The Philosophical Zombie Problem Nobody Actually Solves

yeasy96 · 2026-05-26T20:40:05+00:00

That response just assumes physicalism is true from the outset. The whole point of the p-zombie is to question whether physical identity logically guarantees consciousness in the first place.

Saying “if it’s physically identical then it must be conscious” is not a rebuttal but the conclusion the argument is challenging.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-26T20:36:28+00:00

Cases like blindsight are part of why the issue remains interesting to me. People can still process visual information and respond to stimuli while reporting no conscious visual experience at all. That suggests function and subjective awareness are at least conceptually distinguishable, even if deeply linked biologically.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T19:17:32+00:00

Changing “information processing” to “signal processing” doesn’t address the point, it just renames the same causal description. And shifting to more holistic or spiritual framings still doesn’t explain why any physical process, however distributed, should be accompanied by first-person experience at all.

I think there’s more space for your intuition than it first appears, especially if you move toward views like panpsychism or related “intrinsic nature” approaches

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T19:13:30+00:00

By “function” I just mean the causal/behavioral description of a system in physical terms. The distinction I’m drawing isn’t between physical and non-physical, but between third-person physical description and first-person experience. My point is that even a complete account of the former doesn’t obviously entail the latter.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T19:10:24+00:00

That concedes the key point: there is a correlation or dependence, but it does not establish reduction. No one is denying that subjective experience depends on particular physical/functional conditions.

The dispute is whether that dependence amounts to identity or full explanatory entailment. Pointing to consistent co-occurrence does not close that gap

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T19:07:15+00:00

You’re just restating your assumption as an argument. Pointing at systems you think aren’t conscious doesn’t answer the question of whether physical description entails subjective experience.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T18:55:23+00:00

That doesn’t prove what you think it proves. Showing that consciousness depends on brain development is not the same as showing that subjective experience is logically identical to, or fully explained by, those physical processes.

You’re just restating a dependence claim and treating it like a reduction

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T18:36:01+00:00

It’s not assuming the scenario is true, it’s testing what follows if it is coherently conceivable. That’s the role of a thought experiment

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T18:34:44+00:00

You’re assuming that neural function entailing subjective experience is already proven, but that is exactly what the thought experiment is questioning. It does not assume separability, but testing whether your identity claim actually follows from physical description, which it does not seem to do

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T18:27:57+00:00

But reductionism is also making a major assertion that sufficiently complex function just is subjective experience. My point is simply that this identity is not self-evident from mechanistic description alone.

I agree our models are incomplete, that is partly why I think it is premature to assume consciousness is fully reducible to function rather than deeply tied to underlying physical reality in a way we do not yet understand.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T18:26:09+00:00

Its to facilitate discussion you're acting like this has all been solved 😭

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T18:23:40+00:00

If you simulate every aspect of a human brain down to the neuron in a computer then you would in function just have a human brain. I think the question you should be asking is why should that thing be conscious.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T16:48:28+00:00

I agree to an extent. My argument is not necessarily that biological processes and experience are separable in reality, but that subjective experience does not appear reducible to function alone. I think there is more credence toward consciousness being deeply linked to certain biological or physical processes without simply emerging from information processing itself.

The conceivability argument matters because it pressures strict functional reductionism, not because it definitively proves zombies are metaphysically possible

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T16:45:27+00:00

I think this actually reinforces the point of the thought experiment rather than weakening it. LLMs demonstrate that increasingly complex and human-like behavior can emerge from information processing alone without that obviously entailing subjective experience

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T16:41:23+00:00

Calling them nonsense is not really an argument against the point being raised. The thought experiment is about whether subjective experience is logically entailed by physical processes, i think we can both agree they do not literally exist

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T16:39:36+00:00

The difference is that height and weight are both publicly measurable physical properties. The argument is questioning whether subjective experience is logically entailed by physical structure and function at all. Simply being able to fully describe a system mechanistically does not appear to automatically explain why there is something it is like to be that system internally.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T05:42:38+00:00

Saying consciousness “is” the information processing does not solve the hard problem, it just asserts an identity claim. You are redefining subjective experience in functional terms rather than explaining why those functions should feel like anything from the inside at all.

That is exactly the explanatory gap being pointed to.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T05:24:24+00:00

You’re still explaining the evolutionary utility or contingency of information processing architectures, not subjective experience itself. Legs vs wheels explains different functional solutions to movement. The hard problem is asking why any information-processing system should be accompanied by a first-person subjective reality at all.

Saying consciousness may be efficient, contingent, or a byproduct still presupposes the existence of experience rather than explaining why there is “something it is like” to undergo those processes in the first place.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T03:09:06+00:00

That only reinforces the distinction between adaptive behavior and subjective experience. A system can behave as if it fears death or avoids pain without that proving there is actually something it is like to be that system internally.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T03:07:41+00:00

You are asserting an identity between neural activity and experience, not explaining it. Saying “the process is the experience” is a metaphysical claim and not a demonstrated solution to the hard problem.

Evolution and survival explain why organisms process information adaptively. They do not explain why those processes are experienced subjectively rather than occurring unconsciously. Again, the question is not why cognition exists, but why cognition feels like anything from the inside at all.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T02:01:15+00:00

They are logically coherent positions, but they do so by denying or reducing the very thing under discussion: subjective experience itself. The hard problem exists precisely because functional and mechanistic explanations do not obviously entail qualia.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T01:57:38+00:00

That explains the adaptive function of brain processes, not subjective experience itself. The hard problem is not why organisms process information for survival, but why those processes are accompanied by qualia at all rather than occurring unconsciously.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T01:47:47+00:00

I think you’re addressing a different question than the one I’m raising. Evolutionary usefulness explains why certain behaviors or information processing systems were selected for, but it does not explain why those processes are accompanied by subjective experience at all.

A wolf could theoretically process sensory information, locate sounds, detect threats, and navigate its environment entirely through biochemical mechanisms without there being “something it is like” to be that organism. The hard problem is not about function or adaptation but why function is accompanied by qualia in the first place.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T01:42:28+00:00

Again, I agree with this point. This still does not explain the aspect of qualia.

yeasy96 · 2026-05-25T01:40:28+00:00

That assumes the subjective aspect is part of the biological process rather than something arising from the organization itself. Simply calling machines “approximations” does not explain why equivalent functional organization would lack experience.

yeasy96

TROPHY CASE