From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!psych.toronto.edu!michael Mon Mar  9 18:35:10 EST 1992
Article 4259 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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Path: newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!psych.toronto.edu!michael
>From: michael@psych.toronto.edu (Michael Gemar)
Subject: Re: Definition of understanding
Organization: Department of Psychology, University of Toronto
References: <44170@dime.cs.umass.edu> <1992Mar3.000217.18401@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu> <44302@dime.cs.umass.edu>
Message-ID: <1992Mar4.205934.27339@psych.toronto.edu>
Date: Wed, 4 Mar 1992 20:59:34 GMT

In article <44302@dime.cs.umass.edu> orourke@sophia.smith.edu (Joseph O'Rourke) writes:

[in response to Dave Chalmers' fading qualia argument]

>	Thanks for posting this nth version of your fading qualia
>argument.  I'm not sure I can raise the level of discussion myself,
>but let me make two comments.
>
>1. Qualia are slippery, and no one seems to understand them, as you
>have often pointed out.  Resting an argument on intuition about
>qualia is akin to building on sand.  For me at least.  Maybe because
>you have pondered qualia so thoroughly, your intuition is stronger.
>
>2. It seems conceivable that qualia are dependent upon the neurotransmitters
>passed in synapses.  Maybe our feeling of redness is just how it
>feels to have certain chemicals released from neurons in certain
>brain areas.  I know little of neurobiology, but suppose for the
>moment that this were true.
>	Then it could be that the functionality of a single neuron
>is indeed computable, and silicon-substitutable.  But as more and
>more neuron interconnections are replaced, less and less of the
>neurotransmitters are around to be experienced as qualia.  Then
>the person would indeed experience a fading of qualia.

Your second point is, essentially, the position Searle takes. 

- michael
 


