[oska]

> After all, earth could be understood as solar powered super computer, that took a couple of million years to produce humanity.

This is similar to a line I've seen Elon Musk trot out on a few occassions. It's a product of a materialistic philosophy (that the universe is only matter).

[anon84873628]

Yes, and?

[oska]

It comes with all the blindness and limitations of materialist thinking

[smokedetector1]

For some reason materialism is so popular among tech people that it's almost considered foolish/primitive/superstitious to think any other way. Why is that? Is it the fact that programming is a god-like experience that gives one the illusion the mind is as comprehensible as the complex program I wrote in Java? Or is it a shared personality trait of people that get into tech, that they are disconnected from an experience of their own aliveness and soul?

[anon84873628]

I would call the shared personality trait "pragmatism". Since tech people generally recognize that the preponderance of the evidence points towards a purely physical explanation for the human brain.

Even considering the hard problem of consciousness, there's no compelling reason to believe it can't have a physical basis, or can't be replicated in other complex systems.

Going back to the original comment, the perspective that "the earth is a computer that created AGI through humans" is not inherently wrong, though it may be a uselessly broad definition.

[smokedetector1]

> preponderance of the evidence

Theres evidence for the fact that the human brain affects consciousness.

What is the evidence that the brain causes consciousness?

As far as I can see, the only evidence people can produce is a general sense that science has successfully produced materialist explanations for everything it has tried to, and will continue to do so successfully forever.

However the reality is:

- Science has, up til now, failed to make even the slightest progress on the origin of consciousness.

- Science does not even claim to attempt to answer all questions about the human experience.

Therefore, the belief that science will, at some point, explain consciousness is not an inherently rational position, it is based on a sort of faith that science will succeed and apply everywhere. It masquerades as rational because of the materialist bias.

[anon84873628]

That's why I said "pragmatism" and "preponderance". It's a safer bet to believe science can explain consciousness than it is to believe in some alternative explanation, which otherwise makes no appearance in the universe.

If we had magic wands and ghosts floating around, then yeah I'd believe some kind of dualism or metaphysics. But if consciousness is the only real mystery in the universe, then sticking with materialism as the sole basis of reality seems pretty reliable.

Separately, the fact that changing the brain even a little bit can drastically change conscious experience, sure points to the brain being the cause. It makes sense that "experience" could be a side effect of certain highly complex highly connected systems. It doesn't make sense that "experience" (i.e. "having thoughts") magically drives those systems a certain direction. By the time I experience a thought, the underlying physics for it have already happened.

[kbelder]

- Science has, up til now, failed to make even the slightest progress on the origin of consciousness. - Science does not even claim to attempt to answer all questions about the human experience.

Similar argument could be made about every other subject that science has explained, prior to science explaining it. This is just an argument from the gaps.

[oska]

Good questions