But information and energy are different things. The no-hiding theorem is a low-level description that isn't relevant to upper level things like information and entropy.
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Unconditional Mind
- Thread starter Fool
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But information and energy are different things. The no-hiding theorem is a low-level description that isn't relevant to upper level things like information and entropy.
They can change how our neurons respond because our neurons are partly electrochemical. That doesn't change 'reality', merely perceptions.
But we still describe sleep as being unconscious. That means we are dealing with, again, at least two different concepts here.
the no-hiding theorem is about information. information, knowledge, consciousness is power. it is the power to use natural forces in ways not known to the ignorant. case in point gun powder.
no you're trying to differentiate that consciousness travelling inside something is different from consciousness being conveyed outward from something. consciousness only requires something be conscious of something, consciousness isn't required to be conscious of everything. otherwise scientist are unconscious.
It seems you don't understand the use of the term 'energy' in science. Working via some force or process does NOT mean something is energy (as opposed to, say, momentum or spin or mass or parity or...)
Howard Is
Lucky Mud
Yes, two different concepts. But that doesn’t imply two different realities.
If there was no consciousness in a dream I do remember....what is that ?
Well, I would call it limited consciousness, like in sedation. In this consciousness is opposed to being unconscious.
Howard Is
Lucky Mud
But surely limited consciousness, in this discussion, is like being semi-pregnant ?
Martin
Spam, wonderful spam (bloody vikings!)
It does seem that there are degrees of consciousness, like you can be woken up by a loud noise while asleep. Degrees of wakefulness or awareness perhaps?
Well, that's part of my point. It isn't a binary situation. Instead, there are degrees going from the sensitivity of bacteria to local nutrients to full-blown consciousness in humans. Those are not the same phenomena.
Howard Is
Lucky Mud
That is about complexity of behaviour, not awareness of behaviour.
It seems that by ‘full blown consciousness’ you mean awareness of complexity, as opposed to awareness of simplicity.
A human has hundreds of billions of brain cells, neuronal and glial, and another 75 trillion or so non-brain cells. We’re much more complicated than bacteria.
Imagine a monitor screen with only 64 pixels. Not much room for sophisticated and high res imagery. But the 64 pixel screen (bacteria) and the 4K resolution screen (human) are otherwise basically the same.
It is the possible content of the screens which is radically different, and the computing power to make use of it.
An awareness of 64 bits vs an awareness of a gigabit is...still awareness.
Conversely, the most complex machine you can build is....just complex behaviour. Which cannot be classed as awareness.
There is no evidence that awareness is the result of complexity.
There is no theory or scientific evidence proving, or even strongly suggesting, that complex behaviour becomes aware, merely because it is complex enough.
I would say there is a hierarchy of consciousness. One experiences one subjective reality in dreams, another in waking-state. Neither reflect the objective picture of the universe proposed by theoretical physics.
I guess I see it exactly the opposite way. Awareness is the complex processing of information to allow it to be stored, modeled and used in the future.
If something is able to have the complex behavior of a human being, then it will be conscious simply because it has to be able to interact in complex ways with the world and model its own behavior internally. And that *is* awareness.
And I don't think that it is complexity alone that is required. It is complexity of processing of the information in a way that allows internal modeling and random access usage.
Howard Is
Lucky Mud
So you see no difference between an AI capable of complex behaviour, and a human aware of complex behaviour ?
Just a data structure capable of modelling its own behaviour equals awareness ?
I know I exist. I am the subject of my awareness. That is not just a clever data structure.
That clever data structure may well imitate sentience, but it is still just a silicon construct.
Are you simply taking self awareness (which is clearly not just a set of registers configured for modelling system parameters) out of the equation because it is ...inexplicable ?
That’s fine if all you want is AI. There is simply no need to claim that AI equals, or can equal, awareness.
If it is the same complex behavior, no. I see no fundamental difference.
I think there are degrees of awareness and that as the complexity increases, so does the awareness.
Are you *sure* of that? I am not. In fact, all I can see points exactly to it being such a data structure.
And you are 'just' a biological construct. You are made of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorus, and a few other elements.
No, I am saying this because I don't see any fundamentally inexplicable aspect to awareness or consciousness. In humans, the awareness is distributed across different brain regions and is NOT a single 'thing'. I see no reason why that cannot be, in principle, produced with other physical foundations.
if it is reacting to the external environment in complex ways adapted to changes in that environment, in what way is it *not* aware?
Seriously. I really fail to see what 'extra' is required here.
Samana Johann
Restricted by request
One wouldn't take on existence unconditioned...
And no, even if limitless, if no wisdom, no proper attention, no insight into what is liberating, good householder.
It seems to me that the silicon/carbon distinction is beside the point.
Here is my basic position:
If you have two, physically identical structures and one is conscious, then the other will be conscious also.
In other words, it is impossible to have a brain that performs the same activities as a human brain, from data collection, to data processing, to decision making, without it actually being conscious.
Or, to put it another way, philosophical zombies are an incoherent concept. Consciousness supervenes on the physical.
Here is my basic position:
If you have two, physically identical structures and one is conscious, then the other will be conscious also.
In other words, it is impossible to have a brain that performs the same activities as a human brain, from data collection, to data processing, to decision making, without it actually being conscious.
Or, to put it another way, philosophical zombies are an incoherent concept. Consciousness supervenes on the physical.
that isn't what the science is showing. it occurs simultaneously in brain scans. a conscious opinion, a conscious decision, is formed after the information is provided
Brain makes decisions before you even know it : Nature News
in other words before the transceiver "makes a decision about the information"; the information is already known but a decision, choice, opinion is made later by the transceiver consciously.
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