Is Matter Conscious?
There&#x27;s no reason to believe so.<p>Advancements in CS, AI, biology, and general models of intelligence are slowly bringing us to the point where consciousness is no longer a mystery to the enlightened. One of my favorite researchers in general AI is Professor Schmidhuber, who has pioneered some of the (currently) more practical areas of machine learning, too: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;people.idsia.ch&#x2F;~juergen&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;people.idsia.ch&#x2F;~juergen&#x2F;</a><p>Even when we create self-aware machines that can demonstrate generalized intelligence, I think most people will struggle to come to terms with what consciousness is (or more so, what it isn&#x27;t). My spin on it: consciousness isn&#x27;t real; it&#x27;s a necessary perceived byproduct of &#x27;everything else.&#x27;<p>I believe Schmidhuber said it more elegantly, describing consciousness as a result of data compression.