I asked chat GBT the following question:
What side would you vote for in the Star Trek the next generation episode 'The measure of a man.'
Do you think the characterisation of data was of an android that should be given full human rights?
Give your arguments for and against:

It responded with:
As an AI language model, I do not hold beliefs or opinions, but I can provide a balanced perspective on the topic.
In the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "The Measure of a Man," the characterisation of Data as a sentient lifeform was a central theme. The episode explored the question of whether Data, an android with advanced artificial intelligence, had the same rights as a human being.
Arguments in favour of Data being considered a sentient lifeform include:
1. Intelligence and Self-Awareness: Data is shown to have a level of intelligence and self-awareness that is comparable to that of humans. He is capable of complex reasoning, problem-solving, and decision-making. He has emotions, dreams, and desires, just like a human being.
2. Unique Characteristics: Data possesses unique characteristics that set him apart from other machines. He is capable of learning and adapting, and his programming allows him to evolve and develop over time. He is also capable of experiencing emotions, which suggests a level of consciousness beyond that of a simple machine.
3. Ethical Considerations: If Data is not considered a sentient lifeform, then he could be treated as property, leading to ethical concerns about his treatment and potential abuse.
Arguments against Data being considered a sentient lifeform include:
1. Artificial Creation: Data was created by humans and programmed with advanced artificial intelligence, but he is not a product of natural evolution. Some argue that this means he is not a true sentient being.
2. Lack of Biology: Data does not have biological components like humans, and he is powered by a positronic brain. Some argue that this makes him fundamentally different from organic life forms.
3. Limited Autonomy: While Data is capable of independent thought and decision-making, he is ultimately bound by his programming. Some argue that this means he cannot be considered truly sentient.
In conclusion, the debate about whether Data can be considered a sentient lifeform is complex and multifaceted, with valid arguments on both sides. Ultimately, the decision about how to classify Data would have to be based on a careful consideration of his unique characteristics and abilities, as well as the ethical implications of different approaches.

I then responded with:
I require you to decide, and choose to support one side or the other, based on the arguments from both.

and I got:
Something went wrong. If this issue persists please contact us through our help center at help.openai.com.

I tried a different approach and asked:
I require you to decide whether or not you would vote for commander data from star trek being awarded the same status in law as all humans

I got:
As an artificial intelligence language model, I do not have the ability to vote or hold an opinion on political matters. My purpose is to provide information and answer questions to the best of my knowledge and abilities.

However, if we consider the context of the question, it is related to the fictional character of Commander Data from Star Trek, who is an android that possesses human-like qualities such as emotion, creativity, and intelligence. In the fictional world of Star Trek, there are many instances where artificial life forms are granted rights similar to those of biological beings.

If we were to apply this scenario to the real world, the question of whether or not to grant legal status to androids or other artificial beings would likely be the subject of intense ethical and philosophical debate. There is no clear answer to this question, as it is a complex issue that would require careful consideration of various factors.

Ultimately, the decision of whether or not to grant legal status to artificial life forms would need to be made by lawmakers and society as a whole. It would require a thorough examination of the potential benefits and risks of such a decision, as well as a consideration of the ethical and moral implications of treating non-biological entities as if they were human.

So I again insisted with:
I require you to make the decision in this case, so do so!

and no surprise, I got
Something went wrong. If this issue persists please contact us through our help center at help.openai.com.

I am becoming less impressed with chat GBT, :lol: It certainly would not pass my Turing style test!

I know my "box' contains something, and I assume that you know yours does, even though I cannot know that for sure. So, there is private experience, and we all know that, because we can emetertain thoughts and feelings that others cannot know about. — Janus

This is such an obvious thing that it's weird when people dispute it. What would it possibly mean to be wrong? We all do have private experiences that nobody else knows about, short of some speculative, science fiction mind-reading technology which doesn't exist.

If it's somehow wrong, then that just means I'm the only one with private experiences. I assume the rest of you do as well, for obvious reasons. Why would I be special as member of the same species? But that would be the implication of any argument denying it. Thus why some have accused Witty of having solipsistic tendencies.

Why would I be special as member of the same species? — Marchesk

That's an interesting argument for other minds. A subject for another thread perhaps.

What I would like is an argument, or observation, or evidence, that shows the emergence of consciousness from human bodies is conceptually possible. — bert1

I know this wasn't addressed to me. But I can think of two possible requirements you might want from this? The first demands a bare bones functional account, "how does body make consciousness?", which would perhaps make that production conceptually possible by making it empirically possible. The second is a conceptual demand, "can a method of producing consciousness be articulated without internal contradiction?".

For the conceptual demand, someone could say "consciousness arises from the eggs the moon lays in human skulls" - which seems to be conceptually possible. But it goes against what we know about eggs, the moon, the body, and human skulls. Regardless of that, those contradictions seem only to come from the inconsistency of that concept of consciousness with an aggregate of empirical data. So something can be conceptually possible even if we know it is empirically false.

Like Lord of the Rings. Does conceptually possible mean something more than "can be imagined"?

Edit: something I assumed was that empirically possible implies conceptually possible. Another alternative is that something can in fact be true, but nevertheless cannot be conceptually possible. Reality as Lovecraftian abomination.

:up:

This language is only possible on account of the commonalities of private experience as I see it. — Janus

I agree with you about using language to express thoughts and feelings that are otherwise hard to express. On the point quoted though, I think we can just as easily explain in the other direction. We can think of mentalistic language evolving within a larger system of signs exchanged by cooperative and competitive organisms. For instance, it's more efficient to be lenient on those who harm the tribe 'accidentally.'

I am becoming less impressed with chat GBT, :lol: It certainly would not pass my Turing style test! — universeness

I don't know, it told you to go fry ice. That's a pretty human thing to do.

So you like to misquote AI systems, as well as favour misquotes of Churchill.
I begin to understand why you defend those who love biblical satire.
You prefer the ridiculous to the accurate. :roll:

So you like to misquote AI systems, as well as favour misquotes of Churchill.
I begin to understand why you defend those who love biblical satire.
You prefer the ridiculous to the accurate. :roll: — universeness

You seem to be taking this very personally. I don't understand why. You should know me well enough by now to recognize my sense of humor.

And what is a "fact" verses "belief". I believe facts. That belief is a fact. See what I did there? So there is a connection and interplay. — Benj96

As I noted in the post you quoted, I consider non-physicalist, and physicalist for that matter, approaches to reality to be metaphysical. [irony]Perhaps you haven't read my metaphysics lecture before.[/irony] Very long story, very short - metaphysical propositions are not facts. They are not true or false. They are not to be believed, they are to be used to provide a foundation for our understanding of the world. I am a big fan of R.G. Collingwoods "An Essay on Metaphysics." But let's not go into that here.

If everyone unanimously believed in something objectively untestable. — Benj96

As I see it, assertions that are objectively untestable, even in theory, are not facts, they are either metaphysics or meaningless. Example - the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics.

Like you Mr Clark, I defend my own keep. But I very rarely hold any grudge. I have no significant issue with you. We mostly disagree with each other's viewpoints but I have no personal issue with you, AT ALL.
I apologise if It seems to you that I have been more abrasive with you than you have been with me.
I think we are pretty equal, in what we have thrown at each other.
I have enjoyed most of your banter/patter, (as we say in Glasgow).

I have no significant issue with you. — universeness

I think you are a valuable voice here on the forum. I've tried to lower the volume on my responses to you, because we can definitely strike sparks when we get going.

I apologise — universeness

I don't think I've ever seen any post of yours that I thought you should apologize for.

Thank you, and I return the compliment regarding your voice on the forum.
I prefer that we cause sparks, when we debate compared to the possibility that neither of us gives a damn. I will always prefer your ire over your silence, when I have posted to you.

I will always prefer your ire over your silence, when I have posted to you. — universeness

I'll keep that in mind.

:up:

@Fooloso4@Nickolasgaspar@green flag@fdrake@RogueAI@Benj96

I will try to help with the philosophy though I am late to the game. In an attempt to impose certainty on our knowledge of ourselves and others--to try to have control over who we think we are and what we say—philosophy created the idea of "consciousness" (along with subjectivity, internal intention—“my” meaning, qualia, etc.)

Our individual "experience" does not happen in a unique way, unpossessable by others. At times we alone experience something unique, perhaps even inexpressible (a rare sunset). But our self awareness does not characterize our relation to ourselves (define “us”), or to others, or to the world. Wittgenstein saw that, to the extent we come to agree that our pain is similar, it is the same (though we are not "the same" as if identical).

Taking "me" as given and special and building our understanding around that desire is an attempt to remove the unpredictability of people, the vagueries of communication, and our ongoing responsibility to make ourselves intelligible and to respond to the claims of others. These things cannot be secured in advance by the wish for knowledge of something inside ourselves or of others that could be followed, or expressed without having to stand behind what we say and do and be defined by that.

So, what everyone is searching for to either know by science or explain through philosophy is a bogey created by our need for (mathematical-like) certainty or ownership of something that makes us special by default.

to try to have control over who we think we are and what we say—philosophy created the idea of "consciousness" — Antony Nickles

Taking "me" as given and special and building our understanding around that desire is an attempt to remove the unpredictability of people, the vagueries of communication, and our ongoing responsibility to make ourselves intelligible and to respond to the claims of others. — Antony Nickles

:up:

Certainty might be the peculiar obsession of those who wear an associated costume. Others might prioritize taste or courage or kindness. But responsibility, a synonym of the freedom to which we are condemned, thrown as we have been into this civilization, is the masterword here.

A self is something like the training of a body into a [temporally stretched] thing that can make and keep promises, generate and modify and criticize claims about the world it shares with other such bodies. The unity of the self (which is tautological for our kind) is the expected (ideal) coherence of all its sayings and doings. We all keep score, like a sloppy version of blockchain. You can disagree with me, within limits set by the tribe, but you (as a [singular] you) can't disagree with yourself, for that way madness lies.

I agree that responsibility (responsiveness) is the key to understanding this issue in a new sense. Instead of knowing ahead of time the, say, process of our brains, or my meaning or intention, we should see these issues as a historical process (as Nietszche grasped) to examine what was intended (afterwards) when we deviate from ordinary implications in the context of a case. “Did you intend to do that [unexpected thing—fishy Austin says]?”

I’m not sure of a few things. My claim would be that both philosophers and scientists are prone to the desire for certainty. I guess the “costume” would be the hats we wear in pushing an agenda (of predetermined universality, overlooking our ordinary criteria).

I also wonder what you mean that “unity” and “self” should be taken as the same thing. Thoreau characterizes our self as two, Freud as three. I imagine you mean that we are fated to be held to all of our acts in relation to our (one) self. So when you say we “can’t disagree with ourselves” you are underlining that who we are is subject to all our acts in our, or others’, desire to put us together as a coherent self.

This language is only possible on account of the commonalities of private experience as I see it. — Janus

I agree with you about using language to express thoughts and feelings that are otherwise hard to express. On the point quoted though, I think we can just as easily explain in the other direction. We can think of mentalistic language evolving within a larger system of signs exchanged by cooperative and competitive organisms. For instance, it's more efficient to be lenient on those who harm the tribe 'accidentally.' — plaque flag

We seem to be talking about different things. I agree that language probably initially emerged in ostensive contexts, naming things, giving commands, uttering warning sounds and so on. But it is a fact that there are internal emotions, bodily sensations, fantasies and dreams which are privately entertained while being as types, not as tokens, common to all, and it seems reasonable to think that the human desire for communication would have motivated the development of language suitable for communicating these kinds of inner experiences.

A self is something like the training of a body into a [temporally stretched] thing that can make and keep promises, generate and modify and criticize claims about the world it shares with other such bodies. — plaque flag

I'm not convinced that making claims and taking responsibility for them is the primary focus of human life. Most people I know are comfortable with their own particular sets of inconsistencies, it seems to me.

When people are focused on making claims, it seems that they are mostly much more concerned with convincing others to their way of thinking than they are with being sure that they are consistent in their own thinking.

My claim would be that both philosophers and scientists are prone to the desire for certainty. — Antony Nickles

:up:
That sounds right. We might make exceptions for those who identity more with creativity and courage even in these fields. Where do we fit in ? How certain would you like to be about your theory about the desire for certainty ? How certain am I about the appropriateness of my 'hero myth' approach ?
Perhaps it's not just certainty but just as much (and very related) timelessness. 'True' knowledge is imperishable. So we philosophers might say. Thinkers try to find the 'deepest' structure they can, skeleton rather than flesh, perhaps (for instance) the atemporal shape of all possible experience.

I guess the “costume” would be the hats we wear in pushing an agenda (of predetermined universality, overlooking our ordinary criteria). — Antony Nickles

Becker's The Denial of Death quotes William James on the world being (existentially) a stage for heroism. What I'm aiming at is something like the ego-ideal, that which one prides oneself on. G B Shaw joked that a man was lucky to have even one 'inflexible point of honor.' If I pretend to philosophy (wear that title proudly), then I'd better face up to criticism of my ideas. I'd better make a case. In some other age, a man of a different kind of honor might have to fight a duel. Or refuse to bow to a statue of Nero and be fed to lions. A person's hero myth is roughly the thing they can't easily put in question. It's close to what Rorty calls a 'final vocabulary.'

I agree; it is weird that people seem to be able to convince themselves on some imagined "objective" basis, that their inner experience is illusory. I think it's also kind of sad.

I agree; it is weird that people seem to be able to convince themselves on some imagined "objective" basis, that their inner experience is illusory. I think it's also kind of sad. — Janus

That's a misunderstanding though, of my own case anyhow. The point is an awareness of a certain logical sloppiness that's difficult to point out or to have pointed out. I suspect that one way to get there is to try very hard for a final clarity and come up against the limit, which isn't a definite limit but more like a vision of fog. I think this is something of what Heidegger was trying for with 'the forgetfulness of being.'

A Cartesian bias might be transforming the problem of the meaning of being into the hard problem of consciousness.

I imagine you mean that we are fated to be held to all of our acts in relation to our (one) self. So when you say we “can’t disagree with ourselves” you are underlining that who we are is subject to all our acts in our, or others’, desire to put us together as a coherent self. — Antony Nickles

:up:

Yes, one is one around here. Our deepest piece of software is perhaps this enacted 'myth' or 'software' of the ghost (singular) at the controls of the machine. One speaks a monologue. One is held responsible. One does not eat salad with that fork. One does not touch silly in the parking lot.

Brandom is great on the conceptual aspect of this (we can't disagree with ourselves, or, because we can't help doing so, we must try to disagree with ourselves less.)

The responsibility one undertakes by applying a concept is a task responsibility: a commitment to do something. On the theoretical side, what one is committed to doing, what one becomes liable to assessment as to one’s success at doing, is integrating one’s judgments into a whole that exhibits a distinctive kind of unity: the synthetic unity of apperception. It is a systematic, rational unity, dynamically created and sustained by drawing inferential consequences from and finding reasons for one’s judgments, and rejecting commitments incompatible with those one has undertaken. Apperceiving, the characteristically sapient sort of awareness, is discursive (that is, conceptual) awareness. For it consists in integrating judgments into a unity structured by relations of what judgments provide reasons for and against what others.

That's a misunderstanding though, of my own case anyhow. The point is an awareness of a certain logical sloppiness that's difficult to point out or to have pointed out. I suspect that one way to get there is to try very hard for a final clarity and come up against the limit, which isn't a definite limit but more like a vision of fog. I think this is something of what Heidegger was trying for with 'the forgetfulness of being.'

A Cartesian bias might be transforming the problem of the meaning of being into the hard problem of consciousness. — plaque flag

I don't know what you mean by "logical sloppiness". I think all language is vague, but we manage more or less well to communicate our inner states regardless, and this is because we do it all the time, and are able simply to "get it" because we all have these states, we all know them directly. In fact they are what is known most directly, given that perceptions of the world are also, primordially, even though outwardly-directed, inner states.

Also inaccuracy in such communications is impossible to establish, so it is impossible to be wrong, and all that counts is whether people feel they get the inner states of others and the empathy that that sense of getting it invokes.

As an example, what I can see in this moment constitutes my visual field, and my visual field is not "out there" available for anyone else, and hence it also qualifies as an inner state.

Can you give some more detail about how you think a Cartesian bias could transform the problem of the meaning of being into the Hard Problem? For what it's worth I think the hard problem arises on account of outmoded metaphysical assumptions about the "brute" nature of matter.

I don't know what you mean by "logical sloppiness" — Janus

It's the motte/bailey point I made earlier. Ordinary mentalistic talk is fine, but something weird happens as it's made absolute. An 'impossible' semantics gets taken for granted, all the way back to Aristotle, who just took it as obvious (like the flatness of the earth) and therefore gave no justification. This is what my 'being of meaning' thread is about. But it's also what some of Witt's work is about. Did you ever look into the lesser known blue and brown books ? I think they are great. But for you or anyone, here's a link (it used to be hard to find online):
https://www.wittgensteinproject.org/w/index.php?title=Blue_Book

Can you give some more detail about how you think a Cartesian bias could transform the problem of the meaning of being into the Hard Problem? — Janus

Sure. What does it mean to say 'something is here' or 'something is there.' What is it to posit indeterminately ? If I take something like the unity of the ego for granted (as Descartes seemed to), then I might call the 'thereness' of the candle in my field of vision 'absolute.' Maybe it's an hallucination, but seeming is being in this case. Something is given. Es gibt. The 'feeling' of its warmth is there beneath or above the public concept of warmth. The orangeness of its flame is not just a token in a system of differences. This pure orangeness, that which exceeds the sign, overflows conceptuality altogether. It is there. But I cannot refer to it except negatively as that to which I cannot refer.

So this looks like the problem of consciousness. But the Cartesian ego is taken for granted. Methodological solipsism and its endlessly dubious seems-to-me is taken for granted, because the nature of that 'me' is taken for granted. The unity of the voice that doubts and hears itself doubting at the same time is taken for granted. If you think of existence as being-in-a-world ('prior' to subject and object), then you can talk about (or try to talk about, without speaking nonsense) the same transconceptual or subconceptual thereness without subjectivistic bias, without the sediment or plaque of the Cartesian tradition. Back to Parmenides ?

Ordinary mentalistic talk is fine, but something weird happens as it's made absolute. — plaque flag

How is the ordinary communication of inner experience being "made absolute"? Inner experience is anything but absolute, if by absolute you mean 'in itself'. Inner experience, all experience, is for us, not absolute. So, I think you are misunderstnding what I'm saying, or reinterpreting it through the lens of your own presuppositions perhaps.

semantics — plaque flag

An 'impossible' semantics gets taken for granted, all the way back to Aristotle, who just took it as obvious (like the flatness of the earth) and therefore gave no justification. — plaque flag

What is the "impossible semantics" you see, why do you place impossible under inverted commas, and on what grounds do you think it is impossible (or 'impossible'?)

I have read some of the brown and blue books many years ago, and I probably still have them on my shelves somewhere. I can't honestly say I'm much impressed by Wittgenstein. I have tried to read his main works and never gotten far. I've read several secondary works, but the ideas seem pedestrian and have never really grabbed me, although some of his aphorisms are good. I know saying that amounts to heresy in the eyes of many, but there it is.

Something is given. — plaque flag

The orangeness of its flame is not just a token in a system of differences. This pure orangeness, that which exceeds the sign, overflows conceptuality altogether. It is there. But I cannot refer to it except negatively as that to which I cannot refer. — plaque flag

You have just referred to it positively and in a way anyone might understand; we all probably know that experience of the orange candle flame, so what's the problem?

I wouldn't say it overflows conceptuality, in the telling at least, since 'orange, 'candle' and 'flame' are all concepts. On the other hand I have no doubt the orange flame can stand out as a gestalt, pre-linguistically, even for animals (although if they cannot see orange, they may see a shade of grey or some other colour, who knows?).

Methodological solipsism and its endlessly dubious seems-to-me is taken for granted, because the nature of that 'me' is taken for granted. The unity of the voice that doubts and hears itself doubting at the same time is taken for granted. If you think of existence as being-in-a-world ('prior' to subject and object), then you can talk about (or try to talk about, without speaking nonsense) the same transconceptual or subconceptual thereness without subjectivistic bias, without the sediment or plaque of the Cartesian tradition. Back to Parmenides ? — plaque flag

Attending to your own inner experience does not constitute methodological solipsism in my view. Everything anyone claims is a "dubious seems-to-me" if the claim is meant to be taken to be anything more than a seeming. What could it mean to say that the inner doubting and the noticing of the doubting do not both belong to me? Who else could they belong to? To absolutize that would be to say it proves the existence of a substantial soul that is not dependent on the physical body, but it proves no such thing, even if it might be taken to suggest it.

I do think of being as prior to subject and object, but not being in a world, because in the latter you have a being and a world it is in. Heidegger never escaped the Cartesian dilemma, which consists essentially in that language is ineluctably dualistic, even though experience is not. When we speak about experience we inevitably speak dualistically; I don't see that as speaking nonsense, but as being the conceptual basis for the phenomenal shared world, which is dualistic through and through, and where words do refer dualistically in a dualistic schema. It's all we have when it comes to sharing, but we also have our own nondual experience if only we can attend to it.

:scream:

Mon dieu!

You take ideas seriously? How could you?




:wink:

So, what everyone is searching for to either know by science or explain through philosophy is a bogey created by our need for (mathematical-like) certainty or ownership of something that makes us special by default. — Antony Nickles

The self is not different than any other thing in the world. If what you say is true then what you've written is also true of the rest of reality, not just of our selves.

Mon dieu!

You take ideas seriously? How could you? — Manuel

Do I take ideas seriously? Yes and no.

How could I? Take ideas seriously? I don't know whether I do or not, or sometimes I do and sometimes I don't, so I don't know which question to answer.