On 05 Mar 2015, at 22:44, LizR wrote:
On 6 March 2015 at 06:22, Bruno Marchal <marc...@ulb.ac.be> wrote:
On 04 Mar 2015, at 21:36, LizR wrote:
On 5 March 2015 at 04:37, Bruno Marchal <marc...@ulb.ac.be> wrote:
So it is not the state of the halting problem which are physical,
it is the physical which needs to be redefined in term of a measure
(or the logic of the measure one, of that measure) on the halting
programs.
Yes, that's what I was trying to say, in my roundabout way. Using
"physical" confuses the matter, if you'll pardon the pun.
There is no reversal in Tegmark. He misses the mind-body problem in
general, and the computationalist one in particular.
Yes, he is in the interesting position of being what might be
called a "mathematical materialist" - deriving the material world
from maths and finding he still has the mind-body problem, which he
then solves by saying it isn't a problem (as for example Dennett
does. Of course he may be right...)
He may be right? Well, even if right, he has to prove it, and by
definition, that is the mind-body problem!
Yes, you clever logic chopper! But that doesn't mean the problem
can't be solved by showing that it's only an apparent problem.
Fair enough.
I imagine Dennett would say something like this:
"Consciousness is a complex illusion
This is self-defeating. Without consciousness, no one can be deluded
on consciousness.
generated as a sort of user interface between the brain and the world.
Assuming there is a word, and that the brain is unique into that
unique world. Or assuming the brain infinitely complex and the world
infinitely complex and some unknown means on normalization or
renormalization.
That is the problem of many people working on consciousness, they
believe that the problem of matter has been solved, but as QM
illustrates, the problem has only deepen. We cannot take the notion of
physical world or universe for granted.
It is more like consciousness select the "consistent enough" histories/
dreams/computation (to sump on the alternate intensional nuances).
It is no more fundamental to reality
Which one?
If consciousness is not fundamental for reality, then reality will be
not fundamental for consciousness.
than the pattern of pixels on my screen is a real desktop.
That type of argument can make me doubt of many things, perhaps all
content of my consciousness, but one: consciousness.
(I think I know you do agree with this, but may be not all months).
It is an attempt to explain how we have experiences that is based on
Cartesian dualism, while science tells us that the world is made of
matter, energy, etc - there are no ghosts in the machine -
eventually the idea of consciousness being anything more than what I
have said will look as outdated as elan vital and phlogiston."
This like saying that the high programming language LISP or C++ is
phlogiston, because we can reduce them to number theoretical relations.
And then it ignores that such high level structure, when they become
able to refer to themselves are confronted to complex self-
identification procedure.
It is the confusion of level. A confusion between a program, and its
compilation into another program.
To believe that consciousness can be outdated is outrageous. It
eliminates the person, which with comp is the main selector of
computational histories, at the logical origin of physics.
If Dennett would apply that form of reductionism in the arithmetic
TOE, he should say that consciousness is outdated, but also matter
energy time particles, as they are reduced to natural numbers and some
first person limits.
Dennett ignores the problem.
Of course this doesn't address the consequencs of taking this view
to its logical extreme as Bruno has done (or I should say claims to
have done, since I haven't been able to follow the whole argument).
I'd be interested to hear what DCD would have say about comp.
Dennett is computationalist. I met him in Toulouse 1988. He came to my
talk, where I explained the link Cantor-Kleene-self-reproduction-self-
reference (the diagonals).
In brainstorms and Minds eyes (his best books) he is clearly
computationalist, even high level computationalist.
But if your read the beginning of "Consciousness Explained", you can
see him asserting that there is no more conceptual difficulties in
physics. He seems unaware that we can be rationalist and non
Aristotelian. It is alas frequent, and a part of academics are taboo
on this, apparently. (In my time those people negated both
consciousness *and* the existence of a problem of interpretation of QM)
But I appreciate somehow Dennett reasoning. He is only honest with his
Aristotelian faith. He saw somehow the hard problem: the
incompatibility between mind and matter, and as a believer in matter,
he choose to make mind into non existence.
Would he take its own computationalist hypothesis seriously enough,
and look on computer science, he would see that both matter and
consciousness must be explained in term of phenomenologies, and
explained as perceived as real by the machines/numbers in the relevant
relations. In that case we eliminate only the substance, and none of
the many higher types of objects, like person and trees.
To say that consciousness does note exist is equivalent with saying
that you are a zombie. It is equivalent with "you have the right to
torture myself".
If consciousness did not exist, the industry of anesthesia would not
exist. Anesthesia is one rare phenomenon observed on all animals and
plants (amazingly enough. Fundamental research use paramecia to study
the basic of the phenomenon. I don't imply by only this that paramecia
supports consciousness, note).
Without consciousness pain can't make its job, nor most satisfactions,
without mentioning the spiritual quest (for which consciousness is the
first mystical state: where you hallucinate a reality).
Bruno
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