David Nyman wrote:
> On Oct 10, 2:56 pm, "1Z" <peterdjo....domain.name.hidden> wrote:
>
> > > If you aren't in fact
> > > claiming this, then your appeal to 'computation' as picking out the
> > > relevant properties can be valid only in the context of *specific*, not
> > > generalised, instantiations, and thus becomes merely a shorthand for
> > > decribing tightly constrained activities of just *those* physical
> > > systems.
> >
> > I have no idea how you come to that conclusion.
>
> I don't see how you can *avoid* this conclusion, unless you've landed
> on some unexcluded middle position that I fail to grasp. If
> computationalists claim the same set of properties as are picked out by
> *any* instantiation of a computation are also responsible for a stable
> state of consciousness, then they simply aren't being serious about the
> 'physical' aspect of these 'properties'. Any relationship whatever
> between the properties that support computation, and those putatively
> reponsible for any 1-person state of the machine,
The claim of computationalism is that the relationship
between the properties that support (a particular kind of)
computation , and those putatively reponsible for any 1-person state of
the machine,
are identical. ie, physical systems are conscious because of their
cpmputional properties, and only
indirectly because of the physical properties that support he
computation.
> is *irrelevant* to
> the causal explanation of the computation (i.e. such a state could vary
> wildly with the instantiation, but this would have no effect whatsover
> on the computation *qua computation*).
Some causation is required for computation, and *some*
properties are required for causation. So far, everything
is compatible with materialism (ie the claim that "material things are
the only things").
> However, it's precisely what
> *must* be relevant if the internal state is to be determined by those
> selfsame properties.
If the computation that produces consciousness is "computation C",
then "computation C" will not be produced by any set of properties,
so in that sense the properties are relevant. Is that the problem?
Or do you think that different sets of properties must
produce different conscious states? That is not
an implication of the supervenience of consciousness on
the physical. Supervenience only requires that
the same mental state is always
associated with the same physical one.
Of course the same physical state will
produce the same computational state...
> To claim that the *same* 1-person state is
> generated by wildly variable sets of properties, is precisely to say
> that such 'properties' - i.e. whatever material aspects they are
> supposed to pick out - are in effect *irrelevant* to the state.
What is relevant is relations between the properties, ATC.
That is the properties are neither irrelevant
nor relevant in the way suggested by token-token identity (which is
what you seem to be assuming).
> This
> appears to be flatly contradictory, unless in effect the 'properties'
> so picked out are not in any meaningful sense 'physical' - i.e. they
> are purely relational.
I am not clear why you would call that meaningless.
That is still miles form Bruno-style non-physicalism,
in which neither matter nor space nor time
nor any physical property at all is needed.
But I am not arguing that computationalism
is compatible with physicalism I am arguing that computationalism
is compatible with materialsim -- "matter exists".
> In this case, I would have to agree with Bruno
> that 'matter' is simply being deployed as a placeholder for relata,
That's a feature, not a bug.
> and
> has no further explanatory role (except existence, of course - your
> sticking point, I think).
That would be a redundancy argument,. not an incompatibility
(contradiction) argument.
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Received on Tue Oct 10 2006 - 15:29:25 PDT