On Sun, Jun 27, 2021 at 7:38 PM Tomas Pales <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Sunday, June 27, 2021 at 2:36:38 AM UTC+2 Bruce wrote: > > Much as I respect Russell, his book is not an authoritative source for >> anything. It is all rampant speculation. >> On the matter of the stability of laws and the connection with >> simplicity, I refer you to the 'grue/bleen' paradox introduced by Nelson >> Goodman. That shows that the idea of simplicity as an explanation for >> anything is misplaced. >> > > Note that the relation between simplicity and frequency is not Russell's > speculation but a fact following from Kolmogorov's definition of > complexity: simpler objects are more frequent than more complex objects > because the same simpler object is contained in less simple objects. > This is only if everything is considered to be a bit string. There is no reason to suppose that this is true. > This fact is then used in Solomonoff's theory of induction: > > "Solomonoff induction is an ideal answer to questions like "What probably > comes next in the sequence 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8?" or "Given the last three > years of visual data from this webcam, what will this robot probably see > next?" or "Will the sun rise tomorrow?" Solomonoff induction requires > infinite computing power, and is defined by taking every computable > algorithm for giving a probability distribution over future data given past > data, weighted by their algorithmic simplicity > <https://arbital.com/p/Kolmogorov_complexity/>, and updating those > weights by comparison to the actual data." > What a load of garbage! Science is not a matter of induction from observed data. Goodman's grue/bleen paradox puts paid to that idea. Algorithmic simplicity has nothing to do with real world data. Bruce > https://arbital.com/p/solomonoff_induction > -- 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/CAFxXSLQt3_1OM077AdYzoKj60Gc_u8JnDErHtd6A15SuC9vm2g%40mail.gmail.com.
