How does anyone learn what the term “consciousness” applies to? So far as I can tell, it’s universally by observing human beings (who are, so far as anyone can tell, implemented almost entirely in human brains) and most specifically themselves. So it seems that if “consciousness” refers to anything at all, it refers to something human brains—or at least human beings—have. (I would say the same thing about “intelligence” and “humanity” and “personhood”.)
I suppose it’s just barely possible that, e.g., someone might find good evidence that many human beings are actually some kind of puppets controlled from outside the Matrix. In that case we might want to say that some human brains have consciousness but not all. This seems improbable enough—it seems on a par with discovering that we’re in a simulation where the electrical conductivity of copper emerges naturally from the underlying laws, while the electrical conductivity of iron is hacked in case by case by experimenters who are deliberately misleading us about what the laws are—that I feel perfectly comfortable ignoring the possibility until some actual evidence comes along.
How does anyone learn what the term “consciousness” applies to? So far as I can tell, it’s universally by observing human beings (who are, so far as anyone can tell, implemented almost entirely in human brains) and most specifically themselves. So it seems that if “consciousness” refers to anything at all, it refers to something human brains—or at least human beings—have. (I would say the same thing about “intelligence” and “humanity” and “personhood”.)
I suppose it’s just barely possible that, e.g., someone might find good evidence that many human beings are actually some kind of puppets controlled from outside the Matrix. In that case we might want to say that some human brains have consciousness but not all. This seems improbable enough—it seems on a par with discovering that we’re in a simulation where the electrical conductivity of copper emerges naturally from the underlying laws, while the electrical conductivity of iron is hacked in case by case by experimenters who are deliberately misleading us about what the laws are—that I feel perfectly comfortable ignoring the possibility until some actual evidence comes along.