I fail to understand how the “mindless wallpaper” of the next level of simulation must be “unreal” while our simulated selves “are and we know we are conscious”. They cannot be unreal merely because they are simulations because in the thought-experiment we ourselves are simulations but, according to you, still real.
No, you completely misunderstood what I said. I did not say that the “mindless wallpaper” (scare quotes) of the next level must be unreal. I said that in order for the philosophical thought experiment to make the point it’s being used to make the mindless wallpaper (not scarequotes—this is the actual term Eliezer used) needs to be assumed mindless. In real life, I fully expect a simulated person to have an internal self, to be real in the sense of having consciousness. But what I fully expect it totally irrelevant.
We’re talking philosophical stories. Are you familiar with the story about another planet that has a substance XYZ that is just like water but has a different chemical composition from water? Well, in real life, I fully expect that there is no such substance. But in order for the thought experiment to make the philosophical point it’s being used to make we need to grant that there is such a substance. Same thing with the mindless wallpaper. We must assume mindlessness, or else the thought experiment just doesn’t work.
If you want to be totally stubborn on this point, then fine, we just need to switch to a different thought experiment to make the same point. The drug that induces the (mistaken) feeling that the drugged person has achieved a scientific discovery doesn’t suffer from that problem. Of course, if you want to be totally stubborn about the possibility of such a drug, we’ll just have to come up with another thought experiment.
I fail to understand how the “mindless wallpaper” of the next level of simulation must be “unreal” while our simulated selves “are and we know we are conscious”. They cannot be unreal merely because they are simulations because in the thought-experiment we ourselves are simulations but, according to you, still real.
No, you completely misunderstood what I said. I did not say that the “mindless wallpaper” (scare quotes) of the next level must be unreal. I said that in order for the philosophical thought experiment to make the point it’s being used to make the mindless wallpaper (not scarequotes—this is the actual term Eliezer used) needs to be assumed mindless. In real life, I fully expect a simulated person to have an internal self, to be real in the sense of having consciousness. But what I fully expect it totally irrelevant.
We’re talking philosophical stories. Are you familiar with the story about another planet that has a substance XYZ that is just like water but has a different chemical composition from water? Well, in real life, I fully expect that there is no such substance. But in order for the thought experiment to make the philosophical point it’s being used to make we need to grant that there is such a substance. Same thing with the mindless wallpaper. We must assume mindlessness, or else the thought experiment just doesn’t work.
If you want to be totally stubborn on this point, then fine, we just need to switch to a different thought experiment to make the same point. The drug that induces the (mistaken) feeling that the drugged person has achieved a scientific discovery doesn’t suffer from that problem. Of course, if you want to be totally stubborn about the possibility of such a drug, we’ll just have to come up with another thought experiment.