Article View: sci.cognitive
Article #618Re: Consciousness
From: Michael Olea
Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2003 21:13
Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2003 21:13
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in article lnd2rv0k34b2sp117g8sbjl5mtu5e6acci@4ax.com, r norman at rsn_@_comcast.net wrote on 11/11/03 11:27 AM: > On Tue, 11 Nov 2003 19:14:13 GMT, "Dio" <dadaismo@tin.it> wrote: > >> Is consciousness produced only by brain or it could be produced by a machine >> too? >> > > An excellent question that has been around for a very long time. > > Given that we really don't know what consciousness is or what produces > it, the question of whether a purely computational device could be > conscious is an open question. I presume you do not mean simply a > mechanical gadget -- computation and information processing does seem > to be intimitately involved. > > One general philosophical argument is that all biological processes > are simply the working out of the laws of physics and chemistry. That > is, the brain IS a kind of machine already, so yes, consciousness can > be produced by a machine. And that means that is could also be > produced by a non-biological machine. > The last sentence does not necessarily follow - it is a logical possibility that whatever it is that makes a machine "non-biological" also makes it incapable of consciousness. I am not advocating that position, just pointing out a flaw in the reasoning.
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X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 10681a,dcd28dbff7b24044 X-Google-Attributes: gid10681a,public X-Google-Thread: 1045ed,dcd28dbff7b24044 X-Google-Attributes: gid1045ed,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2003-11-11 13:14:10 PST Path: arc1-ca.pugleaf.net!archiver1.google.com!news2.google.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!news-xfer1.atl.newshosting.com!63.218.45.11.MISMATCH!newshosting.com!news-xfer2.atl.newshosting.com!207.69.154.101.MISMATCH!elnk-atl-nf1!newsfeed.earthlink.net!prodigy.com!newsmst01.news.prodigy.com!prodigy.com!postmaster.news.prodigy.com!newssvr27.news.prodigy.com.POSTED!8296ffd1!not-for-mail User-Agent: Microsoft-Outlook-Express-Macintosh-Edition/5.02.2106 Subject: Re: Consciousness From: Michael Olea <oleaj@sbcglobal.net> Newsgroups: sci.cognitive,bionet.neuroscience Message-ID: <BBD69100.12C8%oleaj@sbcglobal.net> References: <9yasb.6880$9_.283969@news1.tin.it> <lnd2rv0k34b2sp117g8sbjl5mtu5e6acci@4ax.com> Mime-version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Lines: 28 NNTP-Posting-Host: 64.160.118.58 X-Complaints-To: abuse@prodigy.net X-Trace: newssvr27.news.prodigy.com 1068585216 ST000 64.160.118.58 (Tue, 11 Nov 2003 16:13:36 EST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2003 16:13:36 EST Organization: SBC http://yahoo.sbc.com X-UserInfo1: TSU[@I_A\S@MBP\YORID]_\@VR]^@B@MCPWZKB]MPXHDUWYAKVUOPCW[ML\JXUCKVFDYZKBMSFX^OMSAFNTINTDDMVW[X\THOPXZRVOCJTUTPC\_JSBVX\KAOTBAJBVMZTYAKMNLDI_MFDSSOLXINH__FS^\WQGHGI^C@E[A_CF\AQLDQ\BTMPLDFNVUQ_VM Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2003 21:13:36 GMT