In these discussions I’ve concerned myself only with improper use of the word
“qualia” to support mystical arguments that attempt to place human consciousness > into a special category exempt from simulation or duplication.
The category of things whose simulations are not duplications isn’t special or exceptional.It includes most things. Simulated planes don’t fly, simulated gravity
doesn’t attract, etc, etc. There is a smaller category of things whose simulations are
duplications. It is not an extraordinary claim to say consc. belongs in the first category.
You need to examine the intutions that make you think it belongs in the second.
In order to claim that qualia can’t be duplicated in a qualia simulator, you are claiming that a purely mental property exists, outside physical reality.
That doesn’t follow, as explained above. That simulated gravity does not atrract,
does not imply gravity is non-physical.
The untrained mind takes this to mean that there must be no qualia in the
machine… and only the machine, instead of realizing that this just means there’s no > such thing in the first place.
There clearly is such a things since I experience qualia every time I suck a lemon
or sit on a brass tack. The “untrained mind” should have stuck with “we don’t know
one way or the other”.
That we only think they exist because that’s how the algorithm feels from the inside >-- that is, the algorithm that our brain has for labeling things in the world as minds.
If the algorithm feels like anything from the inside, there are qualia, because qualia
are what something feels like. This is the error Searle is always pointing out:: you can’t say conscious experience is just an illusion, because to be able to have illusions, you must be able to have experiences in the first place...
Our brains are built to suppose that things which move by themselves have minds > and intentions.
That has almost nothing to do with qualia.
And when you point this assembly of biases at something that is otherwise very
simple, it’s trivial to see that the question isn’t, “can machines duplicate qualia?”,
because clearly, we are machines, so the question is silly.
In some senses of “machine” (eg artificial construct), we are clearly not machines.
Absent a definition of “machine”, that comment is almost meaningless.
So, the whole concept of qualia (as applied to this topic) is basically the human
brain grasping at straws to preserve its inbuilt intuition that these are separate
categories, instead of simply dropping them to realize that we are all made of the
same stuff as machines are,
You mean quarks and electrons? Good luck building an electromagnet out of soap,
then. We do have qualia,and they could depend on some vary specific physical and chemical properties, as does being a ferromagnet or a liquid crystal. That being the case, qualiaphilic arguments should not be lumped in with the supernatural,
at least not without consideration of the specific argument.
The category of things whose simulations are not duplications isn’t special or exceptional.It includes most things. Simulated planes don’t fly, simulated gravity doesn’t attract, etc, etc. There is a smaller category of things whose simulations are duplications. It is not an extraordinary claim to say consc. belongs in the first category. You need to examine the intutions that make you think it belongs in the second.
That doesn’t follow, as explained above. That simulated gravity does not atrract, does not imply gravity is non-physical.
There clearly is such a things since I experience qualia every time I suck a lemon or sit on a brass tack. The “untrained mind” should have stuck with “we don’t know one way or the other”.
If the algorithm feels like anything from the inside, there are qualia, because qualia are what something feels like. This is the error Searle is always pointing out:: you can’t say conscious experience is just an illusion, because to be able to have illusions, you must be able to have experiences in the first place...
That has almost nothing to do with qualia.
In some senses of “machine” (eg artificial construct), we are clearly not machines. Absent a definition of “machine”, that comment is almost meaningless.
You mean quarks and electrons? Good luck building an electromagnet out of soap, then. We do have qualia,and they could depend on some vary specific physical and chemical properties, as does being a ferromagnet or a liquid crystal. That being the case, qualiaphilic arguments should not be lumped in with the supernatural, at least not without consideration of the specific argument.
You responded to my post, when I think you meant to respond to pjeby’s.