Speakpigeon
Contributor
- Joined
- Feb 4, 2009
- Messages
- 6,317
- Location
- Paris, France, EU
- Basic Beliefs
- Rationality (i.e. facts + logic), Scepticism (not just about God but also everything beyond my subjective experience)
There is a fundamental difference the Brain-in-a-vat argument and the idea that our entire world is a simulation running on a computer.
The Brain-in-a-vat seems within the reach of even human technology. In other words, it is a highly convincing and realistic scenario. A brain in a vat would presumably take the simulated physical world to be the actual world.
The idea of a simulation, that the world itself, including the brain experiencing this world, could be a simulation is much more fantastic and therefore somewhat more difficult to accept as a possibility.
The main sticking point, however, is that we still have no explanation as to how our subjective experience could possibly be a property or consequence of the way our brain works. The idea of a simulation requires that we accept the idea that our subjective experience would be a creation of the simulation and therefore, fundamentally, an illusion.
In the Brain-in-a-vat, the nature, or indeed natures, of both our brain and our subjective experience remain exactly as we believe them to be. With the idea of a simulation, both our subjective experience and the physical world are turned into illusions.
The Brain-in-a-vat, although more realistic and conceivable, is nonetheless more metaphorical in its motivation. It doesn't even try to suggest that you really are a brain in a vat. Rather, it is an argument, a logical argument to explain why we cannot be certain of the reality of our perception of the physical world and, hence, of the reality of the physical world itself as we think of it.
The idea of the simulation is not an argument. It is a metaphysical claim about reality. A such, it is to be seen as connected with the idea that consciousness is a process and, therefore, to the idea that computers can become conscious. All that would be required would be that the software got to a sort of critical threshold of complexity.
The Brain-in-a-vat, on the contrary, suggests a decisive epistemological dualism between our own mind that we know and that we therefore know that it exists (Descartes' "I think, therefore I am") and the material world that we can only believe in, and that therefore we don't know that this material world really exists.
In effect, these two ideas are polar opposite. The Brain-in-a-vat says the physical world may not exist, while the simulation says that our subjective experience may be just an illusion.
To the extent that they are polar opposite, I don't see how anyone could see these two ideas as equally convincing. If you find them equally convincing, it is likely because you haven't understood at least one of them.
EB
The Brain-in-a-vat seems within the reach of even human technology. In other words, it is a highly convincing and realistic scenario. A brain in a vat would presumably take the simulated physical world to be the actual world.
The idea of a simulation, that the world itself, including the brain experiencing this world, could be a simulation is much more fantastic and therefore somewhat more difficult to accept as a possibility.
The main sticking point, however, is that we still have no explanation as to how our subjective experience could possibly be a property or consequence of the way our brain works. The idea of a simulation requires that we accept the idea that our subjective experience would be a creation of the simulation and therefore, fundamentally, an illusion.
In the Brain-in-a-vat, the nature, or indeed natures, of both our brain and our subjective experience remain exactly as we believe them to be. With the idea of a simulation, both our subjective experience and the physical world are turned into illusions.
The Brain-in-a-vat, although more realistic and conceivable, is nonetheless more metaphorical in its motivation. It doesn't even try to suggest that you really are a brain in a vat. Rather, it is an argument, a logical argument to explain why we cannot be certain of the reality of our perception of the physical world and, hence, of the reality of the physical world itself as we think of it.
The idea of the simulation is not an argument. It is a metaphysical claim about reality. A such, it is to be seen as connected with the idea that consciousness is a process and, therefore, to the idea that computers can become conscious. All that would be required would be that the software got to a sort of critical threshold of complexity.
The Brain-in-a-vat, on the contrary, suggests a decisive epistemological dualism between our own mind that we know and that we therefore know that it exists (Descartes' "I think, therefore I am") and the material world that we can only believe in, and that therefore we don't know that this material world really exists.
In effect, these two ideas are polar opposite. The Brain-in-a-vat says the physical world may not exist, while the simulation says that our subjective experience may be just an illusion.
To the extent that they are polar opposite, I don't see how anyone could see these two ideas as equally convincing. If you find them equally convincing, it is likely because you haven't understood at least one of them.
EB
