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Kyre comments on Consciousness and Sleep - Less Wrong Discussion

8 Post author: casebash 07 January 2016 12:04PM

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Comment author: gjm 07 January 2016 01:44:12PM 9 points [-]

You still have experiences while you are asleep

During some periods of sleep. So far as I am aware, in deep sleep there's no reason to think you are having any experiences at all.

Anyway, for those who don't object to thought experiments: imagine that there's some machine that completely suspends all your brain activity for five minutes, after which it continues from exactly its previous state. Are you the same person after as before? If you answer yes to this -- which I bet almost everyone does -- then the implications are the same as those you'd get from sleep involving a complete cessation of consciousness.

Comment author: Kyre 12 January 2016 07:47:48AM 0 points [-]

For 5 minutes suspension versus dreamless deep sleep - almost exactly the same person. For 3 hours dreamless deep sleep I'm not so sure. I think my brain does something to change state while I'm deep asleep, even if I don't consciously experience or remember anything. Have you ever woken up feeling different about something, or with a solution to a problem you were thinking about as you dropped off ? If that's not all due to dreaming, then you must be evolving at least slightly while completely unconscious.