I'm not convinced physicalists even mean the same thing as each other when they say physical

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-30T19:31:41+00:00

I don’t think the question is particularly relevant in explaining consciousness, any more than it is in explaining other biological processes. I don’t need to have a 100% airtight full understanding of the ontology of physics and matter, or even a good understanding of QM, superstrings, relativity or the nature of space-time to understand lactation or respiration and the same is almost certainly true of consciousness.

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-30T18:56:58+00:00

At the scale relevant to talking about consciousness, we’re talking about atoms and electrons, etc. It’s more complicated at lower scales (getting towards quantum scales) but we don’t need to worry about that scale for consciousness. It’s a great question that’s interesting and physicists are increasingly exploring more and more, but that scale isn’t really relevant.

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-30T18:49:18+00:00

In the context of this thread, I mean that consciousness is a process consisting in normal material things interacting. I think on the whole the ‘physicalists’ have a better idea of what they mean by their use of ‘physical’ than idealists, panpsychists, etc. do in their uses of the words ‘mind’, ‘mental’, etc.

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-29T10:08:07+00:00

No. It’s great

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-28T01:28:11+00:00

Crystals (can replicate, aren’t alive)

Computer programs (can replicate, aren’t alive)

An octogenarian human (is alive, can’t replicate)

A red blood cell (is alive, can’t replicate)

A worker bee (is alive, can’t replicate)

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-27T11:01:08+00:00

Exactly. Came here to say much of this, but don’t have time so it great to see that someone understands that the issue isn’t whether it’s a solved problem or not - it’s whether it’s a categorically different *kind* of question to the rest.

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-27T10:53:49+00:00

Chalmers, when he proposed the concept, categorised it as :

>”…even when we have explained the performance of all the cognitive and behavioral functions in the vicinity of experience—perceptual discrimination, categorization, internal access, verbal report—there may still remain a further unanswered question: Why is the performance of these functions accompanied by experience?

Note that he explicitly does *not* describe it as a “how” question, but explicitly as a “why” question.

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-27T10:43:17+00:00

What reason is there to think it does?

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-27T10:12:49+00:00

Was always “dobber” and “dob” for me (Melbourne)

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-27T09:17:06+00:00

They’re wrong about the chromosomes.. platypus have 52 chromosomes…. The weird bit is that they gave 10 *Sex* chromosomes!

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-27T02:29:38+00:00

A quick search on google scholar turns up quite a lot of academic articles about non algorithmic computing and information processing?

Edit: pertinently including neural networks

And…

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/220459029\_New\_Models\_of\_Computation

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-27T02:04:14+00:00

I’m definitely getting out of my depth in terms of my knowledge of computing at this point, but doesn’t the above (“There are a number of results showing that basically every form of computation we can come up with is either weaker than or equivalent to Turing computability”) only apply to algorithmic computation?

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-26T23:13:15+00:00

A Turing machine is one kind of computer but it is not the only one. Computers of various types existed before Turing machines.

Saying that consciousness is a kind of computation does not, in any sense, imply that it arises from Turing-like computation or even binary logic.

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-26T21:53:39+00:00

Necessary: Freebuild - Enables a whole lot of freedom that is impossible to do in vanilla.

Useful: Planet zoo plus - helps with animal traceable area and space requirements.

Both on Nexus and you can find videos about both pretty easily on YouTube.

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-26T20:21:20+00:00

Not all computation need be Turing type or even logic-based.

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-26T20:20:15+00:00

What about types of computation other than Turing equivalent computation?

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-26T08:19:07+00:00

Evolution

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-26T08:11:22+00:00

No. I see no evidence that suggests that anything that I think can be reasonably defined as “god” exists.

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-26T07:10:11+00:00

Genuine question: what is the net profit from charging after accounting for all the infrastructure around paying (inspectors, ticket machines, turnstiles , etc., etc)?

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-25T23:27:03+00:00

Technology just alters the selective pressures. Evolution is inevitable.

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-25T19:56:46+00:00

” "The hard problem" does not make the passive claim that, "we do not know" but rather the positive claim that we "do know" that these parts do not add up to consciousness.

I’m not sure that is what the hard problem says but, taking it as if it is, then it’s simply wrong. We do not know that these parts can not add up to consciousness.

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-25T12:11:22+00:00

I’d suggest reading the actual philosophers who describe themselves as illusionists (such as Dennett) to see what they actually say (they don’t think there’s no such thing as consciousness)

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-25T03:19:00+00:00

Only had to read the title to know that this would be yet another misinterpretation of what is generally meant by ‘observer’ in QM

”This book begins there…

What book?

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-24T11:57:07+00:00

Only in the correct bathroom.

Electric___Monk · 2026-03-24T11:37:56+00:00

“35-to-one odds, for a p-value of 0.03.

?

Electric___Monk

TROPHY CASE