Brent Meeker writes:
> > Maybe there is something about my brain that would render me unconscious if all outside
> > input stopped, but that seems to me a contingent fact about brains, like the fact that I
> > would be rendered unconscious if my oxygen supply were cut off. A hallucination is defined
> > as a perception without a stimulus
>
> Not really; it may just be a perception that doesn't match the stimulus, e.g. a
> perception of Christ brought about by hearing certain piece of music.
In psychiatry, a misperception is called an "illusion", a perception without a stimulus is called a
"hallucination". But I accept I've misused the term "isomorphism" as described below.
> >and there are millions of people in the world who have
> > hallucinations all the time. Sometimes people are so overwhelmed by hallucinatory experiences
> > that you could saw their leg off and they don't notice, which is in part how dissociative
> > anaesthetics like ketamine work. If you like, you can say that consciousness is maintained by
> > one part of the brain interacting with another part of the brain: one part is program, the other
> > part data, or one part is computer, the other part environment. The point is, whatever you
> > choose to call it, an isolated physical system can experience consciousness.
>
> I won't insist, because you might be right, but I don't think that is proven. It may
> be that interaction with the environment is essential to continued consciousness.
But surely even if this is so for all brains evolved on Earth it is not logically necessary
for every possible conscious machine.
> >>>The conclusion I therefore draw from computationalism is that every possible
> >>>conscious computation is implemented necessarily if any physical process exists.
> >>
> >>That would seem to require mappings that are not isomorphisms.
> >
> >
> > How do you define the non-isomorphic mappings?
>
> Consider the physical process "tick tock tick tock..." There are only two states so
> it can be isomorphic to "1010101..." or "abababa...". But it cannot be isomorphic to
> a process "rock scissors paper rock scissors paper..." with three states. There can
> be a mapping between them: there can be a mapping between "1" and the content of the
> Oxford English Dictionary, but there's no "iso" about the morphism unless there is
> some structure that is preserved by the mapping.
>
> >>>This seems to me very close to saying that every conscious computation is
> >>>implemented necessarily in Platonia, as the physical reality seems hardly
> >>>relevant.
> >>
> >>It seems to me to be very close to a reductio ad absurdum.
> >
> >
> > Like Bruno, I am not claiming that this is definitely the case, just that it is the case if
> > computationalism is true. Several philosophers (eg. Searle) have used the self-evident
> > absurdity of the idea as an argument demonstrating that computationalism is false -
> > that there is something non-computational about brains and consciousness. I have not
> > yet heard an argument that rejects this idea and saves computationalism. Personally,
> > I would bet in favour of computationalism being true, but I cannot say that I am sure.
> >
> > Stathis Papaioannou
>
> I would bet on computationalism too. But I still think the conclusion that every
> physical process, even the null one, necessarily implements all possible
> consciousness is absurd.
What about the idea that every possible consciousness is implemented necessarily, without
the need for a physical substrate? In discussing Tim Maudlin's paper, Bruno has concluded
that either computationalism is false or the supervenience theory is false. Both Bruno and
Maudlin take it as given that the idea of a recording or any physical system implementing
every conscious process is absurd, but I hold on to the only empirical fact in all this, which is
that *some* physical system implements *some* consciousness.
It could be argued that even if there were some ultimate physical basis to consciousness the
possibilty of infinitely nested virtual realities makes the probability that my current experience is
based on that "bottom" level zero, and therefore the starting premiss that there is at least one
physically implemented consciousness spurious, but that's starting to get circular...
Stathis Papaioannou
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Received on Sat Sep 09 2006 - 02:24:06 PDT