Categoría: Functionalism
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Some problems of the very intuitive evolutionary emergentist paradigm trying to explain consciousness from neurons
Some problems of the very intuitive evolutionary emergentist paradigm trying to explain consciousness from neurons, thanks to Andrés Gómez Emilsson and Chris Percy at Qualia Research Institute: The “Slicing Problem” is a thought experiment that raises questions for substrate-neutral computational theories of consciousness, particularly, in functionalist approaches. The thought experiment uses water-based logic gates to…
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Only mammals and birds are sentient, according to Nick Humphrey
Only mammals and birds are sentient, according to neuroscientist Nick Humphrey’s theory of consciousness, recently explained in “Sentience: The invention of consciousness”. In 2023, Nick Humphrey published his book Sentience: The invention of consciousness (S:TIOC). In this book he proposed a theory of consciousness that implies, he says, that only mammals and birds have any…
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Kolmogorov theory of consciousness. An algorithmic model of consciousness
Characterizing consciousness is a profound scientific problem with pressing clinical and practical implications. Examples include disorders of consciousness, locked-in syndrome, conscious state in utero, in sleep and other states of consciousness, in non-human animals, and perhaps soon in exobiology [astrobiology] or in machines. Here, we address the phenomenon of structured experience from an information-theoretic perspective. ……
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A conversation between Brian Tomasik and Luke Muehlhauser
Luke and Mr. Tomasik found that they agreed about the following: Physicalism and functionalism about consciousness. Specifically, Mr. Tomasik endorses “Type A” physicalism, as described in his article “Is There a Hard Problem of Consciousness?” Luke isn’t certain he endorses Type A physicalism as defined in that article, but he thinks his views are much…
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Can GPT3 or a later version of it experience suffering?
And if so, should we be continuing to develop it? I have to admit that I don’t know much about how the system works, but I’m genuinely curious: how do we know that it doesn’t feel anything? I’m just concerned because I’m seeing more and more articles about its creation and the many amazing things…
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Against functionalism: why I think the Foundational Research Institute should rethink its approach, by Michael Edward Johnson
FRI believes in analytic functionalism, or what David Chalmers calls “Type-A materialism”. Essentially, what this means is there’s no ’theoretical essence’ to consciousness; rather, consciousness is the sum-total of the functional properties of our brains. Since ‘functional properties’ are rather vague, this means consciousness itself is rather vague, in the same way words like “life,” “justice,” and “virtue”…
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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…
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On theories of sentience: a talk with Magnus Vinding
Magnus Vinding is a philosopher focused on reducing suffering. In his works, he has covered topics such as effective altruism, anti-speciesism, suffering-focused ethics (about which he was writing a book at the time of this interview), and issues of personal identity and ontology, such as open individualism and physicalism. He has a degree in mathematics…