<html><body><div style="color:#000; background-color:#fff; font-family:times new roman, new york, times, serif;font-size:12pt"><div style="font-family: 'times new roman', 'new york', times, serif; font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 13px;">Stathis Papaioannou <stathisp@gmail.com> wrote:</span><br></div><div style="font-family: 'times new roman', 'new york', times, serif; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br></span></div><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">>The inputs and outputs I'm talking about are action potentials which</span><br></div><div style="font-family: 'times new roman', 'new york', times, serif; font-size: 12pt;"><div style="font-family: 'times new roman', 'new york', times, serif; font-size: 12pt;"><div class="y_msg_container">>trigger
neurotransmitter release at synapses. The neurons in the NCC<br>>receive inputs from other neurons that connect with them and send<br>>output to other neurons via their axon. </div><div class="y_msg_container"><br></div><div class="y_msg_container">Just third-person descriptions in the language of physics.</div><div class="y_msg_container"><br></div><div class="y_msg_container">> In the process, qualia may somehow be produced, but qualia are neither inputs nor outputs so are<br>> excluded from this part of the analysis. </div><div class="y_msg_container"><br></div><div class="y_msg_container">Yes, qualia "may somehow be produced." Actually, I think are produced. lol. How does that happen?</div><div class="y_msg_container"><br></div><div class="y_msg_container">Consider for a moment that the world might not be fully understandable in the third-person language of physics. Perhaps there is something that we might call
first-person ontology. As science-minded people, we want to describe everything in the world in the objective language of physics. But perhaps the world is both subjective and objective.</div><div class="y_msg_container"><br></div><div class="y_msg_container">Toothaches are not the same thing as the physics that describe them. They really hurt! </div><div class="y_msg_container"><br></div><div class="y_msg_container"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">> If the artificial NCC neuron </span><span style="font-size: 12pt;">reproduces the outputs given certain inputs, then all </span><br></div><div class="y_msg_container">> the downstream neurons to which it connects behave normally. This is irrespective of<br>> any qualia it may or may not have, since as you admitted qualia are<br>> not outputs. </div><div class="y_msg_container"><br></div><div class="y_msg_container">No, I wrote that qualia might be inputs or outputs, or
something else entirely.</div><div class="y_msg_container"><br></div><div class="y_msg_container">I notice that you did not respond to my criticism of <span style="font-size: 12pt;">functionalism and multiple realizability, which I consider very important. You quoted it below but did not answer.</span></div><div class="y_msg_container"><br>>> Here is my more general issue with functionalism and multiple realizability<br>>>.as they relate to strong AI on digital computers:<br>>><br>>> I have a ceiling fan in my home. The blades are made of wood. I've seen<br>>> other ceiling fans with metal blades, and still others with stained-glass<br>>> blades. They all function as fans, and so along with functionalists I'm<br>>> happy to call them all fans. I've also seen hammers made of iron and others<br>>> made of steel. Again, both hammers. Fans are realizable in wood, metal and<br>>> glass; hammers are
realizable in iron and steel. Only the functions are<br>>> important. The substrates make no difference. All well and good.<br>></div><div class="y_msg_container">>> But things get muddled when we begin to talk about the supposed multiple<br>>> realizability of brains in both organic materials and software/hardware<br>>> platforms. A digital computer is not in the same class of things as fans and<br>>> hammers. With fans and hammers, we are looking purely at the direct physical<br>>> effects of one substrate on another. Fans are defined as those physical<br>>> things that directly circulate physical air, hammers are defined as those<br>>> physical things that directly drive physical nails. A computer program, by<br>>> contrast, is defined by functionalists as anything that admits of abstract<br>>> 1's and 0's (or ons and offs, however you want to think of it) and the brain<br>>> (like
everything else in the world) does admit to such an interpretation.<br>>> This is why they say brains are multiply realized on computers. But those<br>>> syntactical abstractions are not actually *intrinsic* to the physics of the<br>>> organic brain. Functionalists and computationalists merely assign them to<br>>> the physics.<br>>><br>>> Gordon<br><br></div><div class="y_msg_container">Gordon</div> </div> </div> </div></body></html>