I’m not sure what you are asking for with “pick a number”…

I don’t see any reason to assume 1) is true, and I think that yes, if it is possible to make conscious simulations, folks will do so. But I am skeptical that that is in fact possible; the assumption that the brain generates consciousness solely in virtue of something about its computational activity that can then be abstracted into a computer program seems quite audacious to me.

Is that enough salt for you?

Or do you just think it is false?

And granting it for the sake of argument would you pick a #.
As I said in email I still think 1.
3 would be nicer though still quite disturbing.

Right, but this is different in that we aren’t talking about a single instance of a mind, but a massive hosting environment in which billions of minds are not only instantiated, but interact with each other. If biological hardware is needed for consciousness, then I suppose we might imagine a super-brain (in a super-vat!)that could do the trick — perhaps we grow a new lump of neural tissue to add a new virtual person — but that certainly seems a lot clumsier that what was implied in Bostrum’s example, and anyway, it’s hard to see in what sense the simulacra mightn’t be considered actual, biological persons.

I quite agree, after spending so much time reading, brooding, studying, arguing, and reflecting on the mind-body problem from all three angles — philosophical, scientific, and introspective/mystical — that the mental/material categories may not be distinct in the way that is conventionally imagined, and that a new understanding of both consciousness and matter will be necessary to get anywhere with these problems in a productive way, either philosophically or scientifically. Easy for me to say, of course.

Regarding this:

There is a huge assumption here, which is that it is in fact possible to create conscious programs. I was seduced by that notion myself for a long time, but these days I “hae me doots”. The only entities that we know with certainty can create conscious minds are biological brains, and we simply don’t know enough about how they do that do be at all confident that they do so solely in virtue of their computational processing.

I hae similar doots, but if technology is truly expanding exponentially, as some say, then one thing we might see in the future is the eventual erasure of the software-hardware distinction. Perhaps the artificial consciousness will be the software, and the software will be nothing more and nothing less than the hardware (nano-nanotech?).

A physicalist explanation of the mind-body problem seems to be a variation on that theme: mind, the thing we might call “software” in a hardware/software analogy, is simply a form of matter, i.e., hardware.

Just a thought.

Kevin

A deeply serious person. As well as everything else he manages the ‘Nick Bostrum’ event which we are now participating in. Going to his home page you will read that as an undergraduate he set a record in Sweden which I thought was a brilliant English joke but it was just my lateral Irish mind. In fact he seems to be from Sweden which is non-explanatory but significant. Say ja with a rising inflexion, then say ja with a falling inflexion. That’s about the range.
Best Wishes,
Michael.