X-Message-Number: 8103
Date: 18 Apr 97 01:11:14 EDT
From: "Robert C. Ettinger" <>
Subject: CRYONICS Wheelness, Panpsychism

Wheelness, Panpsychism:

Some info folk have tried to ridicule my implied contention that every feature
of a system must have a "seat" in the system or its functions, whether
distributed or not. (Their aim is to dismiss the necessity for the search for
the seat of feeling, the self circuit.) They have repeatedly invoked the
"absurdity" of looking for a "seat of car-ness" in automobiles. We'll get back
to autos in a bit; let's start with something simpler, the wheel, as in
wagon-wheel etc.

Of course a wheel is just a collection of atoms, and its wheelness is an

emergent property of the system, of the atoms collectively and not individually.
The info folk are right in this--nothing profound or difficult in the concept.

But the POINT is that wheelness is a definite, specific, easily discerned, esily

described, and easily understood property. We do NOT just wave the magic wand of
"emergence" and claim that makes all problems disappear. Instead, we note that
the main feature of a wheel is that it rolls, and this is related to its
roundness in its main plane, ideally its circularity. A circle is easily
described and understood, nothing mysterious or mystical about it.  We have not

dodged the issue or laid a smoke screen or hollered "Emergence!" Instead we have

FOUND the seat of wheelness, pinned it down in terms easily understood. The seat
of wheelness is in the circularity of the wheel (mainly; there must also be a
certain cohesiveness of the atoms etc.). 

"Car-ness" is a concept less clear-cut; there is a less clear distinction
between "cars" and "non-cars." Nevertheless, we could proceed the same way with
"car-ness" as with"wheelness" and find a reasonably clear and concise way to

assign "car-ness" to appropriate parts/functions of the auto....Of course, there
is no particular NEED to look for a "seat of car-ness;" the concept is handled
well enough implicitly. We know how cars work; there isn't a problem.


With consciousness and feeling, there IS a problem. We do NOT know the nature or

origin of feeling or its offshoot, consciousness. But we very much NEED to know,
because it is the most important (although not necessarily the profoundest or
most difficult) of all scientific problems. The importance arises from the fact

that our subjective experiences (feeling and all that arises therefrom) are what
give us life as we know it, the capacity for enjoyment or suffering with all
their variations and gradations. Here also is the origin of values, hence life
strategies. 

At extremes of info-freakery (sorry), on the other hand, we find denial of any
need to seek a seat of feeling; feeling and consciousness are claimed just to

"emerge" from almost any system, so there and forget it. Even Dr. Perry has said

that MAYBE ("maybe" emphasized to acknowledge his caution) even a thermostat has
some kind or some degree of feeling. The most extreme pan-psychists say that
even an atom has its own little consciousness.

Most casual readers will find it odd that anyone should argue at length to show
that a thermostat isn't conscious. However, the info people include some of the
brightest and best, and we do need to straighten them out--especially to rule
out the possibility that WE need straightening out. We also need to inspire the
experimentalists a bit in their search for the seat of feeling, this search
being so far mostly without any clear understanding that qualia represent a
separate and distinct problem from those of sensory signal transmission and
computation and storage.

Robert Ettinger 

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