What do you think of Roger Penrose’s idea that these algorithms will never really understand anything. Consciousness and true understanding in the way a human understands, require new physics that can explain consciousness.
When you say ‘require new physics that can explain consciousness’, are you imagining:
“New insight shows human brain neuron connections have hundreds of tiny side channels that run much faster than the main connections, leading scientists to conclude that the human brain’s processing apacity is much greater than previously thought”
or
“New insight reveals thin threads that run through all connections and allow neurons to undergo quantum superposition, allowing much faster and more complex pattern-matching and conscious thought than previously thougt possible, while still remaining overall deterministic”
or
“New insight shows that the human mind is fundamentally nondeterministic and this somehow involves quantum mechanics”
or
“New insight shows souls are fundamental”
What do you (or your interpretation of Robert Roger Penrose) think a new physics insight that would make consciousness go from mysterious to non-mysterious look like?
“New insight shows that the human mind is fundamentally nondeterministic and this somehow involves quantum mechanics”
When you say “nondeterministic” do you mean the human brain works akin to a Nondeterministic Turing Machine (and thereby can solve NP-complete problems in polynomial time), or simply that there is some randomness in the brain, or something else?
I don’t have a specific mental image for what I mean when I say ‘non-deterministic’, I was placing a bet on the assumption that YimbyGeorge was hypothesizing that conscious was somehow fundamentally mysterious and therefore couldn’t be ‘merely’ deterministic, based on pattern-matching this view rather than any specific mental image of what it would mean for consciousness to only be possible in non-deterministic systems.
Do you think it will ever be possible to simulate a human mind (or analagous conscious mind) on a deterministic computer?
Do you think it possible in principle that a ‘non-deterministic’ human mind can be simulated on a non-deterministic substrate analagous to our current flesh substrate, such as a quantum computer?
If yes to either, do you think that it is necessary to simulate the mind on the lowest level of physics (e.g. on a true simulated spacetime indistinguishable from the original) or are higer-level abstractions (like building a mathematical model of one neuron and then using this simple equation as a building block) permissible?
(Also, are you just asking about Robert Roger Penrose’s view or is this also your view?)
My intuitive view is that human minds cannot be simulated by turing machines because Qualia are not explained by computation. I beleive Roger Penrose’s views are similar.
However useful Philosophical Zombie like AI can be created by turing computation. I Think the Blindsight novel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blindsight_(Watts_novel) describes a world where conscious and non consious intelligences both exist.
Brains cause consciousness. Brains are made out of protons, neutrons, electrons and photons. Our knowledge of physics is more than adequate to model protons, neutrons, electrons and photons under Earthlike conditions for all purposes relevant to biology. If you believe, as I do, that duplicating a physical brain would duplicate a consciousness then our knowledge of fundamental physics is adequate to explain consciousness.
I do agree that we don’t know how consciousness works but I don’t think advancements in fundamental physics are necessary to solve the puzzle. (Advancements in fundamental physics are necessary to solve things like “why is there a universe”and “why is time” but I expect it’s possible to figure out what consciousness is without solving these bits of physics.)
What do you think of Roger Penrose’s idea that these algorithms will never really understand anything. Consciousness and true understanding in the way a human understands, require new physics that can explain consciousness.
When you say ‘require new physics that can explain consciousness’, are you imagining:
“New insight shows human brain neuron connections have hundreds of tiny side channels that run much faster than the main connections, leading scientists to conclude that the human brain’s processing apacity is much greater than previously thought”
or
“New insight reveals thin threads that run through all connections and allow neurons to undergo quantum superposition, allowing much faster and more complex pattern-matching and conscious thought than previously thougt possible, while still remaining overall deterministic”
or
“New insight shows that the human mind is fundamentally nondeterministic and this somehow involves quantum mechanics”
or
“New insight shows souls are fundamental”
What do you (or your interpretation of
RobertRoger Penrose) think a new physics insight that would make consciousness go from mysterious to non-mysterious look like?When you say “nondeterministic” do you mean the human brain works akin to a Nondeterministic Turing Machine (and thereby can solve NP-complete problems in polynomial time), or simply that there is some randomness in the brain, or something else?
I don’t have a specific mental image for what I mean when I say ‘non-deterministic’, I was placing a bet on the assumption that YimbyGeorge was hypothesizing that conscious was somehow fundamentally mysterious and therefore couldn’t be ‘merely’ deterministic, based on pattern-matching this view rather than any specific mental image of what it would mean for consciousness to only be possible in non-deterministic systems.
3rd or 4th options
Do you think it will ever be possible to simulate a human mind (or analagous conscious mind) on a deterministic computer?
Do you think it possible in principle that a ‘non-deterministic’ human mind can be simulated on a non-deterministic substrate analagous to our current flesh substrate, such as a quantum computer?
If yes to either, do you think that it is necessary to simulate the mind on the lowest level of physics (e.g. on a true simulated spacetime indistinguishable from the original) or are higer-level abstractions (like building a mathematical model of one neuron and then using this simple equation as a building block) permissible?
(Also, are you just asking about
RobertRoger Penrose’s view or is this also your view?)My intuitive view is that human minds cannot be simulated by turing machines because Qualia are not explained by computation. I beleive Roger Penrose’s views are similar.
However useful Philosophical Zombie like AI can be created by turing computation. I Think the Blindsight novel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blindsight_(Watts_novel) describes a world where conscious and non consious intelligences both exist.
Brains cause consciousness. Brains are made out of protons, neutrons, electrons and photons. Our knowledge of physics is more than adequate to model protons, neutrons, electrons and photons under Earthlike conditions for all purposes relevant to biology. If you believe, as I do, that duplicating a physical brain would duplicate a consciousness then our knowledge of fundamental physics is adequate to explain consciousness.
I do agree that we don’t know how consciousness works but I don’t think advancements in fundamental physics are necessary to solve the puzzle. (Advancements in fundamental physics are necessary to solve things like “why is there a universe”and “why is time” but I expect it’s possible to figure out what consciousness is without solving these bits of physics.)