The Singularity, Virtual Immortality and the Trouble with Consciousness (Op-Ed)

Qualia relates to the raw sensations of experience, like colours, smells, sounds.

It is through our actual experience that we know what something tastes, looks or smells like, and it is not some information already drilled inside our brains on birth. We have to experience sensations to understand them.

• Computers and AI can never have a real, conscious mind, even if they appear to behave, talk and act in the same way a human being does(like self-driving cars, for example).
• Simulation of consciousness, however sophisticated, is merely a duplication, not the real thing.
• Computers can be made to act conscious, by saying or doing things that make us believe they may be conscious, but consciousness, as we know, cannot be replicated in a non-biological system.

... is a ripe area of debate, with some neuroscientists saying that it is not possible to transfer the entire person in a computer, and even if it is done successfully, the resulting entity would not be that person, but a ‘zombie’ who acts like that person.

These computers, armed with our mental information, may seem very intelligent and will claim that they are conscious, but they are not.

1. The nature of artificial intelligence singularity with a consciousness (hypothetically) is vastly different and superior to ‘Superstrong AI’ which may be supremely intelligent, and even appear to be conscious. Being conscious beats appearing conscious.
2. The human inner awareness cannot be wholly recreated or synthesized as of today, so uploading one’s complete neural patterns and ‘brain information’ cannot be authentic virtual immortality. We aren’t able to reproduce or transfer first-person consciousness.

1. The consciousness can be entirely physical, a product of the brain.
2. It is an independent, unique entity, a special feature of physical reality, and can be a different reality in itself.
3. Everything that exists has some form of ‘proto-consciousness’, or varying levels of consciousness, as stated in the old theory of panpsychism.
4. Consciousness is non-physical, existing as a dual entity, connected to the physical brain at some metaphysical level. This non-physical substance is also called the ‘soul’.
5. As believed by eastern religions for thousands of years, consciousness can be the ultimate reality, whereas our physical reality could just be a subset of the same.

1. If consciousness were completely physical then it is easy for Superstrong AI to be aware like humans are.
2. If consciousness is an independent unique entity, then one cannot say if computers, AI, and other non-biological entities can ever experience any real awareness.
3. In the case of panpsychism, where everything can have a certain level of consciousness, then Superstrong AI, too by this logic, can be aware.
4. If the ‘soul’ exists, connected to the human mind, then Superstrong AI can not experience any true awareness, no matter how advanced.
5. If consciousness is the ultimate reality then everything could be conscious, including non-biological entities.

Virtual Immortality follows a similar path, depending on how we define consciousness.

1. It is possible to upload a virtual self if consciousness is entirely physical.
2. In case of consciousness being an independent entity, if it is understood and studied, then it is possible to upload a first-person mental self, though with some caveats and limitations.
3. If everything is conscious then too, our mental self can be uploadable, provided advanced technologies can control consciousness.
4. In case of consciousness being the soul, it would be impossible to transfer the self.
5. If consciousness is the extreme reality, then it should exist in itself, without the need for unique digital upload.

In case a digital replication procedure does work perfectly, there is an unanswered question of where the self would be, if, for example, it is replicated five times. It can lead to various possibilities in the self:

1. Each of the five replicas can be super-identical twins, with their own consciousness, or can be psychological zombies.
2. I can sense that I suddenly have five other selves, and can merge with them.
3. The consciousness shifts from one replica to the other, maybe in fragments.
4. The original self disappears, and all of the replicas claim they are the original.