Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
>
> Brent Meeker writes:
>
> > > > Assuming that consciousness supervenes on the physics, this follows
> > > just from the continuity of the physics. But it doesn't follow that
> > > there is some experience corresponding to 1msec of brain processing
> - it
> > > might be that "seeing the flash" spans some time interval.
> > >
> > > That's true, but it still allows that the process underpinning
> > > consciousness can be arbitrarily divided up. I think others on the
> list
> > > have used "observer moment" to mean these arbitrarily small time
> slices,
> > > even though you can't actually observe anything during one of them.
> > >
> > > Stathis Papaioannou
> >
> > OK, but that means "observer moments" are not fundamental and the
> "illusion" of their continuity may be provided by the continuity of
> their underpinning. But I don't see how a strictly stepwise discrete
> process as contemplated in the UD can provide that continuity. It was my
> understanding that it assumed consciousness could be provided by a
> series of disjoint states.
> >
> > Brent Meeker
>
> It's an assumption of computationalism that the discrete computational
> steps will lead to continuity of consciousness. Moreover, it's an
> assumption of computationalism that a discontinuity in substrate of
> implementation (i.e. from brain to digital computer) will preserve
> continuity of consciousness.
Maybe that assumption is inconsistent.
Computational steps have an order in Platonia. In implementing them in the material world, as in a computer, the sequentiallity (is that a word?) of the steps is provided by the underlying physics just as the 1s and 0s are provided by switches. But without the continuity of the substrate it seems the states need some axiomatic, inherent order as in Platonia. So then it is not clear that states can be chopped arbitrarily finely and still function as computations - or a stream of conscious states.
Brent Meeker
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Received on Sun Jan 28 2007 - 22:01:42 PST