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Consciousness likely not unique to earthlings, paper says

40 points by giuliomagnifico

by keiferski

1 subcomments

I am thinking more and more that it’s fundamentally a Wittgensteinian kind of problem.
We define a word to mean a certain collection of things (consciousness) and then try and stretch that definition to other things in the world that have the same appearance.
The problem is that this abstract term likely doesn’t exist in itself as a quality, but is just a shorthand for a collection of behaviors that are observed only in biological entities.
And so even if a machine exhibits all the appearance qualities of this definition of consciousness, it’s fundamentally not the same thing at all, and the only reason we think it is, is because our language is insufficient for actually describing reality.
In pragmatic terms it might not actually matter, if a machine 100 years from now passes every conceivable Turing Test. But that doesn’t mean that machines have become conscious in the way humans are conscious.
Expanding in an edit: It just means that the word consciousness is more descriptive, like awareness, and not the soul-derived concept that it still functions as today. Side note – I spent a couple months last year researching the history of consciousness for an essay contest, and one conclusion is how consciousness is descended in large part from our concepts of the soul. Which explains a lot of the reason it has such cultural prestige today.

by zkmon

5 subcomments

Probably they should start by NOT treating the consciousness as a non-physical special thing. Maybe it's not a thing to search for at all. At what point did it become a thing? Separate from chemical and physical interactions between elements?
When you redefine consciousness as just any other chemical, electrical or physical thing, suddenly it's everywhere. You don't need to search for it. The river which finds its way to ocean, has it. The earthquake which decides when to erupt has it. The electrons which decide to jump across orbitals have it.
The confusion is around cause and effect. The standard notion is that a conscious agent can initiate an effect without a cause. A boulder doesn't roll over and hit another unless someone moved it in the first place. It doesn't decide to move and hit another. However this distinction barely survives on the temporal sequencing of cause and effect. That temporal sequence is only valid in a very narrow context and range.
We should stop seeing consciousness as a thing.

by kbrkbr

0 subcomment

Probably best to read the paper. I personally don't find it very convincing, because of the many speculative premises. But that is not a refutation.
Here it is:
https://faculty.ucr.edu/~eschwitz/SchwitzPapers/SubstrateFle...

by viach

1 subcomments

When I checked the last time "consciousness" was not defined yet. So the title can be read as "Some things are likely not unique to earthlings"

by OgsyedIE

2 subcomments

Of the many different scientific traditions that have converged on different ways of treating this question, the most compelling one I've found is Prigogine's dissipative structures model, which on a detailed read seems to be the most amenable tool for some follow-up work somewhere to start quantifying such things. Worth a look in if you enjoyed the OP article.

by typerandom

0 subcomment

My perspective on consciousness is not as a single function unique to humans, but as a process of learning that emerges from coherent interaction at all scales of observers. I think the reason humans have developed the kind of consciousness we generally observe is due to our slow development combined with the physical architecture to support the processing and growth. While many animals learn to master their mechanics and survival early, humans are slow and take time to develop. I often hear people argue that humans are incredible at learning, but I’d argue it being the opposite. We are terrible at learning, and it is what enables us to have the time to observe and learn from coherent information at scales inaccessible to other observers.

by aetherspawn

1 subcomments

Despite the general consensus, I disagree with the idea that you can explain consciousness in an entirely physical way.
That’s because consciousness allows an object to experience its wholeness, but there is no physical explanation as to what makes an object ‘whole’, for example smooshing two brains together doesn’t result in a single consciousness any more than cutting a brain in half results in two. Yet, the same action by another mechanism (reproduction) does create a new consciousness.

by albert_e

1 subcomments

Do humans themselves have varying degrees of consciousness? How would we know / measure.
How does a level of consciousness that goes well above human baseline look like / work like / feel like?
Could such consciousness go to levels not merely slightly above human levels -- but like 10x or 100x (if there were a way to quantify).
What would that unlock?
Curious to know if there has been any vivid description of these possibilities by people much smarter than me ... that might help me appreciate the shape of such things :)

by darkhorse13

5 subcomments

Wow, a paper said this so it must be true. What is the point of research like this that can never be tested? Genuinely curious. Shouldn't we find non-Earth lifeforms FIRST before even trying to make these conclusions?
Edit: Wasn't trying to be harsh here. To be clear, I do believe in consciousness. This sounded a little clickbaity. I also think string theory is a meaningless pursuit.

by cadamsdotcom

2 subcomments

The problem with assertions like this is there’s not an attempt to prove or disprove them. Just a vague reasoning from examples.
Science works. Philosophy can help guide that by helping us decide where to look. So I guess this paper is helping in its own small way.

by bawolff

0 subcomment

Reading the paper, this seems kind of silly.
The argument essentially is. The universe is really big. It would be weird if we were the only thing alive in it, so probably there are other life forms out there. Given enough of them probably some are conscious and made out of different stuff then we are.
And sure, fair enough. That seems plausible. But it also seems like not a very interesting argument. It is essentially just saying the universe is big, therefore all the possibilities are out there.

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by mellosouls

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“This thing that nobody knows what it is is likely shared by things nobody knows even exist.”

by t23414321

1 subcomments

..dead by translation.
Solaris ? Do stars dream of being a Sun and what they can do about it ? (master SF)
- but is he talking about.. _frozen_ mass imagination (or snapshot hallucination) ??
- consciousness? - yes, lots of it is there, as of many other beings caught by _Language Models_
.

by kelseyfrog

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Of all the non-earthlings I've met, exactly zero are what I'd call conscious.

by peter-m80

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> Schwitzgebel and Pober do not attempt to define consciousness
Aaand I stopped reading. If you cannot describe or frame the object of your study, then I don't care.

by flanked-evergl

1 subcomments

In other news, water's wetness is likely not unique to earth.

by grantcas

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[dead]

by visarga

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[dead]

by beshrkayali

1 subcomments

It can’t, unless you descend into sophistry. We came up with and defined the word “consciousness” specifically to fit our own understanding of the collection of behaviors we do that seem to apply only to us. What it means is based on what _we humans_ do, not something observed objectively, so it’s more like a human trait than a thing by itself that we fit into.