Craig: beutiful. I saved it for my closer understanding (if...). One little intrusion though:
*you write: the first copy of something should not be different from the 15,347,498th copy (figure arbitrary)*. My 'agnosticism' objects: The first copy is restricted to the techniques applicable for copting, not necessarily including the 'totality' of the original (infinite complexity). The later copies copy the first one. Meaning: we CANNOT copy in toto, only in our human cpabilities. (I extend such restriction to *'analytical'* - restricted to KNOWN parts, to *'statistical'* dependent on the border-limits and the qualia we include in identifying the counted items, to *'probability' *and some more.) John Mikes On Mon, Oct 14, 2013 at 11:46 AM, Craig Weinberg <[email protected]>wrote: > A first draft that I posted over the weekend. * > * > > *I. Trailing Dovetail Argument (TDA)* > > *A. Computationalism makes two ontological assumptions which have not > been properly challenged:* > > - *The universality of recursive cardinality* > - *Complexity driven novelty*. > > Both of these, I intend to show, are intrinsically related to > consciousness in a non-obvious way. > > *B. Universal Recursive Cardinality* > > Mathematics, I suggest is defined by the assumption of universal > cardinality: The universe is reducible to a multiplicity of discretely > quantifiable units. The origin of cardinality, I suggest, is the > partitioning or multiplication of a single, original unit, so that every > subsequent unit is a recursive copy of the original. > > Because recursiveness is assumed to be fundamental through math, the idea > of a new ‘one’ is impossible. Every instance of one is a recurrence of the > identical and self-same ‘one’, or an inevitable permutation derived from > it. By overlooking the possibility of absolute uniqueness, computationalism > must conceive of all events as local reproductions of stereotypes from a > Platonic template rather than ‘true originals’. > > A ‘true original’ is that which has no possible precedent. The number one > would be a true original, but then all other integers represent multiple > copies of one. All rational numbers represent partial copies of one. All > prime numbers are still divisible by one, so not truly “prime”, but > pseudo-prime in comparison to one. One, by contrast, is prime, relative to > mathematics, but no number can be a true original since it is divisible and > repeatable and therefore non-unique. A true original must be indivisible > and unrepeatable, like an experience, or a person. Even an experience which > is part of an experiential chain that is highly repetitive is, on some > level unique in the history of the universe, unlike a mathematical > expression such as 5 x 4 = 20, which is never any different than 5 x 4 = > 20, regardless of the context. > > I think that when we assert a universe of recursive recombinations that > know no true originality, we should not disregard the fact that this > strongly contradicts our intuitions about the proprietary nature of > identity. A generic universe would seem to counterfactually predict a very > low interest in qualities such as individuality and originality, and > identification with trivial personal preferences. Of course, what we see > the precise opposite, as all celebrity it propelled by some suggestion > unrepeatability and the fine tuning of lifestyle choices is arguably the > most prolific and successful feature of consumerism. > > If the experienced universe were strictly an outcropping of a machine that > by definition can create only trivially ‘new’ combinations of copies, why > would those kinds of quantitatively recombined differences such as that > between 456098209093457976534 and 45609420909345797353 seem insignificant > to us, but the difference between a belt worn by Elvis and a copy of that > belt to be demonstrably significant to many people? > > *C. Complexity Driven Novelty* > > Because computationalism assumes *finite* simplicity, that is, it > provides only a pseudo-uniqueness by virtue of the relatively low > statistical probability of large numbers overlapping each other precisely. > There is no irreducible originality to the original Mona Lisa, only the > vastness of the physical painting’s microstructure prevents it from being > exactly reproduced very easily. Such a perfect reproduction, under > computationalism is indistinguishable from the original and therefore > neither can be more original than the other (or if there are unavoidable > differences due to uncertainty and incompleteness, they would be noise > differences which we would be of no consequence). > > *This is where information theory departs from realism, since reality > provides memories and evidence of which Mona Lisa is new and which one was > painted by Leonardo da Vinci at the beginning of the 16th century in > Florence, Italy, Earth, Sol, Milky Way Galaxy*.* > > Mathematics can be said to allow for the possibility of novelty only in > one direction; that of higher complexity. New qualities, by > computationalism, must arise on the event horizons of something like the > Universal Dovetailer. If that is the case, it seems odd that the language > of qualia is one of rich simplicity rather than cumbersome computables. > With comp, there can be no new ‘one’, but in reality, every human > experience is exactly that – a new day, a new experience, even if it often > seems much like the one before. *Numbers don’t work that way. Each > mechanical result is identical. A = A. A does not ‘seem much like the A > before, yet in a new way‘*. This is a huge problem with mathematics and > theoretical physics. They don’t get the connection between novelty and > simplicity, so they hope to find it out in the vastness of super-human > complexity. > > *II. Computation as Puppetry* > > I think that even David Chalmers, who I respect immensely for his > contributions to philosophy of mind and in communicating the Hard Problem > missed the a subtle but important distinction. The difference between a > puppet and a zombie, while superficially innocuous, has profound > implications for the formulation of a realistic critique of Strong AI. When > Chalmers introduced or popularized the term zombie in reference to > hypothetical perfect human duplicates which lack qualia and subjective > experience, he inadvertently let an unscientific assumption leak in. > > A zombie is supernatural because it implies the *presence of an absence*. > It is an animated, un-dead cadaver in which a living person is no longer > present. The unconsciousness of a puppet, however, is merely tautological – > it is the natural *absence of presence* of consciousness which is the > case with any symbolic representation of a character, such as a doll, > cartoon, or emoticon. A symbolic representation, such as Bugs Bunny, can > be mass produced using any suitable material substance or communication > media. Even though Bugs is treated as a unique intellectual property, in > reality, the title to that property is not unique and can be transferred, > sold, shared, etc. > > The reason that Intellectual Property law is such a problem is because > anyone can take some ordinary piece of junk, put a Bugs Bunny picture on > it, and sell more of it than they would have otherwise. Bugs can’t object > to having his good name sullied by hack counterfeiters, so the image of > Bugs Bunny is used both to falsely endorse an inferior product and to > falsely impugn the reputation of a brand. The problem is, any reasonable > facsimile of Bugs Bunny is just as authentic, in an Absolute sense, as any > other. The only true original Bugs Bunny is the one we experience through > our imagination and the imagination of Mel Blanc and the Looney Tunes > animators. > > The impulse to reify the legitimacy of intellectual property into law is > related to the impulse to project agency and awareness onto machines. As a > branch of the “pathetic fallacy” which takes literally those human > qualities which have been applied to non-humans as figurative conveniences > of language, the computationalistic fallacy projects an assumed > character-hood on the machine as a whole. Reasoning (falsely, I think) that > since all that our body can see of ourselves is a body, it is the body > which is the original object from which the subject is produced through its > functions. Such a conclusion, when we begin from mechanism, seems > unavoidable at first. > > *III. Hypothesis* > > I propose that we reverse the two assumptions of mathematics above, so that > > - *Recursion is assumed to be derived from primordial spontaneity > rather than the other way around.* > - *Novelty can only be meaningful if it re-asserts simplicity in > addition to complexity.*This would mean: > - *The expanding event horizon of the Universal Dovetailer would have > to be composed of recordings of sensed experiences after the fact, rather > than precursors to subjective simulation of the computation.* > - *Comp is untrue by virtue of diagonalization of immeasurable novelty > against incompleteness.* > - *Sense out-incompletes arithmetic truth, and therefore leaves it > frozen in stasis by comparison in every instant, and in eternity.* > - *Computation cannot animate anything except through susceptibility > to the pathetic fallacy. * > > This may seem like an unfair or insulting to the many great minds who have > been pioneering AI theory and development, but that is not my intent. By > assertively pointing out the need to move from a model of consciousness > which hinges on simulated spontaneity to a model in which spontaneity can > never*, by definition *be simulated, I am trying to express the > importance and urgency of this shift. If I am right, the future of human > understanding depends ultimately on our ability to graduate from the > cul-de-sac of mechanistic supremacy to the more profound truth of > rehabilitated animism. Feeling does compute because computation is how the > masking of feeling into a localized unfeeling becomes possible. > > * > IV. Reversing the Dovetailer* > > By uncovering the intrinsic antagonism between the above mathematical > assumptions and the authentic nature of consciousness, it might be possible > to ascertain a truer model of consciousness by reversing the order of the > Universal Dovetailer (machine that builds the multiverse out of programs). > > - *The universality of recursive cardinality reverses as the > Diagonalization of the Unique > * > - *Complexity driven novelty can be reversed by Pushing the UD*. > > *A. > Diagonalization<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantor%27s_diagonal_argument>of > the Unique > * > > Under the hypothesis that computation *lags behind* experience*, no > simulation of a brain can ever catch up to what a natural person can feel > through that brain, since the natural person is constantly consuming the > uniqueness of their experience before it can be measured by anything else* > .* Since the uniqueness of subjectivity is immeasurable and unprecedented > within its own inertial frame, no instrument from outside of that frame can > capture it before it decoheres into cascades of increasingly generic public > reflections. > > PIP flips the presumption of Universal Recursive Cardinality inherent in > mathematics so that all novelty exists as truly original simplicity, as > well as a relatively new complex recombination, such that the continuum of > novelty extends in both directions. This, if properly understood, should be > a lightning bolt that recontextualizes the whole of mathematics. It is like > discovering a new kind of negative number. Things like color and human > feeling may exploit the addressing scheme that complex computation offers, > but the important part of color or feeling is not in that address, but in > the hyper-simplicity and absolute novelty that ‘now’ corresponds to that > address. The incardinality of sense means that all feelings are more > primitive than even the number one or the concept of singularity. They are > rooted in the eternal ‘becoming of one’; before and after cardinality. > Under PIP, computation is a public repetition of what is irreducibly > unrepeatable and private. Computation can never get ahead of experience, > because computation is an a posteriori measurement of it. > > For example, a computer model of what an athlete will do on the field that > is based on their past performance will always fail to account for the > possibility that the next performance will be the first time that athlete > does something that they never have done before and that they *could not > have done before*. Natural identities (not characters, puppets, etc) are > not only self-diagonalizing, natural identity itself is > self-diagonalization. We are that which has not yet experienced the > totality of its lifetime, and that incompleteness infuses our entire > experience. The emergence of the unique always cheats prediction, since all > prediction belongs to the measurements of an expired world which did not > yet contain the next novelty. > > *B. Pushing the UD* – If the UD is a program which pulls the experienced > universe behind it as it extends, the computed realm, faster than light, > ahead of local appearances. It assumes all phenomena are built bottom up > from generic, interchangeable bits. The hypothesis under PIP is that if > there were a UD, it would be pushed by experience from the top down, as > well as recollecting fragments of previous experiences from the bottom up. > Each experience decays from immeasurable private qualia that is unique into > public reflections that are generic recombinations of fixed elements. > Reversing the Dovetailer puts universality on the defense so that it > becomes a storage device rather than a pseudo-primitive mechina ex deus. > > The primacy of sense is corroborated by the intuition that every measure > requires a ruler. Some example which is presented as an index for > comparison. The uniqueness comes first, and the computability follows by > imitation. The un-numbered Great War becomes World War II only in > retrospect. The second war does not follow the rule of world wars, it > creates the rule by virtue of its similarities. The second war is > unprecedented in its own right, as an original second world war, but unlike > the number two, it is not literally another World War I. In short, > experiences do not follow from rules; rules follow from experience. > > *V. Conclusions* > > If we extrapolate the assumptions of Compuationalism out, I think that > they would predict that the painting of the Mona Lisa is what always > happens under the mathematical conditions posed by a combination of > celestial motions, cells, bodies, brains, etc. There can be no truly > original artwork, as all art works are inevitable under some computable > probability, even if the the particular work is not predictable > specifically by computation. Comp makes all originals derivatives of > duplication. I suggest that it makes more sense that the primordial > identity of sense experience is a fundamental originality from which > duplication is derived. The number one is a generic copy – a one-ness which > comments on an aspect of what is ultimately boundaryless inclusion rather > than naming originality itself. > > Under Multisense Realism (MSR), the sense-first view ultimately makes the > most sense but it allows that the counter perspective, in which sense > follows computation or physics, would appear to be true in another way, one > which yields meaningful insights that could not be accessed otherwise. > > When we shift our attention from the figure of comp in the background of > sense to the figure of sense in the background of comp, the relation of > originality shifts also. With sense first, true originality makes all > computations into imposters. With computation first, arithmetic truth makes > local appearances of originality artifacts of machine self-reference. Both > are trivially true, but if the comp-first view were Absolutely true, there > would be no plausible justification for such appearances of originality as > qualitatively significant. A copy and an original should have no greater > difference than a fifteenth copy and a sixteenth copy, and being the first > person to discover America should have no more import than being the > 1,588,237th person to discover America. The title of this post as > 2013/10/13/2562 would be as good of a title as any other referenceable > string. > > *This is *not* to suggest that *human* experience lags behind > neurological computation. MSR proposes a model called eigenmorphism to > clarify the personal/sub-personal distinction in which neurological-level > computation corresponds to sub-personal experience rather than personal > level experience. This explains the disappearance of free will in > neuroscientific experiments such as Libet, et. al. Human personhood is a > simple but deep. Simultaneity is relative, and nowhere is that more true > than along the continuum between the microphysical and the macrophenomenal. > What can be experimented on publicly is, under MSR, a combination of near > isomorphic and near contra-isomorphic to private experience. > > -- > 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]. 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