The cloned consciousness problem.

General Philosophy
41

Hard to know if they will ever be possible. The idea, it would seem, is that memories are stored by patterns of neural activity. Neurons fire in response to stimulus. When the stimulus is repeated enough, the particular connections strengthen (by increasing the number of neurotransmitter receptors). Later, something triggers that pattern.

If it was remotely as easy as that, we might never be able to do what you’re asking. 86 billion neurons, each with an average of 7,000-10,000 synaptic connections, means 100 trillion total connections. How many different patterns can you make with 100 trillion connections? I don’t know if it’s possible to calculate that. How many patterns of 3, of 4, of 5 … of 1,000 … of 1,000,000 … of 1 billion … of 1 trillion…

AND! Will your pattern for the memory of a particular object be the same as my pattern?

And I don’t suspect it’s remotely as easy as that.

42

AI / Computer memories are physical in nature, and they seem to be doing well on the memory manipulation.

It seems to suggest, the physical storage of memories in the machines are not the same physical storage of memories in humans.

Is then human memory in the form of physical storage at all? In what way are they physical? What’s the difference on the physical storages?

43

I don’t know enough about either human or computer information storage to be of any help. I can’t imagine how many ways there are to accomplish the task.

44

Sure but that doesn’t really test your view.

Consider this hypothetical:

I make a perfect scan of your complete physical structure. Then I zap you such that your body is vaporized down to the constituent atoms.
Now: using my amazing tech I can put all these atoms back where they were and recreate you entirely. But in my lab I also have containers of all the elements needed so I can also recreate you using new atoms.

Does it make a difference which set of atoms I use?
Why?

45

In that case, should we be open minded on the nature of human consciousness? It still sounds not conclusively physical in nature.

46

I’ve been talking about memory, not consciousness. I do not believe consciousness is physical in nature.

47

Isn’t memory a part of consciousness? Can memory be separated from consciousness?

48

I don’t know if you mean anything specific by “difference”. If you reassemble me with different atoms, then you could either not vaporize me in the first place, or reassemble me with the original atoms in addition to reassembling me with different atoms. Either way, there are two of me.

But in what way does that “make a difference”?

49

My position is that memory has nothing to do with consciousness. I think consciousness is fundamental, a property of matter just as mass and charge are, and everything is conscious. But everything can only be conscious of its own self, its own nature. Humans, and various other species, are conscious of their memories. But the things we are conscious of are not what consciousness is. Other things do not have memories to be conscious of.

50

But would you say someone is conscious, if he/she has absolutely no memory of their past at all?

If you cannot remember what you just read, then you couldn’t respond to it in conscious way. Yes?

51

Yes. They aren’t conscious of memories, but they are still conscious of whatever they are conscious of.

I cannot be conscious of a memory if I don’t have the memory. But I am conscious of other things.

52

But wouldn’t you forget what you were conscious of, the moment you were conscious other things?

53

Sure. As you say, I would be conscious of other things. Consciousness is there, regardless of what it is of.

54

But without memory of even the most immediate past, consciousness would be just blankness in the mind. The immediate problem for consciousness with no memory would be, it cannot know who he / she is, or why he / she is there for, and all the incoming information is not being stored for any processing.

Without memory, one cannot imagine, think or infer anything. Experience and knowledge are all stored in one’s memory, which is the foundation of all mental operation. Without memory, there is no consciousness. Just my 2 cent. :slight_smile:

55

But they are not human brains which is the difference, we can even see the difference in problem solving and thinking ability.

Also far as we know humans are conscious and AI is not (yet) and we still don’t have a grasp on consciousness.

56

Then it would be a copy of the body but not exactly the person, maybe. It’s hard to say since it’s a hypothetical. But you seem stuck on the physical aspect of identity which is only part of the questions.

That aside my only question about all this speculation is how does it translate into real life. Like…why should we care? In your case you say continuity is an illusion, so what does that look like applied to our lives?

57

I am very aware that my definition of consciousness is not shared by anyone here. It’s all good. :grinning_face: I think a plant is conscious, although it does not remember (at least not at all the way we do), imagine, infer, or have any other kind of mental operation. I think a plant experiences its own nature. So does an electron.

58

We can still infer consciousness from the biological beings such as humans and intelligent animals by the way they interact with nature and other humans and animals.

Consciousness can be ability of interacting intelligibly for their well being and survival in the world, rather than some sort of entity or existence.

59

I am not sure if plants are conscious. In fact I cannot see any evidence for plants are conscious.

They can be alive, but they don’t interact intelligently as animals do. They lack all the signs of possible mental operations within them, which are detectable in animals.

60

Yeah, I’m alone in this. I don’t think intelligence or mental operations have anything to do with consciousness. We are conscious of these things, because we have the brains that we have. But what we are conscious of is not what consciousness is.