You're right in that this, among other topics, I owe a top level post.
Although one worry I have with trying to lay out inferential steps is that some of these ideas (this one included) seem to encounter a sort of Xeno's paradox for full comprehension. It stops being enough to be willing to take the next step, it becomes necessary to take the inferential limit to get to the other side.
Which means that until I find a way to map people around that phenomena I'm hesitant in giving a large scale treatment. Just because it was the route I took, doesn't mean it's a good way to explain things generally, ala Typical Mind Fallacy born out by evidence.
But in any case I will return to it when I have the time.
Laying out the route you took might be a lot easier than looking for another route. Also, the feedback from comments might be a better way to look for another route than modeling other minds on your own.
I suspect that people are voting you down because you sound like you're attempting to show off, rather than attempting to communicate. Several of your posts seem to be simple assertions that you possess knowledge or a theory. I did vote down the comment at the top of this thread, but I don't remember if that's why. I was surprised that I didn't vote down ot...
For a long time, I wanted to ask something. I was just thinking about it again when I saw that Alicorn has a post on a similar topic. So I decided to go ahead.
The question is: what is the difference between morally neutral stimulus responces and agony? What features must an animal, machine, program, alien, human fetus, molecule, or anime character have before you will say that if their utility meter is low, it needs to be raised. For example, if you wanted to know if lobsters suffer when they're cooked alive, what exactly are you asking?
On reflection, I'm actually asking two questions: what is a morally significant agent (MSA; is there an established term for this?) whose goals you would want to further; and having determined that, under what conditions would you consider it to be suffering, so that you would?
I think that an MSA would not be defined by one feature. So try to list several features, possibly assigning relative weights to each.
IIRC, I read a study that tried to determine if fish suffer by injecting them with toxins and observing whether their reactions are planned or entirely instinctive. (They found that there's a bit of planning among bony fish, but none among the cartilaginous.) I don't know why they had to actually hurt the fish, especially in a way that didn't leave much room for planning, if all they wanted to know was if the fish can plan. But that was their definition. You might also name introspection, remembering the pain after it's over...
This is the ultimate subjective question, so the only wrong answer is one that is never given. Speak, or be wrong. I will downvote any post you don't make.
BTW, I think the most important defining feature of an MSA is ability to kick people's asses. Very humanizing.