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All of Myles H's Comments + Replies

Why it's so hard to talk about Consciousness
Myles H42

Its worth mentioning that the majority of people are in camp #2. For example, in Illusionism as a Theory of Consciousness, Frankish notes:

Although it has powerful defenders — pre-eminently Daniel Dennett — illusionism remains a minority position, and it is often dismissed out of hand as failing to ‘take consciousness seriously’ (Chalmers, 1996).

Further, in the 2020 PhillPapers Survey, 998 English-speaking philosophers were asked "Hard problem of consciousness (is there one?): no or yes?" and 62% said yes while only 29% said no.

One other (more anecdotal) ob... (read more)

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2TAG
Camp 1 includes illusionists, functionalists, and materialists.
What are Emotions?
Myles H82

Wow, thank you so much. This is a lens I totally hadn't considered.

You can see in the post how I was confused how evolution played a part in "imbuing" material terminal goals into humans. I was like, "but kinetic sculptures were not in the ancestral environment?"

It sounds like rather than imbuing humans with material goals, it has imbued a process by which humans create their own. 

I would still define material goals as simply terminal goals which are not defined by some qualia, but it is fascinating that this is what material goals look like in humans... (read more)

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3Seth Herd
I'm so glad you found that response helpful! I primarily mean reward in the sense of reinforcement - a functional definition from animal psychology and neuroscience: reinforcement is whatever makes the previous behavior more likely in the future. But I also mean a positive feeling (qualia if you like, although I find that term too contentious to use much). I think we have a positive feeling when we're getting a reward (reinforcement), but I'm not sure that all positive feelings work as enforcement. Maybe. As to how deep can that recursive learning mechanism go: very deep. When people spend time arguing about logic and abstract values online, they've gone deep. There's no limit- until the world intervenes to tell you your chain of predicted-reward inferences has gone off-track. For instance, if that person has lost their job, and they're cold and hungry, they might track down the (correct) logic that they ascribed too much value to proving people wrong on the internet, and reduce their estimate of its value.
What are Emotions?
Myles H40

There is no such thing as "inherent value"

Does this also mean there is no such thing as "inherent good"? If so, then one cannot say, "X is good", they would have to say "I think that X is good", for "good" would be a fact of their mind, not the environment.

This is what I thought the whole field of morality is about. Defining what is "good" in an objective fundamental sense.

And if "inherent good" can exist but not "inherent value", how would "good" be defined for it wouldn't be allowed to use "value" in its definition.

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1Joe Rogero
Yes.  One can say all sorts of things. People use the phrase "X is good" to mean lots of things: "I'm cheering for X", "I value X", "X has consequences most people endorse", etc. I don't recommend we abandon the phrase, for many phrases are similarly ambiguous but still useful. I recommend keeping this ambiguity in mind, however, and disambiguating where necessary.  I would no more describe morality as solely attempting to define objective good than I would describe physics as solely attempting to build a perpetual motion machine. Morality is also about the implications and consequences of specific values and to what extent they converge, and a great many other things. The search for "objective" good has, IMO, been a tragic distraction, but one that still occasionally bears interesting fruit by accident. 
What are Emotions?
Myles H10

"Values" happen to be a thing possessed by thinking entities

What happens then when a non-thinking thing feels happy? Is that happiness valued? To whom? Or do you think this is impossible?

I can imagine it possible for a fetus in the womb without any thoughts, sense of self, or an ability to move, to still be capable of feeling happiness. Now try to imagine a hypothetical person with a severe mental disability preventing them having any cohesive thoughts, sense of self, or an ability to move. Could they still feel happiness? What happens when the dopamine re... (read more)

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1Joe Rogero
When a baby feels happy, it feels happy. Nothing else happens.  There are differences among wanting, liking, and endorsing something.  A happy blob may like feeling happy, and might even feel a desire to experience more of it, but it cannot endorse things if it doesn't have agency. Human fulfillment and wellbeing typically involves some element of all three.  An unthinking being cannot value even its own happiness, because the concept traditionally meant by "values" refers to the goals that an agent points itself at, and an unthinking being isn't agentic - it does not make plans to steer the world in any particular direction.  I am. When I say "happiness is good", this is isomorphic with "I value happiness". It is a statement about the directions in which I attempt to steer the world.  The physical process that implements "valuing happiness" is the firing of neurons in a brain. It could in theory be implemented in silicon as well, but it's near-certainly not implemented by literal rocks.  Yep, that makes sense. I notice, however, that these things do not appear to be emotions. And that's fine! It is okay to innately value things that are not emotions! Like "having a model of the world that is as accurate as possible", i.e. truth-seeking. Many people (especially here on LW) value knowledge for its own sake. There are emotions associated with this goal, but the emotions are ancillary. There are also instrumental reasons to seek truth, but they don't always apply. The actual goal is "improving one's world-model" or something similar. It bottoms out there. Emotions need not apply.  First off, I'm not wholly convinced this is true. I think emotions are usually accompanied by valenced qualia, but (as with my comments about curiosity) not necessarily always. Sure, if you define "emotion" so that it excludes all possible counterexamples, then it will exclude all possible counterexamples, but also you will no longer be talking about the same concept as other people us
AI Safety Sphere
Myles H10

Sorry about that. I just tested it and it should be working fine. I deleted your account, so you can try signing up again. (also check spam)

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