My proof for God's existence

[fosio]

There’s nothing to suggest that the property of awesomeness entails a self-conscious entity that is the 3-O god.

I never said it did. But being infinitely awesome does. Since it is more awesome to be conscious than to not be conscious.

But there’s no logical way to jump from “well it doesn’t exist in finitude” to “okay so it must be an immaterial, infinite being”. Again, if it succeeds the conclusion sounds like a Platonic Form.

If it doesn’t exist in finitude, then logically it must exist in infinitude. As for immateriality, I don’t see why immateriality or materiality is a critical component of the concept of god or the omnigod you mentioned. Our materiality does not make us less awesome – assuming for the moment dualism, if we lost our bodies, i.e. died, we would not be thereby be made more awesome for it. Certainly God does have materilaity in Jesus.

But whether we categorize something as “material” or “immaterial” is a human artifact. We know that God experiences qualia. I view qualia as a physical thing. Not reduced to a physical thing, but a physical thing in of itself. There is no need for qualia to be reduced to the physical since qualia is already in our primitive understanding physical. Qualia is a visceral experience. Viscerality is something physical. In God’s case this qualia may operate without the need for any physiology but a disembodied qualia is still a physical thing. There are concrete objects and abstract objects. Concrete=physical. God is a concrete object, so God is physical. One need not have a “body” to be physical. Assuming dualism, if you die and are just your soul – that soul would still be physical for that soul would be experiencing qualia. There is no such thing as a sensation that is non-physical in character. Our qualia, our sensations of color etc. – these are physical sensations. Even if there were no external world and we were all monads, they would still be physical sensations. But as I said, this is just my peculiar preference of terminology. If one chooses to subdivide some physical things as “immaterial” and others as “material”, that may be useful, enlightening … but it doesn’t express any proposition.

Also, are you familiar with the work of Christof Koch? He is a neurobiologist working in the field of consciousness. He specializes in the neural correlates of consciousness. Anyway, he discusses zombies throughout his works. He thinks that a lot of our everyday actions are done unconsciously (like when you drive on the highway for a long time and you aren’t consciously aware of what you are doing) and finds it perplexing that we even have consciousness because everything could be done without a subjective experience of the event.

I don’t know why one would think that a neurobiologist would be qualified to make sense of what is primarily a matter of philosophy. Neurobiology, which is nothing but a buzz word, may supply data, but the reasoning that may make use of it, is a reasoning of philosophy, not science.

But as for that argument … from your presentation it seems he is saying that we are sometimes miimally conscious when doing activity that is evoluntionary advantageous and that he doesn’t understand why we are conscious at all when doing any such activities.

Well the reason we are minimally conscious when driving sometimes – though that is not a safe habit – is b/c such activity requires (for completion, not safety) only minimal understanding. One is conscious to the extent that one is understanding. For other activities such as philosophizing, the understanding required for it is greater and so the level of consciousness that accompanies it is greater. The reason why some drivers are more conscious than others when driving corresponds to what kind of intellectual activity is going on in their brain. An auto-pilot driver may be using a very simple algorithm and a consicous driver may be using a more pain staking algorithm.

 

[fosio]

I think your ‘proof’ falls down before you get to your first statement.

The OED definition of ‘metaphysical’ is, amongst others:
“Excessively subtle or abstract”
“Not empirically verifiable”
“Immaterial, incorporeal, supersensible; supernatural”
“That transcends matter or the physical”
“Fanciful, imaginary”

So before you even start, you’re caveating your ‘proof’ by saying that it’s not based on anything verifiable - thereby defeating the argument before it begins. In fact, to distil your ‘proof’ down, you appear to be saying: “Based on my belief in something awesome, which I shall call God, God must exist. QED, goodnight.”

Leaving aside the subjectivity of what is awesome or not, your ‘proof’ is nothing of the kind - merely a circular affirmation of what you happen to believe.

I’m also amazed that you say:

So even if it were proved that God doesn’t exist - to the same level of evidence as the law of Gravity… you’d still believe? (Would that be God just testing the faithful by ‘planting the evidence’ for his non-existence?) You may call that faith - I’d have another word for it.

if you don’t like the word “metaphysical” replace it with “logical.” Many people believe metaphysical and logical possibility are co-extensive. I am not sure.

 

[fosio]

Couldn’t the argument be applied as a proof of an infinitely evil being? It doesn’t matter if puts you on a higher level, just that it clearly distinguishes the said being from other beings.

No it does. I stipulated that it does. Evil is simply a disordering and so it is a negative property just as entrophy is a negative property.

Wow. I really expected something much stronger. Computers process information, as does the iPhone, a television, etc, so are these devices consciously understanding these information process? A thermostat processes information, is it conscious? Chalmers has a section in his book called “What it’s like to be a thermostat” in which he says the thermostat does have consciousness. I doubt you are committed to that view.

A thermostat does not process information. It merely records information. Information processing involves a system that is able to reason upon the information. A better example would be a theorem-prover. As for whether a theroem-prover is conscious – I would say no. The reason is that it is not actually procession information but processing symbols. Without a semantics, those symbols could as can be mathematically proved, refer to any number of things. The way a system gains semantics is through an integration of qualia into the system such that the semantics are relative to the qualia and ultimately defined in terms of the qualia.

Though I’m not sure if you are a committed student of his theories, or if you just like using his objections when it’s convenient for you.

Such a comment is deserving of no reply other than this one.

you, the physicalist, would still need to be able to reduce qualia.

Not at all. Qualia already as understood naively is already understood by us in a physical way. Color, taste – these things apart from any root in physiology are already physical things. There is no need to reduce qualia to physical things since qualia is already a physical thing. There is a need to account for how qualia arise from physical things (since if it arose from non-physical things, physicalism would not be true). Assume for the moment that qualia was a physical thing but could NOT arise from physical things – then physicalism would be JUST as false – so whether qualia naively is understood to be physical is not the bottom line. The bottom line is whether qualia can arise out of physical things (since it doesn’t arise out if itself).

Qualia arises out of physical things because when a system processes the informational content of qualia as something that is impressing upon the system (whether as pain or pleasure or color, or impressing taste upon the tongue) – that is WHAT IT MEANS for a system to experience qualia.

When a thermometer records the temperature it is not experiencing qualia b/c the system is not processing that information as something that makes an impression upon the system. When you feel in your nerves an uncomfortably cold temperature, you experience qualia b/c you – the system – is processing that information as something that is impressing upon your skin. If your skin had not the proper nerves and other physiological elements, you would not experience the qualia – in fact it would be impossible to experience the qualia in the same way without those nerves. You or rather God could experience it some other way, but God cannot have the qualia that you and I have precisely b/c cold temperature does not impress upon God the way it does you and I.

 

[wanstronian]

if you don’t like the word “metaphysical” replace it with “logical.” Many people believe metaphysical and logical possibility are co-extensive. I am not sure.

Okay, but it still makes no sense. For a start I disagree with your second sentence, if for no other reason that ‘awesomeness’ is a purely subjective property. You might as well say that something is ‘infinitely smelly’ or ‘infinitely ugly’ - it’s just nonsensical.
I also contest your third sentence, which is basically saying that for something to exist in the abstract, there must be something very similar in reality. I don’t believe this is true, but lets move on to your fourth sentence, which is the killer:
“There is something actual that grounds the possibility of there being something infinitely awesome.”
Well, here you’re just making a statement without any evidence to back it up. What is the “something actual?”

But then, reading your post again, you’re saying that the definition of God (or, a god) is something “quite awesome”. So maybe you’re talking about an Einsteinan god, ie god as a metaphor for the myriad amazing things that evolution and geology has to show us?

 

[Anthony_A]

If it doesn’t exist in finitude, then logically it must exist in infinitude. As for immateriality, I don’t see why immateriality or materiality is a critical component of the concept of god or the omnigod you mentioned. Our materiality does not make us less awesome – assuming for the moment dualism, if we lost our bodies, i.e. died, we would not be thereby be made more awesome for it. Certainly God does have materilaity in Jesus.

This is the “Either/Or” fallacy. Logically, it could NOT exist. Existence in finitiude and existence in infinitude are not our only options. Though you are correct that God has materiality in Jesus, that is the second person of God, The Son. And just because x has a property does not mean that x is that property.

But whether we categorize something as “material” or “immaterial” is a human artifact. We know that God experiences qualia. I view qualia as a physical thing. Not reduced to a physical thing, but a physical thing in of itself. There is no need for qualia to be reduced to the physical since qualia is already in our primitive understanding physical. Qualia is a visceral experience. Viscerality is something physical. In God’s case this qualia may operate without the need for any physiology but a disembodied qualia is still a physical thing.

This is merely question begging. You view qualia as ontologically physical yet say it is not reduced to the physical. What is it that you mean by that? Qualia is a subjective experience. We may come to experience qualia by physical means, but if qualia cannot be reduced I see no reason to just assume that qualia physical.

There are concrete objects and abstract objects. Concrete=physical. God is a concrete object, so God is physical. One need not have a “body” to be physical. Assuming dualism, if you die and are just your soul – that soul would still be physical for that soul would be experiencing qualia. There is no such thing as a sensation that is non-physical in character. Our qualia, our sensations of color etc. – these are physical sensations. Even if there were no external world and we were all monads, they would still be physical sensations. But as I said, this is just my peculiar preference of terminology. If one chooses to subdivide some physical things as “immaterial” and others as “material”, that may be useful, enlightening … but it doesn’t express any proposition.

That’s quite hasty logic to establish the physicality of God. I agree that one doesn’t need a body the way that we humans have a body, but being extended in 3 dimensions seems to be of a necessity. Assuming dualism (Cartesian, which is not what I’m defending), if I were to die and just be a soul, being a physical soul would go against the very definition of a Cartesian soul.

Assuming property dualism (which I am defending), I am doubtful of disembodied existence. I talked about this in the A.I. thread, but it was kind of buried in there so I don’t expect you to have read that post. I’ll give you this - we humans need physical bodies (in the everyday sense) to experience qualia. The neural correlates by which we process data from the outside world are physical. But I can’t just say the qualia itself is physical simply because it has a physical correlate.

Well the reason we are minimally conscious when driving sometimes – though that is not a safe habit – is b/c such activity requires (for completion, not safety) only minimal understanding. One is conscious to the extent that one is understanding. For other activities such as philosophizing, the understanding required for it is greater and so the level of consciousness that accompanies it is greater. The reason why some drivers are more conscious than others when driving corresponds to what kind of intellectual activity is going on in their brain. An auto-pilot driver may be using a very simple algorithm and a consicous driver may be using a more pain staking algorithm.

Well you seem to equate consciousness to awareness in this example, but it’s not what I mean. If a zombie were driving the car I would say he is aware, but not having a conscious experience of the event. We do things sometimes without having that truly subjective experience. Koch is puzzled why any subjective experience comes in when we truly could do without it.

 

[Anthony_A]

No it does. I stipulated that it does. Evil is simply a disordering and so it is a negative property just as entrophy is a negative property.

Okay, okay. Suppose I unstipulate it. Just pretend I started my own thread called “My proof for Satan’s existence” and used the format of your argument.

A thermostat does not process information. It merely records information. Information processing involves a system that is able to reason upon the information. A better example would be a theorem-prover. As for whether a theroem-prover is conscious – I would say no. The reason is that it is not actually procession information but processing symbols. Without a semantics, those symbols could as can be mathematically proved, refer to any number of things. The way a system gains semantics is through an integration of qualia into the system such that the semantics are relative to the qualia and ultimately defined in terms of the qualia.

But if qualia is physical, as you argue, why couldn’t any physical system experience qualia? As for semantics, it is not at all clear how a neuron has a semantics. Searle’s “Chinese Room” is an argument that needs to be applied to humans. It works just as well and it’s equally mysterious how neurons firing in a certain configuration means anything. His argument is an argument against all of materialism, not just A.I.

Not at all. Qualia already as understood naively is already understood by us in a physical way. Color, taste – these things apart from any root in physiology are already physical things. There is no need to reduce qualia to physical things since qualia is already a physical thing. There is a need to account for how qualia arise from physical things (since if it arose from non-physical things, physicalism would not be true). Assume for the moment that qualia was a physical thing but could NOT arise from physical things – then physicalism would be JUST as false – so whether qualia naively is understood to be physical is not the bottom line. The bottom line is whether qualia can arise out of physical things (since it doesn’t arise out if itself).

It isn’t clear that the subjective experience of colour is physical. Consider the “Inverted Spectrum” argument (this is a very basic version of it): You and I could observe my water bottle and when asked “what colour is the water bottle?” suppose we both answer “green”. But now imagine that when I said “green” I really experienced a colour exactly like the one you experience and identify with “red”. And vice versa. Now there’s no amount of physical information that you could possess which would say “He is definitely experiencing the colour that 99.9% of other people identify as green”. It’s that private access of our subjective experience, of our qualia, that is of concern, not physical correlates or neuronal bases.

Qualia arises out of physical things because when a system processes the informational content of qualia as something that is impressing upon the system (whether as pain or pleasure or color, or impressing taste upon the tongue) – that is WHAT IT MEANS for a system to experience qualia.

Again, it’s equally puzzling that humans experience a neuron firing and it magically has a “what it means” content.

When a thermometer records the temperature it is not experiencing qualia b/c the system is not processing that information as something that makes an impression upon the system. When you feel in your nerves an uncomfortably cold temperature, you experience qualia b/c you – the system – is processing that information as something that is impressing upon your skin. If your skin had not the proper nerves and other physiological elements, you would not experience the qualia – in fact it would be impossible to experience the qualia in the same way without those nerves. You or rather God could experience it some other way, but God cannot have the qualia that you and I have precisely b/c cold temperature does not impress upon God the way it does you and I.

I only take issue with the first sentence. The rest of the paragraph I agree with you on. I don’t see how a thermometer doesn’t act like the person in your example. A cold temperature impresses on the system, the thermometer senses that the temp has dropped and does not match the current readout, so the mercury, or digital readout, changes as a result of the new information.

 

[fosio]

As for semantics, it is not at all clear how a neuron has a semantics. Searle’s “Chinese Room” is an argument that needs to be applied to humans. It works just as well and it’s equally mysterious how neurons firing in a certain configuration means anything. His argument is an argument against all of materialism, not just A.I.

Searle doesn’t acutally say AFAIK that AI cannot be conscious. IIRC, he says that robots which are able to sense the external environment may be conscious.

You are assuming tha consciousness must reside solely within the brain but that’s a mistake. Consciousness is grounded in the whole of human physiology. Your nervous system extends to your whole body and interacts with a whole. The reason why the neural network in your brain has semantics is b/c that neural network’s symbols are causally linked to the experience of qualia through our senses. The environment makes an impression on our body and that impression is semantally preserved by the causal link between the actual impression that is made (sensing of the cold or sensing of the warmth, etc.) as it cascades through the nervous system and is further processed and remembered in the brain.

It isn’t clear that the subjective experience of colour is physical. Consider the “Inverted Spectrum” argument (this is a very basic version of it): You and I could observe my water bottle and when asked “what colour is the water bottle?” suppose we both answer “green”. But now imagine that when I said “green” I really experienced a colour exactly like the one you experience and identify with “red”. And vice versa. Now there’s no amount of physical information that you could possess which would say “He is definitely experiencing the colour that 99.9% of other people identify as green”. It’s that private access of our subjective experience, of our qualia, that is of concern, not physical correlates or neuronal bases.

I’m not sure you understood me. The subjective experience itself is physical; not simply caused by physical things but the experience itself is physical – it is clearly an experience about something physical. When you subjectively experience color, that is an experience about a physical thing. As long as you accept realism, I don’t see how you can deny this.

As for your hypothetical, I don’t see what it accomplishes. Let’s take hallucinations since I think that would make your hypothetical stronger. When one has a visual hallucination, that qualia is a physical thing. The fact that there is no object in the external world that accords with that qualia does not make that qualia not physical. The physicality of qualia is a characteristic of the qualia itself. I see your hypothetical as a problem for epistemology not something that has bearing on physicalism.

I only take issue with the first sentence. The rest of the paragraph I agree with you on. I don’t see how a thermometer doesn’t act like the person in your example. A cold temperature impresses on the system, the thermometer senses that the temp has dropped and does not match the current readout, so the mercury, or digital readout, changes as a result of the new information.

In a thermometer, the cold temperature does not impress upon the system; the information is merely captured. Suppose a mercury thermometer were capturing temperature but it was linked electronically to some software program that captured mechanically what the level of mercury is and then transmitted those bits of information over a wireless network to some laptop computer where there resided another software program that converted those bits using an algorithm to some number representing temperature. Did cold temperature make an impression upon the program in the laptop computer? No of course not. How about for the software program that happens to be physically attached to the mercury thermometer? No of course not, how close the software program is has no bearing. How about the mercury thermometer itself? No. I will present two arguments for that:

1. There’s no guarantee that temperature is being measured. The mercury level could correspond to the force of gravity to some extent or to some other physical force. There is nothing inherent in the thermometer that makes the mercury level intimately tied to the nature of cold temperature – the mercury level just happens to be in most physical environments a good barometer of it.
2. No impression is being made on the thermometer. Let me explain. The cold temperature is not causing coldness in the thermometer. it’s simply gears that happen to lower or raise to temperature. In a human, cold temperature is not merely “recorded” as information but cold temperature makes the skin actually cold and it is this coldness of the skin that is sensed and passed on to our neural network in causal knitwork – and in this context, that is simply what qualia IS or MEANS. If we do not grasp how subjective experience is included in that, I think that is more a function of our lack of cognitive power than it is a lack of an explanation. We shouldn’t assume or expect that the nature of qualia is something within our cognitive grasp. I think it is barely within our cognitive grasp and that it does not come easily. Our physiology may be too complex or sublime for us to grasp. But if you let go of reason for a moment and just feel, I think you can see what I mean and at least have a gut feeling that this does account for and in fact just is qualia.

 

[Anthony_A]

You are assuming tha consciousness must reside solely within the brain but that’s a mistake. Consciousness is grounded in the whole of human physiology…

I didn’t mean to present my view as brain-centric. I agree with your paragraph talking about the wholeness of the human (or robot), but I think we both understand that a device/organ that functions like a brain is pretty essential.

I’m not sure you understood me. The subjective experience itself is physical; not simply caused by physical things but the experience itself is physical – it is clearly an experience about something physical. When you subjectively experience color, that is an experience about a physical thing. As long as you accept realism, I don’t see how you can deny this.

I agree that the experience is physical in the respect of all the physiology that is going on. I don’t agree that the qualia itself is physical. Or at the very least, we don’t have a firm grasp of the nature of qualia to say whether it is physical or not.

1. There’s no guarantee that temperature is being measured. The mercury level could correspond to the force of gravity to some extent or to some other physical force. There is nothing inherent in the thermometer that makes the mercury level intimately tied to the nature of cold temperature – the mercury level just happens to be in most physical environments a good barometer of it.

I suppose there’s no guarantee that the thermometer is measuring temperature, but in the way that there is no guarantee of anything. There’s no guarantee that objects won’t start “falling up” or other breakdowns of physics occuring. This was Hume’s observation with causation. We don’t really know how causation works.

1. No impression is being made on the thermometer. Let me explain. The cold temperature is not causing coldness in the thermometer. it’s simply gears that happen to lower or raise to temperature. In a human, cold temperature is not merely “recorded” as information but cold temperature makes the skin actually cold and it is this coldness of the skin that is sensed and passed on to our neural network in causal knitwork – and in this context, that is simply what qualia IS or MEANS.

I just don’t see how the example of skin being cold and a thermometer being cold is all that different. I mean there’s all sorts of mechanical work going on in the skin and the nervous system when a cool breeze hits my skin. And I don’t see it as a good enough explanation to say that the thermometer isn’t actually cold simply because the functional system in which it “becomes cold” is seen and comprehended in a much simpler fashion.

 

[kk23wong]

I also contest your third sentence, which is basically saying that for something to exist in the abstract, there must be something very similar in reality. I don’t believe this is true, but lets move on to your fourth sentence, which is the killer:

“There is something actual that grounds the possibility of there being something infinitely awesome.”

Well, here you’re just making a statement without any evidence to back it up. What is the “something actual?”

But then, reading your post again, you’re saying that the definition of God (or, a god) is something “quite awesome”. So maybe you’re talking about an Einsteinan god, ie god as a metaphor for the myriad amazing things that evolution and geology has to show us?

It is awesome.
It is aweful.
It is apple.

An apple is not an apple.
An apple is not an ape.
An apple is not an atom.

Atom is an apple.
Apple is an ape.
Apple is an apple.

Truth is in your heart. Peace will be with you.

The definition of God(s) varies from one to another.

Evolution and Geology cannot prove the existence of the god with a pratical hyothesis.

Thank you for your sharing.​

*Philosophy, I must say.

Actually, I am not.
Actually, you are not.
Actually, he may not.

He may.
She may.
I will.

Peace is in peace.
Peace is in gate.
Peace is in walls.

“Your walls are too high for FREEDOM.”, I shouted.
He said, “Stop and retreat. By the will of my God, I command you to go back.”
“My mother asked me not to.”, I said.
He said, “Who is your mother?”
“You are a son of her. We are different, but we are one.”
I continued, “That’s why I am here.”
“By the will of our God, open the gate and surrender.”
“Honor will be ‘we’.”

Philosophy, I must say.

“You are the last one.”, he replied.
I said, “The last one will rise with unumbered.”
“If you refuse to fight me, I am going back to the island.”
“Troy will be destroyed in three days.”
He is surprised, “Why? How?”
“They are in stone ages. Your city states have been detroyed.”
I continued, “They do not build on a solid ground.”
“What?! I am not going to let Troy being crashed.”
I replied, “Fight me and your city will be save.”
“I am not going to kill the rests.”

“The song of the dead has started. Extinction is on going.”, I said.
“You are the last knight in your states.”
He said, “I will fight if you have approval from your King.”
“We have a Queen.”, I replied.
“We will have King.”
He shouted, “Little boy, come back with the Lord.”
“I am not going to fight without glory.”
I smiled, “You are not going to be died without it.”

States are cities.
States are walls.
States are water.

Cities will be destroyed.
Cities will be flooded.
Cities will be burnt.

Fire is everywhere.
Flood is everywhere.
Dead is everywhere.

“You are stepping on my face.”, the president said.
I replied, “No. He does.”
“He closed the Gate. He is one of us.”
The president said, “He is my master once, I will not let him died.”
“A knight should be in the battlefield, not inside the walls.”
I continued, “I want him NOW!”

“One-on-one, You-and-me!”*

 

[Charlemagne_II]

The argument is too Anselmian for me.

 

[Anthony_A]

Fosio,

Charlemagne’s comment about your argument being too Anselmian reminded me of a top notch contemporary philosopher you may want to look into: Yujin Nagasawa. He is a physicalist who has published on Anselmian proofs for God’s existence. I think you would find his work very helpful in developing your own ideas.

 

[fosio]

I just don’t see how the example of skin being cold and a thermometer being cold is all that different. I mean there’s all sorts of mechanical work going on in the skin and the nervous system when a cool breeze hits my skin. And I don’t see it as a good enough explanation to say that the thermometer isn’t actually cold simply because the functional system in which it “becomes cold” is seen and comprehended in a much simpler fashion.

The difference is this: your brain is becoming informational aware of what effect the lack of thermodynamic friction is having on your skin and internal parts – both being part of your constitution. The thermometer is not becoming informational aware of anything related to itself. In the thermometer, information about the external temperature, not any thermodynamic friction on the thermometer, is being represented, but it is not being represented to the thermometer – it is being represented to you. The thermometer has intentionality, as the term is used by Daniel Dennett and apparently by medieval philosophers, derived from its use by you.

Your experience of cold and heat is of much richer informational content than what is present in a thermometer.

Here’s the proof btw. When under general anesthesia you do not have any experiences. You don’t experience cold or heat. But if you and Chalmers are right, you, your body, should experience cold or heat. I suppose you could say that you did experience it but the general anesthesia causes amnesia to occur when you wake, but that is not how general anesthesia works (and if it did work that way, no one should want to do anything under general anesthesia … would you want to experience something tortorous if you simply had the guarantee that you would not remember the tortore afterwards? – no)

 

[Anthony_A]

The difference is this: your brain is becoming informational aware of what effect the lack of thermodynamic friction is having on your skin and internal parts – both being part of your constitution. The thermometer is not becoming informational aware of anything related to itself. In the thermometer, information about the external temperature, not any thermodynamic friction on the thermometer, is being represented, but it is not being represented to the thermometer – it is being represented to you. The thermometer has intentionality, as the term is used by Daniel Dennett and apparently by medieval philosophers, derived from its use by you.

Your experience of cold and heat is of much richer informational content than what is present in a thermometer.

Here’s the proof btw. When under general anesthesia you do not have any experiences. You don’t experience cold or heat. But if you and Chalmers are right, you, your body, should experience cold or heat. I suppose you could say that you did experience it but the general anesthesia causes amnesia to occur when you wake, but that is not how general anesthesia works (and if it did work that way, no one should want to do anything under general anesthesia … would you want to experience something tortorous if you simply had the guarantee that you would not remember the tortore afterwards? – no)

I don’t exactly object to any of that. I never said that the thermometer is having the same type of experience that I would have were we both to experience a chill. I only meant that the way in which it processes information is functionally similar to how our brain works. No doubt the functional infrastructure of a human brain is much more sophisticated and adept to producing the kind of experience that is “cold”.

 

[fosio]

I don’t exactly object to any of that. I never said that the thermometer is having the same type of experience that I would have were we both to experience a chill. I only meant that the way in which it processes information is functionally similar to how our brain works. No doubt the functional infrastructure of a human brain is much more sophisticated and adept to producing the kind of experience that is “cold”.

It is similar only in the way fire is similar to life.