zlacker

Given that you have to admit you do not understand the subject (what it means to be conscious), none of what you said has bearing (aside from being interesting, I appreciate the response). And you must admit to that, since this is neither philosophically nor scientifically solved.

As we do not understand our own consciousness and how it functions (or whether or not it functions in me the way it does in you, if it exists at all - anywhere), we cannot compare a replication of that system to ourselves except as a black box. When seen as a black box, a philosophical zombie and a sapient individual are identical.

>>krageo+(OP)
The fact that we don't understand it now does not imply that it can't ever be understood.

A black box is something we don't have access to its inner workings. We can probe and inquire the working brain. It's just really hard and we've been working at it for a few decades only (dissecting a dead brain before powerful microscopes gives you very little insight).

Unless you share the Zen-like opinion that a brain can't understand itself, which I don't, and seems like an issue of faith as well and a dead end.

>>tambou+q4
All I am saying is that it is not understood, so any reasoning that fundamentally relies on understanding it is premature. Perhaps we will one day understand it (which I think is perfectly possible), but that day is not today.