On the Limits of Zombies
I'm beginning to suspect that conscious general intelligence works because it speaks the same qualitative language as the ontological substrate of reality. If this is true, we aren't going to see general intelligence out of zombies with remotely the same adaptability, nor with remotely the same solution efficiency as we see in gestalt qualia computers. Conscious minds have direct ontological access to the underlying qualitative dynamics of reality, along with countless qualitative and form universals that have intrinsic computational properties that are optimally suited to solve problems generated by the very same qualitative dynamics and universals. In a universe in which causality is always mediated by intrinsic quality - pain repelling, pleasure attracting, etc - it would follow that blindness to all form and quality deprives us of a first principles understanding of reality, which is necessary to "pilot it into the most ideal regions of possibility space" in the ...