[ExI] Digital Consciousness

[spike]

>... On Behalf Of Ben Zaiboc
...

"spike" <spike at rainier66.com> wrote:
> 
> >... neuronal pathways 
> absolutely different in each person, chaotic branching dendrites going 
> to synapses every which way along completely different paths in each 
> person, so we all feel something a little different, and yet we all say in
perfect unison "red."... As I am using (or misusing) the term, I take qualia
to be an attempted 
> description of what happens immediately after those 700 nm photons hit 
> a retina.  This concept is absolutely necessary to really 
> understanding what is a thought and what is going on in a connectome, ja?
spike


>...That kind of makes my point for me... slightly different set of
perceptions than the equivalent word among people living in Greenland, for
instance), can be called a quale.  If you want...

I realized the way I am using the term, it is reduced to a more specific
form of the term "thought."
  
>...Notice that this is not the same thing as "the 'feel' of seeing red"
(whatever that means), which is what seems to be the most common use of the
word...

Ja.  I am almost back to where I started.
  
>...  Gordonqualia are those things that exist in organic brains, but can't
be reproduced in a digital computer, etc.

OK, I see but I am not ready to concede that point.  My contention is that
if we go down deep enough, we can eventually sim everything that is going on
in an organic brain, everything no exceptions full stop.  

If that principle is false or there is some fundamental reason why it cannot
be, then all our hopes and dreams of cryonic reanimation are nothing but a
fart in a hurricane.  But I think any mechanical system can be simulated to
arbitrary precision, and that there are insights available from doing that
which we can never get to using the physical system.

Gordon has made several excellent points recently and opened my mind to a
branch of AI I hadn't sufficiently pondered.  I just disagree with the
notion that a brain cannot be simulated, if that is what he is arguing.

>...Or the name for whatever it is that represents the 'symbol' Red in our
minds, that gets used whenever we need something to mean that category.  If
this is what actually happens.  Ben Zaiboc
_______________________________________________

I just thought of a qualia game, which quantizes qualia.  I will post it in
a separate thread, to avoid hijacking this thread, which I will call the
quantia game.  Please stand by.

spike