[ExI] Do digital computers feel?

[Brent Allsop]

Hi Stathis,


Thanks for expressing all this so concisely. I hope I can be as concise 
so we can make progress with this.  I think the key point in our 
misunderstanding is captured by you with this:


On 2/14/2017 5:02 AM, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
> You're missing the point when you talk about "qualitative 
> representation". *Observable behaviour* is the only thing necessary to 
> consider in order to replicate *observable behaviour*. The argument is 
> that if you ignore qualia and just replicate *observable behaviour* 
> then the qualia will also necessarily be replicated. I gave an example 
> of this which I believe is clear (tell me if not) with the 
> glutamate/glycine swap.
>

Yes, your answer was very clear.  I agree with most of what you are 
saying, but we both believe that the other is missing the point. You 
first want to focus on: "If you ignore qualia and just replicate 
*observable behavior* then the qualia will also necessarily be 
replicated."  But even if I do agree with this, from how I see things, 
it is still missing or removing some important functionality.  In the 
past you never want to move beyond this, because or until this has been 
settled.  The problem is, I can't point out the required functionality 
being removed, until you first understand and agree with some other 
things in the qualitative theory.  So, this time, could you move beyond 
that, at least for a bit and digest this initial description, then given 
that understanding (if you agree), I'll be able to point out the reasons 
I can't yet accept this functionalist way of doing neuro substitution.

Let's start on the subjective side of things, again, with our simple 3 
element system.  The system is experiencing both redness and greenness 
as a unified composite qualitative experience.  So, there are two 
qualitative representations of knowledge and there is a 3rd part of the 
system that is binding the two different representations into one 
composite experience. The fact that the system is aware of both of these 
qualitative representations at the same time, is the critical base 
functionality on which the comparison system is derived - outputting an 
indicator that could lead to one saying they are consciously aware that 
they are qualitatively the same or not.

So, given that we subjectively know that, would you agree with the 
following?  There must be something that is performing the functionality 
of the redness experience, and there is something that is performing the 
functionality of the greenness, and there is a 3rd element that is 
performing the function of binding these two representations of 
information together to make a composite experience - enabling the 3rd 
awareness/comparison neuron to indicate whether they are the same or not.

You seem loath to want to go there, instead, first, wanting to first 
focus on: "If you ignore qualia and just replicate *observable behavior* 
then the qualia will also necessarily be replicated."  But this ignoring 
of qualia is the problem, and you end up removing the most important 
parts of the functionality we want to observe as we neuro substitute.

Let's compare this subjective way of observing things to the objective 
way of observing things, and for the time being assume it is glutamate 
that has or performs the redness experience functionality, and it is 
glycene that performs the greenness experience functionality.  Given 
that, with subjective observation, we would experience a redness 
detector and with objective observation we would see a glutamate 
detector.  So, what the 3rd part of the system (we are assuming it is a 
single neuron for simplicity's sake) is basically an objective and 
subjective comparison system - outputting an indicator as to whether the 
two representations of knowledge are functioning the same or not.  This 
functionality derived from the way it binds together awareness of the 
two representations of knowledge to make one composite qualitative 
experience.

Now, when you say you replace glutamate with glycene, and you replace 
the glutamate receptor with a glycene receptor, then assert that the 
comparison neuron will behave the same, you are removing the important 
comparison functionality, or simply falsifying the theory that it is 
only glutamate that reliably performs the redness function (if so, 
necessitating that it be something else, yet to be discovered, that is 
reliably performing the redness functionality we know so well).  Both 
representations of knowledge are now the same qualitative glycene (or 
the greenness functionality), yet you are asserting that the output is 
still indicating that the two are different.  This removal of the 
correct functionality as you do the neuro substitution, is why I can't 
accept your line of reasoning, along with it being the source of all the 
"hard" problems.

If you assume the qualia experience functionality will arise or emerge 
in some other way or some other abstracted level, then it is this other 
abstracted location of qualia that can't be ignored, and must be able to 
be reliably compared via composite awareness.  I am talking about doing 
a neuro substitution at this level, with the required qualia comparison 
functionality, not the level you are talking about, where the qualia 
being compared is being removed.  If you are going to claim that a 
comparison functionality can be constructed out of this simplistic lower 
level (I don't see how this could be done), then provide at least one 
theoretically possible description of such (as I have done with 
glutamate, glycene, and a binder neuron to make a composite experience), 
and with that, whatever it is, it will be obvious what happens, and why, 
as the neural substitution occurs.

If you do the neural substitutuion on a system that, instead of ignoring 
and removing qualia comparison, you provide any testable theoretical 
method of really doing the function of qualitative comparison, it can be 
obvious what is going on during the neural substitution.  Let's do this 
by having two sets of such identical 3 element qualitative comparison 
systems, one that doesn't change and is for constant reference 
comparison purposes, and the other one is the one we will perform the 
neuro substitution on.  We will bind these two systems with the same 
provided binding system in a meta comparison functioning system which 
will monitor and compare all the qualities, as the neural substitution 
takes place on one of the systems, so you can prove to everyone, both 
objectively and subjectively, exactly what it is going on, and why both 
of the 3 element systems are always indicating: "It is red" even though 
one is the qualia invert of the other after one of the neuro 
substitution steps.  If you duplicate all this *observable behavior*, 
including the meta awareness of what is going on with both systems, 
there will be no hard problems when it is neuro substituted since you 
are not removing the most important *observable behavior*.

Does that help?

Brent Allsop









-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20170214/a1a749a1/attachment.html>