The argument suggests that it is unlikely that a perfect replica of the functioning of a specific human brain can be emulated on a practical computer. The conclusion generalizes that out to no conscious emulation of a human brain, at all.
These are enormously different claims, and neither follows from the other.
Practical CF: A simulation of a human brain on a classical computer, capturing the dynamics of the brain on some coarse-grained level of abstraction, that can run on a computer small and light enough to fit on the surface of Earth, with the simulation running at the same speed as base reality, would cause the conscious experience of that brain.
i.e., the same conscious experience as that brain. I titled this “is the mind a program” rather than “can the mind be approximated by a program”.
Whether or not a simulation can have consciousness at all is a broader discussion I’m saving for later in the sequence, and is relevant to a weaker version of CF.
The conclusion does not follow from the argument.
The argument suggests that it is unlikely that a perfect replica of the functioning of a specific human brain can be emulated on a practical computer. The conclusion generalizes that out to no conscious emulation of a human brain, at all.
These are enormously different claims, and neither follows from the other.
The statement I’m arguing against is:
i.e., the same conscious experience as that brain. I titled this “is the mind a program” rather than “can the mind be approximated by a program”.
Whether or not a simulation can have consciousness at all is a broader discussion I’m saving for later in the sequence, and is relevant to a weaker version of CF.
I’ll edit to make this more clear.