X-Message-Number: 5672
From: 
Date: Sat, 27 Jan 1996 13:22:24 -0500
Subject: feeling, Humanists

Peter Merel (#5665) asked me to clarify the "self circuit" relative to his
metaphor of the mind as a flower garden.

Sorry, I can't connect with that, but I suppose I can try to clarify the
"role" of the self circuit, although it baffles me why so many people find it
hard to understand. 

The "role" is implicit in the definition. The definition of "self circuit" or
"subjective circuit" is "the portion(s) or aspect(s) of the brain or/and its
functions that permit or result in feeling or qualia (hence consciousness)." 

Since it is feeling that characterizes LAWKI (life as we know it), the self
circuit is the GROUND OF BEING, and for us the most important phenomenon in
the universe. But it requires a very long discussion--on which I am
working--even to make a dent in the "philosophical" problems concerning
criteria of identity and survival.

Again: we know that much or most of the brain is either just housekeeping or
computing. But there must be some part(s) or aspect(s) fundamentally
distinguishing a person from an unfeeling--even though possibly or
potentially intelligent--system such as an ordinary computer.

Here of course we already run into an obstacle in some people's minds; they
will not concede the possibility of intelligence without feeling, believing
that intelligence which is in all ways equal or superior to the human will
necessarily (somehow) include feeling as a globally emergent trait. This
position seems unreasonable to me, considering that many lower animals
certainly have feeling, and perhaps animals that are MUCH lower; and
considering that ordinary computers and programs should be able eventually to
out-think humans in almost all ways--even if only by sheer brute force of
speed and memory. 

We have gone 'round and 'round about the "imitation game," and some will not
concede that a computer might successfully imitate a human's mental actions
and reactions, or the outward manifestations thereof, and in particular a
human's conversation, without actually experiencing anything in the
subjective sense. Again, it is hard for me to credit this incredulity, since
we have so many examples of partial isomorphism, the map which is not the
territory; and also examples of the same result produced by completely
different mechanisms.  

As to the physical nature of the subjective circuit, the lab people will have
to discover that. Presumably it has substantial elements of feedback and
homeostasis, possibly involving some kind(s) of standing wave. 

I certainly don't claim to have contributed anything much by giving the "self
circuit" one of its names. (Joe Strout prefers "subjective circuit," and that
may be better.) But just naming it, and stressing its importance, may
possibly help a trifle in the focus of attention of the experimentalists. It
might also, conceivably, one day help cryonicists to  know where to focus
attention with respect to quality of preservation.

Re Humanists (David Harris, #5670): Rotsa ruck with them. I don't think there
is anything especially mysterious about why these "naturalistic" people are
not more receptive to cryonics. The Communists are materialists (supposedly),
yet they also make poor candidates. The reason is the same: a mind-set
elevating some abstraction (Communists the State, Humanists the Species or
Society) above the individual. Their obsession is "being good" in some
altruistic way, or in some way certified by their authorities....But thanks
to Ralph Merkle for his indefatigable efforts, which might even help. (Don't
forget  to tell them about immortalists and the Golden Rule: more than anyone
else, we must walk the walk if we hope for friendly neighbors and a clean
nest.)

Robert Ettinger


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