[chmsky00]

The hard problem will be solved in time.

My reasoning is that the people that defined it did so in a time when our science was less developed, so of course the problem seemed much harder.

Information theory makes even the hard problem a matter of understanding interaction fields of physics, with the chemistry of biology. Relativity and sensory network effects explain relative experience elegantly enough.

A lot of theories from back in the day are built on outdated understanding. Unfortunately their authors did not get to see our achievements in engineering unravel a lot of their over baked theories due to a need to fill in gaps without hard evidence. Same as we won’t see technology in the future have no need of all this software we wrote. It won’t literally be handed on.

Luminiferous Aether was once a thing to many even though it’s not one discrete thing. One might consider it was a poetic initial take on field theory, which we now rely on sets of glyphs of shares meaning. Which artistically could also be imagined as flowing sets of matrix code that glow like a luminous field.

If there’s a hard problem to consciousness it’s an unwillingness to consider there is no Valhalla. Is there a hard problem? Or do we hope for an answer that suggests we’re not just meatbags?

[nickelpro]

The hard problem has technological progress built into its definition. It defines problems of consciousness that can be solved by progress as the "soft" problems, and the problem that cannot be solved by progress as the "hard" problem. The hard problem doesn't say that a mechanism _hasn't_ been found, it says a mechanism _cannot_ be found. Like Gödel's incompleteness theorems or Heisenberg's uncertainty principle it places a limit on what can be known about the system, "[the hard problem will] persist even when the performance of all the relevant functions is explained."

The validity of that is up to you, but if you accept the hard problem as a valid question it will not be solved by technological progress.

[chmsky00]

Yep it’s not an interesting idea, the hard problem. We can never see outside our universe. We can’t know all states of matter ever. We can’t peek beyond the speed of light. We can solve a lot of problems we actually have without an answer (42, but what…)

Humans have a willingness to see truth in metaphor and analogy, and invent them to avoid accepting we’re just meat bags.

That’s what the hard problem of consciousness is to me; biological ideation run amok.

It has useful political effects, it can be used to disabuse the self righteous because it’s a purposeful thought ending monolith, nothing more.

We’ll keep iterating on our theories of the interaction of fields and matter and stop caring about the hard problem like we quit discussing luminiferous aether. We’ll stop seeing the literal edge of reality as a boundary on experience in the first place.

[PKop]

>a matter of understanding

There is also the possibility that our cognitive limits will prevent us from creating artificial intelligence and consciousness, even if it is materially possible.

[chmsky00]

Good, we don’t need AI.

I’d be more interested in augmented human intelligence. Growing neuron structures to speed the acquisition of skill and knowledge.

AI as we know it now is for empowering aristocrats. Here’s Googles data center empowering Google to make business choices that involve extracting effort from us.

I’d rather science and technology empower individuals uniquely and not be ground down to the fiscally prudent efforts.