Quentin Anciaux wrote:
2015-05-05 9:08 GMT+02:00 Bruce Kellett <bhkell...@optusnet.com.auQuentin Anciaux wrote:2015-05-05 8:09 GMT+02:00 meekerdb <meeke...@verizon.net <mailto:meeke...@verizon.net>It's not my theory. It's not mine either... do we have to have everything sort outbefore discussing ? You can't have any theory, because one sure thing I can say about any theory, it's that it is incomplete, and therefore false. But if it's going to be successful explanation it needs to show that our world, as some class, is not too improbable. That's a sure thing, and if computationalism cannot, it would be a failure. So yes, we should have a theory of measure, the fact we don't have it, is not a problem for the discussion of the consequences. It would be a problem, if you could show such measure problem cannot be solvable... Bruno never claimed he has one, just that it has to be extracted and must exist. But that "must" means "otherwise my theory fails". Yes, if there is no measure in accordance with what we live, the theory fails... that's part of the fact you can prove computationalism to be false... If in fact, this become intractable... well it would not be falsifiable with that in practice... But one has to show some progress in the direction of providing a suitable measure. It is not enough just to claim that "If my theory is true then such a measure must exist." If you show no progress, then your theory can be labelled a degenerating research program and should be abandoned. Computationalism does not have to be disproved on its own terms: it just has to be shown that no progress has been made after many years of trying. I think we are fast reaching this point.Well even without the measure theory, if we succeed to do AGI, it would be a strong indication that it is somehow correct... if we can by engeenering, succeed to upload a person and by interviewing her having confidence it's the same person, it would also be a strong indication... if technologically we can in the future do that, and you personally undergo uploading and find yourself surviving it, it would be a proof for you that it must be so (like quantum suicide experiment, you could not share that proof, but nonetheless, it would still be the best proof you will ever have and hope)... without a measure theory.
Even if you do all that, it will not be strong evidence for computationalism. It would, certainly, be evidence for strong AI, but that just means that consciousness can be simulated with a physical computer. It would go no distance towards establishing the comp hypothesis.
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