WEBVTT 1 00:00:09.119 --> 00:00:12.679 Welcome to the Gods I View Podcast. I am your host, 2 00:00:13.320 --> 00:00:20.000 Trevor back the second time in podcast Studio Alpha aka 3 00:00:20.160 --> 00:00:25.199 my wife's office aka a shed I built. I hesitate 4 00:00:25.199 --> 00:00:26.920 to call it a shed. It's pretty nice. We've got 5 00:00:26.920 --> 00:00:29.839 French doors, we got a dormer, we've got six windows, 6 00:00:29.879 --> 00:00:33.679 we got a c it's pretty sweet, pretty sweet, and 7 00:00:33.799 --> 00:00:36.640 for one thousand dollars, I can give you a backstage two. 8 00:00:36.759 --> 00:00:38.880 And I'm kidding, but we do need to figure out 9 00:00:38.880 --> 00:00:43.679 a way to monetize this thing. No, I kid, I kid. 10 00:00:44.039 --> 00:00:47.840 It really is. As you often remind me listeners and emails, 11 00:00:48.119 --> 00:00:52.240 it's a it's a form of therapy. It's nice. There's 12 00:00:52.280 --> 00:00:56.960 something about the rant, there's something about the intellectual rant 13 00:00:58.399 --> 00:01:02.640 that's helpful. But the problem is, I don't know anyone 14 00:01:02.679 --> 00:01:05.400 in my day to day life that I can rant 15 00:01:05.480 --> 00:01:08.760 about this stuff with, because you got to be a 16 00:01:08.840 --> 00:01:14.879 kind of a specific person to be, you know, not 17 00:01:15.480 --> 00:01:19.200 like you. You might think even you out there like, oh, 18 00:01:19.239 --> 00:01:21.519 you'd love to talk about this stuff. But the truth is, 19 00:01:22.359 --> 00:01:25.680 I think it's fun to listen to. But as far 20 00:01:25.719 --> 00:01:28.640 as like having this type of conversation in real life, 21 00:01:29.079 --> 00:01:31.879 it's it's a little overwhelming. It's a little much. It's 22 00:01:31.959 --> 00:01:34.239 kind of like, can we just talk about the weather? 23 00:01:34.560 --> 00:01:38.560 You know? And so the one place I might go 24 00:01:38.680 --> 00:01:41.879 where I could find people who would be interested in 25 00:01:41.959 --> 00:01:48.599 talking about this stuff, you know, the university, my work colleagues. 26 00:01:50.000 --> 00:01:53.439 I just get I get so annoyed by that because 27 00:01:53.480 --> 00:01:55.920 they just disagree with me. You know, I want people 28 00:01:55.920 --> 00:01:58.439 to disagree with me. I mean, I want people to 29 00:01:58.560 --> 00:02:03.439 agree with me or at least perspective. But academia is 30 00:02:03.480 --> 00:02:09.199 so it's a reductionists. Now that that's difficult. So I'm 31 00:02:09.319 --> 00:02:15.439 excited to report that there are finally in this theory 32 00:02:15.479 --> 00:02:17.639 has been around for a while, but it's getting a 33 00:02:17.639 --> 00:02:21.439 lot of traction lately. There are finally some theories of 34 00:02:21.520 --> 00:02:29.280 consciousness that I think I would hesitate to call them 35 00:02:29.360 --> 00:02:38.159 purely reductionist or purely materialistic. Now they are physical, but 36 00:02:38.240 --> 00:02:41.360 there's something about them. They've got a little bit of something. 37 00:02:41.520 --> 00:02:44.400 I think. They still suffer from some of the same problems, 38 00:02:44.439 --> 00:02:49.800 but it's new. It's sort of a new dawn in neuroscience. 39 00:02:49.840 --> 00:02:51.479 And we're going to talk about that theory tonight. It's 40 00:02:51.520 --> 00:02:57.719 called integrated information theory. Now, I did a debate once 41 00:02:57.919 --> 00:03:02.719 and no It's funny because it was agreed that it 42 00:03:02.759 --> 00:03:06.159 wasn't a debate, but it was. This guy said, hey, 43 00:03:06.199 --> 00:03:08.479 could you come talk to my buddy. He's an atheist 44 00:03:08.599 --> 00:03:12.400 and he's like obsessed with AI and let's have a debate. 45 00:03:12.439 --> 00:03:15.719 And I said, no, I'm not interested in having a debate. 46 00:03:15.759 --> 00:03:17.479 And he said, okay, well just come have a talk 47 00:03:18.240 --> 00:03:24.240 the conversation. So I said sure. And so I was 48 00:03:24.280 --> 00:03:26.919 like kind of looking to have a talk and the 49 00:03:26.960 --> 00:03:29.479 guy was like, very quickly, like I need to understand 50 00:03:29.479 --> 00:03:32.680 what you believe so I can argue against it. And 51 00:03:32.719 --> 00:03:35.639 I'm like, oh, buddy, well, I mean I guess this 52 00:03:35.759 --> 00:03:37.439 is what I believe. And then he's like hitting me 53 00:03:37.439 --> 00:03:41.759 with this tough It's like, oh boy, and basically his position, 54 00:03:43.360 --> 00:03:46.800 you know not. It's funny how often non scientific people 55 00:03:46.840 --> 00:03:52.520 are like enamored by science. And so his position really 56 00:03:54.280 --> 00:03:58.080 was that, hey, we figured this out. We figured out 57 00:03:58.120 --> 00:04:02.719 what consciousness is. It's called it. And he showed me 58 00:04:02.759 --> 00:04:06.479 a Nature paper and he said boom, I win. And 59 00:04:06.759 --> 00:04:11.759 you know a couple couple things. I am not really 60 00:04:11.879 --> 00:04:16.600 approaching this topic as a consciousness researcher. I'm just approaching 61 00:04:16.639 --> 00:04:21.279 this topic as I would say an educated layman. Yes, 62 00:04:21.360 --> 00:04:24.680 I do neuroscience research, but I don't study consciousness. You know, 63 00:04:24.720 --> 00:04:32.439 I study neurodegenerative disease and cerebrovascular disease. And so you know, 64 00:04:32.480 --> 00:04:34.600 if someone presents me with the Nature paper and says 65 00:04:34.600 --> 00:04:38.680 it's figured out, you know, I tend to take their 66 00:04:38.800 --> 00:04:42.759 word for it and just sort of retreat to my 67 00:04:43.000 --> 00:04:47.920 natural skepticism. You know that often we overinterpret findings. Often 68 00:04:48.040 --> 00:04:53.439 scientists make category errors. And so what I didn't know 69 00:04:53.480 --> 00:04:56.120 at the time is that I the theory he was 70 00:04:56.319 --> 00:05:04.560 espousing as the physical or the the reductionist materialistic answer 71 00:05:05.600 --> 00:05:08.759 to my fringe and wacky views that consciousness might be 72 00:05:08.759 --> 00:05:13.560 more than computation actually didn't support his position. You know, 73 00:05:13.639 --> 00:05:15.600 if I had just known more about it at the time, 74 00:05:15.639 --> 00:05:17.399 I could say, oh, well, interesting you brought that up, 75 00:05:17.399 --> 00:05:20.480 because that theory is more in line with my beliefs 76 00:05:20.519 --> 00:05:29.879 than yours. Anyway, Alas can't win every argument, so it 77 00:05:30.040 --> 00:05:32.000 might be good here before we play the clip. This 78 00:05:32.120 --> 00:05:34.639 is one of the best clips I've ever heard on 79 00:05:34.839 --> 00:05:40.120 I So you're in luck. It might be worth just 80 00:05:40.839 --> 00:05:44.519 clarifying the position here that we take on this show. 81 00:05:44.560 --> 00:05:47.079 And you know, if we have a recurring topic. It's 82 00:05:47.160 --> 00:05:52.920 this topic. And so what is the position? What is 83 00:05:53.000 --> 00:05:56.399 our you know, assuming you agree, what is our position 84 00:05:56.480 --> 00:05:59.800 here at the God side View podcast? And I think 85 00:06:00.240 --> 00:06:08.399 position is that consciousness is not excuse me, consciousness is 86 00:06:08.439 --> 00:06:12.720 not merely an epiphenomenon. And so to unpack what that means, 87 00:06:13.800 --> 00:06:20.720 it's not merely an emergent property of complexity. This isn't 88 00:06:20.360 --> 00:06:24.480 in the public, this is in the like pop science community, 89 00:06:24.519 --> 00:06:31.879 this is the most popular position in neurosciences, becoming increasingly 90 00:06:32.000 --> 00:06:35.800 less popular, but it's still preferred to something like the 91 00:06:35.839 --> 00:06:42.439 spirit or the soul, right, But at his heart, what 92 00:06:42.480 --> 00:06:46.120 it means is like, hey, you see when I show 93 00:06:46.160 --> 00:06:49.920 you an apple. If I scan your brain while I 94 00:06:49.959 --> 00:06:55.000 show you an apple, this part of your brain becomes active. Therefore, 95 00:06:56.319 --> 00:06:59.959 that part of the brain is what produces the experience 96 00:07:00.240 --> 00:07:06.639 of appleness, of seeing an apple, of having memories about 97 00:07:06.639 --> 00:07:10.519 times you've made an apple. It's all wrapped up in 98 00:07:10.560 --> 00:07:13.240 these neurons. And this is called the neural the neural 99 00:07:13.360 --> 00:07:19.360 correlates of experience. So when you experience something, what part 100 00:07:19.399 --> 00:07:22.879 of the brain becomes more active or less active? In harmony, 101 00:07:25.160 --> 00:07:27.279 whatever that part of the brain is. We can now 102 00:07:27.360 --> 00:07:30.720 say with certainty that this part of the brain explains 103 00:07:30.759 --> 00:07:36.040 the conscious experience of that thing you saw or smelled 104 00:07:36.160 --> 00:07:42.360 or remembered. And you know, certain parts of that circuitry 105 00:07:42.399 --> 00:07:48.319 are merely pragmatic, right, Like there are parts of your 106 00:07:48.360 --> 00:07:55.160 brain that merely allow you to interpret color and shape, 107 00:07:55.399 --> 00:08:02.040 and you know the the boundary, the threshold distinction, like 108 00:08:02.040 --> 00:08:04.600 where's the edge of the apple compared to the background. 109 00:08:05.319 --> 00:08:08.360 And we might call that like your primary visual cortex. 110 00:08:08.959 --> 00:08:11.920 But then there's another much more complex part of your 111 00:08:11.959 --> 00:08:18.639 brain where you have the conscious experience of that information, 112 00:08:19.879 --> 00:08:22.839 that visual information, and you might have an association with 113 00:08:22.879 --> 00:08:25.920 a memory. You might think about what an apple tastes like, 114 00:08:26.000 --> 00:08:31.120 what it smells like different apples you've seen. This is 115 00:08:31.120 --> 00:08:34.360 called association. And somewhere in there we think is the 116 00:08:34.399 --> 00:08:40.120 conscious experience, because in the moment where you report having 117 00:08:40.159 --> 00:08:44.320 the conscious experience of seeing the apple, this part of 118 00:08:44.320 --> 00:08:48.000 your brain was active. This is called neural correlates of consciousness, 119 00:08:49.080 --> 00:08:52.759 and it's for the most part how neuroscientists study consciousness. 120 00:08:54.440 --> 00:09:01.879 We don't buy it. We acknowledge, of course that you 121 00:09:02.080 --> 00:09:08.039 cannot have the conscious experience of seeing an apple or 122 00:09:08.720 --> 00:09:13.240 you know, et cetera without that basic hardware, but that 123 00:09:13.360 --> 00:09:19.519 the experience itself is fundamentally distinct, because of course you 124 00:09:19.559 --> 00:09:23.480 can imagine a system that could see an apple and 125 00:09:23.519 --> 00:09:28.840 respond to an apple and retrieve important information about apples 126 00:09:29.240 --> 00:09:35.440 without a conscious experience, like chat GBT for example. So 127 00:09:35.519 --> 00:09:39.240 clearly there is something else, There is more to the story. 128 00:09:39.279 --> 00:09:44.200 That is I think our basic position we are not 129 00:09:44.279 --> 00:09:53.679 automatons having an epiphenomenal conscious experience. We are embodied agents, 130 00:09:54.080 --> 00:09:58.440 and consciousness is some core feature of who or what 131 00:09:58.480 --> 00:10:03.960 we are, and it's unique, and there's a lot of 132 00:10:04.000 --> 00:10:07.840 room for mystery in that, in that space of trying 133 00:10:07.879 --> 00:10:11.559 to answer this what is traditionally called the hard problem 134 00:10:12.240 --> 00:10:18.519 of consciousness, how do you get experience from matter? All right, 135 00:10:18.639 --> 00:10:21.039 let's jump into the clip. They start the clip off 136 00:10:21.080 --> 00:10:24.440 talking about the start of this research and Francis Quik 137 00:10:24.559 --> 00:10:26.840 was a big part of that, and so we're going 138 00:10:26.879 --> 00:10:29.480 to pick up right there with that conversation. 139 00:10:29.080 --> 00:10:31.519 They're sort of approach to it. Correct me if I'm wrong. 140 00:10:31.679 --> 00:10:34.480 Was still a bit sort of materialist in a sound 141 00:10:34.519 --> 00:10:37.240 sort of old place for from neural Garletts. So okay, 142 00:10:37.519 --> 00:10:40.039 I nailed d NA. Francis creek. Right, Okay, now we 143 00:10:40.120 --> 00:10:43.720 can let's nail consciousness just finding the neurons so exactly. 144 00:10:43.759 --> 00:10:46.200 So now coming coming to the to the question. 145 00:10:46.000 --> 00:10:48.720 A bit there where we can be very grateful for 146 00:10:48.840 --> 00:10:51.399 these these pioneers for at least sort of blowing this 147 00:10:51.480 --> 00:10:54.159 box open that that we can even talk about the topic. 148 00:10:54.519 --> 00:10:56.519 But of course, what they what they did or I 149 00:10:56.559 --> 00:10:59.360 can you know, to give Francis quick As as an 150 00:10:59.399 --> 00:11:06.639 example here he basically imported certain let's say, paradigmatic assumptions 151 00:11:06.679 --> 00:11:10.279 from biochemistry, which is great. I mean you have to 152 00:11:10.279 --> 00:11:14.600 start bootstrapping from somewhere, right, So basic assumptions about biochemistry 153 00:11:14.639 --> 00:11:19.000 and a certain I guess mindset of thinking about emergent 154 00:11:19.080 --> 00:11:22.480 properties right in a biochemical sense, right, you might, for example, 155 00:11:22.679 --> 00:11:24.960 in a really simple sense, you might say life is 156 00:11:24.960 --> 00:11:29.879 an emergent property from certain biochemical processes or something, or 157 00:11:29.919 --> 00:11:32.759 even before life, you might talk about other you know, 158 00:11:32.840 --> 00:11:37.679 higher levels of biological organization or biological functions that somehow 159 00:11:37.720 --> 00:11:42.000 emerge from you know, this this biochemical substrate. And so 160 00:11:42.039 --> 00:11:45.600 they imported this way of thinking into the first research 161 00:11:45.679 --> 00:11:51.440 done in consciousness science. And so this was very good 162 00:11:51.480 --> 00:11:53.080 to get things off the ground, to get the search 163 00:11:53.080 --> 00:11:55.600 for neural correlates off the ground and so on. But 164 00:11:55.840 --> 00:11:59.120 you know, to quote Julio Tononian and Christoph Koch who 165 00:11:59.200 --> 00:12:02.000 often say this, the problem is that if you start 166 00:12:02.039 --> 00:12:06.720 from the physical world and you try to squeeze out consciousness, right, 167 00:12:06.759 --> 00:12:08.799 I think that's the way it really often says it. 168 00:12:09.159 --> 00:12:10.879 You know, it's never going to work. You're always going 169 00:12:10.960 --> 00:12:13.480 to be left with this this classic thing called the 170 00:12:13.480 --> 00:12:17.159 hard problem of consciousness. Right, if you're starting from the 171 00:12:17.200 --> 00:12:19.759 substrate as being what you what you think to be 172 00:12:19.799 --> 00:12:22.720 the base level of reality, right, you're always going to 173 00:12:22.759 --> 00:12:27.000 have this hard problem or this explanatory gap between you know, 174 00:12:27.039 --> 00:12:31.399 what you know about this physical substrate and and and 175 00:12:31.559 --> 00:12:35.080 the and the fact that consciousness is so qualitatively different 176 00:12:35.120 --> 00:12:37.320 from that, You're always going to be left with this 177 00:12:38.039 --> 00:12:40.759 sense that it's not really scratching your itch of explanation, right, 178 00:12:40.799 --> 00:12:43.840 there must be something else there. So yeah, so this 179 00:12:44.240 --> 00:12:49.320 absolutely is I would even say it's it's pretty predominant 180 00:12:49.320 --> 00:12:51.960 in the field still that people approach the question with 181 00:12:52.039 --> 00:12:56.840 this sort of emergentist thinking, and it's also applicable from 182 00:12:56.879 --> 00:13:01.960 a computational functionalist perspective. Well, for the most part, the 183 00:13:02.000 --> 00:13:04.360 notion of emergence might be a bit different if you 184 00:13:04.399 --> 00:13:09.159 think it emerges from some you know, information theoretic construct 185 00:13:09.320 --> 00:13:12.399 or some mathematical you know construct or something, or if 186 00:13:12.440 --> 00:13:16.440 it emerges from some neurofiring pattern or something, you know, 187 00:13:16.519 --> 00:13:18.120 the core kind. 188 00:13:18.000 --> 00:13:22.639 Of think about think about the degree of magical thinking 189 00:13:22.759 --> 00:13:26.320 you have to employ here. You know, we've got to 190 00:13:26.320 --> 00:13:29.960 be better about not letting the popular science people or 191 00:13:30.000 --> 00:13:34.840 even many you know, very professional neuroscientists. You need to 192 00:13:34.840 --> 00:13:38.559 be better about not letting them get away with insisting 193 00:13:38.639 --> 00:13:44.039 that their position is clearly the most logical, makes the 194 00:13:44.159 --> 00:13:52.399 least amount of assumptions, and has the most straightforward logic chain, right, 195 00:13:53.120 --> 00:13:55.840 Because to say that, to sort of wave your hands 196 00:13:55.840 --> 00:13:58.200 and say like, oh well, just sort of emerges out 197 00:13:58.200 --> 00:14:03.480 of firing patterns, this is speaking a desire into existence. 198 00:14:03.840 --> 00:14:08.919 It is not actually explanatory. It's just a statement of belief. 199 00:14:09.840 --> 00:14:14.879 There is no actual mechanistic explanation being conveyed. And usually, 200 00:14:14.919 --> 00:14:17.080 as like a layperson, you hear them say that, and 201 00:14:17.080 --> 00:14:20.559 you just sort of assume that that mechanistic explanation must 202 00:14:20.600 --> 00:14:26.360 exist somewhere. However, it does not because it can't because 203 00:14:26.399 --> 00:14:32.720 it's a category area. They're just explaining a correlation. They're 204 00:14:32.720 --> 00:14:36.639 showing you, Yeah, the brain looks like this when you're 205 00:14:36.679 --> 00:14:39.279 thinking about this, and it's like, okay, I can accept 206 00:14:39.320 --> 00:14:43.399 that as fact. Fair enough, Okay, So how does that 207 00:14:43.480 --> 00:14:46.080 explain consciousness? Oh? They're like, Oh, that's it. That's the end. 208 00:14:46.600 --> 00:14:50.600 You know, I've heard this good kind of example of 209 00:14:50.679 --> 00:14:55.519 like it was an interview with Sabine Hasenfelder. Actually I 210 00:14:55.519 --> 00:14:58.159 think it was Alex O'Connor and Sabine Hasenfelder, but I'm 211 00:14:58.159 --> 00:15:03.639 not sure where he said. Hey, you know, to me, 212 00:15:03.799 --> 00:15:06.039 it seems like, excuse me, I've got like a tickle 213 00:15:06.080 --> 00:15:11.080 in my throat. To me, it seems like like he 214 00:15:11.200 --> 00:15:12.799 was saying to Sabine, let me present you with the 215 00:15:12.799 --> 00:15:19.080 scenario over there is a light bulb, and as I'm talking, 216 00:15:19.200 --> 00:15:23.720 it turns on. Occasionally. Through experimentation, we can sort of 217 00:15:23.759 --> 00:15:30.200 figure out what you might call a scientific explanation, and 218 00:15:30.840 --> 00:15:34.919 you might say, you know, I notice that every time 219 00:15:34.960 --> 00:15:37.639 I hit like a high note, like if I ask 220 00:15:37.720 --> 00:15:39.440 a question like hey, what do you think about this? 221 00:15:40.080 --> 00:15:42.960 And I sort of have an upward inflection, it lights up. 222 00:15:43.399 --> 00:15:45.600 And I could run a series of experiments and I 223 00:15:45.600 --> 00:15:49.919 could go like, oh and I could say that was embarrassing. 224 00:15:50.360 --> 00:15:56.159 I could hum different notes and determine predictably that the 225 00:15:56.240 --> 00:15:58.240 light turns on at this time, and so I could 226 00:15:58.279 --> 00:16:01.200 write out a predictive model I could show, I could 227 00:16:01.240 --> 00:16:05.399 run all these empirical experiments in multiple trials and show 228 00:16:05.440 --> 00:16:13.639 at a frequency between this and this that light bulb illuminates. Right, correct, right, 229 00:16:13.679 --> 00:16:16.519 he says, just so, being correct, and she goes, yes, absolutely, 230 00:16:17.480 --> 00:16:20.679 And you know the question then, is is that an 231 00:16:20.720 --> 00:16:25.679 adequate explanation? And some being said, yes, that's as much 232 00:16:25.720 --> 00:16:28.080 as you can hope for in science. And I actually 233 00:16:28.120 --> 00:16:31.480 kind of think that's true, because I think that is 234 00:16:31.519 --> 00:16:35.639 the domain science should operate in. But clearly, clearly that's 235 00:16:35.679 --> 00:16:38.679 not what Alex meant, right, Like, clearly that's not a 236 00:16:38.720 --> 00:16:43.279 satisfying explanation. You know, we want to know why who 237 00:16:43.320 --> 00:16:46.799 put the light there? You know, why does the system exist? 238 00:16:48.320 --> 00:16:51.240 Or you could even go deeper into the mechanistic explanation 239 00:16:51.360 --> 00:16:55.960 of like, you know, how does it work? You know, 240 00:16:56.039 --> 00:17:01.080 is it that the sound waves are vibrating some membrane 241 00:17:02.039 --> 00:17:04.200 that's connected, like you could you could even take like 242 00:17:04.240 --> 00:17:08.599 a detailed mechanistic chain that would be still scientific, but 243 00:17:08.680 --> 00:17:11.200 a better explanation, but really at the end, at the 244 00:17:11.279 --> 00:17:12.519 end of the day, we want to know, like why 245 00:17:12.559 --> 00:17:14.200 is this here? Does somebody put it here? You know, 246 00:17:14.240 --> 00:17:16.759 what's the point of it to serve some role? Is 247 00:17:16.799 --> 00:17:22.680 it arbitrary? You know? And scientists kind of like to 248 00:17:22.839 --> 00:17:27.599 pretend like they explained the latter with the former. You know, 249 00:17:28.039 --> 00:17:30.079 they like to say, like, well, since we can predict 250 00:17:30.119 --> 00:17:32.359 when the light will turn on, therefore we know why 251 00:17:33.160 --> 00:17:36.759 it exists, why it turns on, who put it there, 252 00:17:36.880 --> 00:17:39.119 how it got here, you know what I mean. So 253 00:17:39.160 --> 00:17:41.440 they'll often they'll often sort of try to do that 254 00:17:41.599 --> 00:17:45.519 slight of hand in conversation. And I think if you 255 00:17:45.640 --> 00:17:49.680 are someone who listens to popular scientific explanations of things, 256 00:17:50.359 --> 00:17:53.240 you have to be kind of vigilant for that. That 257 00:17:53.359 --> 00:17:56.240 is a that is something that is sort of slipped in, 258 00:17:57.319 --> 00:17:59.720 Like if you're listening to Richard Dawkins or Neil de 259 00:17:59.720 --> 00:18:03.240 grasse Tyson or you know, they're really bad examples. But 260 00:18:03.359 --> 00:18:10.519 even like much more credentialed and sophisticated scientists will make 261 00:18:10.559 --> 00:18:11.279 the same mistake. 262 00:18:11.319 --> 00:18:14.039 Pattern is more or less the same, and it is 263 00:18:14.079 --> 00:18:17.200 very different from that. It has a totally different approach 264 00:18:17.279 --> 00:18:17.839 to the question. 265 00:18:18.400 --> 00:18:21.960 Yeah, I'm actually again sorry to depose again already, but 266 00:18:22.039 --> 00:18:27.000 he makes this claim that it is very different. I'm 267 00:18:27.079 --> 00:18:31.799 not really sure if that's true, but I'll let you 268 00:18:31.799 --> 00:18:33.960 be the judge. We're gonna listen to twenty minutes of this. 269 00:18:34.079 --> 00:18:36.559 It's long. We normally don't play that long of a 270 00:18:36.559 --> 00:18:39.160 clip on the show, so I'll do my best to 271 00:18:39.240 --> 00:18:44.200 listen in and try not to interrupt. But no promises indeed. 272 00:18:44.279 --> 00:18:47.240 And I find it funny that wasn't that there? It 273 00:18:47.319 --> 00:18:52.400 is bat between Dave Chalmers who sort of first phrase. 274 00:18:52.119 --> 00:18:54.319 The heart problem of consciousness? Right, how do we get 275 00:18:54.359 --> 00:18:56.480 from sort of the neuronal activity in our brains to 276 00:18:57.400 --> 00:19:00.119 mind the water of the wine of consciousness? 277 00:19:00.200 --> 00:19:02.000 Right? Yeah? 278 00:19:02.200 --> 00:19:04.279 And then there was this bad I think also between 279 00:19:04.359 --> 00:19:07.759 Christoph who was still sort of finding those cologies and 280 00:19:07.759 --> 00:19:09.920 he lost it. Right. So, so where we are right 281 00:19:09.960 --> 00:19:12.400 now is that the art problem is pretty much established. 282 00:19:13.759 --> 00:19:18.160 I do think like in society and and and culture 283 00:19:18.200 --> 00:19:24.079 at large, we find it very hard to do not 284 00:19:25.480 --> 00:19:31.480 think that complex computational systems systems can give rise to consciousness. Right, 285 00:19:31.519 --> 00:19:36.440 So why exactly in I t is our touring machines 286 00:19:36.480 --> 00:19:39.359 that let's stick with computation. We have nowadays. Are our 287 00:19:39.359 --> 00:19:41.000 big l l ms are in the end all turing 288 00:19:41.079 --> 00:19:44.279 machines right? And why can't they be conscious? 289 00:19:44.359 --> 00:19:48.200 According to I T, Well, you have to look under 290 00:19:48.200 --> 00:19:49.240 the hood. In I T. 291 00:19:50.680 --> 00:19:51.920 What I mean by that is you have to look 292 00:19:51.920 --> 00:19:54.640 at how things are built, not just on what they do. 293 00:19:56.039 --> 00:19:59.640 So so, uh, you know, something that we often say 294 00:19:59.680 --> 00:20:01.799 in I is that consciousness is a. 295 00:20:01.799 --> 00:20:04.359 Question of being, not of doing right. 296 00:20:05.519 --> 00:20:09.440 So it takes a bit to you know that, maybe 297 00:20:09.480 --> 00:20:11.880 contemplate what that really what that means. But in more 298 00:20:12.119 --> 00:20:16.759 practical terms, most paradigms are functional as paradigms, meaning it's 299 00:20:16.759 --> 00:20:19.960 about about doing something right that you think consciousness is 300 00:20:20.000 --> 00:20:25.640 about somehow performing a certain function or computation something like that. 301 00:20:26.640 --> 00:20:28.200 And so. 302 00:20:30.039 --> 00:20:34.359 Llms can indeed do much of what we can do, 303 00:20:34.720 --> 00:20:37.920 and especially if it's combined with some advanced robotics and 304 00:20:37.960 --> 00:20:40.880 so on, it'll end up being they'll end up being 305 00:20:40.920 --> 00:20:44.480 able to imitate our behavior assumably, you know, I would 306 00:20:44.519 --> 00:20:50.200 assume perfectly eventually. But the problem from it's perspective is 307 00:20:50.240 --> 00:20:52.839 that they're not built the right way right quite simply, 308 00:20:53.480 --> 00:20:58.680 where it says consciousness doesn't isn't produced somehow because of 309 00:20:58.720 --> 00:21:02.039 some sort of a function that you're doing, right, you 310 00:21:02.079 --> 00:21:08.559 can have you can build a system that is, let's say, 311 00:21:08.599 --> 00:21:11.720 functionally equivalent to a human but the wiring, to make 312 00:21:11.759 --> 00:21:15.920 it very simple, the architecture, the neural architecture is going 313 00:21:15.960 --> 00:21:20.079 to be completely different from from a human brains architecture. 314 00:21:20.400 --> 00:21:23.400 Then it might end up doing exactly the same thing, right, 315 00:21:23.480 --> 00:21:26.920 it might be just as intelligent, right in the way 316 00:21:26.920 --> 00:21:29.640 that we measure intelligence based on behavior and functions and 317 00:21:29.680 --> 00:21:30.000 so on. 318 00:21:30.440 --> 00:21:32.359 But because of the way this thing is built, because 319 00:21:32.359 --> 00:21:32.720 of how. 320 00:21:32.599 --> 00:21:36.720 It's wired, it it isn't an actual It isn't a 321 00:21:36.759 --> 00:21:37.640 conscious entity. 322 00:21:37.839 --> 00:21:38.359 Yeah right. 323 00:21:38.599 --> 00:21:40.960 I liked and you looked to know his book five 324 00:21:41.039 --> 00:21:42.799 where he compares it with the brain to sort of 325 00:21:42.839 --> 00:21:46.400 ads lark camera because we talking about images and is 326 00:21:46.480 --> 00:21:49.839 seeing stuff. I can our cameras here a I've reraten 327 00:21:49.920 --> 00:21:53.680 on a app sort of a Seamas sensor that reads 328 00:21:53.680 --> 00:21:56.279 out the photodiodes and gives the picture in the end. Right, 329 00:21:56.319 --> 00:21:58.359 So we end up both the picture and actually the 330 00:21:58.400 --> 00:22:01.000 cameras nowadays might even have a eye a resolution picture 331 00:22:01.039 --> 00:22:03.839 than I do. But if as you say, we look 332 00:22:03.920 --> 00:22:09.279 under the hood, I see quite neatly organized photodioids on 333 00:22:09.359 --> 00:22:13.839 that sensor that correct me if I'm wrong. Aren't truly 334 00:22:13.880 --> 00:22:17.039 interconnected the one it's next to the other and doesn't 335 00:22:17.039 --> 00:22:18.720 connect to the other one. It's just in the end 336 00:22:18.720 --> 00:22:22.000 of the processing it gives us that image. So I 337 00:22:22.000 --> 00:22:25.440 guess then integrated information as that photo camera is not 338 00:22:25.799 --> 00:22:31.160 integ integration low, processing power probably high. I can give 339 00:22:31.680 --> 00:22:37.200 eight K video stream image, so that's good computation output high, 340 00:22:37.279 --> 00:22:40.799 but integration low exactly so, and then the theory would say, Okay, 341 00:22:41.039 --> 00:22:44.920 therefore the camera is not conscious because it's integration is. 342 00:22:44.880 --> 00:22:47.559 Low or even non existent actually in that case. 343 00:22:48.559 --> 00:22:52.279 So yeah, you can think of the way most computers 344 00:22:52.279 --> 00:22:54.640 today are built. I mean, by the way, before I 345 00:22:54.640 --> 00:22:56.599 say too much, I should give credit to especially my 346 00:22:56.640 --> 00:23:01.079 colleagues Graham Findley and Billy Marshall, who recently came out 347 00:23:01.079 --> 00:23:06.559 with a great paper that's called Dissociating intelligence from Consciousness. 348 00:23:06.599 --> 00:23:08.599 I shouldn't have papered by heart, but it's interesting. 349 00:23:08.640 --> 00:23:14.440 We call it computer consciousness for short in the description. 350 00:23:14.599 --> 00:23:16.640 Actually, nice to just park that one for a bit, 351 00:23:16.759 --> 00:23:18.200 just intelligence versus consciousness. 352 00:23:18.200 --> 00:23:19.599 It's just yeah, well, but it's this question. 353 00:23:19.680 --> 00:23:22.599 Actually, if you know l l M's basically indeed, you 354 00:23:22.640 --> 00:23:24.880 know or it's even to some degree that the camera 355 00:23:25.440 --> 00:23:28.960 related to the camera past. So in a really simple sense, 356 00:23:29.119 --> 00:23:32.480 you know, computers is how they're they're typically structured. 357 00:23:32.519 --> 00:23:34.279 People refer to it as feed. 358 00:23:34.079 --> 00:23:37.559 Forward processing, where there's not a lot of cross talk 359 00:23:37.640 --> 00:23:41.920 between modules, right, and so information is kind of sent up, 360 00:23:42.200 --> 00:23:44.839 sent up this hierarchy and different you know, feed forward 361 00:23:44.880 --> 00:23:48.119 streams in through different modules and it ends up being 362 00:23:48.839 --> 00:23:51.839 processed at higher levels and then you know, create some 363 00:23:51.880 --> 00:23:57.160 sort of an output, right, and so a you could 364 00:23:57.279 --> 00:24:03.079 in theory build a a neuromorphic computer and it would 365 00:24:03.079 --> 00:24:05.359 say something different about that case. Right, You can just 366 00:24:05.400 --> 00:24:07.680 table that though, but if you just compare the way 367 00:24:07.839 --> 00:24:10.599 you know, computers are also your your digital camera there, 368 00:24:11.240 --> 00:24:13.680 the way it's wired, it's totally different from how the 369 00:24:13.680 --> 00:24:17.240 brain is wired. Right, and without getting into too many details, 370 00:24:17.799 --> 00:24:22.279 you know this the LLM or what the computer powering 371 00:24:22.319 --> 00:24:25.799 the LLM, it's simply as a whole does not have 372 00:24:26.440 --> 00:24:29.720 a what we would call a maximal of integrated information. 373 00:24:29.799 --> 00:24:30.480 It simply isn't. 374 00:24:30.519 --> 00:24:34.880 It doesn't hang together you could say as a single entity. Right, 375 00:24:34.920 --> 00:24:37.279 it doesn't actually hang together. It hangs together for us 376 00:24:37.279 --> 00:24:39.880 when we look at it, right, and its functions seem 377 00:24:39.920 --> 00:24:44.279 to hang together for us as external extrinsic observers of it, 378 00:24:44.640 --> 00:24:48.000 but in itself, you know, to use an it term, 379 00:24:48.519 --> 00:24:51.920 it's intrinsic from its intrinsic perspective, if you will. It's 380 00:24:51.960 --> 00:24:54.400 not really a thing, right, it doesn't hang together as 381 00:24:54.440 --> 00:24:54.720 a thing. 382 00:24:55.119 --> 00:24:56.960 But if you look at a human brain, it. 383 00:24:56.960 --> 00:24:59.119 Indeeds or at least certain parts of the brain. We 384 00:24:59.119 --> 00:25:02.240 should be very precise the substrate of consciousness, which is 385 00:25:02.279 --> 00:25:05.680 a sub portion of my brain in I T. It's 386 00:25:05.680 --> 00:25:10.839 predicted to be a region mostly of posterior cortex. We 387 00:25:10.920 --> 00:25:15.680 call it the posterior hot zone. And this, this part 388 00:25:15.720 --> 00:25:18.000 of the brain is wired completely differently right in a 389 00:25:18.039 --> 00:25:23.839 fully integrated system. And interestingly, to even draw a parallel 390 00:25:23.839 --> 00:25:26.240 to the brain, there is a certain part of the 391 00:25:26.279 --> 00:25:29.559 brain that's actually wired more like this computer I. 392 00:25:29.559 --> 00:25:35.000 We'll pause right there. This is incredibly compelling number one, 393 00:25:35.319 --> 00:25:40.200 just to let you know. However, I worry we're in 394 00:25:40.359 --> 00:25:47.400 danger of making the same mistake where we just attribute 395 00:25:47.559 --> 00:25:52.240 something we see as explanatory. Now it's a little bit 396 00:25:52.319 --> 00:25:55.160 tougher to make that case with I T I T 397 00:25:55.359 --> 00:25:59.839 is a much more sophisticated theory than just neural correlates. 398 00:26:01.480 --> 00:26:03.880 But I almost think you could argue we still just 399 00:26:03.880 --> 00:26:07.119 start talking about neural correlates. So let's think it through 400 00:26:07.160 --> 00:26:11.000 a little bit. Well, maybe we'll actually make the pro 401 00:26:11.079 --> 00:26:18.440