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From: harnad@mind.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.ai,comp.cog-eng
Subject: Re: Evolution of consciousness
Message-ID: <562@mind.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 25-Feb-87 09:32:04 EST
Article-I.D.: mind.562
Posted: Wed Feb 25 09:32:04 1987
Date-Received: Fri, 27-Feb-87 07:29:15 EST
References: <552@mind.UUCP> <807@houem.UUCP>
Organization: Cognitive Science, Princeton University
Lines: 49
Keywords: function, cause, methodological epiphenomenalism, explanation vs. interpretation
Xref: utgpu comp.ai:260 comp.cog-eng:70
Summary: Without an independent functional role, consciousness is irrelevant to a functional explanation



M. B. Brilliant (marty1@houem.UUCP) of AT&T-BL HO 3D-520 asks:

>	In 25 words or less, what's methodological epiphenomenalism?

Your own reply (less a few words) defines it well enough:

>	I propose that we ignore [the philosophy] and get on with the
>	engineering. [We already know how] to build systems that interact as
>	though they were conscious.  Even if a criterion could be devised to
>	tell whether X is "actually" conscious, not just "seemingly" conscious,
>	we don't need it to build [functionally] conscious systems.

Except that we DON'T already know how. This ought to read: "We should get
down to trying" to build systems that can pass the Total Turing Test (TTT)
-- i.e., are completely performance-indistinguishable from conscious
creatures like ourselves.  Also, there is (and can be) no other functional
criterion than the TTT, so "seemingly" conscious is as close as we will
ever get. Hence there's nothing gained (and a lot masked and even lost)
from focusing on interpreting trivial performance as conscious instead
of on strengthening it. What we should ignore is conscious interpretation:
That's a good philosophy. And I've dubbed it "methodological epiphenomenalism."

>	Thus, the evolutionary advantage of consciousness in primates (the
>	actuality as well as the appearance) is that it facilitates such social
>	interactions as communication and cooperation.  The advantage of
>	building consciousness into computer programs (now I refer to the
>	appearance, since I can't empathize with a computer program) is the
>	same: to facilitate communication and cooperation.

This simply does not follow from the foregoing (in fact, it's at odds
with it). Not even a hint is given about the FUNCTIONAL advantage (or even
the functional role) of either actually being conscious or even of appearing
conscious.  "Communication-and-cooperation" -- be it ever as "seemingly
conscious" as you wish -- does not answer the question about what functional
role consciousness plays, it simply presupposes it. Why aren't communication
and cooperation accomplished unconsciously? What is the FUNCTIONAL
advantage of conscious communication and cooperation? How we feel about one
another and about the devices we build is beside the point (except for
the informal TTT). It concerns the phenomenological and ontological
fact of consciousness, not its functional role, which (if there were
any) would be all that was relevant to mind engineering. That's
methodological epiphenomenalism.
-- 

Stevan Harnad                                  (609) - 921 7771
{allegra, bellcore, seismo, rutgers, packard}  !princeton!mind!harnad
harnad%mind@princeton.csnet