[visarga]

I think panpsychism is a bad approach. If we look at consciousness as we encounter it in nature, it seems to be a property of self replicators in their competition for life and reproduction. So it can't be a property of laptops, unless they are self replicating laptops responsible for their own existence. Or could be a property of a virtual entity running in a sim in the laptop, but then it's not consciousness of the same world as ours.

The role of consciousness is to keep the body alive: fend dangers, find food and reproduce. It does that by taking into account the state of the environment and the internal state of the body and acting in such a way as to maximise its own rewards, learning to avoid bad situations along the way. Evolution has shaped the body and rewards in order to maximise survivability. It's interesting to see how surviving bootstraps meaning and consciousness out of itself (and its environment).

[Erlich_Bachman]

That outlook is a product of the way you look at the data, not the data itself.

How are laptops not reproducing? If you looked at the population of laptops in the world when they were first introduced - and then tracked them through the years, they have clearly started reproducing. They even evolved! The basic shape stays the same, but they are clear evolutionary trends, like the taxonomy, outwinning the poor designs, branches of evolutionary traits etc!

Of course you can choose to look at the people that are building them, but how do you actually know that laptops are not "parasites" for example? Or a symbiotic life form like dogs? Yes, individual humans might take specific actions for building specific laptops, but so what, we take actions to raise and walk dogs also. Do we as humans really have a choice of stopping producing laptops? If not, couldn't it be just as easily seen that laptops actually use us to reproduce? Like flowers use bees to reproduce? You don't see flowers as being less alive because bees are ultimately required for them to reproduce?

Sure, one might need to talk more about the design of a laptop, the basic idea of a computer in a portable interface with certain features - not any individual physical laptop as being alive. But why not? People are surely not only alive in a physical sense. Many of the physical differences and transformations actually don't make much difference. It's the inherent internal something (entity? information? idea? soul?) that is more alive than the physical body itself.

The point is, "property of self replicators in their competition for life and reproduction" - is not a very good metric for consciousness. Many people don't see it as coming from the data itself, and more being a predetermined paradigm or outlook on the world, which someone already comes in with, when they look at the data. When someone with another outlook (for example that consciousness actually uses the physical world, including the reproduction cycle) to its own goals, not the other way around - then the data starts supportnig that too. It's all about how to look at it.

[intralizee]

I must say this is beautifully written. Our perception of how we view the world is fundamentally important. Self importance with what's observable can create an illusion. How you described objects entering the world, similar to any other process is perfect.

[intralizee]

It's arguable to say one thing is encountered in nature unlike something else. Everything from my perception is the product of nature. Example: People tend to view technological advances by humans as different than "plants or animals evolving over time" but I would argue it's no different fundamentally. Objects are functioning with properties they inherently have and from the outside world for seeking an advantage.

The role of consciousness is debatable. People who died by suicide have some significance against the theory of consciousness keeping the body alive. My observation of consciousness makes me consider it an abstract layer of observation & emotions and nothing more. I don't even think emotions have to be there. It's hard to describe and I understand why some people don't even think consciousness is a real thing.

[visarga]

How would the body we able to get sustenance every day without consciousness? We wouldn't be able to find the kitchen. How would we reproduce without it? How would we defend from dangers without it? I think it's pretty clear what the role is. Consciousness is a manifestation of life with the purpose of serving life.

On the other hand, what are emotions? They are predictions of future cumulative rewards/bad situations. The role of emotion is to guide actions, they are not just an 'abstract layer'. And rewards are signals based on circuits designed by evolution, to maximise life.

[intralizee]

Difficult questions for anyone to truthfully answer. I’m not aware if you’ve ever had a moment of reflex without thought. I had few I’m aware of and they were either in the best interest of myself, someone else, and even an object. I would think memories resulted in the reflexes and when awareness kicks in only afterwards of the action taken. The relevance is what’s responsible for actions or how maybe an illusion is taking place when it comes to perception of responsibility. The objects in this world may share an equivalent experience. Then there’s the thought of awake compared to the experience of a dream and how the essence is vastly different for me. Emotions are similar. Some humans don’t experience them all compared to the majority. I think of emotions similar to breathing from conception. Something is triggering it by association to pattern recognition. Anyway hard to answer something that’s hard even theorizing about.