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Originally Posted by Interesting Ian  What about inventing a matter duplicator, duplicating a person, and seeing if this duplicated person is conscious. I bet she wouldn't be. |
LOL - Mike did say practical!
I suspect we are a long way from being able to demonstrate (or refute) my speculation. However, it is interesting that you do get odd cases like:
http://perdurabo10.tripod.com/id1202.html
This describes a reasonably successful maths student with very little brain tissue! Perhaps this makes more sense if you assume that we attach a chunk of mental matter.
I feel reproducible, accepted ψ effects may be the way to progress. Imagine someone with enhanced ψ (maybe as a result of a training program) who could reliably communicate with a foetus, or with someone as they were dying (to observe the detachment of the mental components, perhaps).
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Originally Posted by Interesting Ian I don't think that a lot of these materialists are saying it's a side effect. Rather consciousness literally is the function (execution of an algorithm) itself. |
This is where I feel that the simulation idea really pays off. These arguments are steeped in philosophical subtleties, but seem to fall to bits when you examine them in the context of computer simulation. For example, a simulated brain may or may not be experiencing pain with no outputs either way. Do the functionalists really propose that these two possibilities are equivalent!
While talking about a real brain there is far more room for hand-waving - such as a need for feedback to/from the body, various physiological effects, etc.
Recent legal arguments regarding execution by lethal injection possibly bring that question uncomfortably close to home!
David