I just realized that for some reason only half of these posts show up in my e-mail… Bruno, you speak of self-consciousness… do you mean body-image? Or do you mean abstract self-recognition? Or the tendency towards false identification? Or body relation/identification in a combative framework? It seems like your notion of self-acceleration or self-speeding is what some people call psycho-active or psychedelic …. Or what others call meditative metamorphoses through concentration. Concentration or the will to power in the Spinoza and Nietzschean sense as self- speeding. The lack of this concentration of the will or self- intensification/force equated to what Kierkegaard called spiritlessness… a symptom of modernity.
On Jul 2, 4:27 am, Bruno Marchal <marc...@ulb.ac.be> wrote: > On 01 Jul 2011, at 13:23, selva kumar wrote: > > > Is consciousness causally effective ? > > > I found this question in previous threads,but I didn't find a answer. > > Was it in the FOR list (on the book Fabric of reality by David > Deutsch) ? I thought I did answer this question, which is a very > imprtant and fundamental question. > > It is also a tricky question, which is very similar or related to the > question of free-will, and it can lead to vocabulary issue. I often > defend the idea that consciousness is effective. Indeed the role I > usually defend for consciousness is a relative self-speeding up > ability. Yet the question is tricky, especially due to the presence of > the "causally", which is harder to grasp or define than > "consciousness" itself. > > Let me try to explain. For this I need some definition, and I hope for > some understanding of the UDA and a bit of AUDA. Ask precision if > needed. > > The main ingredient for the explanation are three theorems due to Gödel: > > - the Gödel completeness theorem (available for machine talking first > order logic or a sufficiently effective higher order logic). The > theorem says that a theory or machine is consistent (syntactical > notion, = ~Bf) iff the theory has a model (a mathematical structure in > which it makes sense to say that a proposition is true). I will > rephrase this by saying that a machine is consistent if and only if > the machine's beliefs make sense in some reality. > > - the Gödel second incompleteness theorem ~Bf -> ~B(~Bf): if the > machine is consistent, then this is not provable by the machine. So if > the beliefs are real in some reality, the machine cannot prove the > existence of that reality. This is used in some strict way, because we > don't assume the machine can prove its completeness (despite this has > shown to be the case by Orey). This entails that eventually, the > machine can add as new axiom its own consistency, but this leads to a > new machine, for which a novel notion of consistency appears, and the > 'new' machine can still not prove the existence of a reality > "satisfying its beliefs. yet that machine can easily prove the > consistency of the machine she was. This can be reitered as many times > as their are (constructive) ordinals, and this is what I describe as a > climbing from G to G*. The modal logic of self-reference remains > unchanged, but the arithmetical interpretation of it expands. An > infinity of previously undecidable propositions become decidable, > and ... another phenomenon occurs: > > - Gödel length of proof theorem. Once a machine adds an undecidable > proposition, like its own consistency, as a new axiom/belief, not only > an infinity of (arithmetical) propositions become decidable, but an > infinity of already provable propositions get shorter proofs. Indeed, > and amazingly enough, for any number x, we can find a proposition > which proofs will be x times shorter than its shorter proof in the > beliefs system without the undecidable proposition. A similar, but not > entirely equivalent theorem is true for universal computation ability, > showing in particular that there is no bound to the rapidity of > computers, and this just by change of the software (alas, with finite > numbers of exceptions in the *effective* self-speeding up: but > evolution of species needs not to be effective or programmable in > advance). > > Now I suggest to (re)define consciousness as a machine (instinctive, > preprogrammed) ability to bet on a reality. This is equivalent > (stricto sensu: the machine does not need to know this) to an ability > of betting its own consistency (excluding that very new axiom to avoid > inconsistency). As a universal system, this will speed-up the machine > relatively to the probable local universal system(s) and will in that > way augment its freedom degree. If two machines play ping-pong, the > machine which is quicker has a greater range of possible moves/ > strategy than its opponent. > > So the answer to the question "is consciousness effective" would be > yes, if you accept such definition. > > Is that consciousness *causally* effective? That is the tricky part > related to free will. If you accept the definition of free will that I > often suggested, then the answer is yes. Causality will have its > normal "physical definition", except that with comp such physicalness > is given by an arithmetical quantization (based on the material > hypostase defined by Bp & Dp): p physically causes q, iff something > like BD(BDp -> BDq). I recall Dp = ~B ~p. But of course, in God eyes, > there is only true (and false) number relations. The löbian phenomenon > then shows that the consciousness self-speeding up is coupled with the > building of the reality that the machine bet on. At that level, it is > like if consciousness is the main force, perhaps the only original > one, in the physical universe! This needs still more work to make > precise enough. There is a complex tradeoff in between the "causally" > and the "effective" at play, I think. > > I hope this was not too technical. The work of Gödel plays a > fundamental role. This explanation is detailed in "Conscience et > Mécanisme", and related more precisely to the inference inductive frame. > > To sum up: machine consciousness, in the theory, confers self-speeding > up abilities to the machine with respect to the most probable > continuation/universal-machine. It is obviously something useful for > self-moving creature: to make them able to anticipate and avoid > obstacles, which would explain why the self-moving creatures have > developed self-reflexive brains, and become Löbian (self-conscious). > Note that here the role is attributed to self-consciousness, and not > really to consciousness. But you need consciousness to have self- > consciousness. Consciousness per se has no role, like in pure > contemplation, but once reflected in the Löbian way, it might be the > stronger causally effective force operating in the 'arithmetical > truth', the very origin of the (self) acceleration/force. > > Note that the Gödel speed-up theorem is not hard to prove. There is a > simple proof of it in the excellent book by Torkel Franzen "Gödel's > theorem An Incomplete Guide To Its Use and Abuse" which I recommend > the reading (despite it is more on the abuses than the uses). The > original paper is in the book by Davis: the undecidable (republished > in Dover), and which I consider as a bible for "machine's theology". > > 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 everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
