<html><head></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div><div>On Dec 31, 2009, Gordon Swobe wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><blockquote type="cite"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; font-family: Verdana; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; ">Simulated objects affect each other in the sense that mathematical abstractions affect each other</span></blockquote><div><br></div>OK, that's all I need! And mind is an abstraction, that's why computers will be able to produce it exactly, not simulate it, produce it.<br><div><br></div><blockquote type="cite"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; font-family: Verdana; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; ">and we can make pragmatic use of those abstractions in computer modeling.</span></blockquote><div><br></div>We can indeed. Pragmatic means something works, but you seem to think that the fact that something works is no reason to think it might be true; you have already demonstrated that you think ideas that don't work, such as your ideas that conflict with evolution, is no reason to think they are untrue. I disagree, I do not think that strategy leads to enlightenment. <br><div><br></div><blockquote type="cite"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; font-family: Verdana; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; ">But those objects cannot as you claimed in a previous message "burn" each other, nor can they as Stathis claimed have the property of "wetness". Simulated fire doesn't burn things and simulated waterfalls are not "wet".<br></span></blockquote><div><br></div><div>As you have done many many times before you make declarations but don't say why we should believe such statements and you don't even try to refute the arguments against them, you just ignore them. Well I admit that is easier. </div><div><br></div><blockquote type="cite"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; font-family: Verdana; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; ">It looks like religion to me when people here confuse computer simulations of things with real things</span></blockquote><div><br></div>I maintain that 3 facts are undeniable: <br><div><br></div>1) It is virtually certain that random mutation and natural selection produced life on Earth.</div><div>2) It is virtually certain that evolution can see intelligent behavior but is blind to consciousness.</div><div>3) It is absolutely certain that there is at least one conscious being on this planet.</div><div><br></div><div>From that I conclude that intelligent behavior must produce consciousness. You say you don't understand how that could be and I don't exactly understand it either but reality is not required to be a slave to our understanding. The way science advances is that evidence amounts that something is puzzling and people start to think of ways of solving the puzzle. Your way is simply to pretend that the evidence doesn't exist, and I don't think objecting to such a philosophy is religious.</div><div><br></div><div> John K Clark<br><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><br><blockquote type="cite"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; font-family: Verdana; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; ">,especially when those simulations happen to represent intentional entities, e.g., real people.<br></span></blockquote></div><br></body></html>