Debate What is the bare minimum needed to be conscious?

[Beholder]

Intelligence is like having a calculator in your head. It can instantly be taken away by a disease, yet you are still very much conscious and feeling, even if you can't recall any memories nor make any thoughts. I remember when I had amnesia with a tropical fever, which made it clear to me that sensations and calculations have no relation. The idea that higher calculations are needed to feel anything, is only a superiority complex grown out of evolutional needs for a lack of empathy.

When a larva is eaten alive, it cries just like a human child would at the same frequencies. Plants cry in 20000-100000 Hz when in pain, so human hearing in 20-20000 Hz evolved to hear everything except the painful screams from plants. Some say that plants can't feel pain because they don't have dedicated pain nerves, but human nerves use extreme values and contradictory signals to transmit pain, not dedicated nerves. Some say that plants can't feel pain because their responses are reflexes, but the same can again be said for humans, because the pain does not even reach the brain before sending a reflex response to muscles. Our consciousness might not even reside in the brain. Just like a nerve only transmits data, calculations only transform that data, and memory only store it. So far, there is nothing that objectively sets humans apart in the ability to feel. Without the brain, we can't remember having been conscious, but we might still have been conscious without the brain recording it.

Anyone worried about this can just stop mowing the lawn and start to eat fruits, mushroom (the visible part above ground is a fruit), berries, nuts, seeds, and animals dying of natural causes. Ethical wheat must be collected without harming the plant. A tree stuck in the wrong place might have to be moved or killed in order to end its suffering.

 

[MODAT7]

This gets into the sentience vs. self aware vs. conscious arguments. Is a body without a spirit truly alive? Is a comatose patient only temporarily dead?

 

[8thsinner]

Everything is conscious if it exists, even atoms and crystals can talk. Plants, bugs, wheat, gorillas...they are part of the all that is, it's all connected.

 

[Beholder]

This gets into the sentience vs. self aware vs. conscious arguments. Is a body without a spirit truly alive? Is a comatose patient only temporarily dead?

Some people who were in "vegetative state" woke up and remembered what people told them.

 

[PaulaJedi]

This gets into the sentience vs. self aware vs. conscious arguments. Is a body without a spirit truly alive? Is a comatose patient only temporarily dead?

We don't really know if plants do or do not have spirits, if you think about it.

 

[8thsinner]

We don't really know if plants do or do not have spirits, if you think about it.

Well...you don't, others do.

 

[Einstein]

We don't really know if plants do or do not have spirits, if you think about it.

There have been experiments showing plants will respond to music.

 

[PaulaJedi]

There have been experiments showing plants will respond to music.

Some believe they are sentient beings, too.
This experiment is interesting:

The radical new experiments that hint at plant consciousness

 

[MODAT7]

I've been reading off and on about AI consciousness. Most of the "experts" don't even know how to define consciousness nor know the difference between sentience and consciousness. It's almost comical. I've come to the conclusion that consciousness exists in levels instead of a binary value. If something is alive, it will display some level of consciousness from very little to a full value.

The dictionary definitions for a lot of the simple definitions can apply all the way down to single cell organisms. Bacteria are known to grow in colonies and communicate among themselves displaying some complex behavior. They are also known to respond to both positive and negative external stimuli. This might even be called a group consciousness under certain definitions. I wouldn't rate it more than 1% conscious.

I've heard of numerous experiments with plants claiming some sort of consciousness. I've also heard of those experiments being attempted in more controlled and scientific lab environments and failing. Mythbusters even disproved a few of them. It is well known that plants lack a nervous system, pain receptors, and a brain, so I doubt they feel pain. Plants do have a moderately complicated internal communication system, but most of the time it is very slow. It can respond to some electrical triggers, but those triggers are weak and localized to the trigger area. That's how rapid leaf curling is done in the plant mentioned and how venus fly traps work. There seems to be some basic memory in regular non-neural cells, but this seems to be limited to only what the cells need to survive. It takes a lot of energy to vibrate 20kHz to 100kHz, and I doubt plants really do this. I doubt I'd call a plant more than 2% conscious.

Bugs have a tiny brain and primitive nervous system. Most are likely to feel pain and have the most basic of memory. Smarter bugs can learn very simple things. When a bug cries out in pain while it is being eaten, this is more of an automatic reactive response. I doubt I'd call an advanced bug more than 5% conscious. I'd rate dumb gnats the same as plants.

I describe unicellular organisms, plants, and bugs having a genetically programmed reactive behavior vs true intentional complex behavior.

Human levels of consciousness typically deal with and include: advanced memory, learning, reasoning, general understanding, interpretation of learning, coherency, understanding of cause and effect, problem solving, understanding errors and fixing them, being able to differentiate between information that may or may not be true even if it seems true, ability to design and use tools, imagination and anticipation and creativity, developing desires beyond the programmed biological, all eventually leading to advanced information processing, discrimination, comprehension, and prediction. This tends to lead to: self awareness, awareness of others, awareness of what others are thinking about, sense of morality, ability to perceive emotions... Which leads to: the difference between just simple existence vs. having an inner world and growing concepts. This tends to lead to living purposefully vs simply reactionary.

Animals have many of these qualities in varying amounts (some a lot more than others). I'd say it ranges from 30-80% depending on the species and the smarter individuals within it. For example: low level functionality is easy to pass, but high level functionality is not. Most people on twitter and fakebook would be considered low level zombies and around the 50% mark. Some dolphins would be smarter than these humans.

Reflexes are a little more complicated. Some go through local loops, but others require a basic cranial response. If you think about surgeries, local anesthetics would stop a local reflex response. More complicated surgeries require a general anesthetic and tend to block pain receptors in the brain rather than locally. I've yet to hear of a patient being fully unconscious and spazzing out on the operating table when getting cut open by a scalpel. Many people when sleeping have greatly reduced to practically no feelings in their limbs, but I don't recommend cutting on them as a home experiment to find out.

Consciousness does reside in the brain... but not all of subconsciousness does. "Gut reaction" and "heartfelt" have been proven to be real things. It seems that dense neural clusters tend to form primitive intelligences but can't really act standalone. (This is an interesting study in itself.) It has been noted that heart transfer patients will sometimes take up interests and activities of their doners. I've never heard of a gut transfer patient, so can't comment there.

To make things a little more complicated, I've programmed some of my microcontrollers to monitor an environment, react to it, remember certain values, and act on those values. Others have done far more advanced in robotics projects. Does that make hardware projects sentient? By some definitions, yes. Does that make hardware conscious? No. They are mindlessly following fixed instructions they could never change nor move beyond. If you turn off hardware (kill it), you can turn it back on and it will reload and follow the same instructions. That can't be done with life.

Some have talked about simulating emotions in AI. All those emotions will ever be is a stream of data. Each individual stream can be turned on and off at will. Pain is a simulated concept in AI as computer hardware has no concept of pain. Pain can be switched on and off at will. I sure wish I could do that sometimes. It seems only life has a true concept of pain. Where AI gets dangerous is when all these simulations get merged into one and can't be individually controlled anymore.

 

[Beholder]

I've been reading off and on about AI consciousness. Most of the "experts" don't even know how to define consciousness nor know the difference between sentience and consciousness. It's almost comical. I've come to the conclusion that consciousness exists in levels instead of a binary value. If something is alive, it will display some level of consciousness from very little to a full value.

The dictionary definitions for a lot of the simple definitions can apply all the way down to single cell organisms. Bacteria are known to grow in colonies and communicate among themselves displaying some complex behavior. They are also known to respond to both positive and negative external stimuli. This might even be called a group consciousness under certain definitions. I wouldn't rate it more than 1% conscious.

I've heard of numerous experiments with plants claiming some sort of consciousness. I've also heard of those experiments being attempted in more controlled and scientific lab environments and failing. Mythbusters even disproved a few of them. It is well known that plants lack a nervous system, pain receptors, and a brain, so I doubt they feel pain. Plants do have a moderately complicated internal communication system, but most of the time it is very slow. It can respond to some electrical triggers, but those triggers are weak and localized to the trigger area. That's how rapid leaf curling is done in the plant mentioned and how venus fly traps work. There seems to be some basic memory in regular non-neural cells, but this seems to be limited to only what the cells need to survive. It takes a lot of energy to vibrate 20kHz to 100kHz, and I doubt plants really do this. I doubt I'd call a plant more than 2% conscious.

Bugs have a tiny brain and primitive nervous system. Most are likely to feel pain and have the most basic of memory. Smarter bugs can learn very simple things. When a bug cries out in pain while it is being eaten, this is more of an automatic reactive response. I doubt I'd call an advanced bug more than 5% conscious. I'd rate dumb gnats the same as plants.

I describe unicellular organisms, plants, and bugs having a genetically programmed reactive behavior vs true intentional complex behavior.

Human levels of consciousness typically deal with and include: advanced memory, learning, reasoning, general understanding, interpretation of learning, coherency, understanding of cause and effect, problem solving, understanding errors and fixing them, being able to differentiate between information that may or may not be true even if it seems true, ability to design and use tools, imagination and anticipation and creativity, developing desires beyond the programmed biological, all eventually leading to advanced information processing, discrimination, comprehension, and prediction. This tends to lead to: self awareness, awareness of others, awareness of what others are thinking about, sense of morality, ability to perceive emotions... Which leads to: the difference between just simple existence vs. having an inner world and growing concepts. This tends to lead to living purposefully vs simply reactionary.

Animals have many of these qualities in varying amounts (some a lot more than others). I'd say it ranges from 30-80% depending on the species and the smarter individuals within it. For example: low level functionality is easy to pass, but high level functionality is not. Most people on twitter and fakebook would be considered low level zombies and around the 50% mark. Some dolphins would be smarter than these humans.

Reflexes are a little more complicated. Some go through local loops, but others require a basic cranial response. If you think about surgeries, local anesthetics would stop a local reflex response. More complicated surgeries require a general anesthetic and tend to block pain receptors in the brain rather than locally. I've yet to hear of a patient being fully unconscious and spazzing out on the operating table when getting cut open by a scalpel. Many people when sleeping have greatly reduced to practically no feelings in their limbs, but I don't recommend cutting on them as a home experiment to find out.

Consciousness does reside in the brain... but not all of subconsciousness does. "Gut reaction" and "heartfelt" have been proven to be real things. It seems that dense neural clusters tend to form primitive intelligences but can't really act standalone. (This is an interesting study in itself.) It has been noted that heart transfer patients will sometimes take up interests and activities of their doners. I've never heard of a gut transfer patient, so can't comment there.

To make things a little more complicated, I've programmed some of my microcontrollers to monitor an environment, react to it, remember certain values, and act on those values. Others have done far more advanced in robotics projects. Does that make hardware projects sentient? By some definitions, yes. Does that make hardware conscious? No. They are mindlessly following fixed instructions they could never change nor move beyond. If you turn off hardware (kill it), you can turn it back on and it will reload and follow the same instructions. That can't be done with life.

Some have talked about simulating emotions in AI. All those emotions will ever be is a stream of data. Each individual stream can be turned on and off at will. Pain is a simulated concept in AI as computer hardware has no concept of pain. Pain can be switched on and off at will. I sure wish I could do that sometimes. It seems only life has a true concept of pain. Where AI gets dangerous is when all these simulations get merged into one and can't be individually controlled anymore.

How can plants respond to pain if they don't have nerves? Maggots don't have a central nervous system either.