On 01/06/07, Torgny Tholerus <torgny.domain.name.hidden> wrote:
>
> Stathis Papaioannou skrev:
>
> On 01/06/07, Torgny Tholerus <torgny.domain.name.hidden> wrote:
>
> I behave AS IF I am conscious because the natural selection has favored
> > that type of behavior.
> >
>
> Which implies you really are conscious, because otherwise why would
> evolution have gone to the trouble of making *me* conscious if it could have
> got away without it?
>
> It did got away without it... ;-)
>
I assure you, at least one entity in the universe is conscious: me. If
evolution could have made me a zombie, it would have. Therefore, it seems
reasonable to assume that evolution couldn't help but grant me consciousness
as a side-effect or epiphenomenon, the real prize being intelligent
behaviour. There are some philosophers (eg. Daniel Dennett) who would argue
that consciousness is *nothing but* this intelligent behaviour, and the idea
of a zombie is logically incoherent, but I'm not entirely convinced that
this is right.
--
Stathis Papaioannou
--~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group.
To post to this group, send email to everything-list.domain.name.hidden
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list-unsubscribe.domain.name.hidden
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en
-~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
Received on Fri Jun 01 2007 - 09:53:10 PDT