Consciousness: The Gap

We introduced the differential in the first consciousness post (here), then we went forward to talk about subjectives (here) which are short-term value functions (STVF) attached to sensory information. Now, we shall discuss the real gate.

In the previous post also, we talked about ‘events’, and we said that events can only be ‘perceived’ or observed after subjectives have been attached to information (raw data). A perspective is the resultant of subjective information. To begin, let us first define reality.

Reality is a complex system of perspectives. 

It is important at this point to have a clear definition of reality, because if we take a serious look at consciousness, we’d notice that part of what makes us conscious, per se, is the physical space we exist in. Let’s call this space Real Space (RSp). Space is a precondition for consciousness. So in our quest for conscious AI, we will have to create a mind space (MSp) that would act as a physical space for future robots. Remember that our physical space cannot be their own space, since they didn’t ‘naturally’ evolve from it. So, AI consciousness would inevitably be an ‘implicit’ phenomenon. Implicit because their physical space would also act as a mind space.

So, an android observes the event of a planet in space, say Earth, resulting in a perspective. The same android experiences another event, say, a pair of shoes. These 2 events are part of our reality, but one might ask; what does a pair of shoes have to do with a planet in space, right? But one thing is certain, these 2 perspectives are connected due to the simple fact that they exist in the same physical space and owing to their chronological order as well. We say that these 2 perspectives are ‘culturally’ related. Below is an illustration.

In the illustration above, we have perspective P1 and mutually exclusive perspective P2. We call it the real gate or culture gate. These two seemingly unrelated perspectives create a phenomenon; the gap. The gap is the fundamental of all consciousness because so many other phenomenons arise as a result. The gap is also the differential, d. We shall treat these other phenomenons in time and we shall also call them gap functions.

The gap is fundamental to consciousness because it is the seat of philosophical inquiry. If we observe well enough, we’d notice that philosophical musings always tend to make sense of mutually exclusive realities. For example; why do I exist? In this case, I’m comparing the idea of the universe to that of my puny self, and I’m trying to no avail to merge the two perspectives together (this creates a ‘gap’). Another example is; comparing the event of the big bang to that of a cup of coffee on a table. In the chronological sense, there can be no cup of coffee without the big bang, but in the cultural sense, these two perspectives don’t relate. This is the reason why we are ‘cultural’ beings, our consciousness is full of gaps.

Consciousness: The Differential

Consciousness is a controversial topic because the study of the phenomenon has brought about more confusion. Although neuroscience and psychology have compiled lots of research in the hope of understanding consciousness better, consciousness largely remains a philosophical phenomenon. The study of consciousness is the study of the Self. It is the belief that consciousness can be resolved logically that drives the research in computer science. I believe the ‘problem’ of consciousness can be attacked fundamentally. [I intend to divide this paper into many posts so I don’t spend too much time on one post]

 

1. The Differential

Living things process information (data); we take in smell (nose), touch (skin), visual information (eyes), audio (ears), and taste (tongue). These major organs are akin to sensors in electronics. Information is taken in and then processed. But how is information processed? This is an important question that must be answered in the pursuit of replicating consciousness via artificial intelligence (AI).

[Can consciousness be ‘replicated’ per se? Well, I like to think that we (animals) are reactionary beings; meaning that we react to consciousness rather than seek to grasp it. In our reactions we have gone a long way, in engineering, in science, in art. We can also react in such a way as to ‘duplicate’ what we are. Indeed, since we are more like existential robots (in a deep sense), then conciousness can also lead us to react by technologically creating consciousness. Some scientists and philosophers might argue that how can we create something that we do not understand, but the truth is we don’t have to understand consciousness for us to recreate it. Remember, we are “reacting” to consciousness. This might stem up yet a new argument: if we are reacting to consciousness, then are we really ‘conscious’? This is a compelling argument which I tried to answer here. In the writeup, I maintained that human beings are not necessarily ‘conscious’, that in fact what we are, are reactions to consciousness. So, yes, we can and we are going to replicate consciousness, but not because we understand consciousness.]

So, information comes in, say, molecules through my nostrils (smell). The nostrils act as sensors. In the case of artificial intelligence (AI), such a processing unit would have to differentiate sense inputs. All information coming through the inputs (senses); vision, audio, olfactory, taste, and tactile (touch) , have to be differentiated. This is the first logical step in replicating consciousness.

The differential ‘d‘ is correlate to the logic gate in electronic circuits where we have the inputs and the output. This logic gate would form the differential. Before we further analyse the differential, we have to analyse the sensory inputs (in the case of AI) and what makes them “sensible”. We shall do this deduction in the next post.