2008/12/1 Abram Demski <abramdemski.domain.name.hidden>:
> "Yes, consciousness supervenes on computation, but that computation
> needs to actually take place (meaning, physically). Otherwise, how
> could consciousness supervene on it? Now, in order for a computation
> to be physically instantiated, the physical instantiation needs to
> satisfy a few properties. One of these properties is clearly some sort
> of isomorphism between the computation and the physical instantiation:
> the actual steps of the computation are represented in physical form.
> A less obvious requirement is that the physical computation needs to
> have the proper counterfactuals: if some external force were to modify
> some step in the computation, the computation must progress according
> to the new computational state (as translated by the isomorphism)."
So if you destroy the counterfactual behaviour by removing components
that are not utilised, you end up with a recording-equivalent, which
isn't conscious. But what if you destroy the counterfactual behaviour
by another means? For example, if I wear a device that will instantly
kill me if I deviate from a particular behaviour, randomly determined
by the device from moment to moment, but survive, will my
consciousness be diminished as a result? You might say, no, because if
the device were not there I would have been able to handle the
counterfactuals. But then it might also be argued for the first
example that if the unused components had not been removed, the
recording-equivalent would also have been able to handle the
counterfactuals; and you can make this more concrete by having the
extra machinery waiting to be dropped into place in a counterfactual
universe.
--
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 Dec 05 2008 - 04:00:40 PST