On Saturday, February 8, 2014 8:47:26 PM UTC-5, stathisp wrote: > > On 7 February 2014 07:47, Bruno Marchal <[email protected] <javascript:>> > wrote: > > >> Well, I *could* be a zombie and still say that, unless you consider > >> the idea of zombies contradictory (which maybe it is). > > > > > > I bet you are not a zombie. But you seem to illustrate my point, if > > epiphenomenalism is true, despite you are not a zombie, you could be > one, > > and that is a step toward the elimination of the person. > > I know I'm not a zombie, but you don't know that.
You might know it intuitively, but not be able to justify it logically. Craig > I don't know how you > would bet on it either, since you could not prove it in order to get > your payout! The most you can know is that if a certain substitution > is made in by brain then *if* I am conscious I will continue to be > conscious. > > >>> You could say "I have headache", which is a first person experience, > and, > >>> for that reason I will take an aspirin, yet the existence of that > first > >>> person headache is not used by my brain to make me taking the aspirin. > >>> That > >>> seems close to non-sense to me. It prevents you to be a zombie, but > makes > >>> you deluded in all high level person behavior. > >> > >> > >> A zombie would take an aspirin as well, wouldn't it? Otherwise its > >> zombie deception would be obvious. > > > > > > Sure, he would take aspirin, coffee, and many things. We do agree on the > > definition of zombie. > > They act like any acting human. By definition p-zombiness is not > > behaviorally detectable. > > > > > > > > > >> > >>> In fact, we don't even need to talk on consciousness. I think it makes > >>> sense > >>> to say that a program can have a high level causal efficacy, even when > >>> the > >>> behavior does not violate the laws of physics or arithmetic which > >>> supports > >>> that high level efficacy. > >>> > >>> For example, nobody will say that Deep Blue win the chess tournament, > >>> because this NAND receives this inputs and then (followed by a lengthy > >>> description of all the low level happenings). > >>> > >>> We will explain deep blue behavior in terms of most of its high level > >>> ability. We will say "he lost that game because he did not recognize > that > >>> his opponents has made a Nimzovitch entry", or "he win that game > because > >>> it > >>> tested more possibilities than the opponents". > >>> > >>> That will be the real (or more genuine) explanation, both for the > >>> computer > >>> scientists who programmed deep blue, and for the chess players. > Indeed > >>> the > >>> use of the NAND gates are somehow entirely irrelevant, we could have > >>> programmed deep blue on another type of machine. > >>> > >>> As complex entities, we need to have higher level description and > >>> explanation, and are necessarily ignorant of our lower levels, which > >>> might > >>> only be the support of our explanation, and is different from the more > >>> genuine high level explanation. > >>> > >>> In that way, we can recover the sense of "I take an aspirin because I > >>> have a > >>> persistent headache since the morning". > >>> > >>> God might know that your body takes an aspirin because it obeys to SWE > >>> equation, but the SWE is only a context in which a person with a first > >>> person headache experience can take an aspirin. It is not the cause or > >>> the > >>> explanation of your behavior. You need to be God, to say that your > >>> consciousness has no role, and from God's view, I can make sense, but > >>> everything get wrong, hereby, simply because we are not in that God > >>> position. > >>> > >>> OK? > >> > >> > >> I don't really disagree with any of that, but I would still say that > >> chess program makes moves due to the activity of electrons in > >> semiconductors, > > > > > > You remain locally correct, but that is less easy to do for oneself (as > you > > don't know the level), and if you make consciousness having no role, > because > > its role is subdue to some material causality, then with comp matter > will be > > doubly eliminated, as it will become the illusion of an epiphenomenon. > > > > > > > > > > > >> not because it is exercising a particular strategy > >> except in a manner of speaking. But the substantive point I want to > >> make is that there is no downward causation, > > > > > > I don't think there is any causation at all. Causation is a modal > notion, > > and as to be treated indexically to, and with comp, in a way related to > the > > many computations in arithmetic. > > > > > > > > > > > > > >> for if there were we > >> would observe magical events. If you accept that then I agree with > >> you, any apparent disagreement is really just semantics. > > > > > > We must still discuss if this is very semantics. Some higher level laws > can > > be quite autonomous relatively to lower level laws, and some downard > > causation, even if reductible in theory to particles or numbers, remains > > meaningful at his own level. > > Downward causation would involve, for example, a neuron spontaneously > firing when all the biochemical parameters show that it should not. > That would be something miraculous. It has never been observed, or we > would know there is something very wrong with science. > > > -- > Stathis Papaioannou > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
