On 21 Dec 2011, at 10:58, Russell Standish wrote:
On Tue, Dec 20, 2011 at 09:06:10PM +0100, Bruno Marchal wrote:
On 20 Dec 2011, at 01:03, Russell Standish wrote:
Even though the parts may be distributed across multiple branches of
the MV, and have different counterfactual histories?
?
What is a branch of a W in a MW if you allow interaction between
worlds?
Who said anything about interaction between the worlds? I assume by
interaction, you mean the usual interaction physicists means
(interference), or information being passed.
Not statistical interferences, like with comp (below the subst level)
and like most probably with the quantum MWI.
Comp, be it digital or quantum, makes classical computation non
interacting with parallel computation. Locally, if our brains were
quantum computers this would be locally false, but not in a relevant
way to contradict the MGA consequences, by the fact that if worlds
interfere that much still does not violate Church thesis, and
quantum computer are Turing emulable.
We're not discussing quantum computers here.
Are you arguing that comp does not entail the principle "323"?
I don't believe so.
So you agree that comp entails "323"?
This makes even harder my understanding of your refutation attempt.
Be careful of not including the conclusion in the definition of
COMP.
...snip...
If the emulation is by means of dovetailing, then I think not. A
dovetailer is not conscious.
That is ambiguous. A dovetailer, like Robinson arithmetic (when
proving all its theorems) is not conscious, per se. But it
instantiates consciousness, indeed all possible machine's
consciousness.
Great. But this is more than mere terminological wrangling. To an
observer of the dovetailer, no conscious processes are visible.
No conscious processes are ever visible.
To do
that would require a means of determining whether a computation is
conscious or not, something we don't have, and probably never will.
That's always the case. You judge by chatting with person or by
observing them and recognizing yourself.
That's how I became open to the idea that all löbian entities
(machine or not machine) are conscious.
It is another manifestation of there being no God's viewpoint in a
Multiverse.
I am not sure about that. Many would say that the very idea of
"multiverse" is an attempt of describing "God's viewpoint".
With mechanism we have universal dreams and universal dreamers,
sharing, or not, dreams and subroutines.
It cannot be a God's point of view. The Multiverse is too simple to
admit an observer...
?
I feel this invalidates applying Maudlin's argument to a
dovetailer.
Let me introduce a new definition. I define a closed generalized
brain (CGB) the portion of reality that you need to emulate a dream.
This may require the input of random numbers on the synapses.
This, I think, would directly contradict computationalism (unless you
mean pseudo-random, or the randomness recoverable by the comp
indeterminacy). By definition of "correct level" you keep both of them
"intact" through a single turing emulation in your local "physical"
reality.
It seems
to me that dreams are the result of filtering and amplifying random
thermal noise with the brain. It is just a theory, of course, but it
would mean that the CGB is a Multiverse.
So either that Multiverse is Turing emulable, and the MGA applies to a
dovetailing on it, or it is not and comp is false.
Many neurophysiologists would be that such a portion of reality is
in the skull, and that the process is Turing emulable (and I think
it your position).
Sure, but the contents of the skull is an object that extends over
multiple branches of the Multiverse.
With mechanism it must be the primitive matter (the "matter" whose
determination below our level is not needed in the computation of my
actual state) which is multiversal. If the computational content
extends in the multiverse then you are just making our level *very*
low. Again, if that is Turing emulable MGA can be applied, and if it
is not, then comp is false.
It seems to me you are trying to make the comp level below the
substitution level, like if the consciousness of the guy reconstituted
in Moscow was needing the presence of the other in Washington to be
conscious.
That notion makes sense, with comp, and if the quantum multiverse
results from comp, it would mean our brains/body would be quantum
computers, and our level would be very low. I doubt this, and find
more plausible that the level is higher, but none of this prevents the
immateriality step.
Comp implies that such CGB exists. That CGM can
be emulated by a turing machine, why would it matter the emulation
is done by dovetailing from the first person point of view?
Because in the 1st person POV, the "inert" parts are not inert.
If that is needed for the first person view, by comp that has to be
Turing emulable.
Only
in the 3rd person dovetailed POV. And, I find it hard to think of the
dovetailer as conscious.
It does not need to be conscious. It needs only to instantiate
consciousness. As it does, even in "time and space" when it is a
concrete UD running in a primary physical universe, and that is all we
need to get the epistemological contradiction: primitive matter has no
interaction with consciousness. It becomes like invisible horses
pulling cars.
But put another way, perhaps it means that consciousness
cannot supervene on a physical implementation of a dovetailer.
Which
is probably what you're trying to get to.
I just reason from the assumption. Consciousness would supervene on
the execution of a physical universal dovetailer. Why wouldn't it?
Because the dovetailer is an incredibly simple program. It hardly
seems conscious. If I ask it a question, it is mute, so the Turing
test hardly helps.
The UD is not a person (or only in a very large sense). "It" does not
need to be conscious. But it executes all computations, so, together
with the physical supervenience thesis, it instantiates all persons
consciousness (indeed all physical machine's first person
consciousness). Of course, after MGA, in absence of flaws, only the
arithmetical instantiation will matter, and the physical appearances
have to be retrieved from arithmetic.
...snip...
It doesn't eliminate the supervenience of the consciousness on the
simulated physics within the UD. It seems this is in accordance with
Brent's comments too.
Presumably you would argue that this is simulated matter, not
primitive matter. Sure.
You lost me here. The "primitive matter" in comp is not *a priori*
simulable, it appears below our sharable substitution level.
It may or may not be simulable a priori. Why would a materialist
assume that primitive matter is necessarily nonsimulable?
I agree, but don't see the relevance. If a materialist want it not
being simulable, he can make it playing a role in the mind, and comp
is wrong. But if that primitive matter plays no role, and if he bet on
comp, then primitive matter becomes the trace of the many computations
in the "parallel dreams".
But what's to stop the primitive matter being
multiversal - whether it can be simulated or not is a little beside
the point.
On the contrary it is crucial. It makes the difference between
emulable in one reality (in our branch of the quantum multiverse in
case we imagine a concrete one), which is equivalent with Turing
emulable, or necessitating Non Turing emulable interactions or
interferences with parallel realities.
I don't expect there will be interference between the realities. Why
does supervenience over multiple branches entail there must be
interactions between realities?
To make your argument working. If the parallel realities play no role,
then the MGA works even without mentioning them. I was just trying to
get your point.
The point is that if it is
Turing emulable, then the MGA applies.
I don't see this.
If it is Turing emulable, then it is emulable in a single reality, by
definition of what is a computation.
Computability is an a dimensional theory, with effective (recursive)
translation of many dimensions into any dimension including zero (like
the UD, it is, extensionally, an empty function from nothing into
nothing. Like you said, a program without input and without output,
like a physical universe, a dream, etc.
You have then to believe that
a physical inactive piece has a physical activity relevant in a
particular computation.
The physically "inactive" piece is only physically inactive in one
branch. If the supervenience is across multiple branches, then the
absurdum is no longer.
But if the multiples branches are needed for the comp supervenience,
then it has to be Turing emulable, and then it can be emulated in a
single reality.
...snip...
If a dream can supervene on a closed generalized brain Turing
emulation, then it has to supervene to its emulation in one of its
classical instantiation, either in a concrete quasi-classical
(normal) history (or, after MGA, in arithmetic, or in the UD*).
Why?
It is the comp assumption. My consciousness survives in case my brain
is emulated at the correct level, in *some* reality. Usually, we will
say "yes" to a doctor, if the artificial brain works in my usual local
reality.
And
in that single reality emulation, MGA can be applied. If you give a
role to physically inactive, by making them active in some other
world you are forced to introduce a non Turing emulable *physical*
component in matter playing a role in consciousness, where comp show
that we get it for free below our substitution level.
Why?
Comp predicts that there is a multiverse. But you are trying to
conceive a notion of multiverse to refute MGA, but the point is that
such a move will work only if the use of that Multiverse is not Turing
emulable. Everything Turing emulable can do its job in any rich enough
single reality, by the way computations are defined.
...snip...
The UD is not conscious, as a person, but once you add the
supervenience thesis, it instantiates consciousness at each moment
where it executes a conscious program (say Russell Standish's one,
then Bruno's one, etc).
Why does this depend on supervenience?
I meant "physical supervenience". It is just introduced to get the
contradiction.
MGA is a reductio ad absurdum.
How does this work?
By showing that the physical activity related to a computation can be
mimicked without any computation being done (like the filmed graph).
So if we keep comp, consciousness relies only on the abstract
computations and not on any particular physical implementations (given
that this would entail that a movie is thinking, which is absurd, if
only by the stroboscopic argument).
COMP + SUP-PHYS entails any consciousness supervenes on any computation.
Because Maudlin assumes a single universe physics,
Where? It assumes only the Turing emulabilty.
Its the only way to get inactive parts, and so force the absurdum. The
assumption is not explicit in Maudlin's work, but its there.
If the inactive parts play a role in the computation, then they are
active. MGA would no more work if that activity is not Turing
emulable. If it is, I can run it in a single reality, or in a
"classical" branch.
The other branches role can only change the relative statistics. They
don't interact like a bus can interact with a register in a computation.
...snip...
You might try to refute the 323 principle as clearly as possible by
using a *physical* multiverse. I think you will see by yourself that
you have to endow some primitive Matter with some non Turing
emulable processes at some point.
I don't see the 323 principle as being relevant here - perhaps you can
explain more why its needed.
The 323 principle states that if we assume comp *and* physical
supervenience (even multiversal) then if a piece is inactive (but then
also multiversally inactive) the presence or absence of consciousness
in a single computation does not depend on the presence or absence of
that inactive piece.
But then we have to accept that a movie of a filmed universal boolean
graph instantiates a consciousness by virtue of comp, despite there is
no more any computation at all.
This prevents physics to be explained by any *choice* or *inference*
of a primitive universal entity, or universal law. We have to recover
physics by a sum on all universal machines competition below our
substitution level (by UDA1-7, + MGA).
I thought your were trying to refute the 323 principle. But you seem
to me just lowering the substitution level.
I might miss something, and I hope we will see clarifications on this.
Bruno
http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/
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