On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 04:56:39PM +0200, Platonist Guitar Cowboy wrote: > 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.
Why? It only priveleges some experiences over others if the full UD* is not instantiated, but the point of this "robust for practical purposes" is that we could never tell in practice. > > > > > > > > > > > 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. > Ok - well let's keep discussing. If parts of my argument are unclear, I'd like to find a way of recasting it to make it better. > > > > > 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. > The arithmetical UD is a robust universe. That is the definition of robust. > > > 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) > Where's the contradiction? > 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 Sufficiency is a loaded term. It is better to stick with supervenience. > 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. > The MGA only works for non-robust universes. As soon as the universe is robust, all counterfactuals are in fact physically realised, and physical supervenience becomes equivalent to computation supervenience, with respect to the MGA at least. > > > > 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. > If all the integers (and their arithmetical properties) exist, then we have a robust universe. The UD exists and "runs to completion". For this not to be the case, there must be some integers that can never be realised. Whilst one can think of bizarre cases such as prime numbers stop existing after 10^10^10^10^10^10^10, but all other numbers remain existing, the most believable scenario for reality to be non-robust is that there is some maximum integer (even if we can never know what it is). > > > > > 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 > It was Bruno who introduced this term, and I believe it was largely in response to Peter Jones's criticism, as it doesn't appear in the presentation in the Lille thesis. Bruno's position is that the MGA is only required for the non-robust case. For many years, I left it at that, for being a good little platonist, I could never conceive of reality not being robust. Plus I could never get the MGA, until I realised that it could be made to work, provided you negated the many worlds interpretation, and assumed some preferred classical reality. That is the core of my paper's critique. I don't know whether Bruno ultimately accepted that criticism, but he did manage to convince me that the many worlds is already robust, and so does not present a problem for his argument. As for gain - yes we gain something: the understanding of what the MGA actually implies. True, it doesn't address the measure issue - that is different line of research, to which appendix A is a contribution. Whether appendix A belongs in that paper is another question, of course, but I guess I was thinking of maybe commenting on Jean de la Haye's critique of Bruno's work. -- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Prof Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile) Principal, High Performance Coders Visiting Professor of Mathematics [email protected] University of New South Wales http://www.hpcoders.com.au Latest project: The Amoeba's Secret (http://www.hpcoders.com.au/AmoebasSecret.html) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- 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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