James of Seattle
jamesofseattle.bsky.social
James of Seattle
@jamesofseattle.bsky.social
78 followers 140 following 280 posts
Observer on the world, trying to keep things straight.
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Yes. Presumably there is some set of neurons required for generating the Chinese word for “dog” which you could change back to how they were before the memorizing. The English mind wouldn’t change, but the Chinese mind would. Alt., you could change them all back.
There will be some physical change that you can make which will alter one of the minds without altering the other. I can’t prove this, but I would be shocked (i.e., need some reason to believe) if this is not the case.
But then he’s no longer just memorizing the rules from the notebook, but instead is learning Chinese. But still, you can partition part of the brain and say English mind, and another (overlapping) part the Chinese mind, and those will be physically different.

1/2
For anyone interested in the idea that pattern recognition is the basis of consciousness [Psychule Theory!], this video w/ @drmichaellevin.bsky.social will be a useful discussion of the role of patterns in nature and intelligence:
youtu.be/imTnPhE20YQ?...
The Hidden Realm of Patterns Animating Life & The Universe | Dr. Michael Levin
YouTube video by Jack Roycroft-Sherry
youtu.be
Based on my understanding of how learning in the brain works, similar to learning in neural nets, the act of ”memorizing” is going to physically change some neurons, but not all of them. I’m assuming some subsequent physical changes will alter the “Chinese” mind but not the “English”. Think not?
[didn’t mean to *claim* the trademark on MUM … that’s @wanjawiese.bsky.social ’s, I think]
Read this twice. Happy to report that I’m a dyed in the wool Physicalist, Computational Functionalist, and apparently a Homunctionalist. Woot! I don’t think Searle’s memorizing the rules defeats functionalism as the english and Chinese understanding parts of his brain are physically different.
Cool. Then I think pattern recognition is going to supply @keithfrankish.com ’s microfunctionalism as a Minimal Unifying Model (TM). Stay tuned.
Would pattern recognition count as a specific computation or a higher level functional relation?
Reposted by James of Seattle
sure, if you enjoy the horrifying limits of human perception
For your enjoyment (by @jagarikin)
This is a really good discussion, and now I can never watch a video with Chalmers without thinking “Math Guy” …
Reposted by James of Seattle
Videos from the Natural Philosophy Symposium are coming online at last! We start with the opening plenary by David Chalmers @davidchalmers.bsky.social: Can There Be a Mathematical Theory of Consciousness? Commentary by Ryan Smith.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zsve...
David Chalmers, Can There Be a Mathematical Theory of Consciousness? | Natural Philosophy Symposium
YouTube video by Hopkins Natural Philosophy Forum
www.youtube.com
Sean Bean dying at the beginning? Did they get that from Game of Thrones, or the other way around?
Man, I drove across the country from Seattle to DC, but I couldn’t find the booth for the people paying for it anywhere. Oh well, terror accompolished.
Not sure what difference that makes. They discovered rules which generated “complexity” such that it was impossible to predict a (far) future state from within the system. They could have put randomness into the rules, or not. Nothing within the system would be able to tell.
This is exactly what Wolfram and the Game of Life (forgot the creator) showed. Just a few simple rules can lead to forms complex and unpredictable from within the system. “Choice” is just a description of patterns recognized from within the system.
Yeah baby!
🚨🚨🚨WA Governor Bob Ferguson responds to a letter he received from AG Pam Bondi in which she threatened to place him in jail. 🧯He is on fire! 1/2
Reposted by James of Seattle
Does consciousness require biology?

Ned Block has a new paper out, for which he shared a time limited link on Bluesky. He argues in the paper that the “meat neutral” computational functionalism inherent in many theories of consciousness neglect what he sees...
selfawarepatterns.com/2025/10/12/d...
Does consciousness require biology?
Ned Block has a new paper out, for which he shared a time limited link on Bluesky. He argues in the paper that the “meat neutral” computational functionalism inherent in many theories o…
selfawarepatterns.com
Great piece! But I was struck by the suggestion that computational functionalism would suggest simple life forms were not likely to be conscious. If the fundamental basis of consc. is a simple computation, simple life forms might just have simple consciousness. Did I miss something?