On 08 Jun 2015, at 00:00, LizR wrote:
On 8 June 2015 at 05:08, Bruno Marchal <marc...@ulb.ac.be> wrote:
On 07 Jun 2015, at 18:35, John Clark wrote:
On Sat, Jun 6, 2015 Bruno Marchal <marc...@ulb.ac.be> wrote:
>> An event is just a place and a time; are you saying that
mathematics is incapable of handling 4 coordinates?
> Of course, applied mathematics exists, and you can represent
event in mathematics, but you shopuld not confuse something (a
physical event) and its mathematical representation.
I am not confusing that but I think sometimes you might be
confusing a physical thing with the language (mathematics) the
descriptive representation of the thing is presented in. Or maybe
not, maybe you're right and mathematics is more than just a
language and is more fundamental than physics; nobody knows
including you.
Nobody can know. But we can reason from hypothesis. With the
computationalist hypothesis, the immateriality of consciousness is
contagious on the possible environment. Nobody pretends this is
obvious, especially for people stuck at the step 3.
The question being asked is, why hypothesis best explains
consciousness? Comp attempts to take the default materialist
assumption, that consciousness is a (very, very complicated) form of
computation, and to derive results from that assumption.
The materialist assumption is that there is a primitive physical
universe, and that we are conscious because we have a phsical body
containing a computer doing relevant computation. This is shown to be
an epistemological nonsense, or to be based on a god-of-the-gap type
of move.
The way I define comp1 is a much weaker hypothesis, a priori neutral.
It is the hypothesis that my consciousness does not change if my brain
is replaced by a digital physical brain emulating my brain at some
level. It is ontologically neutral (matter is not taken as primitively
existing).
Then, the goal is not to explain consciousness per se, but to show
that any explanation of consciousness will necessitate an entire
explanation of the physical appearance without using the assumption of
primitive matter. UDA shows that the materialist assumption is
incompatible with the computationalist one, even when used in that
weak sense. Consciousness itself is then explained by computer
science, but that is done in AUDA, not in UDA, which strictly speaking
just expose the problem.
Hence what I've called comp1 is the default materialist hypothesis
(also known as the strong AI thesis, I think)
Comp1 is not comp, even if it is "comp" for a materialist: but that
position is proved to be nonsense.
Comp is just "I am a digitalizable machine".
String AI is the thesis that machine can think (be conscious). It does
not logically entail comp. Machine can think, but does not need to be
the only thinking entities. Gods and goddesses might be able to think
too.
- this is more or less equivalent to the idea that a computer could,
given a suitable programme and resources, be conscious. From this
Bruno attempts to show, via a chain of reasoning, that the
computations involved have to take place in arithmetical reality
("Platonia").
Hmm.... Let us be precise. That the computation take place in
arithmetic is a mathematical fact that nobody doubt today. UDA
explains only that we cannot use a notion of primitive matter for
making "more real" some computations in place of others. It makes the
physics supervening on "all computations in arithmetic".
This conclusion I call comp2. The task of anyone who disagrees is
simply to show that comp2 doesn't follow from comp1.
There are various ways to try to show this. One is to doubt the
starting assumptions ("comp1"). The starting assumptions include the
idea that simple arithmetic exists independently of mathematicians -
that 2+2=4 was true in the big bang, for example.
I always intuit that you get the thing, but express it in a slightly
misleading way. To say that 2+2=4 was true in the big bang does not
really make sense, as an arithmetical proposition is true "out of time
and space". mathematical propositions are not depending on physics.
The universe appears to obey certain bits of methematics to high
precision, or alternatively you could say that various bits of maths
appear to correctly describe the behaviour of the universe and its
constituents to high precision. So that is the "which comes first?"
question, which as you correctly say we can't know (indeed we can't
know anything, if "know" means justified true belief, apart from the
fact that we are conscious, as Descartes mentioned).
Why? If you define to know by true belief, then we might be able to
know things. may be we do know that 2+2=4, because we believe it, and
it might also be true.
(It is my fault, because someone I use "to know" in the non
theaetetical sense of "know for sure".
So one can doubt comp1 by doubting either that consciousness is a
computation,
Consciousness is NEVER a computation. An 1p thing is never a 3p thing.
You can associate consciousness to a computation, but you can't
identify them.
It is the same with number. You can represent the number 2 by two
pebbles on a table. But you cannot use two pebbles to prevent the
number two to be represented by many other pairs, including purely
mathematical one like the set { {} {{}} }.
or that maths exists independently of mathematicians.
That even just arithmetical truth is independent of mathematician.
This is important because everyone agree with any axiomatic of the
numbers, but that is not the case for analysis, real numbers, etc.
Then one can doubt the steps of the argument. I personally find
little to doubt, assuming comp1, until we reach step 7 or 8, or
whichever step is the MGA. (There has been a lot of heat about
pronouns, but as far as I can see this hasn't made a dent in the
arguments presented.)
Thanks for reassuring me.
So the other main point of attack is at the comp2 end, so to speak,
with the MGA.
The reversal occurs already at step seven. MGA is for those cutting
the air, and it shows that to avoid step 7's consequence people have
to introduce a non Turing emulable property of matter, or a god-of-the-
gap (hardly Turing emulable itself). But then comp1 is made false.
There is Brent's "light cone" argument, which IMHO seems
unconvincing because one can make a "cut" between a brain and the
world along the sensory nerves - this is basically saying that a
person could be a brain in a vat, and never know it. But it also
fails if one can in theory have an AI, because an AI is by
hyopthesis a digital machine and could therefore could be re-run and
given the same inputs, and due to the nature of computation would
have to repeat the same conscious experiences.
In the 3-1 view, but the 1-view itself is not duplicated from its own
1p view.
And then that description falls foul of Bruno/Maudlin's argument
about leeching away the material support for the computation until
it is turned into a replayed recording. At this point we can use
"Russell's paradox" - sorry, I mean argument - that a recording of
such complexity may indeed be conscious. The MGA seems to hand-wave
a bit about this whole process - like the Chinese room, we "simply"
record the activities of the processing devices and then "simply'
project the movie onto the system, and so on, leaving aside the Vast
size of the envisaged apparatus. Nevertheless, if we assume comp1
then we assume by hypothesis that a recording isn't conscious (only
a computation can be conscious, according to comp1). So that's
really a comp1 objection.
Yes, that would entails magic in comp. Comp1 is really that we survive
only because we keep the relevant computations instantiated in the
relative way. But eventually consciousness is no more attached to one
computation, but to all computations going through my current state.
This disperses us in arithmetic, and this disperses our computations
into a continuum, as the computations dovetail on the real number
inputs too.
So the question in the end is which is the most reasonable
hypothesis. How does materialism explain consciousness? How does
comp explain the appearance of a material universe?
Materalism failed to explain consciousness, and usually just hide the
problem, our use comp1, but then we get comp2.
Then comp1 explain consciousness by showing that machine which
introspect meets concept obeying to the usual semi-axiomatic of
consciousness, qualia, etc. That is done precisely in the machine's
interview (AUDA).
I hope this helps a little bit,
Bruno
Over to you.
--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
Groups "Everything List" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it,
send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com.
Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/
--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
"Everything List" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email
to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com.
Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
