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Dear Peter,

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You wrote :

« Computers will never reach consciousness. There is an infinite qualitative difference between physical processes that are subject to physical laws and hence cannot transcend those laws and a conscious being who can be self-aware and act with intention … Being an inheritor of the materialist philosophy, as most scientists are, without even thinking of its inadequacy, I found myself profoundly disturbed »
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Would you kindly indicate the evidence permitting to conclude that “computers will never reach consciousness” ?

Also, what is there to prove that somebody “acts with intention” ?

In common language, “intention” designates “a wish that one means to carry out”. It implies the notion of “purpose”. Whereas the Mozley & Whitley’s Law Dictionary does not define it in terms of “wish” or “desire” or any notion of “purpose”, but simply in terms of the “not unlikely consequences of a deliberate act” :

[ When used with reference to civil and criminal responsibility, a person who contemplates any result, as not unlikely to follow from a deliberate act of his own, may be said to intend that result, whether he desire it or not. Thus, if a man should, for a wager, discharge a gun among a multitude of people, and any should be killed, he would be deemed guilty of intending the death of such person: for every man is presumed to intend the natural consequence of his own actions. Intention is often confounded with motive, as when we speak of a man’s “good intentions. ]

My understanding is that, given the current state of the art of scientific knowledge, it is impossible to identify and measure “intention” in a person’s mind using objective tools. It can only be done by purely subjective means, i.e., depending on how an observer interprets a particular behaviour.

It seems to me that the religious explanation of “conscience” you indicate can also only be purely subjective.

But, I await your further explanations with interest ...

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>>Would you kindly indicate the evidence permitting to conclude that “computers will never reach consciousness” ?<<

No evidence only expert opinion can be extracted from the 54 pages of the first chapter “Consciousness and Computation” in Roger Penrose’s book “Shadows of the Mind - a Search for the Missing Science of Consciousness” (OUP 1994), summarised in the Preface thus:

“My case has two distinct strands to it. One of these is essentially negative, in that I argue strongly against the commonly held viewpoint that our conscious mentality - in all of its various manifestations - could, in principle, be fully understood in terms of computational models. The other strand to my reasoning is positive in the sense that it represents a genuine search for a means - within the constraints of the hard facts of science - whereby a scientifically describable brain might be able to make use of subtly unknown physical principles in order to perform the needed non-computational action”.

Note that Penrose is a distinguished mathematical physicist and atheist. And that in spite of his search, he does not explicitly claim that science will be able to EXPLAIN consciousness (as e.g. it can explain the movement of the planets).

When he writes that “scientifically describable brain night be able to make use of subtly unknown physical principles in order to perform the needed non-computational action” this is a personal belief not very different from that of the theist who can make use of other (albeit non-physical) principles - namely of his/her faith - that in his/her mind can play the role of Penrose’s “non-computational action”.

My personal belief is that science might be able to better and better approximate the function of consciousness by some “non-computational actions” but never to fully explain it like it can some phenomena from the physical world.

Yuyutsu,
How can you possible say that consciousness is not a phenomenon? Can you really disregard your own rich experience of the world and of inner thought and memory? It seems to me that consciousness is the most reliable phenomenon that we can experience.

Dear Peter,

Phenomena occur - whereas consciousness is constant and everlasting.
Phenomena can be observed objectively - whereas consciousness cannot.

Consciousness can be likened to light:

We rarely experience pure light directly - what we normally experience is refracted light that has taken shape and form after hitting an object. The result is that normally our experience is that of seeing an object rather than of seeing light itself.

Similarly we rarely experience pure consciousness (which, if taken further, amounts to experiencing God directly) - what we normally experience is an indirect and limited expression of consciousness that was refracted by hitting our minds and/or certain spots in our brain. This includes memory and logic, which collates impulses to deduct that consciousness must have been present in the past (somewhat like the effect of light on a camera-film), but truly we ordinarily experience neither the world nor consciousness, but rather the deductions of some mind which we call 'ours'. The experienced memory-based IDEA of consciousness (itself a phenomenon, like any other idea) falls short behind actual consciousness and as rich as the contents of our mind may be, it's still a far cry from consciousness itself.

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Dear George,

Though it would be a nightmare which I hope never happens, I cannot discard the possibility that one day man will be able to look at brains and minds and measure their intention using objective tools. Likewise, I cannot discard the possibility that man will one day create new brains and minds that would be practically indistinguishable from existing brains and minds.

Thankfully, last time something similar was attempted, it was prevented by God (Genesis 11:1-9), but as for the future we have no guarantees.

Even if man creates new minds which parrot: "I am conscious", "Don't hurt me", "I want to rule the world", etc., we must remember that minds (old or new) are not conscious. While you and I are conscious, our minds are probably just a dead mechanism.

New Scientist published a number of articles on conciousness sometime early last year and there's been a spirited (pun intended) commentary in the journal ever since. I am in a train between Swan Hill and Melbourne right now, so cannot give any more details. However there is a wide range of views among scientists,beyond this one. I tend to agree about god of the gaps. Who knows what our clever consciousness will find out about itself in the future.

Dear Yuyutsu,

>>While you and I are conscious, our minds are probably just a dead mechanism.<<

It all depends on what you call "consciousness" and what "mind". For instance, Penrose distinguishes between the former and "awareness", whereas e.g. the German language does not even have an equivalent of the word "mind".