Artificial Intelligence

[MD]

Glad you asked. If consciousness is fundamental, every single thing must be conscious. That is the point of it being a fundamental aspect of reality. If shanz is under the impression that the majority of scientists believe that even atoms are conscious, he is severely misguided.

Actually the majority of scientists who study consciousness do state that there is a mental aspect to reality. Prepare to get PWNED! I will enjoy this.

Guilio Tononi:
Developed the IIT, the integrated information theory of consciousness which is heralded as the best theory from classical neuronal physics perspective.

http://articles.boston.com/2012-08-1...-human-brain/5

TONONI: I think consciousness is a fundamental part of the universe—just as fundamental as mass, charge, and so forth, and it’s just as real. In fact, I think conscious things are more real [than material things] like stones and cars and mountains and planets. Conscious things are really real. They don’t need an external observer. They exist in and of themselves. It’s a more real form of existence, because it’s observer-independent.


Christof Koch
Worked with Francis Crick on consciousness. Chief scientific officer of the Allen Institute for Brain Science.

Enriched With Information - Science News

"Koch says he might be wrong, but he believes that consciousness, like an electron’s charge, is something inherent in the fabric of reality that gives shape, structure and meaning to the world. “Consciousness is not an emergent feature of the universe,” he says. “It’s a fundamental property.”


VS Ramachandran
Probably one of the coolest and most famous neuroscientists. One of the best of the best. Noted in Time 2011 as one of the most influential people.

The Human Brain and Cosmic Mind | The Costa Rican Times

"V.S. Ramachandran, a brain scientist at the University of San Diego, says there may be a soul in the sense of “the universal spirit of the cosmos,” but the notion of “an immaterial spirit that occupies individual brains and that only evolved in humans is complete nonsense.” That sounds right."

From Times Higher Education - Astute critic or just a philistine caricature?

"Ramachandran is no professional philosopher. He accepts that his position on the mind-brain relation has not been thought through, just taken off the shelf as a pragmatic working model. The fascinating thing is his choice of model. Not the functionalism or physicalism normally associated with reductionist science, but Russell's "neutral monism", another link from Rama to Spinoza."





I am itching to bring in all the other quantum theories and what they state. But I won't.

 

[MD]

Shanz you cannot make one response that actually addresses my position, so I am finished with you. If you want to debate what I am actually saying, let me know.

Apophenia, interesting point. We'll talk tomorrow.

I was the one who suggested this earlier, to stop responding to me. But you wouldn't, so I won't. Accept it your position is flawed. I have debated you completely point to point on what you're saying. The truth is materialism is incomplete. But you can't handle it.

 

[apophenia]

I'm not talking about God, I'm talking about consciousness. Stop thinking everything has to do with God. Even if mental properties were fundamental to reality, it does not suggest anything close to what we define as God.

That is a good point. This debate is taking place within a primarily American cultural context. In that context, any suggestion which evokes the slightest whisp of a notion of anything other than matter-in-motion->abiogenesis->evolution->emergent properties=consciousness will be interpreted as the thin edge of the wedge of religious fundamentalism.

 

[1137]

Alright so I have a question for you both, though I will ask shanz not to respond if he cannot do so in an adult manner cannot discuss my actual position, amd cannot get it through his head i am not a closed minded fundamentalist materialist.

1. Is consciousness the most fundamental aspect of reality?
2. If consciousness is fundamental, does this not change an awful lot about reality? First of all, if consciousness is basic it does, in fact, imply something that is not necessarly God but some kind of mystical aspect of reality. How does it change things? Are we created by this consciousness? Is life a dream or the imagination of God? Is there even any objective reality if we are all part of one consciousness? Expand on this idea.

Actually, can shanz just not respond.

 

[1137]

I was the one who suggested this earlier, to stop responding to me. But you wouldn't, so I won't. Accept it your position is flawed. I have debated you completely point to point on what you're saying. The truth is materialism is incomplete. But you can't handle it.

Grow up man.

 

[MD]

That is a good point. This debate is taking place within a primarily American cultural context. In that context, any suggestion which evokes the slightest whisp of a notion of anything other than matter-in-motion->abiogenesis->evolution->emergent properties=consciousness will be interpreted as the thin edge of the wedge of religious fundamentalism.

I agree to some extent. But a lot of it has to do with the new atheism movement. It has galvanized many people into believing whatever Dawkins/Dennett say to be true. They're almost like priests for a new faith.

 

[MD]

Alright so I have a question for you both, though I will ask shanz not to respond if he cannot do so in an adult manner cannot discuss my actual position, amd cannot get it through his head i am not a closed minded fundamentalist materialist.

1. Is consciousness the most fundamental aspect of reality?
2. If consciousness is fundamental, does this not change an awful lot about reality? First of all, if consciousness is basic it does, in fact, imply something that is not necessarly God but some kind of mystical aspect of reality. How does it change things? Are we created by this consciousness? Is life a dream or the imagination of God? Is there even any objective reality if we are all part of one consciousness? Expand on this idea.

Actually, can shanz just not respond.

First of all it's SHAHZ. Not Shanz. And secondly yes, I will stop. Just don't reply to any of my posts either and I'll call it a day.

 

[1137]

I agree to some extent. But a lot of it has to do with the new atheism movement. It has galvanized many people into believing whatever Dawkins/Dennett say to be true. They're almost like priests for a new faith.

Throw out total BS and tell me not to respond anymore? Nice move. I have never read a single thing by either. Are you unaware that atheism is simply no belief in God? That is it, all there is to it. You obviously do not realize that. Atheism even leaves room for mysticism, taoism, even fundamental consciousness, just no deities. Educate yourself for Christ's sake.

 

[MD]

Throw out total BS and tell me not to respond anymore? Nice move. I have never read a single thing by either. Are you unaware that atheism is simply no belief in God? That is it, all there is to it. You obviously do not realize that. Atheism even leaves room for mysticism, taoism, even fundamental consciousness, just no deities. Educate yourself for Christ's sake.

Man now I feel bad for you. But I see how you put down other religious people with a smug sense of superiority, so I don't feel that bad .

I wasn't referring to you, but generally because a lot of atheists are against philosophical positions which damage their positions as in anything that is not material monism.

Are you aware that you just quoted Dennett earlier in the thread with his multiple drafts model? LOL!

 

[1137]

Looking at this from the mystical perspective of a cosmic mind / fundamental consciousness, doesn't it seem that monism would simply solve the problem? I mean if the physical and non-physical are all part of the same thing, then there is no issue. It does not matter whether consciousness is caused by physical processes or not because there is only one fundamental substance that everything comes out of. I would have little issues with this, though it might lead me to some mystic / Taoish lines of thought, which is where I previously came from. If there is a metaphysical and conscious fundamental part of reality (which, no matter what you say, is "spiritual" / mystical by definition), and the physical (let's say the strings of string theory and all that follow) come out of however it naturally acts, it really changes nothing. In fact, I already accept that except I had no reason to consider this "Tao" to be conscious. There is, in reality, no difference between something not conscious like this Tao and something conscious like this Tao I suppose, so I guess this mystical perspective is fine be me. What it comes down to is that we are never going to be able to wrap our head around the reality that exists outside of our 3 dimension, outside of our universe. So, whether it is conscious or not does not matter.

"The Tao that can be named is not the eternal Tao." Crazy how old eastern philosophers had these ideas.

But, back to artificial intelligence, how is this a problem? If this conscious "Tao" is a fundamental part of all reality it does not need to be created in an AI, it will automatically be there. If it is a part of all reality down to the strings of string theory, the AIs will naturally have qualia. So, the idea poses absolutely no threat.

 

[1137]

Great, now I have to start meditating again. Haha. Seriously though, it is important to understand that things such as the love, pain, happiness, depression, etc are still caused by reactions in the brain. Even if the underlying fundamental reality of nature includes consciousness, it does not change that. Unless you believe that the brain is completely meaningless.

Also, this idea of consciousness being fundamental holds no more merit than consciousness being explained in materialistic ways. One we cannot even test for, the other we may simply not have explained yet. They are both equally likely, and relative to this thread on AIs they are irrelevant as I pointed out. Either we need to understand it in materialistic views to create strong AIs or they will naturally have these qualia because it is fundamental.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

You know, I've been wanting to work on a CA model of subatomic particles for a while, but can't seem to find anyone who's working on anything similar. Any leads for me?

There are a couple of good volumes with papers from conference proceedings, such as Complexity, Entropy and the Physics of Information and the Proceedings of the Workshop of Physics and Computation (at least those published in '93 and '94). Succi wrote a paper published in the proceedings of the 5th international conference on cellular automata for research and industry entitled "Kinetic approach to lattice quantum mechanics" you might find interesting. Also, have you read any of Ed Fredkin's work?

 

[otokage007]

Lol dude I like you so I'm not going to get into a fight with you. But I never said plants think. I simply said plants have consciousness. And the scientist from the article said so as well.

We are big guys here discussing bout a topic, u don't need to refrain yourself, just keep being respectfull.

But back to the topic, and I'm sorry because I just can't let u get away with this for your own sake! "plants have consciousness" is just a way of speaking, it is not intented to be taken literally, I mean, plants are aware of their surroundings of course, but not in the same way an animal is.

"Awareness is the state or ability to perceive, to feel, or to be conscious of events, objects, or sensory patterns." Of course they perceive and feel, but they don't know what they are doing, they don't even know they are alive actually, they just react. Hm... To put an example, it's like saying that "cleverbot" has consciousness because when u say Hello, he will say Hello back at you. He actually don't know what u are doing nor what he's doing, he is not even aware of being speaking, his programing is just answering a stimuli, the same way plants do.

Man now I feel bad for you. But I see how you put down other religious people with a smug sense of superiority, so I don't feel that bad .

I wasn't referring to you, but generally because a lot of atheists are against philosophical positions which damage their positions as in anything that is not material monism.

Are you aware that you just quoted Dennett earlier in the thread with his multiple drafts model? LOL!

It is not atheism as it is science. Usually a scientific thinking person will often ask for evidences to believe that kind of philosophical things. When presented with no evidences, it is not possible for you to convince them. So if it is demonstrated that most of the brain's functioning has a material place on the brain that is producing it, why not thinking the same bout conciousness? There's more evidence towards it, than against it.

 

[MD]

But back to the topic, and I'm sorry because I just can't let u get away with this for your own sake! "plants have consciousness" is just a way of speaking, it is not intented to be taken literally, I mean, plants are aware of their surroundings of course, but not in the same way an animal is.

"Awareness is the state or ability to perceive, to feel, or to be conscious of events, objects, or sensory patterns." Of course they perceive and feel, but they don't know what they are doing, they don't even know they are alive actually, they just react. Hm... To put an example, it's like saying that "cleverbot" has consciousness because when u say Hello, he will say Hello back at you. He actually don't know what u are doing nor what he's doing, he is not even aware of being speaking, his programing is just answering a stimuli, the same way plants do.

Well it really depends on how you define consciousness. How do you know the intention of the scientist and his quote? He would've said he didn't intend it that he was using consciousness in a figurative way or whatever. I would argue that plants have more purpose than a cleverbot. They have evolved to look for food, feel pain , etc. And as such have subjective experience. And actually to be honest, I would also say that the cleverbot has a very minimal level of consciousness as well.

It is not atheism as it is science. Usually a scientific thinking person will often ask for evidences to believe that kind of philosophical things. When presented with no evidences, it is not possible for you to convince them. So if it is demonstrated that most of the brain's functioning has a material place on the brain that is producing it, why not thinking the same bout conciousness? There's more evidence towards it, than against it.

Well actually no...I just posted three neuroscientists who state otherwise. And they are doing the most research into this from a classical perspective. And the whole thread is about how there is no proof or evidence that the brain creates subjective experience.

If you want I can post the quantum theories of mind, which are also non material and where other great scientists are working on. Material monism works for Dawkins and the new atheist movement. It doesn't work so well for consciousness.

 

[1137]

Oxford says

1 [mass noun] the state of being aware of and responsive to one’s surroundings: she failed to regain consciousness and died two days later

2 a person’s awareness or perception of something: her acute consciousness of Luke’s presence

the fact of awareness by the mind of itself and the world: consciousness emerges from the operations of the brain


There is an actually definition of consciousness, people just over look it because it doesn't leave room for the magical beliefs they need.

 

[otokage007]

Well it really depends on how you define consciousness. How do you know the intention of the scientist and his quote? He would've said he didn't intend it that he was using consciousness in a figurative way or whatever.

I'm quoting your own source:
6. Would you say, then, that plants “think”?
-No I wouldn’t, but maybe that’s where I’m still limited in my own thinking! To me thinking and information processing are two different constructs[...]
-[...]Just as a plant can’t suffer subjective pain in the absence of a brain, I also don’t think that it thinks. (I will translate this for you: since plants don't have a brain, they can not think. So yes, the autor was obviously speaking in a figurative way. The same way an inmunologist will say that white cells have memory and learning skills.)

I would argue that plants have more purpose than a cleverbot. They have evolved to look for food, feel pain , etc. And as such have subjective experience. And actually to be honest, I would also say that the cleverbot has a very minimal level of consciousness as well.

Well it is not possible to have subjective experience if you can't learn nor memorize. But before u say plants can go to school to be educated, let me recall some things:

-Learning is acquiring new, or modifying existing, knowledge, behaviors, skills, values, or preferences and may involve synthesizing different types of information. The ability to learn is possessed by humans, animals and some machines. (u don't see plants in here do u?)

source: Learning - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

And, as a biologist, let me say that a cortex is needed in order to learn, so a brain is needed too.

But that's not all, in order to achieve subjective experience, u will need not only learning skills, but also memory. Let me explain what memory is:

In psychology, memory is the processes by which information is encoded, stored, and retrieved. Encoding allows information that is from the outside world to reach our senses in the forms of chemical and physical stimuli. In this first stage we must change the information so that we may put the memory into the encoding process. Storage is the second memory stage or process. This entails that we maintain information over periods of time. Finally the third process is retrieval. This is the retrieval of information that we have stored. We must locate it and return it to our consciousness. Some retrieval attempts may be effortless due to the type of information. (source: Memory - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Now, what do you need to have memory? Well, a rather complex brain, of course. Temporal lobe, frontal lobe and hipoccampus are needed to manifest all types of memory. Damages in just one of these organs, can procue a high variety of illness related to the loss of memories.

source: Which Part Of The Brain Controls Memory

You can say a plant is concious and can think, well, no one will take u literally because no one will believe such ignorance still exists these days. But if u insist u are speaking literally, then u can also say the sky is red, but no one will actually believe u.

There is an actually definition of consciousness, people just over look it because it doesn't leave room for the magical beliefs they need.

This is why the Bible does so much harm. A scary amount of christians think the brain is useless and the soul is responsible of mental process. This is scary! Really!

 

[Pleroma]

And, as a biologist, let me say that a cortex is needed in order to learn, so a brain is needed too.

So you're a biologist? Can you tell me where in the brain that the processing of sweetness and redness takes place? Qualia are fundamental than any Brain or matter.

 

[idav]

So you're a biologist? Can you tell me where in the brain that the processing of sweetness and redness takes place? Qualia are fundamental than any Brain or matter.

Sweetness and redness are observations of physical aspects. Our brain doesn't create the chemicals found in sugars and it doesn't create the frequency of light being observed.

 

[idav]

That still doesn't explain what color is and how it's made. Or why it even exists? Although on a space time level there might be a whole new aspect of reality I cannot even begin to fathom, from a classical material perspective the idea of color is impossible. Either all physical properties have mental properties to them, or the quantum world has something that our brains interact with. Either way classical materialism is incomplete.

Colors are reflecting physical attributes of an object. Science has already explained what we see and how we see it. Color is various frequencies of light. We can only see a very small fraction of the light spectrum.

I agree a machine that is sensing and storing the data is very minimally aware that it is processing this information. If you and I agree on that then awareness cannot be an evolved process because then only some biological organisms can be capable of awareness. The machine is aware because of the connectivity it has within its nodes, which is allowing consciousness to emerge from the rudimentary consciousness of space and time.

It is intelligence that is emergent and awareness would be a fundamental. Consciousness is emergent as well as it is an advanced form of awareness that depends on other factors like memory.

 

[MD]

Colors are reflecting physical attributes of an object. Science has already explained what we see and how we see it. Color is various frequencies of light. We can only see a very small fraction of the light spectrum.

Actually the reflecting physical attributes are waves. Science has not explained how our brains create color. It simply has gotten to the point where it says different cells (cones) react to different wavelengths differently resulting in a chemical response in the brain. The mechanism of action behind how the perception of color is formed in the brain is unknown.

If the brain does assign colors to different waves, and creates these completely novel entities that exist outside an objective universe, then the brain has a special power to create new things out of nothing. To me that's magic.

However let's assume that is correct. Then the materialist model simply will have to state that all qualia are at least partly hallucinations then, because an illusion is the interpretation of the data given to the brain. A hallucination is the creation of perceptions without sensations. And color is the creation of a new perception completely different from the sensation of light, as the sensation of light itself is simply a wave. Without color. Are you willing to make that claim? Because if you are then you have opened up a new can of worms, considering how hallucinations themselves are a very poorly understood topic. And that what we refer to as reality, is wrong.