On 8/21/2018 2:20 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:
On 21 Aug 2018, at 07:56, Brent Meeker <[email protected]> wrote:
On 8/20/2018 9:54 PM, Russell Standish wrote:
On Mon, Aug 20, 2018 at 09:03:04PM -0700, Brent Meeker wrote:
We must be looking at some different enumeration of the argument. I have:
Clearly. I was referring to the enumeration in the SANE2004 paper, which is
kind of canonical:
OK. I also have the SANE paper.
7) The seventh step introduces the Universal Dovetailer (UD). Let N denotes the
set of
natural numbers. A function from N to N is said to be total if it is defined on
all natural
numbers. A function is said to be computable iff there is a programme FORTRAN
which
computes it12. Church thesis (CT) makes the particular choice of FORTRAN
irrelevant. CT
claims that all computable functions, total or not, are computed by algorithm
expressible in
FORTRAN. In particular all total computable functions are computed by such
FORTRAN
program...
Yes I understood it introduced the UD and per the C-T inferred that all
possible computations are performed by it.
Bruno wrote,"In that case consciousness is associated with a digital
self-referential entity which cannot distinguish
a “bottom” (primary) physical reality from an arithmetical reality"
I objected, "But you didn't show that."
You responded, "This is directly the result at step 7 of the UDA. And it is pretty
much required for the Church Turing thesis to hold."
So I still don't see why the UD implies consciousness is associated with a
digital self-referential entity which cannot distinguish a “bottom” (primary)
physical reality from an arithmetical reality.
It is not the UD which implies this, but just the digital mechanist hypothesis.
A person whose brain is in a vat, with the right configuration, cannot know
that she is in a brain in a vat. Similarly, we cannot know if we are processed
by something primarily physical or not. If I implement the combinators in
FORTRAN or in LISP, no combinators can distinguish the two from their personal
experience (that without observation). Same for the arithmetical/physical.
The UD is used to formulate the measure problem, not to argue that a digital
machine cannot distinguish an arithmetical from a physical “master machine”,
which is a direct consequence of digital mechanism.
It seems to me like the rock that computes everything. The UD is effectively
running every possible simulation at once
So to speak. The universal dovetailer has to dovetail, of course.
and so is simulating everything at once. Whether some thread within it
simulates you or simulates a rock on alpha centauri becomes a matter of
interpretation.
? If it simulates you, you will feel to be conscious. The point will be that
there is no rock which could ever be simulable by any computer, except those
exloiting directly the infinities of computations below our level of
substitution, like plausibly, a quantum computer.
The computations of the UD can have no unique interpretation.
A computation *is* an interpretation, made by a universal machine. That is what
the universal do: computation.
But that doesn't make it an interpretation. My wristwatch does
universal computation.
Then with mechanism, some can be associated to consciousness, when they emulate
self-referential entity.
Can you watch a running program and tell that it is emulating a
self-referential entity or not?
If curiosity is conscious on Mars, it has to be conscious in the virtual mars
during its training on Earth, and it has to be conscious in arithmetic, in
virtue of the same number relations.
Exactly my point. The Mars Rover is not conscious simpliciter, it is
conscious of its body and its environment. The program running on it's
cpu could have any interpretation; it is only its connections to the
environment that provide a definite interpretation. The enivronment can
be simulated too, but then the closed system cannot provide its own
interpretation. Number relations do not of themselves provide an
interpretation.
8) Yes, but what if we don’t grant a concrete robust physical universe? Up to
this
stage, we can still escape the conclusion of the seven preceding reasoning
steps, by
postulating that a ‘‘physical universe’’ really ‘‘exists’’ and is too little in
the sense of not being
able to generate the entire UD*,
The entire UD is infinite. So it cannot exist in the physical universe.
Better to not assume a “god" when doing metaphysics; It biases the whole
reasoning.The idea that seeing is the criterion of reality is the Aristotelian
speculation that Plato warned us to not fall in.
Exactly. You are assuming a UD god that is infinite.
Brent
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