Re: Are First Person prime?
Le 09-août-06, à 12:46, 1Z a écrit : Timeless universe, universes where everything that can exist does exist, are not well founded empirically. So we should understand that you would criticize any notion, sometimes brought by physicists, of block-universe. Time would be a primitive? What about relativist notion of space-time? BTW I agree with most of your post (of 09/08/2006) to David. At the same time I'm astonished that you seem attracted by the idea of making time a primitive one. I know that some respectable physicists do that (Prigogine, Bohm in some sense), but many physicist does not (Einstein, ...). Of course it is more easy to explain that consciousness supervene on number relations to someone who already accept consciousness could supervene to a block-universe than to someone who want time (or consciousness, or first person notion) to be primitive. Of course I believe that once we assume the comp hyp. there is no more choice in the matter. Let me comment your other post in the same reply (to avoid mail box explosion). The non-existence of HP universes still doesn't disprove comp. It shows we con't live in abig universe, whether a big phsyical univere or a big Platonia. Nice. It means you get the seven steps of the 8-steps version of the UDA. (Universal Dovetailer Argument). Thanks for resending the 15-steps version of it, it can help. Now I think that my SANE paper, which contains the 8 steps version of the UDA, is, despite minor errors, the closest english version of my Lille thesis, and even better with respect to readability. (Except that it lacks, like the 15 steps version) the movie-graph argument). Available here in html or pdf: http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/publications/ SANE2004MARCHALAbstract.html Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Are First Person prime?
Le 09-août-06, à 18:08, Colin Geoffrey Hales a écrit : Platonia has not been instantiated. Our universe has. The problem with such a conception is that it seems to need a form of dualism between Plato Heaven and terrestrial realities. With the comp hyp, all there is is (arithmetical) Platonia. Instanciation is relative and appears from inside. Being the stuff, the substrate. It's the only thing actually instantiated. This seems, imo, contradicts what you I remember you said somewhere else (or I'm wrong?), mainly when you say, in a monist frame, that everything is relational. The fact is that there is no such thing as a 'third person'. Ontologically ? No, experientially. Nobody experiences 'third person'. Everybody has a 1st person experience only. There is no such thing as an objective view. I think that many people confuse third person view and 0 person view. I will probably (try to) clarify this in the roadmap-summary. I agree there is no objective *view*, but I think there is a notion of objective reality, although such a reality is not necessarily knowable as such. Furthermore it also seems to have us duped that further considerations of mathematical idealisations and abstractions in general likewise tells us something about the composition of the actual underlying natural world for example that it is the result of a computer running one of our abstractions. With comp I would say we can prove that the composition of the underlying world have to emerge, NOT as the result of a computer running one of our abstractions (like in Schmidhuber's theory for example) but on all possible computations existing in Platonia, and well defined through that miraculous Church's thesis. The quantum would emerge from digitalness seen from digital entity. Physical realities would be number theoretical realities as seen by relative numbers. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Are First Person prime?
Le 09-août-06, à 18:12, Tom Caylor a écrit : Bruno Marchal wrote: Of course I have a problem with the word universe and especially with the expression being inside a universe. The reason is that I think comp forces us to accept we are supported by an infinity of computations and that the 1-(plural and singular) appearance of the universe emerges from that. cf UDA. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ I haven't been following this thread, but this caught my attention. Bruno, how can you have a real problem with something based on the fact that it seems to contradict the comp assumption? I thought that you make a point to stress that you only assume comp for purposes of argument to see where it leads. You are right. It is just that I feel somehow guilty to always mention the comp. hyp. From now on, you should always interpret me, when I say I think ..., by we can proved under the comp. assumption that Are you implying that you personally have faith in comp to the point that words that don't agree with the comp assumption actually give you a problem? Or is the problem caused by a personal belief that is outside of the comp assumption, but that is manifested when talking about comp, if you follow me? About my personal opinion on comp, I am still going through the four days: The good one where I hope that comp is true and believe that comp is true; or when I hope comp to be false, and I believe it to be false. The bad one where it is the reverse. The problem is that comp almost entails such oscillations. Indeed, although I do not insist on that point I must admit there is something a little bit diabolical in comp (and which is similar to some godelian sentence) which is that comp predicts that the first person attached to a machine really cannot believe or know that comp is true. Strictly speaking comp is unbelievable. No consistent machine can take comp for granted, and that is why eventually saying yes to a doctor (for an artificial body) have to be based on an act of faith (and that is also why I think it is better (more honest) to put comp in theology rather than in, say, psychology, like I was used to do before our conversation-thread on theology. It is diabolical in the sense that when someone tell me I don't believe in comp, well, strictly speaking, he confirms comp (but I *must* remain silent, or else I have to be more explicit on the G/G* differentiation and the way to translate the comp hyp itself in the language of arithmetic, but for this I have to dwelve a little bit more in the technics). Bruno PS Apology for letting you with some unsolved problem concerning the Wi and the Fi. I propose we come back on this latter (OK?). Meanwhile I suggest you could read the wonderful introduction to recursion theory made by N. J. Cutland, which is quite readable by undergraduate in math: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0521294657/103-1630254-7840640? redirect=true I see you can buy it together with the bible of recursion theory, the book by Hartley Rogers, which, imo, is the book which exploits in the best possible manner Church's Thesis. http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Can we ever know truth?
Hi Norman, It has been said that dreams provide the royal (and oldest) path to metaphysics and doubt. What you are saying here is behind the key of the 6th steps of the UDA argument. Although nowadays video games + some amount of imagination can be a good substitute for dream. Now I am not sure why you say that you can only assume that reality is how things appear to you. I think that this is an Aristotelian prejudice. It is OK if you are thinking about some first person (incorrigible) reality, but you can infer (interrogatively at least) that such a personal reality is a symptom of a more independent reality lying beyond, like the platonist one. And then with the comp hyp you can even assume that that reality is Pythagorean, where there are only numbers and number theoretical relations. Bruno Le 09-août-06, à 18:53, Norman Samish a écrit : In a discussion about philosophy, Nick Prince said, If we are living in a simulation. . . To which John Mikes replied, I think this is the usual pretension. . . I think 'we simulate what we are living in' according to the little we know. Such 'simulation' - 'simplification' - 'modeling' - 'metaphorizing' - or even 'Harry Potterizing' things we think does not change the 'unknown/unknowable' we live in. We just think and therefore we think we are. This interchange reminded me of thoughts I had as a child - I used to wonder if if everything I experienced was real or a dream. How could I know which it was? I asked my parents and was discouraged, in no uncertain terms, from asking them nonsensical questions. I asked my playmates and friends, but they didn't know the answer any more than I did. I had no other resources so I concluded that the question was unanswerable and that the best I could do was proceed as if what I experienced was reality. Now, many years later, I have this list - and Wikipedia - as resources. But, as John Mikes (and others) say, I still cannot know that what I experience is reality. I can only assume that reality is how things appear to me - and I might be wrong. Norman Samish http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Quantum Weirdness
Le 09-août-06, à 21:00, Norman Samish wrote (to Colin): Thank you, Colin Hales. I believe your remarks apply to any theory. Theories are descriptions of what we think reality may be - they are not reality. You cannot be sure of that either. Perhaps some theory *can* be exact, and then as David Deutsch put it, in any case, we need to take our theory seriously enough so that we are able to find them wrong, in case they are wrong (and refutable). Note also that if you say yes to a doctor, it is not a theory nor a model of your brain that he will put in your skull, but you (assuming comp and assuming the doctor is lucky enough through his/her choice of substitution level). Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
RE: Interested in thoughts on this excerpt from Martin Rees
Bruno Marchal writes (quoting SP): ...a controlled experiment in which measure can be turned up and down leaving everything else the same, such as having an AI running on several computers in perfect lockstep. I think that the idea that a lower measure OM will appear more complex is a consequence of Komogorov like ASSA theories (a-la Hal Finney, Mallah, etc.). OK? I understand the basic principle, but I have trouble getting my mind around the idea of defining a measure when every possible computation exists. I am not sure I understand. All real number exist, for example, and it is the reason why we can put a measure on it. All computations exist (this is equivalent with arithmetical realism) yet some are or at least could be relatively more frequent than others. Sure, but it's the details that are mind-boggling. Why do dog-computations bark and cat-computations meow? If there is a definite mathematical answer how do we even begin to fathom it? Or would you go the reductionist route of starting with basic physical laws, on which chemistry, biology, psychology etc. are built, the more basic sciences supporting the less basic? I agree from some 1 pov. But 1 plural pov here would lead to some Bell inequalities violation. That is: sharable experiments which shows indirectly the presence of some alternate computations. I don't understand this statement. I am suggesting that the computers are running exactly the same program - same circuitry, same software, same initial conditions, all on a classical scale. I don't see that there is any way for the AI to know which computer he was running on (if that question is even meaningful) or how many computers were running. I know it looks counterintuitive, but an AI can know which computer is running and how many they are. It is a consequence of comp, and the UDA shows why. The answer is: the computer which is running are the relative universal number which exist in arithmetical platonia (arithmetical truth is already a universal video game, if you want, and it is the simplest). How many are they? 2^aleph_zero. I have already explain it here: http://www.mail-archive.com/everything-list@eskimo.com/msg05272.html It is a key point and we can come back on it if you have some difficulties. Well now I'm confused! I thought the whole point of the earlier part of the UDA as discussed in the cited post (and many others of yours) is that you *can't* know the details of your implementation, such as what type of computer you are being run on, how fast it is running, if there are arbitrary delays in the program, and so on. Are you now saying that if I am being run on the 3rd of 100 PC's in the basement of the local university computer science department, but everyone is keeping this a secret from me, there is a way I can figure out what's going on all by myself?! If I were the AI the only advantage I can think of in having multiple computers running is for backup in case some of them broke down; beyond that, I wouldn't care if there were one copy or a million copies of me running in parallel. Except, as I said above, for the relative probabilities. But this is equivalent with accepting a well done back-up will not change your normal measure. Yes, I think what you mean by relative probabilities is that if there were several possible versions of me next moment, then I would be more likely to experience the one with higher measure. It is only relative to the other possibilities that measure makes a subjective difference. Ah but you get the point now! So, as long as this *relative* measure does not come into play, the absolute measure makes no difference? Stathis Papaioannou _ Be one of the first to try Windows Live Mail. http://ideas.live.com/programpage.aspx?versionId=5d21c51a-b161-4314-9b0e-4911fb2b2e6d --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Interested in thoughts on this excerpt from Martin Rees
Le 10-août-06, à 14:16, Stathis Papaioannou wrote : Bruno: I am not sure I understand. All real number exist, for example, and it is the reason why we can put a measure on it. All computations exist (this is equivalent with arithmetical realism) yet some are or at least could be relatively more frequent than others. Stathis: Sure, but it's the details that are mind-boggling. Why do dog-computations bark and cat-computations meow? If there is a definite mathematical answer how do we even begin to fathom it? I think there is a definite (but necessarily partial) mathematical answer once we assume the comp hyp. It seems to me that the UD argument explains informally what shape this mathematical answer could have: a measure problem. Now I am not sure I understand why you don't see it. This is because I can infer by most of your posts that you handle well the relevant thought experiments. You certainly convince me I should explain more about the UDA in the roadmap-summary, before explaining the lobian interview. Or would you go the reductionist route of starting with basic physical laws, on which chemistry, biology, psychology etc. are built, the more basic sciences supporting the less basic? Except that the UDA is supposed to help to understand that the basic-ness of science could be the other way round: psychology/theology being more fundamental than physics. I hope I will be clear on that. I have put a first version of the roadmap in the trash, because it was too long and at the same time it was not even addressing some difficulties which I am guessing many people have through your post. It is hard because I try to write a short text, and simultaneously I try to anticipate the sort of objections I find reasonable through my reading of the current many posts on the notion of persons. I know it looks counterintuitive, but an AI can know which computer is running and how many they are. It is a consequence of comp, and the UDA shows why. The answer is: the computer which is running are the relative universal number which exist in arithmetical platonia (arithmetical truth is already a universal video game, if you want, and it is the simplest). How many are they? 2^aleph_zero. I have already explain it here: http://www.mail-archive.com/everything-list@eskimo.com/msg05272.html It is a key point and we can come back on it if you have some difficulties. Well now I'm confused! I thought the whole point of the earlier part of the UDA as discussed in the cited post (and many others of yours) is that you *can't* know the details of your implementation, such as what type of computer you are being run on, how fast it is running, if there are arbitrary delays in the program, and so on. Are you now saying that if I am being run on the 3rd of 100 PC's in the basement of the local university computer science department, but everyone is keeping this a secret from me, there is a way I can figure out what's going on all by myself?! Did you read my old post to Brett Hall: http://www.mail-archive.com/everything-list@eskimo.com/msg05272.html Perhaps you could comment it and tell me what does not convince you. It is indeed correct that the earlier parts of the UD Argument show that a machine cannot know about comp-delays, or about the real/virtual nature of a computer which would support the machine's computation until ... you realize that for exactly those reasons the machine first person expectations can only be computed (exactly and in principle) through a measure on all possible computations (reducing physics to searching such a measure). But then the first person can no more be associated with *any* particular computations. Read the Brett Hall post where I explain more, again in a steppy fashion (but the point is different from the UDA). To sum up that point: 1) comp shows we cannot know which computations supported us. 2) digging deeper in comp, this means eventually we are supported by *all* (relative) computations (relative to some actual state; the actuality itself is handled in the traditional indexical way, and eventually indexicality is treated through the logic of self-reference (G and G*). Yes, I think what you mean by relative probabilities is that if there were several possible versions of me next moment, then I would be more likely to experience the one with higher measure. It is only relative to the other possibilities that measure makes a subjective difference. Ah but you get the point now! So, as long as this *relative* measure does not come into play, the absolute measure makes no difference? But physics arise (or should arise, with the comp hyp.) from the *relative* measure, and physics will be what makes possible for consciousness to be able to manifest itself. George asked me to explain this like if I was talking to some grandmother, but it is tricky to do that. The reason is
Re: NOT YET THE ROADMAP
Bruno, I liked what George Levy wrote (19 July 2006): As a mathematician you are trying to compose a theory of everything using mathematics, this is understandable, and you came up with COMP which is strongly rooted in mathematics and logic. A bit lesser the continuation: I came up independently with my own concept involving a generalization of relativity to information theory ( my background is engineering/physics) and somehow we seem to agree on many points. Unfortunately I do not have the background and the time to give my ideas a formal background. It is just an engineering product and it feels right. because engineering and physics (as we know them from past times) are also based on mathematical logic - (if not on straightforward math!) and that puts George in a similar basket with you (No peiorative tone intended, or involved!) To your advice to seek a mathematician (as gossip has it: Einstein relied on the math-help of Goedel): it would serve to anchor George into YOUR basket (sorry George, I believe you are way above such fallibilities as to be 'anchored'). Why not consult (and not just educate into YOUR ways) somebody with a different view (background thinking?) from the rigorous mathematical concepts? I still believe that there is more than just 'numbers' and processes in the existence with different basis than just comp. I don't believe you can PROVE that there is nothing else but math-numbers-comp, unless you call all other possibilities with such NAMES. Name-calling is futile. I can arrive there in a 'little zillion' steps is fairy tale - without at least some details on the 'HOWs'. (Old cliche: the validity of a legal argument). I still wait impatiently for your 'roadmap' communications and preserve my mind to accept it as maybe proving me wrong. I hope I will not miss them in the maze of posts now swarming this list - really beyond my reading capabilities. I would love to watch (and find) a 'subject' preserved for YOUR line eg as: ROADMAP with nobody just clicking 'Reply' to make posts as the same subject 350 times. Grandmotherishly yours John M - Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Thursday, August 10, 2006 10:59 AM Subject: NOT YET THE ROADMAP You should perhaps try to find a mathematician in your neighborhood for helping you to formalize a bit your approach. I can give you book advices on information theory if you are interested. Unfortunately the relation between information theory and logic are not so easy. I know that Abramski works on it, and Devlin wrote a book on information in some logician sense (this is not yet standard), you could search Devlin on Amazon for the reference. In this setting quantum information theory is also hard to avoid. There are many good books too. - Skipped: Copied above - I believe that what you are saying is right, however I am having some trouble following you, just like Norman Samish said. It would help if you outlined a roadmap. Then we would be able to follow the roadmap without having to stop and admire the mathematical scenery at every turn even though it is very beautiful to the initiated, I am sure. For example you could use several levels of explanation: a first level would be as if your were talking to your grandmother; a second level, talking to your kids (if they listen); a last level, talking to your colleagues. BM: Like I just said to Stathis, I have some difficulties. But this is really because I want that roadmap post to be comprehensible by the grandmother. Thanks for being patient, Bruno --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Are First Person prime?
Colin Hales wrote: Perhaps the 3rd person is best called 'virtual'. It's role is one for 'as-if' it existed. Yes, that's a reasonable suggestion. Then 3rd person might be reserved for the type of observation in George's examples. The 'shareable knowledge base' is then an aspect of 'personal virtual reality', and those elements held in common by a community of 1st persons (common frame of reference) constitute 'consensual virtual reality'. David David Nyman: Sent: Thursday, August 10, 2006 11:20 AM To: Everything List Subject: Re: Are First Person prime? George Levy wrote: Colin Hales remarks seem to agree with what I say. However, I do not deny the existence of a third person perspective. I only say that it is secondary and an illusion brought about by having several observers share the same frame of reference. This frame of reference consists of identical contingencies on their existence. I'm glad you find agreement here. I don't think any of us deny the existence of a third person perspective. All three of us, I think, agree that it is secondary, but where your 'third person' comes into being through the sharing of a frame of reference, I'm applying the term to the totality of 'frames of reference', whether shared or not. Your 'shared frame of reference' would seem to be achieved through my 'shareable knowledge base', but for me a frame of reference is always third person from one perspective or many. So I'm saying that third person is an illusion brought about simply in virtue of having a 'frame of reference' at all - the illusion inherent in representing the world. I'm not quite sure what to do about this inconsistency of terminology. Perhaps the 'shared illusion' could be 'objectivity'? Perhaps the 3rd person is best called 'virtual'. It's role is one for 'as-if' it existed. Colin Hales --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Are First Person prime?
Colin Geoffrey Hales wrote:
Misc responses to 1Z [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Colin Hales wrote:
David Nyman:
snip
An _abstract_ computation/model X implemented symbolically on a of
Sort of...but I think the word 'hardware' is loaded with assumption.
I'd
say
that universe literally is a relational construct
A timeless relational construct or an evolving relational construct ?
Evolving. The evolution of the construct from state to state makes it feel
like there is time.
Why shouldn't it just *be* time ?
and that it's appearance
as 'physical' is what it is like when you are in it. .ie.
Presumably, what is *necessarily* like when you are
in it , since there is no contingency in Platonia.
Platonia has not been instantiated. Our universe has. Our universe may
act, somewhere, somehow, as if it were interacting with entities in
platonia, but that does not make platonic entities 'real' any more than
real/imaginary power vectors delivered out your power-outlet make the
square root of -1 real.
You are in line with my prejudices on that one!
I await an apriori deduction of qualia from
relational structures
Why stop there? What about an a-priori deduction of mass from relational
structures? Or space? Or electric fields? Or gravity?
Most of those just *are* relational
structrures, AFAICS.
All the same...and
none of these have been predicted by any abstract model or 'lumpy/thingy'
ontological thinking.
The physics we have is structural/relation from
top to bottom. It was predicted from observation, or rather
hypothesis/deduction/refutatin/confirmation...
The question is what can futher be predicted from that. If
qualia cannot, they are presumably fundamental in some way...
The abstract model predicts things that behave
'model'-ly. Parameters/variables in the model match adequately when
compared to reality. They do not describe what it is actually made of
I agree. Physics goes no further than isomorphism.
f = ma says nothing about what mass is. It says what mass _does_.
I agree.
Of course: it is well founded empirically. We have abundant
evidence that only certaint things exist within a given spatial
volume (contingency) that they endure through time, and so on.
No. We have abundant evidence of some'thing' behaving as per an
abstraction of 'thing' at the scales we explore. We have NOT proven that
these laws apply at all scales..indeed we have abundant evidence to the
contrary! Absense of evidence is not evidence of absense.
That is not really the issue. The issue is that only
some things exist, only some laws apply, and so on.
Somethingism vs. everythingism.
Time, in particular, is not a mere mathematical construct. It is
actually
quite hard, if not impossible, to capture the passing (a series) of
time
mathematically. That is precisely why Platonists and othe mathematical
literalists tend argue that it doesn't exist.
Timeless universe, universes where everything that can exist
does exist, are not well founded empirically.
No they are not. Again a mathematical model (quantum mechanics) that seems
to imply multiple universes does not mean that they exist
There is a big difference between multiple universes and everything.
Physical multi-world-ism is basically on the somethingist side of the
fence.
Schordinger's equation means some things are definitely impossible.
Only that the
model makes it look like it does. I can imagine any number of situations
where the fuzziness of the ultra-scale world obeys the rules of a QM-like
model.
For example, the perfectly deterministicly repeated trajectory of whatever
an electron is made of through 35.4 spatial dimensions is going to look
awfully fuzzy to critters observing it as course scales within 3
dimensions. QM depicts fuzziness... and 'aha' the universe is made of QM?
Not so. It merely appears to obey the abstraction QM provides us.
Fuzziness can be accomodated within physics in a way that
qualia can't.
A 35.4 dimensional universe is just a minute corner of Platonia.
QM says nothing about what the universe is actually constructed of. It is
not constructed of quantum mechanics! It is constructed of something that
behaves quantum mechanical-ly.
Physicalism in general assumes that there is some substrate to
to physical behaivour/porperties...but it is assumed to be only
a bare substratee with no interesting properties of its own.
Perhaps this:
Waving a bit of it ('stuff', the relational-substrate) around in a
circle
(for example) in indirect 'as-if' symbolic representation as a
computation
of an abstraction X in no way instantiates X or Xness,
Why not? What *does* implementation consist of ?
Being the stuff, the substrate. It's the only thing actually instantiated.
hmmm. But if you wave a *real* thing around, it is surely
stuff, in itself...?
it instantiates
'being_waved_around_in_a_circle_ness' from the point of view of being
the
Re: Quantum Weirdness
Norman Samish wrote: QM says nothing about what the universe is actually constructed of. It is not constructed of quantum mechanics! It is constructed of something that behaves quantum mechanically. Thank you, Colin Hales. I believe your remarks apply to any theory. Theories are descriptions of what we think reality may be - they are not reality. Superpositions are observed, e.g in the TSE. --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Quantum Weirdness
scerir wrote: Has the 'axiom of choice' (I know very little about it, only that famous paradox) something to do, from some epistemic point of view, with the quantum 'collapse/reduction/projection'? No. --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Are First Person prime?
Bruno Marchal wrote: The problem with such a conception is that it seems to need a form of dualism between Plato Heaven and terrestrial realities. With the comp hyp, all there is is (arithmetical) Platonia. Instanciation is relative and appears from inside. With the materialist hypothesis there is also no dualism. --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Are First Person prime?
Bruno Marchal wrote: Le 09-août-06, à 12:46, 1Z a écrit : Timeless universe, universes where everything that can exist does exist, are not well founded empirically. So we should understand that you would criticize any notion, sometimes brought by physicists, of block-universe. Yes, I certainly would! It is unable to explain the subjective passage of time. Dismissing the subjective sensation of the passge of time as merely subjective or illusional is a surreptitious appeal to dualism and therefore un-physicalistic! Time would be a primitive? What about relativist notion of space-time? What indeed ? It means time is local, not that time is non-existent. BTW I agree with most of your post (of 09/08/2006) to David. At the same time I'm astonished that you seem attracted by the idea of making time a primitive one. I know that some respectable physicists do that (Prigogine, Bohm in some sense), but many physicist does not (Einstein, ...). The ones that do can expalain my subjective sensation of time, the ones that don't, can't. Of course it is more easy to explain that consciousness supervene on number relations to someone who already accept consciousness could supervene to a block-universe than to someone who want time (or consciousness, or first person notion) to be primitive. Indeed. Of course I believe that once we assume the comp hyp. there is no more choice in the matter. A computation (as opposed to an algorithm) is a process taking place in time. Not many people would say yes to a doctor who wanted to make a static image of their brain and store it in a filing cabinet. --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Can we ever know truth?
Norman, my response to the subject is: NO. I learned a good _expression_ here (on this list) I think from Tom(?): "perception of reality". "I can onlyassume that reality ishow things appear to me - and I might be wrong." (Wise way to save one's sanity.) Upon (cultural?) historical examples I have to conclude that our knowledge (unspecified, - all of it) is limited and increasing over time, so the 'reality' we think of is changing to include more and more details. We experience within our ever existing knowledge-base (ncluding now) by interpretation of the impacts we get into the now-content controlled variants. Provided that we believe that there IS a reality - the source of those impacts unknown - I would not call my present-level partial interpretation as the (unknown) total. John M - Original Message - From: Norman Samish To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Wednesday, August 09, 2006 12:53 PM Subject: Can we ever know truth? In a discussion about philosophy, Nick Prince said, "If we are living in a simulation. . ." To which John Mikes replied, "I think this is the usual pretension. . . I think 'we simulate what we are living in' according to the little we know. Such 'simulation' - 'simplification' - 'modeling' - 'metaphorizing' - or even 'Harry Potterizing' things we think does not change the 'unknown/unknowable' we live in. We just think and therefore we think we are." This interchange reminded me of thoughts I had as a child - I used to wonder if if everything I experienced was real or a dream. How could I know which it was? I asked my parents andwas discouraged, in no uncertain terms, from asking them nonsensicalquestions. I asked my playmates and friends, but they didn't know the answer any more than I did. I had no other resources so I concluded that the question was unanswerable and that the best I could do was proceed as if what I experienced was reality. Now, many years later, I have this list - and Wikipedia - as resources. But, as John Mikes (and others) say,I still cannot know that what I experience is reality. I can onlyassume that reality ishow things appear to me - and I might be wrong. Norman Samish No virus found in this incoming message.Checked by AVG Free Edition.Version: 7.1.405 / Virus Database: 268.10.8/415 - Release Date: 08/09/06 --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: The moral dimension of simulation
- Original Message - From: David Nyman [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Everything List everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Wednesday, August 09, 2006 12:10 PM Subject: Re: The moral dimension of simulation [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I think we simulate what we are living in according to the little we know. Such 'simulation' - 'simplification' - 'modeling' - 'metaphorizing' - or weven 'harrypotterizing' things we think does not change the unknown/unknowable we live in. We just think and therefore we think we are. John David wrote: I'm encouraged by the above to ask if you have any views deriving from this vis-a-vis the 'first person prime' thread? David The thread was much much more than I could attentively follow. My vocabulary is different from most posts and so the 'first person prime' is hard to comprehend. My views do not derive from that thread. 'My' 1st person views are derived from 'impacts' (I will accept a better word) I get - interpreted (adjusted?) according to my 'mindcontent' - experinece, knowledge-base, personality, - which means that it is by no means primary. My percept of reality is a composite of them all. Yours is different. If you tell me about yours, I will 'catch' them in the form my 1st person(ality) understands them, not as you thought it. I wonder if I caught your question? John M --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Quantum Weirdness
Serafino, I regret that I am unable to answer your question - perhaps another list member will volunteer his opinion. Norman ~ - Original Message - From: "scerir" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Wednesday, August 09, 2006 1:08 PM Subject: Re: Quantum Weirdness Norman Samish:A while back Peter Jones and Brent Meeker independently pointed outthe illogicality of my non-acceptance of both MWI AND "wave-collapse" as explanations of "quantum weirdness." Since the word 'weirdness' is in the subject line, may I ask the following?Has the 'axiom of choice' (I know very little about it, only that famousparadox)something to do, from some epistemic point of view, with the quantum 'collapse/reduction/projection'? -serafino --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
RE: Are First Person prime?
1Z: Why shouldn't it just *be* time ? A structure evolves from state to state in a regular way. The fact that an observer built of that structure inside that structure can formulate mathematical descriptions with a t in them that correlate well with what is observed does not mean that there is anything real in t any more than it means anything else in the maths is reified. Time is yet another 'as-if' construct. The universe (the structure) behaves as if a t was there when it's just an artifact of models. The experienced moment to moment progress of the state of the structure literally is what we perceive as time in the sense that there's no special entity pouring some 'timeness' into the structure. A metaphor experience for this occurs when you write industrial 'real-time' control software state machines. You can make the control system speed up and slow down (meaning that the control system sees the world slow-down and speed up, resp.) based on the rate the state machine is executed. and that it's appearance as 'physical' is what it is like when you are in it. .ie. Presumably, what is *necessarily* like when you are in it , since there is no contingency in Platonia. Platonia has not been instantiated. Our universe has. Our universe may act, somewhere, somehow, as if it were interacting with entities in platonia, but that does not make platonic entities 'real' any more than real/imaginary power vectors delivered out your power-outlet make the square root of -1 real. You are in line with my prejudices on that one! I await an apriori deduction of qualia from relational structures Why stop there? What about an a-priori deduction of mass from relational structures? Or space? Or electric fields? Or gravity? Most of those just *are* relational structrures, AFAICS. No. They are descriptions of observations formulated by observers of 'the relational structure'. To an observer built of the structure inside the structure bits of the structure behave 'massly', gravitationally, electric field-ly, space-ly and so on. If the mathematics ca, in some sense, termed an expression of relationality, that's just an artifact of the maths, not a statement about the original structure exhibiting the behaviour. All the same...and none of these have been predicted by any abstract model or 'lumpy/thingy' ontological thinking. The physics we have is structural/relation from top to bottom. It was predicted from observation, or rather hypothesis/deduction/refutatin/confirmation... Yes, and none of that physics says anything at all about the intrinsic structural nature of the entities portrayed by the physics. The are descriptions of behaviour (WHAT HAPPENS) that correlate with observation. Correlation(WHAT HAPPENS) is not causation(WHY IT HAPPENS). Causation is what is happening in the underlying structure. Again: the universe is behaving 'as-if' physics was driving it to an observer inside the structure, of the structure. The question is what can futher be predicted from that. If qualia cannot, they are presumably fundamental in some way... The abstract model predicts things that behave 'model'-ly. Parameters/variables in the model match adequately when compared to reality. They do not describe what it is actually made of I agree. Physics goes no further than isomorphism. So you actually agree with my above comments. Methinks there's confusion in here somewhere! f = ma says nothing about what mass is. It says what mass _does_. I agree. And again. Now extrapolate the same thing to every mathematical model ever made by science. They all have the same status and exactly the same type of statement can be made of every parameter in very one of them. Of course: it is well founded empirically. We have abundant evidence that only certaint things exist within a given spatial volume (contingency) that they endure through time, and so on. No. We have abundant evidence of some'thing' behaving as per an abstraction of 'thing' at the scales we explore. We have NOT proven that these laws apply at all scales..indeed we have abundant evidence to the contrary! Absense of evidence is not evidence of absense. That is not really the issue. The issue is that only some things exist, only some laws apply, and so on. Somethingism vs. everythingism. There is an evolving structure, we are in it. It behaves with amazing amounts of regularity (even the persistence of randomness and chaotic behaviour is regularity!). The regularity as perceived (in the first person!)...that orderliness...correlates well with some models and not others, at some scales and not others. These models are descriptions only and are not explanations in the sense of causality. Time, in particular, is not a mere mathematical construct. It is actually quite hard, if not impossible, to capture the passing (a series) of time
RE: Are First Person prime?
Bruno Marchal Le 09-août-06, à 18:08, Colin Geoffrey Hales a écrit : Platonia has not been instantiated. Our universe has. The problem with such a conception is that it seems to need a form of dualism between Plato Heaven and terrestrial realities. With the comp hyp, all there is is (arithmetical) Platonia. Instanciation is relative and appears from inside. I'm interested in building an AI inside this structure with us. There may be a relationship between this AI and platonia in the same way (whatever way that is) our perceptions may make use of it. Evolution didnt need to be all fussed about it...neither am I. I could agree with you or disagree ...it would have no effect on the outcome. Being the stuff, the substrate. It's the only thing actually instantiated. This seems, imo, contradicts what you I remember you said somewhere else (or I'm wrong?), mainly when you say, in a monist frame, that everything is relational. The stuff is the relation happening. The particular relational outcome we inhabit is it...the substrate...the structure of which we are part that appears like it does to us inside it. The fact is that there is no such thing as a 'third person'. Ontologically ? No, experientially. Nobody experiences 'third person'. Everybody has a 1st person experience only. There is no such thing as an objective view. I think that many people confuse third person view and 0 person view. I will probably (try to) clarify this in the roadmap-summary. I agree there is no objective *view*, but I think there is a notion of objective reality, although such a reality is not necessarily knowable as such. Nomenclature gnomes at work again! I think what you call objective reality is what I call the substrate...the relational structure that is the universe. Furthermore it also seems to have us duped that further considerations of mathematical idealisations and abstractions in general likewise tells us something about the composition of the actual underlying natural world for example that it is the result of a computer running one of our abstractions. With comp I would say we can prove that the composition of the underlying world have to emerge, NOT as the result of a computer running one of our abstractions (like in Schmidhuber's theory for example) but on all possible computations existing in Platonia, and well defined through that miraculous Church's thesis. The quantum would emerge from digitalness seen from digital entity. Physical realities would be number theoretical realities as seen by relative numbers. Bruno I'm interested in the 'natural mathematics' of the relational structure and how it can be utilised by us to make artifical versions of us and the creatures around us. The key to it is the messy, smelly meat called brain material, not considerations of platonic realms or postulated computations therein. It may be that what we find will be generalised later into COMP and other systems of abstraction, but that will change nothing for me trying to build an AI with the reality we inhabit. Like I said above...the structure built us on its own...and didnt need a maths book to do it..because it literally is the maths... Cheers Colin Hales --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Are First Person prime?
1Z wrote: Bruno Marchal wrote: Le 09-août-06, à 12:46, 1Z a écrit : Timeless universe, universes where everything that can exist does exist, are not well founded empirically. So we should understand that you would criticize any notion, sometimes brought by physicists, of block-universe. Yes, I certainly would! It is unable to explain the subjective passage of time. Dismissing the subjective sensation of the passge of time as merely subjective or illusional is a surreptitious appeal to dualism and therefore un-physicalistic! I don't see that problem. In the block universe each subject is modelled as having different states at different times and hence subjectively experiences the passage of time. Brent Meeker --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Are First Person prime? - time
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Bruno, I spent some (!) time on speculating on 'timelessness' - Let me tell up front: I did not solve it. Hi John For example, we can conceive of a consciousness generated by a computer operating in a time share mode where the time share occur every thousand years. The important thing is that there should be a logical flow in the computation, and it really does not matter what is the time scale, the sampling, in which dimension you operate or the level of computation. (you could be operating across several levels) The only thing that matters is that each point of the computation be connected to the next one by a valid logical link, as in a network. This logical network in fact frees you from having to specify a dimension such as time or a level of computation. The logical connections (or consistent histories as Bruno calls them) in the network are in fact emergent according to the Anthropic principle. The logical links (or consistencies) exist because you are there to observe them. Just as a Rorschach test . You are making the links as you go along. George --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Are First Person prime?
1Z wrote: Not only is it not necessary to treat such a 1st person as ontologically primative, it is hardly even coherent , since such a 1st person is clearly complex. I think I see where the confusion lies. My definitions rely on there being a unique ontologogical 'substance' because of my frustration that there is a pervasive use (not necessarily yours) of 1st-person and 3rd-person to denote, respectively, the 'inside' and 'outside' views of persons. This then leads to the idea that these derive from different ontological substances (e.g. Chalmers in effect, dualism in general). So my single substance is in that sense 'primitive'. Bruno would I think say that this substance is Number. I just say it's whatever it is and it's the same for everything. Of course, it's the intersection of this substance with structure that produces persons (and all other phenomena), which are, as you rightly say, complex. The problem is, that while a)-c) is not all that can be said about first personhood, it is pretty much all that *is* said in your various definitions [*]. I quite agree, with the above proviso. I was merely trying to point out different uses of the term that I thought important, but you may well have found this superflous. The obvious is sometimes elusive. OK: now we seem to be getting to the nub of the problem. Consciousness and qualia. IOW, 1st-personhood divides into two problems: an Easy Problem of a)-c); and a Hard problem of d) qualia and e) incommunicable experiences. I would say that qualia are the fact of *being* structured substance *behaving* in a certain kind of 'perceiver+perceptual model' way. As such they are themselves incommunicable, although existing in non-random mutual relations (e.g. that of red to blue, or middle C to bottom A). The information they encode relationally is what is communicable both to the 'self' and to others - epistemology from ontology. Empirically my assumption is that they must also map in some systematic way to material structure, which is not to say that qualitative and material structural levels map one-to-one. However I don't believe that qualia are 'substrate independent' (you may recall that this is where we began in the dear, dim days of the FOR group). Now: if qualia are the only aspect of 1st-personhood whose emergence form structured matter is fishy, why not make qualia ontologically fundamental, and keep the Easy aspects of 1p-hood as high-level emergent features ? (It's not just that we don't *need* to treat the a)-c) as primitive, it is also that we can't! A structure that contains representations of other structures is inherently complex!) I think I agree, as I say above. I know I lost you with my previous remarks about a primitive substance with primitive differentiation, but the fundamental nature of 'qualia' was what I was trying to convey. The substance on its own won't do, because it has no content, and semantically to have differentiation one needs to start with a substance. Hence qualia are to be found at the intersection, and different types of structure yield different types of qualia. ( I am taking it that qualia are basically non-structural [**] ) 'Fraid not. But now I can agree with you that 1p-hood in its Easy aspect is indeed a high level emergent feature of this structured ontology. Then the fact of *being* the structured substance is the 'qualia', and the relational aspects (information) constitute our knowledge of the structural entities so formed (i.e. 'the world'). I take the 'active principle' of information to be the relational aspects expressed as behaviour. IOW, one structure treats another as information when its behaviour is systematically changed by incorporating it. Is that idea even coherent ? How can a universal Person contain representations of what is outside itself ? It can't of course. Only of what is inside itself. My intuition about the 'Big Person' was simply to express the idea that the 'substance' is universally available to be structured into persons. Persons are just zones so structured. We needn't mention the BP ever again. Thank you for your excellent treatment of the physicalism/ mentalism issues, with which I pretty much entirely agree. I'd just like to comment on a couple of things: But it is almost tautologous that the real world cannot be made of those ingredients alone (particularly that is can't be a mere abstraction). Thus we have candidates for real properties of the world not captured by physics: concreta, intrinsic properties and qualities. The last is of the most interest, of course. The resemblance between qualia and quality might not be coincidental. Qualities might be intrinsic to matter yet incapable of being seen through the spectacles of physics. Our own qualia might be a direct insight into these qualities, not something else in disguise. We need not suppose that all qualities are like human qualia; qualia might be only a tiny subset of the
RE: Are First Person prime?
Brent Meeker: 1Z wrote: Bruno Marchal wrote: Le 09-août-06, à 12:46, 1Z a écrit : Timeless universe, universes where everything that can exist does exist, are not well founded empirically. So we should understand that you would criticize any notion, sometimes brought by physicists, of block-universe. Yes, I certainly would! It is unable to explain the subjective passage of time. Dismissing the subjective sensation of the passge of time as merely subjective or illusional is a surreptitious appeal to dualism and therefore un-physicalistic! I don't see that problem. In the block universe each subject is modelled as having different states at different times and hence subjectively experiences the passage of time. Brent Meeker Exactly! See my other post. Being of an evolving structure completely defined by state transitions makes it amenable to the treatment by the concept of time, but does not reify time in any part of the structure...it's intrinsic to its operation. Then, to those entities inside, observing and evolving along with the structure/part of it 'what it is like' qualia of time I dont think is a property of the qualia per se, but the rate/depth to which they are analysed. A high novelty environment means faster/more brain process, time apparently goes slowly (eg during an accident). In a low novelty environment the brain analysis rate/depth drops. Time appears to go more quickly. Cheers Colin Hales --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
