in regards to intelligence, we can question boththe extent to which more neurons are correlated with intelligence and whether more intelligence in fact predicts greater moral weight;
many ways of arguing that more neurons results in more valenced consciousness seem incompatible with our current understanding of how the brain is likely to work; and
there is no straightforward empirical evidence or compelling conceptual arguments indicating that relative differences in neuron counts within or between species reliably predicts welfare relevant functional capacities.
I use neuron counts as a very rough proxy for the information processing complexity of a given organism. I do make some assumptions, like that more sophisticated information processing enables more complex emotional states, things like memory, which compounds suffering across time, and so on.
It makes sense to me that sentience is probably on some kind of continuum, rather than an arbitrary threshold. I place things like photo-diodes on the bottom of this continuum and highly sophisticated minds like humans near the top, but I’ll admit I don’t have accurate numbers for a “sentience rating”.
I hold my views on neuron counts being an acceptable proxy mostly because of what I learned from studying Cognitive Science in undergrad and then doing a Master’s Thesis on Neural Networks. This doesn’t make me an expert, but it means I formed my own opinions and disagree with the RP post somewhat. I have not had the time to formulate substantive objections in a rebuttal however. Most of my posts on these forums are relatively low-effort.
What do you think of RP’s work (mostly) against using neuron counts? From the summary:
(Also this more specific hypothesis.)
I use neuron counts as a very rough proxy for the information processing complexity of a given organism. I do make some assumptions, like that more sophisticated information processing enables more complex emotional states, things like memory, which compounds suffering across time, and so on.
It makes sense to me that sentience is probably on some kind of continuum, rather than an arbitrary threshold. I place things like photo-diodes on the bottom of this continuum and highly sophisticated minds like humans near the top, but I’ll admit I don’t have accurate numbers for a “sentience rating”.
I hold my views on neuron counts being an acceptable proxy mostly because of what I learned from studying Cognitive Science in undergrad and then doing a Master’s Thesis on Neural Networks. This doesn’t make me an expert, but it means I formed my own opinions and disagree with the RP post somewhat. I have not had the time to formulate substantive objections in a rebuttal however. Most of my posts on these forums are relatively low-effort.