[ExI] Semiotics and Computability (was: The digital nature of brains)

[Gordon Swobe]

--- On Thu, 2/4/10, Stefano Vaj <stefano.vaj at gmail.com> wrote:

Stathis wrote:
>> Searle would say that there
>> needs to be an extra step whereby the symbol so grounded gains
>> "meaning", but this extra step is not only completely mysterious, it
>> is also completely superfluous, since every observable fact about
>> the world would be the same without it.

No, he would remind you of the obvious truth there exist facts in the world that have subjective first-person ontologies. We can know those facts only in the first-person but they have no less reality than those objective third-person facts that as you say "would be the same without it".

Real subjective first-person facts of the world include one's own conscious understanding of words.

Stefano wrote:
> Which sounds pretty equivalent to saying that it does not
> exist,

I think you want to deny the reality of the subjective. I don't know why. 

-gts