[ExI] ai emotions

Brent Allsop brent.allsop at gmail.com
Thu Jun 27 17:09:16 UTC 2019


Hi Stuart,



Thanks for continuing this discussion on consciousness!



Max Tegmark’s paper, like everything else in all of the peer reviewed
literature on physics, and consciousness, and particularly studies on
perception of color are all completely qualia blind.



Everyone uses the term “red” in only a functionalist way, which imparts no
qualitative meaning, whatsoever.  For example, you said: “Redness is a
function of red”.  Statements like this provide no qualitative meaning,
especially when you consider what should be an obvious fact that my redness
could be like your greenness.



In order to know, qualitatively, the meaning of a word, like redness or
red, you need to keep in mind that it is only a label for a particular set
of physical properties or qualities.  Everyone uses the term “red” to talk
about when something reflects or emits red light, they also use it as a
label for a particular type of light, they also use it to talk about “red”
signals in the optic nerve and “red” detectors in the retina…  ALL of these
are purely functionalist definitions and provide no qualitative meaning.
They are completely ambiguous definitions, and nobody knows which physical
qualities they are talking about, when the use any such terms.



In order to not be qualia blind, you need to use different words for
different sets of physical properties or qualities.  I use the word “red”
as a label for the physical property of anything that reflects or emits 650
NM light.  I use the word “redness” as a label for a very different set of
physical properties or qualities.  It is a label for a set of physical
qualities we can be directly aware of, as something our brain uses to
represent knowledge with.  This physical quality can be used to represent
any type of knowledge.  A bat could use it to represent echolocation
knowledge.  Some people could use it to represent green knowledge, and so
on.  To say “Redness is a function of red” is, again, completely qualia
blind and ambiguous.  Qualitatively, I have no idea what you are talking
about.  Are you talking about your redness, or my redness which is like
your grenness?



Tononi’s idea of “redness = PHI(red)” is also completely sloppy, definition
wise.  Is he talking about one person’s redness, which may be another’s
greenness….?  As I was saying, this, and everything else is completely
qualia blind.



Take the name of the neurotransmitter glutamate, for example.  We know this
is a label for a particular set of physical properties.  We also have
abstract descriptions of glutamate's atomic makeup, and how it behaves in
synapses.  But, again, all of this abstract information about glutamate is
also just functional.  It provides no qualitative meaning.  We know how
glutamate behaves in a synapse, but what is that glutamate behavior
qualitatively like?  If you think of the qualitative definition of the word
redness, and the qualitative definition of the word glutamate, you should
realize that these could be abstract labels for the same set of physics.
Not realizing this is qualia blindness.



The ONLY thing that provides qualitative meaning to anything is subjective
experience, or our ability to directly experience some of the physics in
our brain.  ALL objectively observed information is purely abstract, and
devoid of any qualitative meaning.  We can’t talk about consciousness in
any way, until we start thinking clearly, and non-ambiguously about the
qualitative meaning of words.



Max Tegmark asserts the existence of some “perceptronium”?  Even if there
was such a thing, all objective observations of such would be purely
functional, while direct experience of such functional descriptions would
be qualitative.  Proposing new physics buys you nothing about
consciousness, as long as you remain qualia blind, and fail to make the
qualitative connections.  Once you are no longer qualia blind, you realize
you don’t need any new physics.  You just need to think, clearly and
qualitatively, about what we already know of current physics.



We simply must see people start using multiple words to talk about
different physical qualities.  Red for something that reflects or emits red
light, and redness for a very different set of physical qualities, which
could be a quality of anything we already know about, objectively, in the
brain, like glutamate.



On Thu, Jun 27, 2019 at 9:05 AM Stuart LaForge <avant at sollegro.com> wrote:

>
> Quoting Brent Allsop:
>
> > I’ve been confronting Naive Realists bleating completely qualia
> > blind (only use one word ‘red”, instead of multiple words like red
> > and redness to talk about different physical properties and
> > qualities.) rhetoric on places like quora and reddit.
>
> Redness is the knowledge of red. Consciousness is like a
> physical/mathematical function by which information becomes knowledge
> which is system-integrated information. Redness is thereby a function
> of red. To borrow Tononi's notation, redness = PHI(red). What is the
> distinction between consciousness and the ability to actively learn? I
> have trouble of seeing one. In some respects, the point of
> consciousness seems to be to find out what happens next.
>
> > Sometimes it is so frustrating that so many people just can’t think.
>
> It is only frustrating if you think about it. Just kidding of course,
> but if you need to reach people like that, then try appealing to their
> emotions. It often works better than logic. Logic is overrated anyhow.
> If you start with incorrect premises, then you reach wrong
> conclusions. GIGO applies to people as well as learning machines.
>
> > After feeling so dirty, and frustrated with so little progress, with
> > so many, it is so nice to be pulled back up in the clouds, trying to
> > keep up with you guys taking me where I’ve never  been before.
> > Thanks everyone, for providing such an inspiring forum, for so many
> > continued years, and for restoring my faith in humanity so often.
>
> You have done your part to make the list an interesting forum, Brent,
> so one list member to another thank you as well.
>
> Here is a paper about consciousness by physicist Max Tegmark you might
> like entitled "Consciousness as a State of Matter". I notice you don't
> have him or that particular camp set up on Canonizer.
>
> https://arxiv.org/abs/1401.1219
>
> He is a little all over the place, but his ideas are interesting and
> overlap some of mine. I still have to see if I can reconcile our maths
> but that will take time.
>
> Stuart LaForge
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Stuart LaForge
>
>
>
>
>
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