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Russia Sucks.

The quality of life sucks. The human rights suck. The economy sucks. The politicians suck. The weather sucks. The people suck. The women suck. The food sucks.
Their location sucks. The Law Enforcement sucks. The public johns suck.
Their parking ticketts suck. Healthcare sucks. Jobs suck. Their neighbours to the south east a couple countries Suck. Theyre next to Europe wich sucks. Their infrastructure sucks.

Russia has music and the arts(sciences included) with deep roots that wont soon disolve wich makes everything that sucks about Russia,only suck a little.


America sucks ass but.

The healthcare aint bad. The economy aint too shabby. Our human rights could be alot worse. Our politicians suck. The weather is nice. The poeple suck. The women dont suck, wich sucks. The public johns usualy suck. Parking tickettes suck. Jobs tend to not suck unles you suck. Our neighbours to the south a couple countries suck. Were not next to Europe, wich sucks. Our infrastructure kapwns the rest of the worlds wich definately dosnt suck.


But you know what realy sucks?

Russians and Americans trying outsuck eachother.

... yo' momma sucks.





Where don't the people suck... just wondering?


Yeah they do... maybe you suck too much to be sucked? Or maybe you don't know how to make the women feel like sucking?

Nonsense. The US has really old infrustructure. Everything worth a damn was built in the f'ing 60's or earlier.

Seriously, politicans are all too interested in throwing money at special interests instead of doing what we elected them to do.

Take care of the roads, water supply, roads (yeah, I said that twice... I live in Los Angeles... the traffic is terminal. It will kill you.), etc.

We have too much traffic... ie not enough roads or trains.

We have power shortages every summer... ie not enough power (Deregulated areas can blame their local utility but I live in an area where the city owns the power stations and we keep having "rolling" brown outs. I've had to get a UPS just to deal with the bs.)

Our internet bandwidth is slower then just about every other country in the first world. ie our communications infrustructure needs to be upgraded/replaced.

Many areas can't get building permits because they there isn't enough water.



I am sick and f'ing tired of our politicans always talking about nationalizing healthcare or something equally super expensive when they can't even manage the damn roads! Look morons, the Canadians maintain their roads and their nationalized healthcare sucks worse then our deregulated one. Why the hell would I trust them with running the hospitals and docters when they can't even keep fresh asfault and paint on the road? The only people that don't get that point are either out for a free ride, are too idealistic to face reality, or so rich that they no no matter how screwed up it gets they can buy their way out of it.


Are you sure? Cus yo' momma wants to give it a shot...

still dont see why you would want a CONCIOUS computer to do stuff for you, its like sticking ears on a turtle, its extra baggage. a nonconcious computer could do the same task just as easily.

I dont know bull about carter, but I Know this ain't true.

he has a point, they are watched severly for most of their lives, but they really aren't without their rights.

do chimps muse? because the idea of subjective thought is that you think beyond whats obvious. there isnt proof that chimps muse (it really isnt useful to them) so I doubt they have the definable concious.

oh come on, god got it right only once. how do you expect us to do better?

space probes do not need a conciousness...
deep sea exploring is already easy enough with a remote device
factories can already work automatically without a conciouness. can you please find a (much) better example?

can we go back to the fact this is FICTION. I wouldnt believe in hogwarts just because Rowling wrote it... why should you believe a fiction writer who more likely than not has no experience in robotics?
also, at the very least you are assuming that their conciousnesses are limited to certain forms of thought, again we get back to the conciousness paradox.

oh of course not...

ok, come on. what was the big thing over in the east thats spelled U-S-S-R?

you increase road density in LA and you wont have anyplace to live.

LA is a city, of course it sucks. its also a rather poor city out in the middle of a very hot dry desert.


almost everyplace else things are so much better. even nearby cities.

ok, just because the roads in one of USs most overpopulated cities are crap, doesnt mean the rest of the infrastructure here isn't way better.


and if we did replace asphault around the country as much as LA needs it, we would all be drowning in toxic fumes. you guys are already, but the point takes.

I cant think of one way in which we are behind the times in any of our infrastructure. and thats even just on the side thats controlled by our (well, it was before) minimalist government, where private companies reign things are practically rebuilt every few weeks.

just look at vegas.

anyway detouring back at the computer stuff: everything you described would be better if done in serial, because you have one interesting thing going on in which all data pertains to. our minds work in MASSIVE parrallel, we organize many different pathways of thought pertaining to countless different decisions every second of the day. computers are neither built for that, nor will ever need it if we want them to work for us.

that is highly debatable



they are actually trying to program an autonomous deep sea explorer for searching around Europa



eh, just because early humans physically couldnt comprehend how to use a written language, does it mean that they werent conscious?

Define consciousness and cite a source for your definition. Two seconds with google should do it. Please use at least a "somewhat" credible source. If you cite a personal page hosted on Anglefire or a myspace page I won't credit it. Then I'll cite sources for chimps and other intelligent mammals to show that they are conscious.

Hell... they can even learn sign language. They're just very stupid compared to humans. But our ultimate reason for not extending rights is that they're not human beings. Don't blame me for making that observation... I've been called some fairly nasty names in this thread for simply pointing out the obvious. I didn't make the world the way it is... I didn't make humanity... I'm just telling you what's right before your eyes. We value our own above all others. Just like every other species on earth. You can moralize that until the sun burns out. It won't change anything.

mmm, i would personally enslave everything. It's why were here. i dont care whether the creature is conscious or not, if i am better than it, and as you said in your post, humans see themselves as better than everything else, then it is subservient to me, or it will be dead.

PS, trist, we miss you on IRC

autonomous is different from concious.

because we give them treats if they do, that doesnt mean they're concious.

I'm not going to do a formal citation
but from standford's dictionary of philosophy:
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/consciousness/#2
conciousness is an umbrella term refering to numerous qualifications.
sentience being one
now, stop with the ploys.

what does this have to do with anything? I conceeded this point. although, again, chimps are not fully concious to our level.

Yes it is... in fact, on second thought I would agree that a conscious intelligence woudl probably be counter productive in many of these tasks. You would however want a HIGH degree of intelligence and autonomy. You'll want a large skill set... such as self repair, knowledge of several sciences and a list of protocol to follow in the event of detecting various things.

Though true consciousness would probably cause more problems then anything else. So I agree, you wouldn't want that.


That we give them treats for it is completely irrelevant. If you came upon some ancient humans... from say... 20,000 years ago that communicated in gestures and grunts... would you say they weren't conscious because we could only motivate them to learn by giving them treats? Hell, little children are largely pressured into learning with a mix of punishment and reward.


Then you haven't defined your argument.

Ergo it does not stand. Your choice.


Others didn't... and you should have noticed by now that I'm talking other people more then yourself. I'm not interested in having a discussion with someone that confuses contradiction with discourse. You must give reasons for disagreeing and then support them. Otherwise it's just contradiction.

As to these primates not being conscious... your inability or unwillingness to define consciousness in the first place renders the whole objection moot.

Please cite your evidence that Carter personally brought peace between those two countries. Because I thought Israel wiping out Egypt’s attack force and demonstrating he could completely ruin Egypt is what made peace.

He was the one who brokered the treaty, brought them to the table and got the job done.



Where did I claim that Reagan built up the military after Vietnam instead of Carter? And why do you think that’s so smart?

The Carter not Reagan remark was to shut down those who give Reagen all the credit for our build up after Vietnam.



This has to be the silliest claim you’ve made:

So how many of them died? I was in the military while this was going on, friends of mine were involved in operation Operation Eagle Claw. I was one of many who were wheeping that afternoon knowing what had happened.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_hostage_crisis



Furthermore, I don’t see how that could have led to WW3 anyway. You’re exaggerating and that does nothing to make you sound intelligent, wise, or reasonable. Carter is well noted as SCREWING UP that negociation.

leading to WW3 We invade Iran, the soviets invade to the north to protect them, it escalates into a full scale war, bringing in Nato and the Warsal Pac countries... end result WW3. Remember I lived this event USAF at OFFITT AFB 55th Stratigic Recon Wing, SAC HQ unit. I was involved with it!



Please show me how he set the stage for the soviet collapse? Reagan is very well documented as being responsible for that unless you want to cite Gorbachev. But Carter? If you want to make that claim you’re going to have to prove it. Most of the things I’ve said are common knowledge.

common knowlage is Carter deniged the Soviets needed crops to sustain themselves. the resulting famine brought a high degree of unrest within the Soviet Union. That is what set the stage that Reagan was able to capitalze upon.


This is such a silly claim I almost don’t know where to start with it.

Under Carter the Shah of Iran fell and the current Republic of Iran was formed. Carter refused to support the Shah’s power base which is why we are STILL dicking around with Iran today. His mistake led to our need to support Saddam against Iran in the first place just to keep the Iranians from going expansionist on us. Furthermore, prior to that “foreign oil” wasn’t a problem because foreign oil sources weren’t threatening to shut down on us. He CAUSED THE PROBLEM IN THE FIRST PLACE! It was under his administration that we had oil shortages. So him saying “we should reduce dependence on foreign oil” isn’t worth much. Also it wasn’t a problem for previous presidents so they wouldn’t have said anything about it. Every president since carter has also said we should reduce dependence. But if not for carter we might not even have to. He screwed up the middle east worse then it was in the first place. So he gets no credit there.

Oh I see it now, yes you are so right, that is what caused the 1973 embago that gave us the gas shortages and the Nixon adminitration freezing prices as a result... of cource, must have been that way.



Really? And when has his interference actually accomplished anything? I’ll point out to you that he said he trusted the NEW Iranian regime because he believed they were “men of god”.

Too many nations to count, so many that are no longer either in or on the brink of civil war, but then again, I guess one wrong statement about the Muslim-Nazis cancells all that out


People bitch about Bush being a jesus freak, but Carter is a 1000 times the Jesus freak bush ever was… That Carter was president is absolutely scary.

You know nothing about Christianity, if you did you would know that so called "Jesus Freaks" are not christians.



And did he fix any of those problems? Or are you just giving him credit because things were falling apart under his administration? Would Bush be a better president if we blew up New York and Los Angeles? I mean… you seem to think the worse things are whomever’s in office has to be a better guy… right?

did he fix any of those problems?
Yes
1. He began the rebuilding of the US military
2. The riots ended in 72, he brought about an era of race relation rebuilding.
3. The economy, could have been worse but alas he did not solve nor even really start to solve that one.

We were not falling apart under his adminitration... all these things were piled on him from day one and all came from the Nixon addmin.



I really wish you wouldn’t… I’m bored of listening to all this drivel already. Carter is well recognized as probably the worst president in US history. And while people are bitching about Bush, ultimately I don’t think Carter’s nomination for that position is in much trouble. He’s still out there embarrassing us long after he left office. If we’re lucky bush will be quiet after he’s out of office. But even if he isn’t I doubt he’ll go off to write anti Semitic books or embolden people screaming for our blood.



you are the one putting forth the drivel, what kind of fools do you listen to? carter was one of the better Presidents. Know your history and you will know thisto be true. He cleaned up the pile of crap left from 16 years of Keddedy-Johnson and Nixon. (Ford was a good man and would have also made a good President if elected, he did not have time after taking office to accomplish enough.


Seriously… don’t talk to me about how Carter was a good president. He wasn’t. Everyone that knows anything has that FACT nailed down. I’m not going to waste time arguing about it with anyone unless they have PROOF to the contrary. As none exists… you have your work cut out for you. Good luck defending Carter… for your next project I’ll suggest holding back a hurricane with a 2 inch square of tissue paper. It’s equally futile.

Regards, Karmashock.

[/quote]


The proof is there to be seen by anyone with eyes. so your right, no need to argue about it. Besides, you can be misled all you wish. a great and humble man like Mr. Carter does not need me to defend him. we were lucky we had him to clean up the mess that Nixon left behind. A lessor man would not have been able to clean up so much so fast and allow our nation to move forward. His time was done in 4 years and then Reagan became the man of the hour. People forget who cleaned up the house and only prase the one who moved in the new fixtures. Had Carter not shoveled out all the S##t then we would not have been able to rise again from the mess of the earily 70's.

so you have never seen curious little children? I see them all the time, they learn by asking questions, making subjective connections between unexplainable circumstance and a hidden cause. they are also conditioned by punishment and rewards, but the same thing happens with dogs, cats, even mice. are they concious?

quite the opposite, its all that matters: pavlov's dogs.

ok, list your sources on every last fact.

by formal citation I meant i wasnt going to drudge up time of publishing, author etc. doesnt mean i wont cite something.

your entire post was addressed towards a single person, seeing as you talked almost completely towards me in any respect, I had plenty of reason to assume your argument was directed.

I already cited a source!
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/consciousness/#2\
and again, you are very naive to assume something that has puzzled the best minds in all fields can be so easily pegged down. I've already told you that we are working with a VERY fuzzy term, so you cannot say that my arguement fails when we aren't working with a formal definition for something that is not formally defined.

in essence, you fail. (neutral comment!)

whoa, worship complex...

Yeah? Well... then Truman 'somehow' through his diplomatic skill alone got the Japanese to sign an unconditional surrender to the United States.


Had nothing to do with getting their navy sent to the bottom of the pacific, parking a massive invasion force off their shores, and then dropping two nuclear bombs on them... that's just a coincidence... Truman was just that smooth.


Carter showed up. A monkey could have done it.

What was Egypt going to do? Say no? No wasn't an option. They got their asses handed to them.



Who are these people? Cite a source and then please explain to me what this has to do with this thread?

Because so far you're on a complete non sequitor with this point.



Wait... did you just claim to be a former pilot of the "55th Stratigic Recon Wing" in 1979-1981?

Furthermore... they were held for a year... He tried tried to get them out by force and the operation failed... which I'm not going to blame him for because presidents aren't generals (with the exception of the three or four US presidents that were generals before they were president). It was a disaster and was considered a major reason that Reagan won by the landslide.


Seriously dude... arguing against this point is a stupid move. Like a fat man trying to fly by flapping his arms it just ain't gonna happen. I don't care if you were in command of the intergalactic space rangers of the Universe... it's nonsense.




that isn't common knowledge. I could ask 100 people and I doubt if any of them would know that. Cite a source.



You're right. I was wrong here. However, you must also grant that it wasn't much of a problem prior to his administration. Furthermore, you must also grant that Iran's new government has caused most of the problems we've been dealing with in the middle east for the past 25 years. Directly or indirectly almost all of it is the result of that fall.

Carter could have supported the Shah. He didn't. I don't see that he has much credibility with Mid East relations by that decision alone. I furthermore see no other decisions in that area that advanced US interests. Which was his JOB.




That's a cope out. Cite one. Make sure to give me enough information to look it up.



You don't know enough about me to say that I know nothing about Christianity. I have nothing against Christians. I am not calling Christians "jesus freaks" I said "PEOPLE" call Bush a Jesus freak.


Don't be that little dog that barks louder so it sounds more impressive. It fools no one... if anything it's just annoying.



Are you implying that that wouldn't have happened without him? Are you implying that it was even his idea? Because that sounds like something the Pentagon would just ask for regardless. It's a bit like giving him credit for the mail being delivered.


How? I'm pretty sure the Governors of more then a few states would take issue with that.


If anything he made it worse. Though I'll accept "did nothing".


I'm not going to make the same mistake you've made by defending an indefensible man... But I'll note that most of the things you've thrown at Nixon were problems that built up over multiple presidencies... in the case of race relations that's been an issue for hundreds of years. I don't even know what you're specifically blaming Nixon for... I won't bother to defend him. I think the man snapped under the pressure of the office and lost his mind.


So you keep saying yet when asked to back that up all I get is hot air.


This statement made milk squirt out my nose... and I wasn't even drinking milk... weird.

Carter does too much preaching and judging to be considered humble. Besides, I don't think you can be President of the US and be humble at the same time... the two states preclude each other unless you achieved office via the vice presidency and then only became president because the president was shot or choked on a ham sandwich.

Do you really think carter did anything wouldn't have happened anyway? I've seen nothing "positive" that he did that wouldn't have been done by anyone. I can think of a few negative things he did that were unique to the man... but I don't see anything positive to the nation that was his specific contribution.

Putting the Pentagon back in order would have happened anyway.

Egypt was going to sign some kind of treaty because it had no choice.

Race relations? How did he fix that? Did he give a speech? Because when I talk to black people they don't talk about how carter made life better for them. They rarely talk about white people at all on that subject.

Vietnam screwed up the country... I don't know if you can really blame Nixon for it... that's more Johnson then anything. But Nixon lost his damn mind. Carter so far as I've seen never had one to begin with. No, he's not stupid... just profoundly foolish and naive.

[quote

whoa, worship complex... [/quote]

Not quite, a huge amount of respect.. Yes, worship.. No!

I save the worship for Clinton!   

In the future please try to think up the more obvious rebuttals and use them to filter your replies.

Monkeys are curious as well. That is an obvious rebuttal you should have worked into your statement somehow... I shouldn't have to remind you of that.

As to dogs and mice being conscious... I don't know... depends on how you define it.

If you define it as being self aware then the mirror test is pretty good. That is if an animal recognizes itself in a mirror then it's self aware... QED.


But I'm guessing that doesn't meet your standards. Define them. I'm not going to argue against an undefined argument anymore then I'm going to punch a shadow.



What does pavlov's dog have to do with this?

It sounds like you're citing catch phrases at me now.


Well... I'll see you pavlov's dog and cite you three mighty morphen power rangers.

Cite a complete argument or I have no idea what you're talking about... I can't even been certain you know what you're talking about.


Define your argument.

I go to great lengths to explain my points which is why my posts are so long. I am explaining what I mean. you are not. Ergo your argument is not defined. Ergo it doesn't really exist in the context of this discussion.


Define it or I'm going to formally note that you don't have one and ignore further statements by you on this topic. I'm not being hostile here... I have no choice. If you don't explain what you mean then you have no point. QED.



No you cited a paper that gives the history of philosophy's exploration of the concept of consciousness.

Give me either a paragraph of prose or a list of bullet pointed requirements.

If YOU know what consciousness is then that shouldn't be hard... shouldn't take you more then two minutes. As it stands it looks like you found the article least likely to be read on Google and then cited it.


If it's a fuzzy term then how can you say something is or is not conscious? You very confidently talk about a term you're now telling me isn't well understood by experts... let alone a layman like yourself.


Help me out here... why should I credit your grasp of the concept for use in this discussion when you don't feel comfortable even defining it with less then some huge document that includes it's history back to 2000 years ago.

What did clinton do worthy of worship? Don't get me wrong, I thought he was an ok president... but worship? The man was a great speaker... very charismatic... but he was more show and display then he was actual accomplishment. His presidency was replete with HUGE multi million dollar media events where he'd announce he was giving 2 to 5 million dollars to some feel good cause. He did it constantly... That sort of stuff just doesn't make the world a better place. First, feel good causes are rarely "good" causes in actuality... and 5 million from the president of the united states is not worth a press event.


I've got nothing against the man. I wouldn't mind having a man like that after bush. He just strikes me a placeholder in history. If you wanted the president to do nothing for 8 years... I'd elect him. That's not an insult. Most of the time it's best if the president doesn't do much. Better to leave things as they are in most cases rather then change something carelessly.

He was also an ok sax player... I thought that was pretty cool.

true, but not on the subjective level kids are. monkeys need to know their surroundings, kids want to.
again karma, since you didnt hear me the FIRST THREE TIMES
its an UMBRELLA definition, its broad and reaches into MANY contexts.
there are numerous disorders that can cause a person not to recognize self or to be displaced in thought of self, while still being functional in every other way. that definition fails.
I've defined it repeatedly, in saying sentience and in citing that link. thats one of the better accepted definitions.
are you serious...
*sigh* since I have to read everything out for you:
there is more than one type of learning, one of the bigger differences is between conditioning and subjective knowledge. the idea of why a ball bounces (gravity) is subjective, while the idea "that man will feed me when he rings that bell" or "he will hit me if I dont do what he says" are conditioning, no other animal has shown capacity to learn through anything but conditioning, we are alone in that respect.

I dont intend to insult you: but if you cannot connect pavlov's dogs to a debate about conditioning vs. subjective understanding, maybe you should step down.

I have to your liking, despite the fact that doing so degrades the quality of hte argument as it wont be universally compatable.
well I shouldnt say to your liking, otherwise you would like it. rather I qualified excessively.

and it has the definition right in it! go figure!
[quote]
Sentience. It may be conscious in the generic sense of simply being a sentient creature, one capable of sensing and responding to its world (Armstrong 1981). Being conscious in this sense may admit of degrees, and just what sort of sensory capacities are sufficient may not be sharply defined. Are fish conscious in the relevant respect? And what of shrimp or bees?

Wakefulness. One might further require that the organism actually be exercising such a capacity rather than merely having the ability or disposition to do so. Thus one might count it as conscious only if it were awake and normally alert. In that sense organisms would not count as conscious when asleep or in any of the deeper levels of coma. Again boundaries may be blurry, and intermediate cases may be involved. For example, is one conscious in the relevant sense when dreaming, hypnotized or in a fugue state?

Self-consciousness. A third and yet more demanding sense might define conscious creatures as those that are not only aware but also aware that they are aware, thus treating creature consciousness as a form of self-consciousness (Carruthers 2000). The self-awareness requirement might get interpreted in a variety of ways, and which creatures would qualify as conscious in the relevant sense will vary accordingly. If it is taken to involve explicit conceptual self-awareness, many non-human animals and even young children might fail to qualify, but if only more rudimentary implicit forms of self-awareness are required then a wide range of nonlinguistic creatures might count as self-conscious.

What it is like. Thomas Nagel's (1974) famous“what it is like” criterion aims to capture another and perhaps more subjective notion of being a conscious organism. According to Nagel, a being is conscious just if there is “something that it is like” to be that creature, i.e., some subjective way the world seems or appears from the creature's mental or experiential point of view. In Nagel's example, bats are conscious because there is something that it is like for a bat to experience its world through its echo-locatory senses, even though we humans from our human point of view can not emphatically understand what such a mode of consciousness is like from the bat's own point of view.

Subject of conscious states. A fifth alternative would be to define the notion of a conscious organism in terms of conscious states. That is, one might first define what makes a mental state a conscious mental state, and then define being a conscious creature in terms of having such states. One's concept of a conscious organism would then depend upon the particular account one gives of conscious states (section 2.2).

Transitive Consciousness. In addition to describing creatures as conscious in these various senses, there are also related senses in which creatures are described as being conscious of various things. The distinction is sometimes marked as that between transitive and intransitive notions of consciousness, with the former involving some object at which consciousness is directed (Rosenthal 1986).
[quote]
human concious is the collective of all of this.

oh you are so behind...

there is no concrete definition of conciousness, merely a collective or qualifications that are under debate. this much is quite obvious and has not changed for 200+ years.

because if fails in nearly all agreed upon circumstances



you cannot play artful dodger with me, if you cannot keep up with the pace of the arguement back down.

What does that even mean? monkeys play... they explore out of simple curiosity as well.

I think I'm going to hammer on this point... I want to see where the cracks in your argument lead.


So did the definitions that defined blacks as inferior. Note, I am not saying you're prejudiced or immoral in your conclusions. I am simply saying that you're working from the preconceived notion that some animals are not conscious and then desperately concocting reasons to support that conclusion on the fly. I don't think you've really considered the concept and would be happier just accepting that notion.

That's a mistake in my opinion. You should challenge all your beliefs and come up with reasons for believing or disbelieving in various theories and classifications.


Most if not all primates show signs of consciousness. I don't know if they are conscious because who knows what that means in the first place. But as I've demonstrated by knocking down every single challenge you've put down as required they do "seem" to be conscious.

They are stupid... quite stupid by human standards. But they think... reason... and feel.

Oh really? What disorder would cause a person not to recognize themselves in the mirror yet leave them otherwise functional? Aside from blindness of course... And remember before you cite them that by "functional" we mean still "conscious". Is an insane person conscious? Is someone in a coma conscious?

*gets popcorn*

No, you cited a long winded weblink once that you refuse to condense into an actual definition. You say the definition is in there, yet you refuse to quote it.



Is subjective learning a term you just invented or does it actually exist? I looked it up and it doesn't seem to be related to anything you're talking about. I don't mind if you're making up terms, I'd just like to know before hand.

Really? Primates show an ability to problem solve without training. Slowly reasoning out problems. Expecting them to understand gravity is not a test of consciousness as it's a complex issue. Is consciousness simply your way of saying "intelligence"? Again, stupid humans often cannot understand simple concepts yet are still regarded as conscious. Does your definition say they are not?

Or do they remain conscious by virtue of being human?...

Primates learn. Some of them are tool users. Picking up a stick or bit of grass... tricking fire ants to bit the stick... and then eating the ants off the stick.


They were not shown how to do that. They figured that out on their own. Make sure that your tests make a distinction between intelligence and consciousness or explicitly link the two concepts together. Note that if you do link them I will turn that against stupid humans to demonstrate that your definition states that anyone with an IQ lower then X is not conscious and has a mind no better then some animals.


The idea that you were saying that everything a primate could learn was nothing more then Pavlov's dog didn't occur to me because it's so ridiculously wrong.

I continue to err in over estimating you... no offense.


Ok... this first qualification basically includes anything that responds to stimuli. That's pretty much all life on earth. Even plants.


Ok... little narrower then before... this still includes micro organisms though.


Ok good... now we're to the mirror test. So... most birds fail... but a lot qualify. Nearly all mammal qualify... there might be others as well.


... hmm... I think we're including insects in this... so that's broader then the last one. No real progress because anything that can pass the mirror test will pass this one.



This more hypothesizes future research rather then trying to define anything.


Again... insects would seem to qualify here.


Ok... so the most strenuous test was the self awareness test. Well, if you can recognize yourself in a mirror, then you're self aware. All primates pass, some birds, most mammals larger then a basketball in total volume.


Your definition came down on my side if anything. So... stop disagreeing. You just cited evidence that backed me.


And as I pointed out lots of animals qualify under the definition you just cited.



I addressed the cited qualifications. If you have additional ones, I'll check them out.


I'm not dodging. I'm nailing you down so you can't slip away... ironic that you would call me artful dodger. I am forcing you to define your argument so that you can't pretend it was something else five minutes later.

As to the circumstances. If you cited them all above, I showed that lots of life passes those tests. Not just humans. So I don't know what you think you're talking about. If you have additional conditions that you haven't listed... which are relevant... then cite them and we'll move forward.

As it stands, by your own definition primates are conscious. And to get back on topic somewhat, I said that AI's would not acquire rights simply because they were conscious. I said that only humans are given rights. Others said that we would give animals rights if they were conscious. I've just proved that point wrong by showing that by your own definitions many are conscious... and yet they do not have rights. I won't speak to the morality or immorality of this, it was just my point that intelligence and consciousness would not ensure or give them the right to fair treatment in human society.


My point is sustained unless you wish to offer further evidence.


Regards, Karmashock.

This is the most confusing thread ever, you guys have like 10 arguements going on at once and it seems that at one point in time the forum had a glitch and decided that for fun it would rearange all the posts. I mean I read the same thing over twice....

And mjl whatever that number is, IQ doesnt change with age. The only time it would change is if you suffered severe head injury, or if you had the potential of a high IQ and were in a deprived enviornment.

There are a few other reasons why your test results could be so funky. Either you purposefully didnt try your best on the test, or those tests werent given to you by a licensed psychiatrist. Plus, it also matters which one you take, cause each different test has its own scale and method. You need to give a little more info about it.

Would you please pull that poll out of your butt? did not the smily face tell you that it was a joke? Liten up will ya, before you give yourself a holier than thou, self righious stroke!

There's no need to be rude. I was just curious. Furthermore, what poll? And expecting me to get sarcasm or... whatever the nature of that joke is without some explicit cue isn't really reasonable through a text box. I could pick up on that in person through voice tone and we'd probably have better context. In any event, no need to be snappy.

I like LOL at this

I know... I'm trying to bring it back on topic a bit by bringing it back to AI's. Which is the only reason we started talking about consciousness. My point was that intelligence and consciousness doesn't give you elevated rights in human society... unless you're already human.


IQ tests are generally pretty unreliable and aren't well regarded in academic institutions for that reason. Furthermore, everyone I know that's taken one has had it change over time. I for example had ridiculously high IQ scores as a child... they had ot be wrong because I'm not that smart. I'm certain that if I took it again it would be something more believable... but it's too late. I already don't believe in those scores.


I went through about 2 days of testing. They tested everything. The only thing I scored badly on was short term memory. I have horrible short term memory. I have a digit span of 5... that means that means that I can't remember and manipulate more then 5 numbers reliably. I did well on everything else... but who cares... it's a stupid test.

There are countless supportive theories on that IQ do evaluated your intellectual potential. And IQ tests are still quite wide spread and regarded as a good way of defining a childs potential. Though most psychologist view them as counterproductive sometimes.

without posting a 10,000 word disertaion the point I am making is that you are mistaken, IQ does change with age. Your information that it does not change is mistaken.

WASHINGTON - A new mathematical model could help explain how certain environments can trigger changes in a person's IQ as well as the relative influence of genes and the environment on IQ by exploring how internal and external factors might interact. The model helps explain the puzzling finding that IQ scores have risen over time and suggests a larger environmental role in IQ than previously thought. The model and an extensive discussion appear in the April issue of Psychological Review, published by the American Psychological Association (APA). WWW Link

The Flynn effect, or IQ paradox, is simply the rise in mean IQ scores during the 20th century. The paper first goes into some detail on what intelligence is and how it is measured. Then a critical review and analysis of the Flynn effect and the Dickens-Flynn (2001) models is discussed. The basic idea of these models is that environment, with hereditary, influences IQ and IQ in return affects that environment. The conclusion is that the model may be appropriate for explaining the rise in IQ scores in future years but there is still major work that must be done on it. WWW Link

Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry
Vol. 23 Issue 1 Page 69 January 1982

CHANGES IN IQ, ENVIRONMENTAL AND INDIVIDUAL FACTORS: A FOLLOW-UP STUDY OF EDUCABLE MENTALLY RETARDED CHILDREN Dagmund Svendsen
WWW Link

IQ testing envionmental variances From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia WWW Link

Community and International Nutrition
Once-Weekly and 5-Days a Week Iron Supplementation Differentially Affect Cognitive Function but Not School Performance in Thai Children1
Rassamee Sungthong2, Ladda Mo-suwan*, Virasakdi Chongsuvivatwong and Alan F. Geater

Epidemiology Unit and * Department of Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine, Prince of Songkla University, Songkhla, 90110, Thailand
WWW Link

This should be enough reference material to show you the error. (at your age of 16 it is good you know as much as you do but do not think you know it all or that what you were once told is still known to be the truth. Knowlage changes with time and the addition of new knowlage.

happy reading

thats "snippy"   

did someone get snip snipped?