On 4/27/2017 11:46 PM, David Nyman wrote:
On 27 Apr 2017 11:12 p.m., "Brent Meeker" <meeke...@verizon.net
<mailto:meeke...@verizon.net>> wrote:
Sure. Here's the last exchange:
/Davic: As far as the contradiction is concerned, I think you've
found it for yourself. You've said many times that the number 2
has no independent existence but must depend on there being 2
things. IOW, you take the view that numbers are inferred only
secondarily from objects which, broadly, is the intuitionist
position on mathematics. Fine, if so for numbers, then equally so
for computation. If computation is at root an inference from the
relations between objects, and at the same time one holds that
consciousness supervenes on those inferred relations, then one has
reasoned oneself around in a circle, and not a virtuous one at
that. Is it really intelligible to say that your mind supervenes
on a set of secondary relations that are themselves nothing other
than a product of its own powers of inference?/
///
//Brent: But on that account they are not "nothing other than" -
the are //*instantiated*//computational relations./
/
/
/David: Sorry, Brent, that doesn't help. AFAICT you're just
dodging my point. Could you respond in a way that isn't merely a
verbal flourish?/
You didn't explain what point I was dodging. You said, "/Is it
really intelligible to say that your mind supervenes on a set of
secondary relations that are themselves nothing other than a
product of its own powers of inference?" / And insofar as I
understand that, it seems to say computationalism is incoherent
because it would imply that mental constructs supervene on
themselves. First, that's not what I said. I pointed out that I
said they supervened on physical instantiation of computation.
Second, I don't see that saying mental constructs supervene on
other mental constructs is incoherent. There could be a hierarchy
of self-reflection.
It's your use of the word instantiated that's the dodge. The only work
that word is doing in context is to assume what is demanding an
explanation. The whole question is precisely whether physical objects
indeed "instantiate" computation in a manner that could be shown to
make a real difference to anything, which is to say a difference that
doesn't reduce to a mere redescription of an existing physical state
of affairs. And the point then is that, if your notion of computation
is inextricably bound to fundamental physical action, the relevant
physical states continue to evolve one into another without the
necessity of the merest notion of computation.
So your complaint is that I'm assuming a kind of emergence in which
computation emerges from physical processes and in your view is that
this is an illegitimate notion of computation because it's bound to
physical actions. Is that right? I would point out that Bruno supposes
computation to be emergent in arithmetic; even though it's just numbers
satisfying equations.
You're right, I think, to be looking for recursive explanation; that
computation permits an unlimited hierarchy of recursion is indeed its
utility in the subject under discussion. But the hierarchy has to be
anchored in the relevant relations in the first place, which are
definitevely computational not physical.
First, I deny that there is a hierarchy of explanation that has to be
anchored. Second, the question of what is the ontology of the world is
theory dependent.
Once that is established in the theory then of course what starkly
demands explanation is the extraction of characteristically physical
relations within, as you elegantly put it, a hierarchy of
self-reflection. Of course this is an open question not a solution,
although as Bruno points out, there are some promising early indications.
There are also some falsifications - which are passed off as "everything
happens - just not here".
And, lest the point be lost, should definitive contradiction be found
in this direction, so much the worse for computationalism as a theory
of mind.
Anyway, there you have both the contradiction and the reversal in a
nutshell. By the way, given the recent references to the alternative
assumption of an "external world", I feel I ought to point out that
physics has surely already shown us unequivocally that there is no
such thing. The most probing investigations have resulted only in the
purely mathematical formulation of a deterministically evolving state
of affairs that is nothing like the concrete perceptual world of
inter-subjective agreement within which we perceive and act.
It is perfectly consistent with, and predictive of, the concrete
perceptual world - modulo neurocognition. Physics (in the broad sense)
accounts very accurately for everything up to inputs to the brain.
Darwinian evolution accounts for some of what happens then, but not in
much detail. I think AI will eventually, not /*solve*/ the "hard
problem", but dissolve it.
Brent
The open question is then: how can it be that, under such conditions,
a concrete world *appears* to exist and how can such substantial
appearances be brought into principled alignment with what physics is
describing? Your hierarchy of self-reflection surely recommends itself
in this regard, but I feel honour bound to say that Bruno is pointing
to a logically necessary point of entry into that maze. Always
assuming (and never forgetting) a prior assumption of the
computational theory of mind, of course.
David
Brent
On 4/27/2017 9:35 AM, David Nyman wrote:
Brent: We've just been through (again) finding there is no
contradiction between physics and arithmetic. Your answer seems to be
that physics can be an illusion of digital thought, therefore primary
physics is otiose. But thought can't be a consequence of physics
because....well you just don't see how it could be.
That's a bit quick. I've explained both the reversal and the
incompatibility. Then either you don't respond or your response
suggests you haven't grasped the point. Care to try again?
David
On 27/04/2017, Brent Meeker<meeke...@verizon.net>
<mailto:meeke...@verizon.net> wrote:
On 4/27/2017 12:54 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:
If there is a primary physical reality, you have to explain how it
drives the arithmetical consciousness flux. But how could it do that?
If it does it in a digitally simulable way, it cannot work (because
that is done in arithmetic too)
We've just been through (again) finding there is no contradiction
between physics and arithmetic. Your answer seems to be that physics
can be an illusion of digital thought, therefore primary physics is
otiose. But thought can't be a consequence of physics because....well
you just don't see how it could be.
Brent
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