On 23/04/2017 10:52 pm, Bruno Marchal wrote:
On 23 Apr 2017, at 01:34, Bruce Kellett wrote:
On 23/04/2017 9:03 am, Quentin Anciaux wrote:
The contradiction is in requiring computation which is a
mathematical notion, if physicalism is true, so everything reduce to
matter, computationalism is false by definition, as computation as
such is not a physical notion.
That is just word salad. A description of a physical process is not,
in itself, physical (unless it is written down or stored physically).
Similarly, computation is not physical in so far as it is an abstract
description of what a computer does.
This is an Aristotelian begging the question. And false. Computations
have been discovered in mathematical logic, and they have been
implemented in the physical realm after.
Descriptions of computations might have been discovered in arithmetic.
But descriptions are not the thing itself -- map and territory all over
again.
A platonist would say that a physical computer is not even a computer,
it is a local terrestrial approximation of a universal number only.
That would also beg the question, so better not to commit ourselves in
ontology when working on the mind body problem.
So it would be better for you not to commit to the ontology of the prior
existence of arithmetic -- that would beg the question.
But the computer is physical, and the computation does not exist
absent the computer.
It does not exist in the physical sense. Sure.
It seems that you have merely defined computationalism as the thesis
that physicalism is false, and then claimed that the assumption of
computationalism contradicts physicalism. But that is logic chopping
of the basest kind.
Bruno, at least, starts from the "Yes, doctor" idea, which is not, of
itself, inconsistent with physicalism, and then attempts to argue
that the notion of abstract computations (platonia) renders the
physical otiose. There is still no contradiction. The best that Bruno
can achieve is something that seems absurd to him. But that is merely
a contradiction with his instinctive notions of what is reasonable --
it is not a demonstrated logical contradiction.
Yes, with the Movie Graph Argument, we still need Occam, but that is
ridiculous to mention, given that the goal is to show we can do an
experimental testing.
An experimental testing of what?
And the conclusion is not a logical contradiction indeed, but then you
are like the guy who would say that despite thermodynamics explains
how a car move we keep the right to believe in invisible horses. With
such moves, there is no fundamental science at all.
All that my argument requires is that we accept the existence of an
external (physical) world, with which we can interact. This world is
'objective' in the sense that there is intersubjective agreement about
it. I think you accept as much, so the discussion can proceed from
there. Ontology can be left to one side. (Or, as Brent would say,
ontology is theory-dependent.)
Bruce
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