Ifeel that Iam apartof, but separatefrom an 'out there' world. 2. Ifeel that my perception of the world mingles with feelings of past experience. 3. My experienceof the world is selective and purposeful. 4. I am thinking ahead allthe timeintrying ...

This paper relates to a formal statement of the mechanisms that are thought minimally necessary to underpin consciousness. This is expressed in the form of axioms. We deem this to be useful if there is ever to be clarity in answering questions about whether this or the other organism is or is not conscious. As usual, axioms are ways of making formal statements of intuitive beliefs and looking, again formally, at the consequences of such beliefs. The use of this style (...) of exposition does not entail a claim to provide a mathematically rigorous formal deductive system. Conventional mathematical notation is used to achieve clarity, although this is elaborated with natural language in an attempt to reduce terseness. In our view, making the approach axiomatic is synonymous with building clear usable tests for consciousness and is therefore a central feature of the paper. The extended scope of this approach is to lay down some essential properties that should be considered when designing machines that could be said to be conscious. In the broader discussion about the nature of consciousness and its neurological mechanisms, it may seem to some that axiomatisation is premature and continues to beg many questions. However, the approach is meant to be open- ended so that others can build further axiomatic clarifications that address the very large number of questions which, in the search for a formal basis for consciousness, still remain to be answered. Of course, in discussions about consciousness many will also argue that the subject is not one that may ever be formally addressed by means of axioms. The view taken in this paper is 'let's try to do it and see how far it gets'. (shrink)

This paper looks closely at previously enunciated axioms that specifically include phenomenology as the sense of a self in a perceptual world. This, we suggest, is an appropriate way of doing science on a first-person phenomenon. The axioms break consciousness down into five key components: presence, imagination, attention, volition and emotions. The paper examines anew the mechanism of each and how they interact to give a single sensation. An abstract architecture, the Kernel Architecture, is introduced as a starting point for (...) building computational models. The thrust of the paper is to relate the axioms to the kernel architecture and indicate that this opens a way of discussing some first-person issues: tests for consciousness, animal consciousness and Higher Order Thought. (shrink)

In the period between Turing’s 1950 “Computing Machinery and Intelligence” and the current considerable public exposure to the term “artificial intelligence ”, Turing’s question “Can a machine think?” has become a topic of daily debate in the media, the home, and, indeed, the pub. However, “Can a machine think?” is sliding towards a more controversial issue: “Can a machine be conscious?” Of course, the two issues are linked. It is held here that consciousness is a pre-requisite to thought. In Turing’s (...) imitation game, a conscious human player is replaced by a machine, which, in the first place, is assumed not to be conscious, and which may fool an interlocutor, as consciousness cannot be perceived from an individual’s speech or action. Here, the developing paradigm of machine consciousness is examined and combined with an extant analysis of living consciousness to argue that a conscious machine is feasible, and capable of thinking. The route to this utilizes learning in a “neural state machine”, which brings into play Turing’s view of neural “unorganized” machines. The conclusion is that a machine of the “unorganized” kind could have an artificial form of consciousness that resembles the natural form and that throws some light on its nature. (shrink)

Impossible Minds: My Neurons, My Consciousness has been written to satisfy the curiosity each and every one of us has about our own consciousness. It takes the view that the neurons in our heads are the source of consciousness and attempts to explain how this happens. Although it talks of neural networks, it explains what they are and what they do in such a way that anyone may understand. While the topic is partly philosophical, the text makes no assumptions of (...) prior knowledge of philosophy; and so contains easy excursions into the important ideas of philosophy that may be missing in the education of a computer scientist. The approach is pragmatic throughout; there are many references to material on experiments that were done in our laboratories. The first edition of the book was written to introduce curious readers to the way that the consciousness we all enjoy might depend on the networks of neurons that make up the brain. In this second edition, it is recognized that these arguments still stand, but that they have been taken much further by an increasing number of researchers. A post-script has now been written for each chapter to inform the reader of these developments and provide an up-to-date bibliography. A new epilogue has been written to summarize the state-of-the art of the search for consciousness in neural automata, for researchers in computation, students of philosophy, and anyone who is fascinated by what is one of the most engaging scientific endeavours of the day. This book also tells a story. A story of a land where people think that they are automata without much in the way of consciousness, a story of cormorants and cliffs by the sea, a story of what it might be like to be a conscious machine... (shrink)

While the recent special issue of JCS on machine consciousness (Volume 14, Issue 7) was in preparation, a collection of papers on the same topic, entitled Artificial Consciousness and edited by Antonio Chella and Riccardo Manzotti, was published. 1 The editors of the JCS special issue, Ron Chrisley, Robert Clowes and Steve Torrance, thought it would be a timely and productive move to have authors of papers in their collection review the papers in the Chella and Manzotti book, and include (...) these reviews in the special issue of the journal. Eight of the JCS authors (plus Uziel Awret) volunteered to review one or more of the fifteen papers in Artificial Consciousness; these individual reviews were then collected together with a minimal amount of editing to produce a seamless chapter-by-chapter review of the entire book. Because the number and length of contributions to the JCS issue was greater than expected, the collective review of Artificial Con- sciousness had to be omitted, but here at last it is. Each paper’s review is written by a single author, so any comments made may not reflect the opinions of all nine of the joint authors! (shrink)

This paper critically tracks the impact of the development of the machine consciousness paradigm from the incredulity of the 1990s to the structuring of the turn of this century, and the consolidation of the present time which forms the basis for guessing what might happen in the future. The underlying question is how this development may have changed our understanding of consciousness and whether an artificial version of the concept contributes to the improvement of computational machinery and robots. The paper (...) includes some suggestions for research that might be profitable and others that may not be. (shrink)

L’article décrit les efforts employés par ceux qui travaillent sur des machines et des analyses informationnelles afin de fournir des clés de compréhension de la conscience et des hypothèses sur les moyens nécessaires à la fabrication d’une machine consciente. Le texte mentionne certaines origines de ces considérations et fait le compte rendu des contributions de plusieurs chercheurs. Une distinction est établie entre les approches fonctionnelles et phénoménologiques. Les premières mènent aux méthodes algorithmiques fondées sur la programmation conventionnelle, tandis que les (...) secondes mènent aux analyses du réseau neural. Le texte attire l’attention sur de nombreuses questions ouvertes suscitées par cette approche et comporte des réflexions sur des travaux futurs. (shrink)

Igor Aleksander and Helen B. Morton, Int. J. Mach. Conscious. 06, 67 (2014). DOI: 10.1142/S1793843014400113.

Much discussion on the singularity is based on the assumption that the design ability of a human can be transferred into an AI system, then rendered autonomous and self-improving. I argue here that this cannot be foreseen from the current state of the art of automatic or evolutionary design. Assuming that this will happen 'some day' is a doubtful step andmay be in the class of 'searching for the Philosopher's Stone'.