(January 15, 2023 at 9:16 am)GrandizerII Wrote:(January 14, 2023 at 4:09 pm)Paleophyte Wrote: Last I checked the ability to plan for tomorrow was a survival advantage. Other organisms can only adapt as quickly as evolution changes them from generation to generation. Conscious organisms can adapt their behaviour from one instant to the next while evolution is still tying its sneakers.
I agree with you that planning for tomorrow has practical utility. I don't think even Dmitry is disputing that.
The question is whether phenomenal consciousness (that which involves qualia) has any practical utility.
Can you explain how we'd do any planning without consciousness? No self-awareness, no awareness of the future, no planning for any self in any future.
Quote:Let's consider the example brought up by Dmitry: pain induced by a needle. Whatever do we need to have this awful feeling of pain for? Is our body being conditioned/primed to avoid/prepare for such similar pain-triggering stimuli in the future not sufficient to keep us surviving?
Pain is little more than a damage indicator. Don't do this, it hurts. About as complicated as a check engine light. There's some pretty obvious survival advantage to avoiding an unnecessarily punctured hide.
And if pain is DMitry's bar for qualia then he's just thrown humanish p-zombies out the window. Every organism down to and including single-celled organisms exhibit some level of distress when damaged. It's about as fundamental a reaction as you can find.
