>>
>> Except that in time, as people realise what I just said above, the
>> hypothesis has some emprical support: If the universe were made of
>> appearances when we opened up a cranium we'd see them. We don't.
>
> Or appearances don't appear to be appearances to a third party.
>
Precisely. Now ask yourself...
"What kind of universe could make that possible?"
It is not the kind of universe depicted by laws created using appearances.
>> > I do need some rules or knowledge to begin with if I
>> > am to get anywhere with interpreting sense data.
>>
>> You do NOT interpret sense data! In consciuous activity
>> you interpret the phenomenal scene generated using the
>> sense data.
>
> But that is itself an interpetation for reasons you yourself have
> spelt out. Sensory pulse-trains don't have any meaning in themselves.
An interpretation that is hard-coded into your biology a-priori. You do
not manufacture it from your own knowledge (unless you are hallucinating!)
your knowledge is a-poteriori.
>
>> Habituated/unconscious
>> reflex behaviour with fixed rules uses sense data directly.
>
> Does that make it impossible to have
> adaptive responses to sense data?
Not at all. That adaptation is based on what rule acquired how? Adaptation
is another rule assuming the meaning of all novelty. Where does that come
from? You're stuck in a loop assuming your knowledge is in the zombie.
Stop it!
>
>
>> Think about driving home on a well travelled route. You don't even know
>> how you got home. Yet if something unusual happened on the drive - ZAP -
>> phenomenality kicks in and phenomenal consciousness handles the
>> novelty.>
>
> Is that your only evidence for saying that it is impossible
> to cope with novelty without phenomenality?
I am claiming that the only way to find out the laws of nature is through
the capcity to experience the novelty in the natural world OUTSIDE the
scientist, not the novelty in the sensory data.
This is about science, not any old behaviour. The fact is that most
novelty can be handled by any old survivable rule. That rule is just a
behaviour rule, not a law of the natural world. The scientist needs to be
able to act 'as-if' a rule was operating OUTSIDE themselves in order that
testing happen.
>
>> > With living organisms, evolution provides this
>> > knowledge
>>
>> Evolution provided
>> a) a learning tool(brain) that knows how to learn from phenomenal
>> consciousness, which is an adaptive presentation of real
>> external world a-priori knowledge.
>> b) Certain simple reflex behaviours.
>>
>> > while with machines the designers provide it.
>>
>> Machine providers do not provide (a)
>
>
>> They only provide (b), which includes any adaptivity rules, which are
>> just
>> more rules.
>
> How do you know that (a) isn't "just" rules? What's the difference?
Yes rules in our DNA give us the capacity to create the scenes in a
repeatable way. Those are natural rules. (Not made BY us). The physics
that actually does it in response to the sensory data is a natural rule.
The physics that makes it an experience is another natural rule. All these
are natural rules.
You are assuming that rules are experienced, regardless of their form. You
are basing this assumption on your own belief (asnother assumption) that
we know everything there is to know about physics. You act in denial of
something you can prove to yourself exists with simple experiments.
You should be proving to me why we don't need phenomenal consciousness,
not the other way around.
>
> You seem to think there is an ontological gulf between (a) and (b). But
> that seems arbitrary.
Only under the assumptions mentioned above. These are assumptions I do not
make.
>>
>> Amazing but true. Trial and error. Hypothesis/Test in a brutal live or
>> die laboratory called The Earth.... Notice that the process
>> selected for phenomenal consciousness early on....
>
> But that slides past the point. The development of phenomenal
> consciousness was an adaptation that occurred without PC.
>
> Hence, PC is not necessary for all adaptation.
I am not claiming that. I am claiming it is necessary for scientific
behaviour. It can be optional in an artifact or animal. The constraints of
that situation merely need to be consistent with survival. The fact that
most animals have it is proof of its efficacy as a knowledge source, not a
disproof of my claim.
Read the rest of my paragraph before you blurt.
>
>> which I predict will eventually be
>> proven to exist in nearly all animal cellular life (vertebrate and
>> invertebrate and even single celled organisms) to some extent. Maybe
>> even
>> in some plant life.
>>
>> 'Technology' is a loaded word...I suppose I mean 'human made'
>> technology.
>> Notice that chairs and digital watches did not evolve independently of
>> humans. Nor did science. Novel technology could be re-termed 'non-DNA
>> based technology, I suppose. A bird flies. So do planes. One is DNA
>> based.
>> The other not DNA based, but created by a DNA based creature called the
>> human. Eventually conscious machines will create novel technology too -
>> including new versions of themselves. It doesn't change any part of the
>> propositions I make - just contextualises them inside a fascinating
>> story.
>>
>> Colin Hales
>
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Received on Sun Nov 26 2006 - 17:14:55 PST