Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!rutgers!princeton!mind!harnad From: harnad@mind.UUCP Newsgroups: comp.ai,comp.cog-eng Subject: Re: Minsky on Mind(s) Message-ID: <471@mind.UUCP> Date: Thu, 29-Jan-87 20:51:19 EST Article-I.D.: mind.471 Posted: Thu Jan 29 20:51:19 1987 Date-Received: Sat, 31-Jan-87 03:46:42 EST References: <463@mind.UUCP> <464@mind.UUCP> <2099@dciem.UUCP> Organization: Cognitive Science, Princeton University Lines: 87 Keywords: processes, consciousness, epiphenomenalism Summary: On the null hypothesis, definition, parsimony and evidence Xref: watmath comp.ai:189 comp.cog-eng:47 mmt@dciem.UUCP (Martin Taylor) of D.C.I.E.M., Toronto, Canada, writes: > Of course [rooms and corporations] do not feel pain as we do, > but they might feel pain, as we do. The solution is not in the punctuation, I'm afraid. Pain is just an example standing in for whether the candidate experiences anything AT ALL. It doesn't matter WHAT a candidate feels, but THAT it feels, for it to be conscious. > On what grounds do you require proof that something has consciousness, > rather than proof that it has not? Can there be grounds other than > prejudice (i.e. prior judgment that consciousness in non-humans is > overwhelmingly unlikely?). First, none of this has anything to do with proof. We're trying to make empirical inferences here, not mathematical deductions. Second, even as empirical evidence, the Total Turing Test (TTT) is not evidential in the usual way, because of the mind/body problem (private vs. public events; objective vs. subjective inferences). Third, the natural null hypothesis seems to be that an object is NOT conscious, pending evidence to the contrary, just as the natural null hypothesis is that an object is, say, not alive, radioactive or massless until shown otherwise. -- Yes, the grounds for the null hypothesis are that the presence of consciousness is more likely than its absence; the alternative is animism. But no, the complement to the set of probably-conscious entities is not "non-human," because animals are (at least to me) just about as likely to be conscious as other humans are (although one's intuitions get weaker down the phylogenetic scale); the complement is "inanimate." All of these are quite natural and readily defensible default assumptions rather than prejudices. > [i] Occam's razor demands that we describe the world using the simplest > possible hypotheses. > [ii] It seems to me simpler to ascribe consciousness to an entity that > resembles me in many ways than not to ascribe consciousness to that > entity. > [iii] I don't think one CAN use the TTT to assess whether another > entity is conscious. > [iv] Silicon-based entities have few overt points of resemblance, > so their behaviour has to be convincingly like mine before I will > grant them a consciousness like mine. {i} Why do you think animism is simpler than its alternative? {ii} Everything resembles everything else in an infinite number of ways; the problem is sorting out which of the similarities is relevant. {iii} The Total Turing Test (a variant of my own devise, not to be confused with the classical turing test -- see prior chapters in these discussions) is the only relevant criterion that has so far been proposed and defended. Similarities of appearance are obvious nonstarters, including the "appearance" of the nervous system to untutored inspection. Similarities of "function," on the other hand, are moot, pending the empirical outcome of the investigation of what functions will successfully generate what performances (the TTT). {iv} [iv] seems to be in contradiction with [iii]. > The problem splits in two ways: (1) Define consciousness so that it does > not involve a reference to me, or (2) Find a way of describing behaviour > that is simpler than ascribing consciousness to me alone. Only if you > can fulfil one of these conditions can there be a sensible argument > about the consciousness of some entity other than ME. It never ceases to amaze me how many people think this problem is one that is to be solved by "definition." To redefine consciousness as something non-subjective is not to solve the problem but to beg the question. [The TTT, by the way, I proposed as logically the strongest (objective) evidence for inferring consciousness in entities other than oneself; it also seems to be the only methodologically defensible evidence; it's what all other (objective) evidence must ultimately be validated against; moreover, it's already what we use in contending with the other-minds problem intuitively every day. Yet the TTT remains more fallible than conventional inferential hypotheses (let alone proof) because it is really only a pragmatic conjecture rather than a "solution." It's only good up to turing-indistinguishability, which is good enough for the rest of objective empirical science, but not good enough to handle the problem of subjectivity -- otherwise known as the mind/body problem.] -- Stevan Harnad (609) - 921 7771 {allegra, bellcore, seismo, rutgers, packard} !princeton!mind!harnad harnad%mind@princeton.csnet