VAuroch comments on Zombies Redacted - Less Wrong Discussion
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I know people who claim that they don't have qualia. I doubt that it is true, but based on their words they should be considered zombies. ))
I would like to suggest zombies of second kind. This is a person with inverted spectrum. It even could be my copy, which speaks all the same philosophical nonsense as me, but any time I see green, he sees red, but names it green. Is he possible? I could imagine such atom-exact copy of me, but with inverted spectrum. And if such second type zombies are possible, it is argument for epiphenomenalism. Now I will explain why.
Phenomenological judgments (PJ) about own consciousness, that is the ability to say something about your own consciousness, will be the same in me and my zombie of the second type.
But there are two types of PJ: quantitative (like "I have consciousness") and qualitative which describes exactly what type of qualia I experience now.
The qualitative type of PJ is impossible. I can't transfer my knowing about "green" in the words.
It means that the fact of existence of phenomenological judgments doesn't help in case of second type zombies.
So, after some upgrade, zombie argument still works as an argument for epiphenomenalism.
I would also recommend the following article with introduce "PJ" term and many problems about it (but I do not agree with it completely) "Experimental Methods for Unraveling the Mind-body Problem: The Phenomenal Judgment Approach" Victor Argonov http://philpapers.org/rec/ARGMAA-2
I don't see any difference between me and other people who claim to have consciousness, but I have never understood what they mean by consciousness or qualia to an extent that lets me conclude that I have them. So I am sometimes fond of asserting that I have neither, mostly to get an interesting response.
Maybe your are phlizombie))
I think we should add new type p-zombies: epistemic p-zombies: The ones, who claim that they don't have qualia, and we don't know why they claim it.
You are not only one who claimed absence of qualia. I think there are 3 possible solutions.
a) You are p-zombie
b) You don't know where to look
с) You are troll. "So I am sometimes fond of asserting that I have neither, mostly to get an interesting response."
Or more likely :
d) the term "qualia" isn't very properly defined, and what turchin means with "qualia" isn't exactly what VAuroch means with "qualia" - basically an illusion of transparecny/distance of inference issue.
No one defines qualia clearly. If they did, I'd have a conclusion one way or the other.
Do you have a clear definition of clear definition? Or of anything, for that matter?
In this case, "description of how my experience will be different in the future if I have or do not have qualia" covers it. There are probably cases where that's too simplistic.
That's easy to describe. If I have any experience in the future, I have qualia. If I have no experience in the future, I have no qualia. That's the difference.
Taboo "qualia", "experience", "consciousness", "awareness", and any synonyms. Now try to provide a clear definition.
Please stop commenting. Now try to present your argument.
But more importantly, VAuroch defined clear definition as describing how experience would be different. Experience cannot be tabooed if that is what clear definition means.
How are qualia different from experiences? If experiences are no different, why use 'qualia' rather than 'experiences'?
Qualia means the specific way that you experience something. And if you don't experience something in any way at all, then you don't experience it. So if there are no qualia, there are no experiences. But they don't mean the same thing, since qualia means "the ways things are experienced", not "experiences."