From: Green Sound (liveevil@020.co.uk)
Date: Tue Sep 21 1999 - 19:52:58 MDT
When I said that a Turing machine had pre-determined state transitions, I didn't
mean environmental wiring. I meant that each state transition was predictable,
given the current internal state and input state. This is in contrast to a
machine that contains non-deterministic elements where state transitions are
unpredictable.
I'm saying that a Turing machine can display these "magical qualities", but only
if it interacts with a non-deterministic chaotic system, i.e. our world affected
by indeterminate quantum dynamics bubbling up through electron motion, atomic
vibration, etc.
I believe human intelligence is Turing computable and doesn't require
unpredictable, ineffable components. For example, a frequent occurrence in
emergency rooms is with a head trauma victim that will state something very
unique to the moment. But they will restate it word for word every ten minutes
as if they just realized it. Like their software is going, "If these conditions
exist then output this phrase." Watching this, the mystical qualities of
intelligence and free will seem to disappear and you are left with a robot.
So what happened to the magical qualities we associate with sentience if we are
completely predictable? They come from our environment, the robot always
responds to the input from the chaotic system in a predictable manner, but this
response causes the system to produce a new unpredictable input. I think
something happens in the combination of the absolute predictability of the
Turing machine, and the absolute undeterminability of our world at the quantum
level.
Anyways, do you really think the universe would allow you to instantiate any
consciousness without knowing what its internal experience was? Interaction is
the safety valve for preventing accidental hells.
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