting scientific arguments, they are usually philosophic or political

>>4248398
The relevant discussion is that a philosophical zombie is indistinguishable from a "real" human being - by definition. the definition of the term precludes a way to test if a human being is conscious or merely a zombie. Thus, who cares? If the people arguing with me are all about that distinction, I really don't give a rats ass. They're welcome to discuss invented empirical facts - but I do prefer that they don't try to claim that it has any relation to this reality, nor more importantly that it has a basis in evidence.

>>4248407
I had one the other day trying to argue for big bang theory by trying to explain what a standard candle is, specifically the type 1a supernova.

>>4248407
It's easier to argue philosophy you don't have to have proof just make up what sounds most intuitive to you something entirely anti scientific.

Besides science isn't really up for debate we could have discussions about the validity of M-theory but there's no point because we can't really say either way it's validity and it'd just be as retarded as these philosophy "debates"

>>4248398
There is something more to life than the objective parts. That would be the subjective part, for which there is nothing BUT evidence, for any data to be judged evidence of anything else it must be judged so by a subject. The subject is the necessary axiom.

>>4248422
Can you provide a model of these other parts that offer falsifiable predictions of other people? If not, then you're discussing a empirical unfalsifiable thing, aka a non-thing, aka nonsense.

>>4248416
That's what I'm saying if it's indistinguishable from a "real" human that's because it is a "real" human there's no difference just one supposed because it must be different from a human because I've given humans this attribute that P-zombies don't have! When if they were identical to humans they would have that attribute.
Dualism is dead.

>>4248428
Empirically unfalsifiable =/= nonsense. Your ideology is muddying your thought process.

>>4248441
>Empirically unfalsifiable =/= nonsense.
I didn't say that.
I said "all empirical /and/ unfalsifiable claims are nonsense".

(I admit I have to back off a little bit, such as galaxies which will move outside our light cone. But that's a minor nitpick that misses the point.)

>>4248448
Ugg, that is still coming out not quite clearly. All claims which are empirical and which are unfalsifiable are nonsense.

>>4248448
>I said "all empirical /and/ unfalsifiable claims are nonsense".

My mistake, I thought you had made a typo.

It's not an empirical claim, then. Subjectivity is not something that can be objectively sensed.

>>4248457
And yet, you're making a traditional existence claim, aka an empirical claim.

So, I have to ask the most important question in science: "How do you know this?"

>>4248461
>And yet, you're making a traditional existence claim, aka an empirical claim.

And if there were no such thing as subjectivity, you might have a point. However empiricism cannot be applied to subjectivity, so you don't.

>So, I have to ask the most important question in science: "How do you know this?"

Subjectively, the evidence is inescapable. It's also necessarily axiomatic (cannot be refuted without the refutation being self-contradictory).

>>4248490
So, you argue that you're right, and that you cannot be wrong. Good. Now that we're agreed that this can in no way be refuted, this also cannot be an argument for any observable phenomena.

So, we're back to:
1- humans arose through biological evolution
2- biological evolution is an algorithmic process
3- thus there is a specific algorithm which started with basically nothing and rocks and ended in a physic object that is conscious
4- thus there remains the possibility that we can construct a non-human machine that has consciousness - unless we make the irrational and unsupported claim that only humans can be conscious.

>>4248490
What part of you are you talking about that can't be addressed by functions of a part of your body? eyes are your visual perception hearing your ears brain the processing of incoming and outgoing information nose smell/taste mouth taste nerve endings give feeling. You add all those together + more that I've not listed specifically and you have a human you let them communicate and no not just linguistically as in an inner speech communicate through sending chemicals and creating x y or z response to said chemical you have a human that is what a human is there is no need for anything else.

>>4248500
Except that there is - necessarily - a metaphysical component of reality and specifically of consciousness. This means that your statements 1-3 are incomplete, as what they describe does not include an understanding of that metaphysical stuff, and therefore 4 does not follow, because the metaphysical consciousness cannot be inferred (without possibility of error) from physical quantities alone.

It may well be the case that constructing a sufficiently complex replica of human neurology in any given substrate will lead to a consciousness to arise, but it cannot be known to do so because as The Chinese Room shows, subjectivity cannot be errorlessly inferred from objects, no matter how complex.

>>4248538
There may be no need for anything else in an objective description of a human, however there IS something else which is obvious to any subject, which would be the subject itself which is not described by all the stuff you just listed.

>>4248407
well that's easy to explain. science and math are hard, and there are few who are intelligent enough to understand it. Any idiot can spout philosophy, as is evidenced in this thread.

Pic is so releated.

>>4248548
Who says there isn't a self-aware consciousness in the Chinese Room? No really.

>>4248557
I'm out this retard is just regurgitating the same shit now, Subjective experience isn't some privileged thing just because you happen to be hooked upto the fucking computer, you're like an AI program saying well these humans can't tell what I'm subjectively thinking even if they programmed me to have subjective perspective.
I can't wait till they finish the scanner that reads your brain for what you see how you see it move onto something that reads your inner most thoughts and hearing and senses because faggots like you will have nowhere left to hide in your ever changing god of the gaps mentality towards consciousness.

>>4248578
He's not saying that. What pisses me off though if that he's saying that our physics explanation is somehow "insufficient" or "lacking", demanding an answer to a question that doesn't need an answer. Just like "How do magnets work?". They work, because the evidence says so. "How do certain physics processes result in consciousness?". They do, because the evidence says so.

>your opinions change the way you react changes everything about you changes and yet you're saying there is still an intangible immaterial you that doesn't change
>Yeah, you know why? Because there has been an intangible immaterial me that hasn't been discontinuous throughout all of those changes.
Actually the body is not discontinuous. So this is incorrect.

@Reductionist:
Anon is arguing that because no other consciousness can be proven to exist other than our own, we can build a highly realistic AI but never know that it is conscious.
This, however, is a philosophical black hole, and means that Anon must also accept that all other humans could indeed be P-zombies as well.
This line of thinking leads to dead ends (thus the black hole analogy) and we must reject it if we are to further other interesting lines of reasoning.
This is the reason I choose to suspend it. Because it is uninteresting.
I agree with your idea that evolution is an algorithmic process which produces consciousness, and can thus be reproduced.
Again, Anon is arguing that you can not say for sure that it produces consciousness, as the only consciousness that can be inferred logically is your own.

Having seen the march of progress in neurobiology and computing over the last few decades, I have no problem imagining that the ongoing research into animal consciousness and artificial intelligence will eventually bear fruit. It is simply a matter of time.

On the other hand, consciousness is an illusion, so this whole argument is pointless.

Virtual reality is not the same as reality. Therefore, simulated intelligence is not real intelligence.

>>4248619
>Again, Anon is arguing that you can not say for sure that it produces consciousness, as the only consciousness that can be inferred logically is your own.
Sort of agreed. You need a basic acceptance of physical reality, and then an acceptance that you're not the center of the universe. With that, then you can conclude other people are conscious like you.

>>4248611
Not the guy u were replying to, but
>the evidence says so
The evidence doesn't speak for itself. Simply knowing facts about the substrates of consciousness doesnt' make you understand consciousness.

Btw, no religious, creationistfag here, so don't use any strawman on me.

>>4248636
Ok... Are you aware of the voluminous evidence that certain areas when damaged damage certain areas of the mind. The correlation between areas of the brain and areas of the mind are pretty constant across individuals.

>>4248632
Unfortunately due to plato's cave, you can never infer anything beyond the facts that you exist and are receiving sensory input.
Of course, as has been said, this is uninteresting and leads to a dead end/black hole where nothing is real.
In fact, this is equivalent to the classic philosophy instant win phrase:
"well that's assuming x exists"
which is b& because it is h4x and makes the game not fun.
Ie, impossible to refute philosophical trolling.
You are right to infer that others are conscious but anon's issue was that you inferred it, and then he sucked you into a pointless philosophy debate about dualism.

>>4248575
Technically, the answer to your question is "intuitive understanding of what it means to be a self-aware consciousness". Searle doesn't address that issue directly, his focus is on semantics vs syntax.

>>4248578
>these humans can't tell what I'm subjectively thinking even if they programmed me to have subjective perspective.
The problem is that one cannot program for subjectivity using objective algorithms. This is th hard problem of consciousness in a nutshell.

>>4248611
>What pisses me off though if that he's saying that our physics explanation is somehow "insufficient" or "lacking", demanding an answer to a question that doesn't need an answer. Just like "How do magnets work?". They work, because the evidence says so. "How do certain physics processes result in consciousness?". They do, because the evidence says so.
The physical explanation is incomplete. You may not feel the need for an answer, but the object-focused approach does not provide an answer for questions about subjectivity. The correlation is there, yes. The causation, mechanism, these remain inscrutable.

>>4248619
>Actually the body is not discontinuous. So this is incorrect.
The gestalt "body" is continuous, yes, but the components are not.

>>4248632
Again, inference is not evidence. It's a reasonable conclusion, and I'm not disputing it. However it is a meaningful problem for the question of whether things produced by an artifice that lacks a grasp of the metaphysical can produce subjectively conscious beings when the most reasonable conclusion we have of other consciousnesses is within things produced by nature.

>>4248651
It's only pointless because you don't like admitting that you're not working with the full palette.

>>4248651

>Ie, impossible to refute philosophical trolling.

hence what the OP said

>ITT morons.

Even if true A.I. turned out to be impossible, it could still get to the point of being indistinguishable from human intelligence.

Hey OP, prove your consciousnesses exists.

see? didn't think so.

Me-1 OP-0

>>4248657

or it could always be distinguishable because its gonna be dumb as fuck when it comes to simple non-arithmetic matters

>>4248636
I'd say I agree with this.
You cannot say "It works because the evidence says so".
In reality, it works because it has underlying causes.
You know /how/ it works because the evidence /seems/ to point to it.
Much like consciousness "works" as a result of the mechanisms in the brain, and might be understood by evidence, in your case brain damage.

>>4248661

whats your criteria for proof? if you have no coherent criteria, then I win by default and your demand is invalid.

im listening.

Consciousness is an illusion in the first place.

Humans are temporal beings, living instant by instant like film reel. Memories are not real, they are only figments of the imagination that exist only in the mind. There really isn't much of a difference between a dream and a memory, and just because you interpreted reality in a certain manner doesn't mean that your interpretation is correct.

It's only by definition that consciousness can only be a biological function. All we've ever actually accomplished by creating this definition is a broad, generalized separation between ourselves and the tools we create. It's almost ironic, considering that we design these tools for the sake of fulfilling purposes that we are otherwise too lazy or incapable of completing, and yet the moment that a concept like "consciousness" comes about, it's suddenly permanently distant from our own capabilities.

Those who say machines cannot achieve consciousness in the near future have either put no serious though into the meaning of the word, or simply have not come to terms with the fact that they are nothing but a biological machine in their own right.

tl;dr, this thread is silly.

>>4248653
>The causation, mechanism, these remain inscrutable.
And this bothers you for physics causing consciousness, but doesn't for "How do magnets work?". There is not a single proposed mechanism for how magnets work. (Ok, electro-weak theory, but then there's no theory underlying electo-weak theory).

This is inherent in the nature of science. You explain things with models based on evidence. Why does the model work? Because evidence.

>>4248664
>You cannot say "It works because the evidence says so".
Yes, you can, and you do. This is inherent to science. There is no other kind.

>In reality, it works because it has underlying causes.
You have no understanding of what "science" means.

For reference, here's a real scientist:

Feynman 'Fun to Imagine' 4: Magnets (and 'Why?' questions...)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMFPe-DwULM

>>4248643
Yeah so? Some correlations seem to show something in some cases and other in other cases. Like, on average people with damage in some areas don't recover that function, but in a few rare cases they do. Nature is full of these examples. A correlation, again, doesn't speak for itself.
A correlation is a statement like this: a sculpture is a block of shaped rock. If you don't share the subjective background with the one who made the sculpture, you don't understand the principle behind making one or how it should be viewed (ie, not only as a block of shaped rock). It's similar with consciousness and its correlates. Consciousness is not just its physical correlates.

If you replicate the physical correlates it's possible you might not get a consciousness, just like if you copy a sculpture by Michelangelo by making a concrete cast of it, you don't get the same sculpture, just a "Chinese" version of it (a cheap concrete copy of a sculpture which looks like the original, but it's not really a sculpture). Something like that.

>>4248681

>Consciousness is an illusion in the first place.

>shits too hard to explain lol I"ll just say its an illusion

It is an illusion relative to what? What is real and what is illusion and how do you differentiate the two? Oh ya you can't

>>4248693
>Yeah so? Some correlations seem to show something in some cases and other in other cases. Like, on average people with damage in some areas don't recover that function, but in a few rare cases they do. Nature is full of these examples. A correlation, again, doesn't speak for itself.
You're confusing correlation with experiments done with control, aka exactly what's needed for causation.

Guy can do basic arithmetic before accident. Guy gets certain part of brain damaged, and can no longer do basic arithmetic. This is the /classic/ kind of "experiment-control" kind of experiment. You can't get better than this.

Go ahead, continue denying reality.

>>4248251
A simulation of a hurricane is not a hurricane. But a simulation of an adding machine is an adding machine. The question then becomes: what are 'you' most like?

You are the behaviour of your brain. Anything that can reproduce that is you. A 'simulation' of you that would with increasing irritation tell you that it is really you, describe how it is feeling, curse at you, plead with you - and it's not 'real'? What a thought.

There is no theory or understanding of how matter can embody consciousness, nor do we understand how matter can feel. If you have developed a theory of how this works, share it! Otherwise Occam's in the haus.

>>4248681

let me guess a rock is "real" because when you stub your toe on it it hurts

but the hurting is an illusion because its in your mind

oh wait...the only way you know the rock is there is if you stub your toe on it, observe it through your subjective senses, derp derp subjectivity loop, everything is subjective

good job you turtle shit

(2b)||(-2b)=?

Induction is impossible.

/thread.

>>4248699
Yeah, but you're not making any argument, just repeat the same shit that correlations.. do what?

>>4248723
Yes - I'm repeating the same shit over and over in different ways in hopes that you will your error. It's not "merely correlation" you dipshit. It's a causation. We have the experimental confirmation of causation. That's exactly what one concludes when one does the same thing over and over again after controlling for other possible causations. We've had people had their brain damaged in a multitude of ways, and each time they had X ability in the mind before, and lost it after. We've controlled for possible alternative explanations and causations. Thus we conclude that it's causation.

>>4248738
So what man? Do you even think? What does it matter you lose a capacity you formed using an intact brain, which worked as a whole to produce consciousness? Can you make one from scratch because you know a correlation? How?

>>4248681
>Consciousness is an illusion in the first place.
The basis of all epistemology cannot, by definition, be an illusion.

>>4248682
>And this bothers you for physics causing consciousness, but doesn't for "How do magnets work?".
Magnets don't suffer from an intractable subject/object duality.

>>4248701
>You are the behaviour of your brain. Anything that can reproduce that is you. A 'simulation' of you that would with increasing irritation tell you that it is really you, describe how it is feeling, curse at you, plead with you - and it's not 'real'?
No, the behavior of the brain is the objective data. The subjective perspective is "you". Replicating the behavior of an individual is not known to replicate the subjective perspective of that individual (because no individual has been replicated). However this can be tested. If two objectively indistinguishable copies of an individual are in fact the same subjective individual, then anomalous information transfer between the replicas would occur, as you would have one subject in two objects. Put the two replicas in isolated environments, and test for information transfer between the two.

>>4248752
>correlation
No, causation.
And yes, considering that's what happened every day when someone has a baby. You effectively make a brain from rock. A baby goes from things we can artificially construct in a lab, taking in nutrients (more or less rocks for this discussion), and it becomes conscious. Unless there's magic in the womb now too.

>>4248765
>Magnets don't suffer from an intractable subject/object duality.
You continue to demand explanations for that which is not visible, but is an empirical claim.

>>4248765
>The basis of all epistemology cannot, by definition, be an illusion.
Lol. Unless it works as an illusion.

>>4248772
No one says there's magic. But it doesn't mean you can artificially replicate it and get the same thing.

what does it mean to say consciousness is an illusion

who is having the illusion?

subject X is having the illusion

well the subject is consciousness

inanimate mechanical objects can't be subject to illusions, there is no one there to fool

If you artificially replicate a consciousness then physics breaks down because you two entities sharing the same consciousness will be able to communicate across distances faster than light.

ipso facto, you can only have artificial consciousness at the cost of physics laws, can't have both

>>4248778
It's not an empirical claim, because it's not sense-able.

>>4248783
No, that doesn't work either.

>>4246387
I feel like that when I chug three bottles of robitussin, lol.

>>4248572
>science and math are hard, and there are few who are intelligent enough to understand it.

And in /sci/ there are few who are intelligent enough to understand philosophy.

>Any idiot can spout philosophy, as is evidenced in this thread.

No, that's only what it looks like to (and a trick that only works on) people who don't understand the philosophy involved.

>>4248801
>It's not an empirical claim, because it's not sense-able.
I do hate this circle we're in. You keep going on whichever side of the fence when it suites your argument. It's not sensible to make it immune to scientific critique, but is is sensible in your argument that it cannot be false.

To the question "How do you know this?". All truth is axiomatic. Science is based on some axioms. Morality has its own axioms. Logic which undermines nearly all has its own axioms.

What axioms are you using to claim that your shit is true? Axioms of science? That usually is what one invokes when one deals with the observable and sensible. If it's purportedly observable and sensible, and you didn't use axiom to make the claim, then it's bullshit. That's the rationist / materialist / atheist / whatever mindset, which I adopt.

Why the hell is this thread still here?

>>4248765
>The basis of all epistemology cannot, by definition, be an illusion.
My point exactly.

Epistemology, by definition, cannot be an illusion.
Consciousness, by definition, must be biological.

The only real separation made is one by the made by the definitions we created in the first place. These separations are not inherent. They are a product of our own creation.

My entire argument comes down to a simple idea: Machines, in the long run, can and will be capable of anything man can do. We only throw around words like "life" and "consciousness" to confuse and baffle ourselves, when we don't even have a full understanding of these concepts to begin with.

OP is essentially saying, "I don't know what causes consciousness, so fuck anyone else that says consciousness can be understood." He's using his own ignorance as evidence to say something cannot exist, which can hardly be called scientific in the least. He's probably an engineer and likes dick a lot, too.

>>4249262

machines maybe

computers as they operate today, no.

there is no way to enter the material world and inspect it, ever. You only have access to the virtual representation your brain produces which is akin to a dream, in fact, no different, except that it's shared by other people within your dream

>>4249263

>there is no way to enter the material world and inspect it, ever. You only have access to the virtual representation your brain produces which is akin to a dream, in fact, no different, except that it's shared by other people within your dream

>>4249263
I think the primary difference at this point is that we are still able to read the "minds" of computers because they are still dependent on our existence. Like, unless I turn my computer on and tell it what to do, it will not run itself.

As long as we get to a point where computers are self-sufficient, will we be able to understand them anymore? My best comparison would be the relationship between "Thought" and "Reflex" in the human mind.

"Thought" can create, control, and eliminate various "Reflexes", but there was a point in time in evolutionary history where "Reflex" created "Thought". DNA creates, controls, and eliminates RNA, but there was a point in history where RNA created DNA.

Computers exist right now in a state of "reflex", acting only as we've programmed them to. But what happens when we get to a point where we create a program that determines not only the most optimized solutions, but acts upon them as well? Will we still understand their reasoning, or will we simply accept that they work and continue trying to understand them anyway? As I see it, it's no different than how we regard the human mind right now.

>>4249288
Tl;dr

I can't prove it will happen, but there's a good chance we'll make a computer one day that will act in its own benefits without ever needing further input from us, outside of providing it electricity.

What is this thread, and invasion of /x/?

When the fuck did /sci/ fill with so much idiots? And why the fuck is this thread alive? You must be a uber retard to not believe in determinism. Then what is it? Magic?
Not even mad.

>>4249262
Look, we all appreciate The Matrix and other post modernist "stuff", but that is academic only. The moment you start using that to limit inquiry into the world around us is when I call you a nihilist and an asshat.

Furthermore, even if we were in The Matrix, I would still make the same decisions. It's a non-difference. I would still be hungry tomorrow, and I would take the same course of action to get food. Only when the model of The Matrix differs from the "real world" do I start giving two shits.

>>4249299
Wow. This missed the entire discussion here.

For this new topic, I find both determinism and true-random plausible and consistent with the evidence.

>>4249297
Which is your average day on /sci/

>>4249299
The problem with determinism is that it only applies in a world where all the information can be... well, determined.

It's not that the world ISN'T determined. It's just that humans inherently have no way of knowing whether it is or not. It's pretty much the consequence of the Uncertainty Principle; The only way you can properly observe a closed system is if you can look inside it without ever actually interacting with it. Merely observing it skews the results when you get down to quantum levels, because our methods of observation require we disrupt the system in advance.

This isn't just a philosophical question we're talking about here. It's a downright scientific problem we're dealing with. No matter how you push or pull the numbers, 99% will never be 100%. And the most we will ever be is "Pretty goddamn sure", never "Absolutely guaranteed."

>>4249321
...
Heisenburg's does indeed say that even if the world obeyed deterministic rules, we could never do the exact calculations of a small isolated system with 100% certainty.

There is the deeper question as to whether physics itself is deterministic or not. This could be detectable despite Heisenburg's. However, Bell's Inequalities shoot that idea right out of the water. You either have to give up counterfactual definiteness, or locality, and giving up either is profoundly weird.

Basic description of Bell's inequalities
http://www.stat.physik.uni-potsdam.de/~pikovsky/teaching/stud_seminar/Bell_EPR-1.pdf

I argue that consciousness is in the essence of matter and reality itself. The brain's form of consciousness, ie human sentience, is just one convoluted form of nature that reacts and changes with its surrounding.

Maybe artificial personas won't get a tinge in their gut when they want to cry. Maybe it'll be an internal flash of the color turquoise. Would it not be matter experiencing and intercepting its own existence all the same?

Sometimes I think the souls we wish we had are just right in our fucking faces but our eyes just glaze over with dispositions.

>>4249303
I get the feeling you're disagreeing with me, and yet you're not disagreeing with me at the same time. We're arguing semantics.

I'll try to make it simple; It's not a question of "Do we live in the matrix" that I'm approaching. It's a question of "How do we manipulate the matrix?"

I'm saying that regardless of whether we live in the matrix or not, the universe still works a certain way. But at the same time, our knowledge on how the universe works is far from perfect and any time we CLAIM we have reached "perfection", it only means that we haven't found a reason to believe we're wrong. It doesn't mean we're actually right.

Think of it this way; Both an axe and a chainsaw will chop down a tree. If you define the axe as "something that chops down a tree", then the chainsaw suddenly counts as an axe. But it's doesn't matter whether it's a chainsaw or an axe; what matters is whether it chopped the tree down.

Relate this to whether intelligence is artificial or biological. Does it matter whether consciousness is biological or mechanical? Maybe. But as far as I'm concerned, all that matters is that they both get the job done. Intelligence is intelligence, regardless of whether it's from a machine or not.

I know I might not be making sense, but I promise you this isn't just any old "descarte" argument I'm making here.

>>4249340
For once in this thread -- I don't think I disagree with any of that.

>>4249326
>You either have to give up counterfactual definiteness, or locality, and giving up either is profoundly weird.
But just because it's weird, does that mean it's wrong?

I mean, right now, we're approaching precisely what makes the Copenhagen interpretation hotly debated. We don't actually KNOW that it's true. We just know that it fits best with the information we've been provided and gives us groundwork to build off of. The Copenhagen Interpretation or any other interpretation isn't wrong or right. It's simply conventional.

Frankly, it's profoundly weird because that's just how it is. We consider anything that's not conventional to be weird. It's how we work. It's what lets us survive. Doesn't mean that everything that's conventional is inherently true.

>>4245638

215 replies later
still no comp sci monkey can answer this
>so what's the algorithm for consciousness? I'm trying to learn some c++, thanks.


OP was right.

>>4249352
Copenhagen was always meant as a joke interpretation. Some lay people heard about it and thought the author was serious. He was not. The half-alive half-dead whatever cat was meant to display the extreme /silliness/ of the idea.

>But just because it's weird, does that mean it's wrong?
Nope. The evidence seems pretty convincing that we either have to give up counterfactual definiteness, or locality, no matter our intuition.

>>4249363

>If, during the long course of ages and under varying conditions of life, organic beings vary at all in the several parts of their organization, and I think this cannot be disputed; if there be, owing to the high geometric powers of increase of each species, at some age, season, or year, a severe struggle for life, and this certainly cannot be disputed; then, considering the infinite complexity of the relations of all organic beings to each other and to their conditions of existence, causing an infinite diversity in structure, constitution, and habits, to be advantageous to them, I think it would be a most extraordinary fact if no variation ever had occurred useful to each beings welfare, in the same way as so many variations have occured useful to man. But if variations useful to any organic being do occur, assuredly individuals thus characterized will have the best chance of being preserved in the struggle for life; and from the strong principle of inheritance they will will tend to produce offspring similarly characterized. This principle of preservation, I have called, for the sake of brevity, Natural Selection.
[Origin, p 127 6th ed.]

>>4249363
The point just kinda sails right over your head, doesn't it?

Humor me. Define "consciousness" for me. Show me how I can determine whether an object is or isn't conscious. Define for me when consciousness begins. Define for me when it ends. And don't use bullshit like "You lose consciousness when you die", because then that only requires you to define the differences between life and death as well.

Tell me what makes a brain a brain. Tell me what makes life "alive". Tell me when a person dies. Tell me what is and isn't human. And then I accept your authority to decide whether consciousness can be created artificially or not. Otherwise, you're speaking entirely out of your ass and even if I DID give you a correct answer, you wouldn't be able to understand it in the first place.

In fact, that's a good description of how every discussion I've had with various retards on this board (like the OP) have gone.

OP here.

Im a philosophy major
and over 200 ppl got trolled and don't understand what they're talking about.

Carry on

John Searle already defeated the possibility of consciousness on comp programs

so did that other guy David Chalmers

has to do wtih computers being binary and qualia being irreducible or something

>>4249398
>qualia being non-binary
>qualia being irreducible
Well, Searle is wrong.

>>4249397
It's because you are so horrendously vague with your questions, and yet you expect a precise definition in response. No matter what answer you're given, you can shoot every single one down because you've provided us no groundwork to decipher what you mean in the first place.

It's like asking "What is the sound of one hand clapping"? It's a rhetorical question, asked in an utterly pointless manner. It's not that there is no answer. It's that the question in itself sucks and requires a level of detail which you have not provided. You might as well be a politician. You are an embarrassment to philosophy, and are precisely why it has not been taken seriously in a very long time.

>>4249398
Chaos theory has already shown how even simple true/false statements can conform and create a system that, while predetermined, is indecipherable without knowing the exact origins.

Neither Searle or Chalmers have proven anything. The only thing they've proven is that for something to be "conscious", it must be as (if not more) impossible to interpret than the human mind itself. Then they proceed to assume that because all computers are understood, the will never reach beyond human understanding.

I give the reasoning a C+ at best.

>>4249403

give your own definitions of consciousness, base your argument around those definitions, the ones you think make sense and ought to be valid

>>4249408


writing a computer code that makes the program conscious is about as stupid as thinking you can make a piece of paper conscious by writing magical letters on it

what becomes conscious? What becomes a subject that is able to experience reality, pleasure and pain?

give me a break, there is no magic code you can write to do that

I'm all for the possibility of MECHANICAL brains made out of artificial metal neurons and shit, but not fucken java or c++ programs becoming conscious, they are just disjointed input/output functions...get out

well OP is correct, but then, comp sci majors think Furbies & Tickle-me-Elmos are conscious these toys exhibit human-like behavior

and most comp sci are still stuck on 1930's behaviorism, if it quacks like a duck, it is 100% a duck to them

>>4249425
>and most comp sci are still stuck on 1930's behaviorism, if it quacks like a duck, it is 100% a duck to them
Yep. We advocate that we ought to be methodological naturalists in our study of the world. If some thing is indistinguishable in every way from a duck to a third person observer, then it is a duck.

>>4249426

well most high-level intellectuals went beyond that fallacy, but in terms of their menial code-monkey work, i guess it works.

>If some thing is indistinguishable in every way from a duck to a third person observer, then it is a duck.

or the person is being tricked, making an error, not looking at all the possible variables, judging a book by its cover, etc.

but these nuances don't matter much in code-monkey work...when they open their e-mails and hear "you got mail" they think their computers are sentient....go figure

>>4249422
I don't have a definition of consciousness. That's why I'm asking to begin with. I have absolutely no means of proving whether something is conscious or not, because I have no definition.

Consciousness altogether doesn't make sense to me. In fact, it doesn't seem like anything other than an arbitrary definition to defining various forms of thought process, with heavily blurred lines in between. As far as I can tell, there isn't really a definition that can be set in stone, because every time we find out that a computer or certain animals meet the qualifications, the definition suddenly changes to exclude them. Therein lies my confusion.

if something doesn't exhibit a pain response to a stimulus, like "ouch" then it isn't experiencing pain

this is the leap computer nerds make because they are philosophical tadpoles.

and this is why computer sci never have anything interesting to say about consciousness, like that silly guy Minsky

>>4249430
You are being fallacious and deceitful. No one advocates that such a pithy testing is what Turing meant in his Turing Test.

Life is a dream.

Astral Projection is waking up.

Believe what you want to believe, but I urge you all to try it.

>2012
>still thinking you can have sentient, conscious organic intelligence via codon realisation
>still using the consciousness-brain relationship to describe the soul

so what's the enzyme configuration for consciousness? I have a muddy puddle and four AA cells, thanks

>>4249430
>or the person is being tricked,

Accounted for in the control
>making an error,

Accounted for in the sample size, and the comparison between a real duck and something that looks like one

>not looking at all the possible variables, We're not evaluating its nutritional content, we're evaluating its likeness to a duck

>judging a book by its cover, etc.
That's the whole point, etc.

>>4249423
The brain is a series of relationships between all the neurons and various sections.

Consciousness IS software of the human mind. It is the collection of all the individual programs constantly running with varying priorities. The difference between your paper metaphor and the programming metaphor is that a paper is nothing but a single sheet. Programming is composed of many different papers, arranged not in a linear format, but a "choose-your-own-adventure" format.

As for the magic algorithm, it doesn't exist. Yet. Doesn't mean that it won't. There was a point in time in evolutionary history where creatures "consciousness" didn't exist. That's hardly justification to say consciousness couldn't exist. It's only justification to say that it didn't at the time.

You have proven nothing. Good day.

>>4249447
>calling it software, not firmware

It's in ROM. It's not really software.

>>4249447


the world runs on your mind, your mind doesn't run on the world

>>4249447

it can't exist because it lacks the parts

you need a CNS system, an actual physical CNS, not a virtual binary simulation

just like you can't make a program DIGEST your food, you can't make a program EXPERIENCE anything--it lacks the CNS, it lacks the actual digestive enzymes, etc

Im all for recreating consciousness via mechanical cyborg brains and nanotech neurons...but you need the whole physical system replicated...

a computer program is at best a simulation, and not even that in this case....

>>4249451

this ^
x10000000000000

computers simulate and make virtual representations of things, they can't actually produce a real process unless the process itself is a binary simulation.

a computer can no more be conscious as it can produce babies with a woman

you can't program sperm in c++
you can't program consciousnes in c++

sci majors are really dumber than rocks

>>4249451
>You need a biological central nervous system more or less exactly like a human's to be conscious.
How do you know this?

>>4249448
How about "Your mind runs on the world and the world runs on your mind"?

As far as I can tell, both statements are true. My mind did not spur itself into existence. However, it continues its existence regardless.

The world runs on my mind. The world created my mind. The world runs on itself, and my mind runs on itself. Each of these statements is completely true. The only variable is the perspective from which you approach each one.

Please don't begin a philosophical debate with me. Neither of us is going to win, because your objective is to prove me wrong, and my objective is to show you that you were hasty with your reasoning.This discussion could easily go on forever if I didn't need to sleep, simply because there's no concrete answer in the first place and you insist on finding one anyway.

>>4249452

>sci majors are really dumber than rocks

pretty sure that is obvious from this thread, and the fact that OP ran circles around folks

>>4249453
Remember anon, whenever someone asks "how do you know" they really mean "You can't know" and they are always so certain that they know you can't know.

>>4249455

once your mind is gone, you lack a frame of reference, in effect infinite time will pass within one moment and if you are never recreated then all is gone instantly

if you are recreated by some universe, then that becomes the new present

everything fast-forwards to the end once you die, it will either end then...or start again with your recreation

you think this is the "objective" present? no
this is just the present you forced upon the world

>>4249452
Man these people really are missing the boat. You could in principle write C++ to make it pass the Turing test, give it a constructed artificial non-biological body that could pass a casual visual inspection, and voila.

It's the same thing as you. You are a brain inside of a machine, your body. Your brain /is/ a computer exactly like a desktop is a computer. Just yours is properly structured and "coded" so that you're conscious. If we copied the structure and "code" to our walking desktop in the artificial body, then you couldn't tell the two apart.

Your silly antics of "simulated sperm isn't real sperm" has nothing to do with anything.

>>4249461


just like digestion depends on actual enzymes breaking down food and passing it through membranes so does consciousness depend on "actual biological parts" like the CNS

you can't replicate that in a binary code that simply does input out put operations and loop functions; lmfao, are you stupid? answer honestly.

the turing test is irrelevant to the discussion, we aren't talking about Fooling people, people are dumb as shit (you are a prime example)...fooling random observers or some test means nothing, we aren't testing Intelligence...we are talking about creating Consciousness

there is no test for consciousness, IQ and answering questions means nothing in terms of consciousness

a zombie could pass a turing test, it means nothing
it only shows some object answered ur questions to your satisfaction

>>4249464
>just like digestion depends on actual enzymes breaking down food and passing it through membranes
And why can't we use alternative enzymes? Or conventional industrial processes? Same result. Different mechanism. Anyway, this is a poor argument by analogy. "Arguments by analogy are fraud."

>so does consciousness depend on "actual biological parts" like the CNS
How do you know this? We define digestion to be the breakdown of food, and we observe that certain enzymes do this. Other processes can do this too. We can define conscious sensibly only in terms of visible phenomena. Unless you want to start partaking in magic.

>you can't replicate that in a binary code that simply does input out put operations and loop functions; lmfao, are you stupid? answer honestly.
I argue that it's in principle possible to write C++ code which passes the Turing test.

>>4249461
>. Just yours is properly structured

thats the point, you can't structure it properly purely on computer code, computer code only has symbolic functions

no actual physical structure

thats why your program can never create a real phenomena, like a hurricane, a blood type, a sperm cell, a consciousness,

>>4249464
>a zombie could pass a turing test, it means nothing
Ah, stop reading too soon. I see.

By definition, there is no observable difference between a zombie and a real person. Ergo, for all practical purposes, they are the same thing. The difference only matters in useless philosophy discussions, like this one. Have fun wanking. I'll be doing science.

>>4249467
>And why can't we use alternative enzymes? Or conventional industrial processes?

then it won't be our human digestion you are replicating, but some other form. same goes for "consciousness"

and more importantly, a computer program can't digest anything, it exists virtually in electrical charges, lmfao--are you stupid? be honest

>I argue that it's in principle possible to write C++ code which passes the Turing test.

where is the argument? all i see is a baseless premise.

the turing test has nothing to do with consciousness, and has to do with a machine exhibiting intelligence.

once again, /sci/ is dumber than a rock when it comes to important philosophical distinctions

>>4249472
>and more importantly, a computer program can't digest anything, it exists virtually in electrical charges, lmfao--are you stupid? be honest
I argued we would put this desktop into a artificial body.

But really, the crux of the argument is in my second post.

>>4249470

it's a life and death distinction

just like when we discovered that many ppl under anaesthesia were experiencing intense pain from surgery while exhibiting no physical signs--indistinguishable from peacceful sleeping ppl

but once again, /sci/ users are dumber than rocks, and nuances like this escape them

>>4249474

>I argued we would put this desktop into a artificial body.

That isn't what the OP is referring to, he said you could recreate a mechanical brain bit by bit

but you can't make a computer program conscious just via magical codes and algorithms

>>4249475
First, citations please.
Second, I doubt their brain state was completely indistinguishable from those who don't experience pain while under anesthetics. You argue as though they were, which is definitely more than whatever studies you can cite actually show.

>>4249460
>in effect infinite time will pass within one moment and if you are never recreated then all is gone instantly
Explain this part to me slowly, please.

I don't remember the subject of recreation coming up at all in this discussion. Show me how it relates to what I said, or I have no context for which I can respond to you. What you just said could mean a lot of different things, mind you.

>>4249477
>but you can't make a computer program conscious just via magical codes and algorithms
Again, how do you know this?

>>4249482
To be more helpful.
"You can't make a bunch of electrons in silicon network conscious!"
"You can't make a bunch of neurons in a neural network conscious!"
How do you know the first is true, and the second is false? From my standing point, they're both computation machines. Different kinds of hardware, but both computation machines. There - maybe that'll make sense what I've been saying all along.

>>4249464
The definition of digestion specifically states that it requires enzymes. If it doesn't have enzymes, then it's not digestion.

This is is completely circular reasoning. It makes no actual distinction of what digestion accomplishes. In fact, all you've gone and stated was that consciousness needs to be biological because all consciousness is biological.

It does nothing to illustrate possibilities. It only illustrates the current nature of reality and eliminates all potential contradictions in advance. It's like quoting the bible to say what constitutes as marriage, when the definition of marriage is under question to begin with.

Again, please tell me: What. Is. Consciousness.

computers will never be conscious because people like the OP will simply never recognize them as such.

>Again, please tell me: What. Is. Consciousness.

Not yet grasshopper. I don't reveal secrets so easily.

Plus people in this thread are much too dumb, OP seriously out of your league

When was the last time someone made a 300+ reply troll thread on sci that was intellectually stimulating and made everyone mad at the same time?

>>4249488
I'm not so sure thats definable.

>>4249490
>When was the last time someone made a 300+ reply troll thread on sci that was intellectually stimulating and made everyone mad at the same time?
Earlier today.

The people on this board are bored and don't give a fuck about life. This thread has "newfag with inflated ego" written all over it if you seriously think this is impressive.

Seriously. This is about as intellectually stimulating as asking a guy to lick his own elbow. OP is chock full of logical contradictions and it's almost as though he just discovered what an infinite regression is for the first time.

>>4249491
digestion is the breaking down of chemical bonds to harvest energy.

>>4249491
Then how in the fuck can the OP ever know whether or not artificial consciousness has ever been achieved in the first place, let alone claim that it's impossible?

His argument relies entirely on concepts which he himself doesn't even understand. It's fucking pathetic.

>>4249496
Consciousness. You.

>>4249496
So my car digests fuel?

My computer digests electricity?

Not being sarcastic. Honestly, I like that definition. It's just that these are the first questions that come to my mind when I hear it.

>2012
>thinking symbolic functions can become conscious if they are complex enough

>thinking a piece of paper can become conscious if you write complex words on it

seriously, comp sci...get it together

>>4249490
the short answer is that you don't know what consciousness is and any attempt you make marry a definition will lead to including or excluding entities you otherwise wouldn't which makes you uncomfortable.

The fact is a suitably realistic animatronic running some sort of social algorithm and stringing phrases together from a library could convince you it was conscious, and it wouldn't have any ability to learn or solve problems.

It's your ability to empathize with a computer that you're arguing about not whether or not it meets some arbitrary standard of awareness.

>>4249498
What is "You"?

What am "I"? Am I my body? Am I my brain? Am I my consciousness? Would I be me if I didn't have my arms and legs? How much of my brain can be removed before I'm no longer myself? If I have multiple personality disorder, which "me" is me?

Stop providing useless definitions. It's annoying.

>>4249501
>Thinking organic materials can be conscious if you just slap them together
Oh look. I can over simplify too.

>>4249502
>The fact is a suitably realistic animatronic running some sort of social algorithm and stringing phrases together from a library could convince you it was conscious, and it wouldn't have any ability to learn or solve problems.

I still really hate this. This is a perversion of the intent of the Turing test. If it doesn't have the ability to learn or solve problems, then it fails the Turing test. I would be able to distinguish it from a genuine human being.

>>4249504
I wasn't providing a definition, my comment was I'm not sure if consciousness can be defined.

>>4249500
a more self concious person would through in a "biological" quantifier in order to exclude non living things from the definition. I'm not going to. The fact is that the way a car works is very similar to that of a simple organism. Your computer on the other hand doesn't digest anything. The coal plant that powers your computer does though.

a computer code can't experience qualia

computers will never be conscious

qualia isn't reducible to 1's and 0's, input output...

a window is a basic computer, it takes inputs and spits outputs...your throw a ball in a window, it breaks--input output.

this is exactly what a computer does, no matter how complex it is.

input-output is not sufficient to capture qualia, the smell of a rose, the feeling of pain, the feeling of pleasure

a computer can only do input out, its 1 dimensional, qualia exists in 16 dimensions

how will a computer moving 1s and 0s experience an orgasm? what is the arrangement of 1s and 0s that equals an orgasm?

get real, OP was right, sure consciousness is physical and will probably be reproduced in some artificial form--but not in a computer, not using BINARY CODE -- input output hurrr

go away

>>4249511
But that's strictly regarding digestion, right?

What about consciousness, though?

>>4249515
Again how do you know the first is true, and the second is false?
1- "You can't make a bunch of electrons in silicon network conscious!"
2- "You can't make a bunch of neurons in a neural network conscious!"

itt: confused "scientists" wannabe who is too scared and ignorant of neuroscience

>>4249515

>get real, OP was right, sure consciousness is physical and will probably be reproduced in some artificial form--but not in a computer, not using BINARY CODE -- input output hurrr

this ^

you guys are really dumb if you think you can reduce a complex phenomena to just input-output...true/false switch

>>4249521
>It's complex, therefore it can't be reduced to physics.
Sure sounds like creationist thinking 'round here.

>>4249515
Asking binary to describe the scent of a rose is like asking a brain cell to describe the scent of the rose.

The consciousness you're attributing to a human only arises from the collection and arrangement of these brain cells, each responding to their genetic structures. Not providing computer coding this same level of leniency is inexcusable.

Minecraft is not a bunch of 1's and 0's on my screen. My computer simply executes the 1's and 0's in a different format. The human mind is nothing but an emulator for reality.

>>4249519

a symbolic language of 1s and 0s isn't sufficient to capture a material phenomena

you can't make the smell of a rose out of 1s and 0s running in circuit...it lacks the actual structure required

you can't reproduce physical phenomena using virtual electrical charges, they lack the material structure

consciousness has all the structures in place that allow for smells, taste, touches, pain, pleasure, fear, etc...

not even 1 of those is reproducible simply with binary symbols in a virtual world...

the two exist in different worlds.

>>4249509
Rather the turing test is a flawed process for determining if something is intelligent. The parts of your brain that determine whether or not something else is alive is ancient, and prone to a whole host of problems. There are women who care for baby dolls and abandon their own real babies. There are Japanese nerds who want to marry their pillows. Every time you see a face in the patterns plaster on the ceiling or you hear a voice in the wind your brain has failed to correctly interpret the humanity of some object. If you'd stop putting on this charade that your brain, and all of its individual machinations, are some how magic then we can stop debating a trivial detail like "can we consider the computer conscious if it can hold a conversation".

The fact of the matter is ATMs have enough awareness to detect my debit card and spit out the correct amount of money I want, and that's good enough for that job.

>>4249525

its correct though, even if you dont like what it sounds like

you need a certain level of complexity sometimes, and sometimes you don't have enough

a 2 dimensional graph isn't sufficient to capture a 20 dimensional vector force---

input-output, true/false, is a 2 state system...how can you reduce something like the actual feeling of pleasure to, two binary states? which state is pleasure?
it makes no sense

>>4249528

/thread

nothing more to see here

>>4249529
I've been posting for a name for several days now. How the fuck are you so stupid to think I'm one of the dualists? Really. Did you reading fucking anything?

And please - if we are not going to use observable phenomena to determine if something is intelligent, then exactly what are we going to use? Magic?

>>4249531
>a 2 dimensional graph isn't sufficient to capture a 20 dimensional vector force---
Actually, it is. Learn some transfinite math.

I'm starting to wonder if the issue here isn't whether non-concious can become concious, but the definitions of concious and non-concious.

Thinking out loud.

>>4249528
and yet your brain runs on binary processes. Neurons either fire or they don't. Off and on. 0 and 1. You can model the molecule of a rose digitally. You can model an olfactory sensor, and you can model that sensor reacting to the rose molecule. What you keep imagining is that there's some mysterious extra step that simply can't be replicated. And why? Because you FEEL like there is one.

>>4249521
>really dumb
>a complex phenomena
Lrn2Anglisch

>so what's the algorithm for consciousness? I'm trying to learn some c++, thanks.

until someone shows how you can IN THEORY make something conscious out of 1s and 0s, then OP was correct

>>4249531
>
input-output, true/false, is a 2 state system...how can you reduce something like the actual feeling of pleasure to, two binary states? which state is pleasure?
>it makes no sense
What makes no sense is your extreme straw manning. Are you really that stupid? Do you think there's a single neuron in your brain with only two states that determines whether you're happy or not? Do you think in the C++ code example there's only a single bool variable that keeps track of whether you're happy or not?

Fucking seriously?

>>4249540

feel good about this

>2012
>computers will never be conscious or pass a turing test

feels good

>27 hours of philosophy
>any level of asshattery I want
>270 posts starting

>>4249541

how can you produce the feeling of happiness in a program using 1s and 0s, c++

just explain it in theory

how do mathematical functions become literally "happy" or literally feel "pain"

thanks. awaiting your incoherent response and backpeddling

>>4249537
that's exactly the issue. The only way we're able to even be aware that anything is conscious is because we have empathy. We use our empathy to differentiate "things" from "people". the problem is is that our empathy is primitive and faulty. If we can mistakenly believe that something is alive that isn't then why is it so hard to believe that we can mistakenly believe something that is alive is not?

>>4249545
>how do mathematical functions become literally "happy" or literally feel "pain"

lol good point, I change my position, OP was right

>>4249545

check mate
/thread

>how do mathematical functions become literally "happy" or literally feel "pain"

ya algorithms no matter how many you stick together, won't ever feel shit...it doesn't even make sense to say so

>>4249545

hmm...not sure if I agree, but can't refute

>>4249545
How do certain configurations of neurons in the brain make the neurons feel happy, or sad, or in pain? No one knows, and I bet no one will ever know. However, we know that certain configurations of neurons do make those neurons feel happy (in principle - we don't actually know exactly which neurons do it) because of the available evidence. And as I see no relevant difference between a bunch of "neurons in a neural network" vs a bunch of "electrons in a silicon network", I see no reason why both can't be conscious when properly arranged.

>>4249534
we're not going to determine if anything is intelligent at all. We're going to measure if something is better or worse than others at completing assigned tasks. Whether or not a computer is conscious is irrelevant.

ITT
>No Turing test can come close, no matter how good it is at faking an organism. Machines calculate; people count. Machines have programs; people have purposes.
>consciousness is an emergent property of carbon

>>4249556
Then you agree with me that the difference between a zombie and a "real conscious" human being is not important. Good.

However, I was trying to argue that there is a difference between machines that can pass the Turing test - it is a task: act human - and those machines which cannot. Human beings are machines which can fulfill that task.

>>4249555

he isn't talking about silicon, stop making straw men

he is talking about the programs themselves, like windows is a program, he isn't talking about the harddrive or video card

hes talking about a program, software, running on a desktop
what don't you understand>?

he already said a million times silicon chips, nanotech, and mechanical brains could become conscious

hes arguing against 1s and 0s on your monitor becoming conscious

computer programs, running online...running on your desktop

>>4249555


too bad he isn't talking about silicon networks but programs instead

like "hello world" in c++

you believe if you type enough complicated algorithms you can make the "program" conscious...

heh....so silly, justify this absurd position, now. you have 20seconds

>>4249562
But software running on your desktop /is/ electrons in a silicon network. It's just not the right configuration to be conscious. Why don't you understand?

We could hook up your brain to a bunch of sensors and hook that up to a conventional desktop monitor. Ok - we probably wouldn't get a Windows(tm) desktop, but we would get something. That's because your brain isn't "designed" to be a Windows(tm) operating system.

Sometimes I wonder if everything is already concious, but certain arrangements make it more obvious to us.

>>4249564
I already did. When you write programs, they are eventually compiled down and run as electrons moving through silicon. Of course when I write some text it isn't conscious, but when I execute that text as electrons in a silicon network, it may become conscious.

Is this really the debate? Damn that's a lame distinction that I didn't even realize that some people were making.

>>4249565

>But software running on your desktop /is/ electrons in a silicon network. It's just not the right configuration to be conscious

Thanks I agree. It will neer be the right configuration until you start recreating brain parts and the central nervous system out of silicon...in which case programming wouldn't be necessary, what would be necessary is recreating every part of the brain using silicon--then you could get consciousness--

a programming language is trivial and unnecessary...once you have created the actual physical structure that consciousness depends on, then you get consciousness

but 1s and 0s, programming, code, has nothing to do with consciousness, a program will never become conscious for reasons explained earlier

an actual mechanical brain can become conscious

>>4249547
each bit is stored in a node which is connected to other nodes. When a node switches to 1 it sends a vote to all other nodes to turn on.
This vote is reduced by a value stored in the connection between nodes. When a node gets enough votes to turn to it does so and in turn sends votes to all other nodes.
Some nodes are connected to input nodes which receive votes from an environment, and some other nodes are connected to out put nodes which are connected to manipulators for that environment. One particular set of these nodes are connected to all inputs, but the output nodes are connected to a system which does not affect the environment but rather the nodes themselves. when this system outputs 1 in one manipulator all nodes which were voted to turn to 1 have their connections to the voting nodes increased (making their votes worth more). if the system outputs 1 in the other manipulator those connections are weakened (making their votes count for less).

Nothing about this description necessitates any biological functions. Which is exactly why you'll reject it out of hand.

>>4249559
>intelligence is an emergent quality of carbon
>make computer out of carbon

>>4249569

a program is just 1s and 0s.
1s and 0s simulate
1s and 0s are just two arbitrary states

to make consciousness you need actual parts working together, just like you need actual parts to "digest" food

a program can't digest food, ever.

a machine can digest food.
a machine can become conscious.

a program can never become conscious.

>>4249575
A program can be programmed to digest data.

It's not even a difficult concept.

Except for carbon-chauvinistic /sci/entists.

>>4249569
and those physical processes can be simulated digitally. Simulations of biological processes are used in medicine all the time. It's more a matter of computing power to simulate large quantities of cells, but once you do you can strip away from the sim that which isn't necessary for thought. and in fact this is already being done
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Brain_Project

>>4249569
Again, there's this false dichotomy between a "mechanical" computer and an "electrical" computer. The brain is an electrical computer (probably?). A common desktop is an electrical computer. All electrical computers are mechanical computers. They operate by moving electrons from point A to point B. They are entirely physical machines. No magic here.

Also, by the Church Turing equivalence, whatever a so called "mechanical" computer can calculate, so can a Turing machine, and C++ code. Extending it a little bit to the purposes here, I can make an "electrical" computer homologous to your "physical" computer, and if the homology is good, I see no reason why both aren't conscious.

PS: Is this at all practical? Hell no. I agree that this is almost certainly not the way we'll create strong AI. But it's key to emphasize that there is this correspondence, that there is C++ code out there that can pass the Bob test, be indistinguishable from human Bob.

>>4249575
Really - this is just asinine. Whenever someone says that C++ code can be conscious, they're obviously referring to the execution of that C++ code. An executing C++ code /is/ a machine.

>>4249585
>>4249591
Ack, trying to keep this name in this thread only. Those are me.

>>4249585
what a smart person would say to counter this point is the difference between analog and binary.

Which is hogwash because the human brain is dependent on an analog assisted binary, and floating point values can simulate analog phenomena as accurately as necessary.

Neuroscience/CompSci double major graduate here.

OP, you're a faggot who doesnt understand the base concepts of anything.

>>4249584

this is the new thread ^

>>4249591
Then the argument, again, has nothing to do with the efficacy of non-biological or non-mechanical consciousness, but with a misunderstanding of terms. A program is as much a machine as a windmill. The brain is a machine. You can make a brain out of a program.

>>4248922
No, at no point did I ever make a claim that consciousness in others was empirically observable, it has always been something that only appears to the subject. The existence of it is necessarily axiomatic because a denial of it can only be made by a conscious being.

>>4249262
>Epistemology, by definition, cannot be an illusion. Consciousness, by definition, must be biological.
Epistemology cannot be an illusion because it's something we create, not something we observe, so, category error. Consciousness cannot be biological because it is qualitatively different than everything biological and cannot be objectified as such.

>OP is essentially saying, "I don't know what causes consciousness, so fuck anyone else that says consciousness can be understood."
No, he's saying that current objectivist and reductionist approaches do not explain consciousness, so claiming that engineering strategies based on them are capable of handling or producing consciousness is fallacious.

>>4249398
>John Searle already defeated the possibility of consciousness on comp programs
No, what he sowed was that semantic observation cannot be inferred from symbolic manipulation (countering the Turing hypothesis). That's all.

>>4249426
>If some thing is indistinguishable in every way from a duck to a third person observer, then it is a duck.
Which reasoning fails spectacularly when trying to distinguish between a philosophical zombie and a conscious person.

>>4249497
>Then how in the fuck can the OP ever know whether or not artificial consciousness has ever been achieved in the first place, let alone claim that it's impossible?
That's not the issue. The issue is that people are wielding scientific theories that do not explain consciousness and claiming that engineering programs based upon these theories will produce consciousness. It's a completely unfounded claim.

>>4249561
>Then you agree with me that the difference between a zombie and a "real conscious" human being is not important.
It's vital for anyone who claims to be producing consciousness. If you want to avoid that problem, drop the claim of producing consciousness.