On 4/27/2017 10:18 AM, David Nyman wrote:
On 26 Apr 2017 7:26 p.m., "Brent Meeker" <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
On 4/26/2017 12:32 AM, David Nyman wrote:
On 25 Apr 2017 11:07 p.m., "Brent Meeker" <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
On 4/25/2017 1:08 AM, David Nyman wrote:
On 25 Apr 2017 5:15 a.m., "Brent Meeker"
<[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
On 4/24/2017 10:02 AM, David Nyman wrote:
On 24 Apr 2017 7:32 a.m., "Brent Meeker"
<[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
I don't think there's any question that
non-physical things exist, like chess and insurance
and computations. The question was whether the
assumption that computations can instantiate a
mind, i.e. the possibility of a conscious robot,
entails a contradiction of something. The
"something" having to do with physics, is part of
what I would like eulicidated. Bruno says it
reverses the relationship of physics and
psychology...but that's more of a polemic slogan
than entailment of a contradiction.
I don't think so. Here's the way I see it. Let's say we
accept as a hypothesis a computational ontology. Since
this requires no more than the natural numbers with +
and * this amounts to an ontology of arithmetic.
Platonism be damned, our interest at this point is
merely in seeing where the hypothesis can take us. So,
computationalism leads us to the extension of the UD,
which in turn gives us the digital machine, aka the
fully fungible universal computational device. The
reversal then is between role of the "psychology" of
that universal machine and the subset of the trace of
the UD assumed to implement physics.
The UD doesn't have a "psychology". Bruno talks about
the "beliefs" of a universal theorem prover in
arithmetic...but that's not a UD. And was is "the
trace of the UD".
Are you kidding? How long have we all been discussing all this?
To talk of taking a "subset of the trace" sounds to me
like handing waving: We'll make a machine that writes
all possible sentences and then there's a subset that
describes the world.
Ok, so now you know what it is. The point is just that comp
is true then it exists. If not it doesn't. We've been
discussing the consequences of the former case. If you still
want to believe in the necessity of a physical computer, we
only have to accept that comp would be true in the presence
of any such computer capable of running the UD.
The former is now required to play the role of filter
or selector on behalf of the latter; it's what
distinguishes​ it from the much more general
computational background. Of course that "filtration",
by assumption, essentially equates to the extremely
high probability of that very subset being required to
support its own self-selection.
Are you saying this "subset of the trace" must have a
high probability of existing, or it has, by some
measure, a high probability relative to other stuff not
in the trace. If the latter, and if the measure can be
defined, that would be an interesting result; but when
I've asked about this in the past Bruno has just said
it's a hoped for result.
I'm glad you agree it would be interesting.
I understand that Bruno wants to take thoughts as
fundamental and the wants to identify thoughts with
provable or computable propositions in arithmetic. He
thinks that the modality of "provable" is somehow a good
model of "believes" or "thinks". But even if that were
true (I don't think it is) it fails to account for the
physical world which one thinks about and acts in.
IOW it's selection by observation, with the part of
"universal point of view" falling to the suitably
programmed digital machine. It from bit really, but
without the prior commitment to physics as the
unexplained (aka primitive) assumption. OK?
You don't seem to have even mentioned a contradiction.
You didn't ask about the contradiction. You asked about the
reversal. Are you clearer on what is meant by that now? I'm
not asking if you believe it, just can we agree what is meant?
I did ask about the contradiction. From above: "The question
was whether the assumption that computations can instantiate
a mind, i.e. the possibility of a conscious robot, entails a
contradiction of something. The "something" having to do with
physics, is part of what I would like eulicidated." So, no
I'm not clear what the reversal means. It is claimed to
contradict the idea that matter is in some sense fundamental,
e.g. Democritus "Nothing exists except atoms and the void;
all else is opinion." But in my view ontology is theory
dependent, i.e. you find a theory that works well as an
explanation and a predictor and then that theory provides an
ontology: the POVI (intersubjective observable) elements of
the theory. So I'm not clear on what is the reversal. The
function of bodies, including brains, is, we think, within
the scope of physics. Is this "reversed"...to what exactly?
Ok, I see that this is an important misunderstanding. If physics
is taken to be the fundamental science, in the sense that a
completed physics will not demand further explanation, then
consciousness will clearly have to be explained entirely on the
basis of that fundamental science. For example, you yourself have
said that you believe the controversy will be settled by a
completed neuroscience.
That's slightly different than what I said. I pointed out that
Newton's theory of gravity did not explain gravity, and neither
does Einstein's. When we have a theory that is effective, i.e.
makes only accurate and even surprising predictions, when then
think of it as "explaining" the phenomena. But this "explanation"
is not at all like the explanation that was sought before the
instrumentally successful theory. This is exemplified in the case
of Newton: people wanted an explanation of the the gravitational
force - not just a formula to calculate it - and Newton answered,
"Hyposthesi non fingo."
So my expectation is that cognitive science will go the same way.
When we have learned to make AI robots to behave as conscious
people behave, the "hard problem of consciousness" will be seen to
have been the wrong question - like "What causes the force of
gravity?" Mystics will still ponder it and it will still be
controversial among metaphysicians.
By contrast, if comp is to be assumed in the fundamental role,
then the emergence of the universal machine will then *precede*
that of physics.
I assume you mean "precede" in some explanatory, not temporal,
sense. But I don't think explanations are necessarily
hierarchical with a bottom; I think they are better thought of as
circular. If they bottom out anywhere, it is ostensively.
What Bruno is at pains to show is then that the machine possesses
a "point of view", aka its psychology, in terms of which physics
will emerge as a complex of inter-subjective appearances (just as
you, Bruce and indeed Bruno and I require). Note by the way that
this immediately establishes in principle the elusive
interior/exterior distinction. It would also have to be the case,
if comp is indeed to succeed, that the computations corresponding
to those physical appearances would themselves typify (massively)
those supporting human level subjectivity. So in this way
sentient entities would "select" the very physical environments
necessary for their own existence.
But that seems to a chauvinistic view of the situtation. One
could as well say the physical environment selected the creatures
that can exist in it. But whichever way you look at it, it
doesn't look to me like a contradiction between the computational
theory of mind and physics.
I don't understand why we keep talking past each other like this. I'm
trying to keep the issues of contradiction and reversal distinct.
Above, I was talking about the reversal. It is, as you rightly say, a
reversal of explanatory priority and it can't be waved away into
virtuous explanatory circularity, because logically you need the
notion of machine psychology before "physical" computations can
thereby be isolated from computations in general.
I see that is the case if you start your explanation from arithmetical
realism and Church-Turing. But if you start from
physics->biology->evolution->arithmetic you derive "machine psychology".
Then at that point (but not before) you're again right that one can
then equally say that the environment selects its sentient
inhabitants. We will have reached a point of virtuous explanatory
equilibrium.
So are we in agreement that both physics can be explained from
computationalism and computationalism can be explained from physics?
The latter seems, by some on this list, to be an absurdity (the "hard
problem"). I would agree that it's far from demonstrated. But on the
other hand the derivation of physics from computationalism isn't
demonstrated either - it seems to rest on the idea that whatever is
reasonably consistent must be computable so physics must be computable,
even though we have no idea what that computation is or what physics may
result.
Of course the contradiction
What contradiction? I have asked for a clear definition of this
contradiction, but so far I've only heard that there isn't actually a
contradiction - rather a reductio. But a reductio doesn't tell you
which premise (or inference) is wrong.
Brent
is also implied because this cannot be done on the basis that physics
is itself irreducible to computation, if the comp theory of mind is to
have any serious content whatsoever. I've already said why I think the
contradiction is obvious for anyone who takes the view that
computationalism is a secondary inference from physical objects. I
haven't yet seen an adequate argument from you in response.
David
Brent
Of course the foregoing is not proven but it's implied by comp
and it hasn't been disproved either. Anyway, in a nutshell,
that's the reversal (i.e of explanatory priority) between physics
and machine psychology.
David
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
[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>.
To post to this group, send email to
[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>.
Visit this group at
https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list
<https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list>.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout
<https://groups.google.com/d/optout>.
--
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 [email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>.
To post to this group, send email to
[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>.
Visit this group at
https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list
<https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list>.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout
<https://groups.google.com/d/optout>.
--
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 [email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>.
To post to this group, send email to
[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>.
Visit this group at
https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list
<https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list>.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout
<https://groups.google.com/d/optout>.
--
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 [email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>.
To post to this group, send email to [email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>.
Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
--
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 [email protected].
To post to this group, send email to [email protected].
Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
