[ExI] Red

[John Clark]

On Sun, Jul 12, 2026 at 8:52 PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

*>>consciousness is the way data feels when it is being processed
>> intelligently. *
>>
>
> *> I have long been a fan of "consciousness is the way data feels when it
> is being processed intelligently." However I think it can be improved upon.
> I would now say "Consciousness is how a process feels when it discriminates
> information."*
>

*Technically that might be slightly better but* I still prefer mine because
it's snappier, requires less explanation, and it looks better on a T-shirt.
Sometimes a* little inaccuracy saves a LOT of explanation.*

*I don't think either data or information is what is conscious, it is only
> processes which are conscious.*
>

*OK but if consciousness = processing information intelligently then I
don't see a huge difference in the way the idea is expressed. *

*>>There is no proof AIs are conscious and never will be, *
>>
>
> *> I disagree that there can be no proofs of consciousness. Any process
> that demonstrates awareness via reliable responsiveness to information is
> necessarily conscious of that information.*
>

*I am *almost* 100% certain that your conclusion is correct. There's
overwhelming evidence that you are right because we both know with 100%
certainty that at least one conscious being exists in the universe (and
probably many billions), and there is a huge amount of objective evidence
that Charles Darwin was right, and it would be nearly impossible to explain
how natural selection could have produced consciousness if your conclusion
was wrong. Nevertheless that falls a little short of a mathematically
rigorous proof. *

*John K Clark*

ggg



>
> *but given the mountain of evidence that keeps increasing each day don't
>> you think it would be wise if when you encounter an Artificial Intelligence
>> your default position should be to assume the AI is conscious? After all, I
>> am quite certain that is already your default position whenever you
>> encounter an intelligent human being.  *
>>
>> *When you meet an intelligent entity do you really need to know if its
>> brain is wet and squishy or dry and hard before you can determine if it's
>> conscious or not?  *
>>
>> *John K Clark*
>>
>>
>>>>>>>> *Yes and that is the fundamental problem you will never be able to
>>>>>>>> overcome, there is a limit to what cause-and-effect can tell you, and
>>>>>>>> therefore there is a limit to what science can tell you. Quantum Mechanics
>>>>>>>> can say why some molecules reflect red light and other molecules reflect
>>>>>>>> green light but that's not what you're talking about, you're talking about
>>>>>>>> color qualia. You could maintain it's a brute fact that Glutamate has the
>>>>>>>> green quality and glycine has the red quality; but both those molecules are
>>>>>>>> extremely complicated objects and yet they produce an extremely narrow very
>>>>>>>> specific qualia, so to explain the entire conscious experience with your
>>>>>>>> theory you're going to need an astronomical number of brute facts, perhaps
>>>>>>>> even an infinite number of them. But my theory only needs 2 brute facts:*
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> *1) On is different from off. *
>>>>>>>> *2) Consciousness is the way data feels when it is being processed
>>>>>>>> intelligently. *
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> *Therefore William of Ockham would say that my theory is superior
>>>>>>>> to your theory. *
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> *> We simply need nature to tell us, through direct apprehension,
>>>>>>>>> which one is which, so we can have our grounded dictionary of the physical
>>>>>>>>> qualities of what we are objectively observing.*
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> *This dictionary you keep talking about is going to be huge,
>>>>>>>> perhaps going beyond huge and merging with the infinite; even if by some
>>>>>>>> miracle you possessed such a monstrosity would you really feel that the
>>>>>>>> consciousness problem had been solved? Wouldn't you want to know WHY one
>>>>>>>> molecule has the happiness property while another slightly different
>>>>>>>> molecule has this sadness property? *
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> *We're getting to the point where maintaining that AIs are not
>>>>>>>> conscious is becoming indistinguishable from maintaining that solipsism is
>>>>>>>> true. *
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>
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