On Mon, Sep 16, 2013 at 7:47 PM, Craig Weinberg <[email protected]> wrote: > > > On Saturday, September 14, 2013 5:53:01 AM UTC-4, telmo_menezes wrote: >> >> On Fri, Sep 13, 2013 at 12:06 PM, Craig Weinberg <[email protected]> >> wrote: >> > >> > >> > On Friday, September 13, 2013 5:31:40 AM UTC-4, telmo_menezes wrote: >> >> >> >> On Thu, Sep 12, 2013 at 5:47 PM, Craig Weinberg <[email protected]> >> >> wrote: >> >> > Which reasoning is clearly false? >> >> > >> >> > Here's what I'm thinking: >> >> > >> >> > 1) The conclusion "I won't be surprised to be hanged Friday if I am >> >> > not >> >> > hanged by Thursday" creates another proposition to be surprised >> >> > about. >> >> > By >> >> > leaving the condition of 'surprise' open ended, it could include >> >> > being >> >> > surprised that the judge lied, or any number of other soft >> >> > contingencies >> >> > that could render an 'unexpected' outcome. >> >> >> >> Ok but that's not the setup. The judge did not lie and there are no >> >> soft contingencies. The surprise is purely from not having been sure >> >> the day of the execution was the one when somebody knocked at the door >> >> at noon. Even if you allow for some soft contingencies, I believe the >> >> paradox still holds. >> > >> > >> > I don't understand why it's a paradox and not just contradiction. If I >> > say >> > 'you're going to die this week and it's going to be a surprise when', >> > that >> > is already a contradiction. >> >> Ok, after a good amount of thought, I have come to agree with this. >> The judge lied. You convinced me! :) > > > Ah cool! Thanks for posting the problem also, it helped me resurrect some > lost mathematical-logical ability. > >> >> (with due credit to Alberto and >> Brent, who also helped convince me). A more honest statement would be >> "you're going to die this week and it will probably be a surprise >> when", or, "you'll probably die this week and it will be a surprise if >> you do". >> >> My thought process involves reducing the thing to a game. There are 5 >> turns in the game, and the attacker has to choose one of those turns >> to press a button. The defender also has a button, and its goal is to >> predict the action of the attacker. If both press the button. the >> defender wins. If only the attacker pressers the button, the attacker >> wins. Otherwise the game continues. The system is automated so that >> the attacker button is automatically pressed. Now the attacker (judge) >> is making the claim that he can always win this game. He cannot, there >> is no conceivable algorithm that guarantees this. Playing multiple >> instances of the game, I would guess the optimal strategy for the >> attacker is to chose a random turn, including the last. This will >> offer 20% of the games to the defender, but there's nothing better one >> can do. >> >> I read your post and now I think I understand you positions better. > > > Nice. > >> >> I >> am not convinced, but I will grant you that they are not easily >> attackable. On the other hand, this could be because they are >> equivalent to Carl Sagan's "invisible dragon in the garage" or, as >> Popper would put it, unfalsifiable. Do you care about falsifiability? > > > Falsifiability is nice - especially in public-facing physics, but since > falsification itself is a sensory experience, we should not insist on the > same kind of falsifiability for private physics that we have in public > physics.
Alright. Personal or 1p experiences are probably outside the realm of phenomena that can be investigated under Popperian science. I think this is something that many of us can agree with, independently of accepting/rejecting comp, for example. I think this is also what characterises hard-core positivists: they either find 1p reality irrelevant or even reject its existence. >> >> If so, can you conceive of some experiment to test what you're >> proposing? > > > There may not be a test, so much as accumulating a body of understanding by > correlating uses of information and qualities of sensation. It's more at the > hypothesis stage than the testing stage. > >> >> >> The symbol grounding problem haunted me before I had a name for it. >> It's a very intuitive problem indeed. I tend to believe that the >> answer will actually look something like an Escher painting. Assuming >> that neuroscience is enough, one can imagine the coevolution of neural >> firing patterns with environmental conditions. This can lead to neural >> firing patterns that correlate with higher abstractions -- the >> symbols. Why not? > > > Still there's the hard problem. Why would neural firing patterns have a > smell? I don't know! But I think the mystery is not so much how symbols appear or why they appear. Computers can do that. The big mystery is how they become qualia. Which leads me to a point where I can definitely agree with you (if I understand you correctly): private experiences have at least the same reality status as public experiences. My main problem with your ideas is that I feel you throw too much of the baby away with the (public) bath water. Cheers, Telmo. > Thanks, > Craig > >> >> >> Cheers, >> Telmo. >> >> > Adding the conceit of precise times doesn't >> > alter the fundamental contradiction that you can be surprised when >> > someone's >> > true prediction comes true. The week already includes every hour of >> > every >> > day of the week, so it can't be a surprise on that level, but if the >> > judge >> > doesn't specify a single time then it also has to be a surprise on >> > another >> > level. You just have to pick on which level you are talking about, or >> > decide >> > that one level automatically takes precedence over the other. >> > >> >> >> >> > The condition of expectation >> >> > isn't an objective phenomenon, it is a subjective inference. >> >> > Objectively, >> >> > there is no surprise as objects don't anticipate anything. >> >> >> >> I would say that surprise in this context can be defined formally and >> >> objectively. The moment someone knocks at the door, the prisoner must >> >> have assigned a probability < 1 that he would be executed that day. >> >> This is clearly not the case for Friday, where p=1. >> > >> > >> > Even on Friday it can still be a surprise, a meta-surprise, when he >> > finds >> > out the judge lied, or knocks on the door an hour later. If we say that >> > can't happen though, p=1 is still limited to Friday only if it's >> > Thursday. >> > It doesn't accumulate. On Wednesday it's still 50-50 for Thursday and >> > Friday >> > each. On Tuesday it's .33 for Wednesday-Friday each, so on Wednesday, >> > when >> > the knock comes, he is 66% surprised - unless there's something I'm >> > missing. >> > >> >> >> >> If we assume a >> >> rational prisoner, we can replace it with an object. Some computer >> >> running an algorithm. Here we can define the computer belief as some >> >> output it produces somehow. We can even make this problem fully >> >> abstract and get rid of the colourful story with hangings and judges. >> > >> > >> > That's a problem if you fall for the Pathetic Fallacy and assume that >> > computer 'beliefs' are literal rather than figures of speech. I posted >> > more >> > about this here: >> > >> > http://multisenserealism.com/2013/09/12/why-computers-cant-lie-and-dont-know-your-name/ >> >> >> >> >> >> > 2) If we want to close in tightly on the quantitative logic of >> >> > whether >> >> > deducibility can be deduced - given five coin flips and a certainty >> >> > that >> >> > one >> >> > will be heads, each successive tails coin flip increases the odds >> >> > that >> >> > one >> >> > the remaining flips will be heads. The fifth coin will either be 100% >> >> > likely >> >> > to be heads, or will prove that the certainty assumed was 100% wrong. >> >> >> >> Coin flips are independent events. Knock/no-knock events are not >> >> independent. Each day that passes without a knock increases the >> >> probability of a knock the next day. >> > >> > >> > Ok, but his surprise is not independent either. In a Wednesday knock, >> > that >> > means he is 33% unsurprised. From the outset he can only be 20% >> > unsurprised >> > at the minimum just by virtue of his knowing it has to be 1 out of 5 >> > days...including Friday, because Friday is only p=1 on Thursday after >> > noon. >> > On on level, the knocks are independent events also - they either happen >> > or >> > they don't - so probability breaks down at any moment of incidence. The >> > probability is a subjective expectation, it cannot be relied on as an >> > object. Probability is an abstraction layer that is a posteriori to >> > events. >> > Spacetime is a museum of causally closed tokens which can represent and >> > embody subjective experience, not the other way around. >> > >> >> >> >> > I think the paradox hinges on 1) the false inference of objectivity >> >> > in >> >> > the >> >> > use of the word surprise >> >> >> >> Ok, let's replace the judge and the prisoner. A computer sits in a >> >> room for 5 days. One of those days, at noon, an input will be fed to >> >> the computer. If the computer fires an output at the exact same time >> >> that the input is received, it wins. The computer is only allowed to >> >> fire its response once. It's now a game between the programmer of the >> >> computer and the programmer of the system that emits the signal to the >> >> computer. How would you program these systems? It's clear that, if you >> >> are programming the computer, you will mostly certainly add a rule to >> >> fire the response if it's Friday. And then... >> > >> > >> > I don't see the problem. All the computer can to is computer a 20% >> > probability on Monday of all five days, and pseudorandomly pick one. >> > Every >> > day that both programmer and computer do not pull the trigger, the odds >> > go >> > up when it guesses again. It's the part about 'the judge/programmer was >> > right' that is arbitrary and omniscient. How can the programmer tell the >> > computer is not going to pick Friday until Thursday night? >> > >> >> >> >> >> >> > and 2) the false assertion of omniscience by the >> >> > judge. It's like an Escher drawing. In real life, surprise cannot be >> >> > predicted with certainty and the quality of unexpectedness it is not >> >> > an >> >> > objective thing, just as expectation is not an objective thing. >> >> > >> >> > Or not? >> >> >> >> I am open to the possibility that this is a language trick, but not >> >> yet convinced. >> > >> > >> > See what you think of that post. These kinds of paradoxes don't really >> > come >> > naturally to me, but I do feel very clear about the underlying nature of >> > symbol grounding and how it related generally. Think of an Escher >> > drawing - >> > its the same thing - the paradox is only a paradox if you read a symbol >> > as a >> > literal reality. No symbol has any objective reality outside of some >> > experience which interprets that way. >> > >> > Craig >> > >> >> >> >> >> >> Telmo. >> >> >> >> > Craig >> >> > >> >> > >> >> > On Thursday, September 12, 2013 5:33:24 AM UTC-4, telmo_menezes >> >> > wrote: >> >> >> >> >> >> Time for some philosophy then :) >> >> >> >> >> >> Here's a paradox that's making me lose sleep: >> >> >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unexpected_hanging_paradox >> >> >> >> >> >> Probably many of you already know about it. >> >> >> >> >> >> What mostly bothers me is the epistemological crisis that this >> >> >> introduces. I cannot find a problem with the reasoning, but it's >> >> >> clearly false. So I know that I don't know why this reasoning is >> >> >> false. Now, how can I know if there are other types of reasoning >> >> >> that >> >> >> I don't even know that I don't know that they are correct? >> >> >> >> >> >> Cheers, >> >> >> Telmo. >> >> > >> >> > -- >> >> > 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. >> >> > 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. >> > 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. > 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. 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