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I was wondering if someone can point me to good LW's article(s)/refutation(s) of Searle's Chinese room argument and consciousness in general. A search comes up with a lot of articles mentioning it but I assume it is addressed in some form in the sequences?
The Zombie sequence) may be related. (We'll see if I can actually link it here.) As far as the Chinese Room goes:
I think a necessary condition for consciousness is approximating a Bayesian update. So in the (ridiculous) version where the rules for speaking Chinese have no ability to learn, they also can't be conscious.
Searle talks about "understanding" Chinese. Now, the way I would interpret this word depends on context - that's how language works - but normally I'd incline towards a Bayesian interpretation o
This thread is for asking any questions that might seem obvious, tangential, silly or what-have-you. Don't be shy, everyone has holes in their knowledge, though the fewer and the smaller we can make them, the better.
Please be respectful of other people's admitting ignorance and don't mock them for it, as they're doing a noble thing.
To any future monthly posters of SQ threads, please remember to add the "stupid_questions" tag.