Philosophy of Science

[Protozoa]

@Aylen
So basically, in the Bobiverse (lol), they can scan the brain of a person, effectively destroying their brain, but transcoding their brain into procedural software. This software can be run without inputs and given various inputs, controls, and modifications. All the while the subject is aware, while its going on. But they know how the brain functions in order to do this.

So blind people can paint objects with perspective, despite never having seen anything with their eyes. So the understanding of perspective was already encoded into the brain. And the brain has a unique structure all on its own, independent from input. Think of it as being in a sensory deprivation tank, but you raise someone up from birth like that, metaphorically speaking, in order to study its structure. And they don't really know what's going on and wouldn't feel pain because the brain has no pain receptors. I mean wouldn't it still be aware though? And wouldn't a software version of that also be just as aware? Is there a difference? Is one somehow more ethical than the other? Are we just meatbags when it's all said and done?

[Aylen]

@Aylen
So basically, in the Bobiverse (lol), they can scan the brain of a person, effectively destroying their brain, but transcoding their brain into procedural software. This software can be run without inputs and given various inputs, controls, and modifications. All the while the subject is aware, while its going on. But they know how the brain functions in order to do this.

So blind people can paint objects with perspective, despite never having seen anything with their eyes. So the understanding of perspective was already encoded into the brain. And the brain has a unique structure all on its own, independent from input. Think of it as being in a sensory deprivation tank, but you raise someone up from birth like that, metaphorically speaking, in order to study its structure. And they don't really know what's going on and wouldn't feel pain because the brain has no pain receptors. I mean wouldn't it still be aware though? And wouldn't a software version of that also be just as aware? Is there a difference? Is one somehow more ethical than the other? Are we just meatbags when it's all said and done?

Well, I believe in an animating force. I am not willing to say that an animating force would reside within a lab grown brain so yeah it is probably ethical on some level. It is still gross and unnecessary since I believe that we are past that kind of "science". It would be like a step backwards or something.

Blind people who produce art are fascinating but they still have access to some senses that apparently are stronger due to the brain rewiring to make up for their blindness. You don't need eyes to "see".

This groundbreaking work explores how children and adults who have been blind since birth can both perceive and draw pictures. John M. Kennedy, a perception psychologist, relates how pictures in raised form can be understood by the blind, and how untrained blind people can make recognizable sketches of objects, situations, and events using new methods for raised-line drawing. According to Kennedy, the ability to draw develops in blind people as it does in the sighted. His book gives detailed descriptions of his work with the blind, includes many pictures by blind children and adults, and provides a new theory of visual and tactile perception--applicable to both the blind and the sighted--to account for his startling findings. Kennedy argues that spatial perception is possible through touch as well as through sight, and that aspects of perspective are found in pictures by the blind. He shows that blind people recognize when pictures of objects are drawn incorrectly. According to Kennedy, the incorrect features are often deliberate attempts to represent properties of objects that cannot be shown in a picture. These metaphors, as Kennedy describes them, can be interpreted by the blind and the sighted in the same way. Kennedy's findings are vitally important for studies in perceptual and cognitive psychology, the philosophy of representation, and education. His conclusions have practical significance as well, offering inspiration and guidelines for those who seek to engineer ways to allow blind and visually impaired people to gain access to information only available in graphs, figures, and pictures.
https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/handle/1807/1021

I am not familiar with the Bobiverse, sorry.