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A Microsoft researcher built a goat-powered LLM in Age of Empires II to prove it's not sentient (www.xda-developers.com)
submitted 2 months ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] 1 point 2 months ago (4 children)

You’re mixing up two different things. One is normal brain development, and the other is consciousness itself. It’s true that a human being needs certain external stimuli for the brain to develop in a healthy way and for mental experience to be normal and stable. But that does not mean that, without those stimuli, consciousness does not exist.

A person can still be conscious and yet suffer severe cognitive, emotional, or behavioral changes because of sensory deprivation or an extremely limited environment. What changes is the quality of development, mental functioning, and maybe the kind of consciousness they have, not necessarily the existence of consciousness itself.

Also, there is no clear way to measure how much, how little, or whether someone has “no” consciousness at all. Because of that, claiming that a lack of stimuli means a lack of consciousness goes beyond what can actually be established.

So your argument seems to confuse “without stimuli, there is no normal development” with “without stimuli, there is no consciousness.” Those are not the same thing.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago* (3 children)

    One is normal brain development, and the other is consciousness itself. It’s true that a human being needs certain external stimuli for the brain to develop in a healthy way and for mental experience to be normal and stable. But that does not mean that, without those stimuli, consciousness does not exist.

    Human beings require external stimuli for any higher brain development to happen, not just healthy brain development.

    But that does not mean that, without those stimuli, consciousness does not exist.

    Yes.... It does. Any example you would like to share of a conscious individual who lacks access to any and all external stimuli?

    A person can still be conscious and yet suffer severe cognitive, emotional, or behavioral changes because of sensory deprivation or an extremely limited environment.

    Yes, but they did not develop in that extreme deprivation. And even if they did develop in a way that was restricted, they did not lack external stimuli completely.

    Your body literally need to be experience external stimuli to develop the capacity for consciousness.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (2 children)

    Yes, I have to admit that I don’t have any example of consciousness in an individual completely without external stimuli. In fact, I agree with you on the last point you made. My point is that we need to be more precise about what we mean by “external stimuli” exactly.

    We could even say that it may be impossible to isolate the mind completely from all stimulation in the first place. That leads to the real issue: perhaps those external stimuli are always present in some form, even if they are extremely minimal, indirect, or invisible to us at first glance.

    So I correct myself, the argument is not necessarily that consciousness can exist with literally no input whatsoever, but rather that what we call “external stimuli” may include things so subtle that they are easy to overlook. In that sense, the claim becomes less about the absence of stimulation and more about how little stimulation is actually enough to sustain consciousness or mental activity.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (1 child)

    perhaps those external stimuli are always present in some form, even if they are extremely minimal, indirect, or invisible to us at first glance.

    I still think the connection between external stimuli and consciousness are a lot more glaring than what you realize. After all it is how we medically determine consciousness in humans. Our ability to process and respond to external stimuli is a direct reflection of our somatic and autonomic physiology.

    We could even say that it may be impossible to isolate the mind completely from all stimulation in the first place.

    You can, it's called anesthesia.

    In that sense, the claim becomes less about the absence of stimulation and more about how little stimulation is actually enough to sustain consciousness or mental activity.

    Its interdependent on your period of development. In gestation unborn infants produce more grey matter than what is really needed to sustain life and can get by with internal stimuli and the external stimuli provided by the womb. However as we develop we become more dependent on higher and higher levels of interaction with our environment to develop our mental capacity.

    If a person were to be put under anesthesia since early development or e acquired a tbi that made them unresponsive at an early age, they would all likely mentally deteriorate to a persistent vegetative state.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago

    Although I’m not sure one can say with absolute certainty that anesthesia completely isolates the mind from external stimuli, you’re probably right. You’ve brought Helen Keller’s testimony to mind:

    "Before my teacher came to me, I did not know that I am. I lived in a world that was a no-world. I cannot hope to describe adequately that unconscious, yet conscious time of nothingness. I did not know that I knew aught, or that I lived or acted or desired. I had neither will nor intellect. I was carried along to objects and acts by a certain blind natural impetus. I had a mind which caused me to feel anger, satisfaction, desire. These two facts led those about me to suppose that I willed and thought. I can remember all this, not because I knew that it was so, but because I have tactual memory. It enables me to remember that I never contracted my forehead in the act of thinking. I never viewed anything beforehand or chose it. I also recall tactually the fact that never in a start of the body or a heart-beat did I feel that I loved or cared for anything. My inner life, then, was a blank without past, present, or future, without hope or anticipation, without wonder or joy or faith."

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