(May 29, 2013 at 11:13 pm)bennyboy Wrote: A sleeping brain (at least in some states of sleep), or one in a coma, is not conscious. Therefore it is the processing of information which seems intrinscially linked to awareness.
The $64,000 question is whether ANY physical structure which can do massively parallel processing in the same (or similar) way will necessarily be conscious, or whether ONLY the organic system of the brain found in animals on Earth can achieve this. Generally, it's good not to speculate on things that aren't known to exist. However, the idea that life has ONLY existed on Earth, and that the mind has ONLY evolved on this little speck of dust, reaches Biblical proportions in its anthropocentrism.
I just don't think we're that important. I think the existence of my mind says that minds can exist in the universe. And if the universe can have minds, it is likely to have many more than just us. To think otherwise is almost to believe in magic, IMO.
I did not claim that we are the ONLY minds in the universe. I stated that we have the only examples yet known. Huge difference. I would also like to think that there are other minds in the universe, but based on current evidence and knowledge, I assume that they too are the product of something we could easily describe as a brain located in something we would describe as a lifeform (particular chemistry, fit, form and function be damned).
Our disagreement is that you suggest that minds are somehow ontologically distinct entities from the brains they haunt.
