>> I remember thinking about this after reading Godel esher bach. The reason I don't believe it's clearly probable is that it's hard to imagine that a system that hasn't been forged under as much natural selection to have much intentionality. And it's hard to imagine consciousness without that.
I too thought of G.E.B. wasn't there a story in there where someone was talking to an ant colony? Not the ants, but the colony as a whole. I've long considered the similarity between cells:people and people:society. A society can have behaviors and a sort of personality. Consciousness seems a stretch, but not impossible. The thing I tend to think more about is cancer, or the fact that a person can pick a scab or that people with various psychological issues can harm themselves or parts of themselves (see cutting, eating disorders, etc).
I too thought of G.E.B. wasn't there a story in there where someone was talking to an ant colony? Not the ants, but the colony as a whole. I've long considered the similarity between cells:people and people:society. A society can have behaviors and a sort of personality. Consciousness seems a stretch, but not impossible. The thing I tend to think more about is cancer, or the fact that a person can pick a scab or that people with various psychological issues can harm themselves or parts of themselves (see cutting, eating disorders, etc).