From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.ecf!utgpu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!ispd-newsserver!psinntp!scylla!daryl Wed Feb 26 12:53:38 EST 1992
Article 3928 of comp.ai.philosophy:
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
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>From: daryl@oracorp.com
Subject: Re: Virtual Person?
Message-ID: <1992Feb22.001104.8453@oracorp.com>
Organization: ORA Corporation
Date: Sat, 22 Feb 1992 00:11:04 GMT

Mike Gunther writes: (in response to David Chalmers)

> But I can be a functionalist about behavior without being a
> functionalist about qualia.  Why can't neuron replacement result
> in a behaviorally equivalent simulation?  The simulation would
> continue to natter on about its qualia as if it had some, because
> of the functional equivalence.  But it would not actually have
> any qualia, being only a simulation.

> During neuron replacement I can imagine the qualia dropping out
> suddenly, once a threshold is reached, with no effect on behavior.
> The simulation takes over to just such an extent as to compensate for
> the loss of the real thing.  It is less strain on my imagination
> if the qualia are lost all at once, but I think it's also possible
> that the qualia fade.  The person might subjectively see pink, but
> would still report red (cf. the inverted spectrum argument) because
> the functional connection between red-frequency light and the spoken
> word "red" has been maintained.  And I think that one could argue
> that the simulation would also remove awareness of difference.  If
> the subject tried to remember what red used to look like, the memory
> would come out subjectively pink and therefore the subject would not
> notice the change.

It seems like to me that the plausibility of fading qualia (with no
change to behavior) is about the same as the plausibility that we
*have* no qualia (only the illusion of qualia). If you can imagine
that your qualia could fade away gradually without your ever becoming
aware of it, then it seems to me that you have no good argument that
this hasn't already happened. The possibility of fading qualia would
imply that despite what we would like to believe, our introspection is
not reliable in telling us whether we possess qualia. Without invoking
the reliability of introspection, we have no reason for believing that
*anyone* possesses qualia (unless, of course, we become functionalists
or, heaven help us, behaviorists).

The possibility of the sudden disappearance of all qualia once a
threshold is reached doesn't suffer from these problems. Our
introspection is reliable, because if introspection is *possible*,
then we still possess all our qualia. Of course, this possibility
leaves open another strange possibility, that people might suddenly
"die" internally (their consciousness suddenly leaves their bodies),
while their bodies keep going as if nothing were wrong.

It seems to me that functionalism has the least weird consequences,
although every theory of consciousness has its share of problems.

Daryl McCullough
ORA Corp.
Ithaca, NY


