[ExI] Fwd: Chalmers

John Clark johnkclark at gmail.com
Wed Dec 18 23:04:31 UTC 2019


On Wed, Dec 18, 2019 at 5:29 PM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

>I am assuming that the neural networks that increase in activity when a
> certain stimulus is applied is the same - equal - isomorphic - whatever you
> want to call it - as the conscious experience.
>

I think that is an excellent assumption but it is nevertheless just an
assumption and one based on intellagent behavior; that's why you believe
animals are more conscious than rocks and why you believe when one of your
fellow human beings is taking a calculus exam he is probably conscious but
when he is sleeping, or under anesthesia, or dead he is probably not. And
that is also why intelligence theories are so much more important than
consciousness theories.

John K Clark






> They don't produce the conscious experience as a separate response - they
> ARE the conscious experience.  When that network lights up just as it did
> last time and the time before and so on, when a red stimulus was presented,
> you have nailed down where red is (or, I suppose if you want to be really
> precise, that wavelength of red).  If you show a red apple, you get that
> network and another one, presumably representing apples.
>
> Of course you also ask the subject what he is experiencing.  He'd better
> say red or we are in trouble!
>
> I don't know that solipsism is amenable to proof.   bill w
>
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