On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 5:05 PM, Bruno Marchal <[email protected]> wrote: > > On 19 Mar 2013, at 16:52, Telmo Menezes wrote: > >> On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 2:06 AM, Russell Standish <[email protected]> >> wrote: >>> >>> On Mon, Mar 18, 2013 at 07:39:44PM +0100, Bruno Marchal wrote: >>>> >>>> Hi Roger, >>>> >>>> On 18 Mar 2013, at 12:48, Roger Clough wrote: >>>> >>>>> >>>>> Since mind is an MQS or Multiple Quantum Superposition, it can >>>>> process information at the rate of a quantum computer. >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> Since you seem to talk philosophy, let me translate what you say >>>> for our friends the scientists. >>>> >>>> If we assume that mind is a Multiple Quantum Superposition, and if >>>> we assume that mind can exploit those quantum superpositions to >>>> process information, then the mind can process information at the >>>> rate of a quantum computer. >>>> >>>> That implication seems to me quite reasonable. >>>> >>>> Test of the theory according to which a human mind is a Multiple >>>> Quantum Superposition: >>>> >>>> >>>> 1) show me a human as good as a quantum computer for finding a >>>> needle in a haystack. >>>> >>>> 2) Factorize 11111311111911111111511111111111121212111111111 >>>> >>>> >>> >>> Demonstrating these sorts of exponential speedups only falsifies the >>> proposition that a human mind is an ordinary classical computer (but >>> not COMP). It does not confirm in any way that a human mind operates >>> as a quantum computer, since random oracles are another way of >>> bridging computational complexity classes. >>> >>> We only need one idiot-savant to demonstrate this. >>> >>> By contrast, being unable to demonstrate this scaling means - well >>> nothing >>> at all, actually. >> >> >> I agree with Russell here. >> >> More generally, I always disliked these evaluations of the >> computational power of the human brain by the speed at which it can do >> arithmetics. It's quite possible that the brain is a computational >> beast, but the "software" it runs is specialised in other things: >> image pattern recognition, parsing semantic trees and so on. >> Arithmetics is a recent and unnatural activity for the brain, so it >> might very well have to be performed on top of inadequate and >> expensive pre-existing machinery. > > > > But QC is not just a speed scaling of computation. It is a different way to > do some computation, some of which are just impossible to do in "real time" > by a classical computer.
Good point, I didn't mean to imply the contrary. > So here the speed is of conceptual importance. If > my brain is a QC I can do a Fourier transform of the state of my infinitely > many doppelgangers in some superposition states of myself, and this gives > ways to confirm the quantum many-world in a less indirect way than by doing > QM. That would be a cool explanation for the feeling of deja-vu? > My point to Russell was that a random oracle is less powerful than a quantum > computer, even if the contrary is correct (a quantum computer can simulate a > random oracle, in principle). > > My point to Roger was just that it is doubtful that the brain is a quantum > computer, for theoretical and experimental reason. An hypothesis that fascinates me, though, is that it may have access to sources of quantum randomness. I believe that randomness is related to creativity. One of the things that always bothered me with Roger Penrose's argument is that he considers a theoretical classical computer, but real computers have random number generators* that exploit non Turing-emulable sources of randomness. This has non-trivial implications, and anyone who played with evolutionary computation / alife will probably agree. * even pseudo-number generators can be seeded by the clock time, for example > That would change nothing in UDA and AUDA. If the brain is a quantum > computer, it would only mean something on the lowness of the comp > substitution level, and a more complex back and forth between the Turing > emulable and the first person indeterminacy (Turing recoverable from the > indeterminacy on the whole UD*). Sure, I did not assume that the brain as a QC would pose a problem to COMP. > Bruno > > > > > >> >> >>> -- >>> >>> >>> ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- >>> 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 unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >>> email to [email protected]. >>> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >>> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. >>> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. >>> >>> >> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "Everything List" group. >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >> email to [email protected]. >> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. >> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. >> >> > > http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ > > > > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
