Comments on: Dancing Pixies

By: Lehooo

Lehooo — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 01:28:14 +0000

I'm sorry if I'm clogging up this thread, and I'm also sorry if what I'm about to post seems like an act of shameless self promotion, but I felt that is was definitely relevant to this discussion, so I decided to post it anyway. I just read a post here about the supposed recent simulation of a cat's brain by an IBM team and how the experiment was apparently nothing of the sort, and decided to comment on it. My comment was a sort of continuation of the point I was trying to make here earlier, and I referred to Searle briefly, which is why I thought it would be relevant to this discussion. If anyone here has anything to say about my comments over there, please respond either here or in that thread.

By: Lehooo

Lehooo — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 10:45:39 +0000

I meant to write “against the notion that the hypothesized response from Searle is really relevant” without the “not”. Sorry about that, I should check my comments more carefully before posting.

By: Lehooo

Lehooo — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 10:42:41 +0000

Yes, and I think that raises a good point. If we dismiss the physical medium as entirely irrelevant, we do risk having to say that any description of something is really an instance of that thing. Of course we don’t want to say that the fairies of a story book are real, and perhaps arguments such as the one we imagine Searle making here are mostly meant as a reductio absurdum, to express the belief that functionalism leads to being unable to dismiss anything as unreal. In any case, this misses the point. The fairies of the story book are not real because they are only described (incompletely, at least in any story book I’ve read) and not actually fully realized. Fairies are a tricky example as we lack a thorough description of them, seeing as how they’re mythological creatures, so let’s use a dog as an example instead. A dog being described in a book is clearly not a real dog. A real dog is a complex system of processes, with a multitude of organs performing their functions. The dog in the book disqualifies as a real dog not because it is a realization of this system in the wrong medium, but because it is not a realization of this system at all. This of course, is not an argument for functionalism, only against the notion that the hypothesized response from Searle is not really relevant. Not that I think you were saying it was.

By: Peter

Peter — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 22:43:31 +0000

You make a good point, I think, Lehooo; although I think Searle would deny the validity of the idea of something being real within a medium. I can almost hear him saying “Real within a medium? Like fairies are real within the medium of fairy stories? That’s what we call ‘not real’ when we’re being serious.”

By: Lehooo

Lehooo — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 21:18:44 +0000

I don’t know if anyone is still following this thread, but I’ll comment again nonetheless, hoping that someone is reading as this is a very interesting discussion.

I think Searle’s talk about rain reveals his simplistic take on the issue. There is no ground for certainty regarding the question of whether there are phenomena that can only be said to exist in a certain medium. I think I saw a quote somewhere from Searle where he talked about the impossibility of a computer simulation of a digestive system consuming a “real” pizza, which apparently in his mind is analogous to a computer simulation of a brain exhibiting consciousness. This of course misses the point entirely. The computer simulation of the digestive system can only consume a pizza in the same medium that it is represented in. However, if this representation is isomorphic to a “real” pizza, there is no reason to call it anything else than a pizza from the digestive system’s point of view. From out point of view, it would not be considered a pizza only because out digestive systems are represented in a different medium and thus, unable to interact with the pizza directly. For that to happen, it would have to be converted first through some sort of mechanism that can take the digital pizza and create a “real” pizza from it, atom by atom.

The beads on an abacus represent numbers, sliding them up and down simulates arithmetic. Of course, trying to insert the beads into a computer will not cause it to perform arithmetic, they would have to be encoded in a format that is native to the computer. This however, is not cause to believe that only the abacus performs real arithmetic while the computer only simulates it. There is no reason to simply assume that other phenomena are different from numbers only because we have so far only encountered atoms, pizzas and conscious minds in the form they have in the “real” world. This is the reason I think functionalism actually makes more sense than any alternative, it does not assume the existence of any special properties of any specific medium that prohibits an implementation in any other medium from being “real”. I wouldn’t go as far as saying that Ockham’s razor supports functionalism, but I’m leaning toward something along those lines. Functionalism seems to only assume that the essence of any phenomena lies in its interactions with other phenomena, which is what enables it to still be the same phenomena even if it is realized in some other medium. Alternatives to functionalism seem to inevitably assume that there is something more, something inherent in the particular realization of the phenomena in a particular medium which makes it what it is.

Anyway, it’s getting late here, I’m a little bit tired and I’m far from an expert in this area so maybe I’m missing some point here or maybe I’m misrepresenting some of the issues and/or viewpoints I’ve talked about. Furthermore, if something seems unclear, please ask me to clarify.

By: John Davey

John Davey — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 15:19:08 +0000

The primary purpose of the analogy I suppose was to highlight the nature of simulation, to point out that a duck is not the same thing as a painting of a duck or even a robotic, three-dimensional duck. It helps make a point.

What was it you think he said about rain ? I think its quite straightforward isn’t it. A computer program of rain generates nothing phenomenal as nothing about computer programs exist in the physical sense, whereas rain does.

Nothing in, nothing out. Or maybe I’m missing the point somewhere.

By: Peter

Peter — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 09:56:38 +0000

I don’t doubt Searle meant what he said (whatever it was – I’m not altogether sure we’ve actually pinned down exactly what he said about rain). My point is just that people like Bishop, in quoting the rain analogy, should realise that it is really just a persuasive assertion of non-computationalism rather than an actual argument.

By: John Davey

John Davey — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 22:22:47 +0000

I think Searle meant what he said. He meant that consciousness belonged to the domain of observable scientific phenomena and not purely mathematical facts. Consciousness has an objective existence as well as a subjective nature.To that extent it is a physical phenomenon and not mere information processing. Surely this is true. Consciousness has characteristics of absolute form rather mere symbolic content for one. “Red” is syntactical within the framework of a discussion about the wavelengths of light, but as a subjective experience it is pure semantic. How could you describe to a man, blind since birth,what red looks like ? It’s an impossibility. But you could teach him easily about the physics of light and the fact that red corresponds to a wavelength of light in the visible spectrum.

The simple and single fact that mental states are characterised by semantic as well as syntax is sufficient to displace the belief that conscious mental states are information processing (there are plenty of others besides, but this is the main one). Given that, the burden of proof is not actually on Searle to give any account whatsoever of how consciousness arises from physical processes. The fact that is does may be a fact at a “folk knowledge” level vindicated by knowledge of obvious “folk” knowledge – i.e. the effects of a bullet in the brain = but just because science hasn’t provided an answer doesn’t mean it’s not true, and it certainly doesn’t, in any way shape or form ,allow the hard AI enthusiasts to claim that the territory is theirs until science does.

The burden of proof is on the AI people to show that ‘information’ can cross the ontological gulf into the magic world of phenomena. It’s not going to happen – by definition – but in the meantime I suspect a lot of careers built on hard AI will continue to insist that the emperor wears no clothes.

By: Peter

Peter — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 20:43:40 +0000

Searle may very well be right about a lot of this. But some people (I think) would explicitly assert that consciousness is a matter of information processing, and therefore that a computational simulation of consciousness of the right kind would automatically itself be conscious. In that context, to point out that simulations in some other domains don’t generate other kinds of real phenomena is not a refutation. (In fairness I’m not sure Searle himself meant it to be anything more than characteristically vivid counter-assertion.)

One thing that would help here, of course, would be a Searlian account of the physical properties of the brain that give rise to consciousness: that might help us see whether consciousness really is like rain in the relevant ways. But as Searle honestly says, he can’t tell us what these physical properties are.

Perhaps this is worth a further discussion.

By: John Davey

John Davey — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 22:10:36 +0000

“Now the distinction between a simulation and the real thing is a relevant and useful one, but the comparison of rain and consciousness begs the question too much to serve as an argument. By choosing rain as the item to be simulated, we pick something whose physical composition is (in some sense) essential; if it isn’t made of water it isn’t rain. To assume that the physical substrate is equally essential for consciousness is just to assume what computationalism explicitly denies. Take a different example; a letter. When I write a letter on my PC, I don’t regard it as a mere simulation, even though no paper need be involved until it’s printed; in fact, I have more than once written letters which were evntually sent as email attachments and never achieved physical form.”

I think you’re missing the point. Rain is a physical phenomena and according to Searle (who I agree with) so is consciousness. The ‘substrate’ argument is a bit of a red herring in this context. The point is you can’t generate physical phenomena from logical processes.