Consciousness Is Not Physical
lukesmith.xyz
lukesmith.xyz
> It’s important to note that there is a universal range of all mathematical functions: they can only output…. well, numbers.
That isn't even remotely true. Not even digging far, you have higher order functions which takes functions as arguments. You have functions on more abstract algebraic sets.
> You will never see a calculator give you the word “buttercup” or the symbol “” be the output of a function, nor will a sufficiently complex function arise that outputs not just a non-numerical character, but say, a living animal or a distinct smell. You could devise a machine that outputs non-mathematical things when a function takes a certain input, but that is something built outside of this formal system which is the pure realm and ontology of math. Math has a certain ontology which cannot create from itself something of a new or different ontology. This is obvious.
A smell is chemical reaction in your nose between two molecules which triggers a certain electrical impulse propagated to your neurons. You can _argue_ that what happens then is outside the ontology of the material world, but the fact that a smell is not a number has like zero connection to that, so you haven't proven squat.
> that unconscious and unspiritual cosmos of matter is precisely a massive material calculator, we should also realize that it as well cannot create a new distinct ontology out of itself alone—it cannot generate from itself something that is not a physical force of some type or complexity.
What do you mean by a calculator? How can the universe be a calculator if a calculator only deals with numbers (according to your reductive point) yet the universe is also comprised of things that's aren't numbers? You see how that doesn't work out? You can't take a reductive point of view when it suits you and contrast it with non-reductive statements just because.
Also what is "a physical force of some type or complexity" even about?
I'm going to stop here. This is worse than AI slop, it's nonsense.
1. strap author to an operating table
2. trepan a hole in his skull
3. vacuum out his brain
4. ask him to repeat his claim
you just destroyed the antenna and you claim the station is gone.
sure, sure, you will insist the burden of proof is on me, or suggest more violent imagery, or both.
you didn’t actually want to engage.
The information aka "meaningful patterns" exist only in your head, as an artifact of baseline biology, behaviorial modification, and long term memories.
Consciousness is physical.
As for a less violent procedure, you could give the author some anesthetic and ask him to repeat the claim.
In your radio - antenna analogy, this would be what, similar to disconnecting the antenna from the amplifier circuit, a physical alteration, which alters demonstrated consciousness.
The debate seems to stem from, is consciousness the sensory input aka information itself, or is consciousness the ability to process, respond, and adapt to information ?
I argue the later because the information itself is meaningless without a human brain to ascribe meaning.
Furthermore, the meaning of the information is different, depending on the brain and nervous system processing it.
Humans swat flies. Lizards and frogs eat them.
Same events. Same information. Different meanings, different responses, different consciousness.
consciousness, a psychological condition defined by the English philosopher John Locke as “the perception of what passes in a man’s own mind.”
Lobotomies, however they be performed, physical or chemical, alter "the perception of what passes in a mans own mind" as reported and demonstrated by the recipients, while sharing the exact same root biology and environment as the executioners of said procedure.
Are we not judging the quality of others consciousness on an individual level, and ascribing meaning to the information we received while observing the others behavior ?
Ones "class" is the metric we ascribe to our perception of anothers consciousness.
Attacking the analogy doesn’t resolve the actual uncertainty. Which is the difference between what we are doing. You insist certainty. I’m insisting that’s a bit silly.
Thanks for the discussion.