(Original Review, 2010-11-15)
I think that if you look at the internet and the World Wide Web it
gives some insight on what Damásio’s book is all about. On the one hand you
have the network of servers and cabling and input and output devices and on the
other you have the network of websites. We know that the latter sits on the
former but you can tell very little about one network from the other. When you
look at this webpage, for example, it looks like a single, though quite
complex, entity but the annoying advert down the right hand side, for example,
may sit on a server on a different continent from the text that you are reading
and the photograph on yet another. There is nothing on the face of it to tell
you that this is happening (although if you look at the code behind the page you
can see what is intrinsic and what is being imported from elsewhere - but still
very little clue about the hardware). Similarly you can examine the hardware
with all the skills of and electronic engineer and it won't give you the
Guardian webpage. Neuroscience is approaching the brain as the electronics
engineer would approach the internet whilst conscious thought bears more
resemblance to the network of webpages. Consciousness must reside in what the
brain does and not what it is. During our lifetime the molecules within the
brain will have turned over many times and yet not only do we have
consciousness we have a sensation of continuity of one conscious entity which
is inextricably linked just to me and can't move into any other person or
object - even though the stuff of which my brain is made will be continually
changing and could end up inside someone else's brain. An analogy would be if
the company hosting this website swaps over the server storing the data for
this webpage. That could easily happen in a way that would be undetectable to
the person reading the page so long as the data was moved intact.
I'm not saying for a moment that the internet is conscious - others
have made that point and I make no comment. What I'm trying to point out is that just as you can tell very little (nothing really) about the function of
the world wide web and its content from looking at the hardware (and vice
versa) you can tell very little about consciousness and the experience of
having a brain by looking at the anatomy (and physiology) of the brain,
certainly at the macro level. Just because you can't bottle consciousness like
you can bottle a brain you can't bottle the world wide web either as it is a
dynamic function and not a solid object. That doesn't mean that it's
supernatural. Consciousness is a dynamic function of the brain and it isn't a
solid object either - nor is it supernatural in my opinion (these are not
exclusive alternatives as some seem to assume).
My point about external input being necessary for changes to the
web whereas consciousness is entirely internal. Whilst it is true that most content on the web has been put there by
human beings it is perfectly conceivable that content could be automatically
generated in response to information received from sensors (or perhaps even
randomly) - and this probably does happen in relation to such as traffic and
weather. Compared to human consciousness the web is very primitive still, of
course. The analogy is as imperfect as using the interaction of snooker balls
to demonstrate the interaction of the planets - one is not the other but it is
not without some validity.
As for the external influence on our consciousness - that comes from
our genetic inheritance. We have a lot of pre-programmed instinctive behaviour
(the lower animals such as insects appear to be entirely instinctive and their
behaviour can be precisely modelled by a robot, but we can't be sure they
aren't conscious nevertheless). And then, of course, our conscious experience
is being continuously affected by input through our senses - and by any
psychoactive substances that we might take.
Of course, my analogy only works if you believe there is something
outside of us that directs all these actions. Websites/the internet does not
change server data for websites by itself. Those are conscious actions by
conscious individuals.
As someone in Tech for a long time, and back in the day involved in learning
about deep learning/deep neural networks ("AI" if you will), the
whole idea of computers, the internet or neural networks somehow gain
consciousness and becoming self-aware is patently ridiculous. I also don't believe, for instance, that consciousness is the result
of, or our brains are simply a large series of floating point matrix
calculations, driven by some cost function.
Here's my theory. It centres on the SallyAnne test which talks about
theory of mind - the understanding that other entities can have a view point. So,
the brain builds a model of the world it sees. Gradually that model becomes
complex enough to understand that other entities with their own models may
exist. At this point your behaviour in the test changes. However, over time,
the model gets more and more complicated until it includes the fact that the
other entities world model includes a model of you. My theory is that at this
point you have lift off though feedback. You become conscious through your
model of other people's model of you. Rather egotistical maybe.
I'd suggest that the emergent behaviour happens from first
"modelling" others as having something we call a 'conscious mind',
which even entirely behavioural agents can appear to have if we are not aware
of all the stimuli they are subjected to, and then - due to recognising that we
are similar to them - modelling ourselves the same way. Observing children
develop, it would appear that they (typically) have models of other people as
individuals with their own motivations before they become 'fully conscious' of
themselves as individuals.
Modelling the observable responses of others as a 'black box'
capable of self-determination would appear to make sense from an evolutionary
perspective, and re-using the neural apparatus to model oneself appears to be a
reasonable and effective use of resources.
NB: Damásio is a fellow Portuguese.
