Re: G.K. Chesterton on Materialism

[John Clark]

On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 2:17 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:

> Correlation, even 100% correlation, does not equal causation.


BULLSHIT! If when X is changed there is ALWAYS a change in Y in the same
direction, and when Y changes you can   ALWAYS  find a change in X  that
preceded it, then X causes Y. IT'S WHAT THE WORD "CAUSES" MEANS!

> Two unrelated systems can both be related to a third,
>

If they are both related to the same thing then they are not unrelated.

  John K Clark

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Re: Losing Control

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 19, 2013 8:09:47 PM UTC-4, stathisp wrote:
>
> On Wed, Mar 20, 2013 at 10:01 AM, Craig Weinberg 
> > 
> wrote: 
> > 
> > 
> > On Tuesday, March 19, 2013 6:19:22 PM UTC-4, stathisp wrote: 
> >> 
> >> On Wed, Mar 20, 2013 at 9:01 AM, Craig Weinberg  
> >> wrote: 
> >> 
> >> >> I'll agree on your terms, but you have to make it explicit. 
> >> > 
> >> > 
> >> > My terms are: 
> >> > 
> >> > Super-Personal Intentional 
> (Intuition) 
> >> >  | 
> >> >  | 
> >> >  | 
> >> > unintentional (determinism) +-- unintentional 
> >> > (random) 
> >> >  | 
> >> >  | 
> >> >  | 
> >> >Sub-Personal Intentional 
> (Instinct) 
> >> > 
> >> > 
> >> > + = Free will = Personal Intentional (Voluntary Preference) 
> >> > The x axis = Impersonal 
> >> 
> >> I don't think these are definitions, they are arguments. A definition 
> >> of "intentional" in the common sense does not normally include 
> >> "neither determined nor random". 
> > 
> > 
> > Whose definition are you claiming doesn't include that? Why is that 
> > arbitrary and unsupported assertion not an 'argument' but my thorough 
> > diagram is less than a 'definition'? 
> > 
> > 
> >> You should start with the normal 
> >> definition 
> > 
> > 
> > Fuck that, and fuck normal. 
> > 
> >> 
> >> then show that it could be neither determined nor random. 
> >> It is a serious problem in a debate if someone surreptitiously puts 
> >> their conclusion into the definition of the terms. 
> > 
> > 
> > It is not a problem. All definitions are terms reflecting conclusions. 
> You 
> > don't have to agree with my terms, but there is no basis to assert that 
> > there is some objective normalcy which they fail to fulfill. My terms 
> are a 
> > plausible definition of the actual phenomena we are discussing, and that 
> is 
> > the only consideration that I intend to recognize. 
>
> All I am saying is that you should start with something that is not 
> already loaded with your conclusion, then reach your conclusion 
> through argument. If I "intend" to do something I do it because I want 
> to do it. On the face of it, I could want to do it and do it whether 
> my brain is determined or random. You can make the case that this is 
> impossible, but you have to actually make the case, not sneak it into 
> the definition. 
>

I'm not trying to sneak anything into the definition. The case that I make 
is that while it could be locally true that a given person could 
theoretically want something intentionally even if their brain were 
completely driven by unintentional influences, it doesn't make sense that 
there could be any such thing as 'intentional' if the entire universe were 
driven exclusively by unintentional influences. It is like saying that a 
dog could think that it is a cat if cats exist, but if you define the 
universe as having no cats, then there can be no such thing as 
cat-anything. No thoughts about cats, no cat-like feelings, no pictures of 
cats, etc. In an unintentional universe, intention is inconceivable in 
every way.



> >> > What looks deterministic is not conscious, but what is consciousness 
> can 
> >> > have be represented publicly by activity which looks deterministic to 
> >> > us. 
> >> > Nothing is actually, cosmically deterministic, only habitual. 
> >> 
> >> If something conscious can look deterministic in every empirical test 
> >> then that's as good as saying that the brain could be deterministic. 
> > 
> > 
> > No, because empirical tests are third person and consciousness is not. 
>
> We are talking about third person observable determinism only. 


Who is?
 

> The 
> brain could be third person observable deterministic and still 
> conscious. 
>

The third person view always seems unintentional (deterministic-random). 
That goes along with it being a public body in space. You can't see 
intentions from third person.
 

>
> >> A 
> >> computer is deterministic in every empirical test but you could also 
> >> say without fear of contradiction that it is "not actually, cosmically 
> >> deterministic, only habitual." 
> > 
> > 
> > It could be in theory, but in fact, computers prove to be less than 
> sentient 
> > in every way. 
>
> Perhaps they are as a matter of fact, but not as a theoretical 
> requirement, that is the point. 
>

But the fact has to be understood before a theory can be worthwhile. I have 
a theory which explains the fact and it leads me to say that no assembled 
machine can ever have an experience which is more than the sum of its parts.
 

>
> >> I don't see the relevance of history here. How would it make any 

Re: Losing Control

[Stathis Papaioannou]

On Wed, Mar 20, 2013 at 10:01 AM, Craig Weinberg  wrote:
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 19, 2013 6:19:22 PM UTC-4, stathisp wrote:
>>
>> On Wed, Mar 20, 2013 at 9:01 AM, Craig Weinberg 
>> wrote:
>>
>> >> I'll agree on your terms, but you have to make it explicit.
>> >
>> >
>> > My terms are:
>> >
>> > Super-Personal Intentional (Intuition)
>> >  |
>> >  |
>> >  |
>> > unintentional (determinism) +-- unintentional
>> > (random)
>> >  |
>> >  |
>> >  |
>> >Sub-Personal Intentional (Instinct)
>> >
>> >
>> > + = Free will = Personal Intentional (Voluntary Preference)
>> > The x axis = Impersonal
>>
>> I don't think these are definitions, they are arguments. A definition
>> of "intentional" in the common sense does not normally include
>> "neither determined nor random".
>
>
> Whose definition are you claiming doesn't include that? Why is that
> arbitrary and unsupported assertion not an 'argument' but my thorough
> diagram is less than a 'definition'?
>
>
>> You should start with the normal
>> definition
>
>
> Fuck that, and fuck normal.
>
>>
>> then show that it could be neither determined nor random.
>> It is a serious problem in a debate if someone surreptitiously puts
>> their conclusion into the definition of the terms.
>
>
> It is not a problem. All definitions are terms reflecting conclusions. You
> don't have to agree with my terms, but there is no basis to assert that
> there is some objective normalcy which they fail to fulfill. My terms are a
> plausible definition of the actual phenomena we are discussing, and that is
> the only consideration that I intend to recognize.

All I am saying is that you should start with something that is not
already loaded with your conclusion, then reach your conclusion
through argument. If I "intend" to do something I do it because I want
to do it. On the face of it, I could want to do it and do it whether
my brain is determined or random. You can make the case that this is
impossible, but you have to actually make the case, not sneak it into
the definition.

>> > What looks deterministic is not conscious, but what is consciousness can
>> > have be represented publicly by activity which looks deterministic to
>> > us.
>> > Nothing is actually, cosmically deterministic, only habitual.
>>
>> If something conscious can look deterministic in every empirical test
>> then that's as good as saying that the brain could be deterministic.
>
>
> No, because empirical tests are third person and consciousness is not.

We are talking about third person observable determinism only. The
brain could be third person observable deterministic and still
conscious.

>> A
>> computer is deterministic in every empirical test but you could also
>> say without fear of contradiction that it is "not actually, cosmically
>> deterministic, only habitual."
>
>
> It could be in theory, but in fact, computers prove to be less than sentient
> in every way.

Perhaps they are as a matter of fact, but not as a theoretical
requirement, that is the point.

>> I don't see the relevance of history here. How would it make any
>> difference to me if the atoms in my body were put there yesterday by a
>> fantastically improbably whirlwind?
>
>
> Because the atoms are only tokens of a history. It's like if you dropped a
> bunch of infants into New York City. Even if they had adult bodies, without
> the history of their experience, they have no way to integrate their
> perceptions.
>
>>
>> I'd still feel basically the same,
>> though I might have some issues if I learned of my true origin.
>
>
> That's because you think that the universe is a place filled with objects,
> but I don't think that is possible. Objects are amputated experiences.

So you claim that if the hydrogen atoms in my body were replaced with
other hydrogen atoms I would stop being conscious?


-- 
Stathis Papaioannou

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Re: Losing Control

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 19, 2013 7:14:14 PM UTC-4, Brent wrote:
>
> On 3/19/2013 3:19 PM, Stathis Papaioannou wrote: 
> > On Wed, Mar 20, 2013 at 9:01 AM, Craig Weinberg 
> > > 
> wrote: 
> > 
> >>> I'll agree on your terms, but you have to make it explicit. 
> >> 
> >> My terms are: 
> >> 
> >>  Super-Personal Intentional (Intuition) 
> >>   | 
> >>   | 
> >>   | 
> >> unintentional (determinism) +-- unintentional 
> >> (random) 
> >>   | 
> >>   | 
> >>   | 
> >> Sub-Personal Intentional (Instinct) 
> >> 
> >> 
> >> + = Free will = Personal Intentional (Voluntary Preference) 
> >> The x axis = Impersonal 
> > I don't think these are definitions, they are arguments. A definition 
> > of "intentional" in the common sense does not normally include 
> > "neither determined nor random". You should start with the normal 
> > definition then show that it could be neither determined nor random. 
> > It is a serious problem in a debate if someone surreptitiously puts 
> > their conclusion into the definition of the terms. 
>
> As a diagram of different action it implies there are, in each quadrant, 
> actions that are 
> both "Intentional" and "unintentional". As I said there's no point in 
> arguing with someone 
> who contradicts himself. 
>

All actions that we take are both intentional and unintentional to 
different degrees. Obviously. We can have a instinct which is highly 
intentional but influenced by physiological conditions which are 
unintentional. We can have a personal preference which is intentional but 
rooted in an arbitrary whim. Human intention is a multilayered, multi-level 
quality, not a binary distinction.

Craig
 

>
> Brent 
>
> > 
> > So, do you believe that it possible that an entity which is 
> > deterministic from a third person perspective could be conscious, or 
> > do you believe that an entity which is deterministic from a third 
> > person perspective could not possibly be conscious? 
>  
>  Yes, I think all deterministic looking systems represent 
> sensory-motor 
>  participation of some kind, but not necessarily on the level that we 
>  assume. 
>  What we see as a cloud may have sensory-motor participation as 
> droplets 
>  of 
>  water molecules, and as a wisp in the atmosphere as a whole, but not 
> at 
>  all 
>  as a coherent cloud that we perceive. The cloud is a human scale 
> emblem, 
>  not 
>  the native entity. The native awareness may reside in a much faster 
> or 
>  much 
>  slower frequency range or sample rate than our own, so there is 
> little 
>  hope 
>  of our relating to it personally. It's like Flatland only with 
>  perceptual 
>  relativity rather than quant dimension. 
> >>> I'm not completely sure but I think you've just said the brain could 
> >>> be deterministic and still be conscious. 
> >> 
> >> What looks deterministic is not conscious, but what is consciousness 
> can 
> >> have be represented publicly by activity which looks deterministic to 
> us. 
> >> Nothing is actually, cosmically deterministic, only habitual. 
> > If something conscious can look deterministic in every empirical test 
> > then that's as good as saying that the brain could be deterministic. A 
> > computer is deterministic in every empirical test but you could also 
> > say without fear of contradiction that it is "not actually, cosmically 
> > deterministic, only habitual." 
> > 
>  This is also why computers are not conscious. The native entity is 
>  microelectronic or geological, not mechanical. The machine as a whole 
> is 
>  again an emblem, not an organic, self-invested whole. 
> >>> I don't understand what you think the fundamental difference is 
> >>> between a brain, a cloud and a computer. 
> >> 
> >> A brain is part of an animal's body, which is the public representation 
> of 
> >> an animal's lifetime. It is composed of cells which are the public 
> >> representation of microbiological experiences. 
> >> 
> >> A cloud is part of an atmosphere, which is the public representation of 
> some 
> >> scale of experience - could be geological, galactic, molecular...who 
> knows. 
> >> 
> >> A computer is an assembly of objects being employed by a foreign agency 
> for 
> >> its own motives. The objects each have their own history and nature, so 
> that 
> >> they relate to each other on a very limited and lowest common 
> denominator 
> >> range of coherence. It is a room full or blind people who don't speak 
> the 
> >> same language, jostling each other around rhythmically be

Re: Losing Control

[meekerdb]

On 3/19/2013 3:19 PM, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:

On Wed, Mar 20, 2013 at 9:01 AM, Craig Weinberg  wrote:


I'll agree on your terms, but you have to make it explicit.


My terms are:

 Super-Personal Intentional (Intuition)
  |
  |
  |
unintentional (determinism) +-- unintentional
(random)
  |
  |
  |
Sub-Personal Intentional (Instinct)


+ = Free will = Personal Intentional (Voluntary Preference)
The x axis = Impersonal

I don't think these are definitions, they are arguments. A definition
of "intentional" in the common sense does not normally include
"neither determined nor random". You should start with the normal
definition then show that it could be neither determined nor random.
It is a serious problem in a debate if someone surreptitiously puts
their conclusion into the definition of the terms.


As a diagram of different action it implies there are, in each quadrant, actions that are 
both "Intentional" and "unintentional". As I said there's no point in arguing with someone 
who contradicts himself.


Brent




So, do you believe that it possible that an entity which is
deterministic from a third person perspective could be conscious, or
do you believe that an entity which is deterministic from a third
person perspective could not possibly be conscious?


Yes, I think all deterministic looking systems represent sensory-motor
participation of some kind, but not necessarily on the level that we
assume.
What we see as a cloud may have sensory-motor participation as droplets
of
water molecules, and as a wisp in the atmosphere as a whole, but not at
all
as a coherent cloud that we perceive. The cloud is a human scale emblem,
not
the native entity. The native awareness may reside in a much faster or
much
slower frequency range or sample rate than our own, so there is little
hope
of our relating to it personally. It's like Flatland only with
perceptual
relativity rather than quant dimension.

I'm not completely sure but I think you've just said the brain could
be deterministic and still be conscious.


What looks deterministic is not conscious, but what is consciousness can
have be represented publicly by activity which looks deterministic to us.
Nothing is actually, cosmically deterministic, only habitual.

If something conscious can look deterministic in every empirical test
then that's as good as saying that the brain could be deterministic. A
computer is deterministic in every empirical test but you could also
say without fear of contradiction that it is "not actually, cosmically
deterministic, only habitual."


This is also why computers are not conscious. The native entity is
microelectronic or geological, not mechanical. The machine as a whole is
again an emblem, not an organic, self-invested whole.

I don't understand what you think the fundamental difference is
between a brain, a cloud and a computer.


A brain is part of an animal's body, which is the public representation of
an animal's lifetime. It is composed of cells which are the public
representation of microbiological experiences.

A cloud is part of an atmosphere, which is the public representation of some
scale of experience - could be geological, galactic, molecular...who knows.

A computer is an assembly of objects being employed by a foreign agency for
its own motives. The objects each have their own history and nature, so that
they relate to each other on a very limited and lowest common denominator
range of coherence. It is a room full or blind people who don't speak the
same language, jostling each other around rhythmically because that's all
they can do.

The brain and body are a four billion year old highly integrated
civilization with thousands of specific common histories. The cloud is more
like farmland, passively cycling through organic phases.

I don't see the relevance of history here. How would it make any
difference to me if the atoms in my body were put there yesterday by a
fantastically improbably whirlwind? I'd still feel basically the same,
though I might have some issues if I learned of my true origin.




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Re: True?

[Stephen P. King]

On 3/19/2013 6:29 PM, meekerdb wrote:
> Of course it works in the sense that the selected theory will save the
> facts, because you only consider theories that are not contradicted by
> the facts - and if you are fortunate enough to have more than one,
> then you consider Occams razor and esthetic criteria.  But you don't
> have to throw out all but one.  You use esthetic criteria just to
> decide which theory is most likely to lead further.  A theory suggests
> new tests and more comprehensive theories, so in general all of them:
> string-theory, loop-quantum-gravity, causal sets, are pursued by
> different people.  It is neither necessary or desirable to choose one
> and nominate it THE TRUTH.
>
> Brent

Amen!


-- 
Onward!

Stephen


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Re: Losing Control

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 19, 2013 6:19:22 PM UTC-4, stathisp wrote:
>
> On Wed, Mar 20, 2013 at 9:01 AM, Craig Weinberg 
> > 
> wrote: 
>
> >> I'll agree on your terms, but you have to make it explicit. 
> > 
> > 
> > My terms are: 
> > 
> > Super-Personal Intentional (Intuition) 
> >  | 
> >  | 
> >  | 
> > unintentional (determinism) +-- unintentional 
> > (random) 
> >  | 
> >  | 
> >  | 
> >Sub-Personal Intentional (Instinct) 
> > 
> > 
> > + = Free will = Personal Intentional (Voluntary Preference) 
> > The x axis = Impersonal 
>
> I don't think these are definitions, they are arguments. A definition 
> of "intentional" in the common sense does not normally include 
> "neither determined nor random". 


Whose definition are you claiming doesn't include that? Why is that 
arbitrary and unsupported assertion not an 'argument' but my thorough 
diagram is less than a 'definition'?

 

> You should start with the normal 
> definition 


Fuck that, and fuck normal.
 

> then show that it could be neither determined nor random. 
> It is a serious problem in a debate if someone surreptitiously puts 
> their conclusion into the definition of the terms. 
>

It is not a problem. All definitions are terms reflecting conclusions. You 
don't have to agree with my terms, but there is no basis to assert that 
there is some objective normalcy which they fail to fulfill. My terms are a 
plausible definition of the actual phenomena we are discussing, and that is 
the only consideration that I intend to recognize.
 

>
> >> >> So, do you believe that it possible that an entity which is 
> >> >> deterministic from a third person perspective could be conscious, or 
> >> >> do you believe that an entity which is deterministic from a third 
> >> >> person perspective could not possibly be conscious? 
> >> > 
> >> > 
> >> > Yes, I think all deterministic looking systems represent 
> sensory-motor 
> >> > participation of some kind, but not necessarily on the level that we 
> >> > assume. 
> >> > What we see as a cloud may have sensory-motor participation as 
> droplets 
> >> > of 
> >> > water molecules, and as a wisp in the atmosphere as a whole, but not 
> at 
> >> > all 
> >> > as a coherent cloud that we perceive. The cloud is a human scale 
> emblem, 
> >> > not 
> >> > the native entity. The native awareness may reside in a much faster 
> or 
> >> > much 
> >> > slower frequency range or sample rate than our own, so there is 
> little 
> >> > hope 
> >> > of our relating to it personally. It's like Flatland only with 
> >> > perceptual 
> >> > relativity rather than quant dimension. 
> >> 
> >> I'm not completely sure but I think you've just said the brain could 
> >> be deterministic and still be conscious. 
> > 
> > 
> > What looks deterministic is not conscious, but what is consciousness can 
> > have be represented publicly by activity which looks deterministic to 
> us. 
> > Nothing is actually, cosmically deterministic, only habitual. 
>
> If something conscious can look deterministic in every empirical test 
> then that's as good as saying that the brain could be deterministic.


No, because empirical tests are third person and consciousness is not. 
 

> A 
> computer is deterministic in every empirical test but you could also 
> say without fear of contradiction that it is "not actually, cosmically 
> deterministic, only habitual." 
>

It could be in theory, but in fact, computers prove to be less than 
sentient in every way.
 

>
> >> > This is also why computers are not conscious. The native entity is 
> >> > microelectronic or geological, not mechanical. The machine as a whole 
> is 
> >> > again an emblem, not an organic, self-invested whole. 
> >> 
> >> I don't understand what you think the fundamental difference is 
> >> between a brain, a cloud and a computer. 
> > 
> > 
> > A brain is part of an animal's body, which is the public representation 
> of 
> > an animal's lifetime. It is composed of cells which are the public 
> > representation of microbiological experiences. 
> > 
> > A cloud is part of an atmosphere, which is the public representation of 
> some 
> > scale of experience - could be geological, galactic, molecular...who 
> knows. 
> > 
> > A computer is an assembly of objects being employed by a foreign agency 
> for 
> > its own motives. The objects each have their own history and nature, so 
> that 
> > they relate to each other on a very limited and lowest common 
> denominator 
> > range of coherence. It is a room full or blind people who don't speak 
> the 
> > same language, jostling each othe

Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[meekerdb]

On 3/19/2013 11:00 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:


On 19 Mar 2013, at 18:35, Bruno Marchal wrote:



On 19 Mar 2013, at 17:34, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:


snip (see the preview post)





As an example, I could point you to the Genome Wager between Lewis Wolpert and Rupert 
Sheldrake


http://www.sheldrake.org/D&C/controversies/genomewager.html

Make your bet. In such a form this is closer to real science, that is, to a predictive 
statement.


That bet is far too vague for me. Define "abnormalities".

I bet that in 2029, they will not been able to judge the case, and will continue to 
disagree.


I can bet that full simulation of higher mammals brain, ---glial, neuronal cells + some 
bacteries, at the molecular level, close to the Heisenberg uncertainty level,--- will 
be done this or the next century.


And I am not betting that we will be able to simulate the folding of all proteins, but 
we will use the shape we already know.  Many steps of the chemical metabolism will be 
simulated very roughly, in the (eternal) beginning.


It might be an ethical problem, of doing this on animals. They did not say "yes" to the 
doctor, but we will do it anyway, and comp will be a practice before people begin to 
think on the theological implications, I'm afraid.


Most humans will choose the level available in their time. It is a field where our 
terrestrial grand-children will never cease to progress.


I think it likely that the first applications will be providing soldiers with augmented 
senses and communication.  Just as AI research has been funded by the military.  Threats 
of war are often used to justify bypassing ethical considerations and rushing into ill 
considered projects.


Brent

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Re: True?

[meekerdb]

On 3/19/2013 10:37 AM, Alberto G. Corona wrote:

No.
What means "truth value" of something? in which range of phenomena? in all phenomena 
applicable? how you can test all phenomena applicable to a theory? you can't. The only 
thing that you can do is to test a particular prediction that the theory predict that 
may never happen (Popperian falsability)
Feyerabend demosntrated  that not even that is possible, or at least unique, since the 
perceptions or "facts" must be interpreted according with the theory. there is no fact 
that is theory-free. A fact pressuposes a theory. So a theory and their perceptions are 
a closed set, that may be autocoherent.
So there may be different theories for the same phenomena, each one with their 
interpreted facts, that may have some kind of morphism between them. That is evidently 
and pefectly exemplified now in some dualities of string theories, or between newtonian 
and relativistic mechanics, or in a certain way, between heliocentrism and  
geocentrisme.  where agreeement between phenomena and  ptolemaic theory, in the case of 
heliocentrism, is maintained at the cost of a more complicated theory.
Then, to escape the Feyerabend trap, there is necessary additional criteria, such is the 
economy of axioms or the Occam Razor as criteria for theory acceptance. Fortunately it 
works, because it seems that we live in a simple, mathematical universe, which is 
amazing per se.


Of course it works in the sense that the selected theory will save the facts, because you 
only consider theories that are not contradicted by the facts - and if you are fortunate 
enough to have more than one, then you consider Occams razor and esthetic criteria.  But 
you don't have to throw out all but one.  You use esthetic criteria just to decide which 
theory is most likely to lead further.  A theory suggests new tests and more comprehensive 
theories, so in general all of them: string-theory, loop-quantum-gravity, causal sets, are 
pursued by different people. It is neither necessary or desirable to choose one and 
nominate it THE TRUTH.


Brent


About opinions:
But all that one may know, even the facts, are subjective perceptions.
But opinions are about internal subjective perceptions,
That there are no scientific theory about some subjective perceptions (some internal 
ones) does not say that these subjective perceptions can never be objects of scientific 
study. Simply it means that at this historical moment there is no methods (or there is 
resistance to them, since the rejection of common sense) that would make them testable 
and scientific.



2013/3/19 Craig Weinberg mailto:whatsons...@gmail.com>>



On Friday, March 8, 2013 11:11:38 PM UTC-5, Stephen Paul King wrote:

On 3/8/2013 11:08 PM, Stephen P. King wrote:

Hi,

Is the following a sound claim?


"...scientifically meaningful propositions are questions about the 
past, the
present, the future, or the eternal laws that:

  * might in principle be both false and true
  * admit a method, at least in principle, to evaluate their truth 
values."

-- 


Is the following a sound claim?

"...examples of propositions that don't belong to science because one 
of the
disqualifying conditions below holds:

  * they're purely mathematical in character so they require no 
empirical input
at all
  * they're statements about fictional objects such as Hamlet that 
can't be
decided from the only available data, in this case the text of 
Hamlet
(there's no "real Hamlet" offering "additional data")
  * they depend on subjective opinions and preferences"

-- 



They sound ok to me. Subjective opinions should not be included when the 
topic of
consideration is subjectivity itself, but they should be understood as 
expressions
of subjective phenomena.

Craig

Onward!

Stephen

PS, I am quotingSean Carroll  

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A philosopher making the Duplication argument

[Stephen P. King]

http://www.closertotruth.com/video-profile/What-is-the-Nature-of-Personal-Identity-Peter-van-Inwagen-/176

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Onward!

Stephen


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Re: Losing Control

[Stathis Papaioannou]

On Wed, Mar 20, 2013 at 9:01 AM, Craig Weinberg  wrote:

>> I'll agree on your terms, but you have to make it explicit.
>
>
> My terms are:
>
> Super-Personal Intentional (Intuition)
>  |
>  |
>  |
> unintentional (determinism) +-- unintentional
> (random)
>  |
>  |
>  |
>Sub-Personal Intentional (Instinct)
>
>
> + = Free will = Personal Intentional (Voluntary Preference)
> The x axis = Impersonal

I don't think these are definitions, they are arguments. A definition
of "intentional" in the common sense does not normally include
"neither determined nor random". You should start with the normal
definition then show that it could be neither determined nor random.
It is a serious problem in a debate if someone surreptitiously puts
their conclusion into the definition of the terms.

>> >> So, do you believe that it possible that an entity which is
>> >> deterministic from a third person perspective could be conscious, or
>> >> do you believe that an entity which is deterministic from a third
>> >> person perspective could not possibly be conscious?
>> >
>> >
>> > Yes, I think all deterministic looking systems represent sensory-motor
>> > participation of some kind, but not necessarily on the level that we
>> > assume.
>> > What we see as a cloud may have sensory-motor participation as droplets
>> > of
>> > water molecules, and as a wisp in the atmosphere as a whole, but not at
>> > all
>> > as a coherent cloud that we perceive. The cloud is a human scale emblem,
>> > not
>> > the native entity. The native awareness may reside in a much faster or
>> > much
>> > slower frequency range or sample rate than our own, so there is little
>> > hope
>> > of our relating to it personally. It's like Flatland only with
>> > perceptual
>> > relativity rather than quant dimension.
>>
>> I'm not completely sure but I think you've just said the brain could
>> be deterministic and still be conscious.
>
>
> What looks deterministic is not conscious, but what is consciousness can
> have be represented publicly by activity which looks deterministic to us.
> Nothing is actually, cosmically deterministic, only habitual.

If something conscious can look deterministic in every empirical test
then that's as good as saying that the brain could be deterministic. A
computer is deterministic in every empirical test but you could also
say without fear of contradiction that it is "not actually, cosmically
deterministic, only habitual."

>> > This is also why computers are not conscious. The native entity is
>> > microelectronic or geological, not mechanical. The machine as a whole is
>> > again an emblem, not an organic, self-invested whole.
>>
>> I don't understand what you think the fundamental difference is
>> between a brain, a cloud and a computer.
>
>
> A brain is part of an animal's body, which is the public representation of
> an animal's lifetime. It is composed of cells which are the public
> representation of microbiological experiences.
>
> A cloud is part of an atmosphere, which is the public representation of some
> scale of experience - could be geological, galactic, molecular...who knows.
>
> A computer is an assembly of objects being employed by a foreign agency for
> its own motives. The objects each have their own history and nature, so that
> they relate to each other on a very limited and lowest common denominator
> range of coherence. It is a room full or blind people who don't speak the
> same language, jostling each other around rhythmically because that's all
> they can do.
>
> The brain and body are a four billion year old highly integrated
> civilization with thousands of specific common histories. The cloud is more
> like farmland, passively cycling through organic phases.

I don't see the relevance of history here. How would it make any
difference to me if the atoms in my body were put there yesterday by a
fantastically improbably whirlwind? I'd still feel basically the same,
though I might have some issues if I learned of my true origin.


-- 
Stathis Papaioannou

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Re: Losing Control

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 19, 2013 5:37:34 PM UTC-4, stathisp wrote:
>
> On Wed, Mar 20, 2013 at 3:11 AM, Craig Weinberg 
> > 
> wrote: 
>
> >> We need to agree on terminology if we're going to have a discussion at 
> >> all. Have aliens visited the Earth? We need to agree that an "alien" 
> >> is a being born on another planet. It doesn't mean we agree on the 
> >> facts, but we need to at least speak the same language! 
> > 
> > 
> > I'm not opposed to agreeing on terminology, but that means we both 
> agree, 
> > not that I agree to your terms. 
>
> I'll agree on your terms, but you have to make it explicit. 
>

My terms are:

Super-Personal Intentional 
(Intuition)   
 |
 |
 |
unintentional (determinism) +-- unintentional 
(random)
 |
 |
 |
   Sub-Personal Intentional (Instinct)


+ = Free will = Personal Intentional (Voluntary Preference)
The x axis = Impersonal

 

> >> So, do you believe that it possible that an entity which is 
> >> deterministic from a third person perspective could be conscious, or 
> >> do you believe that an entity which is deterministic from a third 
> >> person perspective could not possibly be conscious? 
> > 
> > 
> > Yes, I think all deterministic looking systems represent sensory-motor 
> > participation of some kind, but not necessarily on the level that we 
> assume. 
> > What we see as a cloud may have sensory-motor participation as droplets 
> of 
> > water molecules, and as a wisp in the atmosphere as a whole, but not at 
> all 
> > as a coherent cloud that we perceive. The cloud is a human scale emblem, 
> not 
> > the native entity. The native awareness may reside in a much faster or 
> much 
> > slower frequency range or sample rate than our own, so there is little 
> hope 
> > of our relating to it personally. It's like Flatland only with 
> perceptual 
> > relativity rather than quant dimension. 
>
> I'm not completely sure but I think you've just said the brain could 
> be deterministic and still be conscious. 
>

What looks deterministic is not conscious, but what is consciousness can 
have be represented publicly by activity which looks deterministic to us. 
Nothing is actually, cosmically deterministic, only habitual.
 

>
> > This is also why computers are not conscious. The native entity is 
> > microelectronic or geological, not mechanical. The machine as a whole is 
> > again an emblem, not an organic, self-invested whole. 
>
> I don't understand what you think the fundamental difference is 
> between a brain, a cloud and a computer. 
>

A brain is part of an animal's body, which is the public representation of 
an animal's lifetime. It is composed of cells which are the public 
representation of microbiological experiences.

A cloud is part of an atmosphere, which is the public representation of 
some scale of experience - could be geological, galactic, molecular...who 
knows.

A computer is an assembly of objects being employed by a foreign agency for 
its own motives. The objects each have their own history and nature, so 
that they relate to each other on a very limited and lowest common 
denominator range of coherence. It is a room full or blind people who don't 
speak the same language, jostling each other around rhythmically because 
that's all they can do.

The brain and body are a four billion year old highly integrated 
civilization with thousands of specific common histories. The cloud is more 
like farmland, passively cycling through organic phases.

Craig


> -- 
> Stathis Papaioannou 
>

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Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[Russell Standish]

On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 05:05:25PM +0100, Bruno Marchal wrote:
> 
> On 19 Mar 2013, at 16:52, Telmo Menezes wrote:
> 
> >On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 2:06 AM, Russell Standish
> >>as a quantum computer, since random oracles are another way of
> >>bridging computational complexity classes.
> >>
> 
> My point to Russell was that a random oracle is less powerful than a
> quantum computer, even if the contrary is correct (a quantum
> computer can simulate a random oracle, in principle).

To be fair, I never claimed that random oracle computers are
indistingushable from quantum computers. My point was a nod to the
NP=P result in computers with random oracles, an article you pointed
me to. In fact any model of computation that provides a way of
computing something that is physically impossible with the universes
resources for classical computing would provide a means of explaining
that result (assuming it ever arises). We don't know that quantum
computing and random oracles exhaust the possibiltiies.

> 
> My point to Roger was just that it is doubtful that the brain is a
> quantum computer, for theoretical and experimental reason.

Yes,of course. Sufficiently doubtful that it would be a career
limiting move to go hunting for prodgies who can perform these
arithmetical operations faster than the fastest possible classical computer.


-- 


Prof Russell Standish  Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)
Principal, High Performance Coders
Visiting Professor of Mathematics  hpco...@hpcoders.com.au
University of New South Wales  http://www.hpcoders.com.au


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Re: Losing Control

[Stathis Papaioannou]

On Wed, Mar 20, 2013 at 3:11 AM, Craig Weinberg  wrote:

>> We need to agree on terminology if we're going to have a discussion at
>> all. Have aliens visited the Earth? We need to agree that an "alien"
>> is a being born on another planet. It doesn't mean we agree on the
>> facts, but we need to at least speak the same language!
>
>
> I'm not opposed to agreeing on terminology, but that means we both agree,
> not that I agree to your terms.

I'll agree on your terms, but you have to make it explicit.

>> So, do you believe that it possible that an entity which is
>> deterministic from a third person perspective could be conscious, or
>> do you believe that an entity which is deterministic from a third
>> person perspective could not possibly be conscious?
>
>
> Yes, I think all deterministic looking systems represent sensory-motor
> participation of some kind, but not necessarily on the level that we assume.
> What we see as a cloud may have sensory-motor participation as droplets of
> water molecules, and as a wisp in the atmosphere as a whole, but not at all
> as a coherent cloud that we perceive. The cloud is a human scale emblem, not
> the native entity. The native awareness may reside in a much faster or much
> slower frequency range or sample rate than our own, so there is little hope
> of our relating to it personally. It's like Flatland only with perceptual
> relativity rather than quant dimension.

I'm not completely sure but I think you've just said the brain could
be deterministic and still be conscious.

> This is also why computers are not conscious. The native entity is
> microelectronic or geological, not mechanical. The machine as a whole is
> again an emblem, not an organic, self-invested whole.

I don't understand what you think the fundamental difference is
between a brain, a cloud and a computer.

-- 
Stathis Papaioannou

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Re: G.K. Chesterton on Materialism

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 19, 2013 2:24:40 PM UTC-4, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:
>
> On 19.03.2013 19:17 Craig Weinberg said the following: 
> > 
> > 
> > On Tuesday, March 19, 2013 1:38:21 PM UTC-4, John Clark wrote: 
> >> 
> >> On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 1:13 PM, Craig Weinberg 
> >>  
> >>> wrote: 
> >> 
> >>> Intimate relation is not causality. The stock market has been 
> >>> famously been related to skirt lengths 
> >> 
> >> 
> >> If when skirt lengths changed there was ALWAYS a change in the 
> >> stock market in the same direction, and when the stock market 
> >> changed there was ALWAYS a change in skirt lengths that preceded it 
> >> then its true, changing the length of skirts DOES cause a change in 
> >> the stock market; and if humans don't understand how a connection 
> >> between the two could possibly work that's just too bad, it 
> >> wouldn't make it any less true. 
> >> 
> >> And if all of that were true then dress designers would be the 
> >> richest people the world has ever seen. They're not. 
> >> 
> > 
> > I already went through this with you with the vanilla ice cream 
> > example. Correlation, even 100% correlation, does not equal 
> > causation. Two unrelated systems can both be related to a third, and 
> > I think that must be the case with neurological activity and 
> > subjective experience, where the third and fundamental system is 
> > sensory-motor capacity, or sense, from which the private and public 
> > subsystems are derived. 
> > 
>
> In a way everything is just regularities. For example a good short talk 
> in this respect 
>
> Where do the Laws of Nature Come From? (Bas van Fraassen) 
>
> http://www.closertotruth.com/video-profile/Where-do-the-Laws-of-Nature-Come-From-Bas-van-Fraassen-/1372
>  
>
>
Nice. I agree with everything they are saying (well, mainly because it 
agrees with what I have been saying...especially about symmetry :)

Thanks,
Craig
 

> Evgenii 
>

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Re: G.K. Chesterton on Materialism

[Evgenii Rudnyi]

On 19.03.2013 19:17 Craig Weinberg said the following:



On Tuesday, March 19, 2013 1:38:21 PM UTC-4, John Clark wrote:


On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 1:13 PM, Craig Weinberg


wrote:



Intimate relation is not causality. The stock market has been
famously been related to skirt lengths



If when skirt lengths changed there was ALWAYS a change in the
stock market in the same direction, and when the stock market
changed there was ALWAYS a change in skirt lengths that preceded it
then its true, changing the length of skirts DOES cause a change in
the stock market; and if humans don't understand how a connection
between the two could possibly work that's just too bad, it
wouldn't make it any less true.

And if all of that were true then dress designers would be the
richest people the world has ever seen. They're not.



I already went through this with you with the vanilla ice cream
example. Correlation, even 100% correlation, does not equal
causation. Two unrelated systems can both be related to a third, and
I think that must be the case with neurological activity and
subjective experience, where the third and fundamental system is
sensory-motor capacity, or sense, from which the private and public
subsystems are derived.



In a way everything is just regularities. For example a good short talk 
in this respect


Where do the Laws of Nature Come From? (Bas van Fraassen)
http://www.closertotruth.com/video-profile/Where-do-the-Laws-of-Nature-Come-From-Bas-van-Fraassen-/1372

Evgenii

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Re: G.K. Chesterton on Materialism

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 19, 2013 1:38:21 PM UTC-4, John Clark wrote:
>
> On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 1:13 PM, Craig Weinberg 
> 
> > wrote:
>
> > Intimate relation is not causality. The stock market has been famously 
>> been related to skirt lengths
>
>
> If when skirt lengths changed there was ALWAYS a change in the stock 
> market in the same direction, and when the stock market changed there was 
> ALWAYS a change in skirt lengths that preceded it then its true, changing 
> the length of skirts DOES cause a change in the stock market; and if humans 
> don't understand how a connection between the two could possibly work 
> that's just too bad, it wouldn't make it any less true. 
>
> And if all of that were true then dress designers would be the richest 
> people the world has ever seen. They're not. 
>

I already went through this with you with the vanilla ice cream example. 
Correlation, even 100% correlation, does not equal causation. Two unrelated 
systems can both be related to a third, and I think that must be the case 
with neurological activity and subjective experience, where the third and 
fundamental system is sensory-motor capacity, or sense, from which the 
private and public subsystems are derived.

Craig


>   John K Clark 
>
>
>
>

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Re: True?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 19 Mar 2013, at 18:37, Alberto G. Corona wrote:


No.

What means "truth value" of something? in which range of phenomena?  
in all phenomena applicable? how you can test all phenomena  
applicable to a theory?



That's what the theory is all about, if done honestly.




you can't.


of course we can. We do that since centuries, with some rigor in some  
filed, and less so in other field, for reason of hotness and personal  
fears.





The only thing that you can do is to test a particular prediction  
that the theory predict that may never happen (Popperian falsability)



OK.






Feyerabend demosntrated  that not even that is possible, or at least  
unique, since the perceptions or "facts" must be interpreted  
according with the theory. there is no fact that is theory-free. A  
fact pressuposes a theory. So a theory and their perceptions are a  
closed set, that may be autocoherent.


OK. But note that you need arithmetic or Turing equivalent to make  
that precise.







So there may be different theories for the same phenomena, each one  
with their interpreted facts, that may have some kind of morphism  
between them. That is evidently and pefectly exemplified now in some  
dualities of string theories, or between newtonian and relativistic  
mechanics, or in a certain way, between heliocentrism and   
geocentrisme.  where  agreeement between phenomena and  ptolemaic  
theory, in the case of heliocentrism, is maintained at the cost of a  
more complicated theory.


And in computer science, where you can see all first order  
specification of any Turing universal system as a theory (of  
everything).







Then, to escape the Feyerabend trap, there is necessary additional  
criteria, such is the economy of axioms or the Occam Razor as  
criteria for theory acceptance. Fortunately it works, because it  
seems that we live in a simple, mathematical universe, which is  
amazing per se.


Locally, but then comp explains the remative importance of the little  
numbers, and the less little numbers, ...








About opinions:

But all that one may know, even the facts, are subjective perceptions.

But opinions are about internal subjective perceptions,

That there are no scientific theory about some subjective  
perceptions (some internal ones) does not say that these subjective  
perceptions can never be objects of scientific study.


Totally agree.




Simply it means that at this historical moment there is no methods  
(or there is resistance to them, since the rejection of common  
sense) that would make them testable and scientific.



Well, with comp there is. See my url for links, but that is what I  
explain here. The discovery of the universal numbers/machines makes  
that possible. We can derive physics from computer science + some  
modal logic of knowledge, and compare with the facts.


Bruno










2013/3/19 Craig Weinberg 


On Friday, March 8, 2013 11:11:38 PM UTC-5, Stephen Paul King wrote:
On 3/8/2013 11:08 PM, Stephen P. King wrote:

Hi,

Is the following a sound claim?


"...scientifically meaningful propositions are questions about the  
past, the present, the future, or the eternal laws that:

might in principle be both false and true
admit a method, at least in principle, to evaluate their truth  
values."

--


Is the following a sound claim?

"...examples of propositions that don't belong to science because  
one of the disqualifying conditions below holds:
they're purely mathematical in character so they require no  
empirical input at all
they're statements about fictional objects such as Hamlet that can't  
be decided from the only available data, in this case the text of  
Hamlet (there's no "real Hamlet" offering "additional data")

they depend on subjective opinions and preferences"
--

They sound ok to me. Subjective opinions should not be included when  
the topic of consideration is subjectivity itself, but they should  
be understood as expressions of subjective phenomena.


Craig

Onward!

Stephen

PS, I am quoting Sean Carroll

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http://iridia.ulb.

Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[Bruno Marchal]

On 19 Mar 2013, at 18:35, Bruno Marchal wrote:



On 19 Mar 2013, at 17:34, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:


snip (see the preview post)





As an example, I could point you to the Genome Wager between Lewis  
Wolpert and Rupert Sheldrake


http://www.sheldrake.org/D&C/controversies/genomewager.html

Make your bet. In such a form this is closer to real science, that  
is, to a predictive statement.


That bet is far too vague for me. Define "abnormalities".

I bet that in 2029, they will not been able to judge the case, and  
will continue to disagree.


I can bet that full simulation of higher mammals brain, ---glial,  
neuronal cells + some bacteries, at the molecular level, close to  
the Heisenberg uncertainty level,--- will be done this or the next  
century.


And I am not betting that we will be able to simulate the folding of  
all proteins, but we will use the shape we already know.  Many steps  
of the chemical metabolism will be simulated very roughly, in the  
(eternal) beginning.


It might be an ethical problem, of doing this on animals. They did not  
say "yes" to the doctor, but we will do it anyway, and comp will be a  
practice before people begin to think on the theological implications,  
I'm afraid.


Most humans will choose the level available in their time. It is a  
field where our terrestrial grand-children will never cease to progress.


Bruno





http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/



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Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[Bruno Marchal]

On 19 Mar 2013, at 18:13, John Clark wrote:



>> Factorize 13195212121

> Rain Man?

Even Rain Man couldn't figure out that 2^57885161 -1 is a prime  
number as a conventional computer did about a month ago, the number  
has 17,425,170 digits. This is the sort of problem that quantum  
computers would be especially good at because it involves factoring  
numbers, so I don't see why a non quantum computer could so easily  
beat a human with a brain that could make quantum calculations. And  
to make a quantum computer you need to entangle particles, and  
nobody has proposed a plausible way that could be done in the hot  
noisy human brain.


OK.




> show me a human as good as a quantum computer for finding a needle  
in a haystack.


A human with a magnet?


Lol.

Of course "the needle in the haystack" is the name, in computer  
science,  of the problem of finding a data in large database without  
structure.

It is a bit more like searching a lighter in a woman bag :)

Of course the magnet illustrates that some instantiation of the  
problem can admit efficacious solution. But what if the needle is in  
plastic? Perhaps centrifugation will do.


Bruno





 John K Clark





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Re: True?

[Evgenii Rudnyi]

On 19.03.2013 18:37 Alberto G. Corona said the following:

No.



...


Then, to escape the Feyerabend trap, there is necessary additional
criteria, such is the economy of axioms or the Occam Razor as
criteria for theory acceptance. Fortunately it works, because it
seems that we live in a simple, mathematical universe, which is
amazing per se.



I have listened recently to a lecture by Maarten Hoenen about the 
philosophy of Occam. Hence the question. What does it mean when you use 
Occam's name? Do you share any of his philosophical/theological 
positions? Or in your paragraph his name is just an empty token?


Evgenii

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Re: G.K. Chesterton on Materialism

[John Clark]

On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 1:13 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:

> Intimate relation is not causality. The stock market has been famously
> been related to skirt lengths


If when skirt lengths changed there was ALWAYS a change in the stock market
in the same direction, and when the stock market changed there was ALWAYS a
change in skirt lengths that preceded it then its true, changing the length
of skirts DOES cause a change in the stock market; and if humans don't
understand how a connection between the two could possibly work that's just
too bad, it wouldn't make it any less true.

And if all of that were true then dress designers would be the richest
people the world has ever seen. They're not.

  John K Clark

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Re: True?

[Alberto G. Corona]

No.

What means "truth value" of something? in which range of phenomena? in all
phenomena applicable? how you can test all phenomena applicable to a
theory? you can't. The only thing that you can do is to test a particular
prediction that the theory predict that may never happen (Popperian
falsability)


Feyerabend demosntrated  that not even that is possible, or at least
unique, since the perceptions or "facts" must be interpreted according with
the theory. there is no fact that is theory-free. A fact pressuposes a
theory. So a theory and their perceptions are a closed set, that may be
autocoherent.

So there may be different theories for the same phenomena, each one with
their interpreted facts, that may have some kind of morphism between them.
That is evidently and pefectly exemplified now in some dualities of string
theories, or between newtonian and relativistic mechanics, or in a certain
way, between heliocentrism and  geocentrisme.  where  agreeement between
phenomena and  ptolemaic theory, in the case of heliocentrism, is
maintained at the cost of a more complicated theory.

Then, to escape the Feyerabend trap, there is necessary additional
criteria, such is the economy of axioms or the Occam Razor as criteria for
theory acceptance. Fortunately it works, because it seems that we live in a
simple, mathematical universe, which is amazing per se.

About opinions:

But all that one may know, even the facts, are subjective perceptions.

But opinions are about internal subjective perceptions,

That there are no scientific theory about some subjective perceptions (some
internal ones) does not say that these subjective perceptions can never be
objects of scientific study. Simply it means that at this historical moment
there is no methods (or there is resistance to them, since the rejection of
common sense) that would make them testable and scientific.



2013/3/19 Craig Weinberg 

>
>
> On Friday, March 8, 2013 11:11:38 PM UTC-5, Stephen Paul King wrote:
>>
>>  On 3/8/2013 11:08 PM, Stephen P. King wrote:
>>
>> Hi,
>>
>> Is the following a sound claim?
>>
>>
>> "...scientifically meaningful propositions are questions about the past,
>> the present, the future, or the eternal laws that:
>>
>>- might in principle be both false and true
>>- admit a method, at least in principle, to evaluate their truth
>>values."
>>
>> --
>>
>>
>> Is the following a sound claim?
>>
>> "...examples of propositions that don't belong to science because one of
>> the disqualifying conditions below holds:
>>
>>- they're purely mathematical in character so they require no
>>empirical input at all
>>- they're statements about fictional objects such as Hamlet that
>>can't be decided from the only available data, in this case the text of
>>Hamlet (there's no "real Hamlet" offering "additional data")
>>- they depend on subjective opinions and preferences"
>>
>> --
>>
>>
> They sound ok to me. Subjective opinions should not be included when the
> topic of consideration is subjectivity itself, but they should be
> understood as expressions of subjective phenomena.
>
> Craig
>
>
>> Onward!
>>
>> Stephen
>>
>> PS, I am quoting Sean Carroll 
>>
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Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[Bruno Marchal]

On 19 Mar 2013, at 17:34, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:


On 19.03.2013 16:38 Bruno Marchal said the following:


On 19 Mar 2013, at 15:27, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:


On 19.03.2013 12:39 Bruno Marchal said the following:


On 19 Mar 2013, at 10:48, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:


On 18.03.2013 19:39 Bruno Marchal said the following:


...


1) show me a human as good as a quantum computer for finding
a needle in a haystack.


Could you show me a quantum computer that can do that? I guess
that it exist only in dreams of theoreticians (on in that part
of Platonia that the humankind cannot access).


That's an argument of the kind "only bird can fly". I was
alluding to a well now ability of QC. And to pretend that a
brain/mind can do quantum computing would endow a brain/mind with
this abilities.

Grover L.K. Qunatum Mechanics helps in searching for a needle in
an haystack. Physical Review Letters, 78: 325-328, 1997a.
Quant-phys/9605043.

The fact that QC does not yet exist does not invalidate the
argument.



In my view, provided that there is no experimental proof, we remain
in a realm of a metaphysical discussion. Is this what you mean by
the argument?


I think that you are confusing theoretical and metaphysical. I would
avoid the term "experimental proof" as this does not make sense with
the notion of proof most commonly referred in this list (valid
theoretical deduction)


I would say that a valid theoretical deduction concerns logic only.


Not at all. You can reason validly in *all* domains. Only in the hot  
domain, people forgets logic and use emotion instead.


Arithmetic is far beyond "logic". That's a consequence of  
incompleteness. We cannot capture the whole arithmetical truth in one  
formal system. We are warned for an infinity of surprises. But we can  
still make assumption and reason from there. This is true for any  
domain.




Yet, not all valid logic propositions are related to the experienced  
world.


You are a bit imprecise. The purely logical propositions (intuitionist  
or classical) are related to you trivially, I would say. You are using  
them all the time, when doing shopping, work, driving a car, etc. At  
some level they are true *about* you.
But then pure logic alone is not rich. We always needs axioms, to talk  
about something, like strings, numbers, combinators, dreaming  
machines, or gods, goddesses and whatever.






In my view, if we remove empirical evidences from consideration then  
we land in a metaphysical realm.



It when we assume a reality beyond the empirical evidence, that we do  
theology or metaphysics.


Logical thought, which does not mean purely logical thought, are a  
mean to reason in the most independent way of ontological commitment  
(be it matter, gods, numbers, or whatever. Here rigor is the key of  
free thought. The validity of a reasoning guarantied its independence  
from interpretations. That happens with first order logic, and that's  
why I study machine's talking first order predicate calculus. But they  
talk of many things.









Also, there are plenty of experimental confirmations of quantum
computations. What does not yet exist is a general purpose quantum
computer, but the reason why are obvious: it *is* technically
challenging. Yet, since the work on quantum error correction, no one
doubt in the field that quantum computer will appear. May be in ten
years, may be in 100 years. I have already assisted to quite
impressive experience is quantum data encryption and recovery. The
number 15 has already be factorized through a quantum algorithm
(Shor), etc.



I am personally not impressed by the logic that this will be made  
some time in the future. To this end, a statement in a form of a  
wager would be more meaningful. For example, I bet that in ten  
years ...



Too much difficult.






As an example, I could point you to the Genome Wager between Lewis  
Wolpert and Rupert Sheldrake


http://www.sheldrake.org/D&C/controversies/genomewager.html

Make your bet. In such a form this is closer to real science, that  
is, to a predictive statement.


That bet is far too vague for me. Define "abnormalities".

I bet that in 2029, they will not been able to judge the case, and  
will continue to disagree.


I can bet that full simulation of higher mammals brain, ---glial,  
neuronal cells + some bacteries, at the molecular level, close to the  
Heisenberg uncertainty level,--- will be done this or the next century.


Bruno






Evgenii

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Re: G.K. Chesterton on Materialism

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 19, 2013 12:34:20 PM UTC-4, John Clark wrote:
>
> On Mon, Mar 18, 2013 at 4:15 PM, Craig Weinberg 
> 
> > wrote:
>  
>
>>  > The man who thinks he is logical is often just stubborn.
>>
>
> If being ruled by your head rather than your gut or your crotch is 
> stubborn then being stubborn is a virtue.
>

I prefer to rule all three to the extent that I can, but also to be open to 
what all three have to offer.
 

>  
> > There are many things related to consciousness  [...]
>>
>
> it's not just consciousness, there are many things related 
> to EVERYTHING and if one wishes to fit all those parts of the jigsaw puzzle 
> that is the universe together into a self consistent whole then logic is 
> the only tool available; maybe it will turn out that logic is insufficient 
> for that task but its all we've got and so we'll just have to do the best 
> we can.  
>

It's not all we've got at all. We've got intuition, sensitivity, 
aesthetics, experience, practical or common sense... logic is very limited. 
We have a whole other hemisphere of the brain that is used, not just by us, 
but other animals as well. Logic is useless without the other faculties of 
reasoning and evaluating.
 

>   
>
>> > The logical man is a man whose religion is logic.
>>
>
> Wow, calling a guy know for disliking religion religious, never heard that 
> one before, at least I never heard it before I was 12.
>

That's because the man restricted to logic often sees his own sentimental 
attachments and confirmation bias as part of an objective truth, and all 
that conflicts with that is painted as religious. The irony needs to be 
pointed out again and again that this is in fact the very psychology which 
he objects to in religion.
 

>  
>
>> > Not that I'm opposed to logic
>>
>
> Your posts tell a very different story. If it already supported what they 
> wanted to believe nobody, absolutely nobody, would dispute the logical fact 
> that if X is not not Y then X is Y. 
>

X and Y are figures. They are imaginary. They have the qualities that you 
assign to them. We can just as easily define X and Y as a superposition of 
superposition and anti-superposition and you wouldn't bat an eye if it came 
from some theoretical physicist that managed to get a peer reviewed paper 
published. Your logic is prejudice.
 

> If it already supported what they wanted to believe nobody, absolutely 
> nobody, would dispute the logical fact that if changing X always changes Y 
> and changing Y always changes X then X and Y are intimately related. 
>

Intimate relation is not causality. The stock market has been famously been 
related to skirt lengths and other spandrel-type indicators. 
http://www.investopedia.com/articles/stocks/08/stock-market-indicators.asp
 

> But if what you want to be true and what you logically know must be true 
> come into conflict then logic is just going to have to go away and you are 
> left with the pleasant but imbecilic idea that if you want something to be 
> true hard enough you can make it be true.   
>

Wanting something to be true has nothing to do with it. It's a matter of 
recognizing that logic is only one epistemological source - there are 
others, each with their own strengths and weaknesses.
 

>
>  >>> The materialist is sure that history has been simply and solely a 
 chain of causation…"

>>> >> I don't know when Chesterton wrote that but he lived until 1936 and 
>>> by 1925 physicists, the ultimate materialists, did not believe that history 
>>> or anything else was "simply and solely a chain of causation"; however it 
>>> is unlikely that Chesterton ever knew this and like most self styled 
>>> philosophers remained blissfully ignorant of all scientific and 
>>> mathematical discoveries made during the last century or two.  
>>>
>>
>> > Are you referring here to the addition of randomness or probability to 
>> the chain of causation? 
>>
>
> No I am not. I'm referring to Quantum Mechanics, the TITANIC revolution in 
> science that happened in the mid 1920's. In particular I'm referring to the 
> discovery of the Schrodinger Wave equation and Heisenberg's equivalent 
> matrix formulation. On reflection I shouldn't be surprised at your 
> confusion, after all I just said that modern philosophers pay no attention 
> to recent developments in science or mathematics; and by "recent" I mean 
> stuff that happened in the last 200 years.
>

Not to interrupt yet another irrelevant display of ad-hominem vanity, but 
what specifically does QM add to the chain of causation which does not fall 
under the category of randomness or probability? Smaller link in the chain? 
So what?
 

>
> > Even anti-Semites can have valid insights.
>>
>
> Yes but it does call into question ones claim to be a expert on morality, 
> and morality is what G K Chesterton most liked to write about.
>

It has been said that people often teach what they most need to learn.

Craig
 

>
>   John K Clark
>
>
> 

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Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[John Clark]

> >> Factorize 13195212121
>>
>
> > Rain Man?
>

Even Rain Man couldn't figure out that 2^57885161 -1 is a prime number as a
conventional computer did about a month ago, the number has 17,425,170
digits. This is the sort of problem that quantum computers would be
especially good at because it involves factoring numbers, so I don't see
why a non quantum computer could so easily beat a human with a brain that
could make quantum calculations. And to make a quantum computer you need to
entangle particles, and nobody has proposed a plausible way that could be
done in the hot noisy human brain.

> show me a human as good as a quantum computer for finding a needle in a
> haystack.
>

A human with a magnet?

 John K Clark

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Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[Bruno Marchal]

On 19 Mar 2013, at 17:34, Telmo Menezes wrote:

On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 5:05 PM, Bruno Marchal   
wrote:


On 19 Mar 2013, at 16:52, Telmo Menezes wrote:

On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 2:06 AM, Russell Standish >

wrote:


On Mon, Mar 18, 2013 at 07:39:44PM +0100, Bruno Marchal wrote:


Hi Roger,

On 18 Mar 2013, at 12:48, Roger Clough wrote:



Since mind is an MQS or Multiple Quantum Superposition, it can
process information at the rate of a quantum computer.




Since you seem to talk  philosophy, let me translate what you say
for our friends the scientists.

If we assume that mind is a Multiple Quantum Superposition, and if
we assume that mind can exploit those quantum superpositions to
process information, then the mind can process information at the
rate of a quantum computer.

That implication seems to me quite reasonable.

Test of the theory according to which a human mind is a Multiple
Quantum Superposition:


1) show me a human as good as a quantum computer for finding a
needle in a haystack.

2) Factorize 13195212121




Demonstrating these sorts of exponential speedups only falsifies  
the
proposition that a human mind is an ordinary classical computer  
(but
not COMP). It does not confirm in any way that a human mind  
operates

as a quantum computer, since random oracles are another way of
bridging computational complexity classes.

We only need one idiot-savant to demonstrate this.

By contrast, being unable to demonstrate this scaling means - well
nothing
at all, actually.



I agree with Russell here.

More generally, I always disliked these evaluations of the
computational power of the human brain by the speed at which it  
can do

arithmetics. It's quite possible that the brain is a computational
beast, but the "software" it runs is specialised in other things:
image pattern recognition, parsing semantic trees and so on.
Arithmetics is a recent and unnatural activity for the brain, so it
might very well have to be performed on top of inadequate and
expensive pre-existing machinery.




But QC is not just a speed scaling of computation. It is a  
different way to
do some computation, some of which are just impossible to do in  
"real time"

by a classical computer.


Good point, I didn't mean to imply the contrary.


OK.






So here the speed is of conceptual importance. If
my brain is a QC I can do a Fourier transform of the state of my  
infinitely
many doppelgangers in some superposition states of myself, and this  
gives
ways to confirm the quantum many-world in a less indirect way than  
by doing

QM.


That would be a cool explanation for the feeling of deja-vu?


Cool, perhaps. Probable? I don't think so. There are classical  
explanation of that phenomenon. Which one is correct I don't know.






My point to Russell was that a random oracle is less powerful than  
a quantum
computer, even if the contrary is correct (a quantum computer can  
simulate a

random oracle, in principle).

My point to Roger was just that it is doubtful that the brain is a  
quantum

computer, for theoretical and experimental reason.


An hypothesis that fascinates me, though, is that it may have access
to sources of quantum randomness.


But we have access to the comp first indeterminacy, and comp explain  
why it has to be quantum, and have some equivalent of the  
randomization of phase, to eliminate the white rabbits.






I believe that randomness is related
to creativity.


No, randomness has not the redundancy which is the mark of creativity.

 Post number (ith digit = 1 if phi_i(i) stops, and zero if not) is  
creative, in the sense of Emil Post, and corresponds to the Turing  
Universal.


Algorithmic randomness (the most random thing we can conceive, like  
Chaitin's Omega, which is a compression of Post number, render it  
useless.


randomness is useful, tough, for making the computation which can  
develop some relation with it, like the quantum, having a winning  
measure in the rize of the sharable physical laws.


But still, I tend to bet that creativity, if he can exploit it, is  
still independent of it.







One of the things that always bothered me with Roger
Penrose's argument is that he considers a theoretical classical
computer, but real computers have random number generators* that
exploit non Turing-emulable sources of randomness.


Rarely. Only A qubit, or a self-duplication, can give true randomness,  
but below my story in the building I work, they work precisely on how  
to make a qubit such that a measurement would be provably random, but  
even just that is technically quite challenging.






This has
non-trivial implications, and anyone who played with evolutionary
computation / alife will probably agree.



In the UD, we are, in principle dependent on *all* oracles, not just  
the random one. There are many oracles. I doubt that they play a role  
other than the halting oracle (time, somehow) and the random oracle,  
but who knows ...

Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[Telmo Menezes]

On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 5:05 PM, Bruno Marchal  wrote:
>
> On 19 Mar 2013, at 16:52, Telmo Menezes wrote:
>
>> On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 2:06 AM, Russell Standish 
>> wrote:
>>>
>>> On Mon, Mar 18, 2013 at 07:39:44PM +0100, Bruno Marchal wrote:

 Hi Roger,

 On 18 Mar 2013, at 12:48, Roger Clough wrote:

>
> Since mind is an MQS or Multiple Quantum Superposition, it can
> process information at the rate of a quantum computer.



 Since you seem to talk  philosophy, let me translate what you say
 for our friends the scientists.

 If we assume that mind is a Multiple Quantum Superposition, and if
 we assume that mind can exploit those quantum superpositions to
 process information, then the mind can process information at the
 rate of a quantum computer.

 That implication seems to me quite reasonable.

 Test of the theory according to which a human mind is a Multiple
 Quantum Superposition:


 1) show me a human as good as a quantum computer for finding a
 needle in a haystack.

 2) Factorize 13195212121


>>>
>>> Demonstrating these sorts of exponential speedups only falsifies the
>>> proposition that a human mind is an ordinary classical computer (but
>>> not COMP). It does not confirm in any way that a human mind operates
>>> as a quantum computer, since random oracles are another way of
>>> bridging computational complexity classes.
>>>
>>> We only need one idiot-savant to demonstrate this.
>>>
>>> By contrast, being unable to demonstrate this scaling means - well
>>> nothing
>>> at all, actually.
>>
>>
>> I agree with Russell here.
>>
>> More generally, I always disliked these evaluations of the
>> computational power of the human brain by the speed at which it can do
>> arithmetics. It's quite possible that the brain is a computational
>> beast, but the "software" it runs is specialised in other things:
>> image pattern recognition, parsing semantic trees and so on.
>> Arithmetics is a recent and unnatural activity for the brain, so it
>> might very well have to be performed on top of inadequate and
>> expensive pre-existing machinery.
>
>
>
> But QC is not just a speed scaling of computation. It is a different way to
> do some computation, some of which are just impossible to do in "real time"
> by a classical computer.

Good point, I didn't mean to imply the contrary.

> So here the speed is of conceptual importance. If
> my brain is a QC I can do a Fourier transform of the state of my infinitely
> many doppelgangers in some superposition states of myself, and this gives
> ways to confirm the quantum many-world in a less indirect way than by doing
> QM.

That would be a cool explanation for the feeling of deja-vu?

> My point to Russell was that a random oracle is less powerful than a quantum
> computer, even if the contrary is correct (a quantum computer can simulate a
> random oracle, in principle).
>
> My point to Roger was just that it is doubtful that the brain is a quantum
> computer, for theoretical and experimental reason.

An hypothesis that fascinates me, though, is that it may have access
to sources of quantum randomness. I believe that randomness is related
to creativity. One of the things that always bothered me with Roger
Penrose's argument is that he considers a theoretical classical
computer, but real computers have random number generators* that
exploit non Turing-emulable sources of randomness. This has
non-trivial implications, and anyone who played with evolutionary
computation / alife will probably agree.

* even pseudo-number generators can be seeded by the clock time, for example

> That would change nothing in UDA and AUDA. If the brain is a quantum
> computer, it would only mean something on the lowness of the comp
> substitution level, and a more complex back and forth between the Turing
> emulable and the first person indeterminacy (Turing recoverable from the
> indeterminacy on the whole UD*).

Sure, I did not assume that the brain as a QC would pose a problem to COMP.

> Bruno
>
>
>
>
>
>>
>>
>>> --
>>>
>>>
>>> 
>>> Prof Russell Standish  Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)
>>> Principal, High Performance Coders
>>> Visiting Professor of Mathematics  hpco...@hpcoders.com.au
>>> University of New South Wales  http://www.hpcoders.com.au
>>>
>>> 
>>>
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>>> 

Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[Evgenii Rudnyi]

On 19.03.2013 16:38 Bruno Marchal said the following:


On 19 Mar 2013, at 15:27, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:


On 19.03.2013 12:39 Bruno Marchal said the following:


On 19 Mar 2013, at 10:48, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:


On 18.03.2013 19:39 Bruno Marchal said the following:


...


1) show me a human as good as a quantum computer for finding
a needle in a haystack.


Could you show me a quantum computer that can do that? I guess
that it exist only in dreams of theoreticians (on in that part
of Platonia that the humankind cannot access).


That's an argument of the kind "only bird can fly". I was
alluding to a well now ability of QC. And to pretend that a
brain/mind can do quantum computing would endow a brain/mind with
this abilities.

Grover L.K. Qunatum Mechanics helps in searching for a needle in
an haystack. Physical Review Letters, 78: 325-328, 1997a.
Quant-phys/9605043.

The fact that QC does not yet exist does not invalidate the
argument.



In my view, provided that there is no experimental proof, we remain
in a realm of a metaphysical discussion. Is this what you mean by
the argument?


I think that you are confusing theoretical and metaphysical. I would
avoid the term "experimental proof" as this does not make sense with
the notion of proof most commonly referred in this list (valid
theoretical deduction)


I would say that a valid theoretical deduction concerns logic only. Yet, 
not all valid logic propositions are related to the experienced world. 
In my view, if we remove empirical evidences from consideration then we 
land in a metaphysical realm.



Also, there are plenty of experimental confirmations of quantum
computations. What does not yet exist is a general purpose quantum
computer, but the reason why are obvious: it *is* technically
challenging. Yet, since the work on quantum error correction, no one
 doubt in the field that quantum computer will appear. May be in ten
 years, may be in 100 years. I have already assisted to quite
impressive experience is quantum data encryption and recovery. The
number 15 has already be factorized through a quantum algorithm
(Shor), etc.



I am personally not impressed by the logic that this will be made some 
time in the future. To this end, a statement in a form of a wager would 
be more meaningful. For example, I bet that in ten years ...


As an example, I could point you to the Genome Wager between Lewis 
Wolpert and Rupert Sheldrake


http://www.sheldrake.org/D&C/controversies/genomewager.html

Make your bet. In such a form this is closer to real science, that is, 
to a predictive statement.


Evgenii

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Re: G.K. Chesterton on Materialism

[John Clark]

On Mon, Mar 18, 2013 at 4:15 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:


> > The man who thinks he is logical is often just stubborn.
>

If being ruled by your head rather than your gut or your crotch is stubborn
then being stubborn is a virtue.

> There are many things related to consciousness  [...]
>

it's not just consciousness, there are many things related
to EVERYTHING and if one wishes to fit all those parts of the jigsaw puzzle
that is the universe together into a self consistent whole then logic is
the only tool available; maybe it will turn out that logic is insufficient
for that task but its all we've got and so we'll just have to do the best
we can.


> > The logical man is a man whose religion is logic.
>

Wow, calling a guy know for disliking religion religious, never heard that
one before, at least I never heard it before I was 12.


> > Not that I'm opposed to logic
>

Your posts tell a very different story. If it already supported what they
wanted to believe nobody, absolutely nobody, would dispute the logical fact
that if X is not not Y then X is Y.  If it already supported what they
wanted to believe nobody, absolutely nobody, would dispute the logical fact
that if changing X always changes Y and changing Y always changes X then X
and Y are intimately related. But if what you want to be true and what you
logically know must be true come into conflict then logic is just going to
have to go away and you are left with the pleasant but imbecilic idea that
if you want something to be true hard enough you can make it be true.

>>> The materialist is sure that history has been simply and solely a chain
>>> of causation…"
>>>
>> >> I don't know when Chesterton wrote that but he lived until 1936 and by
>> 1925 physicists, the ultimate materialists, did not believe that history or
>> anything else was "simply and solely a chain of causation"; however it is
>> unlikely that Chesterton ever knew this and like most self styled
>> philosophers remained blissfully ignorant of all scientific and
>> mathematical discoveries made during the last century or two.
>>
>
> > Are you referring here to the addition of randomness or probability to
> the chain of causation?
>

No I am not. I'm referring to Quantum Mechanics, the TITANIC revolution in
science that happened in the mid 1920's. In particular I'm referring to the
discovery of the Schrodinger Wave equation and Heisenberg's equivalent
matrix formulation. On reflection I shouldn't be surprised at your
confusion, after all I just said that modern philosophers pay no attention
to recent developments in science or mathematics; and by "recent" I mean
stuff that happened in the last 200 years.

> Even anti-Semites can have valid insights.
>

Yes but it does call into question ones claim to be a expert on morality,
and morality is what G K Chesterton most liked to write about.

  John K Clark

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Re: True?

[Craig Weinberg]

On Friday, March 8, 2013 11:11:38 PM UTC-5, Stephen Paul King wrote:
>
>  On 3/8/2013 11:08 PM, Stephen P. King wrote:
>  
> Hi,
>
> Is the following a sound claim?
>
>
> "...scientifically meaningful propositions are questions about the past, 
> the present, the future, or the eternal laws that:
>
>- might in principle be both false and true 
>- admit a method, at least in principle, to evaluate their truth 
>values." 
>
> -- 
>
>  
> Is the following a sound claim?
>
> "...examples of propositions that don't belong to science because one of 
> the disqualifying conditions below holds:
>
>- they're purely mathematical in character so they require no 
>empirical input at all 
>- they're statements about fictional objects such as Hamlet that can't 
>be decided from the only available data, in this case the text of Hamlet 
>(there's no "real Hamlet" offering "additional data") 
>- they depend on subjective opinions and preferences" 
>
> -- 
>
>
They sound ok to me. Subjective opinions should not be included when the 
topic of consideration is subjectivity itself, but they should be 
understood as expressions of subjective phenomena.

Craig
 

> Onward!
>
> Stephen
>
> PS, I am quoting Sean Carroll 
>
>  

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Re: Losing Control

[Craig Weinberg]

On Monday, March 18, 2013 9:05:13 PM UTC-4, stathisp wrote:
>
> On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 11:39 AM, Craig Weinberg 
> > 
> wrote: 
>
> >> If you say that free will is compatible with determinism then you are 
> >> an compatibilist, otherwise you are an incompatibilist. Why do you try 
> >> to make the discussion difficult by refusing to agree on terminology? 
> > 
> > 
> > Because the terminology is ideologically loaded and makes the truth 
> > impossible to address, obviously. It's like you are demanding that I 
> agree 
> > that electricity is either the work of God or the Devil. 
>
> We need to agree on terminology if we're going to have a discussion at 
> all. Have aliens visited the Earth? We need to agree that an "alien" 
> is a being born on another planet. It doesn't mean we agree on the 
> facts, but we need to at least speak the same language! 
>

I'm not opposed to agreeing on terminology, but that means we both agree, 
not that I agree to your terms.
 

>
> >> It seems, again, that you believe it is a priori impossible for 
> >> consciousness and determinism to co-exist. If we can't get beyond this 
> >> then there is not much point in further debate. 
> > 
> > 
> > Determinism is what consciousness looks like from the crippled third 
> person 
> > perspective. They coexist in the sense that the old woman and the young 
> > woman coexist in the famous ambiguous drawing. 
>
> So, do you believe that it possible that an entity which is 
> deterministic from a third person perspective could be conscious, or 
> do you believe that an entity which is deterministic from a third 
> person perspective could not possibly be conscious? 
>

Yes, I think all deterministic looking systems represent sensory-motor 
participation of some kind, but not necessarily on the level that we 
assume. What we see as a cloud may have sensory-motor participation as 
droplets of water molecules, and as a wisp in the atmosphere as a whole, 
but not at all as a coherent cloud that we perceive. The cloud is a human 
scale emblem, not the native entity. The native awareness may reside in a 
much faster or much slower frequency range or sample rate than our own, so 
there is little hope of our relating to it personally. It's like Flatland 
only with perceptual relativity rather than quant dimension.

This is also why computers are not conscious. The native entity is 
microelectronic or geological, not mechanical. The machine as a whole is 
again an emblem, not an organic, self-invested whole.

Craig
 

>
>
> -- 
> Stathis Papaioannou 
>

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Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[Bruno Marchal]

On 19 Mar 2013, at 16:52, Telmo Menezes wrote:

On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 2:06 AM, Russell Standish > wrote:

On Mon, Mar 18, 2013 at 07:39:44PM +0100, Bruno Marchal wrote:

Hi Roger,

On 18 Mar 2013, at 12:48, Roger Clough wrote:



Since mind is an MQS or Multiple Quantum Superposition, it can
process information at the rate of a quantum computer.



Since you seem to talk  philosophy, let me translate what you say
for our friends the scientists.

If we assume that mind is a Multiple Quantum Superposition, and if
we assume that mind can exploit those quantum superpositions to
process information, then the mind can process information at the
rate of a quantum computer.

That implication seems to me quite reasonable.

Test of the theory according to which a human mind is a Multiple
Quantum Superposition:


1) show me a human as good as a quantum computer for finding a
needle in a haystack.

2) Factorize 13195212121




Demonstrating these sorts of exponential speedups only falsifies the
proposition that a human mind is an ordinary classical computer (but
not COMP). It does not confirm in any way that a human mind operates
as a quantum computer, since random oracles are another way of
bridging computational complexity classes.

We only need one idiot-savant to demonstrate this.

By contrast, being unable to demonstrate this scaling means - well  
nothing

at all, actually.


I agree with Russell here.

More generally, I always disliked these evaluations of the
computational power of the human brain by the speed at which it can do
arithmetics. It's quite possible that the brain is a computational
beast, but the "software" it runs is specialised in other things:
image pattern recognition, parsing semantic trees and so on.
Arithmetics is a recent and unnatural activity for the brain, so it
might very well have to be performed on top of inadequate and
expensive pre-existing machinery.



But QC is not just a speed scaling of computation. It is a different  
way to do some computation, some of which are just impossible to do in  
"real time" by a classical computer. So here the speed is of  
conceptual importance. If my brain is a QC I can do a Fourier  
transform of the state of my infinitely many doppelgangers in some  
superposition states of myself, and this gives ways to confirm the  
quantum many-world in a less indirect way than by doing QM.


My point to Russell was that a random oracle is less powerful than a  
quantum computer, even if the contrary is correct (a quantum computer  
can simulate a random oracle, in principle).


My point to Roger was just that it is doubtful that the brain is a  
quantum computer, for theoretical and experimental reason.


That would change nothing in UDA and AUDA. If the brain is a quantum  
computer, it would only mean something on the lowness of the comp  
substitution level, and a more complex back and forth between the  
Turing emulable and the first person indeterminacy (Turing recoverable  
from the indeterminacy on the whole UD*).


Bruno








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Principal, High Performance Coders
Visiting Professor of Mathematics  hpco...@hpcoders.com.au
University of New South Wales  http://www.hpcoders.com.au


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Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[Telmo Menezes]

On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 2:06 AM, Russell Standish  wrote:
> On Mon, Mar 18, 2013 at 07:39:44PM +0100, Bruno Marchal wrote:
>> Hi Roger,
>>
>> On 18 Mar 2013, at 12:48, Roger Clough wrote:
>>
>> >
>> >Since mind is an MQS or Multiple Quantum Superposition, it can
>> >process information at the rate of a quantum computer.
>>
>>
>> Since you seem to talk  philosophy, let me translate what you say
>> for our friends the scientists.
>>
>> If we assume that mind is a Multiple Quantum Superposition, and if
>> we assume that mind can exploit those quantum superpositions to
>> process information, then the mind can process information at the
>> rate of a quantum computer.
>>
>> That implication seems to me quite reasonable.
>>
>> Test of the theory according to which a human mind is a Multiple
>> Quantum Superposition:
>>
>>
>> 1) show me a human as good as a quantum computer for finding a
>> needle in a haystack.
>>
>> 2) Factorize 13195212121
>>
>>
>
> Demonstrating these sorts of exponential speedups only falsifies the
> proposition that a human mind is an ordinary classical computer (but
> not COMP). It does not confirm in any way that a human mind operates
> as a quantum computer, since random oracles are another way of
> bridging computational complexity classes.
>
> We only need one idiot-savant to demonstrate this.
>
> By contrast, being unable to demonstrate this scaling means - well nothing
> at all, actually.

I agree with Russell here.

More generally, I always disliked these evaluations of the
computational power of the human brain by the speed at which it can do
arithmetics. It's quite possible that the brain is a computational
beast, but the "software" it runs is specialised in other things:
image pattern recognition, parsing semantic trees and so on.
Arithmetics is a recent and unnatural activity for the brain, so it
might very well have to be performed on top of inadequate and
expensive pre-existing machinery.


> --
>
> 
> Prof Russell Standish  Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)
> Principal, High Performance Coders
> Visiting Professor of Mathematics  hpco...@hpcoders.com.au
> University of New South Wales  http://www.hpcoders.com.au
> 
>
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>

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Re: G.K. Chesterton on Materialism

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 19, 2013 6:55:30 AM UTC-4, Bruno Marchal wrote:
>
>
> On 18 Mar 2013, at 21:15, Craig Weinberg wrote:
>
>
>
> On Monday, March 18, 2013 11:33:17 AM UTC-4, John Clark wrote:
>>
>> G K Chesterton wrote:
>>
>> > For we must remember that the materialist philosophy (whether true or 
>>> not) is certainly much more limiting than any religion. 
>>>
>> That is absolutely true, there are more ways of being wrong than of being 
>> right, so if you don't care if your ideas are self consistent or not (for 
>> example if you don't care that X is not Y and X is not not Y) and if you 
>> don't care what words mean (for example if you don't care that if changing 
>> X always changes Y and changing Y always changes X that doesn't mean that X 
>> caused Y) then you have much more freedom over what you can believe than a 
>> logical man does. 
>>
>
> The man who thinks he is logical is often just stubborn. There are many 
> things related to consciousness which can't be defined in the terms we have 
> learned from manipulating public objects. No state of awareness is uniquely 
> one thing and not another. All phenomenology is multivalent and impacted by 
> intention and expectation.
>
>
> I can make sense on this.
>
>
>
>  
>
>>
>> If you want all the parts of your belief system to fit together the range 
>> of things you can believe in is severely limited. And finding ways all the 
>> parts of the universe fit together in a self consistent way is hard, very 
>> hard, so often the logical man must just say "I don't know I'm not 
>> certain", they religious man on the other hand is always certain but seldom 
>> correct.  
>>
>
> The logical man is a man whose religion is logic. Not that I'm opposed to 
> logic, it just can't penetrate to the cause of awareness. Logic is always 
> an a-posteriori analysis of a sensory-motor experience.
>
>
> I can agree with this. But no more if your replaced "logical" by Turing 
> universal. Machines and numbers are beyond logic. That is the unexpected 
> lesson of the 20th century math, and which makes comp consistent with 
> experiences.
>
>
I am happy to entertain the idea that Turing universal (hyperlogic? sense?) 
extends far beyond 'logic', even to a sublime degree, but what gives us a 
reason to see this plane of hyper-extension as the identical plane of 
subjective qualia? I don't see that Turing hyperlogic could or would evoke 
geometry, much less flavor, feelings, images, etc., and especially not 
realism. 

Instead, I see the extension of arithmetic truth as orthogonal to 
subjectivity - an invisible, intangible, web of infinitely narrow 
quantitative associations. Nested - sure, massively complex and 
multi-layered, veridical, predictive, bursting with proto-morphological 
wonders, definitely. What I don't see though is any aesthetic coherence. No 
room for experiential preference, embodiment, moral orientation, no 
presentation or presence of any kind. The mechanism of the Turing machine 
is arbitrarily conjured out of nothing - suddenly there is a phenomena 
which we know as 'read/write', and a local read/write head which interacts 
causally with this movable, controllable 'tape'. There is motion and 
control, continuity and memory, encoding schemas which bring arithmetic 
into local interaction somehow. The whole machine can be simulated on 
another machine only because the original machine includes this list of 
inherent capacities, which are to me, undoubtedly sensory-motor and 
pre-arithmetic.


>
>
>  
>
>>
>> >  there is a very special sense in which materialism has more 
>>> restrictions than spiritualism… The Christian is quite free to believe that 
>>> there is a considerable amount of settled order and inevitable development 
>>> in the universe, but the materialist is not allowed to admit into his 
>>> spotless machine the slightest speck of spiritualism or miracle.
>>>
>> The Christian is not allowed to admit the slightest speck of doubt that a 
>> invisible man in the sky sent His son, who was also Him, to be tortured to 
>> death by humans even though he loved His son, who is also Him, very much 
>> because otherwise he could not forgive humans even though He is omnipotent. 
>> Even though He is omnipotent torturing His son, who is really Him, for the 
>> crime of eating a apple is the only way He could forgive the torturers. The 
>> Christian is not allowed to admit the slightest speck of doubt that it 
>> makes sense that if I'm mad at you and then you torture my son to death I 
>> will no longer be mad at you.
>>
>
> No argument there. I only disagree with you on religion in the sense that 
> I don't think the fictions which have been created are arbitrary. They 
> reflect metaphorical illustrations about consciousness itself, and when 
> taken figuratively all myths can reveal important insights. It's only when 
> people take them literally that it causes problems, and as long as physics 
> refuses to take consciousness seriously, people wi

Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[Bruno Marchal]

On 19 Mar 2013, at 15:27, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:


On 19.03.2013 12:39 Bruno Marchal said the following:


On 19 Mar 2013, at 10:48, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:


On 18.03.2013 19:39 Bruno Marchal said the following:


...


1) show me a human as good as a quantum computer for finding a
needle in a haystack.


Could you show me a quantum computer that can do that? I guess that
it exist only in dreams of theoreticians (on in that part of
Platonia that the humankind cannot access).


That's an argument of the kind "only bird can fly". I was alluding to
a well now ability of QC. And to pretend that a brain/mind can do
quantum computing would endow a brain/mind with this abilities.

Grover L.K. Qunatum Mechanics helps in searching for a needle in an
haystack. Physical Review Letters, 78: 325-328, 1997a.
Quant-phys/9605043.

The fact that QC does not yet exist does not invalidate the
argument.



In my view, provided that there is no experimental proof, we remain  
in a realm of a metaphysical discussion. Is this what you mean by  
the argument?


I think that you are confusing theoretical and metaphysical.
I would avoid the term "experimental proof" as this does not make  
sense with the notion of proof most commonly referred in this list  
(valid theoretical deduction)


Also, there are plenty of experimental confirmations of quantum  
computations. What does not yet exist is a general purpose quantum  
computer, but the reason why are obvious: it *is* technically  
challenging. Yet, since the work on quantum error correction, no one  
doubt in the field that quantum computer will appear. May be in ten  
years, may be in 100 years. I have already assisted to quite  
impressive experience is quantum data encryption and recovery. The  
number 15 has already be factorized through a quantum algorithm  
(Shor), etc.


But again, that is beside the point I made. I was answering a post by  
Roger Clough which speculates about the fact that the human brain is a  
quantum computer. You should address your post to him, as this is  
rather speculative. Not only there are rather good argument why this  
is doubtful, but there are no evidence for this at all.


Bruno






Evgenii

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Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[Evgenii Rudnyi]

On 19.03.2013 12:39 Bruno Marchal said the following:


On 19 Mar 2013, at 10:48, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:


On 18.03.2013 19:39 Bruno Marchal said the following:


...


1) show me a human as good as a quantum computer for finding a
needle in a haystack.


Could you show me a quantum computer that can do that? I guess that
it exist only in dreams of theoreticians (on in that part of
Platonia that the humankind cannot access).


That's an argument of the kind "only bird can fly". I was alluding to
a well now ability of QC. And to pretend that a brain/mind can do
quantum computing would endow a brain/mind with this abilities.

Grover L.K. Qunatum Mechanics helps in searching for a needle in an
haystack. Physical Review Letters, 78: 325-328, 1997a.
Quant-phys/9605043.

The fact that QC does not yet exist does not invalidate the
argument.



In my view, provided that there is no experimental proof, we remain in a 
realm of a metaphysical discussion. Is this what you mean by the argument?


Evgenii

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Re: G.K. Chesterton on Materialism

[Tom Bayley]

On Monday, March 18, 2013 8:15:39 PM UTC, Craig Weinberg wrote:
>
>
>
> On Monday, March 18, 2013 11:33:17 AM UTC-4, John Clark wrote:
>>
>> G K Chesterton wrote:
>>
>> > For we must remember that the materialist philosophy (whether true or 
>>> not) is certainly much more limiting than any religion. 
>>>
>> That is absolutely true, there are more ways of being wrong than of being 
>> right, so if you don't care if your ideas are self consistent or not (for 
>> example if you don't care that X is not Y and X is not not Y) and if you 
>> don't care what words mean (for example if you don't care that if changing 
>> X always changes Y and changing Y always changes X that doesn't mean that X 
>> caused Y) then you have much more freedom over what you can believe than a 
>> logical man does. 
>>
>
> The man who thinks he is logical is often just stubborn. There are many 
> things related to consciousness which can't be defined in the terms we have 
> learned from manipulating public objects. No state of awareness is uniquely 
> one thing and not another. All phenomenology is multivalent and impacted by 
> intention and expectation.
>  
>
>>
>> If you want all the parts of your belief system to fit together the range 
>> of things you can believe in is severely limited. And finding ways all the 
>> parts of the universe fit together in a self consistent way is hard, very 
>> hard, so often the logical man must just say "I don't know I'm not 
>> certain", they religious man on the other hand is always certain but seldom 
>> correct.  
>>
>
> The logical man is a man whose religion is logic. Not that I'm opposed to 
> logic, it just can't penetrate to the cause of awareness. Logic is always 
> an a-posteriori analysis of a sensory-motor experience.
>  
>
>>
>> >  there is a very special sense in which materialism has more 
>>> restrictions than spiritualism… The Christian is quite free to believe that 
>>> there is a considerable amount of settled order and inevitable development 
>>> in the universe, but the materialist is not allowed to admit into his 
>>> spotless machine the slightest speck of spiritualism or miracle.
>>>
>> The Christian is not allowed to admit the slightest speck of doubt that a 
>> invisible man in the sky sent His son, who was also Him, to be tortured to 
>> death by humans even though he loved His son, who is also Him, very much 
>> because otherwise he could not forgive humans even though He is omnipotent. 
>> Even though He is omnipotent torturing His son, who is really Him, for the 
>> crime of eating a apple is the only way He could forgive the torturers. The 
>> Christian is not allowed to admit the slightest speck of doubt that it 
>> makes sense that if I'm mad at you and then you torture my son to death I 
>> will no longer be mad at you.
>>
>
> No argument there. I only disagree with you on religion in the sense that 
> I don't think the fictions which have been created are arbitrary. They 
> reflect metaphorical illustrations about consciousness itself, and when 
> taken figuratively all myths can reveal important insights. It's only when 
> people take them literally that it causes problems, and as long as physics 
> refuses to take consciousness seriously, people will continue to take 
> religion literally.
>

What do you think John 5:19 is trying to say about individual free will? It 
seems to me to be confirming what non-dual traditions also assert: That 
there is no independent self and thus no agent to exercise free will. They 
talk about the universal Self, the unicity of existence, which somehow 
manifests as our apparent, but illusory, individual selves. This universal 
Self is the only actual entity and it has no independent parts. 
Independence/multiplicity is merely a feature of the world of concepts, 
which is ultimately unreal (a product of the Fall?) Free will and 
determinism are both concepts - in actuality it all happens the way it 
happens, and God says it is good, etc...

 
>
>>  
>>>
>>> > The materialist is sure that history has been simply and solely a 
>>> chain of causation…"
>>>
>> I don't know when Chesterton wrote that but he lived until 1936 and by 
>> 1925 physicists, the ultimate materialists, did not believe that history or 
>> anything else was "simply and solely a chain of causation"; however it is 
>> unlikely that Chesterton ever knew this and like most self styled 
>> philosophers remained blissfully ignorant of all scientific and 
>> mathematical discoveries made during the last century or two.  
>>
>
> Are you referring here to the addition of randomness or probability to the 
> chain of causation? 
>
>
>> Incidentally I found some more ideas of Chesterton. In 1290 Edward 1 
>> expelled the Jews from England and Chesterton writes that Edward was a 
>> "just and conscientious monarch"  and acted correctly because the Jews were 
>> "as powerful as they are unpopular and the capitalists of their age" so 
>> when Edward "flung the alien fina

Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[Bruno Marchal]

On 19 Mar 2013, at 10:48, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:


On 18.03.2013 19:39 Bruno Marchal said the following:

Hi Roger,

On 18 Mar 2013, at 12:48, Roger Clough wrote:



Since mind is an MQS or Multiple Quantum Superposition, it can
process information at the rate of a quantum computer.



Since you seem to talk  philosophy, let me translate what you say for
our friends the scientists.

If we assume that mind is a Multiple Quantum Superposition, and if we
assume that mind can exploit those quantum superpositions to process
information, then the mind can process information at the rate of a
quantum computer.

That implication seems to me quite reasonable.

Test of the theory according to which a human mind is a Multiple
Quantum Superposition:


1) show me a human as good as a quantum computer for finding a needle
in a haystack.


Could you show me a quantum computer that can do that? I guess that  
it exist only in dreams of theoreticians (on in that part of  
Platonia that the humankind cannot access).


That's an argument of the kind "only bird can fly". I was alluding to  
a well now ability of QC. And to pretend that a brain/mind can do  
quantum computing would endow a brain/mind with this abilities.


Grover L.K. Qunatum Mechanics helps in searching for a needle in an  
haystack. Physical Review Letters, 78: 325-328, 1997a. Quant-phys/ 
9605043.


The fact that QC does not yet exist does not invalidate the argument.

Bruno





2) Factorize 13195212121


Rain Man?

Evgenii

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Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[Bruno Marchal]

On 19 Mar 2013, at 02:06, Russell Standish wrote:


On Mon, Mar 18, 2013 at 07:39:44PM +0100, Bruno Marchal wrote:

Hi Roger,

On 18 Mar 2013, at 12:48, Roger Clough wrote:



Since mind is an MQS or Multiple Quantum Superposition, it can
process information at the rate of a quantum computer.



Since you seem to talk  philosophy, let me translate what you say
for our friends the scientists.

If we assume that mind is a Multiple Quantum Superposition, and if
we assume that mind can exploit those quantum superpositions to
process information, then the mind can process information at the
rate of a quantum computer.

That implication seems to me quite reasonable.

Test of the theory according to which a human mind is a Multiple
Quantum Superposition:


1) show me a human as good as a quantum computer for finding a
needle in a haystack.

2) Factorize 13195212121




Demonstrating these sorts of exponential speedups only falsifies the
proposition that a human mind is an ordinary classical computer (but
not COMP).


OK.




It does not confirm in any way that a human mind operates
as a quantum computer, since random oracles are another way of
bridging computational complexity classes.


But random oracle does not give the ability of a QC.

Bruno






We only need one idiot-savant to demonstrate this.

By contrast, being unable to demonstrate this scaling means - well  
nothing

at all, actually.

--


Prof Russell Standish  Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)
Principal, High Performance Coders
Visiting Professor of Mathematics  hpco...@hpcoders.com.au
University of New South Wales  http://www.hpcoders.com.au


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Re: G.K. Chesterton on Materialism

[Bruno Marchal]

On 18 Mar 2013, at 21:15, Craig Weinberg wrote:




On Monday, March 18, 2013 11:33:17 AM UTC-4, John Clark wrote:
G K Chesterton wrote:

> For we must remember that the materialist philosophy (whether true  
or not) is certainly much more limiting than any religion.


That is absolutely true, there are more ways of being wrong than of  
being right, so if you don't care if your ideas are self consistent  
or not (for example if you don't care that X is not Y and X is not  
not Y) and if you don't care what words mean (for example if you  
don't care that if changing X always changes Y and changing Y always  
changes X that doesn't mean that X caused Y) then you have much more  
freedom over what you can believe than a logical man does.


The man who thinks he is logical is often just stubborn. There are  
many things related to consciousness which can't be defined in the  
terms we have learned from manipulating public objects. No state of  
awareness is uniquely one thing and not another. All phenomenology  
is multivalent and impacted by intention and expectation.


I can make sense on this.






If you want all the parts of your belief system to fit together the  
range of things you can believe in is severely limited. And finding  
ways all the parts of the universe fit together in a self consistent  
way is hard, very hard, so often the logical man must just say "I  
don't know I'm not certain", they religious man on the other hand is  
always certain but seldom correct.


The logical man is a man whose religion is logic. Not that I'm  
opposed to logic, it just can't penetrate to the cause of awareness.  
Logic is always an a-posteriori analysis of a sensory-motor  
experience.


I can agree with this. But no more if your replaced "logical" by  
Turing universal. Machines and numbers are beyond logic. That is the  
unexpected lesson of the 20th century math, and which makes comp  
consistent with experiences.








>  there is a very special sense in which materialism has more  
restrictions than spiritualism… The Christian is quite free to  
believe that there is a considerable amount of settled order and  
inevitable development in the universe, but the materialist is not  
allowed to admit into his spotless machine the slightest speck of  
spiritualism or miracle.


The Christian is not allowed to admit the slightest speck of doubt  
that a invisible man in the sky sent His son, who was also Him, to  
be tortured to death by humans even though he loved His son, who is  
also Him, very much because otherwise he could not forgive humans  
even though He is omnipotent. Even though He is omnipotent torturing  
His son, who is really Him, for the crime of eating a apple is the  
only way He could forgive the torturers. The Christian is not  
allowed to admit the slightest speck of doubt that it makes sense  
that if I'm mad at you and then you torture my son to death I will  
no longer be mad at you.


No argument there. I only disagree with you on religion in the sense  
that I don't think the fictions which have been created are  
arbitrary. They reflect metaphorical illustrations about  
consciousness itself, and when taken figuratively all myths can  
reveal important insights. It's only when people take them literally  
that it causes problems, and as long as physics refuses to take  
consciousness seriously, people will continue to take religion  
literally.



> The materialist is sure that history has been simply and solely a  
chain of causation…"


I don't know when Chesterton wrote that but he lived until 1936 and  
by 1925 physicists, the ultimate materialists, did not believe that  
history or anything else was "simply and solely a chain of  
causation"; however it is unlikely that Chesterton ever knew this  
and like most self styled philosophers remained blissfully ignorant  
of all scientific and mathematical discoveries made during the last  
century or two.


Are you referring here to the addition of randomness or probability  
to the chain of causation?



Incidentally I found some more ideas of Chesterton. In 1290 Edward 1  
expelled the Jews from England and Chesterton writes that Edward was  
a "just and conscientious monarch"  and acted correctly because the  
Jews were "as powerful as they are unpopular and the capitalists of  
their age" so when Edward "flung the alien financiers out of the  
land" he acted as "knight errant" and was the "tender father of his  
people".  Even in 1920 Chesterton thought there was still a "Jewish  
Problem in Europe". Hitler had his Beer Hall Putsch in 1923.


Even anti-Semites can have valid insights.


Correct. An example is Henry Ford. He was correct on health, oil and  
hemp, but close to the nazis about the Jews. Clark argument was of  
course invalid.






Craig


  John K Clark









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Re: Dartmouth neuroscientist finds free will has neural basis

[Bruno Marchal]

On 18 Mar 2013, at 21:02, John Mikes wrote:



friends:
don't put so much brain-grease into Free Will, please!
It is the religious mambo-jumbo put into the mind of the poor- 
believers in ancient times to make them responsible for deeds the  
powerful disliked - and consequently: make them punishable. Then it  
became a 'human treasure':
"We are FREE to Will!" (like a god) and now even smart, reasonable  
people like us spend centuries to discuss it.
A decision is right when it goes smoothly with the given and  
continuing circumstances it has to fit into (Think of the mis -  
construed 'evolution': if it does not 'fit' the mutant perishes).
We may (or may not) know about the given circumstances and for sure  
may have only desultory and unsafe notions about the 'coming' ones.  
Our evaluation (call it computing?)  results in a decision  
(conscious or not) for our activity - OR just way of thinking.  
Reasonably we try to abide by those circumstances we know of and  
formulate (consciously, or not) our decision according to our best  
belief (maybe this is contrary to our interest?). Hence emerges FREE  
WILL.
I am not faithful enough to believe in MY free will and go to hell  
by force of this misconception. I may make mistakes.
I am not deterministically forced to comply with all facets of the  
infinite complexity - known,  or unknown. I can revolt. Meaning: I  
can knowingly choose the wrong decision.

Is that free will? Maybe. That's a matter of definition.



It is a good definition, close to Standish "right to do something  
stupid", or the "christian's ability to do knowingly the bad". The  
point is that this can make sense in a dtermined reality, and that it  
has nothing to do with randomness.


Bruno





Regards
John Mikes


On Mon, Mar 18, 2013 at 12:25 PM, Bruno Marchal   
wrote:


On 15 Mar 2013, at 18:22, meekerdb wrote:


On 3/15/2013 7:16 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:
You're walking down a road and spot a fork in the road far ahead.  
You know of advantages and disadvantages to both paths so you  
arn't sure if you will go right or left, you haven't finished the  
calculation yet, you haven't decided yet. Once you get to the  
fork you find yourself on the left path and retroactively  
conclude that you must have "decided" to go left.


Yes. That's what I mean by free will. Roughly speaking. Except  
that I decided consciously before acting. If not, it is like  
randomness, or unconscious decision, and that is not free will.  
Free-will is when I want to go the left, and decide accordingly to  
go to the left, and nobody coerce me to not go to the left. It is  
not much different than will + freedom.


That seems to me just and explanation of a certain *feeling* of a  
feeling of freedom and of will.  If you find yourself on the left  
path without having consciously thought "I'll take the left." then  
you miss the feeling of will.  But it may just be that your  
conscious thoughts are lagging a little.


?
I agree but that makes free-will independent of the feeling. With my  
definition of free will, it is real,even if not felt, as the machine  
have the real possibility to hesitate between subgoals and make  
choice hesitantly, knowing partially the consequences.




When you're playing a game, say tennis, and you hit the ball to the  
left you may have done so without conscious consideration yet it  
was just the right shot and so was what you "willed" to win which  
you realize on reflection.


OK. Although I think that free-will is more typical for decision  
taking more time, and more self-controversial, like the decision to  
drink some beer before driving a plane with passengers ...





You have a feeling of freedom so long as you are not coerced or  
limited by something you can consciously consider; that's  
essentially all the feeling of freedom is, not being able to think  
of anything that is restricting or coercing you from taking an   
action.  Since you can't be directly aware of deterministic or  
random processes in your brain, whether they are random or  
deterministic has no bearing on the freedom+will feeling.


I agree. But I think that free-will is more than a feeling. It is a  
real possibility of reflected choice. Indeed it has nothing to so  
with determinacy or randomness.


Bruno




Brent

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Re: Mind is a quantum computer

[Evgenii Rudnyi]

On 18.03.2013 19:39 Bruno Marchal said the following:

Hi Roger,

On 18 Mar 2013, at 12:48, Roger Clough wrote:



Since mind is an MQS or Multiple Quantum Superposition, it can
process information at the rate of a quantum computer.



Since you seem to talk  philosophy, let me translate what you say for
 our friends the scientists.

If we assume that mind is a Multiple Quantum Superposition, and if we
 assume that mind can exploit those quantum superpositions to process
 information, then the mind can process information at the rate of a
 quantum computer.

That implication seems to me quite reasonable.

Test of the theory according to which a human mind is a Multiple
Quantum Superposition:


1) show me a human as good as a quantum computer for finding a needle
in a haystack.


Could you show me a quantum computer that can do that? I guess that it 
exist only in dreams of theoreticians (on in that part of Platonia that 
the humankind cannot access).



2) Factorize 13195212121


Rain Man?

Evgenii

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Re: Losing Control

[Evgenii Rudnyi]

On 19.03.2013 02:05 Stathis Papaioannou said the following:

On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 11:39 AM, Craig Weinberg
 wrote:


If you say that free will is compatible with determinism then you
are an compatibilist, otherwise you are an incompatibilist. Why
do you try to make the discussion difficult by refusing to agree
on terminology?



Because the terminology is ideologically loaded and makes the
truth impossible to address, obviously. It's like you are demanding
that I agree that electricity is either the work of God or the
Devil.


We need to agree on terminology if we're going to have a discussion
at all. Have aliens visited the Earth? We need to agree that an
"alien" is a being born on another planet. It doesn't mean we agree
on the facts, but we need to at least speak the same language!


Recently I have listened to a nice talk about the search of 
extraterrestrial intelligence


http://embryogenesisexplained.com/2013/03/the-starivore-hypothesis.html

The author has mentioned two fallacies (slides 6 and 7)

Artificiality-of-the-gaps

and

Naturality-of-the-gaps

Yet, I was unable to understand his difference between artificial and 
natural. This is another example when there is a long discussion without 
an agreement on the terminology.


Evgenii

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Re: Dartmouth neuroscientist finds free will has neural basis

[Evgenii Rudnyi]

On 18.03.2013 21:02 John Mikes said the following:

friends: don't put so much brain-grease into Free Will, please! It is
the religious mambo-jumbo put into the mind of the poor-believers in
ancient times to make them responsible for deeds the powerful
disliked - and consequently: make them punishable.


I believe that it is more complicated. I am currently under influence of 
Sartre's I and the Other


"Hell is other people."

In order to live in this world, I have to communicate with others and 
then, I guess, there is no way as to take them seriously.


What would be your solution to this relationship in your agnosticism?

Evgenii

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Think of the brain as one airport among many, the mind(s) as national air traffic.

[Roger Clough]

Think of the brain as one airport among many, the mind(s) as national air 
traffic.



Dr. Roger Clough NIST (ret.) 3/19/2013 
"Coincidences are God's way of remaining anonymous."
- Albert Einstein

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