Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!asuvax!ukma!rex!wuarchive!udel!rochester!uhura.cc.rochester.edu!ub!ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu!oistony From: oistony@ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu (Anthony Petro) Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy Subject: Re: Conciousness Message-ID: <74193@eerie.acsu.Buffalo.EDU> Date: 1 May 91 17:24:31 GMT References: <2102@seti.inria.fr> <2124@seti.inria.fr> <11611@uwm.edu> Sender: news@acsu.Buffalo.EDU Reply-To: oistony@ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu Organization: University at Buffalo Lines: 75 Nntp-Posting-Host: ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.3-4.5 In article <11611@uwm.edu>, markh@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (Mark William Hopkins) writes... >Some answers... > >In article <2124@seti.inria.fr> ziane@nuri.inria.fr (ziane mikal @) writes: >>I can easily immagine an intelligent computer and I can also immagine >>a computer with a conciousness. However I have some difficulty to immagine >>a computer having pain. I have some difficulty to understand what it means. > >Consciousness pervades everything even "inanimate" objects like machines. >What makes us different from objects is only that we have sufficient >intelligence and self-awareness to see that part that pervades us. > >A neurocomputer that becomes intelligent will not suddenly become conscious. >It always was. What it WILL suddenly become is AWARE of that fact... this is most interesting, particularly in that the exact opposite may be surmised. dennett's intentionality proposes that everything has some degree of intelligence or "intentionality," the extent determined by the degree of internal representation of its environment the thing has. however, an intentional system need not be conscious, and that's what supposedly makes humans different. i'm not sure exactly how important orders of consciousness are, but i imagine that at least a self-consciousness such as we ourselves posess would be the necessary criterion for pain. then again, this also causes problems when one considers animals: certainly animals seem self-conscious enough to feel pain, but are they self-conscious enough to be aware of their own existence? dennett provides an interesting insight to this in _the intentional stance_ in, i believe, the "reflections" on one of his chapter-papers. >So it's not whether it experiences pain or not, it's whether it knows it's >experiencing pain or not. Pain won't even bother me, a fully cognizant and >intelligent being, if I don't know it's there (like when under anaesthesia). pain seems to be linked with consciousness and not intelligence. it seems to me that to experience pain one must KNOW one is experiencing pain. i don't see how the two are different; it seems nonsensical to me to say "he's experiencing pain but doesn't know it." note that it is not necessary to know what pain IS to experience it, just to know that it is in fact extant in my body at a given time. if i do not know it is there/do not experience it [pain], then pain does not exist... i don't see how i could be unconscious and said to be in pain. pain, then, seems to serve as an indicator of consciousness, perhaps a safety net that evolved to keep conscious beings conscious/alive. hence a nonconscious but intelligent computer, a la dennett, could not feel pain, whereas a conscious one could (or perhaps the presence of pain would be the criterion for consciousness). >>Any reference about the classic "other minds" problem ? > >There's only one consciousness, that's why we all only experience one... i don't see how this follows, mostly because i don't understand the consqeuent here; what do you mean by "we all only experience one?" personally, i find the intentional argument for pan-intelligence easier to fathom than pan-consciousness. but then, i'm not sure what it would mean to be conscious but not intelligent; seems to me that it might be possible to be intelligent and not conscious, but not possible to be conscious but not intelligent... personal disclaimer: it's finals time and my brain is not operating at maximum lucidity. if i've made any gross conceptual errors, please excuse them... anthony m. petro "beethoven" i can say what i want; i'm just an undergrad oistony@UBVMSD.BITNET "frame by frame, oistony@mednet.bitnet death by drowning, petro@sun.acsu.buffalo.edu in your own in your own... analysis..."