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Nominull comments on Suffering - Less Wrong
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For me, a morally significant agent is one that has positive and negative qualia. Since I can't tell this by looking at an agent, I guess. I'm pretty sure that my brother does, and I'm pretty sure that a rock doesn't.
Cyan mentioned pain asymbolia on the last thread: the ability to feel pain, but not really find anything painful or problematic about it. If someone had asymbolia generalized across all mental functions, I would stop counting that person as a moral agent.
Could you elaborate on your reasons for doubting that a rock has qualia?
Qualia appear to require complicated internal structure: knock out a certain brain area and you lose some aspect of it.
I figure it's symmetric. It's just as likely a rock has good qualia as bad qualia in a given situation. Humans are more asymmetric. If they have bad qualia, they tend to stop doing whatever it is, so you can tell they have bad qualia.