RE: The Philosophy of Mind: Zombies, "radical emergence" and evidence of non-experiential
April 27, 2018 at 2:36 pm
(This post was last modified: April 27, 2018 at 2:57 pm by Edwardo Piet.)
I'm back. Khem is unblocked. Gonna try a different approach.
Great! We agree on that!
Do you think suggesting qualia is an illusion is extremely silly?
I accept the identity theory so I think that the brain activity is qualia... but that's because I just think qualia is the same thing from the first person perspective. I don't see a conflict there at all. I don't see any emergence being required.
Where I disagree with Dennett is his silly non-sequitur about consciousness being an "illusion" when it's the one thing in the universe that can't be an illusion including the universe.
We agree.
Right. It seems silly to say that if physical systems are bundled with (or composed of) qualia then that means qualia must be useful because everything is.
The point is that in human brains' qualia itself doesn't appear to be performing a function precisely because it's the nature of qualia within the brain rather than it being something that does something in addition to the brain's consciousness. Qualia in the brain doesn't perform a function (or have utility) in the sense that if the intrinsic nature wasn't qualia and instead the brain was unconscious as was everything else in the universe... it would seem that nothing changes there would just be no subjective experience. Behaviorally indistinguisable philosophical zombies do seem to be logically coherent and that's simply one way of expressing the hard problem of consciousness. Which is why does the brain have qualia?. Or even why does anything have qualia?. Perhaps instead of the hard problem of consciousness it should be called the impossible problem of consciousness. But that doesn't make it an incoherent question. There are many questions that are totally coherent that ask questions about things that are forever unanswerable. It doesn't mean it's not a proper question.
For example: If something does exist beyond all possible experience does it drive our experience of reality causally or is it fundamentally acausal?
We can ask questions about noumenal reality even though the correct answer to those questions are by definition forever unknowable. There is a right and wrong answer to all these questions whether we can know the answer or not. Truth and knowledge are, of course, different.
I share that view.
Right.
Right.
And I think Khem's idea that consciousness is required for civilization and his primary example being art is silly. The phenomenal object of a painting and the noumenal object is separate. A robot civilization that led to robots creating paintings but they don't experience them as what we would call paintings could exist... and yet the noumenal objects still exist and are painted... even though there are no colors to see.... this is all easily conceivable.
And by saying that consciousness is required for creativity he is just begging the question. Like I said, it can easily be conceived that creative behavior could happen without any qualia and I have made it clear repeatedly that "qualia" is the definition of "consciousness" that I'm using.
Next he jumps to saying that just because it's conceivable doesn't mean it's realistic. Which means he's either fundementally missing the point or conceding that philosophical zombies are conceivable which means the hard problem of consciousness is a legitmate problem, however unsolvable. Despite him trying, and failing, to argue otherwise.
Next he'd probably jump to saying something like "unsolvable problems aren't real problems" again missing the point... truth and knowledge are different.
His debates with me are just a long testament to him missing the point and moving the goalposts.
(April 22, 2018 at 9:36 pm)bennyboy Wrote: I don't think that. I completely disagree with that definition of consciousness. To me, consciousness means the experience of qualia, and only that.
Great! We agree on that!
Do you think suggesting qualia is an illusion is extremely silly?
Quote:Sorry maybe it's a clumsy turn of phrase. I mean that rather than being a product OF brain function, some conflate the subjective experience and the brain function, saying they are one and the same. To me, this is unacceptable. One property is the experience of what things are like, and one is a collection of neurological processes that you can monitor and manipulate.
I accept the identity theory so I think that the brain activity is qualia... but that's because I just think qualia is the same thing from the first person perspective. I don't see a conflict there at all. I don't see any emergence being required.
Where I disagree with Dennett is his silly non-sequitur about consciousness being an "illusion" when it's the one thing in the universe that can't be an illusion including the universe.
Quote:Whatever qualia are, I believe that reality itself must have the capacity for experience.
We agree.
Quote: I wouldn't say qualia are useful to a physical system, either-- because without the capacity for qualia, there can be no real use for anything.
Right. It seems silly to say that if physical systems are bundled with (or composed of) qualia then that means qualia must be useful because everything is.
The point is that in human brains' qualia itself doesn't appear to be performing a function precisely because it's the nature of qualia within the brain rather than it being something that does something in addition to the brain's consciousness. Qualia in the brain doesn't perform a function (or have utility) in the sense that if the intrinsic nature wasn't qualia and instead the brain was unconscious as was everything else in the universe... it would seem that nothing changes there would just be no subjective experience. Behaviorally indistinguisable philosophical zombies do seem to be logically coherent and that's simply one way of expressing the hard problem of consciousness. Which is why does the brain have qualia?. Or even why does anything have qualia?. Perhaps instead of the hard problem of consciousness it should be called the impossible problem of consciousness. But that doesn't make it an incoherent question. There are many questions that are totally coherent that ask questions about things that are forever unanswerable. It doesn't mean it's not a proper question.
For example: If something does exist beyond all possible experience does it drive our experience of reality causally or is it fundamentally acausal?
We can ask questions about noumenal reality even though the correct answer to those questions are by definition forever unknowable. There is a right and wrong answer to all these questions whether we can know the answer or not. Truth and knowledge are, of course, different.
Quote:My view is that I can observe all the physical properties and functions of the brain, and still not have direct access to a person's qualia.
I share that view.
Quote: To me this is obvious: if I'm dreaming about a magic unicorn and want to cut off its horn, you can't hand me a hammer-- you have, perhaps, to stimulate a very particular set of neurons.
Right.
Quote:I agree. It wouldn't be hard to make a mathematical weighting system for robots, for example, which would determine the weighting between "Make new robots" behavior and "go to the repair shop" behaviors.
Right.
And I think Khem's idea that consciousness is required for civilization and his primary example being art is silly. The phenomenal object of a painting and the noumenal object is separate. A robot civilization that led to robots creating paintings but they don't experience them as what we would call paintings could exist... and yet the noumenal objects still exist and are painted... even though there are no colors to see.... this is all easily conceivable.
And by saying that consciousness is required for creativity he is just begging the question. Like I said, it can easily be conceived that creative behavior could happen without any qualia and I have made it clear repeatedly that "qualia" is the definition of "consciousness" that I'm using.
Next he jumps to saying that just because it's conceivable doesn't mean it's realistic. Which means he's either fundementally missing the point or conceding that philosophical zombies are conceivable which means the hard problem of consciousness is a legitmate problem, however unsolvable. Despite him trying, and failing, to argue otherwise.
Next he'd probably jump to saying something like "unsolvable problems aren't real problems" again missing the point... truth and knowledge are different.
His debates with me are just a long testament to him missing the point and moving the goalposts.
