It is yet another nail in the coffin of mind-body dualism.
Anyone who can make a statement like that, in earnest, clearly doesn't understand the problem.
Consider this for a moment: If you were somehow provided with a comprehensive list of neural correlates to consciousness, would that be sufficient to show the validity of materialism? Would it be sufficient to disprove dualism?
Have you tried being good at your job? Having worked for a few small companies in the past, I've found that you can very quickly make yourself indispensable and well respected by simply doing what you've been paid to do.
From your description, it sounds like you spend all day "putting out fires" and that you've fallen way behind. Get your act together or find a different line of work.
And how on earth are you the "only IT guy" at a 60 person software company? I'm picturing you, the owner, and 58 salespeople pushing a visual foxpro database on unsuspecting customers.
No, actually. I thought your last comment seemed hostile, but I didn't disagree with it. In fact, I don't see how anything you said contradicted what I had written.
Are you sure you're replying to my posts? Do you have me confused with one of the posters above?
Not quite, DRM exists because a portion of the public doesn't respect copyright. The majority does.
DRM violates the rights of the whole of the public. In raw numbers, DRM does the most harm.
Given how eager both consumers and producers are to violate each others rights, I'd say that the whole of copyright law needs to be evaluated and replaced with a more workable system.
[quote]So, anytime someone creates anything, it immediately becomes "cultural content" and they automatically lose their rights?[/quote]
Yes. This is why we have copyright -- to [i]return[/i] some rights to the author.
Keeping in mind that copyright is temporary, DRM is intended to circumvent the public's right to the work after the authors rights have expired, effectively creating an unlimited copyright term.
Philosophically, DRM is a horrible horrible thing. The public has a responsibility to fight against it. After all, it's [i]their[/i] rights that are being violated.
Off topic, but still interesting: Excessively long copyright terms can also serve to take away the public's rights. As the Google Books case has shown us, authors and publishers don't necessarily have an interest in the preservation of works -- once a work ceases to be profitable, it can be allowed to disappear into time. They're under no obligation to keep the work available until the end of the copyright term. As rights typically come [i]with[/i] obligation, such a revision to copyright law should be considered. It would better serve the public interest.
I'm going to guess that you intended to reply to someone else. If not, then like the Anonymous parent to which I replied, you could use a refresher course in computer science. Go and read about the things I mentioned above!
Yes, this is exactly what I'm saying. The trouble is, like the hypothetical islanders, is that we don't know enough about our "airplanes" to successfully produce one.
Our islanders built a plane based on their understanding of one. A plane, unfortunately, they did not produce. Building a brain based on our current understanding of them is likely doomed to the same fate.
Looks like someone failed computer science 101. Do a search for "Church-Turing Thesis" and "Computational Equivalence". Apparently you need a refresher.
Kevin Trudeau is a well-known fraud. I'm continually amazed that he manages to stay out of prison.
I don't know the "Big Pharma" hates KT, though he certainly wants you to believe that "they" do. After all, if "Big Pharma" was involved in some conspiracy to suppress his nonsense medicine it would lend his books some credibility.
Well, no. As far as I know, Godel never bothered with the subject at all. John Lucas was the first (as far as I'm aware) to use Godel's theorem to argue that the human mind is capable of doing more than any computational system.
Penrose uses a similar argument to achieve the same end. He often get's the credit for it, as he made the idea popular. (I'll skip the description, you can read all about it online.) It's not a terribly good argument, as he presents it, as there are two possible conclusions you can reach. (1) the human mind is beyond mathematics (it's not a Turing machine, if you will. This is what Penrose wants us to accept.) OR (2) we cannot know that the human mind is consistent (a far less exciting finale).
It may be convenient here to sum up the Penrose book I mentioned earlier (Shadows of the mind): (1) Convince the reader that the brain (hence, mind) cannot be a computer via Godel. (2) Propose an alternate view mixing a bit of biology up with some quantum mysticism. (3) A bit of speculative physics (which we're not concerned with here) called Objective Reduction necessary for (2).
That is, Penrose wasn't trying to separate the mind from the brain with Godel, he was trying to show that the classical brain model is inadequate.
Further, he wasn't trying to claim that the brain is a quantum computer. He knows how pointless that would be (better that just about anyone, I'll bet.) He just needs the brain to be a quantum system to promote his whole collapse-causes-consciousness idea.
A far better argument, for your purpose as I assume it, is John Searle's Chinese Room thought experiment. It's not just hand waving (it's more subtle than it appears at first, honest!) and it's defiantly easier for a lay audience to understand.
Quantum computers are Turing reducible. It doesn't matter if your computer is classical or quantum, they can still only solve the same kinds of problems. This goes for the brain as well. (For the philosophers, this means that we cannot so easily escape from Searle's Chinese room.)
All of this quantum mind nonsense seems to have stared with Roger Penrose and his ridiculous "theory". (Read: Shadows of the mind and The emperors new mind) He not only claims that the brain is a quantum system (possible, but totally unfounded) but also proposes a formula by which we can calculate how conscious something is! (He bites the ol' ontological bullet really hard, and goes on to claim that even an electron can be conscious, but only a little bit and only once in a great while.)
This article: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/287/5454/791?ck=nck Very clearly outlines the biggest problems for the theory. This is likely where the "Brain is too hot" argument originated. It's a good one, and not likely to go away anytime soon.
More importantly, even if mother nature managed to work around the problem of a hot brain, it still doesn't get us any closer to consciousness. (See my first paragraph above) In the Penrose-Hameroff model, consciousness appears magically during collapse of the wave function. How they came to such a conclusion is beyond reason. That isn't science, it's mysticism.
Wow, you're way off. The poster is saying he'll have 100 people using the helpdesk software (a pool of 100 support persons) to handle a volume of 5 to 10 requests per minute.
... you have this delusion society is going to cherish and reward you just because you work in a white coat, i don't know where you got this absurd notion from, as no society has ever done this, or ever will
Isn't it disgusting that "society" will "cherish and reward" you for having a white robe but not a white coat?
We have no mechanism to explain gravity, but a wonderful model that handles it well enough to land us on mars. Mendel didn't have DNA and was able to make predictions and conduct his experiments just fine.
Believe it or not, you're the only person I've been in contact with who is against gay marriage. What are your reasons and how do you think gay marriage will affect you personally? I only ask because I honestly don't understand the opposition.
Slashdot Mirror
It is yet another nail in the coffin of mind-body dualism.
Anyone who can make a statement like that, in earnest, clearly doesn't understand the problem.
Consider this for a moment: If you were somehow provided with a comprehensive list of neural correlates to consciousness, would that be sufficient to show the validity of materialism? Would it be sufficient to disprove dualism?
How many counties have "cash assistance" type programs? Oh, wait, this is slashdot. You probably didn't bother to read the headline.
Have you tried being good at your job? Having worked for a few small companies in the past, I've found that you can very quickly make yourself indispensable and well respected by simply doing what you've been paid to do.
From your description, it sounds like you spend all day "putting out fires" and that you've fallen way behind. Get your act together or find a different line of work.
And how on earth are you the "only IT guy" at a 60 person software company? I'm picturing you, the owner, and 58 salespeople pushing a visual foxpro database on unsuspecting customers.
No, actually. I thought your last comment seemed hostile, but I didn't disagree with it. In fact, I don't see how anything you said contradicted what I had written.
Are you sure you're replying to my posts? Do you have me confused with one of the posters above?
Not quite, DRM exists because a portion of the public doesn't respect copyright. The majority does.
DRM violates the rights of the whole of the public. In raw numbers, DRM does the most harm.
Given how eager both consumers and producers are to violate each others rights, I'd say that the whole of copyright law needs to be evaluated and replaced with a more workable system.
[quote]So, anytime someone creates anything, it immediately becomes "cultural content" and they automatically lose their rights?[/quote]
Yes. This is why we have copyright -- to [i]return[/i] some rights to the author.
Keeping in mind that copyright is temporary, DRM is intended to circumvent the public's right to the work after the authors rights have expired, effectively creating an unlimited copyright term.
Philosophically, DRM is a horrible horrible thing. The public has a responsibility to fight against it. After all, it's [i]their[/i] rights that are being violated.
Off topic, but still interesting: Excessively long copyright terms can also serve to take away the public's rights. As the Google Books case has shown us, authors and publishers don't necessarily have an interest in the preservation of works -- once a work ceases to be profitable, it can be allowed to disappear into time. They're under no obligation to keep the work available until the end of the copyright term. As rights typically come [i]with[/i] obligation, such a revision to copyright law should be considered. It would better serve the public interest.
I'm going to guess that you intended to reply to someone else. If not, then like the Anonymous parent to which I replied, you could use a refresher course in computer science. Go and read about the things I mentioned above!
Yes, this is exactly what I'm saying. The trouble is, like the hypothetical islanders, is that we don't know enough about our "airplanes" to successfully produce one.
Our islanders built a plane based on their understanding of one. A plane, unfortunately, they did not produce. Building a brain based on our current understanding of them is likely doomed to the same fate.
Hence, cargo cult science.
Looks like someone failed computer science 101. Do a search for "Church-Turing Thesis" and "Computational Equivalence". Apparently you need a refresher.
You've hit the nail on the head.
This is the "cargo cult" approach to AI. Put all the bits we know about together maybe we'll get consciousness.
It wouldn't be a bad approach, if we knew what all the bits were and how they fit together. We don't.
Go ahead and post it on scribd or wikileaks. Just don't be surprised when no one takes notice or cares.
All the "real cops" can do is ask him to identify himself. He was under no obligation to show his ID to any of the cops (real or otherwise).
In America, you're not obligated to carry any ID with you.
Kevin Trudeau is a well-known fraud. I'm continually amazed that he manages to stay out of prison.
I don't know the "Big Pharma" hates KT, though he certainly wants you to believe that "they" do. After all, if "Big Pharma" was involved in some conspiracy to suppress his nonsense medicine it would lend his books some credibility.
So you wouldn't even TRY to recover the data from a damaged partition? Lazy.
I think I'm required to tell you to "shut up and calculate".
Well, no. As far as I know, Godel never bothered with the subject at all. John Lucas was the first (as far as I'm aware) to use Godel's theorem to argue that the human mind is capable of doing more than any computational system.
Penrose uses a similar argument to achieve the same end. He often get's the credit for it, as he made the idea popular. (I'll skip the description, you can read all about it online.) It's not a terribly good argument, as he presents it, as there are two possible conclusions you can reach. (1) the human mind is beyond mathematics (it's not a Turing machine, if you will. This is what Penrose wants us to accept.) OR (2) we cannot know that the human mind is consistent (a far less exciting finale).
It may be convenient here to sum up the Penrose book I mentioned earlier (Shadows of the mind): (1) Convince the reader that the brain (hence, mind) cannot be a computer via Godel. (2) Propose an alternate view mixing a bit of biology up with some quantum mysticism. (3) A bit of speculative physics (which we're not concerned with here) called Objective Reduction necessary for (2).
That is, Penrose wasn't trying to separate the mind from the brain with Godel, he was trying to show that the classical brain model is inadequate.
Further, he wasn't trying to claim that the brain is a quantum computer. He knows how pointless that would be (better that just about anyone, I'll bet.) He just needs the brain to be a quantum system to promote his whole collapse-causes-consciousness idea.
A far better argument, for your purpose as I assume it, is John Searle's Chinese Room thought experiment. It's not just hand waving (it's more subtle than it appears at first, honest!) and it's defiantly easier for a lay audience to understand.
Quantum computers are Turing reducible. It doesn't matter if your computer is classical or quantum, they can still only solve the same kinds of problems. This goes for the brain as well. (For the philosophers, this means that we cannot so easily escape from Searle's Chinese room.)
All of this quantum mind nonsense seems to have stared with Roger Penrose and his ridiculous "theory". (Read: Shadows of the mind and The emperors new mind) He not only claims that the brain is a quantum system (possible, but totally unfounded) but also proposes a formula by which we can calculate how conscious something is! (He bites the ol' ontological bullet really hard, and goes on to claim that even an electron can be conscious, but only a little bit and only once in a great while.)
This article:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/287/5454/791?ck=nck
Very clearly outlines the biggest problems for the theory. This is likely where the "Brain is too hot" argument originated. It's a good one, and not likely to go away anytime soon.
More importantly, even if mother nature managed to work around the problem of a hot brain, it still doesn't get us any closer to consciousness. (See my first paragraph above) In the Penrose-Hameroff model, consciousness appears magically during collapse of the wave function. How they came to such a conclusion is beyond reason. That isn't science, it's mysticism.
Great for phishing sites, totally useless for man-in-the-middle attacks.
Thoughts are just electrical signals flowing throgh your brain
Cool idea. If you could provide some solid evidence for it, you'll have solved many very complicated problems.
Wow, you're way off. The poster is saying he'll have 100 people using the helpdesk software (a pool of 100 support persons) to handle a volume of 5 to 10 requests per minute.
... you have this delusion society is going to cherish and reward you just because you work in a white coat, i don't know where you got this absurd notion from, as no society has ever done this, or ever will
Isn't it disgusting that "society" will "cherish and reward" you for having a white robe but not a white coat?
You're confusing a model with a mechanism.
We have no mechanism to explain gravity, but a wonderful model that handles it well enough to land us on mars. Mendel didn't have DNA and was able to make predictions and conduct his experiments just fine.
$5/mb is reasonable? In what twisted universe? I pay 15 cents per GB to store data via Amazons S3 service.
Believe it or not, you're the only person I've been in contact with who is against gay marriage. What are your reasons and how do you think gay marriage will affect you personally? I only ask because I honestly don't understand the opposition.
I see your point. Adding that many water fountains and restrooms would put too much of a burden on the average business.