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Article 7428 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: lcarr@silver.ucs.indiana.edu (lincoln carr)
Subject: Re: We've Been Tricked- consciousness
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References: <BwqppI.IsM@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca> <Bwsqpo.8EE@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu> <1992Oct28.163845.122707@Cookie.secapl.com>
Date: Wed, 28 Oct 1992 22:27:46 GMT
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In article <1992Oct28.163845.122707@Cookie.secapl.com> frank@Cookie.secapl.com (Frank Adams) writes:
>
>More likely, there will any number of generations where your attempts to
>apply your criteria will give indeterminate or inconsistent results.
>That is, either you will get "can't tell" as the answer, or you will
>sometimes get "yes" and sometimes "no" for the same being.
>
>Every real world property I can think of behaves this way.  "Alive",
>"taller than 6 feet", whatever.  The vast majority of cases may be
>clearly defined, but if you look hard you can find borderline cases.  It
>is really a radical suggestion that consciousness might be different,
>and I see no reason to think it is true.

Why do I have to resist the claim that the same being might sometimes
meet criteria and other times not?  If I were, say, to sustain a
stroke from an overload of philosophical debate, I could become
subrational.  The same being, I, would at one time have been rational
and at another subrational.  The same idea applies to "alive" and
"taller than 6 feet."  I still see no problem with minima the meeting
of which is either yes or no.


-- 
Lincoln R. Carr, Computer Scientist-Philosopher    lcarr@silver.ucs.indiana.edu
"Treat all rational autonomous moral agents, whether in the form of yourself
or another, never as means solely, but always as ends in themselves."
                  Immanuel Kant, from "Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals"


