Re: virus: Re: Technology (was manifest science)
Joe E. Dees (joedees@bellsouth.net)
Thu, 3 Jun 1999 22:58:36 -0500
Date sent: Thu, 3 Jun 1999 19:44:04 -0700 (PDT)
From: Dylan Durst <ddurst@levien.com>
To: virus@lucifer.com
Subject: Re: virus: Re: Technology (was manifest science)
Send reply to: virus@lucifer.com
> > It's superGodelian degree of complexity, which permits recursive
> > self-reference and thus allows us to be not only conscious (which
> > many animals are), but also self-conscious (conscious of our own
> > consciousness - conscious of our conscious selves).
>
> How few neurons is required for this self-referencing to occur. Surely,
> there must be a specific number if it is to count as 'counsciousness'.
> (note: i'm not asking for a specific number, but i just want you to
> realize . . . fuck it, i don't have enought time to deal with all this
> email)
>
There does logically have to be a point (number of neurons
combined with number of connections combined with degree of
structural complexity) beyond which recursive self-reference is
possible and beneath which it is not, but such a cusp will most
likely be discovered, if at all, empirically. I rather think that the
boundary is a fuzzy yet not nonexistent one, and that we are some
distance beyond it. Wherever it is, experiments suggest that it is
less than the great apes, and greater than the lesser apes;~)
> > It'll come to you.
>
> That's the same thing a priest once told me. And I'm sure that just
> about anything can 'come to' me.
>
>
> - dylan
>
> - - -
> Dylan Durst # ddurst@levien.com # ddurst@cats.ucsc.edu # dylan@haptek.com
> http://www.porter.ucsc.edu/~dsd # <-<--<---<----<----|---->---->--->-->->
>
>