Geoff
Lallygag Moderator
- Joined
- Apr 24, 2007
- Messages
- 5,584
- MBTI Type
- INXP
I created this thread to pick up on a comment in the "are you significant" thread.
To tweak this slightly, I am interested in exploring how the human mind arises, and whether it is just the sum of its parts, or is there something that overlays on the top "a soul", "sentience", or "spark".. call it what you will.
A number of questions around this, I suppose, but here is the first block...
If a sufficiently powerful computer were programmed with the location and velocity of every particle in your brain to run in a simulation, do you think it would or could behave as you and therefore be alive? Does it take something more than the simulation of the measurable actions and identity of the particles of life to make something alive?
My gut instinct is that simulating every particle in a brain will not create life.. that something over and above the parts is required to create sentient life, and that a computer simulation would need to understand something that we currently do not (the motion and location of every part of a human brain will still be messing some sentient "essence"). That some unidentifiable quality arises that is not predicted by the sum total of its parts.
Thoughts?
-Geoff
Langrenus said:If a computer were ever powerful enough to be programmed with the location and velocity of every particle in the universe, could it predict the future with 100% accuracy? Or would Quantum theory make this impossible? Are our thoughts random or just predictable (but complicated) chemical and electrical impulses? Please don't respond, this will completely de-rail Geoff's thread
To tweak this slightly, I am interested in exploring how the human mind arises, and whether it is just the sum of its parts, or is there something that overlays on the top "a soul", "sentience", or "spark".. call it what you will.
A number of questions around this, I suppose, but here is the first block...
If a sufficiently powerful computer were programmed with the location and velocity of every particle in your brain to run in a simulation, do you think it would or could behave as you and therefore be alive? Does it take something more than the simulation of the measurable actions and identity of the particles of life to make something alive?
My gut instinct is that simulating every particle in a brain will not create life.. that something over and above the parts is required to create sentient life, and that a computer simulation would need to understand something that we currently do not (the motion and location of every part of a human brain will still be messing some sentient "essence"). That some unidentifiable quality arises that is not predicted by the sum total of its parts.
Thoughts?
-Geoff