I'd like to ask him if it would be possible to frame the hard problem in terms of computer science (e.g. in terms of a cellular automaton), ideally coming up with a mathematical description of the problem.
If Turing-completeness is insufficient to compute consciousness then it should be perfectly possible to pinpoint where computer science breaks down.
ideally coming up with a mathematical description of the problem.
That would be like asking for a mathematical description of the problem "why is there something rather than nothing?"
One way in which people lose their sensitivity to such questions is that they train themselves to turn every problem into something that can be solved by their favorite formalized methods. So if it can't be turned into a program, or a Bayesian formula, or..., it's deemed to be meaningless.
But every formalism starts life as an ontology. Before we "formalized&...
I'm doing an undergraduate course on the Free Will Theorem, with three lecturers: a mathematician, a physicist, and David Chalmers as the philosopher. The course is a bit pointless, but the company is brilliant. Chalmers is a pretty smart guy. He studied computer science and math as an undergraduate, before "discovering that he could get paid for doing the kind of thinking he was doing for free already". He's friendly; I've been chatting with him after the classes.
So if anyone has any questions for him, if they seem interesting enough I could approach him with them.
Emails to him also work, of course, but discussion in person lets more understanding happen faster. For example, in a short discussion with him I understood his position on consciousness way better than I would have just from reading his papers on the topic.