Russell Standish writes:
> I had a thought about an alternative way of expressing the UDA > (universal dovetailer argument). > > Computationalism is the statement that "I am a computation". To use > the RITSIAR acronym, computations are real in the sense I am real. But > the Church-Turing thesis gives a particular model of a computation, it > is effectively defining a computation as something that there is a > Turing machine emulating. > > The universal dovetailer is a computation. Contained within its > execution trace, are the execution traces of all other programs, > including itself. If we are a program, we can be found inside a > universal dovetailer, which can be found within another UD (infinitely > many, in fact). > > To say that there must be a physical computer on which the dovetailer > should run, is rather similar to saying there must be an ultimate > turtle upon which the world rests. The little old lady was right in > saying "its turtles all the way down". Of course it is also analogous > to saying there must be a prime mover to start the causal chain. If > God created the world, then it immediately poses the question "Who > created God". > > Since it makes no difference in any observable respect whether we are > living in a computer simulation running on a bare substrate, as one > that is incidently computated as part of a universal dovetailer, or an > infinite chain of dovetailers, we really can make use of Laplace's > ripost to Napoleon "Sire, I have no need of that hypothesis" with > respect to a concrete computer running our world. > > To rescue the primitive matter world, we need to deny the existence of > the universal dovetailer. But this denies the Church Turing thesis - > we have to say some computations exist (eg ourselves), but others > don't. To make computationalism compatible with primitive materialism > requires us to abandon the Church-Turing thesis and redefine what we > mean by computation. But if a physical universe is needed to run the UD, without a physical universe there is no UD. It's a circular argument unless you have some other argument showing a computation can run without physical hardware. 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?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---