On Sun, Aug 25, 2019 at 01:15:38PM +1000, Bruce Kellett wrote: > On Sun, Aug 25, 2019 at 1:01 PM Russell Standish <[email protected]> > wrote: > > On Sat, Aug 24, 2019 at 07:34:26PM -0700, 'Brent Meeker' via Everything > List wrote: > > > > > > On 8/24/2019 6:31 PM, Russell Standish wrote: > > > On Sun, Aug 25, 2019 at 10:06:38AM +1000, Bruce Kellett wrote: > > > > On Sun, Aug 25, 2019 at 9:45 AM Russell Standish < > [email protected]> wrote: > > > > > > > > On Sat, Aug 24, 2019 at 05:18:47PM -0400, John Clark wrote: > > > > > > > > > > >> OK so 0=1, that's fine. > > > > > > > > > > > No, that is not fine. If 0=1, pigs have wings. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Yes but that's OK too, if nothing physical exists then pigs > and wings > > > > can't > > > > > cause problems because they don't exist. And there are no > minds that > > > > might be > > > > > upset by paradoxes. > > > > > > > > > > > > > That's kind of the point, though. Minds are nonphysical things, > and > > > > there is no apriori reason why physical things need to exist > for > minds > > > > to exist. > > > > > > > > > > > > You have evidence for disembodied minds? > > > That's not an apriori reason. Assuming you're in principle OK with the > > > concept of a brain in a vat (which is a disembodied mind), then the > > > you too do not have an apriori reason for the existence of physical > > > things. > > > > > > > > > > I don't see that a brain in a vat counts as a disembodied mind. Do you > mean > > a brain that has no environment to perceive or act on? I would deny > that > > such an isolated brain instantiates a mind. On the other hand, if the > brain > > has sensors and actuators operating, say a Mars Rover, then it isn't > > disembodied. > > > > Brent > > > > Yes - I know your argument. In the BIV scenario, the environment could > be simulated. Basically Descartes' evil daemon (malin genie) > scenario. Nothing about the observed physics (bodies and whatnot) > exists in any fundamental sense. > > > Presumably the vat is a physical object that provides nutrients, power, etc to > the BIV. That does not count as disembodied in my book. >
Neither the brain, nor the vat is a body. The body is actually simulated by the evil daemon, and doesn't exist ontologically. Hence disembodied. Now Brent makes good arguments (and I echo simular arguments in my book) that a body must exist phenomenally (ie exist as an experience of the mind), but nowhere does there appear to be a requirement for the body to exist ontologically (in the same reality as the brain and the vat in this example). This is all different from John Clark's argument that something must exist to breathe fire into all the computations. He calls that something "matter", and strongly disavows the ability of arithmetic to do this. Bruno Marchal claims the opposite - that arithmetic, or in fact any abstract system capable of universal computation, is sufficient for the job. To be quite frank, I'm a fence sitter in this debate, as I've yet to see any physically realisable experiment that can settle the matter. -- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dr Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile) Principal, High Performance Coders Visiting Senior Research Fellow [email protected] Economics, Kingston University http://www.hpcoders.com.au ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- 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 view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/20190825041431.GF2402%40zen.
