How do I know you have this "self"?

How do you know other humans do?

svachalek 7 hours ago | parent | next [-]

By the laws of physics, it's pretty clear we don't. The same chemical and electromagnetic interactions that drive everything around us are active in our brains, causing us to do things and feel things. We feel like we're in control of it, we feel like there's something there riding around inside. We grant that other people have the same magic, because I clearly do. But rocks, trees, LLMs, those are not people and clearly, clearly not conscious because they don't have our magic.

▲

digitaltrees 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Hard disagree. We reliably operate with the concept of a self that’s distinct from others. The chemical and physical processes change in response to stimulus.

▲

vidarh 7 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Indeed. We assume a lot, because we don't know. We don't have have settled, universal definitions of what consciousness means. But that also means that while we like to rule out consciousness in other things, we don't have a clear basis for doing so.

▲

root_axis 6 hours ago | parent [-]

Based on that reasoning anything could be conscious. If that's a bullet you want to bite, fair enough.

▲

kortex 5 hours ago | parent [-]

I'll bite that bullet. In fact I contend the idea that "humans and maybe some animals are conscious, but other things are not" is the special pleading stand. Why are the oscillating fundamental fields over here (brains) special, but the oscillations over there (computers, oceans, rocks) not? If they are, where do you draw the line? It smacks of "babies dont feel pain" (widely believed until the 80s! the 1980s!) sort of reasoning.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panpsychism

	▲	root_axis 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Actually I don't really have any problems with panpsychism. It's a pretty uncommon perspective, but when discussing conscious machines, it at least presents a consistent criteria for consciousness.

▲

ofjcihen 7 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

To be fair comments like this sometimes make me think not all humans do.

▲

vidarh 7 hours ago | parent [-]

Ad hominems are always a nice way of getting out of answering something you have no answer to.

	▲	amenhotep 2 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		It's not an ad hominem. In fact, it's perhaps the most good faith interpretation of your words possible. Ad hominem would be calling you stupid because you obviously know that you have a self and only your own stupidity could explain your inability to see how your self is generalisable. When you go around pretending you genuinely think maybe humans don't have selves, really the only way to take you seriously is to think that maybe you're a p-zombie.
	▲	vixen99 3 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		In other words, you don't think it's nice at all.