[ExI] Coherent vs. Incoherent Fears of Being Uploaded

Stathis Papaioannou stathisp at gmail.com
Sat Jan 23 23:17:51 UTC 2010


2010/1/24 Stefano Vaj <stefano.vaj at gmail.com>:
> On 22 January 2010 00:37, Stathis Papaioannou <stathisp at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 2010/1/22 Gordon Swobe <gts_2000 at yahoo.com>:
>>> Some people seem to deny the existence of consciousness and thus their own experiences of life in what look to me like vain attempts to escape the conclusion that humans might have something computers do not have. I don't have much to say to them.
>>
>> I agree that these people can't really deny the existence of
>> consciousness. They must be meaning something other than what it looks
>> like, or being provocative.
>
> Yes, this may the reason why you two like so much discussing between you... :-)
>
> I assume that on the contrary most people do not consider
> consciousness as something much more special or "noumenically
> existing" than, say, sleep.

Most people consider consciousness *extremely* important, the single
most important thing in their lives. That is why a gun held to
someone's head, representing the threat of permanent loss of
consciousness, is so effective a motivator. However, most people also
tend to think that consciousness is something over and above the
capacity for intelligent behaviour, as does Gordon and Searle. This is
absurd, but it isn't immediately obvious that it is absurd even to
rational/scientific types, which is why this discussion is important.


-- 
Stathis Papaioannou



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