[ExI] [Exl] Digital Consciousness

[Gordon]

Rafal Smigrodzki <rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com> wrote:


### Let me ask you this:


> Blind persons with cortical vision implants claim to see things.. 
<snip>


> Would you perhaps claim that the seat of qualia is the cortex, not the
> primitive subcortical nuclei substituted by digital signal processing?

That seems reasonable to me. Some neuroscientists are working on identifying the neural correlates of consciousness (NCC) and I believe they involve a large swath of neurons in the cortex. 

> But, what if in a few years some researchers produce implants capable
> of correcting cortical blindness, caused by damage to the occipital
> cortex? 


Digital implants can certainly stimulate the experience of qualia in the NCC, but so too can electrical shocks or any other external stimulus. I do not believe such implants can themselves have or embody conscious experience of qualia. 

Gordon 
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