Re: Testing Consciousness
- From: "JGCASEY" <jgkjcasey@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: 14 Nov 2005 12:21:06 -0800
iAgent wrote:
> Consciousness has always been a big question
> bugging my mind especially creation of
> consciousness.
> We may build robots that show that they are
> conscious. But can we build robots that are
> really conscious.
We don't know the answer to that one, yet.
Wofl Kirchmeir wrote:
> What is "really conscious"? If you can't tell
> the difference between conscious behavior and
> "really" conscious behavior, then there is no
> difference.
But for yourself, assuming you are in fact
conscious at times, you can tell the difference.
That twitch is not a conscious action. That
conversation you are not listening to you are
not conscious of. Want more examples?
For someone who is color blind two colors may
appear to have no difference. It doesn't mean
there is no difference.
During the time when the autostereograms came
out my optometrist, who couldn't see in stereo
at all due to some early eye defect, suggested
it was some kind of self deception.
Grasping the strangeness of being "alive" isn't
easy when you are so tied up with the everyday.
When I get people to really stop and experience
the NOW and the strangeness of being alive I
often get a "Oh, that's eerie!". Just as some
never see the autostereograms some never get
what I am suggesting they do.
Those who don't really get to "feel" it don't
get it. It is simply like observing that red and
green are of different light wave frequencies
without having the qualia. It is simply an
observation of no importance, "probably due to
some kind of complex feedback or something."
"Just an illusion due to our self talk verbal
behavior" etc.
> You may want to argue that a certain level of
> complexity in organization must accompany
> "real" consciousness, but you will then have to
> justify that criterion, and further justify why
> that level and not a greater or lesser one.
> Always assuming, of course, that you can define
> complexity so that it can be measured (one
> observer's complexity is another observers'
> simplicity.) And so on.
The degree of complexity that might be required
for "consciousness" is unknown but complexity
itself would not be sufficient as our complex
brains are not always "conscious".
> So far, no machine/robot has displayed more that
> a few oddments of "conscious behavior", hence
> we do not ascribe consciousness to them.
>
> Can you tell whether this was written by a
> conscious person, or by a program written by
> a subtle and ingenious programmer?
Consciousness is always singular. You can never
tell if someone else is conscious only infer
they might be. Consciousness has no objective
reality except the clinical definitions which
test for reactivity to external stimuli. This
may have to be extended to monitoring brain
activity as some patients who have failed these
tests have later declared they were conscious.
JGC
.
- References:
- Testing Consciousness
- From: iAgent
- Re: Testing Consciousness
- From: Wolf Kirchmeir
- Testing Consciousness
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