What will be interesting will be the construction and performance of machines that claim
consciousness. Since consciousness is a function of the detailed construction and function
of a physical structure, it will be implemented synthetically. Even any magic therein must be
manifest with the same supporting structures present. The illusions of self and
sensor qualia will support the machines as they do us.

We will even have the basis of a new religion. The "singularity" will be upon us!
--
Frederick Martin McNeill
Poway, California, United States of America
mmcneill@fuzzysys.com
******************************************
“He who does not bellow out the truth when he knows the truth makes himself the accomplice of liars and forgers.” —Charles Peguy
“The cruelest lies are often told in silence.” —Robert Louis Stevenson
“It matters not how a man dies, but how he lives.” —Dr. Samuel Johnson
“Every human being has, like Socrates, an attendant spirit; and wise are they who obey its signals. If it does not always tell us what to do, it always cautions us what not to do.” —Lydia M. Child
******************************************

On Thu, 03 Jul 2008 02:53:05 -0700, Sir Frederick
fuzzysys.com> wrote:

We already have that cult religion as evidenced by your second
sentence which is a statement of faith and belief without any
proof or shred of supporting evidence :)

Art
http://home.ptd.net/~artnpeg

On Jul 3, 7:53 pm, Sir Frederick fuzzysys.com> wrote:

So you think consciousness is a function of detailed construction and
function of a...

Sir Frederick wrote:

I'm not sure that "multiple realization" is only about mental states
being invariably instantiated by a variety of different "stuff" like
brain tissue and electronic hardware. That was the original idea, but
since then it's been considered that qualia like "pain" and so forth
might even supervene on a variety of different schemes or functional
relations, too. For instance, Bob's "pain" might be the result of a
slightly or radically different neural configuration than the same
type of pain that Jane feels, even if both are supported by the same
kind of cellular substrate or "stuff". Which then bodes all sorts of
problems in regard to establishing a reliable or lawful-like
correlation between mental states and physical states.

On Thu, 3 Jul 2008 10:17:02 -0700 (PDT), impromptu mail2brussels.com> wrote:

impromptu mail2brussels.com> wrote in
news:fd1b940f-ed83-4453-a978-a1dc338c7a4c@s50g2000hsb.googlegroups.com:

We have no basis for claiming that Bob and Jane's pains feel the same, and
cannot in principle. All we can have are their respective behaviors,
including their descriptions of their pains, and the states of their
nervous systems at the time (which is itself hugely difficult to pin down
precisely). The felt pains (the qualia) are intervening variables we impute
for explanatory purposes, but which are not themselves comparable or
analyzable.

On Jul 4, 5:10 am, Publius nospam.comcast.net> wrote:

On Jul 3, 7:53 pm, Sir Frederick fuzzysys.com> wrote:

On Jul 3, 6:27 am, Art zilch.com> wrote:

On Thu, 3 Jul 2008 19:26:22 -0700 (PDT), Shrikeback@gmail.com wrote: