On 04 Aug 2016, at 04:37, Bruce Kellett wrote:
On 4/08/2016 1:04 am, Bruno Marchal wrote:
On 03 Aug 2016, at 07:16, Bruce Kellett wrote:
On 3/08/2016 2:55 am, Bruno Marchal wrote:
On 02 Aug 2016, at 14:40, Bruce Kellett wrote:
On 2/08/2016 3:07 am, Bruno Marchal wrote:
On 01 Aug 2016, at 09:04, Bruce Kellett wrote:
Consider ordinary consequences of introspection: I can be
conscious of several unrelated things at once. I can be
driving my car, conscious of the road and traffic conditions
(and responding to them appropriately), while at the same time
carrying on an intelligent conversation with my wife, thinking
about what I will make for dinner, and, in the back of my mind
thinking about a philosophical email exchange. These, and many
other things, can be present to my conscious mind at the same
time. I can bring any one of these things to the forefront of
my mind at will, but processing of the separate streams goes
on all the time.
Given this, it is quite easy to imagine that a subset of these
simultaneous streams of consciousness might be associated with
myself in a different body -- in a different place at a
different time. I would be aware of things happening to the
other body in real time in my own consciousness -- because
they would, in fact, be happening to me.
If you dissociate consciousness from an actual single brain,
then these things are quite conceivable.
Dissociating consciousness from any actual single brain is what
UDA explains in detail. Then the math shows that this
dissociation run even deeper, as your 1p consciousness is
associated with the infinitely many relative and faithful (at
the correct substitution level or below) state in the (sigma_1)
arithmetical relations.
Duplication experiments would then be a real test of the
hypothesis that consciousness could be separated from the
physical brain. If the duplicates are essentially separate
conscious beings, unaware of the thoughts and happenings of
the other, then consciousness is tied to a particular physical
brain (or brain substitute).
Not at all, but it might look like that at that stage, but what
you say does not follow from computationalism. The same
consciousness present at both place before the door is open
*only* differentiated when they get the different bit of
information W or M.
However, if consciousness is actually an abstract computation
that is tied to a physical brain only in a statistical sense,
then we should expect that the single consciousness could
inhabit several bodies simultaneously.
It is irrelevant to decide how many consciousness or first
person there is. We need only to listen to
those which have differentiated to extract the
statistics.
The point that I am trying to make here is that a person's
consciousness at any moment can consist of many independent
threads. From this I speculate that some of these separate
threads could actually be associated with separate physical
bodies. In other words, it is conceivable that a duplication
experiment would not result in two separate consciousnesses, but
a single consciousness in separate bodies. If this is so, the
fact that the separate bodies receive different inputs does not
necessarily mean that they differentiate into separate conscious
beings, any more than the fact that I receive different inputs
from moment to moment means that I dissociate into multiple
consciousnesses.
It seems that the only reason that one might expect that the
different inputs experienced by the separate duplicates would
lead to a differentiation of the consciousnesses -- i.e., two
separate and distinct conscious beings -- is that one is
implicitly making the physicalist assumption that a single
consciousness is necessarily associated with a single body, such
that separate physical bodies necessarily have separate
consciousnesses.
I suggest that for step 3 to go through, you need to demonstrate
that computationalism requires that a single consciousness
cannot inhabit two or more separate physical bodies: without
such a demonstration you cannot conclude that W&M is not a
possible outcome that the duplicated person could experience.
You must demonstrate that different inputs lead to a
differentiation of the consciousnesses in the duplication case,
while not so differentiating the consciousness of a single
person. The required demonstration must be based on the
assumptions of computationalism alone, you cannot rely on
physics that is not yet in evidence.
In other words, start from your basic assumptions:
(1) The "yes doctor" hypothesis;
(2) The Church-Turing thesis; and
(3) Arithmetical realism;
(3) is redundant. There is no (2) without (3).
Yes there is. Arithmetical realism, as you use the term, is
different from the ability to calculate.
No. I define arithmetical realism by the belief in elementary
arithmetic.
I don't "believe in" elementary arithmetic -- I use it to do
calculations.
If you use it, you believe in it, or you play irrational.
I have even redefined an Arithmetical Realist by someone who does
not complain to the director of its children's school when they
learn arithmetic. There is no "metaphysic assumption" here. I use
arithmetic like all theoretical physicists use it.
You use it to define an ontology. Your metaphysics is evident.
My theology is evident, but I don't tell anybody if I believe in it or
not. I just show it to be testable, and count the evidences. I just
study the conceptual and interdisciplianty consequence of surviving
with a digital brain.
My ontology is not the numbers in any metaphysical sense. That is an
invention of yours. If you believe enough in arithmetic to do
calculations, or to buy a computer, or an artificial brain, that is
enough for the reasoning.
You can believe that 2+2=4 is true without commiting to the actual
existence of entities corresponding to '2', '4', etc.
Do you have a problem with predicate logic? I guess no, as you
would have told this before.
I use the common inference rule: P(n) ===> ExP(x),
so from s(0) + s(0) = s(s(0)), I can derive Ex(x+s(0) = s(s(0)))
There is no ontology inherent in arithmetic, so the results of
arithmetic are not efficient causes of anything at all.
Sto talking like if *you* knew that there is anything more. Or, if you
postulate a primary physical reality, just be careful not saying "yes"
to a digital doctor, or to pray your non-computationalist-compatible
god (or to refute the UDA, but without pseudo-philosophy). You will
need to study a few more theoretical computer science.
and demonstrate that consciousness is limited to a single
physical brain. Not that consciousness can be associated with a
physical brain; but that the one consciousness cannot inhabit
two identical, but physically separated brains.
?
Computationalism refutes that claim immediately. Take the WM-
duplication experience, maybe the virtual case to make the
reconstitution box as much numerically identical than the copies
of the body (at the relevant digital level). Or just suppose the
atom in the reconstitution box does not distinguish the first
person experiences. In such a case, after the guy pushed on the
button in Helsinki, he will find itself with once consciousness,
emulated in two places at once. So one consciousness inhabits two
physical separated brains, and as I explained you in my preceding
posts, the understanding of this is part of the understanding of
the FPI (step 3) and the sequel. Eventually, one consciousness is
emulated in infinitely many different numerical relations in
arithmetic, and the bodies appearances will emerge from that.
You asked me something impossible, contradicting comp
immediately, and which would be a problem for the sequel of the
reasoning. It is a bit weird.
It is a bit weird that you do not understand the point I am
making. What I ask is entirely reasonable.
I just proved in my last post to you that it is impossible.
If it is impossible then your "proof" is useless.
The whole point of the proof is that is impossible. You cannot limit
consciousness to any single computational history. The FPI forces you
to attach it to all the relevant computations, and they are infinitely
many.
You use the assumption that the duplicated consciousnesses
automatically differentiate when receiving different inputs.
It is not an assumption.
Of course it is an assumption. You have not derived it from anything
previously in evidence.
See my answer to Brent. It is just obvious that the first person
experience differentiated when it get different experience, leading to
different memories. We *assume* computationalism. How coud the diaries
not differentiate? What you say does not make any sense.
Up to step 3, I use only the notion of first person, and it is
defined by the content of the diary that the person doing the
duplication transported with him/herself.
Once the copies open the door, the diaries differentiate. One diary
contains H-W, the other contains H-M.
The one consciousness could well be aware of two different diaries
simultaneously, just as it is aware of two cities simultaneously.
Diaries add nothing to the argument -- despite your seeming reliance
on them.
I avoid consciousness, and consult only what the person put in their
personal diaries, and use comp to see what they can wrote, etc.
If a guy become aware of the two cities, where he is, where does it
came from?
What you say might make sense in some non-computationalist theory, but
you seem to forget that we assume computationalism.
I ask you to justify that assumption without appealing to
physicalist notions such as mind-body identity.
Well, I show that computationalism (like Everett by the way)
violates the mind-brain identity thesis. So I don't use it
at all, except in the "yes dorctor" sense of the comp hypothesis.
"Computationalism" as you use it here is the endpoint of the argument
Not at all. It is the theory in which I am working. It is CT + YD.
(Church-Turing thesis + "yes doctor").
Please read the posts or papers. Stop telling things which are just
plain wrong.
-- it cannot be used to justify intermediate steps in the argument.
The "Yes doctor" hypothesis does not refute the mind-brain identity
thesis since you are replacing a physical brain by an entirely
equivalent physical "brain" (viz., an emulation on a physical
computer.)
If you have not grasp that computationalism is the hypothesis, and the
reversal is the theorem, then we have a problem. Of course I can use
computationalism at each step: it is the theory in which we are working.
And here, we are at step 3. So wait we get at step seven to discuss
the reversal. Just tell me if you are OK with the step 3. And then we
move to step 4.
No physical assumption are made, except local one for pedagogical
purpose, and they will be eliminated later. Indeed it is the main
object of the proof (+ some use of Occam, as always in applied
science).
If it is only pedagogical, then you can eliminate this local
assumption.
That is done later. let us first be sure you get the step 3 FPI.
That is why I ask you to prove that the physically separated
consciousnesses diverge directly from your stated assumptions of YD,
Church, and arithmetical realism. If you cannot do this, your
argument collapses, and computationalism is false.
I think I am beginning to see what you mean when you say that
everything you say assumes computationalism. By 'computationalism'
you do not mean the three basic assumptions listed above --
rather, you mean the end point of the argument, including the
arithmetic-physics reversal.
Of course not.
Please let us go step by step. tell me if you are OK with Clarks
answer to the question 1, and what you think about question 2. Then
we can proceed.
I have not kept any record of your exchanges with John Clark so I
have no idea what you are talking about.
Your argument then goes something like this: we have assumed
computationalism is true, namely that the endpoint of the argument
for my (Bruno's) theory is true. From this it follows that all the
steps taken to reach that conclusion must also be valid/true, so
one cannot criticize the conclusion by undermining any of the
intermediate steps because they are true by assumption.
Please read the argument.
I have -- that is what it says.
That is a neat trick if you can get away with it, but all it means
is that your arguments are irreducibly and irredeemably circular.
Reductio ad absurdum (assume the conclusion and from that deduce a
contradiction) is not the only way that one can show a purported
proof to be invalid: all that it takes for the whole edifice to
collapse is that one shows that just one step in the proof is
invalid.
As I understand the structure of your argument, you claim that the
UDA -- in arithmetic -- involves an infinity of computations that
pass through your conscious state.
UD ≠ UDA.
That does not answer the point I have made.
You then want to use this to show that physics can be derived from
arithmetic by looking at the statistics of all these computations
and selecting out a consistent set -- which would, it is claimed,
correspond to the physics we observe. An essential ingredient of
this final phase of the argument is FPI, which is why the early
steps of your deductive argument aim to establish the FPI from
more elementary considerations.
But you have not succeeded in doing this because an essential
element of the FPI in step 3 is that consciousnesses in separate
bodies differentiate on different inputs.
See above.
See above.
The only way in which this could happen is if consciousness is
localized to a particular physical body.
Why ?
You tell me. You are the one who claims that this differentiation
occurs.
(You acknowledge the truth of this when you say that for one
consciousness to inhabit more than one body would require
telepathy or "spooky action at a distance".) But the physics
required to establish this is not available until you have
recovered physics from arithmetic at step 8.
Physics is no more required than a bit of biology, but not at the
primary level.
Biology is reducible to physics.
In which theology? What is your theology? If you believe in
physicalism, then UDA shows that you need to say "no" to the doctor,
or to refute the Church-Turing thesis.
You cannot call upon the results of physics to establish that
physics is derivative and not fundamental
Why not? The whole enterprise would be senseless if I did not
believe in some physical reality. Computationalism would be
senseless.
Finally, something we can agree on. Computationalism is senseless.
Invalid deduction here.
But what is not assumed is that physical primary assumption are
necessary. Any computation in arithmetic would work as well, but
would be unpedagogical.
Get over you concerns with whether the physical is primary. You are
claiming to derive physics from arithmetic, so you cannot use
physics in your derivation.
I derive that physics is not primary, in UDA (the derivation of
physics is for later, in AUDA). I don't use the fact that physics is
primary in the UDA step, *that* would be circular.
(unless via a reductio argument, but step 3 is not a reductio)
Indeed. Just tell me if you are OK with John Clarks' answer. And
then if you agree with the principle exposed in the question 2.
I have no idea what you are talking about.
read the thread question one and question two.
As John Clark seems uninterested in the reasoning, and failed to
answer my "QUESTION 1", I take the opportunity to ask you, given
that you seem to misunderstand the FPI.
You are told, in the WM duplication protocol, that both copies
will have a cup of coffee after the reconstitution. Are you OK
that P("experience of drinking coffee") = 1? (assuming digital
mechanism and of course all default hypotheses). Do you think the
guy in Helsinki was wrong when he said, in Helsinki, to expect to
drink some coffee soon?
What possible relevance has that to the points that I am making?
It is sub-step for helping to get the step 3, and thus the local
FPI. The global FPI, which is needed for the rversal will
be given in step 7.
I know. That is why deriving the FPI in step 3 is crucial to your
argument. But step 3, as presented, assumes the results of step 7,
so the argument is invalidly circular.
You are inventing this. Step 3 does not use step 7. Please follows the
thread or avoid trolling the discussion. Read my exchange with Clark,
I just give him a new proof of the FPI.
Bruce, I have to say that you look more and more like the guys who
decide something is crackpot before studying it, as your remark have
just no relationship with the reasoning proposed, and then you confess
you don't read the post, nor the papers, nor the books I have
suggested, etc.
I have just proved again, in anew way, the FPI, so read the proof, and
let us move to step 4, unless you have a genuine point against step 3.
But it does not use step 7, that is pure invention, or total
misunderstanding, or total non reading and just repeating parrots
which repeat parrots, etc.
Bruno
Bruce
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