Re: How can a grown man be an atheist ?

Mon, 16 Dec 2013 16:08:37 -0800 

On 12/16/2013 2:27 PM, Jason Resch wrote:





On Mon, Dec 16, 2013 at 3:14 PM, meekerdb <meeke...@verizon.net 
<mailto:meeke...@verizon.net>> wrote:


    On 12/16/2013 12:40 PM, LizR wrote:

    On 17 December 2013 08:06, meekerdb <meeke...@verizon.net
    <mailto:meeke...@verizon.net>> wrote:

        JKC makes a big point of the complete separation of quantum worlds, 
although
        Everett didn't write about multiple worlds.  Everett only considered 
one world

        and wrote about the "relative state" of the observer and the observed system. 
        In some ways this is more fundamental because in principle the "different

        worlds" of MWI can interfere with one another.  That they usually don't 
is a
        statistical result.

    ("Many worlds" is just a nice (and roughly accurate) description, like Big 
Bang
    (better than Small Hiss) or Black Hole (better than Very Faintly Glowing 
Region of
    Infinite Gravity :)

        I think that's an unfair criticism of Copenhagen. Deterministic 
theories just
        push the problem back in time.  Ultimately there is either an uncaused 
event or
        an infinite past.  So there is not great intellectual virtue in 
rejecting
        uncaused events. Quantum mechanics is an interesting intermediate case. 
 It has
        randomness, but randomness that is strictly limited and limited in such 
a way
        that it produces the classical world at a statistical level.


    The problem is pushed back onto whatever is considered fundamental. If 
there is an
    original event, it is only uncaused if it doesn't emerge naturally from (for
    example) the equations that are believed to describe the universe. One can 
say the
    same about an infinite past.

        Your own theory also introduces uncaused events, namely the 
computations of a
        universal dovetailer. The whole idea of "everythingism" was inspired by 
QM, but
        QM itself doesn't entail that everything happens. If you measure a 
variable you
        only get eigenvalues of that variable - not every possible value.  If 
you
        measure it again you get the same eigenvalue again - not any value.


    I was given to believe that the computations of the UD aren't events, and 
that they
    simply exist within arithmetic as a logically necessary consequence of its
    existence. Did I get that wrong?


    I wouldn't say "wrong".  It depends on whether you think "There exists a 
successor
    of 2." implies that 3 exists. Personally I think it is a confusion to say 
that a
    logical formula is satisfied by X is the same as saying X exists in the 
ontological
    sense.



        On the contrary, self-duplication explains the appearance of such
        indeterminacy, without adding any further assumptions.


        Well, the existence of self-duplication, even via Everett, is a further
        assumption.

    Surely the existence of duplication (rather than self-duplication) arises 
from the
    equations? So one has self-duplication as a consequence, to the same extent 
that
    one has it within ones own personal past? Or have I misunderstood that too?

    (Or are you just talking about the sort of assumptions we have to make all 
the time
    anyway?)


        Occam favors it. Your belief in "3)" substitutes a very simple 
explanation by
        a call to a form of built-in-non-explainable magic.


        No more magic than a UD.

    Why is the UD magic? (Is arithmetic magic?)



    It's hypothetically generating all possible worlds, but where is it?  It's 
in
    Platonia.  It's "the word made flesh."  Sounds a lot more magical than 
"that atom
    decayed by potential tunneling just like the equations say."




In a sense, one can be more certain about arithmetical reality than the physical 
reality. An evil demon could be responsible for our belief in atoms, and stars, and 
photons, etc., but it is may be impossible for that same demon to give us the experience 
of factoring 7 in to two integers besides 1 and 7.



But that's because we made up 1 and 7 and the defintion of factoring.  Their our language 
and that's why we have control of them.



So while Descartes could doubt physical reality, he could not doubt the "unreality 
of arithmetically impossible experiences".



I don't think Descartes could doubt physical reality.  Even Bruno rejects solipism and 
that's just doubting the reality of other people.  I find it pretty easy to doubt that you 
can always add one more to an integer.  I think 10^10^10 + 1 may well equal 10^10^10 in 
most contexts.



In that sense, arithmetic would in-part control possible experiences, and is harder to 
doubt than the possibility that physics is constrains experiences. Indeed, 
computationalism suggests this is true.  An appropriately programmed computer can 
generate any experience that can be possibly experienced in any universe: our own "laws 
of physics" do not constrain our possible experience whatsoever,


?? They seem to constrain my experience of breathing under water and flying to 
Mars.


so long as a Turing machine can be built within the laws of some physical 
universe.


I know.  That's your story and you're sticking to it.

Brent

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