Zombie Dennett: which is more likely? That philosophers could interpret the same type of experience in fundamentally different ways, or that Dennett has some neurological defect which has removed his qualia but not his ability to sense and process sensory information?
Consciousness continuity: I know I’m a computationalist and [causalist?], and I am weakly confident that most LWers share at least one of these beliefs. (Speaking for others is discouraged here, so I doubt you’ll be able to get more than a poll of beliefs, or possibly a link to a previous poll.)
Definitions of terms: computationalism is the view that cognition, identity, etc. are all computations or properties of computations. Causalist is a word I made up to describe the view that continuity is just a special form of causation, and that all computation-preserving forms of causation preserve identity as well. (That is, I don’t see it as fundamentally different if the causation from one subjective moment to the next is due to the usual evolution of brains over time or due to somebody scanning me and sending the information to a nanofactory, so long as the information that makes me up isn’t lost in this process.)
Zombie Dennett: which is more likely? That philosophers could interpret the same type of experience in fundamentally different ways, or that Dennett has some neurological defect which has removed his qualia but not his ability to sense and process sensory information?
Consciousness continuity: I know I’m a computationalist and [causalist?], and I am weakly confident that most LWers share at least one of these beliefs. (Speaking for others is discouraged here, so I doubt you’ll be able to get more than a poll of beliefs, or possibly a link to a previous poll.)
Definitions of terms: computationalism is the view that cognition, identity, etc. are all computations or properties of computations. Causalist is a word I made up to describe the view that continuity is just a special form of causation, and that all computation-preserving forms of causation preserve identity as well. (That is, I don’t see it as fundamentally different if the causation from one subjective moment to the next is due to the usual evolution of brains over time or due to somebody scanning me and sending the information to a nanofactory, so long as the information that makes me up isn’t lost in this process.)