Wooden Neurons: Will They Be Conscious?

[Meatbot]

What if you have 10 foot neurons made of wood with mechanical clockwork innards, and they shoot different types of metal balls to each other to send messages. What if they have some mechanical method for reproducing every other function of a neuron? What if they are arranged in exactly the same way the neurons in the brain are? Will that group of wooden neurons be conscious?

What if you take a group of 100 million people and have each one perform the duties of a neuron? Will that system be conscious?

Seems to me you would have to say that it would be conscious, as strange as that sounds.

 

[Sorry!]

where does conciousness occur though? I've always wondered the same sort of thing only imagine we had a machine that can make EXACT copies of you (scanns 100% accurate recreates 100% accurate)

would you sort of share conciousness? or does he have a new concious? is it even conscious at all? hm

 

[Meatbot]

where does conciousness occur though? I've always wondered the same sort of thing only imagine we had a machine that can make EXACT copies of you (scanns 100% accurate recreates 100% accurate)

would you sort of share conciousness? or does he have a new concious? is it even conscious at all? hm

-I think he would be conscious and he would think he was you. If you asked him, he'd claim to be you. He'd have all of your memories. It would be two consciousnesses. I think consciousness is something that emerges from certain arrangements of matter.

 

[Moridin]

The China brain does create a mental state. This is yet another one of those intuition pumps that fall to bits when analyzed, just like the Chinese room. Our intuition that it is impossible is just a bias against non-neuron minds, furthered by the implausibility by the scenario. There is a natural desire to locate the mind at a specific point, because the mind feels like one thing.

 

[dst]

What if you have 10 foot neurons made of wood with mechanical clockwork innards, and they shoot different types of metal balls to each other to send messages. What if they have some mechanical method for reproducing every other function of a neuron? What if they are arranged in exactly the same way the neurons in the brain are? Will that group of wooden neurons be conscious?

What if you take a group of 100 million people and have each one perform the duties of a neuron? Will that system be conscious?

Seems to me you would have to say that it would be conscious, as strange as that sounds.

What if you had, say, silicon doped into + & - types and say, had a huge grid of alternating types based on logic, and then decided to pump electricity through it? ;)

I don't see how you could just take a bunch of neurons and throw them together in whatever order you need to when we don't even understand what makes something "conscious". Obviously if you knew then you would have to call it "conscious" regardless of the materials (light interference anyone?).

 

[Meatbot]

I don't see how you could just take a bunch of neurons and throw them together in whatever order you need to when we don't even understand what makes something "conscious".

Yeah...I think only certain arrangements would be conscious in the way we normally understand it, although I think consciousness is a continuum. Some arrangements might be "less" conscious and some "more" conscious, whatever that might mean. Also, some arrangements would operate very slowly, and some could operate faster than our brain. How might it feel to think 100 times slower than you do now?

Who is to say that a rock is not in some way minimally conscious? It has signals that propagate through the vibration of atoms. The atoms respond to each other's vibration. It can take input from vibration of the rock, and from temperature changes. It can change it's structure by melting. This is obviously different from what the brain does, but is it different enough that it's not conscious? I don't know.

 

[dst]

Well, it could be depending on how you look at it. Why isn't a computer conscious? "It" has a "state of mind" (the content of its cpu registers), it has a "memory", it has feelings ("tiredness" or actually just mechanical wear/fatigue), etc? I mean, sure, you program a PC to do what it does but isn't that what evolution or God effectively did to us? Take 10 normal (i.e. non-mentally dysfunctional) people in a room, shoot their mothers in front of them. All display the same reactions (horror). Take 10 more, repeat, 100 more, rinse and repeat. Any change? No. Some might have different reactions (good riddance, fear, etc). Take 100 computers and load up MS-Paint. MS-Paint loads up. Some will have different reactions (for instance, the Windows based PCs will crash :D). So in any case, how would you logically define "consciousness"?

 

[Moridin]

Well, it could be depending on how you look at it. Why isn't a computer conscious? "It" has a "state of mind" (the content of its cpu registers), it has a "memory", it has feelings ("tiredness" or actually just mechanical wear/fatigue), etc? I mean, sure, you program a PC to do what it does but isn't that what evolution or God effectively did to us?

Look up multiple draft model of consciousness.

 

[Meatbot]

Well, it could be depending on how you look at it. Why isn't a computer conscious? "It" has a "state of mind" (the content of its cpu registers), it has a "memory", it has feelings ("tiredness" or actually just mechanical wear/fatigue), etc?

Perhaps it is on some dim level.

 

[dst]

Look up multiple draft model of consciousness.

Yeah, I got this: http://www.conscious-robots.com/en/reviews/theories-and-models-of-consciousness/multiple-draft-2.html

Dennett argues that consciousness is executed in some sort of virtual machine modulated by cultural learning that runs on the brain parallel hardware. This virtual machine installs in the brain is a set of ‘mind habits’, which are not visible at a neuron-anatomic level.

Another analogy would be a hardware abstraction layer. The point being, that there is a soul of sorts but it's just a collection of ridiculously complex objects combining to become even more ridiculously complex, and on top of that, self-programmingly ridiculously complex. In any case, just looking at myself gave me the impression of that quote, long before I read it.

 

[Q_Goest]

Hi Meatbot – are you familiar with functionalism? It was a concept initiated by Putnam back in the 60’s.

Its core idea is that mental states (beliefs, desires, being in pain, etc.) are constituted solely by their functional role — that is, their causal relations to other mental states, sensory inputs, and behavioral outputs. Since mental states are identified by a functional role, they are said to be multiply realizable; in other words, they are able to be manifested in various systems, even perhaps computers, so long as the system performs the appropriate functions. While functionalism has its advantages, there have been several arguments against it, claiming that it is an insufficient account of the mind.

Ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functionalism_(philosophy_of_mind)"

So yes, the proposal for a mechanical consciousness per your OP is often believed to have mental states per functionalism.

Meatbot said: Who is to say that a rock is not in some way minimally conscious? It has signals that propagate through the vibration of atoms. The atoms respond to each other's vibration. It can take input from vibration of the rock, and from temperature changes. It can change it's structure by melting. This is obviously different from what the brain does, but is it different enough that it's not conscious? I don't know.

Putnam has since written a book, “Representation and Reality” (1988) in which he does a 180 and decides functionalism is false, and therefore computationalism fails. In the appendix of his book, he makes the often quoted statement, “Every ordinary open system is a realization of every abstract finite automaton.” This argument basically proves that even a rock can have conscious mental states for exactly the points you make. Putnam points out that such states as are in a rock are purely symbolic and arbitrarily chosen, which is obviously correct and accepted by the most ardent computationalists like Dennett and Chalmers.

To defend computationalism, Chalmers wrote a paper entitled, “Does a Rock Implement Every Finite-State Automaton” (can be found online). Similar attacks on Putnam’s argument were done by Copeland, Christly and Endicott.

In Putnam’s defense, Bishop wrote numerous papers which strongly support Putnam’s view, as did a philosopher named Maudlin.

There are similar attacks on computationalism by Harnad who points out that computationalism is symbol manipulation and he comes up with an argument called “the Symbol Grounding problem”. Searle also attacks computationalism by noting that computations are not intrinsic to physics.

Personally, I have to agree with the anti-computationalists. The biggest problem right now with any computational view is simply defining “computation”. What is a computation? The most brilliant minds in philosophy have thus far failed to produce an adequate definition that shows how a computer can be intrinsic to anything physical in nature.

 

[Oerg]

-I think he would be conscious and he would think he was you. If you asked him, he'd claim to be you. He'd have all of your memories. It would be two consciousnesses. I think consciousness is something that emerges from certain arrangements of matter.

Well then again, why should he display a different set of conciousness since everything was cloned 100%? What is different that he should share a different set of conciousness?

 

[DaveC426913]

I think a mechnical brain would be conscious in direct proportion to how closely it simulated the various features and functions of the brain.

But it would run EXTREEEEEEMELY slowly...

 

[sysreset]

i've always wondered the same sort of thing only imagine we had a machine that can make EXACT copies of you (scanns 100% accurate recreates 100% accurate)

would you sort of share conciousness? or does he have a new concious? is it even conscious at all? hm

I agree with Meatbot that he would be conscious and would probably debate with you about who is the "real you". No real way to resolve who IS the real you after a perfect biological fax is done, although after a period of debate both of "you" would have to admit that your experiencial perceptions have now diverged and the consciousness is no longer identical.

Another amazing thing, when you think about creating mechanical conscious machines, is how we have the sense that our conscious self remains constant for our entire lives, up to about 100 years. How is it that every time we either wake up from sleep, wake up from anaesthesia, etc. that we haven't been "re-booted" and have to start all over with a new consciousness? Or do we, and we don't realize it somehow?

 

[DaveC426913]

Another amazing thing, when you think about creating mechanical conscious machines, is how we have the sense that our conscious self remains constant for our entire lives, up to about 100 years. How is it that every time we either wake up from sleep, wake up from anaesthesia, etc. that we haven't been "re-booted" and have to start all over with a new consciousness? Or do we, and we don't realize it somehow?

Robert J. Sawyer wrote a book, with this as a subplot, called https://www.amazon.com/dp/0765311070/?tag=pfamazon01-20.

 

[octelcogopod]

Another amazing thing, when you think about creating mechanical conscious machines, is how we have the sense that our conscious self remains constant for our entire lives, up to about 100 years. How is it that every time we either wake up from sleep, wake up from anaesthesia, etc. that we haven't been "re-booted" and have to start all over with a new consciousness? Or do we, and we don't realize it somehow?

I think that question has a pretty simple answer.
Your brain with all its 'data' didn't change.
In theory if you die and am resurrected somewhere else with the same brain and memories in another life you would still be 'you', granted you had memories intact.

 

[sysreset]

I think that question has a pretty simple answer.
Your brain with all its 'data' didn't change.
In theory if you die and am resurrected somewhere else with the same brain and memories in another life you would still be 'you', granted you had memories intact.

I agree with your conclusion but to me it is almost unbelievable that a person can undergo a coronary heart bypass, be put under general anaesthesia for hours, maybe have an accidental seizure or two, and then wake up and in a few hours feels pretty much like they are the same person with the same consciousness that they had for the prior 60 years. I am sure that the brain with all its 'data' did change during that process, but just not in areas critical for consciousness.

Conversely, there are instances of individuals who are otherwise intact but have temporary or even permanent bouts of amnesia, thus apparent disjointed or 'rebooted' consciousness. There must be very specific brain areas which are responsible for maintaining a sense of a lifetime of consciousness, and it may map to areas involved in long-term memory.

 

[Oerg]

I agree with Meatbot that he would be conscious and would probably debate with you about who is the "real you". No real way to resolve who IS the real you after a perfect biological fax is done, although after a period of debate both of "you" would have to admit that your experiencial perceptions have now diverged and the consciousness is no longer identical.

Then what happens immediately after cloning? Since every molecular and atomic arrangement in the two bodies are the same, why is it that you should be looking through your body and not his? What happends to your conciousness?

 

[DaveC426913]

Then what happens immediately after cloning? Since every molecular and atomic arrangement in the two bodies are the same, why is it that you should be looking through your body and not his? What happends to your conciousness?

It sounds like you are talking sci-fi cloning. Immediately after real cloning, you are still a single-celled egg.

 

[Sorry!]

It sounds like you are talking sci-fi cloning. Immediately after real cloning, you are still a single-celled egg.

well i think they were referring to my post not the OP so if that's the case then i WAS talking about sci-fi sort of cloning... with a machine to make perfect 100% copies

 

[Oerg]

well i think they were referring to my post not the OP so if that's the case then i WAS talking about sci-fi sort of cloning... with a machine to make perfect 100% copies

This has always been something that has bothered me, and I take comfort that I do not know the answer, and that maybe our very being and conciousness is unique to us, humans.

 

[JoeDawg]

A good scifi book that looks into this sort of consciousness identity issue is Greg Egan's "Diaspora"

 

[sysreset]

After a hypothetically EXACT carbon copy of your entire being is made (sci fi as of today) you would have two separate consciousnesses, one in each copy, and both consciousnesses would immediately diverge. They would share past memories but would then be just like any other set of identical twins with similar traits but gradually diverging world views. And of course, the unsolvable argument over who is really the valid original being.

 

[Meatbot]

Well then again, why should he display a different set of conciousness since everything was cloned 100%? What is different that he should share a different set of conciousness?

I would think because consciousness is generated by matter and it's a different collection of matter. If it's not different, then you'd be able to experience the input from both sources. You'd be able to see what the clone sees. I think that would require that consciousness is somehow not only determined by the atoms involved, but also by something apart from them. In that case, the two people would be "connected" by some type of consciousness-bearing medium.

 

[baywax]

The China brain does create a mental state. This is yet another one of those intuition pumps that fall to bits when analyzed, just like the Chinese room. Our intuition that it is impossible is just a bias against non-neuron minds, furthered by the implausibility by the scenario. There is a natural desire to locate the mind at a specific point, because the mind feels like one thing.

You're right Moridin. This topic is about as subjective as it gets.

The terminology has to be defined and I'll start by noting how "awareness" is often mistaken for "consciousness" and visa versa.

I think you can safely say that a machine can be made aware of things around it but to say it has a "conscious awareness" will be a stretch because the word consciousness applies to human, neuron interaction with the environment. The environment can be other neurons in the brain and it can be wind sun and water etc...

You can never get inside another person's head and determine if THEY are conscious or not... so how is it that we can so happily determine the conscious... or unconscious... state of a machine? Turing tests, reflex tests, etc... do not properly gage the existence of consciousness. They help determine awareness of certain criteria but, as we know, what we call consciousness is an elusive target for scrutiny after centuries of use of the word.

I think the subject might be sensitive because the word "consciousness" has become an almost religious term and so, applying it to the function of a machine may appear as blasphemy to those people used to using it with regard to "enlightenment".

The term consciousness has been completely struck from the vocabulary of the Neuro-sciences and has been replaced with "awareness" due to the above complications.

 

[al-mahed]

"Will any physical system that reproduces the functions of a human brain be conscious?"

This is not a scientifical issue I think... this is more like a question about "the philosofical existence of the consciousness"

 

[cuddles]

Personally I think that any intelligent system is conscious to a certain degree. The more intelligent the system is the more conscious it because. Consciousness should effectively be treated as a perception or experience of the mechanism which enable the system to compute. That need not imply however that consciousness equals choice, choice is of course a virtual concept. Consciousness means that a certain intelligent system experiences its own computation. However it can never the programming which is hardcoded into it. The programming steers the conscious aspect to do certain tasks as one might see it. Compare to the internet, which I believe is conscious to a very large degree, yet it cannot escape its original programming, just as much as humans cannot escape the physical laws in our brain which guide our neurons and eventually cause our actions. There is no 'choice'.

This is the only probable theory I have thus far encountered that could explain why we are conscious yet there still is no choice, if someone has a better one, I am open to it as I have no idea what should be the reason that prompts intelligent systems to become conscious.

 

[Meatbot]

The more intelligent the system is the more conscious it because.

What would it mean to be more conscious than you are now? I think that degrees of consciousness are on a continuum, but what would it feel like if you were more conscious? Perhaps your mind would be able to process more things at once, or keep more things in active memory at the same time, or think in multiple streams simultaneously. It is well known that the brain shuts off attention to details in the environment that it deems irrelevant. Perhaps more of these details would be part of your awareness?

 

[cuddles]

I would say the more aware of one's own computation. Though I realize this definition is highly informal but since units for that field are—at least by my knowledge—not yet defined it is hard to give a good formal definition.

 

[sysreset]

Look at consciousness from a behaviorist's point of view. We infer that certain people or animals are conscious based on their behavior. But there is a trap there. Take for example a person who is conscious but 100% paralyzed due to a medication or a brain injury. Others have no way of identifying conscious activity (without a functional MRI, that is) and for all appearances that person is not a consious being , exhibits absolutely no behavior whatsoever or any apparent recognition of surroundings, yet the person is conscious. So behaviorism isn't the answer. But then the same dilemna appears when evaluating whether a very complex network of computer circuits or a complex network of living beings is conscious. You see vast swarms of bees or birds acting in concert, is the individual bird any more or less conscious than the entire swarm unit of bees?? Is there a quantum unit of consiousness, will it ever be possible to measure whether ANY system has more or less units than another??

 

[singleton]

Look at consciousness from a behaviorist's point of view. We infer that certain people or animals are conscious based on their behavior. But there is a trap there. Take for example a person who is conscious but 100% paralyzed due to a medication or a brain injury. Others have no way of identifying conscious activity (without a functional MRI, that is) and for all appearances that person is not a consious being , exhibits absolutely no behavior whatsoever or any apparent recognition of surroundings, yet the person is conscious. So behaviorism isn't the answer.

I would say that basing belief of others' consciousness based on behaviorism breaks down with a much simpler argument: if we sufficiently programmed a humanoid-like (appearance wise) robot that was intelligent but without any consciousness. From a behavioral standpoint it does all it needs to do and could act just as 'complicated' as a conscious human could.

 

[octelcogopod]

I would say the more aware of one's own computation. Though I realize this definition is highly informal but since units for that field are—at least by my knowledge—not yet defined it is hard to give a good formal definition.

But then again, I would say humans are not in any shape or form aware of their own computation.
The computation the brain does is a purely physical thing, it's neurons, chemicals and electrical signals in the brain, while the choices humans make on a subjective level is not really the computation itself, but rather a side effect of that computation.

A good example would be if a human wants to eat an apple.
He hasn't eaten for a substantial period, there is an apple on the table, and nothing is really stopping him from eating it, if he thinks "hey I haven't eaten in awhile I'm hungry and that apple looks good" how much of that is actual choice?
His stomach already sent signals to the brain, he already liked apples since he was a kid, which makes the brain perceive the apple as an edible and good object before he ever decided to, and he probably already ate several apples which helped the brain become what it is.

I would say that really you can't choose something before your brain has been given any kind of input to process some kind of logical answer within itself regarding the thing in question.

Hence, my conclusion would be that any self awareness regarding choice and self computation would rather be your brain being able to process more information at the same time, which would in practical term mean that a "more conscious" person would probably have a brain that would be a lot more picky about apples.
I say this because (and without going too off topic) the brain in general really does seek to have perfection to whatever it thinks perfection is, and I do believe that the more information the brain has and can process about something, especially at the same time, the more nuances are picked up, and the more imperfections are noticed and NOT discarded, maybe like shape, age, color or whatever else.

However something to note is that I believe any of this is involuntary on the subjective level, it's more controlled by the physics of the brain and to some extent the sensory system of the body too.. Always a slave to those things I would say.

 

[vanesch]

Look at consciousness from a behaviorist's point of view. We infer that certain people or animals are conscious based on their behavior. But there is a trap there. Take for example a person who is conscious but 100% paralyzed due to a medication or a brain injury. Others have no way of identifying conscious activity (without a functional MRI, that is) and for all appearances that person is not a consious being , exhibits absolutely no behavior whatsoever or any apparent recognition of surroundings, yet the person is conscious. So behaviorism isn't the answer. But then the same dilemna appears when evaluating whether a very complex network of computer circuits or a complex network of living beings is conscious. You see vast swarms of bees or birds acting in concert, is the individual bird any more or less conscious than the entire swarm unit of bees?? Is there a quantum unit of consiousness, will it ever be possible to measure whether ANY system has more or less units than another??

Indeed. In fact, the question is a very old philosophical one, and is sometimes called "the hard problem" of consciousness, or the mind/brain problem.

There are two stances on it:
- behaviourist/materialist, who claim that "if it walks like a duck, and talks like a duck, it is a duck", and the duck is the prototype of "human consciousness". It is the similarity in behaviour that makes us suppose that other human beings are "conscious" (have a subjective experience). The Turing test is an example of this kind of reasoning, just as is the Chinese room. But there's a confusion here between *intelligence* (= capacity to solve problems) and "consciousness".

- dualist, who takes that subjective experience (consciousness), although coupled to the material world, is nevertheless something else. The "philosophical zombie" is an illustration here. Essentially, dualist arguments are anti-materialist arguments, in that they argue that behaviour or material organization ALONE cannot be taken as irrefutable proof that there is a subjective experience.

I'm personally seduced by the dualist arguments, I have to say. Of course, there is sometimes a confusion between the dualist position (which is just a refusal of the behaviourist position), and a mystical/religious position of "soul" and so on, which is often used by materialists to attack the dualist comments. Dualism doesn't mean mysticism or religion, however. It is just the recognition that subjective experience is not "provable" externally by material, behavioural means.

An argument I always like to use against materialists is that they are too antropocentric, and cannot imagine different forms of consciousness: "does it hurt a rock when it is broken ?"

No matter how silly this question might be at first sight, if you analyse what "causes pain" in a "conscious being", then it is very difficult to give a fundamental reason why a rock cannot be suffering pain from being broken, while you do suffer pain if you break your leg.

 

[Moridin]

Let us say that pain is something that results from a particular type of electro-chemical reaction. If a rock does not have this electro-chemical reaction, there is no pain.

If qualia is an incoherent concept, then all p-zombies are as well. Pain is not something that you can just strip off a person's mental life without bringing about any behavioral or physiological differences This solves the "hard" problem of consciousness quite nicely. One of the most used counters against dualism is that it is vague and lacks primary attributes (or "substance" as it was earlier called).

There are various other arguments, such as Mary the color scientist etc. but they are not that convincing. Mary has been in a black and white room and can only observe the outside from a black and white monitor. She knows all the the physical facts about colour, including every physical fact about the experience of colour in other people, from the behavior a particular colour is likely to elicit to the specific sequence of neurological firings that register that a colour has been seen etc.

The question is if she will learn something new when she steps out. The dualist would say yes, but are pretty much unable to state what in more than a vague sense. The materialist would simply argue that if she knows everything about it, this grants her omniscience in that area, and will learn nothing knew.

Besides the vagueness of the term dualist and what it is suppose to be that is experience this qualia, I think it is about a being reserved against reductionism in human experience and behavior. p-zombies and so on seems to be intuition pumps.

 

[sysreset]

Hence, my conclusion would be that any self awareness regarding choice and self computation would rather be your brain being able to process more information at the same time, which would in practical term mean that a "more conscious" person would probably have a brain that would be a lot more picky about apples...the brain in general really does seek to have perfection to whatever it thinks perfection is, and I do believe that the more information the brain has and can process about something, especially at the same time, the more nuances are picked up, and the more imperfections are noticed and NOT discarded, maybe like shape, age, color or whatever else.

I guess my dog, who would eat a rotten apple right out of the trash, is conscious, but less conscious than I.

I notice that a lot of the posts seem to touch upon (but do not explicity state) a link between consciouness and senses such as sight, taste, or sound. "More consciousness" could be imagined to enhance our existing 5 senses, or be imagined to create new ones...

It is interesting to speculate what the side effects of "more consciousness" would be. Is more consciousness better or worse? Would I become super-picky about apples, or more appreciative of the same apples? Or would I become unaware of apples because I am busy with other thoughts?