Spirits (was RE: [extropy-chat] Qualia Bet.)

David McFadzean davidmc at gmail.com
Fri Dec 2 23:51:48 UTC 2005


On 11/28/05, Brent Allsop <allsop at extropy.org> wrote:

> When, in your field of vision you see a patch of red, next to a patch of
> green, next to a patch of a new phenomenal property that you have never
> experienced before (say a tetrachromat is effing to you who is a normal
> trichromat) you will know you are effing.  Even if it is turtles all the way
> down (yea right!) who will care?  Right?

I don't think so. Let's assume that we experiment with a real effing machine.
We find a group of stones that all look like the same colour (blue) to us
normal trichromats but a tetrachromat is able to separate the stones into
two groups. We can tell the tetrachromat perceives them differently because
they can repeatedly separate them into the same groups even if they are
first randomized outside the tetrachromat's sight. Let's assume that the
distinction becomes obvious to normal trichromats if an ultraviolet
light is used to illuminate the stones.

Now we hook you up the tetrachromat with the effing machine and find that
you too can repeatedly separate the stones into two groups in normal light.
Before they all looked blue, but when hooked up to the effing machine they
appear to you as dark blue and light blue. So you separate the stones and your
choices are validated after with the ultraviolet light.

So does that mean you experienced the same qualia as the tetrachromat?
There is no way to tell. It is possible, but it is also possible the
tetrachromat
sees the stones as dark green and light green, or as yellow and orange, or
as rough and smooth, or as warm and cold, or something else we have no
words for.

So even if the effing machine works it still doesn't tell us what it
like to be a tetrachromat.

:D



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