Vladimir_Nesov comments on Alien parasite technical guy - Less Wrong

61 Post author: PhilGoetz 27 July 2010 04:51PM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Article Navigation

Comments (54)
Tags: ai philosophy psychology consciousness

Comments (54)

You are viewing a single comment's thread.

Comment author: Vladimir_Nesov 27 July 2010 06:03:52PM 7 points [-]

You only use 10% of your brain. Something else is using the other 90%.

That myth again?

Comment author: PhilGoetz 27 July 2010 06:16:19PM *  21 points [-]

No, not that myth again. I'm using the same words to say something completely different. That's why it's funny. I hope.

Comment author: thomblake 27 July 2010 08:41:06PM 9 points [-]

I was going to comment on how clever it is and how someone was going to object loudly without getting the joke, but I clearly wasn't fast enough.

Comment author: JanetK 28 July 2010 11:41:56AM 2 points [-]

Ditto. But then I noticed that the 10% used by consciousness is within the 100% used by the 'thinker' or some sort of metaphor like that. It is not a different part of the brain, just the part that is currently accessible.

That is my problem with 'me' and 'my brain' as two different things. Why does no one else seem to have a feeling of identity with their whole brains? Why do they not take ownership of all their actions? Boy, the idea that there are two minds takes a long time to die.

So I liked the posting and I am voting it up but I hope your can find another way to express consciousness then an awkward first person singular pronoun.

Comment author: torekp 30 July 2010 04:00:14PM 3 points [-]

Why does no one else seem to have a feeling of identity with their whole brains? Why do they not take ownership of all their actions?

I'd rather go a step farther and identify with my whole organism. But the real action isn't in how one parses one's identity, but in which aspects of oneself are targeted for change and which are accepted.

From Phil's post:

When I say "I", I mean the conscious part of this thing called Phil.

We think that we, the rational part, can do a better job of managing our team.

Conscious part and rational part aren't the same.

Comment author: JanetK 31 July 2010 10:21:06AM 3 points [-]

Right on torekp, voted up

Comment author: Randaly 28 July 2010 07:11:36PM 1 point [-]

It's more like ~5%, really.

Comment author: CaptainOblivious2 31 July 2010 01:11:04AM *  5 points [-]

Yeah, I always wondered about that... sure, it sounds good: try hard, and you can accomplish anything!

But independent of whether it's even true or not, how could anyone actually know it's true? Who volunteered to have 90% of their brain scooped out to see if it made any difference?

(I can see it now: "No, Mr Smith, you were always a complete moron - that's why you let us scoop out 90% of your brain")

Powered by Reddit Powered by Reddit