On 6/12/2014 1:17 AM, LizR wrote:
On 12 June 2014 15:09, meekerdb <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
I wouldn't go so far as to way it's "wrong", but I don't find it as
conclusive as he
does. First, I think it's a category confusion to say that "Ex(x+1 = 3)"
proves
that 2 exists. The truth of mathematical existence statements just implies
that the
axioms lead to the proof that a certain predicate can be satisfied. That's
not the
same "exist" as "Liz exists". So there is no proof that the UD exists or
even that
arbitrarily large numbers exist in the sense that you exist.
The problem is that (like Winston Smith) I don't know the sense in which I exist. That's
one of my reasons for being on this forum.
Second, he implies that step 8 proves that the physical is dispensable; but
when
challenged on the point he grants that is likely that human-like
consciousness can
only exist within a physical environment. So he hasn't proven that the
physical is
dispensable. He qualifies this by saying the physical may not be
dispensable, but
it isn't "the primitive physical". I think "the primitive physical" is a strawman.
It's ill defined and I don't know of anyone who asserts it except as a working
heuristic. Even the physicists he accuses of believing in primitive
matter, think
that matter may be just mathematical relations (c.f. Max Tegmark, John
Wheeler) and
others think it is just a certain way to organize qualia or knowledge (c.f.
Bertrand
Russell, Chris Fuchs). Of course most physicists think the mind/body
problem is too
ill defined a problem to tackle right now.
Well, Tegmark and even Wheeler are rather fringey on this one I believe. Have you read
Max's book? He got a lot of flak for suggesting his MUH. I think Bruno's point is that
most physicists assume the material universe is primitive (irreducible to simpler things
etc). Even you appear to be doing this when you say "That's not the same "exist" as
"Liz exists"."
Instead he tries to identify consciousness as just a relation between
operators in
modal logic or numbers in arithmetic. The similarity of relations is
suggestive, but
I don't see that it proves anything; or more accurately that it proves too
much. It
proves that consciousness is realized by very stupid, even trivial,
programs. Which
to me seems like changing the meaning of "consciousness". But as I say
this isn't
necessarily /wrong/ - it might be right is the sense that it can be filled
out and
made into a theory with some predictive power and consilience.
Ah, well, that's the point of course. But you may also be chasing a straw man, or
suffering from the category confusion you mention above when you insist (or appear to
insist) that 2 needs to "exist" for comp to work. Maybe 2 and the UD don't need to
exist. Maybe we have this notion of existence which is abstracted from the appearance of
a physical world, but maybe there is no such thing.
Try reading that out loud to yourself.
I must admit I too find it hard to imagine that the totality of my being is contained in
something like "[]p & p" (or whatever it is). But I also find it hard to imagine that 2
needn't be even, or that 23 could not be prime. Those are also irreducible facts, as far
as I can tell.
Yes it's true that they follow from the axioms of arithmetic. But that doesn't imply
"existence" except in the sense of satisfying a formula. Bruno's point is that there a
true statements of arithmetic that don't follow from the axioms - but this depends on
there being an infinity of statements. And even if you assume that, the true statements
that must exist are not very interesting.
Can 2 be even without existing?
Sure it can. Just like Sherlock Holmes can live on Baker St. It's a logical consequence
of some axioms.
Maybe it can, but then maybe the universe can be observable without existing,
too.
"This world, like all worlds, is māyā
But when everything is maya, then maya doesn't mean anything - or more accurately it just
means "everything".
Brent
"What is there? Everything! So what isn't there? Nothing!"
--- Norm Levitt, after Quine
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