![]() ![]() ![]() Here self-awareness, or sentience, is characterize by information processing systems capable of representing themselves, i.e. In information processing terms, the system has to store a representation of the red apple, and a second representation of the act of being aware of the red apple.Ĭlosely related to Higher Order Theories of consciousness are Self-Representational Theories of Consciousness, of which the most well known account is given by Douglas Hofstadter in his books "Godel, Escher and Bach", and "I am a Stange Loop". For a Sentient being to be conscious of the red apple, it is not enough to have a mental states corresponding to a red apple, but also to have a higher order mental state which corresponds to 'being aware of there being a red apple'. they can have a first order mental state corresponding to apple. There are higher order mental states: These are mental states about other mental states, including first order mental states.īoth sentient and none sentient beings can see a red apple - i.e.signals from the outside world), sensations and emotions in themselves. There are first order mental states: These are the perceptions (i.e.The general approach of such theories is the following: The problem is still considered an open one, but there has been attempts to "solve" it, most notably Higher Order Theories of consciousness. A physicalist theory of the mind can tell you that pain is the firing of certain neurons, and a functionalist theory can tell you what types of behavior and mental states correlate with pain, but neither of them can address the question of "What it's like to feel" pain. Chalmers posits that currently no physicalist or functionalist theory of the mind can provide and explanation of why consciousness is the way it is. Here you are touching upon the hard problem of consciousness, made famous by David Chalmers. You are touching on two different problems in philosophy of mind, the hard problem of consciousness and the problem of freewill. Sentience is the capacity to feel, perceive, or experience subjectively, according to Wikipedia, and if (in this case) an NPC can be programmed to perceive and experience subjectively, is there a way for it to 'feel'? Obviously programs can't feel emotions, but they could be programmed to be aware of things, such as a touch, and hence to feel, in that aspect.ĭo things such as NPC's qualify as "creatures", since they are acting only off of preprogramming? What sort of being/thing does one need to be in order to 'qualify' for sentience? Can one feel existential and yet not be sentient? ![]() In short, does an understanding of sentience and an understanding of oneself make you sentient? A Non-Player Character in a video game), who understands what sentience is, and is aware that they are not sentient, does that make them, in fact, sentient? Does their awareness that they are NOT sentient actually make them sentient? If they have this understanding of sentience, does that mean that they are actually sentient? ![]()
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