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Ozzy . . . the atheists will always eventually resort to solipsism
Asking people to be consistent with their terms rather than hiding behind vague hand-waving isn't solipsism. But I can see that asking people to do that makes you uncomfortable. I wonder why.
Anyway, weird that people who claim there's an important difference between "real" and "simulated" consciousness can't tell us how to figure out which is which.
I used to think the next evolutionary step would be in like 500 years or so. With what is going on I see it happening possibly in the next 100 years. as for as being "human mind". I don't so because the human mind is defined in part by the human body. If A.I.( it is not really AI, that sounds funny) I am hoping it is "more" than us.
Ozzy . . . the atheists will always eventually resort to solipsism . . . despite it resounding defeat and refutation. A materialist or empirical reductionist is at heart a solipsist-in-hiding under the atheist label. I have been unable to understand how anyone can actually believe they do not exist as anything but individual chemical processes in a brain. It is something I am unable to have faith in. The only thing I know for certain is that I exist and I am not my brain or my body. Even Gaylen . . . who knows enough about the philosophical issues surrounding our sense of being . . . somehow manages to reconcile himself to such lack of existence. After all . . . when you say something is an illusion . . . you are saying it doesn't exist.
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Originally Posted by KCfromNC
Asking people to be consistent with their terms rather than hiding behind vague hand-waving isn't solipsism. But I can see that asking people to do that makes you uncomfortable. I wonder why.
Anyway, weird that people who claim there's an important difference between "real" and "simulated" consciousness can't tell us how to figure out which is which.
It is like porn. You know it when you see it. You know real consciousness when you encounter it. Of course that assumes you have a real consciousness to atart with.
Porn? Stuff that some people regard as porn is just advertising to me. Some stuff I regard as art, others regard as porn.
I think you are making the common mistake (or playing the common ploy) or taking something we can all recognize and something we all know it's not and ignoring the extensive grey areas and pretending one is totally and recognisably distinct from the other.
Real and simulated consciousness? The difference between Real sex (done in the home for fun and procreation) or in a studio for pay and profit. Apart from where its at, there is no difference.
It is like porn. You know it when you see it. You know real consciousness when you encounter it. Of course that assumes you have a real consciousness to atart with.
And we're back to my point about the distinction between real and fake consciousness being based on magical thinking. You're bound to end up believing all sorts of wacky things when you confuse feelings for knowledge.
Anyway, weird that people who claim there's an important difference between "real" and "simulated" consciousness can't tell us how to figure out which is which.
For whatever it's worth: I don't think that "simulated consciousness" is a coherent concept. The problem, if there is one, is the simulation of conscious-like behavior. If consciousness is the first-person perspective of a physical system, then knowing whether an intelligent-acting machine is or is not conscious will be virtually impossible without an adequate theory of consciousness - i.e., without knowing the necessary and sufficient physical mechanisms of conscious. But if we can develop a good theory of consciousness, then we could say with reasonably high confidence (never 100% certainty) whether a certain intelligent machine is actually conscious - which is to say, that it actually experiences pain (verses merely behaving as-if in pain), etc.
Even though the type of "enactive" theory that I've suggested is still, at best, only a rough draft of what a good theory of consciousness might look like, I would say that if we build a machine that behaves as if it is conscious and consists of self-organizing networks that not only model "self and world" but also motivate the machine to predict and evaluate possible outcomes and choose behavior based on its needs, then I think we are fairly safe saying that this machine is conscious.
Good summing up. While 'behavior' (or even behaviour) can be the modes of a machine or even an individual machiine in thinking even if it has no mechanism for action, and while consciousness, like electricity or nuclear power can be used and manufactured and has a 'theory' even if we do not know (like consciousness) how it really works or even what it is - all the way down, and it is very easy (a bit too easy) to say that one is real consciousness because it is natural and the machine consciousness is not, because it is in a machine -I had got that far before I read your post it is a good point that, if it look like a consciousness (in a machine) and walks like a consciousness, the the serious question arises of why it isn't a 'real' consciousness.
It needs to be able to learn new things which have nothing to do with whatever specific end goal, which can be installed.
So the root attribute ( reflective-consciousness) can be demonstrated, to emerge out of its own recognized need together alongside the association ( ongoing relationship in the setting). A unity .
I think when they code in "emotion" or "illogical habits" like spending enormous amount of time with "new robots" even though they have all they info they need to live. That would be "aware".
This is one of the strangest ideas I have heard atheists state. That human consciousness is no different than something which could evolve into being inside a man-made machine or computer.
Do some really believe that a machine can have conscious feelings?
This is a non-sequitur: consciousness and feelings are two completely separate things. Consciousness resides in the brain; feelings or emotions represent the interface of the mind with the body. Heart rate, body temperature, muscle tension are all bodily parameters that we associate with emotions. Do animals have emotions? Certainly, this is one of the more primitive functions of the brain. Can robots have emotions? Not likely.
Consciousness is a different story. It's not yes or no, but a matter of degree. Wikipedia:"Consciousness is the quality or state of awareness, or, of being aware of an external object or something within oneself." I don't see any reason why a robot couldn't be considered conscious
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it is a good point that, if it look like a consciousness (in a machine) and walks like a consciousness, the the serious question arises of why it isn't a 'real' consciousness.
