[inventtheday]

Actually, computers are conscious as well. Consciousness is simply a system of information that operates on a continuous sense/plan/act loop. You could argue that they are "less" conscious, but to say that they are unconscious is to make the same mistake as people have made for years by saying that computers cannot "understand" anything.

Some people push back on this by saying computers have no sense of self. Thats not true. Most computers do have internal state representations about themselves. Take a driverless car for example. When it does localization, it's constantly referencing its own shape and speed and comparing it to the environment. That's a sense of self.

Whatever philosophical barriers we place between ourselves and machines (and animals/nature for that matter), one thing is for certain: they will eventually debunked.

[westoncb]

This is what's often referred to as the easy problem of consciousness—there is also a 'hard problem' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_problem_of_consciousness). The tricky thing is people often just use 'consciousness' to refer to either, so most discussions of the subject are talking about completely different things.

[inventtheday]

Thats interesting. Thanks for sharing - I'd never come across that term before. Lack of a common definition for consciousness definitely plagues the discussions around it.

In this case though, it is my opinion that there is no definite distinction between the two "types" of consciousness you are referring to. In my opinion, all consciousness exists on one vast spectrum. The distinctions between types are just constructs of human thought that were erected to preserve our sense of self and specialness as people.

[westoncb]

Here's another way of thinking about it: the non-hard problem of consciousness (I think it's unfair to call it the 'easy' problem—though it's definitely easier) deals with the behavior and structure of a system which has some physical incarnation (whether in circuits or neurons or whatever); the hard problem on the other hand is about the subjectivity involved in being the system—which is no longer a question about the behavior/structure of systems.

I think the difference in type of question is like: if our universe is likened to a board game with some finite set of rules, e.g. Monopoly, the 'physics' of this universe is fully determined by the rules of the game (even if there are non-deterministic aspects where you have to e.g. roll dice). The non-hard problem of consciousness is a question in this realm, like "can I sell one of my properties to another player?"; the hard problem is necessarily outside the scope of the rules; it's a question more like, "what is the molecular composition of a 'Chance' card?". Unfortunately, the question is being asked inside of the game and all that's available in attempt to answer it are the constructs and rules from the game.

It's an interesting thing to consider because in some ways what it discusses is what we have the most direct empirical access to—and yet it's also one of the most clearly unapproachable topics which we couldn't usefully say anything definite about (except that its inaccessibility is interesting)

[larsiusprime]

Invoking "that's just a construct of human thought" gets you into philosophically dicey territory, especially if you're using it to dismiss/reduce aspects of human thought. The danger is you are implicitly invoking A to prove not-A.

[inventtheday]

Not exactly. I'm not invoking A, I'm ignoring it on the grounds that it doesn't reflect reality. I don't see any solid, logical grounding to the claim that there are discreet types of consciousness.

[gfodor]

Your last claim may be true, but your assertions don't constitute any form of debunking. We don't have an objectively agreed upon way to measure consciousness (though some have been proposed) so making bold claims like "computers are conscious as well" doesn't make much sense until we agree on a way to measure and experiment on the presence of consciousness.

[inventtheday]

Society has assumed the defacto circular definition of consciousness as "whatever we, as humans, are experiencing". For obvious reasons, this is not a helpful concept.

Instead, I like to think of consciousness in terms of structures and mechanisms of information flow. If we open our minds up to this type of thinking, we can see consciousness in varying degrees in nature, in computers, and of course in people. For anyone who's curious, the guiding light in this school of thought is Hofstadter's Godel Escher Bach.

[carapace]

I upvoted your original comment above even though I don't agree because you're commenting in good faith in my opinion.

Society as a whole has not assumed a concrete definition for consciousness, as there are a lot of people who don't give it a second thought. Among those who do recognize consciousness as such, the word "consciousness" is as close as you can get to being able to indicate the phenomenon. So I can't agree that it's not a helpful concept.

But in fact, the "thing" that is the referent of that term is not a concept at all. It is the pre-conceptual basis or arena for concepts that arise in it. The TV set is not a TV show.

Humans obviously vary in how conscious they are, both from one to another as well as individually over time so it cannot be properly defined circularly as you say above.

All "structures and mechanisms of information flow" are contents of consciousness not components. Awareness has no qualities, no form, no sides nor parts, it does not experience time: it is always "now", and it is always "here". What you are seeing "in varying degrees in nature, in computers, and of course in people" is mind I think. Cf. Gregory Bateson, "Mind and Nature: A Necessary Unity" and "Steps to an Ecology of Mind"

Lastly, "Godel Escher Bach" is an excellent book and was instrumental in my own process of coming to grips with consciousness. To wit: I think the closest we can come to modelling or describing consciousness mathematically is as a strange loop involving the entire Universe though-out all time.