From: Jef Allbright (jef@jefallbright.net)
Date: Sun Jan 11 2004 - 11:22:57 MST
Metaqualia wrote:
>> Yes! this is pretty much exactly what I meant when i called myself
>> a "panpsychist".
>
> I have a question for "orthodox panpsychists":
>
> 1. What determines what kind of particle collections can be used to
> create a "qualia producing apparatus"? You talk about the qualia of a
> rock, but the existence of the rock as a separate object from
> everything else is only an illusion created by our icon-driven
> visual/cognitive system. What about a rock + the tree next to it,
> plus half of the electrons in one arbitrary atom on venus and the top
> half brain of the furry pink crab on the other side of the galaxy?
> Can this system create a qualia stream? If a rock can, then this
> system and any other one cares to imagine can also, and we go back to
> moravec's "all universes exist"
>
> 2. Why do I experience the qualia stream arising from this particular
> brain and not that arising from Ben's brain? (of course the question
> is circular since I is the qualia stream itself, still from a first
> person perspective, which is the only kind of perspective that really
> exists, there is asymmetry).
>
> The reason I ask these questions is that panpsychism would look like
> a good tool to put the qualia beast in the cage: as long as
> everything feels, then it's ok for us to feel. But when you consider
> these 2 points everything resumes not making too much sense.
You are soooo close. The paradox can be resolved by widening back your
conceptual point of view.
* Yes, there is no intrinsic separation between what we classify as objects
in the universe.
* Yes, the process produces a first-person experience that appears to be
localized.
- Jef
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