Consciousness (Human, animal, etc) Can Exist Without a Brain

I'm really sorry champ, I'm going to be a bit busy for the rest of the day and I don't think I'll get much more time to write so I can't wait any longer. As per the comments section, if you post them while I'm writing this, I'll definitely take a look at them.To condense a long argument, essentially what you're talking about is the physical conditions to which brains adhere (i.e. neurons and action potentials versus bits, plus statistical vs. exact processing). You argue that futurists like Kurzweil predict that we will be able to reverse-engineer the brain (which is currently being worked on). You then discussed the architectural constraints of and that the hope is to one day acquire sufficient technological advancement so as to be able to build an conscious computer. You then readdressed the Turing Test.Firstly, the old metaphor of the computer-brain model is, in fact, going out of favour. There are several problems with the model which include: the brain uses content-addressable memory, facilitated by spreading-activation, not polling precise memory addresses(1). I contend that this will be almost impossible to replicate in a computer, and if it can, this will still only model consciousness. In the same article, the author addresses the contention that synapses are similar to logic gates. He argues that there are moderating factors, like distance to dendrites and and the presence of a variety of chemicals in the synaptic cleft. Essentially, neurons fire electrochemically, not just electrically(1)[see point #7].Secondly, asking a machine "how do you fell?" will return the same result as any other question posed to a computer with a preset answer. This cannot be used to determine the consciousness of an inanimate object. I can write the same type of thing in QBasic, that doesn't mean that Basic is conscious.Thirdly, it is an appeal to authority to say "Ray Kurzweil predicted it, so therefore it is true". While having previously made accurate, independently demonstrable and specific predictions in the past may be a good reason to agree to consider the evidence provided by the person, it does not make them infallible. Linus Pauling, two-time Nobel Prize Laureate and a founder of quantum chemistry and molecular biology, began claiming that vitamin c could cure colds and cancer. This is where the commonly misheld belief that vitamin c is good for you when you're sick comes from. The medical establishment analysed this and concluded it was quackery(2). This does not discredit his initial work but it does serve to illustrate the fallibility of 'authorities'.The analogy with attractiveness and the police officer was obviously facetious and and not supposed to be an inerrant model of truth-prediction. However, I actually still think my model is valid, because whether or not I am a policeman is determined not so much by social proclamation, but a very specific set of criteria. My occupation is not determined by whether other people think I am a something or not. Also, I reject that the assignment of 'titles and jobs' is arbitrary. We have those titles and jobs for a reason; they distinguish between individuals. You've again come back to the solipsism thing. I don't have to experience another person's consciousness to know that they are conscious. I do not have to experience Russia to know that it's often freaking cold there. Further, I assert that if your argument is correct that,"[u]nless you experience the consciousness that a machine experiences, or you experience the consciousness another human experiences, you will have to settle that both are an illusion of consciousness" then you will have no way of assessing that the computer is conscious, and are therefore incorrect in making the assertion that "Consciousness can exist without a human brain". Not necessarily because it isn't the case, but because by your own admission you could never know it to be the case.This debate has been interesting. We have heard the argument that AI and artificial brains are being constructed, which could one day give us the key to understanding consciousness. I assert that just because you have built a brain that is mechanically and/or biologically similar to or the same as a human brain, this is no grounds for assumption of its consciousness. All the evidence that we have suggests that minds are molded over years through learning and rearing as children, through developmental phases and physical growth in brain tissue as new experiences and skills arise. Perhaps I'm wrong, and one day we'll see a conscious computer...but we have no good reason to think this is the case, and so the assertion that "Consciousness CAN exist without a brain" is unjustifiable, and false. (1) 10 Important Differences Between Brains and Computers, Chris Chatham, accessible at: [http://scienceblogs.com...] point #2(2)[http://en.wikipedia.org...]