From: Stathis Papaioannou (stathisp@gmail.com)
Date: Wed Dec 02 2009 - 18:06:38 MST
2009/12/3 Bradley Thomas <brad36@gmail.com>:
>>A computer program running on two machines in parallel could produce two
> streams of consciousness in lockstep.
>
> Nice idea in theory but in practice this set-up is out of lockstep almost
> immediately since no two processors run at exactly the same speed. That's
> not to mention that as soon as you introduce input (necessary for a
> consciousness) then the systems differ substantially in their exposure to
> external entropy. Divergence may not be huge to begin with but any
> divergence is sufficient to show that they are not the same consciousness.
Divergence would not occur if there is no outside input, i.e. if there
is a self-contained virtual environment. The Universe could be an
example of this. It wouldn't matter if the two computers were not
running in parallel as long as they ran the same program. I would not
mind if my program is terminated today if I could be sure that it
would run again at some future time, since I would experience no gap
in consciousness; nor would I be aware from inside the program of any
change in processor speed.
-- Stathis Papaioannou
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Wed Jul 17 2013 - 04:01:05 MDT