Caledonian2 comments on Hand vs. Fingers - Less Wrong

25 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 30 March 2008 12:36AM

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Comment author: Caledonian2 31 March 2008 01:29:00AM 0 points [-]

I'm well aware that p-zombies are physically - and hence behaviourally - identical to their conscious counterparts. The dispute is over what conclusions we can draw from this.

The obvious conclusion is that 'consciousness' as defined in the thought experiment is meaningless. If the consequences of the presence of consciousness are identical in every way to the consequences of the absence of consciousness, the two states are equivalent, and the word 'consciousness' refers only to the null state.