Because “I am my brain” is actually an extremely complex hypothesis; you need to relate all of your inner subjective experience to brain states, action potentials, firing patterns and what not. Since all brains are actually slightly different from one another (at least from a purely physical point of view), the hypothesis that other brains also have subjective experience is untenable due to its sheer complexity.
That’s like saying that “there is a prime number greater than 3^^^3” is an extremely complex and therefore untenable hypothesis, because such a number needs to be coprime to all of the natural numbers below it.
Every possible way to realize the hypothesis “I am my brain” is extremely unlikely, but there are extremely many ways to realize it. A disjunction of lots of unlikely things need not be unlikely.
Every possible way to realize the hypothesis “I am my brain” is extremely unlikely, but there are extremely many ways to realize it.
No, there aren’t. The physical state of your brain is known, and (assuming physicalism/epiphenomenalism/property dualism is true) the physical state must explain everything you might claim about your subjective experience. Either you’re a p-zombie and do not actually have subjective experience, or this explanation must be evaluated for simplicity on Occam’s razor/Solomonoff induction grounds.
You’ve managed to confuse me. I suspect, though, that this analogy is relevant:
What is the probability that the text between the quotation marks in this paragraph is “Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Fusce id velit urna, ac sollicitudin libero. Phasellus ac rutrum nisl. In volutpat scelerisque justo, non congue diam vestibulum sit amet. Donec.”? The prior probability of this being true is minuscule, looking something like 10^-60; therefore, you might as well rule it out now.
On the other hand, I suspect that we don’t actually disagree at all. After all, you seem to be arguing for a position I agree with; I’m simply not sure whether you’re arguing correctly or not.
What is the probability that the text between the quotation marks in this paragraph is “Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Fusce id velit urna, ac sollicitudin libero. Phasellus ac rutrum nisl. In volutpat scelerisque justo, non congue diam vestibulum sit amet. Donec.”? The prior probability of this being true is minuscule, looking something like 10^-60; therefore, you might as well rule it out now.
Prior to what exactly? I do have a prior for “a randomly generated ascii string of that particular length being the same as the string given”. I wouldn’t be able to know to use that as the prior unless I have already been given some information. Then there is all the knowledge of human languages and cultural idiosyncracies I happen to have. Which of those am I allowed to consider? It’s hard to tell since, well, you’ve alreay given me the answer. It’s a bit post for any ‘prior’ except meta-uncertainty. I would need a specific counter-factual state of knowledge to be able to give a reasonable prior.
This seems to be a case of extraordinary claims are extraordinary evidence. It’s like saying, “well yes, the fact that I have a brain is pretty extraordinary, but so what? I clearly have one”. It doesn’t distinguish between a Boltzmann brain and a brain arising normally via natural selection. So is your consciousness a Boltzmann consciousness?
Since all brains are actually slightly different from one another (at least from a purely physical point of view), the hypothesis that other brains also have subjective experience is untenable due to its sheer complexity.
I don’t see any justification for the connecting “since”.
You believe that a single mapping between physical brains and subjective experiences can apply to all humans? What does this mapping look like? How many bits are needed to fully specify it?
Is it reasonable to expect me to necessarily be able to answer that question if materialism is true?
It’s about as reasonable as demanding an account of how the brain can mantain mesoscopic quantum superpositions long enough to influence neural processes.
(What does the mapping from entangled quantum states to experiences look like?)
We don’t know, but it’s going to be far simpler than a mapping from classical brains.
(For all we know, it could be trivial; perhaps each quale is a GENSYM which maps directly to a basis of the quantum system.)
That allows you to replace “I am my brain” with “I am a complex quantum state which is instantiated by my brain; and my inner experience maps directly to this quantum state.” Other brains have evolved to maintain quantum states in the same way, hence they also have subjective experience.
Because “I am my brain” is actually an extremely complex hypothesis; you need to relate all of your inner subjective experience to brain states, action potentials, firing patterns and what not. Since all brains are actually slightly different from one another (at least from a purely physical point of view), the hypothesis that other brains also have subjective experience is untenable due to its sheer complexity.
That’s like saying that “there is a prime number greater than 3^^^3” is an extremely complex and therefore untenable hypothesis, because such a number needs to be coprime to all of the natural numbers below it.
Every possible way to realize the hypothesis “I am my brain” is extremely unlikely, but there are extremely many ways to realize it. A disjunction of lots of unlikely things need not be unlikely.
No, there aren’t. The physical state of your brain is known, and (assuming physicalism/epiphenomenalism/property dualism is true) the physical state must explain everything you might claim about your subjective experience. Either you’re a p-zombie and do not actually have subjective experience, or this explanation must be evaluated for simplicity on Occam’s razor/Solomonoff induction grounds.
You’ve managed to confuse me. I suspect, though, that this analogy is relevant:
What is the probability that the text between the quotation marks in this paragraph is “Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Fusce id velit urna, ac sollicitudin libero. Phasellus ac rutrum nisl. In volutpat scelerisque justo, non congue diam vestibulum sit amet. Donec.”? The prior probability of this being true is minuscule, looking something like 10^-60; therefore, you might as well rule it out now.
On the other hand, I suspect that we don’t actually disagree at all. After all, you seem to be arguing for a position I agree with; I’m simply not sure whether you’re arguing correctly or not.
Prior to what exactly? I do have a prior for “a randomly generated ascii string of that particular length being the same as the string given”. I wouldn’t be able to know to use that as the prior unless I have already been given some information. Then there is all the knowledge of human languages and cultural idiosyncracies I happen to have. Which of those am I allowed to consider? It’s hard to tell since, well, you’ve alreay given me the answer. It’s a bit post for any ‘prior’ except meta-uncertainty. I would need a specific counter-factual state of knowledge to be able to give a reasonable prior.
(All of which I believe supports your point.)
This seems to be a case of extraordinary claims are extraordinary evidence. It’s like saying, “well yes, the fact that I have a brain is pretty extraordinary, but so what? I clearly have one”. It doesn’t distinguish between a Boltzmann brain and a brain arising normally via natural selection. So is your consciousness a Boltzmann consciousness?
I don’t see any justification for the connecting “since”.
You believe that a single mapping between physical brains and subjective experiences can apply to all humans? What does this mapping look like? How many bits are needed to fully specify it?
Is it reasonable to expect me to necessarily be able to answer that question if materialism is true?
(What does the mapping from entangled quantum states to experiences look like?)
It’s about as reasonable as demanding an account of how the brain can mantain mesoscopic quantum superpositions long enough to influence neural processes.
We don’t know, but it’s going to be far simpler than a mapping from classical brains.
(For all we know, it could be trivial; perhaps each quale is a GENSYM which maps directly to a basis of the quantum system.)
What does that have to do with the quantum mind hypothesis?
That allows you to replace “I am my brain” with “I am a complex quantum state which is instantiated by my brain; and my inner experience maps directly to this quantum state.” Other brains have evolved to maintain quantum states in the same way, hence they also have subjective experience.
That doesn’t make a difference wrt your argument.