From: John K Clark (johnkc@well.com)
Date: Thu Jun 19 1997 - 10:36:57 MDT
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YakWax@aol.com On Wed, 18 Jun 1997 Wrote:
>To the universe perception is nothing.
Perhaps not, according to many of the most popular interpretations of Quantum
Mechanics nothing is anything until it is perceived.
>Think about it, logic *is* cause and effect. There is nothing that
>exists that has effect without cause.
When I say that A causes B, I mean that if I place the events observable from
my frame of reference in a sequence ordered according to time, and I find
event A in the sequence, then I will always find event B at some later point
in the sequence, and that's all I mean.
Some thing have no cause and so are random. Modern Physics has caused the
idea of causality to be weakened and that has caused me to write this. If you
like this post then I gladly accept the credit, but if you hate it, don't
blame me, it's not my fault, it's the results of my genes or my environment
or my luck, and I can't control any of them.
>>Me:
>>If I am sad, frightened, angry and jealous then I am feeling 4
>>emotions. Are Emotions something physical?
>These are 4 emotions that are attached to something physical. All
>these emotions are physical reactions, to physical things.
They are caused by physical reactions but as you keep telling me, the
subjective feeling is not the same as those physical reactions, yet I can
still use information to count those immaterial things.
>So the essential thing that makes you be you (and me be me) is the
>position and velocity of your atoms.
Yes.
>Why should this be information?
Why should data on the position and velocity of an atom be information?
I must not understand the question.
>or is consciousness the processing of the information, and the soul
>the infomation it processes?
It's an alternative definition, it's OK but I like mine better because it's
on a lower level so I don't have to explain words like "Ideas".
>If the computer reacts the same as a brain, it is a brain.
I agree.
>two similar brains without senses would act the same. However,
>even if the brain cannot detect it's position, it's position can
>effect it (amount of oxygen, radiation, etc.) But what would the
>brain care!?
If you smother one brain or blow one up with a H Bomb then obviously they
are no longer the same. My point is that if the information on how my mind
operates is put into a computer and then my body is destroyed my
consciousness does not stop, if two phonographs are synchronized and playing
the same symphony and you destroy one machine, the music does not stop.
>If we could build conscious software to run on other systems
>(conscious or otherwise) could it be that other consciouses exist
>within ourselves already.
Perhaps.
John K Clark johnkc@well.com
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