JamesOfSeattle wrote: ↑January 27th, 2018, 3:56 am Okay, let's break this down. What is a primary experiential state? What is the definition which excludes simulation? Exactly what is a phenomenon which is not physical?
What exactly are the qualities of consciousness that you refer to?
Actually, I think it is a form of functionalism. Processes which have a function have a functional description that references only the functional aspects of the process. From the functional/subjective perspective such processes are multiply realizable, and a simulation would be a valid realization.
Would love to hear your solutions to the Hard Problem and Measurement Problem.
I would like to delay answering the first few questions since it would require what I claim to be a solution to the Hard Problem and Measurement problem. To briefly answer the non-algorithmic qualities, our understanding of mathematics gives one strong reason to think that our consciousness does not operate algorithmically. I think brains compute, but they do not compute in the formal sense of algorithmic effective procedures.
I will start with a coarse-grained general view of what I consider the solution. The Hard Problem cannot be answered by neuroscience because no matter what answer they attempt the ontological Hard Problem applies. There must be something in the nature of reality which permits experience to emerge. This is necessarily a question for physics. There are many interpretations of quantum theory as well as proposed modifications to it, but none fit all the experimental and theoretical data as well as the von Neumann interpretation. The othodox quantum formalism provides an explicit mathematical psycho-physical interaction, or in other words describes the structure of experience. The Copenhagen interpretation was purely epistemic, and it is interesting that the epistemic Copenhagen interpretation maps the ontological von Neumann interpretation so well. That has deep significance. The point of von Neumann is that nothing of the physical system can result in state vector reduction. The import of his logical postulate has been entirely misunderstood and turned into "consciousness causing wave function collapse," or worse, something along the lines of thinking consciousness pushes around the particles in experiments. His point is really that non-physical experience (this is primary experience) is what actualizes the quantum state of the system. In other words, a state is experienced. The mistake is to think it is consciousness which does causes in the typical neuroscientific or medical definition of consciousness. It is a question of experience itself, or the Hard Problem.
However, this means experience is emergent, so what causes this emergence? I think Integrated Information Theory, if understood in a quantum ontology, provides an explanation as to how the first single-celled organism emerged along with primary experience. Self-organizing systems far from thermal equilibrium were able to self-organize sufficiently to integrate information into an irreducible information structure which results in a subjective perspective and experience itself. This evolved over time into increasingly complex experiential states, resulting in the emergence of consciousness much later as a result of certain neurobiological mechanisms. With it came purpose, meaning, and understanding.
I suppose that will suffice for now, but I am happy to elaborate since, as I mentioned, this is a very coarse-grained overview and there is a significant amount of ontology and physics that was not explained.