On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 10:14 AM, Russell Standish <[email protected]> wrote:
> > > We don't, if by "concrete" you mean what Bruno means by it. > > > What are they and how do we avoid attributing originality to > > all your doppelgangers distributed in UD if such is given? > > > > originality? > The robust universe in which you require, to avoid the prospect of free lunch, the UD to "run sufficiently and be physically actualized so that consciousness can supervene". This kind of move strikes me as possibly privileging certain continuations of some A/B outcome of 1p experience over others, rendering all Doppelgangers original, which conflicts with mechanism. > > > > > > It also must supervene on the emergent > > > phenomenal physics that arises. That is a raw empirical fact that no > > > pussy-footing around can eliminate. > > > > The MGA demonstrates the > > > fundamental contradiction between COMP and physical supervenience in a > > > non-robust universe, consequently the only way to save COMP is for the > > > universe to be robust. > > > > > > > You pretend that this is common sense. That's much less clear to me. > > > > This stuff is far from common sense. It is a simple matter of logic, > however. > Well, that happens to be the area I find you most unclear. > > If you accept the empirical fact of physical supervenience (as I do, > and indeed also have arguments for why it must be so - see the Occam > Catastrophe discussion in my book), then the fact that the MGA forces > a contradiction between physical supervenience and computational > supervenience in a non-robust universe really just says there is a > choice: either we live in a robust universe, or computationalism is > false. The fact that we additionally observe quantum phenomena really > supports the idea we live in a robust universe. After MGA, I don't see why a robust universe is still needed, when we have arithmetical UD. Even regardless of matter question, it seems sufficient. No need for baroque stuff, although I love the period in music. > In a non-robust > universe, quantum phenomena is just weird. > > Additionally, in a robust universe, the Church-Turing thesis tells us > that physics we supervene on must be emergent from the properties of > universal systems (Bruno's reversal result). Thus the matter we supervene > on cannot be "primitive". The primitive urstuff is something else > entirely - the arithmetic of integers, perhaps, as Bruno suggests - > but not matter as we know it. > Why keep shoving the physics in there? You risk confusion and ambiguity because I could still understand 2 things: 1) Physical supervenience: consciousness of person A supervenes brain state of person A at some time and place (you still state "the physics we supervene on" but then state that these must be "emergent property" of universal systems) 2) consciousness of person A at some time and place supervenes on a relative computational state. So why not state 2, as 1 implies confusingly that a brain executing the right activity is sufficient for consciousness to be experienced. But this is shown in the MGA reasoning to be useless and can be cut out with occam. This sort of usage of language on your part has and is confusing me. > > > > > > > > > You may think robust universes are baroque, but I don't. Infinite, > > > symmetrical ensembles of universes are simpler from an information > > > theoretic perspective than specific finite instances. This is > > > ultimately the strongest argument in favour of platonism. > > > > > > > > But there is a sense that nature doesn't have to play by our > > > rules. Maybe we really do live in a non-robust universe. If so, we > > > cannot have our COMP and eat it. > > > > > > > I don't see how stating that UD (straight, not shaken or stirred with > > Quantum computer material stuff actualizing) is too cumbersome to realize > > physically wherever it is that we are, > > ie assuming non-robustness (which IMHO is virtually equivalent to > assuming ultrafinitism - like Norm Wildberger's position). > Please elaborate why non-robustness assumes ultrafinitism. I don't think this holds. > > gives you convincing leverage > > concerning consciousness relating to experiential outcome of some A/B > > experiment, as the relation of selection is invariant for delays and > > locations of reconstitution. > > > > It demonstrates an inconsistency between physical supervenience and > computational supervenience, notably that physical supervenience > entails that certain very simple computations, such as the replaying > of a recording, will be conscious. > > This only works in a non-robust universe, however, a point that is > often overlooked in treatments of this. > I don't think we gain anything (measure problem/hunting down rabbits) by stating robust universe is some large mathematical structure that appears to be physics; that's already assumed in the original work. And stating it again and again makes more likely confusions of this sort. PGCC -- 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/d/optout.
