[extropy-chat] Qualia bet with Eliezer

[Brent Allsop]

Russell,

 

The only thing "new" about it is the Corelation between what we already know
causally about its physics - and the phenomenal properties that it also has
which we are consciously aware of.  That is why Crick and others call it a
"neural correlate".  Red certainly isn't new - though the idea that it is
something in our brain - rather than something on a surface that reflects
700 nm light may be new for some.

 

It is not "incomputable" in that the information can be abstractly
represented or modeled by numbers and so forth - we can make abstract
software that acts like we do - claiming it has qualia and such - but we
really know it is lying and it must be a much more complex system to enable
it to convincingly do such lying.

 

And any abstract representation of a quale is not "like" it unless it is
being represented by the original quale.  So, in a way, a purely abstract
system - like say a system of abstract numbers - cannot adequately
represent, or if you must - compute it.  Although I would rather define
computation to include what our brain does when it represents information
with qualia where as a traditional computer does computation with purely
abstract representations fundamentally based only on arbitrary causal
properties of physics.

 

Does this help?

 

Perhaps you can make an actual stab at some definitions and let's see if I
can accept any of them?

 

Brent Allsop

 

 

  _____  

From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org
[mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Russell Wallace
Sent: Tuesday, November 29, 2005 10:26 AM
To: ExI chat list
Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Qualia bet with Eliezer

 

On 11/29/05, Brent Allsop <allsop at extropy.org> wrote:

If not Eliezer, is there anyone else that would be willing to take such a
bet?


I might go for it if you come up with a definition of "qualia" that I can
work with (your proposed definition doesn't mean anything at all to me - I
couldn't tell you whether I think qualia exist _now_ from it, any more than
I could tell you whether a snark is a boojum).

Are you relying on new physics for this stuff? If you are, I can come up
with a proposed definition. Or are you saying the mind is incomputable a la
Penrose? If so, I can come up with a definition based on that.

- Russell

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