Discussion Topic |
|
This thread has been locked |
Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Jun 19, 2014 - 05:57pm PT
|
My friend is actually working on the problem, but they can't seem to get a toe hold on where to start. They would be glad to approach the problem indirectly but so far there are no mechanics that remotely point to sentience. What MH2 is suggesting is called data or info stacking, and issues from the belief that awareness and sentience is really just the objective associations of content (memories etc.), except one can get an even greater sense of their own sentience by ignoring content. The whole Heb synapses and mirror neuron tacts (a mirror neuron fires both when an animal acts and when the animal observes the same action performed by another synapses) also have to do with functioning and content, rather than observing in and of itself.
I think what my friend is struggling with is that the focus is on processing, on content, and people are thinking that sentience somehow is blowback or is a kind of subset or consequence of the info stacking or content stacking just mentioned. This, he says, is a non-starter per building that code. At least one of his friends is starting to approach the problem from the opposite end, focusing on sentience, and postulationg that content issues from that. That's not to say content or things are "created" by sentience, which makes the whole business even trickier.
It is a mind f*#k that our most basic human reality, the fact that we ARE aware, is something almost impossible to get hold of in and of itself without defaulting into "religion."
Another interesting note is that while we probably have to try and objectify sentience indirectly, the programmer has to take it on directly, or else he knows the right components to stack from which sentience arises (emergence). There are theories about how this might be so, but they do not point to some thing or functional aspect that can be broken down into code.
My sense of it is that sentience does not even exist in the way we consider all other things to exist. The difficulty of trying to objectify sentience in someone else, even in, or especially in a robot, say, might even suggest that sentience exists only as a subjective phenomenon, and might not even have a purely physical counterpart that "produces" it.
I can appreciate how the issue becomes an entirely different can or worms for the programmer who has to actually cook up some code. We're just talking about it.
JL
|
|
jgill
Boulder climber
Colorado
|
|
|
Jun 19, 2014 - 08:03pm PT
|
I'm sure this has come up before - I may even have mentioned it a thousand posts ago - but it's possible that what we call "sentience" or "consciousness" may never be understood. After all, I have been trying to teach my Corgi Jake the elements of algebra for several years and have made no discernible progress. There are some things humans may never understand. For hundreds of years mathematicians tried to "square the circle" using ancient Greek ruler and compass, but that was shown to be impossible by Galois and others. It could happen that a "proof" might arise that shows the impossibility of understanding these phenomena.
More likely, some hitherto unformed perspective on these subjects might appear that allows us to "see" what has been missed by so many for so long. Perhaps the human mind must necessarily evolve more to successfully contemplate these properties.
I keep returning to the difficulties (paradoxes, etc.) inherent in an entity using an analysis process to study that process.
|
|
MH2
climber
|
|
|
Jun 19, 2014 - 08:32pm PT
|
My friend is actually working on the problem[programming sentience], but they can't seem to get a toe hold on where to start. (JL)
Your friend needs to find a better problem.
You need more background on the Hebb synapse.
You are in no position to say that associative memory is not sentience, in part or in whole. If you had no memory and no ability to learn, what kind of sentience would you have?
|
|
BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
|
|
|
Jun 19, 2014 - 09:07pm PT
|
More likely, some hitherto unformed perspective on these subjects might appear that allows us to "see" what has been missed by so many for so long. Perhaps the human mind must necessarily evolve more to successfully contemplate these properties.
Do we really need to know the numbers and formulas and equations it took for a car to become a car inorder to drive it? Naa.
You don't have to follow neuron activity to understand the mind,body, and soul. Just read the Bible. Its all been right there. There ain't nothin new under the sun today.
Where's MikeL?
|
|
Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Jun 19, 2014 - 10:47pm PT
|
You are in no position to say that associative memory is not sentience, in part or in whole. If you had no memory and no ability to learn, what kind of sentience would you have?
-
Memory is content, the stuff we are aware of, be it just now or a year ago.
If you are saying that sentience IS associative memory, lets say in "whole" for the same of this example, then we'd only have to write the code for this objective process and -
As though they guys hadn't thought of that. Really? In fact, from what they told me, they have exhausted both types of associative memory: auto-associative and hetero-associative. Digitizing either one is just another drill in collaring computational functions, acording to my friend.
This harks back to the myth that sentience and processing are identical, or that the later somehow gives rise to sentience via info or data "stacking." This, apparently, is as hare-brained as thinking we naturaly become conscious once the brain gets sufficiently complex. But no one has a clue what the mechanism is that would make that so.
None of these beliefs have led to one piece of code being written. Not a single X or O.
JL
|
|
go-B
climber
Cling to what is good!
|
|
|
Jun 20, 2014 - 03:17am PT
|
Sometimes I tell my wife when I turn over on the couch that I'm going on a road trip, but that I have to make a few stops along the way! :)
God is the potter and we are the clay, and these birthday suits He has given us are surely amazing!
|
|
Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado, Nepal & Okinawa
|
|
|
Jun 20, 2014 - 04:20am PT
|
If you had no memory and no ability to learn, what kind of sentience would you have?
Good question also, in regard to the mentally impaired. Is a person with Alzheimer's lacking in sentience or just in certain processing abilities involving memory?
Or perhaps sentience is a spectrum with a vegetabalized person whose brain still keeps the heart beating while in a coma at one end, different stages of Alzheimer's at different points along the way, and hyper alert, multi tasking geniuses at the other end?
If so, where does the man or woman experiencing nothingness during zazen fit on the spectrum?
And people high on psychedelics? Or schitzophrenics hallucinating?
If robots can't get high on Acid, are they sentient or just sane?
And what about animal sentience? Where does that fit?
Do we really need language to have conciuousness? And what kind of language would that be? Whales after all, can sing poems where the rhymes are not words but musical notes.
No need to think of robots to contemplate degrees of sentience and consiousness.
|
|
MH2
climber
|
|
|
Jun 20, 2014 - 08:35am PT
|
If you are saying that sentience IS associative memory, lets say in "whole" for the same of this example, then we'd only have to write the code for this objective process and -
As though they guys hadn't thought of that. Really? In fact, from what they told me, they have exhausted both types of associative memory: auto-associative and hetero-associative. Digitizing either one is just another drill in collaring computational functions, acording to my friend. (JL)
Your guys are exhausted, not the possibilities.
The Hebb synapse is a simple rule for how synaptic strength changes. Compare it to the simple rules John Horton Conway arrived at for his cellular automaton, the Game of Life. Although Conway's rules are simple the behavior of the system is not. Much of the behavior of the system cannot be deduced from the rules. The only way to see what happens is to start with some pattern and see what develops from it.
Brain activity is sensitive to the timing of impulse traffic. The Hebb synapse takes this into account. How does the code your AI guys write include the importance of timing? Do they think they can ignore it?
The brain is interconnected. Some 10 billion neurons each of which may influence any other through some chain of other neurons. The effect of one neuron on others can be feedforward excitation, feedforward inhibition, feedback excitation, or feedback inhibition. Have your AI guys explored all the possible behaviors of that? With timing taken into account?
Ultimately, it may be found that we can learn the basic rules of brain operation but still be unable to predict what particular activity will result, or create an emulation that will do what we want it to. As in the Game of LIfe.
|
|
MH2
climber
|
|
|
Jun 20, 2014 - 08:44am PT
|
Jan,
Although memory is compromised in Alzheimer's, it is still present, especially the long-term kind. My question is about an organism, whether human or not, which never had any ability to learn or remember. A blank slate. There might be sentience but how could you recognize it?
A person under general anesthesia is probably more into nothingness than a person "experiencing" nothingness via zazen. Both have sentience, it is just temporarily shelved.
No, language is not essential to sentience in my opinion. But since none of us really knows what we are talking about, all opinions are equal.
|
|
MH2
climber
|
|
|
Jun 20, 2014 - 11:03am PT
|
Good opinion, moosesmart.
|
|
jgill
Boulder climber
Colorado
|
|
|
Jun 22, 2014 - 09:17pm PT
|
Moose contemplates the mind. His Id is seen rising above him.
[Image of "virtual" integrals in which the distances between the end points of certain contours in the complex plane: |λ(z)|,
where λ(z)=∫Q(z,t)dt, are used to paint the pixels lighter or darker hues, then color added in Photoshop]
;>)
|
|
MH2
climber
|
|
|
Jun 22, 2014 - 09:32pm PT
|
There are things I like about this thread.
|
|
TomCochrane
Trad climber
Santa Cruz Mountains and Monterey Bay
|
|
|
Jun 22, 2014 - 09:54pm PT
|
Rupert Sheldrake TED talk banned/censored by TED:
So I just ran across two EXTREMELY fascinating TED talks about the science of consciousness that have been banned on, of all places, TED. One by Graham Hancock and the other by Rupert Sheldrake, two impressively accomplished scientists. What is going on? Is this the beginning of the end of TED as a platform for innovative, provocative, and paradigm-shifting ideas? If so, I'm going to be really sad. I love(d) TED. Anyhow, here are links to the talks. They're SO worth the watch...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKHUaNAxsTg
Wow ted blew it on this one. Rupert probably has more credentials than the whole scientific panel combined. This video being banned lends even more credence to Hancock's assertion that a war on consciousness is taking place.
Simply put The fact that it is banned and people react to this with a closed mind shows that people are afraid of having certain set ideas they have been taught challenged or questioned or having their world view that they have taken for granted become questioned. i think that explains the defensiveness of the detractors comments and at also the fact that it was banned.
Sheldrake brings up questions people have ready responses to because those responses are old conditioned things built by education systems and they refuse to actually give thought to it instead they react and give with opinion and conformity
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0c5nIvJH7w
|
|
Ward Trotter
Trad climber
|
|
|
Jun 22, 2014 - 11:11pm PT
|
The TED controversy with Sheldrake/Hancock goes back to March of 2013.
I have a sneaky suspicion there is something going on in the background here, namely, an internecine conflict between an upstart English/Whitechapel franchise branch and the main TED establishment in the US.
There are broader issues at play here as well. Needless to say.
|
|
healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
|
|
|
Jun 23, 2014 - 01:11am PT
|
I see Sheldrake is putting in his annual thread appearance. His basic assertion is pretty weak; science isn't constrained by dogma, it's constrained by its methods which simply do not lend themselves terribly well to the 'paranormal', fantasy, or other forms of wishful thinking no matter how intently one would hope to the contrary. Thus, it's not really surprising Sheldrake's suppositions on 'morphic resonance', telepathy, and DNA not being morphologically significant fail to accumulate much in the way of scientific traction.
|
|
Ward Trotter
Trad climber
|
|
|
Jun 23, 2014 - 01:57am PT
|
fail to accumulate much in the way of scientific traction.
Neither did Wegener's hypothesis of continental drift. In fact, the idea had predated Wegener and he merely advanced what he considered a reasonable hypothesis coupled with his observations and related ideas---such as the significance of sea floor spreading.
In his work, Wegener presented a large amount of observational evidence in support of continental drift, but the mechanism remained elusive. While his ideas attracted a few early supporters such as Alexander Du Toit from South Africa and Arthur Holmes in England,[11] the hypothesis was initially met with skepticism from geologists who viewed Wegener as an outsider, and were resistant to change.[11] The one American edition of Wegener's work, published in 1925, which was written in "a dogmatic style that often results from Germany translations",[11] was received so poorly that the American Association of Petroleum Geologists organized a symposium specifically in opposition to the continental drift hypothesis.[12] The opponents argued, as did the Leipziger geologist Franz Kossmat, that the oceanic crust was too firm for the continents to "simply plough through".
I'm not trying to suggest that Sheldrake is a Wegener. But it's good to point out once in a while that there are sometimes entrenched interests in the science community , perhaps more in the past than today---but still not totally absent.
|
|
healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
|
|
|
Jun 23, 2014 - 04:22am PT
|
I'm not trying to suggest that Sheldrake is a Wegener.
Glad to hear it. Like J Harlen Bretz after him, Wegener tirelessly amassed evidence for his hypothesis before his death and it took time for science to develop in allied areas sufficient to support their claims.
But it's good to point out once in a while that there are sometimes entrenched interests in the science community , perhaps more in the past than today---but still not totally absent. No one has said there aren't entrenched interests and thinking in science; it's unescapably human. But Sheldrake's claims of an overarching 'dogma' that deliberately suppresses honest inquiry on a wider scale is nonsense.
|
|
WBraun
climber
|
|
|
Jun 23, 2014 - 08:08am PT
|
science isn't constrained by dogma, it's constrained by its methods
Yes
Modern science stubbornly uses the wrong tools to the study the antimatter and then constantly makes claims against it.
Thus ultimately modern science is "Stupid" :-)
|
|
Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado, Nepal & Okinawa
|
|
|
Jun 23, 2014 - 08:24am PT
|
Sheldrake's claims of an overarching 'dogma' that deliberately suppresses honest inquiry on a wider scale is nonsense.
Then why didn't someone refute his TED talk points in another public lecture rather than banning the talk with an anonymous committee?
By banning the talk, his adversaries made his point for him and apparently can't see the irony of their situation though everyone else can.
I would like to see a committee of metrologists address the issue of why the constant for gravity seems to have changed all over the world in the same ways in the past century. If it hasn't, then I'd like to hear their arguments refuting his statements on that.
|
|
MH2
climber
|
|
|
Jun 23, 2014 - 08:28am PT
|
Some people ARE stupid, Jan.
(Referring to the banners, in case it needs saying.)
|
|
|
SuperTopo on the Web
|
Let us know!