zero_iq

I wasn’t arguing from a non-scientific point view at all. Reality is there. That doesn’t make the problem any less “hard”. But I think it is “hard”, not “impossible”.

And as any modern physicist will tell you: most of reality is indeed invisible to us. Most of the universe is seemingly comprised of an unknown substance, and filled with an unknown energy. Most of the universe that we can see more directly follows rules that are unintuitive and uses processes we can’t see. Not only can’t we see them, our own physics tells is it is literally impossible to measure all of them consistently.

Yet despite this, physics works. We can use our minds and tools to reveal the invisible truth. That’s why I believe in the scientific method, and why I think consciousness is not necessarily an impossible problem (unlike Nagel).

But subjective consciousness and qualia fit nowhere in our modern model of physics. It’s potentially “nature of reality”-level stuff – and I don’t mean hippy quasi-scientific mumbo jumbo by this, I mean it seems to reach right down deep into the fundamentals of what physics is and seeks to achieve, to a level that we have not yet uncovered.

I don’t think it’s impossible to explain consciousness. It is part of the universe and the universe is there for us to study. But we are not ready to answer the question. We don’t even fully understand what the question is really asking. It sidesteps our current model of physics. Obviously it is intimately connected to processes in the brain somehow… but that somehow is, currently, an absolute mystery.

I don’t subscribe to Nagel’s belief that it is impossible to solve, but I do understand how the points he raises are legitimate points that illustrate how consciousness does not fit into our current scientific model of the universe.

If I had to choose anyone I’d say my thoughts on the subject are closest to Roger Penrose’s line of thinking, with a dash of David Chalmers.

I think if anyone doesn’t see why consciousness is “hard” then there are two possibilities: 1) they haven’t understood the question and its scientific ramifications 2) they’re not conscious.

In addition to other reasons already given, commercial software may contain licensed code, libraries, assets, trademarks, and other IP that cannot legally be given away for free, or under an open source licence.

Sure, it may be possible to strip those things out, but that may leave the software broken or fundamentally changed, and it may be a significant amount of work to do, which am author or publisher is not likely to spend on abandoned software, especially if their free release would compete with any current products.

3D printer that can print fully-populated functional electronic devices. Design or download a schematic for, say a new camera or phone, make whatever modifications I want, and just hit print!

Basically a replicator for electronic devices…

You respect scientists? Yet you reject science and scientific thinking when it hits you in the face.

You are wading in with extreme arrogance in an area you clearly know very little about.

Many of the most prominent ideas in the field of consciousness are from physicists, biologists, and other scientific fields. The issues are in some cases fundamental to the philosophy of science itself. This is the very bleeding edge of science, where hard physics and metaphysics collide.

Why do you think consciousness remains known as the “hard problem”, and still a considered contentious mystery to modern science, if your simplistic ideas can so easily explain it?

Do you think your naive ideas have not already been thoroughly debated and explored by scientists and philosophers over years of debate and research? The extremely simplistic and basic points you have raised (even ignoring the fallacious ones) are easily invalidated by anyone with even a basic grasp of this field (or indeed basic logic or scientific methodology).

Besides the above, you have clearly not understood the main point of my comment, not engaged in any actual logical debate or analysis of the issues raised (indeed you don’t even to comprehend or recognise what these are) and demonstrated a near total ignorance of modern theories of consciousness.

You had a chance to open your eyes to a whole realm of knowledge and discovery in a fascinating field at the cutting edge of modern science and reason and you just utterly failed to engage with it, handwaving it away with ignorance and stupidity.

Petroleum is what makes cars move, obviously. That’s it!

All those engineers and mechanics who waffle on about physics, laws of motion, and engines and stuff are all a bunch of idiots. I have no respect for them. I don’t need to know about that stuff to talk about how cars work!

You just put petrol in it, it burns and it moves. Burning petrol is what makes cars move. That’s all we’re talking about here! The extent of our debate is whether or not petrol makes cars move. Not how it makes cars go, that’s a wider debate for non-idiots.

(Electric cars? Nonsense. Where’s the gas tank?)

(Boats? No, they’re completely different. I mean yes you put the same fuel in them, but they’re clearly not cars, so it’s not the same.)

My comment just touched the tip of an iceberg that is an entire realm of philosophical and scientific debate that has occupied some of the brightest minds, across multiple disciplines, for decades. But sure, it’s just stupid ridiculous garbage 🙄

You probably think you sounded really clever.

No it hasn’t, and if you don’t see why, and why your explanation is incredibly simplistic and insufficient as an explanation of consciousness, you may not fully realise or understand the problem.

I don’t believe in life after death etc. and I believe consciousness is indeed manifested somewhere in the brain (and tied to those electrical impulses in some way), yet find your explanation utterly insufficient to address the “hard problem” of consciousness. It doesn’t explain qualia, or subjective experience.

Now obviously we do seem to have proved that consciousness is somehow related to such electrical impulses and other processes in the brain… but to say that we even begin to understand how actual subjective conscious experience arises from this is simply not true.

For starters: your logical steps from brain uses electricity -> consciousness is in the brain -> therefore consciousness is in the electrical impulses is a non-sequitur.

To illustrate: CPUs are made up of logic gates that utilise electricity to perform many operations. We know mathematical calculations are done in the CPU. Therefore mathematics is in the logic gates. Does that sound right to you? Is that in any way a satisfactory explanation of what maths is, or where mathemarical concepts exists or how marhs came to be? Does maths only exist in electrical logic gates?

Doesn’t seem at all right does it? Yet that’s precisely the same leap of logic you just used.

Now before you reply with “ah, but that’s totally different” carefully examine why you think it’s different for consciousness…

In addition, there are more than just electrical impulses going on in the brain. Why do you choose electrical or only electrical? Do you think all electrical systems are conscious? What about a computer? What about your house electrical system? Do you draw a distinction? If so, where is the distinction? Can you accurately describe what exactly about certain electrical systems and not others gives rise to direct subjective experience and qualia? What is the precise mechanism that leads to electrons providing a conscious subjective experience? Would a thinking simulation of a brain experience the same qualia?

If you really can’t see what I’m getting at with any of this, perhaps you might be a philosophical zombie… not actually conscious yourself. Just a chemical computer firing some impulses that perfectly simulates a conscious entity, just like an AI but in meat form. Carefully consider: how do you personally know if this is or isn’t true?

Unfortunately, it’s not as simple as that. Theoretically, if everyone was using state-of-the-art designs of fast-breeder reactors, we could have up to 300,000 years of fuel. However, those designs are complicated and extremely expensive to build and operate. The finances just don’t make it viable with current technology; they would have to run at a huge financial loss.

As for Uranium for sea-water – this too is possible, but has rapidly diminishing returns that make it financially unviable quite rapidly. As Uranium is extracted and removed from the oceans, exponentially more sea-water must be processed to continue extracting Uranium at the same rate. This gets infeasible pretty quickly. Estimates are that it would become economically unviable within 30 years.

Realistically, with current technology we have about 80-100 years of viable nuclear fuel at current consumption rates. If everyone was using nuclear right now, we would fully deplete all viable uranium reserves in about 5 years. A huge amount of research and development will be required to extend this further, and to make new more efficient reactor designs economically viable. (Or ditch capitalism and do it anyway – good luck with that!)

Personally, I would rather this investment (or at least a large chunk of it) be spent on renewables, energy storage and distribution, before fusion, with fission nuclear as a stop-gap until other cleaner, safer technologies can take over. (Current energy usage would require running about 15000 reactors globally, and with historical accident rates, that’s about one major nuclear disaster every month). Renewables are simpler, safer, and proven ,and the technology is more-or-less already here. Solving the storage and distribution problem is simpler than building safe and economical fast-breeder reactors, or viable fusion power. We have almost all the technology we need to make this work right now, we mostly just lack infrastructure and the will to do it.

I’m not anti-nuclear, nor am I saying there’s no place for nuclear, and I think there should be more funding for nuclear research, but the boring obvious solution is to invest heavily in renewables, with nuclear as a backup and/or future option. Maybe one day nuclear will progress to the point where it makes more sound sense to go all in on, say fusion, or super-efficient fast-breeders, etc. but at the moment, it’s basically science fiction. I don’t think it’s a sound strategy to bank on nuclear right now, although we should definitely continue to develop it. Maybe if we had continued investing in it at the same rate for the last 50 years it might be more viable – but we didn’t.

Source for estimates: “Is Nuclear Power Globally Scalable?”, Prof. D. Abbott, Proceedings of the IEEE. It’s an older article, but nuclear technology has been pretty much stagnant since it was published.