[ExI] ai emotions

Thu Jun 27 22:39:58 UTC 2019

Hi Stuart,

“Consciousness is not magic, it is math.”

How do you get a specific, qualitative definition of the word “red” from
any math?

“I don't think that substrate-specific details matter that much.”

Then you are not talking about consciousness, at all.  You are just talking
about intelligence.  Consciousness is computationally bound elemental
qualities, for which there is something, qualitative, for which it is like.

“It is irrelevant that I perceive red as green.”

Can you not see how sloppy language like this is?  I’m going to describe at
least two very different possible interpretations of this statement.  If
you can’t distinguish between them, with your language, then again, you are
not talking about consciousness:

1.       One person is color blind, and represents both red things and
green things with knowledge that has the same physical redness quality.  In
other words, he is red green color blind.

2.       One person is qualitatively inverted from the other.  He uses the
other’s greenness to represent red with and visa versa for green things.

You can’t tell which one you’re statement is talking about.  Again, you’re
not talking about consciousness, if you can’t distinguish between these
types of things with your models and language.

Sure, before Galileo, it didn’t matter if you used a geocentric model of
the solar system or a heliocentric.  But now that we’re flying up in the
heavens, one works, and one does not.  Similarly, now, you can claim that
the qualitative nature doesn’t matter, but as soon as you start hacking the
brain, amplifying intelligence, connecting multiple brains (like two brain
hemispheres can be connect) or even religiously predicting what “spirits”
and future consciousness will be possible.  One model works, the other does
not.  In fact, my prediction is the reason we can’t better understand how
we subjectively represent visual knowledge, is precisely because everyone
is like you, qualia blind, and doesn’t care that some people may have
qualitatively very different physical representations of red and green.

If you only care about if a brain can pick strawberries, and don’t care
what it is qualitatively like, then you can’t make the critically important
distinctions between these 3 robots
<https://docs.google.com/document/d/1YnTMoU2LKER78bjVJsGkxMsSwvhpPBJZvp9e2oJX9GA/edit?usp=sharing>
that are functionally the same but qualitatively very different, one being
not conscious at all.

“Nothing in the universe can objectively observe anything else.”

All information that comes to our senses is “objectively” observed and
devoid of any physical qualitative information, it is all only abstract
mathematical information.  Descartes, the ultimate septic, realized that he
must doubt all objectively observed information.  But he also realized: “I
think therefore I am”.  This includes the knowledge of the qualities of our
consciousness.  We know, absolutely, in a way that cannot be doubted, what
physical redness is like, and how it is different than greenness.  While it
is true that we may be a brain, in a vat.  We know, absolutely, that the
physics, in the brain, in that vat exist, and we know, absolutely and
qualitatively, what that physics (in both hemispheres) is like.

Let’s say you did objectively detect some new “perceptronium”.  All you
would have, describing that perceptronium, is mathematical models and
descriptions of such.  These mathematical descriptions of perceptronium
would all be completely devoid of any qualitative meaning.  Until you
experienced a particular type of perceptronium, directly, you would not
know, qualitatively, how to interpret any of your mathematical objective
descriptions of such.

Again, everything you are talking about is what Chalmers, and everyone
would call “easy” problems.  Discovering and objectively observing any kind
of “perceptronium” is an easy problem.  We already know how to do this.
Knowing, qualitatively, what that perceptronium is qualitatively like, if
you experienced it, directly, is what makes it hard.

The only “hard” part of consciousness is the “Explanatory Ga
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Explanatory_gap>p”, or how do you eff the
ineffable nature of qualia.  Everything else is just easy problems.  We
already know, mathematically what it is like to be a bat.  But that tells
you nothing, qualitatively about what being a bat is like.

On Thu, Jun 27, 2019 at 1:10 PM Stuart LaForge <avant at sollegro.com> wrote:

>
> Quoting Brent Allsop::
>
>
> > Max Tegmark’s paper, like everythingelse in all of the peer reviewed
> > literature on physics, and consciousness, and particularlystudies on
> > perception of color are all completely qualia blind.
>
> Perhaps because qualia are arbitrary encodings by consciousnesses for
> perceived physical phenomena. With emphasis on the word arbitrary.
>
> > 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.
>
> How red looks to us on the inside (subjectively) doesn't matter as
> long as it is consistent. It is irrelevant that I perceive red as
> green so long as we both agree to call it red, and I remember what it
> looks like, then we will always be in agreement as to what things are
> red.
>
> Relativity disclaimer: this assumes we are not moving at any
> appreciable fraction of the speed of light with respect to another.
> Otherwise Doppler shifts make it so we no longer agree on an objects
> color.
>
> > 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.
>
> If consciousness didn't serve a function, it would be too costly to
> maintain. I am therefore fine with a functionalist definition of
> consciousness. The qualitative meaning is that meaning itself is
> qualitative. Without consciousness there is no meaning. Consciousness
> gives meaning to shit that happens in the physical universe. That is
> what I mean by redness
>
> > 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.
>
> That's a sensible definition of the word red.
>
> > 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 forth
>
> Right. Red is a wavelength of light and redness is your own subjective
> experience of it. My redness might not be your redness but we would
> agree on what was red.
>
> > 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.
>
> No it is a very precise way of describing what qualia are. They are
> your brain's "token" for a physical property that you can perceive.
> Functions just map the members of one set to another set. So functions
> can be qualitative if you define at least one of the sets to be so.
>
> > Are you talking about your redness, or my redness which is like your
> > grenness?
>
> Again how red "looks" to me versus the way it "looks" to you doesn't
> matter so long as we can consistently agree on what is red and what is
> green. And if we can't consistently agree, then your driver's license
> needs to be revoked. :-P
>
> > Tononi’s idea of “redness = PHI(red)” is also completely sloppy,
> > definition wise.
>
> That's not actually Tononi's idea, it is mine. Tononi equates
> consciousness with PHI but he defines it differently based on
> partitioning sets of information. Overall, I think his definition is
> unnecessarily complicated leading to making it too hard to calculate
> (NP-hard even) to be a useful definition.
>
> > 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.
>
> Qualia don't explain anything. Instead they need to be explained. My
> definition does that. Don't ascribe qualia more importance than they
> merit. I really do think our souls are made out of math not qualia.
>
> >
> > 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.
>
> Again, it doesn't matter how one brain encodes redness vs another so
> long as they agree.
>
> > The ONLY thing that provides qualitativ emeaning 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.
>
> Nothing in the universe can objectively observe anything else. Any
> observation is necessarily subjective even for the most simplest of
> measuring devices let alone full-blown brains. There is no absolute or
> privileged reference frame from which to be objective, not for an
> observer. If particles could not collapse one another's wave
> functions, they would never collide.
>
> > 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.
>
> I disagree. Consciousness is but one of a whole category of physical
> phenomena that would fall under the label emergence and emergent
> properties that current physics explains very poorly. New physics is
> precisely what we need.
>
> > 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.
>
> I don't think that substrate-specific details matter that much. I
> think consciousness is a mathematical property analogous to the wave
> equation which is valid regardless of whether you are talking about
> water waves, sound waves, or electromagnetic waves. Let go of
> glutamate, it is substrate-specific detail that won't help you with
> understanding consciousness.
>
> Consciousness is not magic, it is math.
>
> Stuart LaForge
>
>
>
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