From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!torn!cs.utexas.edu!wupost!uunet!secapl!Cookie!frank Fri Oct 30 15:17:57 EST 1992
Article 7422 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: frank@Cookie.secapl.com (Frank Adams)
Subject: Re: We've Been Tricked- consciousness
Message-ID: <1992Oct28.163845.122707@Cookie.secapl.com>
Date: Wed, 28 Oct 1992 16:38:45 GMT
References: <BwpHGD.EMy@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu> <BwqppI.IsM@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca> <Bwsqpo.8EE@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>
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In article <Bwsqpo.8EE@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu> lcarr@silver.ucs.indiana.edu (lincoln carr) writes:
>The same kind of difficulty arises when one asks the same kinds of
>questions about rationality.  If I want to support, say, minimum
>requirements for consciousness, it is well within the scope of my
>imagination to conceive that, in the course of evolution, that there
>were beings just below these minima and that their progeny developed
>just above these minima.  There doesn't need to be any dramatic
>breakthrough, just a point at which the minima are met.  This would
>support the idea that minima of consciousness could be defined and
>that there is a point at which something could be called definitely
>conscious without saying that consciousness must come in degrees.

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.


