There's no need for a supernatural explanation of consciousness.
We are all p-zombies. Problem solved.
The longer we refuse to acknowledge that consciousness is nothing special, the longer it will take to tackle this topic. The only reason we cling to the idea that our minds are somehow special compared to other animals of various complexity is because we refuse to acknowledge that consciousness might exist in something we can't communicate with and that consciousness is a sliding scale rather than a binary property. Ascribing consciousness only to ourselves is hubris.
If one spends a bit of time observing humans, they will inevitably realise that some humans are more 'conscious' than others also.
tl;dr: we're all p-zombies. The fact that we think that each one of us isn't individually doesn't detract from that.
Just as natural sciences left less and less hiding places for god to exist, ML is leaving less and less hiding places for this borderline magical version of human-unique consciousness to exist. Answering this question in any more detail requires a much more rigorous definition of consciousness which is a big can of worms in itself.
You make a strong claim without anything to back it up. I don’t understand why it’s become trendy to deny that consciousness exists; to me it’s isomorphic to saying “We don’t actually exist at all. Prove me wrong.” It’s a vacuous statement, meant to sound evocative, but difficult to respond to in any meaningful way.
If I made a list of everything in order of how certain I am that the item on the list exists, consciousness would be at the top by far. Everything else could just be a nice illusion.
You falsely imply that the parent comment attempts "to deny that consciousness exists". What the parent comment actually says is "consciousness is nothing special" and "consciousness is a sliding scale rather than a binary property". These are different from non-existence.
Claiming that some mysterious and hard to define property that we can't measure even in principle "exists" in some meaningful way strikes me as the stronger claim than the skeptical take does.
Why do you think the burden of proof should be inverted? The mere fact that most humans intuitively feel "something" doesn't count for much of anything, especially once you stipulate that p-zombies would vote the same way.
I couldn't agree more. It also just seems like a continuation of the old story in science where the things that we think are special or magical just aren't.
We are all p-zombies. Problem solved.
The longer we refuse to acknowledge that consciousness is nothing special, the longer it will take to tackle this topic. The only reason we cling to the idea that our minds are somehow special compared to other animals of various complexity is because we refuse to acknowledge that consciousness might exist in something we can't communicate with and that consciousness is a sliding scale rather than a binary property. Ascribing consciousness only to ourselves is hubris.
If one spends a bit of time observing humans, they will inevitably realise that some humans are more 'conscious' than others also.
tl;dr: we're all p-zombies. The fact that we think that each one of us isn't individually doesn't detract from that.
Just as natural sciences left less and less hiding places for god to exist, ML is leaving less and less hiding places for this borderline magical version of human-unique consciousness to exist. Answering this question in any more detail requires a much more rigorous definition of consciousness which is a big can of worms in itself.