I don't have a dog. So maybe this is bending the thread too far for Nick. But when Dusty expresses
self-awareness by behaving similar to Jackson, this is the self-as-other or other-as-self
reflection concept. Dusty could merely be "conscious of" Jackson, not herself. Perhaps
mimicry is upstream of consciousness. And perhaps classification/similarity, more recognizable
doings versus less recognizable doings, is upstream of mimicry, which is more fodder for the
argument that an LLM will eventually be able to do this, though perhaps not "by itself".
On 7/15/24 10:50, Prof David West wrote:
I agree that each is conscious of each other.
Yes, the second one is tricky, so i will take it in parts.
Dusty is conscious of Dusty. One reason: I give Jackson (my other dog) a treat and
observe body language and facial expressions exhibited by Dusty that I interpret as,
"where's mine?" This indicates to me some kind of Dusty
self-awareness/consciousness of self.
Dave is conscious of Dave.
1) Naive but evident: bullet clips ear—immediate utterance, "*_I'm_* hit."
(utterance is observable behavior)
2) Muddled: noise emanates between navel and spine, sometimes utterance is *_I'm_*
hungry; sometimes "stomach empty," sometimes no utterance at all.
3) Contrarian: extended mediation using the Koan "Who Am I" with each posited answer
rejected until no "I" remains. (A state of existence with zero differentiation between
'observer' and 'observed' // 'conscious' and 'conscious-of'.)
4) Meta: [various ways to achieve, but most blatant is LSD]:
conscious/aware of consciousness and ITS-BEING-CONSCIOUS. (A program is
aware/conscious of itself as ephemeral sequence of [voltage | voltage-not]
?)
Tricky bits:
A-Cases 1) and 2) can quickly devolve into a kind of circular reasoning:
dave is conscious of dave because dave seems to be conscious of dave; or some
kind of argument by authority: dave is conscious of dave because Nick heard
utterances that are interpretable as dave is conscious of dave; or, blaming
language because of the centrality of the verb to-be.
Cases 3) and 4) represent the kind of point-of-departure I warned about earlier—excluded
from the conversation because they are not shared, not logical, not
"scientific."
davew
On Mon, Jul 15, 2024, at 11:43 AM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:
Hi, Prof Dave n all,
I would like us to come back to this point:
/*Is Dusty (Dave) conscious of Dave (Dusty).*/
/*Is Dusty (Dave) conscious of Dusty (Dave).*/
Using our progress around the word Love, I feel like we ought to be able to
agree on the first two propositions. We agree that the two particiants are
consciouus of one another.
So, if I am correct about that, could we move on to dis cuss the second pair,
whether each of the two is conscious of themself.
This is really truicky and, to be honest, I have no idea where it comes out.
Nick
On Fri, Jul 12, 2024 at 12:59 PM Nicholas Thompson <thompnicks...@gmail.com
<mailto:thompnicks...@gmail.com>> wrote:
[Please, Friammers,, if you join this discussion, stay close to this or
other closely related down-to-earth experiences.
Dave, you offer as data:
/*Dave is sleepy and calm.*/
/*Dusty is anxious and afraid.*/
/*Dusty crawls onto Dave's shoulder and finds reassurance and security.*/
/*Dave is tolerant and does not shove Dusty off bed.*/
/*Dave senses Dusty's need for reassurance and rests his arm across her
back and lets her stay as she is.*/
/*Dusty relaxes and goes to sleep.*/
/**/
You then offer the following guide to interpretation:
/*Love is not present in this transaction, unless you presume that a series
of prior interactions created a kind of meta-state of Lovingness between the
two*/
I agree with you that love is a meta state in the sense that it is an
arrangement of other behavioral states. So I will leave that alone. Having so
stipulated, I think it is reasonable to say, on the basis of the data you set
forth, that a meta-state of lovingness exists between you. (I would prefer to
say you love one another, but partly in deference to SG, I will adopt your
lingo.] To call your joint behavior loving is to perform an abduction. The
test of an abduction is to examine the deductions that flow from it:
So, if Dave and Dusty have a loving relationship, then, on my
understanding, the following would be true:
/*You would protect one another against harm.*/
/*You would attend to one another if either was sick, injured, or
depressed.*/
/*You would become uneasy if you were separated for an unexpectedly long
time.*/
Are these things true?
Nick
--
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