Autor: tstadmin
-
Synesthesia as unusual sense, by Craig Weinberg
«The fact of synesthesia (the experience of multiple and unusual sense modalities associated with events that are commonly experienced with one sense modality) shows that there need not be any connection between physical conditions and consciousness. Someone might play a piano and see musical notes at the same time, and that would be a form…
-
Stefano Mancuso on the secret life of plants: how they memorise, communicate, problem solve and socialise
One of the most controversial aspects of Mancuso’s work is the idea of plant consciousness. As we learn more about animal and plant intelligence, not to mention human intelligence, the always-contentious term consciousness has become the subject of ever more heated scientific and philosophical debate. “Let’s use another term,” Mancuso suggests. “Consciousness is a little…
-
If we are sentient robots, without will, sentience is not useful. And if it’s useful, how can it be?
When it is stated that sentience has a purpose, this idea is usually explained by indicating that sentience is useful because it motivates doing certain things and avoiding others. In addition, in this explanation, it is usually indicated that sentience motivates but does not force. That is, under this explanation, sentience is not simply the…
-
The systematic approach to suffering by Robert Daoust
“The study of pleasure and pain belongs to the province of the political philosopher; for he is the architect of the end, with a view to which we call one thing bad and another good without qualification. ” – Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics The systematic approach to suffering will present a collection of lists, a series…
-
The importance of phenomenal binding, by David Pearce
We normally assume a fundamental distinction between conscious and non-conscious systems. Instead, I explore the possibility that what makes animals special isn’t consciousness per se, but phenomenal binding. Unless spooky “strong” emergence is true, then a termite colony, or the enteric nervous system, or a classical digital computer, or the population of the United States…
-
The Physical and Consciousness: One World Conforming to Different Descriptions, by Magnus Vinding
Panpsychism is the doctrine that the world’s fundamental physical stuff also has primitive experiential properties. Unlike the physicalistic idealism explored here, panpsychism doesn’t claim that the world’s fundamental physical stuff is experiential. Panpsychism is best treated as a form of property-dualism. How, one may wonder, is Pearce’s view different from panpsychism, and from property dualist views more…
-
Teorías de la sintiencia: una charla con Magnus Vinding
English version Magnus Vinding es un filósofo centrado en reducir el sufrimiento. En su obra desarrolla temas como el altruismo eficaz, el antiespeciesismo, la ética centrada en el sufrimiento (sobre la que actualmente está escribiendo un libro) y cuestiones de identidad personal y ontología, como el individualismo abierto y el fisicalismo. Es licenciado en matemáticas…
-
Lab Universes: The risk of Creating Infinite Suffering
There’s a small but non-negligible probability that humans or their descendants will create infinitely many new universes in a laboratory. This would cause infinitely many additional instances of the Holocaust, infinitely many acts of torture, and worse. Creating lab universes would be very bad according to several ethical views. Read more
-
Farmed Salmon May Be Depressed
Researchers find that growth-stunted farmed salmon show chronic serotonergic activity and do not respond to acute stress — a state that could be interpreted as depression. In the vertebrate brain, serotonin mediated signaling is vital for several key physiological functions such as the body’s energy regulation, neural plasticity, behavioral and emotional control, and responses to…