Of course. If some of us are right, the consciousness is an algorithm running on a substrate able to compute it.
Then, the transplantation to another substrate is sure possible. How difficult this copping actually is, I wonder.
That all, assuming no magic is involved here. No spirituality, no soul and no other holly crap.
But when we embrace the algorithmic nature of consciousness, intelligence, memories and so on, we lose the unique identifier, so dear to most otherwise rational people. Their mantra goes “You only live once!” or “Everyone is unique and unrepeatable person!”. Yes, sure. So when I was born, a signal traveled across the Universe to change it from the place I could be born, to a place this possibility now expired for good? May I ask, is this signal faster then light? If it isn’t … well, it isn’t good enough.
I am just an algorithm, being computed here and there, before and now.
I forgot to mention this, but I also tried my hand at writing an essay about this sort of thing: finding the physical manifestation of consciousness. If I could vouch for the rigor of it, I’d have posted it to the Facebook group already, but alas, I can’t., though it may be of some use here.
Identifying the physical manifestation of consciousness.
Identifying the final place where physical cause and mental effect meet has been one of neuroscience’s top questions, and as many of us know, is known as the “Hard Problem”. I’d like to try my hand at making a set of rules for the development of a procedure that would pry out the location of that “final destination”. The process is by elimination, ruling out as many intermediaries between consciousness and cause as possible until no intermediary remains. At such a point, it must be concluded that the cause in question is consciousness itself. The principles outlined identify the characteristics of an intermediary, so that they may be cut out. A cause is only an intermediary if it violates any one of these principles:
Instantaneous Change: A change to this physical thing must create an immediate change in mental state. For example, if the heart is our soul, shooting a person in the heart shouldn’t even leave a millisecond of perception, or people with heart disease should also develop psychiatric symptoms not attributable to stress in the course of their illness.
Predictable Change: If a small change in physical state produces a small change in mental state, then a increasing the magnitude of that same change should increase the corresponding mental state without producing any surprises. If increasing that physical change begins to produce the effects of a smaller, but different physical change, then there’s still an intermediary between physical and mental. For example, SSRI’s lift certain kinds of depression, but continued usage can “burn out” serotonin receptors, which means that chemicals like SSRI’s cannot possibly be considered “units of consciousness”.
Unique Change/Repeatability: A change in the state of this physical thing must create a mental state that is unique to that physical change. In graphing terms, value x cannot map to more than one value of y. If there’s more than one possible y value or multiple’s x’s can create the same y, then there’s still an intermediary between physical and mental. For example, and continuing from above, one could start to wonder if “receptors” are the “units of consciousness” and work from there by asking if it’s possible to reproduce a mental state using something other than neurotransmitter receptors. If this possible, then the “unique change” clause is violated by having multiple x’s mapping onto the same y, which implies that there’s an intermediary between neurotransmitter receptors and mental states.
Suppose an LED and its switch are the same thing. To demonstrate this, we put it through the three ( principles to see how the system behaves. Failing any one of these tests indicates that we need to go deeper.
For the Instantaneous Change principle, we can just grab a hypothetical Planck-time high speed camera. If the state change of both the light and the switch are both perfectly in sync with each other even at Planck-time, then they are both the same object. This is not the case, as even the femto-second camera demonstrated on TED Talks could show.
The Predictable Change principle is unapplicable, because there are only two possible states, on/off for the switch, and their two directly correlated states, on/off for the light, so we move on. We can’t very well add a third state for the switch and and expect any kind of change.
Unique Change can be tested by looking at the switch. It appears to be between a power source and the LED light. The method of Alexander the Great would have us cut the switch out of the circuit and see what happens when we pull the wires together. Do the wires, which have the two states, connected/unconnected, correlate directly with the LD’s states of on/off? If so, then the switch was not the LED, for the states of the LED are not permanently changed.
Suppose you have two similar but extremely complicated systems that put compound pendulums to shame and both of which have different starting conditions. Would the state of one system ever be identical to the state of the other at any state that has occurred, or will occur, with system two?
That’s a really cool proof, but phase space can be exponentially large, especially for an “extremely complicated” system. It also requires finite bounds on system parameters.
For that to break my “extremely high probability”, there would have to be relatively few orbits in the phase space approaching a space-filling set of curves, which is itself extremely unlikely, unless you can think up some pathological example.
Their mantra goes “You only live once!” or “Everyone is unique and unrepeatable person!”.
He suggested that it was possible for a person to be repeated, mental state and all, given enough time. I thought to conceptualize the minds of people as being like extremely complicated systems with chaotic interactions to ask if his belief could be true.
Oh I see what you meant now. You don’t become somebody else, which implies there’s an existing mental state that has existed before- you become somebody new.
No, not somebody new. The same consciousness algorithm is running and I am indistinguishable from the consciousness algorithm.
It is not I am you”, it is I am equal consciousness and You are equal consciousness. Therefor *I am you.
For you can change every part of your body and every piece of your memories. Until you are self aware, it’s you. Even with a different body somewhere else.
Does it matter what consciousness is made out of for mind uploading to be possible?
Of course. If some of us are right, the consciousness is an algorithm running on a substrate able to compute it.
Then, the transplantation to another substrate is sure possible. How difficult this copping actually is, I wonder.
That all, assuming no magic is involved here. No spirituality, no soul and no other holly crap.
But when we embrace the algorithmic nature of consciousness, intelligence, memories and so on, we lose the unique identifier, so dear to most otherwise rational people. Their mantra goes “You only live once!” or “Everyone is unique and unrepeatable person!”. Yes, sure. So when I was born, a signal traveled across the Universe to change it from the place I could be born, to a place this possibility now expired for good? May I ask, is this signal faster then light? If it isn’t … well, it isn’t good enough.
I am just an algorithm, being computed here and there, before and now.
I forgot to mention this, but I also tried my hand at writing an essay about this sort of thing: finding the physical manifestation of consciousness. If I could vouch for the rigor of it, I’d have posted it to the Facebook group already, but alas, I can’t., though it may be of some use here.
Wait, so that’s where the whole ‘YOLO’ thing/meme comes from? I notice that I am confused...
How does this square with chaos theory, which models behaviour that diverges greatly due to infinitesimal changes at the start?
What has it got to do with chaos theory?
Suppose you have two similar but extremely complicated systems that put compound pendulums to shame and both of which have different starting conditions. Would the state of one system ever be identical to the state of the other at any state that has occurred, or will occur, with system two?
No, with extremely high probability.
How does that relate to whatever Thomas was saying? For that matter, what is Thomas saying?
Are you sure?
That’s a really cool proof, but phase space can be exponentially large, especially for an “extremely complicated” system. It also requires finite bounds on system parameters.
For that to break my “extremely high probability”, there would have to be relatively few orbits in the phase space approaching a space-filling set of curves, which is itself extremely unlikely, unless you can think up some pathological example.
It does weaken my statement, though.
He suggested that it was possible for a person to be repeated, mental state and all, given enough time. I thought to conceptualize the minds of people as being like extremely complicated systems with chaotic interactions to ask if his belief could be true.
How the identity of a single person squares with it? Wouldn’t a tiny change convert me into somebody else?
At no point has one cubic centimeter of air been exactly like another cubic centimeter of air.
At no point you are exactly the same, as you were seconds ago.
Oh I see what you meant now. You don’t become somebody else, which implies there’s an existing mental state that has existed before- you become somebody new.
No, not somebody new. The same consciousness algorithm is running and I am indistinguishable from the consciousness algorithm.
It is not I am you”, it is I am equal consciousness and You are equal consciousness. Therefor *I am you.
For you can change every part of your body and every piece of your memories. Until you are self aware, it’s you. Even with a different body somewhere else.
Just wondering, does Less Wrong have a procedure for understanding concepts that are incredibly distant from direct experience?