On Sat, Feb 04, 2012 at 01:22:10PM +0100, Bruno Marchal wrote: > > On 03 Feb 2012, at 23:24, Stephen P. King wrote: > > > > I am not missing a thing, Bruno. You are missing something > >that is obvious to the rest of us. > > If someone else can confirm this, and put some light on what Stephen > is saying, I would be pleased. >
Having had some skype discussions with Stephen, I believe Stephen is referring to "that which breathes fire into the equations", as Hawking puts it. We all agree that COMP does not posit any particular "fire breather" - any entity capable of universal computation will do. Bruno selects Peano arithmetic as a sufficient system (PA supports universal computation), for pedagogical reasons, although he'd really rather use combinators, which would also suit the purpose, but are less known. Stephen is objecting that such abstract systems are, well, too abstract. He'd prefer something more concrete - whatever "concrete" might actually be. It is true, I understand, that the UDA (and AUDA) does not eliminate the possibility of a "concrete physical underpinning". It is just that such a concrete physical underpinning has no measurable, or detectable effect on our phenomonology other than that due to its capability of universal computation. Which is why I'd like to remind people of Witgenstein's comment: Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent. Cheers -- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Prof Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile) Principal, High Performance Coders Visiting Professor of Mathematics [email protected] University of New South Wales http://www.hpcoders.com.au ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. 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.
