Let's be clear: behaving identically would include waxing eloquent about their internal experiences of music, art, etc. It would include showing evidence of depression when things don't go their way, evidence of happiness when they do, etc. Behaving identically would include talking about things like what they were thinking about yesterday and the beauty of a sunset.

Why would that *not* be evidence for consciousness?

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(December 26, 2018 at 11:08 am)Dmitry1983 Wrote:

(December 26, 2018 at 11:03 am)polymath257 Wrote: [quote pid='1872257' dateline='1545836268']
In near future robots will have behavior that is identical to humans without having consciousness. Subjective experience seems to be unnecessary.

Why would you think they would fail to have consciousness if they behave identically? I would argue the exact opposite: when they begin to behave identically, they have achieved consciousness.

Identical behavior doesn't mean identical subjective experience. If subjective experience is created by brain then it is likely that programmers will have to code additional layer of software that is responcible for artificial subjective experience in robots.
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I disagree. If that identical behavior includes extensive descriptions of internal states, including their enjoyment of sunsets and the taste of apple pie, why is that NOT evidence that they do, in fact, have consciousness?

(December 26, 2018 at 11:08 am)Dmitry1983 Wrote: Identical behavior doesn't mean identical subjective experience. If subjective experience is created by brain then it is likely that programmers will have to code additional layer of software that is responcible for artificial subjective experience in robots.

Or, that layer could be environmentally "coded" - as appears to have been the case in human beings. Left to their own devices, the robot physically capable of subjective experience would be unlikely to have exactly the same experiences as human beings (even human beings don't have identical subjective experiences, and we're only marginally different from each other - in this, I'd give the point to the bots..they may be worlds away different from us, but they could more easily be exactly like each other).

(December 26, 2018 at 11:08 am)polymath257 Wrote: I disagree. If that identical behavior includes extensive descriptions of internal states, including their enjoyment of sunsets and the taste of apple pie, why is that NOT evidence that they do, in fact, have consciousness?

Because you can already program elements of this behavior in a robot without any subjective experience.

I had to look up what a p-zombie was and it would not be very good at survival.

From the definition I read, a p-zombie is indistinguishable on the outside from a human being, but possess no consciousness.

So a p-zombie is exactly the same as an unconscious human being.

This creature would not be able to move, nor sense the world around him. It would not survive very long.

In an example they gave of a p-zombie and someone poking it with a stick, they said the p-zombie wouldn't be able to feel itself being poked with the stick, but it could react and say "ouch, stop poking me with that stick".

I'm going to need a refresher course on what senses it possess and which ones it doesn't.

If it can see, why can't it feel ?
If it can't feel, why can it see ?

In my opinion, as an unconscious human, it wouldn't react in that way at all.

(December 26, 2018 at 11:14 am)Rahn127 Wrote: This creature would not be able to move

No, p-zomibes would behave exactly like conscious humans including movements.

(December 26, 2018 at 11:12 am)Dmitry1983 Wrote:

(December 26, 2018 at 11:08 am)polymath257 Wrote: I disagree. If that identical behavior includes extensive descriptions of internal states, including their enjoyment of sunsets and the taste of apple pie, why is that NOT evidence that they do, in fact, have consciousness?

Because you can already program elements of this behavior in a robot without any subjective experience.

if you program it to the extent that the behavior is identical, then I believe you have programmed it to be conscious.

(December 26, 2018 at 10:47 am)Dmitry1983 Wrote: What is evolutionary purpose of subjective experience? P-zombies would be just as good at survival as conscious humans.

Why does it need to have a purpose other than it happened to be what evolved and it worked?

Quote:Can atheists explain that?

An atheist is just somebody who doesn't accept that any of the claims of gods that they have been given are believable. It isn't necessary that they be able to explain everything in order not to be convinced that the explanations offered by theists are true.

(December 26, 2018 at 12:03 pm)unfogged Wrote:  It isn't necessary that they be able to explain everything in order not to be convinced that the explanations offered by theists are true.

What explanation?  This guy is insisting that consciousness is unnecessary, and thus...somehow, inexplicable.

One hopes that he doesn't think that saying "god" will suffice, what with that being a noun, not an explanation of consciousness.

(December 26, 2018 at 12:05 pm)Gae Bolga Wrote:

(December 26, 2018 at 12:03 pm)unfogged Wrote:  It isn't necessary that they be able to explain everything in order not to be convinced that the explanations offered by theists are true.

What explanation?  This guy is insisting that consciousness is unnecessary, and thus...somehow, inexplicable.  

One hopes that he doesn't think that saying "god" will suffice, what with that being a noun, not an explanation of consciousness.  

No argument there; I was speaking in more general terms just about the "can atheists explain that" kind of question and not the specific issue of consciousness. The fact that we don't have a full understanding of or explanation for any given question doesn't mean that mean that we have to assume it requires a god which ultimately just replaces something without an explanation that we know exists with something we don't know exists and also couldn't explain if it did. The god of the ever-shrinking gaps is starting to look pretty pathetic these days.

(December 26, 2018 at 11:16 am)Dmitry1983 Wrote:

(December 26, 2018 at 11:14 am)Rahn127 Wrote: This creature would not be able to move

No, p-zomibes would behave exactly like conscious humans including movements.

So they're conscious and aware of their surroundings