This is a great comment and I hope I can do it justice (took an overnight bus and am somewhat sleep-deprived).
First I’d say that neither we nor anyone has a full theory of consciousness. I.e. we’re not at the point where we can look at a brain, and derive an exact mathematical representation of what it’s feeling. I would suggest thinking of STV as a piece of this future full theory of consciousness, which I’ve tried to optimize for compatibility by remaining agnostic about certain details.
One such detail is the state space: if we knew the mathematical space consciousness ‘live in’, we could zero in on symmetry metrics optimized for this space. Tononi’s IIT for instance suggests it‘s a vector space — but I think it would be a mistake to assume IIT is right about this. Graphs assume less structure than vector spaces, so it’s a little safer to speak about symmetry metrics in graphs.
Another ’move’ motivated by compatibility is STV’s focus on the mathematical representation of phenomenology, rather than on patterns in the brain. STV is not a neuro theory, but a metaphysical one. I.e. assuming that in the future we can construct a full formalism for consciousness, and thus represent a given experience mathematically, the symmetry in this representation will hold an identity relationship with pleasure.
Appreciate the remarks about Smolensky! I think what you said is reasonable and I’ll have to think about how that fits with e.g. CSHW. His emphasis is of course language and neural representation, very different domains.
>(Also, not to gripe, but if you don’t yet have a precise definition of “symmetry”, then I might suggest that you not describe STV as a “crisp formalism”. I normally think “formalism” ≈ “formal” ≈ “the things you’re talking about have precise unambiguous definitions”. Just my opinion.)
I definitely understand this. On the other hand, STV should basically have zero degrees of freedom once we do have a full formal theory of consciousness. I.e., once we know the state space, have example mathematical representations of phenomenology, have defined the parallels between qualia space and physics, etc, it should be obvious what symmetry metric to use. (My intuition is, we’ll import it directly from physics.) In this sense it is a crisp formalism. However, I get your objection and more precisely it’s a dependent formalism, and dependent upon something that doesn’t yet exist.
>(FWIW, I think that “pleasure”, like “suffering” etc., is a learned concept with contextual and social associations, and therefore won’t necessarily exactly correspond to a natural category of processes in the brain.)
I think one of the most interesting questions in the universe is whether you’re right, or whether I’m right! :) Definitely hope to figure out good ways of ‘making beliefs pay rent’ here. In general I find the question of “what are the universe’s natural kinds?” to be fascinating.
Hi Steven,
This is a great comment and I hope I can do it justice (took an overnight bus and am somewhat sleep-deprived).
First I’d say that neither we nor anyone has a full theory of consciousness. I.e. we’re not at the point where we can look at a brain, and derive an exact mathematical representation of what it’s feeling. I would suggest thinking of STV as a piece of this future full theory of consciousness, which I’ve tried to optimize for compatibility by remaining agnostic about certain details.
One such detail is the state space: if we knew the mathematical space consciousness ‘live in’, we could zero in on symmetry metrics optimized for this space. Tononi’s IIT for instance suggests it‘s a vector space — but I think it would be a mistake to assume IIT is right about this. Graphs assume less structure than vector spaces, so it’s a little safer to speak about symmetry metrics in graphs.
Another ’move’ motivated by compatibility is STV’s focus on the mathematical representation of phenomenology, rather than on patterns in the brain. STV is not a neuro theory, but a metaphysical one. I.e. assuming that in the future we can construct a full formalism for consciousness, and thus represent a given experience mathematically, the symmetry in this representation will hold an identity relationship with pleasure.
Appreciate the remarks about Smolensky! I think what you said is reasonable and I’ll have to think about how that fits with e.g. CSHW. His emphasis is of course language and neural representation, very different domains.
>(Also, not to gripe, but if you don’t yet have a precise definition of “symmetry”, then I might suggest that you not describe STV as a “crisp formalism”. I normally think “formalism” ≈ “formal” ≈ “the things you’re talking about have precise unambiguous definitions”. Just my opinion.)
I definitely understand this. On the other hand, STV should basically have zero degrees of freedom once we do have a full formal theory of consciousness. I.e., once we know the state space, have example mathematical representations of phenomenology, have defined the parallels between qualia space and physics, etc, it should be obvious what symmetry metric to use. (My intuition is, we’ll import it directly from physics.) In this sense it is a crisp formalism. However, I get your objection and more precisely it’s a dependent formalism, and dependent upon something that doesn’t yet exist.
>(FWIW, I think that “pleasure”, like “suffering” etc., is a learned concept with contextual and social associations, and therefore won’t necessarily exactly correspond to a natural category of processes in the brain.)
I think one of the most interesting questions in the universe is whether you’re right, or whether I’m right! :) Definitely hope to figure out good ways of ‘making beliefs pay rent’ here. In general I find the question of “what are the universe’s natural kinds?” to be fascinating.