RE: Reasons and Persons
Philosophers are at the opposite extreme of engineers, in that they
consider the practical details of their thought experiments to be
unimportant. I think the idea that Parfit is exploring in the term
"psychological spectrum" is how much one can change and remain the
"same" person. I think I'm the same person I was yesterday even though
my brain has changed physically and my mind has changed to reflect that
change. Even though it is very unlikely to happen in reality, it is easy
enough to imagine that the relatively minor physical/psychological
changes that have occurred in the past day are exaggerated, so that
instead of changing from me-yesterday to me-today, I change from
me-yesterday into Napoleon. The point is that this type of radical
change would be different in *degree*, not different in kind from the
type of change that occurs normally. One could even argue that turning
into Napoleon is not as great a psychological change as that experienced
by an infant growing up, or an adult who becomes demented in old age.
Given these examples, what criterion can one come up with which allows
that one is the "same" person over the course of one's life, but a
"different" person if one changes into Napoleon (not having been
Napoleon previously)?
That last question is the search for a criterion for personal identity.
Parfit's answer is that the question is misguided. There is no objective
truth regarding continuity of identity over time, or as the result of
teleportation, or brain duplication, or all the other processes which
may in future become reality. What matters to us is not continuity of
personal identity in some absolute sense, but the feeling of
psychological continuity. And the reason *this* matters to us is simply
that our brains evolved that way: those organisms that do not believe
they are the "same" individual from moment to moment or day to day and
hence have no regard for their future well-being would soon die out.
Stathis Papaioannou
-Original Message-
From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Russell Standish
Sent: Wednesday, 24 May 2006 5:29 PM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Reasons and Persons
Several list members cajoled me into reading David Parfit's "Reasons
and Persons". So I braved our dragon infested library, and sourced a
copy. I can see why his book is relevant to this list, particularly
part 3 of his book "Personal Identity". It was a good recommendation -
I can certainly recommend this as one of the background readers - too
late it missed the cutoff for my book :)
However, there was one thought experiment that concerned me, and it
relates to his notion of psychological spectrum. We are to suppose
that it is possible to generate psyches in between our mind and that
of Napoleon Bonaparte, by progressively swapping in neurons from NB's
brain.
Since we have a number of closet computationlists here, I paraphrased
the thought experiment as what if we swapped the transistors in my PC
for that of a (old-style PPC) Mac. At first, there would be little
difference, and the machine would be indistinguishable from that of a
PC - save a few bugs (anyone remember the Pentium division
bug?). Similarly, at the other end of the spectrum, the machine would
be virtually indistinguishable from a Mac. But what about the machines
in the middle? Surely these machine would simply be
non-functional. Replacing PC transistors with Mac transistors would be
no different from simply disabling the PC transistors - eventually a
critical path would be severed, and the machine would be defunct.
No two human brains are wired identically - indeed our daily
experience updates the connections between our neurons. Gradually
replacing neurons in our brain by someone else's neurons would have
the same effect as simply removing neurons one-by-one. For a while,
there would be little noticable effect - brains are, after all quite
robust against damage. But eventually, and well before the magical 50%
mark I would suggest, the structural organisation of our brain would
be lost, and we'd lose consciousness.
Since quite a bit of Parfit's later arguments depend on this
psychological spectrum thought experiment, it seems some of his
identity issues aren't in fact problems at all. Anyone have a comment
on this, or is it all obvious philosophy 101 stuff that I missed.
Cheers
--
A/Prof Russell Standish Phone 8308 3119 (mobile)
Mathematics0425 253119 (")
UNSW SYDNEY 2052 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Australia
http://parallel.hpc.unsw.edu.au/rks
International prefix +612, Interstate prefix 02
--~--~-~--~~~---~--~~
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
"Everything L
Re: Smullyan Shmullyan, give me a real example
Kim Jones wrote: > >Well, in the case of schizoid mathematician John Nash, his >"psychotic" behaviour was also clearly linked to his maths ability. >After imbibing anti-psychotic medication, not only did his "unreal" >friends disappear, but his mathematical perception as well. I don't think that's true, my understanding is that once he became schizophrenic he no longer did any useful mathematical work, just mystical numerology. In discussing the movie, the wikipedia entry at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Beautiful_Mind says: "The movie also misrepresents the effect Nash's mental illness had on his work. The movie depicts Nash as already suffering from schizophrenia when he wrote his doctoral thesis. In reality, Nash's schizophrenia did not appear until years later and once it did his mathematical work ceased until he was able to bring it under control." And the page at http://www.pnas.org/misc/classics5.shtml says that he once again started doing useful work after his recovery: "In 1970, Nash moved back to Princeton, where he took to shuffling through the halls of the mathematics building, occasionally scribbling enigmatic numerological messages on the walls. Students referred to him as the "Phantom of Fine Hall." Gradually, however, Nash's mental condition began to improve. Schizophrenia rarely disappears completely, but by the 1990s Nash appeared to have made a remarkable recovery, and he had turned once again to mathematical research." The wikipedia article elaborates on what his recent work has been about: "The 1990s brought a return of his genius, and Nash has taken care to manage the symptoms of his mental illness. He is still hoping to score substantial scientific results. His recent work involves ventures in advanced game theory including partial agency which show that, as in his early career, he prefers to select his own path and problems (though he continues to work in a communal setting to assist in managing his illness)." Jesse --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Smullyan Shmullyan, give me a real example
Well, in the case of schizoid mathematician John Nash, his "psychotic" behaviour was also clearly linked to his maths ability. After imbibing anti-psychotic medication, not only did his "unreal" friends disappear, but his mathematical perception as well. The bind he found himself in was surely then to be at once an unreasonable machine (under yours and Bruno's definition) and a reasonable machine as well - and to be both simultaneously!!! For Nash, the delusional was the doorway to provability. He could not separate the two, except under the influence of heavy chemistry. Can we do any better? Should we even try? Kim On 27/05/2006, at 10:25 PM, Stathis Papaioannou wrote: > It is interesting that in psychiatry, it is impossible to give a > reliable method for recognizing a delusion. The usual definition is > that > a delusion is a fixed, false belief which is not in keeping with the > patient's cultural background. If you think about it, why should > cultural background have any bearing on whether a person's > reasoning is > faulty? And even including this criterion, it is often difficult to > tell > without looking at associated factors such as change in personality, > mood disturbance, etc. The single best test is to treat someone with > antipsychotic medication and see if the delusion goes away. --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Smullyan Shmullyan, give me a real example
Stathis: 1. to Kim's question to Bruno (and your reply): I call "reasonable" the items matching OUR (human) logic, even if we call it a machine. There is no norm in the existence for 'reasonable', as Cohen and Stewart showed in their chef d'oeuvre on Chaos in the imaginary "Zarathustrans". We, with our 100 years ahead thinking and Bruno with his 200 should be above such narrowminded limitations. 2.to your 'delusion': it is correct. )"...The single best test is to treat someone with > antipsychotic medication and see if the delusion goes away.") is this to implant new delusions and see how the poor fellow reacts? We had some intelligent dicussions about 'everybody is crazy' (George at al.) and so "crazy" is 'normal' and the "norm" may be crazy. Are the psych-professionals exceptions? 3. You wrote: > An unreasonable machine would look like a brain. The minds of living > organisms, such as they are, evolved ...< Because we know so little about the ways a brain works and assume too much based on our present ignorance to explain everything still unknown. There is the terror of physicists forcing their primitive model on the world, especially on domains where SOME features can be measured in established 'phisics-invented' concepts by the so fa "physics-invented" instruments and read in "physics-invented" units, although the conclusions come from 'non-physics-related' activities (mentality, ideation, feelings, "delusions", etc.,) all having parallel and physically measurable phenomena in the neurological "sciences". we use the 'brain' as a tool and have no idea how it works and for what. In your quoted fragment I feel an equating of brain and mind, which I find at least premature. I don't know what a "mind" may be. I "know"(?) it must be both atemporal and aspatial, while the material of the brain is imagined (physically) to be space and time related. John M - Original Message - From: "Stathis Papaioannou" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Saturday, May 27, 2006 8:25 AM Subject: RE: Smullyan Shmullyan, give me a real example > > Kim Jones writes: > > Bruno, > > what would an "unreasonable machine" be like? You seem to be implying > they exist, also that they can prove things about their possible > neighborhoods and or histories. (?) > > Kim > > > An unreasonable machine would look like a brain. The minds of living > organisms, such as they are, evolved to promote survival and > reproduction, and apparently being "rational" is only a minor advantage > towards this end. I am sure that even logicians, at least when they are > off duty, pluck axioms out of the air according to whim or fashion, hold > contradictory beliefs simultaneously or sequentially, decide that the > correct course of action is x and then do ~x anyway, and so on. > > It is interesting that in psychiatry, it is impossible to give a > reliable method for recognizing a delusion. The usual definition is that > a delusion is a fixed, false belief which is not in keeping with the > patient's cultural background. If you think about it, why should > cultural background have any bearing on whether a person's reasoning is > faulty? And even including this criterion, it is often difficult to tell > without looking at associated factors such as change in personality, > mood disturbance, etc. The single best test is to treat someone with > antipsychotic medication and see if the delusion goes away. This means > that in theory there might be two people with exactly the same belief, > justified in exactly the same way, but one is demonstrably psychotic > while the other is not! Crazy thinking is so common that, by itself, it > is generally not enough reason to diagnose someone as being crazy. > > Stathis Papaioannou > --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Ascension (was Re: Smullyan Shmullyan, give me a real example)
Le 26-mai-06, à 19:35, Tom Caylor a écrit :
>
> Bruno Marchal wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> OK, let us try to name the biggest natural (finite) number we can, and
>> let us do that transfinite ascension on the growing functions from N
>> to
>> N.
>>
>> We have already build some well defined sequence of description (code)
>> of growing functions.
>>
>> Let us choose the Hall Finney sequence to begin with (but the one by
>> Tom Caylor can be use instead).
>>
>> F1 F2 F3 F4 F5 ...
>>
>> With F1(n) = factorial(n), F2(n) = factorial(factorial n), etc.
>>
>> Note this: Hal gave us a trick for getting from a growing function f,
>> a
>> new function growing faster, actually the iteration of the function.
>> That is, Hal gave us a notion of successor for the growing function.
>> Now the diagonalization of the sequence F1 F2 F3 F4 ..., which is
>> given
>> by the new growing function defined by
>>
>> G(n) = Fn(n) + 1
>>
>> gives us a growing function which grows faster than any Fi from Hal's
>> initial sequence. Precisely, G will grow faster than any Fi on *almost
>> all* number (it could be that some Fi will grow faster than G on some
>> initial part of N, but for some finite value (which one?) G will keep
>> growing faster. Technically we must remember to apply our growing
>> function on "sufficiently big input' if we want to benefit of the
>> growing phenomenon. We will make a rough evaluation on that input
>> later, but let us not being distract by technical point like that.
>> The diagonalization gives an effective way to take the "limit" of the
>> sequence F1, F2, F3, ...
>>
>> G grows faster than any Fi. Mathematician will say that the order type
>> of g, in our our new sequence F1 F2 F3 ... G, is omega (the greek
>> letter).
>>
>
> Bruno,
> You are starting to perturb me! I guess that comes with the territory
> where you're leading us.
You should not worry too much. I confess I am putting your mind in the
state of mathematicians before the Babbage Post Markov Turing Church
discovery. Everything here will be transparently clear.
> But of course being perturbed doesn't
> necessarily imply being correct. I will summarize my perturbation
> below. But for now, specifically, you're bringing in transfinite
> cardinals/ordinals.
Only transfinite ordinal which are all countable, and even nameable,
for example by name of growing computable functions as I am
illustrating.
Be sure you understand why G is a well defined computable growing
function, and why it grows faster than each initial Fi. If you know a
computer programming language, write the program!
> This is where things get perverse and perhaps
> inconsistent. For instance, couldn't I argue that G is also infinite?
In which sense? All functions are infinite mathematical object.
Factorial is defined by its infiinite set of inputs outputs: {(0,1)
(1,1)(2,2) (3,6) (4,24) (5,120) ...}.
> Take n = some fixed N>1. Then F1(N) > 1, F2(N) > 2, F3(N) > 3, ...
> and Fn(N) > n, for all n. So each member of the whole sequence F1, F2,
> F3 ... G is greater than the corresponding member of the sequence 1, 2,
> 3, ... aleph_0 (countable infinity). Thus, G >(=) countable infinity,
> even for a fixed n=N>1.
You are right but G is a function. Actually it just does what it has
been programmed to. I don't see any problem here.
>
>> But G is just a well defined computable growing function and we can
>> use
>> Hall Finney "successor" again to get the still faster function, namely
>> G(G(n)).
>>
>> The order type of G(G(n)) is, well, the successor of omega: omega+1
>>
>> And, as Hall initially, we can build the new sequance of growing
>> functions (all of which grows more than the preceding sequence):
>>
>> G(n) G(G(n)) G(G(G(n))) G(G(G(G(n etc.
>>
>> which are of order type omega, omega+1, omega+2, omega+3, omega+4,
>> etc.
>>
>> Now we have obtained a new well defined infinite sequence of growing
>> function, and, writing it as:
>>
>> G1, G2, G3, G4, G5, G6, ... or better, as
>>
>> F_omega, F_omega+1, F_omega+2, F_omega+3
>>
>> just showing such a sequence can be generated so that we can again
>> diagonalise it, getting
>>
>> H(n) = Gn(n) + 1, or better
>>
>> H(n) = F_omega+n (n) + 1
>>
>>
>> Getting a function of order type omega+omega: we can write H =
>> F_omega+omega
>>
>> And of course, we can apply Hall's successor again, getting
>> F_omega+omega+1
>> which is just H(H(n), and so we get a new sequence:
>>
>> F_omega+omega+1, F_omega+omega+2, F_omega+omega+3, ...
>>
>> Which can be diagonalise again, so we get
>>
>> F_omega+omega+omega,
>>
>> and then by Hal again, and again ...:
>>
>> F_omega+omega+omega+1, F_omega+omega+omega+2, F_omega+omega+omega+3
>>
>> ...
>>
>> Oh Oh! a new pattern emerges, a new type of sequence of well defined
>> growing functions appears:
>>
>> F_omega, F_omega+omega, F_omega+omega+omega,
>> F_omega+omega+omega+omega,
>>
>> And we can generated it computationnaly, so we can diagonalise a
RE: Smullyan Shmullyan, give me a real example
Kim Jones writes: Bruno, what would an "unreasonable machine" be like? You seem to be implying they exist, also that they can prove things about their possible neighborhoods and or histories. (?) Kim An unreasonable machine would look like a brain. The minds of living organisms, such as they are, evolved to promote survival and reproduction, and apparently being "rational" is only a minor advantage towards this end. I am sure that even logicians, at least when they are off duty, pluck axioms out of the air according to whim or fashion, hold contradictory beliefs simultaneously or sequentially, decide that the correct course of action is x and then do ~x anyway, and so on. It is interesting that in psychiatry, it is impossible to give a reliable method for recognizing a delusion. The usual definition is that a delusion is a fixed, false belief which is not in keeping with the patient's cultural background. If you think about it, why should cultural background have any bearing on whether a person's reasoning is faulty? And even including this criterion, it is often difficult to tell without looking at associated factors such as change in personality, mood disturbance, etc. The single best test is to treat someone with antipsychotic medication and see if the delusion goes away. This means that in theory there might be two people with exactly the same belief, justified in exactly the same way, but one is demonstrably psychotic while the other is not! Crazy thinking is so common that, by itself, it is generally not enough reason to diagnose someone as being crazy. Stathis Papaioannou --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Reasons and Persons
Russ
where can I get a copy of this alarming book?
cheers
Kim
On 24/05/2006, at 5:28 PM, Russell Standish wrote:
>
> Several list members cajoled me into reading David Parfit's "Reasons
> and Persons". So I braved our dragon infested library, and sourced a
> copy. I can see why his book is relevant to this list, particularly
> part 3 of his book "Personal Identity". It was a good recommendation -
> I can certainly recommend this as one of the background readers - too
> late it missed the cutoff for my book :)
>
> However, there was one thought experiment that concerned me, and it
> relates to his notion of psychological spectrum. We are to suppose
> that it is possible to generate psyches in between our mind and that
> of Napoleon Bonaparte, by progressively swapping in neurons from NB's
> brain.
>
> Since we have a number of closet computationlists here, I paraphrased
> the thought experiment as what if we swapped the transistors in my PC
> for that of a (old-style PPC) Mac. At first, there would be little
> difference, and the machine would be indistinguishable from that of a
> PC - save a few bugs (anyone remember the Pentium division
> bug?). Similarly, at the other end of the spectrum, the machine would
> be virtually indistinguishable from a Mac. But what about the machines
> in the middle? Surely these machine would simply be
> non-functional. Replacing PC transistors with Mac transistors would be
> no different from simply disabling the PC transistors - eventually a
> critical path would be severed, and the machine would be defunct.
>
> No two human brains are wired identically - indeed our daily
> experience updates the connections between our neurons. Gradually
> replacing neurons in our brain by someone else's neurons would have
> the same effect as simply removing neurons one-by-one. For a while,
> there would be little noticable effect - brains are, after all quite
> robust against damage. But eventually, and well before the magical 50%
> mark I would suggest, the structural organisation of our brain would
> be lost, and we'd lose consciousness.
>
> Since quite a bit of Parfit's later arguments depend on this
> psychological spectrum thought experiment, it seems some of his
> identity issues aren't in fact problems at all. Anyone have a comment
> on this, or is it all obvious philosophy 101 stuff that I missed.
>
> Cheers
>
> --
> --
> --
> A/Prof Russell Standish Phone 8308 3119 (mobile)
> Mathematics 0425 253119 (")
> UNSW SYDNEY 2052 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Australiahttp://
> parallel.hpc.unsw.edu.au/rks
> International prefix +612, Interstate prefix 02
> --
> --
>
>
--~--~-~--~~~---~--~~
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
"Everything List" group.
To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
For more options, visit this group at
http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list
-~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
