2015-10-27 19:16 GMT+01:00 Brent Meeker <meeke...@verizon.net>: > > > On 10/26/2015 11:57 PM, Quentin Anciaux wrote: > > > > 2015-10-27 7:44 GMT+01:00 Brent Meeker <meeke...@verizon.net>: > >> >> >> On 10/26/2015 3:37 PM, Russell Standish wrote: >> >>> On Mon, Oct 26, 2015 at 10:44:28AM -0700, Brent Meeker wrote: >>> >>>> On 10/26/2015 2:43 AM, Russell Standish wrote: >>>> >>>> Assuming computationalism, our everyday experience _is_ internal to the >>>>> system. That doesn't make it any less meaningful. >>>>> >>>> I think that's a confusion. The system is the universe with it's >>>> physics. So in a sense everything is internal to it. But >>>> experience is individual and it's meaningful because the individual >>>> has values and memory and so incorporates experiences into decisions >>>> about future actions...that's what constitutes giving them >>>> semantics. >>>> >>>> Hi Brent, I appreciate your point of view very much, but I fail to see >>> how what you say is incompatible with my claim. Where is the >>> confusion? >>> >> >> I think our everyday experience is given meaning as referring to things >> outside ourselves. So it's not internal to "the system" that is the >> experiencer. It is only because the observer is distinct from the rest of >> the world that he can form meaningful symbolic representations of it. >> >> >>> The only clarification I would make is that (with computationalism) >>> the system is formal, but the observer (individual in your >>> terminology) and environment (universe with its physics in your >>> terminology) are a non formal partition of the system. >>> >> >> I'm not sure what you mean by non-formal partition. If your brain is >> replaced by a I/O functionally equivalent digital computer it will still be >> in an environment and will have internal representations that refer to the >> environment. > > > In a computer... an io, is just a memory location... as anything else > is... that the value of that memory location reflect or not an external > world... doesn't change anything from the POV of the program reading it... > so as the meaning must somehow be internal to the program as to what that > value at that memory location means for it. > > > That's like saying a neuron in your brain doesn't know anything. >
I don't know about neurons and interactions with the environment... but as far as a program is concerned, a program has only access to memory locations... so if meaning must arise from the POV of the program (ie: what we could call a conscious program), it must be internal to itself... What you could say I could agree, is that IO of our "real" world do provide regularity pattern to those memory locations when fed with the sensor data... what random value would not... so one can say that meaning arise from stable pattern... where they come from and the fact they represent something ontologically real is unknown to the program... > In a sense it's true, but it obfuscates the source of meaning. What your > neurons, as a brain, know are things about the external world (external to > the brain) with which they interact. The "meaning" is internal in the > sense that it is represented by a pattern in the brain - but it is only > meaning because it has referents outside the brain. A brain that had never > had an environment with which to interact would not have anything to > represent and would contain no "meaning". It would be like the computer > running a random or unknowable program, or the rock that computes > everything. > > Brent > > > -- > 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 everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. (Roy Batty/Rutger Hauer) -- 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 everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
