From: David MOREY (us@divadeus.freeserve.co.uk)
Date: Thu Sep 04 2003 - 19:14:43 BST
I completely agree with Scott here.
David Morey
----- Original Message -----
From: "Scott R" <jse885@spinn.net>
To: <moq_discuss@moq.org>
Sent: Thursday, September 04, 2003 12:50 AM
Subject: Re: MD Self-consciousness
> Andy,
>
> (this is also a reply to your earlier post)
>
> It might help if I explain that my whole thinking on this arose from the
> time I was a grad student of computers/cognitive science. I was especially
> interested in computer models of language use. So I would do thought
> experiments on how people used language. This means that my interest in
> explanations was considerably greater than just "explaining how we cope".
I
> needed a reductionist theory.
>
> It is no particular problem to come up with simple models for parsing
> simple sentences, but digging deeper, it becomes clear that a tremendous
> amount of semantic and pragmatic knowledge is involved. But even that is
not
> what I finally saw as the real problem. It was: how does one get a
computer
> to *see* anything as simple as a word, or even a dot on the page? That is,
> how can one imagine a machine scanning the letters t-i-g-e-r, and
producing
> a mental picture of a tiger. It is no problem programming a computer to
scan
> letters and produce appropriate output, but that inner picture, what
> philosophers call qualia, is a puzzle.
>
> The reason, I finally realized, that these thought experiments failed is
> that a computer is a perfectly spatio-temporal mechanism. Every bit is
> separated from every other bit. We can read off bit configurations as
words,
> but the computer cannot. All that happens is that some bit gets set to 1
(or
> 0) and some machine instruction reads that single bit to go into a routine
> to print out "I see a tiger". But nothing in a computer can grasp a
million
> bits as a gestalt. So a computer can never be conscious.
>
> However, the same reasoning applies to the brain *considered as a
> spatio-temporal mechanism*. There have to be other things going on that
are
> not spatio-temporal. But once admit that, and materialism goes out the
> window, and Sheldrake and others start to make sense.
>
> So I agree that we have internal models, but what I am saying is that no
> spatio-temporal mechanism can process one as a whole. Your responses are
> like Rorty's, for example when he says that our inability to identify
mental
> states by viewing neural activity is "no more mysterious" than our
inability
> to read a language we don't know. My response to this is that our ability
to
> read a language is a complete and unfathomable mystery. So is our ability
to
> see a dot on a page. It transcends space and time. A computer can be
> programmed to print "I see a dot" when a video camera is set up, etc.,
etc.,
> but it doesn't see it, and it can't see it because every bit is separated
in
> space and/or time from every other bit, so every communication is only one
> bit being turned on or off. There is no way to amalgamate those one-bit
> "experiences".
>
> Now the "there's something about consciousness that I just don't see a
> computer having it" argument has been made many times. What I have tried
to
> do here is pinpoint what that something is. It is that normal, everyday
> consciousness does not play by spatio-temporal rules. Given that electrons
> don't either, this shouldn't be all that hard to take in.
>
> - Scott
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <abahn@comcast.net>
> To: <moq_discuss@moq.org>
> Sent: Wednesday, September 03, 2003 6:43 AM
> Subject: Re: MD Self-consciousness
>
>
> > Scott,
> >
> > I had another thought while taking the dog for a morning walk pertaining
> to:
> >
> > "And, again, why is consciousness, self- or otherwise, seen as something
> that
> > needs to be explained, in material terms or otherwise? "
> >
> > I might admit that explaining consciousness is hopeless and completely
> absurd
> > (but that doesn't mean we should quit trying) but self-consciousness is
> another
> > beast. Consciousness is a state of being alive. It is at the root of
> purpose
> > in the sense of a system being able to predict future events. For
> instance, a
> > frog notices a fly on a leave in front of it facing to the east. It can
> predict
> > with some probability what direction the fly is going to go next. This
> ability
> > increases its chance for survival. Well, offering a satisfactory
> explanation
> > for this ability, especially by insisting on a reductive one, is almost
> > impossible. It is like trying to decide what is life. Where is the
line
> > EXACTLY separating the inorganic from the biological. We will never
know.
> >
> > But self-consciousness or I would prefer "reflective consciousness" is a
> term we
> > can use to distinguish humans from all other biological organisms.
> Explaining
> > this then is relatively easy compared to consciousness. What is it that
> makes
> > humans different from other species? Without having to go into the
> mechanics of
> > brain activity, photons and nerve cells and such, we can offer
> satisfactory
> > explanations that help us "cope" in our environment. The one I was
> offering is
> > simply that reflective (self-) consciousness is a property of language.
> Easy!
> > No spatio-temporal universe to worry about. We can use whatever
universe
> you
> > wish to propose. We exist and we use language. From our experience we
> can
> > distinguish that humans have some properties other species do not. One
of
> these
> > is language and another one of these is self-consciousness. All I did
was
> > connect the dots.
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Andy
> >
> >
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>
>
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