> On 30 Jun 2020, at 22:22, 'Brent Meeker' via Everything List 
> <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> 
> 
> On 6/30/2020 6:50 AM, Philip Thrift wrote:
>> 
>> by Forbes physics writer (it is a bit odd Forbes has a regular physics 
>> columnist):
>> 
>> https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2020/06/30/no-science-will-never-make-philosophy-or-religion-obsolete/
>> 
>> @philipthrift
>> 
> 
> He's right that science probably won't replace religion,

With mechanism, that would be akin to replace a model with a theory. 

That is exactly what the incompleteness theorem shows to be impossible. Note 
that

1) a theory is consistent (<>t, ~[]f) if and only if the theory has a model  
(that is Gödel’s *completeness* theorem)

2) no consistent theory can prove the existence of a model of itself

That is why, if a machine develop a belief in some reality (satisfying its 
beliefs), she cannot justify such a belief and it will require some faith.

That is also why if a machine asserts she knows that such a reality exists, she 
became inconsistent.





> but he doesn't understand the reason.  He writes as though it's because 
> science hasn't answered questions about the origin of life, the origin of the 
> universe, etc.  But those are scientific questions

The existence of the universe is a metaphysical question, or a theological one. 
And yes, those are scientific question in the sense that we can build theories 
and test them.

I can agree that physics explains the origin of life, but with mechanism, this 
explanation works then number or combinator theory explains the origin of the 
laws of physics, and the progress is that we go from the theology of Aristotle 
(God = Matter) to the theology of Pythagorus (revised by Gödel-Löb-Solovay) and 
(God = Number).




> and it won't make any difference when they are answered. 

It has to, at least for those who say “yes” to the doctor, like the 
transhumanists, or the sick or wounded guy who want see the next soccer cup 
(when the technology is available). 

Mechanist has its practice, like to put your “soul” on a hard-disk, or to 
upload yourself on the cyberspace…

At the same time, you can “know”, without the ability of not disbelieving this 
intuitively, that “you” are already there..




> Religion (as sociologists all say) exists to explain why a community's ethos 
> is validated and mandated by the universe. 

Religion is the belief in a “universe”. It is the belief in some “One”.

The relation between the ethos and that One is simply the idea that justice 
requires truth, and eventually is a problem of right.




> A community needs to cooperate on a lot of things.  Some of them can be 
> justified/explained by functionality.  But there are others that are somewhat 
> arbitrary.  

The universal machines are stuck in between security and freedom, and in 
between collaborating or not, without the common hesitation between being to 
eat and being eaten, yes, already in the first person limit in the arithmetical 
reality (which is analytical viewed from inside). 

Mechanism generalises human to (universal, Löbian) number, or ‘number. By 
‘number I will mean any object denoted by the terms of a Turing complete first 
order theory.



> And there are many local optima in the social space.  It's religion, 
> including "civil religion" that re-enforces these.

Religion is just the belief in a reality beyond our consciousness here-and-now, 
and some impulse to share it with the others.

Religion is the only goal.

Science is the only mean.

To separate religion from science makes science into pseudo-religion, and 
religion into pseudo-science. It leads to technologies without meaning, or with 
a meaning restricted to “the boss is right”.

With incompleteness, science can see its limitations, and can study the 
geometry of its intrinsic ignorance/truth, and with mechanism, we can 
understand how that guides us, and that provide shortcuts, and some cautious 
warning, some applicable here, some applicable there.

Bruno 




> 
> Brent
> 
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