You seem to have done a 180 shift from insiting that there are only zombies to saying there are no zombies.
3 There is no magic / something else.
[..]
I am apparently incapable of working with thought experiments that defy the laws of logic by their premises.
I don’t know of any examples. Typically zombie gedankens do not take 3 as a premise, and conclude
the oppoiste—that there is an extra non-physical ingredient as a conclusion.
You seem to have done a 180 shift from insiting that there are only zombies to saying there are no zombies.
Yes. My understanding of p-zombies was incorrect/different. If p-zombies have no qualia by the premises, as you’ve shown me a clear definition of, then we can’t be p-zombies. (ignoring the details and assuming your experiences are like my own, rather than the Lords of the Matrix playing tricks on me and making you pretend you have qualia; I think this is a reasonable assumption to work with)
I don’t know of any examples. Typically zombie gedankens do not take 3 as a premise, and conclude the oppoiste—that there is an extra non-physical ingredient as a conclusion.
So they write their bottom line in the premises of the thought experiment in a concealed manner? I’m almost annoyed enough to actually give them that question they’re begging for so much.
Now E.Y.’s Zombie posts are starting to make a lot more sense.
So they write their bottom line in the premises of the thought experiment in a concealed manner?
No. Leaving physicalism out as a premise is not the same as incuding non-physicalaism as a premise. Likewise, concluding non-physicalism is not assuming it.
There must be non-physical things to assume that there is any difference between “us” and “p-zombies”. This is a logical requirement. They posit that there effectively is a difference, in the premises right there, by asserting that p-zombies do not have qualia, while we do.
Premise: P-zombies have all the physical and logical stuff that we do.
Premise: P-zombies DO NOT have qualia.
Premise: We have qualia.
Implied premise: This thought experiment is logically consistent.
The only way 4 is possible is if it is also implied that:
Implied premise: Either us, or P-Zombies, have something magical that adds or removes qualia.
By the reasoning which prompts them to come up with the thought experiment in the first place, it cannot be the zombies that have an additional magical component, because this would contradict the implied premise that the thought experiment is logically consistent (and would question the usefulness and purpose of the thought experiment).
Therefore:
“Conclusion”: We have something magical that gives us qualia.
The p-zombie thought experiment is usually intended to prove that qualia is magical, yes. This is one of those unfortunate cases of philosophers reasoning from conceivability, apparently not realising that such reasoning usually only reveals stuff about their own mind.
I wouldn’t say “qualia is magic” is actually a premise, but the argument involves assuming “qualia could be magical” and then invalidly dropping a level of “could”.
In this case the “could” is an epistemic “could”—“I don’t know whether qualia is magical”. Presumably, iff qualia is magical, then p-zombies are possible (ie. exist in some possible world, modal-could), so we deduce that “it epistemic-could be the case that p-zombies modal-could exist”. Then I guess because epistemic-could and modal-could feel like the same thing¹, this gets squished down to “p-zombies modal-could exist” which implies qualia is magical.
Anyway, the above seems like a plausible explanation of the reasoning, although I haven’t actually talked to ay philosophers to ask them if this is how it went.
¹ And could actually be (partially or completely) the same thing, since unless modal realism is correct, “possible worlds” don’t actually exist anywhere. Or something. Regardless, this wouldn’t make the step taken above legal, anyway. (Note that the previous “could” there is an epistemic “could”! :p)
I had always understood that “We have something magical that gives us qualia” was one of the explicit premises of p-zombies (p-zombies being defined as that which lacks that magical quality, but appears otherwise human). One could then see p-zombies as a way to try to disprove the “something magical” hypothesis by contradiction—start with someone who doesn’t have that magical something, continue on from there, and stop once you hit a contradiction.
We have something magical that gives us qualia” was one of the explicit premises of p-zombies
Nope. eg.
According to physicalism, all that exists in our world (including consciousness) is physical.
Thus, if physicalism is true, a logically-possible world in which all physical facts are the same as those of the actual world must contain everything that exists in our actual world. In particular, conscious experience must exist in such a possible world.
In fact we can conceive of a world physically indistinguishable from our world but in which there is no consciousness (a zombie world). From this (so Chalmers argues) it follows that such a world is logically possible.
Therefore, physicalism is false. (The conclusion follows from 2. and 3. by modus tollens.)
(Chalmer’s argument according to WP)
One could then see p-zombies as a way to try to disprove the “something magical” hypothesis by contradiction
Thus, if physicalism is true, a logically-possible world in which all physical facts are the same as those of the actual world must contain everything that exists in our actual world. In particular, conscious experience must exist in such a possible world.
In fact we can conceive of a world physically indistinguishable from our world but in which there is no consciousness (a zombie world). From this (so Chalmers argues) it follows that such a world is logically possible.
These two steps are contradictory. In the first one, you state that a world physically indistinguishable from ours must include consciousness; then in the very next point, you consider a world physically indistinguishable from ours which does not include consciousness to be logically possible—exactly what the previous step claims is not logically possible.
So the second is then implicitly assuming that physicalism is not true; it seems to me that the whole argument is basically a longwinded way of saying “I can’t imagine how consciousness can possibly be physical, therefore since I am conscious, physicalism is false”.
One might as easily imagine a world physically indistinguishable from ours, but in which there is no gravity, and thence conclude that gravity is not physical but somehow magical.
For some values of “imagine”. Given relativity, it would be pretty difficult to coheretly unplug gravity from mass, space and acceleration. It would be easier under Newton. I conclude that the unpluggabiliy of qualia means we just don’t have a relativity-grade eplanation of them, an explanation that makes them deeply interwoven with other things.
I conclude that the unpluggabiliy of qualia means we just don’t have a relativity-grade eplanation of them, an explanation that makes them deeply interwoven with other things.
Inertia and mass are the same thing. You probably meant “the same proportionality constant between mass and gravitational force”, that is, imagine that the value of Newton’s constant G was different.
But this (like CCC’s grandparent post introducing the gravity analogy) actually goes in Chalmers’ favor. Insofar as we can coherently imagine a different value of G with all non-gravitational facts kept fixed, the actual value of G is a new “brute fact” about the universe that we cannot reduce to non-gravitational facts. The same goes for consciousness with respect to all physical facts, according to Chalmers. He explicitly compares consciousness to fundamental physical quantities like mass and electric charge.
The problem is that one aspect of the universe being conceptually irreducible at the moment (which is all that such thought experiments prove) does not imply it might forever remain so when fundamental theory changes, as Peterdjones says. Newton could imagine inertia without gravity at all, but after Einstein we can’t. Now we are able to imagine a different value of G, but maybe later we won’t (and I can actually sketch a plausible story of how this might come to happen if anyone is interested).
No, I meant a form of matter which coexisted with current forms of matter but which was accelerated by a force disproportionately to the amount of force exerted through the gravity force. One such possibility would be something that is ‘massless’ in that it isn’t accelerated by gravity but that has electric charge.
And by definition, the value of G is equal to 1, just like every other proportionality constant. I wasn’t postulating that MG/NS^2 have a different value.
One might as easily imagine a world physically indistinguishable from ours, but in which there is no gravity, and thence conclude that gravity is not physical but somehow magical.
Oooh, good one. I’m trying this if someone ever seriously tries to argue p-zombies with me.
Within this discussion, I’ve tried to consistently use “magic” as meaning “not physics or logic”. Essentially, things that, given a perfect model of the (physical) universe that we live in, would be considered impossible or would go against all predictions for no cause that we can attribute to physics or logic or both.
So dualism is only one example, another could be intervention by the Lords of the Matrix (depending on how you draw boundaries for “universe that we live in”), and God or ontologically basic mental entities could be others.
So the assertion “we have something magical” is equivalent to “qualia is made of nonlogics” (although “nonlogics” is arguably still much more useful than “nonapples” as a conceptspace pointer).
Errr, yes..that is the intended conclusion. But I don’t think you can say an argument is question begging beccause the intended conclusion follows from the premises taken jointly.
And how, pray tell, did they reach into the vast immense space of possible hypotheses and premises, and pluck out this one specific set of premises which just so happens that if you accept it completely, it inevitably must result in the conclusion that we have something magical granting us qualia?
The begging was done while choosing the premises, not in one of the premises individually.
Premise: All Bob Chairs must have seventy three thousand legs exactly. Premise: Things we call chairs are illusions unless they are Bob Chairs. Premise: None of the things we call chairs have exactly seventy three thousand legs. Therefore, all of the things we call chairs are illusions and do not exist.
I seriously don’t see how the above argument is any more reasonable and any more or less question-begging than the p-zombie argument I’ve made in the grandparent. No single premise here assumes the conclusion, right? So no problem!
ETA: Perhaps it’s more clear if I just say that in order for the premises of the grandparent to be logically valid, one must also assume as a premise that having the information patterns of the human brain without creating qualia is possible in the first place. This is the key point that is the source of the question begging: It is assumed that the brain interactions do not create qualia, implicitly as part of the premises, otherwise the statement “P-zombies have the same brain interactions that we do but no qualia” is directly equivalent to “A → B, A, ¬B”.
So for A (brain interactions identical to us), B (possess qualia), and C (has magic):
(A → B) <==> ¬B → ¬A
((C → B) OR (AC → B)) <==> ¬(A → B)
A
¬B
Refactor to one single “question-begging” premise: ((((C ->B) OR (AC → B)) → C) <==> ¬(¬B → ¬A)) AND A AND ¬B
And how, pray tell, did they reach into the vast immense space of possible hypotheses and premises, and pluck out this one specific set of premises which just so happens that if you accept it completely, it inevitably must result in the conclusion that we have something magical granting us qualia?
I suppose they have the ability to formulate arguments that support their views. Are you saying that the honest way to argue is to fling premises together at random and see what happens?
The begging was done while choosing the premises, not in one of the premises individually.
Joint implication by premsies is validity not petitio principi.
Premise: All Bob Chairs must have seventy three thousand legs exactly.
Premise: Things we call chairs are illusions unless they are Bob Chairs.
Premise: None of the things we call chairs have exactly seventy three thousand legs.
Therefore, all of the things we call chairs are illusions and do not exist.
That is an example of a True Scotsman fallacy, or argument by tendentious redefinition. I don’t see the parallel.
However, all they’ve done is pick specific premises that hide clever assumptions that logically must end up with their desired conclusion, without any reason in particular to believe that their premises make any sense. See the amateur logic I did in my edits of the grandparent.
It is very much assumed, by asserting the first, third and fourth premises, that qualia does not require brain interactions, as a prerequisite for positing the existence of p-zombies in the thought experiment.
I have, but unfortunately that’s mostly because I don’t know the formal nomenclature and little details of writing conceivability and possibility logical statements.
I wouldn’t really trust myself to write formal logic with conceivability and probability without missing a step or strawmanning one of the premises at some point, with my currently very minimal understanding of that stuff.
But putting in the statement that zombies have all of the physical and logical characteristics of people, but lack some other characteristic, requires that some non-physical characteristic exists. You can’t say “I don’t assume magic” and then assume a magician!
Well, I understand that if consciousness was physical, but didn’t effect our behavior, then removing that physical process would result in a zombie. That’s usually the example given, not magic.
The usual p-zombie argment in the literature does not assume consciousness is entirely physical. Which is not the same as assuming it is non physical...
Just to be clear, the fact that they talk about bridging laws or such doesn’t mean they didn’t generate the idea with magical thinking, or that is has a hope in hell of being actually true. It just means they managed to put a band-aid over that particular fallacy.
No comment. That’s not what I said and I’m not saying it now. My point is that, while the p-zombie argument may have been formulated with “magical” explanations in mind, it does not directly reference them in the form usually presented.
I see little point in ignoring what an argument states explicily in favour of speculations about what the formulaters had in mind. I also think that rhetorical use of the word “magic” is mind killing. Quantum teleportation might seem magical to a 19th century physicist, but it still exists.
Which is why my point is that that the argument makes no mention of “magic”.
My point is that, while the p-zombie argument may have been formulated with “magical” explanations in mind, it does not directly reference them in the form usually presented.
Removing something physical doesn’t create a p-zombie, it creates a lobotomized person. If there was a form of brain damage that could not be detected by any means and had no symptoms, would it be a possible side effect of medication?
Compare two people who are physically identical except for one thing which doesn’t change anything else micro or macro scale. Clearly, one of them is a p-zombie, because that one lacks qualia.
I still don’t understand what the difference is between someone who lacks consciousness but is otherwise identical to someone who has consciousness.
With actual humans, p-zombies are almost certainly impossible. But imagine a world in which humans aren’t controlled by their brains; the Zombie Fairy intervenes and makes them act as she predicts they would act. Now the Zombie Fairy is so good at her job that the people of this world experience controlling their own bodies; but in actuality, they have no effect on their actions (except by coincidence.) If one of their brains was somehow altered without the Fairy’s knowledge, they would discover their strange predicament (but be unable to tell anyone—they would live out their life as a silent observer.) If one of their brains was destroyed without the Fairy’s noticing, they would continue as as a lifeless puppet, indistinguishable from regular humans—a p-zombie.
Now, it could be argued that the Fairy—who is what is usually referred to as a Zombie Master—is herself conscious, and as such these zombies are not true p-zombies. But this should give you some idea of what people are imagining when they say “p-zombie”.
That scenario sounds identical to “everybody is a p-zombie”.
It is! Unless of course you happen to be one of the poor people who exist solely to grant said zombies qualia.
Is there also a perception fairy, since perceiving the zombie fairy’s influence doesn’t create any physical changes in brain state or behavior?
Perception proceeds as normal in this counterfactual world. Of course, this world is not necessarily identical to our world, depending on how obvious the Perception Fairy is.
Does “As normal” mean that noticing the effects of the zombie fairy results in electrochemical changes in the brain that are different from those which occur in the absence of noticing those effects?
For some reason I can understand it better if I think of a sentient computer with standard input devices as things that it considers “real”, and a debugger that reads and alters memory states at will, outside the loop of what the machine can know. Assuming that such a system could be self-aware in the same sense that I think I am, how would it respond if every time it asked a class of question, the answer was modified by ‘magic’?
Does “As normal” mean that noticing the effects of the zombie fairy results in electrochemical changes in the brain that are different from those which occur in the absence of noticing those effects?
...yes? How would one notice something without changing brain-state to reflect that?
For some reason I can understand it better if I think of a sentient computer with standard input devices as things that it considers “real”, and a debugger that reads and alters memory states at will, outside the loop of what the machine can know. Assuming that such a system could be self-aware in the same sense that I think I am, how would it respond if every time it asked a class of question, the answer was modified by ‘magic’?
I think you may have misunderstood. The fairy controls the bodies, but has perfectly predicted in advance what the human would have done. Thus whatever they try to do is simultaneously achieved by the fairy; but they have no effect on their bodies. The fairy doesn’t alter their brains at all. If something else did alter their brain, but for some reason the fairy didn’t notice and update her predictions, then they would become “out of sync” with their body.
You need to specify whether your “putting in” is assuming or concluding. In general, it would help to refer to a concrete example of a p-zombie argment from a primary source.
Defining. A p-zombie is defined by all of the primary sources as having all of the physical qualities that humans have, but lacking something that humans have.
A magician is defined as a human that can do magic. Magicians (people identical to humans but with supernatural powers) don’t prove anything about physicalism any more than p-zombies do, unless it can be shown that either are exemplified.
unless it can be shown that either are exemplified.
The literature suggests that p-zombies can be significant if they are only conceptually possible. In fact, zombie theorists like Chalmers think they are naturalistically impossible and so cannot be exemplified. You may not like arguments from conceptiual possibility, but he has argued for his views, where you have so far only expressed opinion.
Then the literature suggests that magicians can be significant if they are only conceptually possible. And the conceptual possibility of non-physicalism disproves physicalism.
Magicians are defined as physically identical to humans and p-zombies but they have magic. Magic has no physical effects, doesn’t even trigger neurons, but humans with magic experience it and regular humans and p-zombies don’t.
So it has all of the characteristics of qualia. Any evidence for qualia is also evidence for this type of magic.
Yes. The argument of the grandparent is logically consistent AFAICT.
P-zombies are (Non-self-contradictory) IFF qualia comes from nonlogics and nonphysics.
Qualia comes from nonlogics and nonphysics IFF nonlogics and nonphysics are possible. (this is trivially obvious)
P(Magicians | “nonlogics and nonphysics are possible”) > P(Magicians | ¬”nonlogics and nonphysics are possible”)
ETA: That last one is probably misleading / badly written. Is there a proper symbol for “No definite observation of X or ¬X”, AKA the absence of this piece of evidence?
If qualia is defined such that is is conceptually possible that one person can experience qualia while a physically identical person cannot the other does not, then qualia are defined to be non physical.
Didn’t we have his exact same argument? Even if qualia are generated by our (physical) brains, this doesn’t mean that they could counterfactually be epiphenomenal if something was reproducing the effects they have on our bodies.
The same could be said of cats: Even if cats are part of the physical universe, they could counterfactually be epiphenomenal if something was reproducing the effects they have on the world.
How does the argument apply to qualia and not to cats?
Generating effects indistinguishable from the result of an ordinary cat—from reflected light to half-eaten mice. Of course, there are a few … extra effects in there. So you know none of you are ordinary cats.
The epiphenomenal cats, on the other hand, are completely undetectable. Except to themselves.
I’m not granting cats a point of view for this discussion: they are something that we can agree clearly exists and we can describe their boundaries with a fair degree of precision.
What do these ‘extra effects’ look like, and are they themselves proof that physicalism is wrong?
The whole point was that if the cats have a point of view, then they have the information to posit themselves; even though an outside observer wouldn’t.
It’s subjective information. I can’t exactly show my qualia to you; I can describe them, but so can a p-zombie.
Didn’t I say I wasn’t going to discuss qualia with you until you actually knew what they were? Because you’re starting to look like a troll here. Not saying you are one, but …
So, you’re saying that it is subjective whether qualia have a point of view, or the ability to posit themselves?
Because I have all of the observations needed to say that cats exist, even if they don’t technically exist. I do not have the observations needed to say that there is a non-physical component to subjective experience.
Y’know, I did say I wasn’t going to discuss qualia with you unless you knew what they were. Do some damn research, then come back here and start arguments about them.
I’m very confused. Are you implying that experiencing qualia is no reason to posit that qualia exists, period?
Or maybe you’re just saying “Hey, unless the cats have conscious self-aware minds that can experience cats, then they still can’t either!”—which I took for granted and assumed the jump from there to “assuming cats have the required mental parts” was a trivial inference to make.
OK, it’s just that the statement “if something is reproducing the effect of cats on the world we have no reason to posit cats as existing” declares that something that is not really a “cat” the way we perceive it, but only an “effect of a cat”, then it does not “exist”. Ergo, if you are only an effect of a cat, you don’t exist as a cat.
Maybe your objection is that we should taboo and dissolve that whole “existing” thing?
Wouldn’t that be nice, but unfortunately EY-style realism and my version of instrumentalism seem to diverge at that definition.
Re qualia, I don’t understand what you are asking. The term means no more to me than a subroutine in a reasonably complex computer program, if currently run on a different substrate.
And, if I understand correctly, this subroutine exists (and is felt / has effect on its host program) whether or not it “exists as qualia” in the particular sense that some clever arguer wants to define qualia as anything other than that subroutine. The fact that there is an effect of the subroutine is all that is required for the subroutine to exist in the first sense, while whether it is “the subroutine” or only a mimicking effect is only relevant for the second sense of “exist”, which is irrelevant to you.
In this case, feel free to assume no-one ever tries to observe cat brains. The “simulation” only has to reproduce your actions, which it does with magic.
Oh, well there’s your problem then. You’re not part of “the effect of cats”. That’s stuff like air displacement, reflected light, purring, that sort of thing.
If you’re using some nonstandard epistemology that doesn’t distinguish between observations that point to something and the thing itself, then nothing. Otherwise the difference between a liar and a reality warper.
Interesting point. Observations are certainly effects, but you’re right, not all effects are observations. Of course, the example wouldn’t be hurt by my specifying that they only bother faking effects that will lead to observations ;)
the example wouldn’t be hurt by my specifying that they only bother faking effects that will lead to observations ;)
I think it would. I think it’s not the same example at all anymore.
Something that reproduces all effects of cats is effectively producing all the molecular interactions and neurons and flesh and blood and fur that we think are what produces our observations of cats.
On the other hand, something that only reproduces the effects that lead directly to observations is, in its simplest form, something that analyzes minds and finds out where to inject data into them to make these minds have the experiences of the presence of cats, and analyzes what other things in the world a would-be-cat would change, and just change those directly (i.e. if a cat would’ve drank milk and produced feline excrement, then milk disappears and feline excrement appears, and a human’s brain is modified such that the experience of seeing a cat drink milk and make poo is simulated).
Something that reproduces all effects of cats is effectively producing all the molecular interactions and neurons and flesh and blood and fur
Not unless something is somehow interacting with their neurons, which I stated isn’t happening for simplicity, and most of the time not for the blood or flesh.
On the other hand, something that only reproduces the effects that lead directly to observations is, in its simplest form, something that analyzes minds and finds out where to inject data into them to make these minds have the experiences of the presence of cats, and analyzes what other things in the world a would-be-cat would change, and just change those directly (i.e. if a cat would’ve drank milk and produced feline excrement, then milk disappears and feline excrement appears, and a human’s brain is modified such that the experience of seeing a cat drink milk and make poo is simulated).
Oh, I meant the interactions occur where they would if the cat was real, but these increasingly-godlike fairies are lazy and don’t bother producing them if their magic tells them it wouldn’t lead to an observation.
My (admittedly lacking) understanding of Information Theory precludes any possibility of perfectly reproducing all effects of the presence of cats throughout the universe (or multiverse or whatever) without having in some form or another a perfect model or simulation of all the individual interactions of the base elements which cats are made of. This would, as it contains the same patterns within the model which when made of “physical matter” produce cats, essentially still produce cats.
So if there’s a mechanism somewhere making sure that the reproduction is perfect, it’s almost certainly (to my knowledge) “simulating” the cats in some manner, in which case the cats are in that simulation and perceive the same experiences they would if they were “really” there in atoms instead of being in the simulation.
If you posit some kind of ontologically basic entity that somehow magically makes a universal consistency check for the exact worldstates that could plausibly be computed if the cat were present, without actually simulating any cat, then sure… but I think that’s also not the same problem anymore. And it requires accepting a magical premise.
Oh, right. Yup, anything simulating you that perfectly is gonna be conscious—but it might be using magic. For example, perhaps they pull their data out of parallel universe where you ARE real. Or maybe they use some black-swan technique you can’t even imagine. They’re fairies, for godssake. And you’re an invisible cat. Don’t fight the counterfactual.
Haha, that one made me laugh. Yes, it’s fighting the counterfactual a bit, but I think that this is one of the reasons why there was a chasm of misunderstandings in this and other sub-threads.
Anyway, I don’t see any tangible things left to discuss here.
Oh, you mean we shouldn’t assume we’re the same as the other cats. Obviously there’s some possibility that we’re unique, but (assuming our body is “simulated” as well, obviously) it seems like all “cats” probably contain epiphenomenal cats as well. Do you think everyone else is a p-zombie? Obviously it’s a remote possibility, but...
Oh, you mean we shouldn’t assume we’re the same as the other cats.
No, I did not mean that, unless one finds some good evidence supporting this additional assumption. My point was quite the opposite, that your statement “if something is reproducing the effect of cats on the world we have no reason to posit cats as existing” does not need a qualifier.
No, I did not mean that, unless one finds some good evidence supporting this additional assumption. My point was quite the opposite, that your statement “if something is reproducing the effect of cats on the world we have no reason to posit cats as existing” does not need a qualifier.
Look, if all “cats” are actually magical fairies using their magic to reproduce the effect of cats, yet I find myself as a cat—whose effect on the world consists of a fairy pretending to be me so well even I don’t notice (except just now, obviously.). Thus, for the one epiphenomenal cat I can know about—myself—I am associated with a “cat” that perfectly duplicates my actions. I can’t check if all “cats” have similar cats attached, since they would be epiphenomenal, but it seems likely, based on myself, that there are.
Do you think everyone else is a p-zombie?
Not sure why you bring that silly concept up...
Because the whole point of this cat metaphor was to make a point about p-zombies. That’s what they are. They’re p-zombies for cats instead of qualia.
Because the whole point of this cat metaphor was to make a point about p-zombies. That’s what they are. They’re p-zombies for cats instead of qualia.
Well, the point was to point out that we only think things exist because we experience them, and therefore that anything which duplicates the experience is as real as the original artifact.
Suppose there were to be no cats, but only a magical fairy which knocks things from the mantlepiece and causes us to hallucinate in a consistent manner (among other things). There is no reason to consider that world distinguishable, even in principle, from the standard model.
Now, suppose that you couldn’t see cats, but instead could see the ‘cat fairy’. What is different now, assuming that the cat fairy is working properly and providing identical sensory input as the cats?
There are two differences: the presence of the fairy (which can be observed … somehow) and the possibility of deviating from the mind. P-zombies are described as acting just like humans, but lack consciousness. “Cats” are generally like the human counterparts to p-zombies (who act just the same—by definition—but have epiphenomenal consciousness.)
TL;DR: it’s observable in principle. But I, as author, have decreed that you arn’t getting to check if your friends are cats as well as “cats”.
Y’know, I’m starting to think this may have been a poor example. It’s a little complicated.
If the fairy is observable despite being in principle not observable… I break.
If it is in principle possible to experience differently from what a quantum scan of the brain and body would indicate, but behave in accordance with physicalism … how would you know if what you experienced was different from what you thought you experienced, or if what you thought was different from what you honestly claimed that you thought?
That would seem to be close to several types of abnormal brain function, where a person describes themself as not in control of their body. I think those cases are better explained by abnormal internal brain communication, but further direct evidence may show that the ‘reasoning’ and ‘acting’ portions of some person are connected similarly enough to normal brains that they should be working the same way, but aren’t. If there is a demonstrated case either of a pattern of neurons firing corresponding to similar behavior in all typical brains and a different behavior in a class of brains of people with such abnormal functioning (or in physically similar neurons firing differently under similar stimuli), then I would accept that as evidence that the fairy perceived by those people existed.
If the fairy is observable despite being in principle not observable… I break.
It’s observable. The cats are epiphenomenal, and thus unobservable, except to themselves.
If it is in principle possible to experience differently from what a quantum scan of the brain and body would indicate, but behave in accordance with physicalism … how would you know if what you experienced was different from what you thought you experienced, or if what you thought was different from what you honestly claimed that you thought?
Pardon?
That would seem to be close to several types of abnormal brain function, where a person describes themself as not in control of their body. I think those cases are better explained by abnormal internal brain communication, but further direct evidence may show that the ‘reasoning’ and ‘acting’ portions of some person are connected similarly enough to normal brains that they should be working the same way, but aren’t. If there is a demonstrated case either of a pattern of neurons firing corresponding to similar behavior in all typical brains and a different behavior in a class of brains of people with such abnormal functioning (or in physically similar neurons firing differently under similar stimuli), then I would accept that as evidence that the fairy perceived by those people existed.
Well, if they can tell you what the problem is then they clearly have some control. More to the point, it is a known feature of the environment that all observed cats are actually illusions produced by fairies. It is a fact, although not generally known, that there are also epiphenomenal (although acted upon by the environment) cats; these exist in exactly the same space as the illusions and act exactly the same way. If you are a human, this is all fine and dandy, if bizarre. But if you are a sentient cat (roll with it) then you have evidence of the epiphenomenal cats, even though this evidence is inherently subjective (since presumably the illusions are also seemingly sentient, in this case.)
If it is in principle possible to experience differently from what a quantum scan of the brain and body would indicate, but behave in accordance with physicalism … how would you know if what you experienced was different from what you thought you experienced, or if what you thought was different from what you honestly claimed that you thought?
Pardon?
How could you tell if you were experiencing something differently from the way a p-zombie would (or, if you are a p-zombie, if you were experiencing something differently from the way a human would)?
But if you are a sentient cat (roll with it) then you have evidence of the epiphenomenal cats, even though this evidence is inherently subjective (since presumably the illusions are also seemingly sentient, in this case.)
In every meaningful way, the cat fairy is a cat. There is no way for an epiphenomenal sentient cat to differentiate itself from a cat fairy, nor any way for a cat fairy to differentiate itself from whatever portions of ‘cats’ it controls (without violating the constraints on cat fairy behavior). Of course, there’s also the conceivability of epiphenomenal sentient ghosts which cannot have any effect on the world but still observe. (That’s one of my death nightmares—remaining fully perceptive and cognitive but unable to act in any way.)
You seem to be somewhat confused about the notion of a p-zombie. A p-zombie is something physically identical to a human, but without consciousness. A p-zombie does not experience anything in any way at all. P-zombies are probably self-contradictory.
How could you tell if you were experiencing something differently from the way a p-zombie would (or, if you are a p-zombie, if you were experiencing something differently from the way a human would)?
I am experiencing something, therefore I am not a p-zombie.
Consider the possibility that you are not experiencing everything that humans do. Can you provide any evidence, even to yourself, that you are? Could a p-zombie provide that same evidence?
Are you asking what I would experience? Because I wouldn’t. Not to mention that such a thing can’t happen if, as I expect, subjective experience arises from physics.
i you cannot find any experimental differences betweenn you and a you NOT experiencing
I cannot present you with evidence that I am experiencing, except maybe by analogy with yourself. I, however, know that I experience because I experience it.
How could you tell if you were experiencing something differently from the way a p-zombie would (or, if you are a p-zombie, if you were experiencing something differently from the way a human would)?
Because p-zombies aren’t conscious. By definition.
In every meaningful way, the cat fairy is a cat. There is no way for an epiphenomenal sentient cat to differentiate itself from a cat fairy, nor any way for a cat fairy to differentiate itself from whatever portions of ‘cats’ it controls (without violating the constraints on cat fairy behavior). Of course, there’s also the conceivability of epiphenomenal sentient ghosts which cannot have any effect on the world but still observe. (That’s one of my death nightmares—remaining fully perceptive and cognitive but unable to act in any way.)
Well, the cat does have an associated cat fairy. So, since the only cat fairy who’s e-cat it could observe (its own) has one, I think it should rightly conclude that all cat fairies have cats. But yes, epiphenomenal sentient “ghosts” are possible, and indeed the p-zombie hypothesis requires that the regular humans are in fact such ghosts. They just don’t notice. Yes, there are people arguing this is true in the real world, although not all of them have worked out the implications.
Now conceive of something which is similar to consciousness, but distinct; like consciousness, it has no physical effects on the world, and like consciousness, anyone who has it experiences it in a manner distinct from their physicality. Call this ‘magic’, and people who posses it ‘magi’.
What aspect does magic lack that consciousness has, such that a p-zombie cannot consider if it is conscious, but a human can ask if they are a magi?
Who said consciousness has no effects on the physical world? Apart from those idiots making the p-zombie argument that is. Pretty much everyone here thinks that’s nonsense, including me and, statistically, probably srn347 (although you never know, I guess.)
Regarding your Magi, if it affects their brain, it’s not epiphenomenal. So there’s that.
And the point I am trying to make is that p-zombies are not only a coherent idea, but compatible with human-standard brains as generally modelled on LW. That they don’t in any way demonstrate the point they were intended to make is quite another thing.
And the point I am trying to make is that p-zombies are not only a coherent idea, but compatible with human-standard brains as generally modelled on LW.
Yes, it merely requires redefining things like ‘conscious’ or ‘experience’ (whatever you decide p-zombies do not have) to be something epiphenomenal and incidentally non-existent.
Um, could you please explain this comment? I think there’s a fair chance you’ve stumbled into the middle of this discussion and don’t know what I’m actually talking about (except that it involves p-zombies, I guess.)
I think there’s a fair chance you’ve stumbled into the middle of this discussion and don’t know what I’m actually talking about (except that it involves p-zombies, I guess.)
I know only the words spoken, not those intended. (And concluded early in the conversation that the entire subthread should be truncated and replaced with a link). So much confusion and muddled thinking!)
Seems reasonable. For reference, then, I suggested the analogous thought experiment of fairies using magic to reproduce all the effects of cats on the environment. Also, there are epiphenomenal ghost cats that occupy the same space and are otherwise identical to the fairies’ illusions, down to the subatomic level. An outside observer would, of course, have no reason to postulate these epiphenomenal cats, but if the cats themselves were somehow conscious, they would.
This was intended to help with understanding p-zombies, since it avoids the … confusing … aspects.
Well, I personally find it an interesting concept. It’s basically a reformulation of standard Sequences stuff, though, so it shouldn’t be surprising, at least ’round here.
Unless you actually understand what “qualia” means, I’m not going to bother discussing the topic with you. If you have, if fact, done the basic research necessary to discuss p-zombies, than I’m probably misinterpreting you in some way. But I don’t think I am.
You seem to have done a 180 shift from insiting that there are only zombies to saying there are no zombies.
I don’t know of any examples. Typically zombie gedankens do not take 3 as a premise, and conclude the oppoiste—that there is an extra non-physical ingredient as a conclusion.
Yes. My understanding of p-zombies was incorrect/different. If p-zombies have no qualia by the premises, as you’ve shown me a clear definition of, then we can’t be p-zombies. (ignoring the details and assuming your experiences are like my own, rather than the Lords of the Matrix playing tricks on me and making you pretend you have qualia; I think this is a reasonable assumption to work with)
So they write their bottom line in the premises of the thought experiment in a concealed manner? I’m almost annoyed enough to actually give them that question they’re begging for so much.
Now E.Y.’s Zombie posts are starting to make a lot more sense.
No. Leaving physicalism out as a premise is not the same as incuding non-physicalaism as a premise. Likewise, concluding non-physicalism is not assuming it.
There must be non-physical things to assume that there is any difference between “us” and “p-zombies”. This is a logical requirement. They posit that there effectively is a difference, in the premises right there, by asserting that p-zombies do not have qualia, while we do.
Premise: P-zombies have all the physical and logical stuff that we do.
Premise: P-zombies DO NOT have qualia.
Premise: We have qualia.
Implied premise: This thought experiment is logically consistent.
The only way 4 is possible is if it is also implied that:
Implied premise: Either us, or P-Zombies, have something magical that adds or removes qualia.
By the reasoning which prompts them to come up with the thought experiment in the first place, it cannot be the zombies that have an additional magical component, because this would contradict the implied premise that the thought experiment is logically consistent (and would question the usefulness and purpose of the thought experiment).
Therefore:
“Conclusion”: We have something magical that gives us qualia.
The p-zombie thought experiment is usually intended to prove that qualia is magical, yes. This is one of those unfortunate cases of philosophers reasoning from conceivability, apparently not realising that such reasoning usually only reveals stuff about their own mind.
I wouldn’t say “qualia is magic” is actually a premise, but the argument involves assuming “qualia could be magical” and then invalidly dropping a level of “could”.
In this case the “could” is an epistemic “could”—“I don’t know whether qualia is magical”. Presumably, iff qualia is magical, then p-zombies are possible (ie. exist in some possible world, modal-could), so we deduce that “it epistemic-could be the case that p-zombies modal-could exist”. Then I guess because epistemic-could and modal-could feel like the same thing¹, this gets squished down to “p-zombies modal-could exist” which implies qualia is magical.
Anyway, the above seems like a plausible explanation of the reasoning, although I haven’t actually talked to ay philosophers to ask them if this is how it went.
¹ And could actually be (partially or completely) the same thing, since unless modal realism is correct, “possible worlds” don’t actually exist anywhere. Or something. Regardless, this wouldn’t make the step taken above legal, anyway. (Note that the previous “could” there is an epistemic “could”! :p)
I had always understood that “We have something magical that gives us qualia” was one of the explicit premises of p-zombies (p-zombies being defined as that which lacks that magical quality, but appears otherwise human). One could then see p-zombies as a way to try to disprove the “something magical” hypothesis by contradiction—start with someone who doesn’t have that magical something, continue on from there, and stop once you hit a contradiction.
Nope. eg.
According to physicalism, all that exists in our world (including consciousness) is physical.
Thus, if physicalism is true, a logically-possible world in which all physical facts are the same as those of the actual world must contain everything that exists in our actual world. In particular, conscious experience must exist in such a possible world.
In fact we can conceive of a world physically indistinguishable from our world but in which there is no consciousness (a zombie world). From this (so Chalmers argues) it follows that such a world is logically possible.
Therefore, physicalism is false. (The conclusion follows from 2. and 3. by modus tollens.)
(Chalmer’s argument according to WP)
These two steps are contradictory. In the first one, you state that a world physically indistinguishable from ours must include consciousness; then in the very next point, you consider a world physically indistinguishable from ours which does not include consciousness to be logically possible—exactly what the previous step claims is not logically possible.
Or am I misunderstanding something?
The first includes “if physicalism is true”, the second doens’t.
Ah, right. Thanks, I somehow missed that.
So the second is then implicitly assuming that physicalism is not true; it seems to me that the whole argument is basically a longwinded way of saying “I can’t imagine how consciousness can possibly be physical, therefore since I am conscious, physicalism is false”.
One might as easily imagine a world physically indistinguishable from ours, but in which there is no gravity, and thence conclude that gravity is not physical but somehow magical.
For some values of “imagine”. Given relativity, it would be pretty difficult to coheretly unplug gravity from mass, space and acceleration. It would be easier under Newton. I conclude that the unpluggabiliy of qualia means we just don’t have a relativity-grade eplanation of them, an explanation that makes them deeply interwoven with other things.
That seems like a reasonable conclusion to draw.
Not really. Just postulate something which does not have the same proportionality constant relating inertia to mass.
Inertia and mass are the same thing. You probably meant “the same proportionality constant between mass and gravitational force”, that is, imagine that the value of Newton’s constant G was different.
But this (like CCC’s grandparent post introducing the gravity analogy) actually goes in Chalmers’ favor. Insofar as we can coherently imagine a different value of G with all non-gravitational facts kept fixed, the actual value of G is a new “brute fact” about the universe that we cannot reduce to non-gravitational facts. The same goes for consciousness with respect to all physical facts, according to Chalmers. He explicitly compares consciousness to fundamental physical quantities like mass and electric charge.
The problem is that one aspect of the universe being conceptually irreducible at the moment (which is all that such thought experiments prove) does not imply it might forever remain so when fundamental theory changes, as Peterdjones says. Newton could imagine inertia without gravity at all, but after Einstein we can’t. Now we are able to imagine a different value of G, but maybe later we won’t (and I can actually sketch a plausible story of how this might come to happen if anyone is interested).
No, I meant a form of matter which coexisted with current forms of matter but which was accelerated by a force disproportionately to the amount of force exerted through the gravity force. One such possibility would be something that is ‘massless’ in that it isn’t accelerated by gravity but that has electric charge.
And by definition, the value of G is equal to 1, just like every other proportionality constant. I wasn’t postulating that MG/NS^2 have a different value.
Oooh, good one. I’m trying this if someone ever seriously tries to argue p-zombies with me.
Most versions of the Zombie Argument I’ve seen don’t specify that the world be physically identical to ours, merely indistinguishable.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof_by_contradiction
Agreed.
I’m being told that this is not the case, but I’m struggling to understand how.
I’m curious about your definition of “magical”. Is it the same as dualism)?
Within this discussion, I’ve tried to consistently use “magic” as meaning “not physics or logic”. Essentially, things that, given a perfect model of the (physical) universe that we live in, would be considered impossible or would go against all predictions for no cause that we can attribute to physics or logic or both.
So dualism is only one example, another could be intervention by the Lords of the Matrix (depending on how you draw boundaries for “universe that we live in”), and God or ontologically basic mental entities could be others.
So the assertion “we have something magical” is equivalent to “qualia is made of nonlogics” (although “nonlogics” is arguably still much more useful than “nonapples” as a conceptspace pointer).
Technically qualia is “non-physics”. Since if a human with a brain that does thinking is physics + logic, qualia is just the logic given the physics.
Errh, yes. Thank you. I think “nonlogics” is a decent fix, in light of this.
Errr, yes..that is the intended conclusion. But I don’t think you can say an argument is question begging beccause the intended conclusion follows from the premises taken jointly.
And how, pray tell, did they reach into the vast immense space of possible hypotheses and premises, and pluck out this one specific set of premises which just so happens that if you accept it completely, it inevitably must result in the conclusion that we have something magical granting us qualia?
The begging was done while choosing the premises, not in one of the premises individually.
Premise: All Bob Chairs must have seventy three thousand legs exactly.
Premise: Things we call chairs are illusions unless they are Bob Chairs.
Premise: None of the things we call chairs have exactly seventy three thousand legs.
Therefore, all of the things we call chairs are illusions and do not exist.
I seriously don’t see how the above argument is any more reasonable and any more or less question-begging than the p-zombie argument I’ve made in the grandparent. No single premise here assumes the conclusion, right? So no problem!
ETA: Perhaps it’s more clear if I just say that in order for the premises of the grandparent to be logically valid, one must also assume as a premise that having the information patterns of the human brain without creating qualia is possible in the first place. This is the key point that is the source of the question begging: It is assumed that the brain interactions do not create qualia, implicitly as part of the premises, otherwise the statement “P-zombies have the same brain interactions that we do but no qualia” is directly equivalent to “A → B, A, ¬B”.
So for A (brain interactions identical to us), B (possess qualia), and C (has magic):
(A → B) <==> ¬B → ¬A
((C → B) OR (AC → B)) <==> ¬(A → B)
A
¬B
Refactor to one single “question-begging” premise:
((((C ->B) OR (AC → B)) → C) <==> ¬(¬B → ¬A)) AND A AND ¬B
...therefore C.
I suppose they have the ability to formulate arguments that support their views. Are you saying that the honest way to argue is to fling premises together at random and see what happens?
Joint implication by premsies is validity not petitio principi.
That is an example of a True Scotsman fallacy, or argument by tendentious redefinition. I don’t see the parallel.
Eh. I’m bad at informal fallacies, apparently.
However, all they’ve done is pick specific premises that hide clever assumptions that logically must end up with their desired conclusion, without any reason in particular to believe that their premises make any sense. See the amateur logic I did in my edits of the grandparent.
It is very much assumed, by asserting the first, third and fourth premises, that qualia does not require brain interactions, as a prerequisite for positing the existence of p-zombies in the thought experiment.
Again: not assuming physicalism it not the same as assuming non-physicalism.
They assume (correctly) that if ¬B and A, then ¬(A → B)
Then they assume ¬B and A.
...
You’ve flattened out all the stuff about conceivability and logical possibility.
I have, but unfortunately that’s mostly because I don’t know the formal nomenclature and little details of writing conceivability and possibility logical statements.
I wouldn’t really trust myself to write formal logic with conceivability and probability without missing a step or strawmanning one of the premises at some point, with my currently very minimal understanding of that stuff.
But putting in the statement that zombies have all of the physical and logical characteristics of people, but lack some other characteristic, requires that some non-physical characteristic exists. You can’t say “I don’t assume magic” and then assume a magician!
Well, I understand that if consciousness was physical, but didn’t effect our behavior, then removing that physical process would result in a zombie. That’s usually the example given, not magic.
The usual p-zombie argment in the literature does not assume consciousness is entirely physical. Which is not the same as assuming it is non physical...
Just to be clear, the fact that they talk about bridging laws or such doesn’t mean they didn’t generate the idea with magical thinking, or that is has a hope in hell of being actually true. It just means they managed to put a band-aid over that particular fallacy.
So physicalism is apriori true, even when there is no physical explanaion of some phenomenon?
No comment. That’s not what I said and I’m not saying it now. My point is that, while the p-zombie argument may have been formulated with “magical” explanations in mind, it does not directly reference them in the form usually presented.
I see little point in ignoring what an argument states explicily in favour of speculations about what the formulaters had in mind. I also think that rhetorical use of the word “magic” is mind killing. Quantum teleportation might seem magical to a 19th century physicist, but it still exists.
Which is why my point is that that the argument makes no mention of “magic”.
Removing something physical doesn’t create a p-zombie, it creates a lobotomized person. If there was a form of brain damage that could not be detected by any means and had no symptoms, would it be a possible side effect of medication?
Supposedly the argument works just as well as a counterfactual.
Compare two people who are physically identical except for one thing which doesn’t change anything else micro or macro scale. Clearly, one of them is a p-zombie, because that one lacks qualia.
I still don’t understand what the difference is between someone who lacks consciousness but is otherwise identical to someone who has consciousness.
With actual humans, p-zombies are almost certainly impossible. But imagine a world in which humans aren’t controlled by their brains; the Zombie Fairy intervenes and makes them act as she predicts they would act. Now the Zombie Fairy is so good at her job that the people of this world experience controlling their own bodies; but in actuality, they have no effect on their actions (except by coincidence.) If one of their brains was somehow altered without the Fairy’s knowledge, they would discover their strange predicament (but be unable to tell anyone—they would live out their life as a silent observer.) If one of their brains was destroyed without the Fairy’s noticing, they would continue as as a lifeless puppet, indistinguishable from regular humans—a p-zombie.
Now, it could be argued that the Fairy—who is what is usually referred to as a Zombie Master—is herself conscious, and as such these zombies are not true p-zombies. But this should give you some idea of what people are imagining when they say “p-zombie”.
That scenario sounds identical to “everybody is a p-zombie”.
Is there also a perception fairy, since perceiving the zombie fairy’s influence doesn’t create any physical changes in brain state or behavior?
It is! Unless of course you happen to be one of the poor people who exist solely to grant said zombies qualia.
Perception proceeds as normal in this counterfactual world. Of course, this world is not necessarily identical to our world, depending on how obvious the Perception Fairy is.
Does “As normal” mean that noticing the effects of the zombie fairy results in electrochemical changes in the brain that are different from those which occur in the absence of noticing those effects?
For some reason I can understand it better if I think of a sentient computer with standard input devices as things that it considers “real”, and a debugger that reads and alters memory states at will, outside the loop of what the machine can know. Assuming that such a system could be self-aware in the same sense that I think I am, how would it respond if every time it asked a class of question, the answer was modified by ‘magic’?
...yes? How would one notice something without changing brain-state to reflect that?
I think you may have misunderstood. The fairy controls the bodies, but has perfectly predicted in advance what the human would have done. Thus whatever they try to do is simultaneously achieved by the fairy; but they have no effect on their bodies. The fairy doesn’t alter their brains at all. If something else did alter their brain, but for some reason the fairy didn’t notice and update her predictions, then they would become “out of sync” with their body.
Brain state is in principle detectable. If the fairy changes brain state, the fairy is detectable by physical means and thus physical.
Oh, I see. Yes, the fairy is physical; the brains, however, could in principle be epiphenomenal (although they aren’t, in this example.)
You need to specify whether your “putting in” is assuming or concluding. In general, it would help to refer to a concrete example of a p-zombie argment from a primary source.
Defining. A p-zombie is defined by all of the primary sources as having all of the physical qualities that humans have, but lacking something that humans have.
A magician is defined as a human that can do magic. Magicians (people identical to humans but with supernatural powers) don’t prove anything about physicalism any more than p-zombies do, unless it can be shown that either are exemplified.
The literature suggests that p-zombies can be significant if they are only conceptually possible. In fact, zombie theorists like Chalmers think they are naturalistically impossible and so cannot be exemplified. You may not like arguments from conceptiual possibility, but he has argued for his views, where you have so far only expressed opinion.
Then the literature suggests that magicians can be significant if they are only conceptually possible. And the conceptual possibility of non-physicalism disproves physicalism.
The literature does not talk about magicians.
Magicians are defined as physically identical to humans and p-zombies but they have magic. Magic has no physical effects, doesn’t even trigger neurons, but humans with magic experience it and regular humans and p-zombies don’t.
So it has all of the characteristics of qualia. Any evidence for qualia is also evidence for this type of magic.
No.Qulia are not defined as epiphenomenal or non physical.
Yes. The argument of the grandparent is logically consistent AFAICT.
P-zombies are (Non-self-contradictory) IFF qualia comes from nonlogics and nonphysics.
Qualia comes from nonlogics and nonphysics IFF nonlogics and nonphysics are possible. (this is trivially obvious)
P(Magicians | “nonlogics and nonphysics are possible”) > P(Magicians | ¬”nonlogics and nonphysics are possible”)
ETA: That last one is probably misleading / badly written. Is there a proper symbol for “No definite observation of X or ¬X”, AKA the absence of this piece of evidence?
If qualia is defined such that is is conceptually possible that one person can experience qualia while a physically identical person cannot the other does not, then qualia are defined to be non physical.
No, they are just implied to be. There is an infinty of facts implied by the definition of “2” but they are not in the definiion, which is finite.
Didn’t we have his exact same argument? Even if qualia are generated by our (physical) brains, this doesn’t mean that they could counterfactually be epiphenomenal if something was reproducing the effects they have on our bodies.
The same could be said of cats: Even if cats are part of the physical universe, they could counterfactually be epiphenomenal if something was reproducing the effects they have on the world.
How does the argument apply to qualia and not to cats?
Gravity!
I think I’m seeing a pattern in this topic of discussion. And it is reminiscent of a certain single-sided geometric figure.
Well, if something is reproducing the effect of cats on the world we have no reason to posit cats as existing anyway, unless we are cats.
What about all of the observations of cats? Aren’t they adequate reason to posit cats as existing?
Um, no. Not if something is reproducing them.
Taboo ‘reproducing’.
Generating effects indistinguishable from the result of an ordinary cat—from reflected light to half-eaten mice. Of course, there are a few … extra effects in there. So you know none of you are ordinary cats.
The epiphenomenal cats, on the other hand, are completely undetectable. Except to themselves.
I’m not granting cats a point of view for this discussion: they are something that we can agree clearly exists and we can describe their boundaries with a fair degree of precision.
What do these ‘extra effects’ look like, and are they themselves proof that physicalism is wrong?
The whole point was that if the cats have a point of view, then they have the information to posit themselves; even though an outside observer wouldn’t.
Are you saying that qualia have a point of view, or are positing themselves?
It’s subjective information. I can’t exactly show my qualia to you; I can describe them, but so can a p-zombie.
Didn’t I say I wasn’t going to discuss qualia with you until you actually knew what they were? Because you’re starting to look like a troll here. Not saying you are one, but …
So, you’re saying that it is subjective whether qualia have a point of view, or the ability to posit themselves?
Because I have all of the observations needed to say that cats exist, even if they don’t technically exist. I do not have the observations needed to say that there is a non-physical component to subjective experience.
Who’s talking about non-physical components? “Qualia” has more than one meaning.
Y’know, I did say I wasn’t going to discuss qualia with you unless you knew what they were. Do some damn research, then come back here and start arguments about them.
or even if we were.
I’m very confused. Are you implying that experiencing qualia is no reason to posit that qualia exists, period?
Or maybe you’re just saying “Hey, unless the cats have conscious self-aware minds that can experience cats, then they still can’t either!”—which I took for granted and assumed the jump from there to “assuming cats have the required mental parts” was a trivial inference to make.
I just don’t see the need for the exception in MugaSofer’s statement, whether you agree with the statement itself or not.
So if something were shown to be reproducing the effect of human minds on the world, you would have no reason to posit yourself as existing anyway?
If you are an artifact of such a reproduction, would you call yourself existing in the same way as if you weren’t?
I would.
That’s a bit why I’m confused as to why you’re (it seems to me) claiming we have no reason to posit self-existence in such a case.
Maybe your objection is that we should taboo and dissolve that whole “existing” thing?
OK, it’s just that the statement “if something is reproducing the effect of cats on the world we have no reason to posit cats as existing” declares that something that is not really a “cat” the way we perceive it, but only an “effect of a cat”, then it does not “exist”. Ergo, if you are only an effect of a cat, you don’t exist as a cat.
Wouldn’t that be nice, but unfortunately EY-style realism and my version of instrumentalism seem to diverge at that definition.
Oh. Then we agree, I think, on the fundamentals of what makes a cat “exist” or not.
Does this also imply the same exist-”exist” perception problem with qualia in your model, or am I horribly misinterpreting your thoughts?
Re qualia, I don’t understand what you are asking. The term means no more to me than a subroutine in a reasonably complex computer program, if currently run on a different substrate.
And, if I understand correctly, this subroutine exists (and is felt / has effect on its host program) whether or not it “exists as qualia” in the particular sense that some clever arguer wants to define qualia as anything other than that subroutine. The fact that there is an effect of the subroutine is all that is required for the subroutine to exist in the first sense, while whether it is “the subroutine” or only a mimicking effect is only relevant for the second sense of “exist”, which is irrelevant to you.
Is this an accurate description?
Pretty much, as I don’t consider this “second sense” to be well defined.
But I specifically stated you were a cat, not an effect of a cat.
I’m not sure how to tell the difference, or even if there is one.
In this case, feel free to assume no-one ever tries to observe cat brains. The “simulation” only has to reproduce your actions, which it does with magic.
Could you taboo the bolded phrase, please?
Sure. an artifact of such a reproduction = whatever you mean by “effect of cats” in your original statement.
Oh, well there’s your problem then. You’re not part of “the effect of cats”. That’s stuff like air displacement, reflected light, purring, that sort of thing.
Where do effects of cats stop and cats begin?
If you’re using some nonstandard epistemology that doesn’t distinguish between observations that point to something and the thing itself, then nothing. Otherwise the difference between a liar and a reality warper.
Looks like we have an insurmountable inferential distance problem both ways, so I’ll stop here.
Fair enough.
Careful, effects are not the same things as observations.
Interesting point. Observations are certainly effects, but you’re right, not all effects are observations. Of course, the example wouldn’t be hurt by my specifying that they only bother faking effects that will lead to observations ;)
I think it would. I think it’s not the same example at all anymore.
Something that reproduces all effects of cats is effectively producing all the molecular interactions and neurons and flesh and blood and fur that we think are what produces our observations of cats.
On the other hand, something that only reproduces the effects that lead directly to observations is, in its simplest form, something that analyzes minds and finds out where to inject data into them to make these minds have the experiences of the presence of cats, and analyzes what other things in the world a would-be-cat would change, and just change those directly (i.e. if a cat would’ve drank milk and produced feline excrement, then milk disappears and feline excrement appears, and a human’s brain is modified such that the experience of seeing a cat drink milk and make poo is simulated).
Not unless something is somehow interacting with their neurons, which I stated isn’t happening for simplicity, and most of the time not for the blood or flesh.
Oh, I meant the interactions occur where they would if the cat was real, but these increasingly-godlike fairies are lazy and don’t bother producing them if their magic tells them it wouldn’t lead to an observation.
My (admittedly lacking) understanding of Information Theory precludes any possibility of perfectly reproducing all effects of the presence of cats throughout the universe (or multiverse or whatever) without having in some form or another a perfect model or simulation of all the individual interactions of the base elements which cats are made of. This would, as it contains the same patterns within the model which when made of “physical matter” produce cats, essentially still produce cats.
So if there’s a mechanism somewhere making sure that the reproduction is perfect, it’s almost certainly (to my knowledge) “simulating” the cats in some manner, in which case the cats are in that simulation and perceive the same experiences they would if they were “really” there in atoms instead of being in the simulation.
If you posit some kind of ontologically basic entity that somehow magically makes a universal consistency check for the exact worldstates that could plausibly be computed if the cat were present, without actually simulating any cat, then sure… but I think that’s also not the same problem anymore. And it requires accepting a magical premise.
Oh, right. Yup, anything simulating you that perfectly is gonna be conscious—but it might be using magic. For example, perhaps they pull their data out of parallel universe where you ARE real. Or maybe they use some black-swan technique you can’t even imagine. They’re fairies, for godssake. And you’re an invisible cat. Don’t fight the counterfactual.
Haha, that one made me laugh. Yes, it’s fighting the counterfactual a bit, but I think that this is one of the reasons why there was a chasm of misunderstandings in this and other sub-threads.
Anyway, I don’t see any tangible things left to discuss here.
Victory! Possibly for both sides, that could well be what’s causing the chasm.
So you’re saying we shouldn’t believe in ourselves?
To paraphrase EY, What do you think you know [about yourself], and how do you think you know it?
Oh, you mean we shouldn’t assume we’re the same as the other cats. Obviously there’s some possibility that we’re unique, but (assuming our body is “simulated” as well, obviously) it seems like all “cats” probably contain epiphenomenal cats as well. Do you think everyone else is a p-zombie? Obviously it’s a remote possibility, but...
No, I did not mean that, unless one finds some good evidence supporting this additional assumption. My point was quite the opposite, that your statement “if something is reproducing the effect of cats on the world we have no reason to posit cats as existing” does not need a qualifier.
Not sure why you bring that silly concept up…
Look, if all “cats” are actually magical fairies using their magic to reproduce the effect of cats, yet I find myself as a cat—whose effect on the world consists of a fairy pretending to be me so well even I don’t notice (except just now, obviously.). Thus, for the one epiphenomenal cat I can know about—myself—I am associated with a “cat” that perfectly duplicates my actions. I can’t check if all “cats” have similar cats attached, since they would be epiphenomenal, but it seems likely, based on myself, that there are.
Because the whole point of this cat metaphor was to make a point about p-zombies. That’s what they are. They’re p-zombies for cats instead of qualia.
Well, the point was to point out that we only think things exist because we experience them, and therefore that anything which duplicates the experience is as real as the original artifact.
Suppose there were to be no cats, but only a magical fairy which knocks things from the mantlepiece and causes us to hallucinate in a consistent manner (among other things). There is no reason to consider that world distinguishable, even in principle, from the standard model.
Now, suppose that you couldn’t see cats, but instead could see the ‘cat fairy’. What is different now, assuming that the cat fairy is working properly and providing identical sensory input as the cats?
There is no (observable) difference. That’s the point. But presumably someone found a way to check for fairies.
If there is no observable (even in principle) difference, what’s the difference? P-zombies are not intended or described as equivocal to humans.
There are two differences: the presence of the fairy (which can be observed … somehow) and the possibility of deviating from the mind. P-zombies are described as acting just like humans, but lack consciousness. “Cats” are generally like the human counterparts to p-zombies (who act just the same—by definition—but have epiphenomenal consciousness.)
TL;DR: it’s observable in principle. But I, as author, have decreed that you arn’t getting to check if your friends are cats as well as “cats”.
Y’know, I’m starting to think this may have been a poor example. It’s a little complicated.
Complicated isn’t a bad thing;
If the fairy is observable despite being in principle not observable… I break.
If it is in principle possible to experience differently from what a quantum scan of the brain and body would indicate, but behave in accordance with physicalism … how would you know if what you experienced was different from what you thought you experienced, or if what you thought was different from what you honestly claimed that you thought?
That would seem to be close to several types of abnormal brain function, where a person describes themself as not in control of their body. I think those cases are better explained by abnormal internal brain communication, but further direct evidence may show that the ‘reasoning’ and ‘acting’ portions of some person are connected similarly enough to normal brains that they should be working the same way, but aren’t. If there is a demonstrated case either of a pattern of neurons firing corresponding to similar behavior in all typical brains and a different behavior in a class of brains of people with such abnormal functioning (or in physically similar neurons firing differently under similar stimuli), then I would accept that as evidence that the fairy perceived by those people existed.
Well, it’s proving hard to explain.
It’s observable. The cats are epiphenomenal, and thus unobservable, except to themselves.
Pardon?
Well, if they can tell you what the problem is then they clearly have some control. More to the point, it is a known feature of the environment that all observed cats are actually illusions produced by fairies. It is a fact, although not generally known, that there are also epiphenomenal (although acted upon by the environment) cats; these exist in exactly the same space as the illusions and act exactly the same way. If you are a human, this is all fine and dandy, if bizarre. But if you are a sentient cat (roll with it) then you have evidence of the epiphenomenal cats, even though this evidence is inherently subjective (since presumably the illusions are also seemingly sentient, in this case.)
How could you tell if you were experiencing something differently from the way a p-zombie would (or, if you are a p-zombie, if you were experiencing something differently from the way a human would)?
In every meaningful way, the cat fairy is a cat. There is no way for an epiphenomenal sentient cat to differentiate itself from a cat fairy, nor any way for a cat fairy to differentiate itself from whatever portions of ‘cats’ it controls (without violating the constraints on cat fairy behavior). Of course, there’s also the conceivability of epiphenomenal sentient ghosts which cannot have any effect on the world but still observe. (That’s one of my death nightmares—remaining fully perceptive and cognitive but unable to act in any way.)
You seem to be somewhat confused about the notion of a p-zombie. A p-zombie is something physically identical to a human, but without consciousness. A p-zombie does not experience anything in any way at all. P-zombies are probably self-contradictory.
I am experiencing something, therefore I am not a p-zombie.
Consider the possibility that you are not experiencing everything that humans do. Can you provide any evidence, even to yourself, that you are? Could a p-zombie provide that same evidence?
How is this relevant? My point is that I’m experiencing what I’m experiencing.
And p-zombies are experiencing what they’re experiencing. You can’t use a similarity to distinguish.
P-zombies aren’t experiencing anything. By definition.
Those two statements are both tautologically true and do not contradict one another.
What would be different, to you, if you weren’t experiencing anything, but were physically identical?
I wouldn’t be experiencing anything.
I thought it had been established that wasn’t a difference.
Are you asking what I would experience? Because I wouldn’t. Not to mention that such a thing can’t happen if, as I expect, subjective experience arises from physics.
Sorry, I thought you were disagreeing with me.
It is relevant because i you cannot find any experimental differences betweenn you and a you NOT experiencing, then maybe there is no such difference.
I cannot present you with evidence that I am experiencing, except maybe by analogy with yourself. I, however, know that I experience because I experience it.
Because p-zombies aren’t conscious. By definition.
Well, the cat does have an associated cat fairy. So, since the only cat fairy who’s e-cat it could observe (its own) has one, I think it should rightly conclude that all cat fairies have cats. But yes, epiphenomenal sentient “ghosts” are possible, and indeed the p-zombie hypothesis requires that the regular humans are in fact such ghosts. They just don’t notice. Yes, there are people arguing this is true in the real world, although not all of them have worked out the implications.
What would be the subjective difference to you if you weren’t ‘conscious’?
To have a subjective anything, you have to be conscious. By definition, if you consider whether you’re a P-zombie, you’re conscious and hence not one.
Now conceive of something which is similar to consciousness, but distinct; like consciousness, it has no physical effects on the world, and like consciousness, anyone who has it experiences it in a manner distinct from their physicality. Call this ‘magic’, and people who posses it ‘magi’.
What aspect does magic lack that consciousness has, such that a p-zombie cannot consider if it is conscious, but a human can ask if they are a magi?
Who said consciousness has no effects on the physical world? Apart from those idiots making the p-zombie argument that is. Pretty much everyone here thinks that’s nonsense, including me and, statistically, probably srn347 (although you never know, I guess.)
Regarding your Magi, if it affects their brain, it’s not epiphenomenal. So there’s that.
The point I am trying to make is that P-zombies are nonsensical. I’m demonstrating that they are equally sensible as an absurd thing.
And the point I am trying to make is that p-zombies are not only a coherent idea, but compatible with human-standard brains as generally modelled on LW. That they don’t in any way demonstrate the point they were intended to make is quite another thing.
Yes, it merely requires redefining things like ‘conscious’ or ‘experience’ (whatever you decide p-zombies do not have) to be something epiphenomenal and incidentally non-existent.
Um, could you please explain this comment? I think there’s a fair chance you’ve stumbled into the middle of this discussion and don’t know what I’m actually talking about (except that it involves p-zombies, I guess.)
I know only the words spoken, not those intended. (And concluded early in the conversation that the entire subthread should be truncated and replaced with a link). So much confusion and muddled thinking!)
Seems reasonable. For reference, then, I suggested the analogous thought experiment of fairies using magic to reproduce all the effects of cats on the environment. Also, there are epiphenomenal ghost cats that occupy the same space and are otherwise identical to the fairies’ illusions, down to the subatomic level. An outside observer would, of course, have no reason to postulate these epiphenomenal cats, but if the cats themselves were somehow conscious, they would.
This was intended to help with understanding p-zombies, since it avoids the … confusing … aspects.
Like brains and rotting flesh?
Whoops. Changed it to “confusing”.
How is it that something which is physically identical to a human and has a physical difference from a human is a coherent concept?
It’s not. I meant that we can replace the soul or whatever with a neurotypical human brain and still get a coherent thought experiment.
Were you saying that the results of that experiment were completely uninteresting?
Well, I personally find it an interesting concept. It’s basically a reformulation of standard Sequences stuff, though, so it shouldn’t be surprising, at least ’round here.
How does that not apply to qualia, unless we are qualia?
We experience qualia. Just like the cats experience being cats.
EDIT: are you arguing we have insufficient evidence to posit qualia?
I experience qualia in exactly the same sense that I experience cats.
All of the evidence I have to posit qualia is due to effects that qualia have on me. Likewise for cats.
I’m pretty sure this comment means you don’t understand the concept of “qualia”.
How do you experience cats?
Unless you actually understand what “qualia” means, I’m not going to bother discussing the topic with you. If you have, if fact, done the basic research necessary to discuss p-zombies, than I’m probably misinterpreting you in some way. But I don’t think I am.
Oddly enough, I feel that if you had done the basic research and explored the same lines of though I did, you would agree with me.
My questions, by the way, aren’t rhetorical. I’m trying to pin down where your understanding differs from mine.
Neither are mine.