AI Cognition Won't Work for Consciousness | Ned Block | Talks at Google

TL;DR

Phenomenal consciousness, or what it is like to experience something, is distinct from access consciousness, which involves the function of conscious experience. Methods such as partial report superiority and binocular rivalry demonstrate the distinction between conscious perception and unconscious perception. The neural processes underlying reporting and conceptualization play a role in access consciousness but not necessarily in phenomenal consciousness.

Transcript

[MUSIC PLAYING] [APPLAUSE] NED BLOCK: Look, I don't want to have one of these talks where I just drone on for some very long period of time, and then there's a question period afterwards. So please feel free to ask questions during the talk. However, if the question seems to me to be one that's going to involve a long, detailed kind of thing, I wil... Read More

Key Insights

• 🧠 The hard problem of consciousness focuses on explaining why a specific brain basis is associated with a particular conscious experience.
• ♿ Phenomenal consciousness and access consciousness are distinct categories, with the former referring to subjective experience and the latter relating to the function of conscious experience.
• ♿ Experimental paradigms, such as partial report superiority and binocular rivalry, provide evidence for the differences between conscious and unconscious perception, as well as the domains of phenomenal and access consciousness.
• ♿ The neural processes underlying reporting and conceptualization are associated with access consciousness, which involves cognitive processes and reasoning.

Questions & Answers

Q: What is the hard problem of consciousness?

The hard problem of consciousness refers to the challenge of explaining why a specific brain basis is associated with a particular conscious experience, rather than another experience or none at all. It is difficult to answer this question because no hypothetical answer has been satisfactory.

Q: How do partial report superiority and binocular rivalry demonstrate the difference between conscious and unconscious perception?

In partial report superiority experiments, participants are shown an array of alphanumeric characters for a brief moment and then asked to report specific characters from a particular row. Despite being able to perceive the entire array, they can only report a limited number of characters due to the capacity of working memory. In binocular rivalry, conflicting visual stimuli are presented to different eyes, leading to alternating conscious perceptions. These experiments highlight the difference between conscious perception, where there is a capacity for rich experience, and unconscious perception, where some information is not conceptualized.

Q: What is the difference between phenomenal and access consciousness?

Phenomenal consciousness pertains to what it is like to experience something, such as seeing a color or feeling pain. It is the subjective aspect of consciousness. On the other hand, access consciousness involves the function of conscious experience, including how it interacts with sensory inputs, other mental states, and behavioral outputs. It is the domain of the "easy problems" of consciousness.

Q: How do the neural processes underlying reporting and conceptualization relate to access consciousness?

The neural processes underlying reporting and conceptualization, which occur in frontal cortex activations, are associated with access consciousness. Access consciousness involves cognitive processes, reasoning, problem-solving, and decision-making, which are enabled by the retrieval and conceptualization of sensory information. These processes are tied to language and symbol manipulation.

Summary & Key Takeaways

• Phenomenal consciousness refers to the actual experience of sensory information, such as seeing a color or feeling pain, while access consciousness pertains to the function of conscious experience, such as its interaction with other mental states and behavioral outputs.

• The hard problem of consciousness is understanding why a specific brain basis is associated with a particular conscious experience, as opposed to another experience or none at all.

• Experimental paradigms, like partial report superiority and binocular rivalry, provide evidence for the distinction between conscious perception and unconscious perception, as well as the differences between phenomenal and access consciousness.