Nisan comments on The conscious tape - Less Wrong
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (113)
Ah, but presumably if we were to wake up the comatose person, they would start interacting with the world; and their output would depend on the particulars of the state of the world. In that case I clearly want to wake them up.
I was thinking of a morally significant dormant Turing machine that was not designed to have input devices. For example, a comatose person with no sensory organs. If they woke up, they would awaken to a life of dreams and dark solitude, proceeding deterministically from their initial state. Let's assume there is absolutely no way to restore this person's senses. It's not clear to me that it's morally desirable to wake them up.