Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 19 Jan 2012, at 18:03, John Clark wrote:
On Wed, Jan 18, 2012 at 2:30 PM, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be
wrote:
And are non computable real numbers fundamental?
If they can not be derived from anything else, and they can not be,
then they must be fundamental.
If they exist, or need to exist. But the useful one can be derived in
the tool-kit of the self-observing digital machine.
None occur in any theory.
Well they occurred in Turing's 1936 paper and many after it, or at
least the concept of them did, no specific non-computable number was
mentioned because none can be specified.
OK. But in that sense real number are just (total) functions from N to
{0, 1}, or N to N. Turing just shows that in some superplatonia, most
arithmetical functions are not computable.
There is a canonical bijection between real numbers, subsets of N,
functions from N to {0, 1}.
I do not assume the existence of all those objects, in the TOE, mainly
for reason of simplicity, and trying to assume the less possible. But
I have no problem if you want to assume them. I recover them in the
epistemology of natural numbers, but it does not change to ass them
(except making all proofs more complex).
If you want, I am agnostic about real numbers.
As Ludwig Wittgenstein said what cannot be spoken about must be
passed over in silence.
Which is one sentence too much about what we cannot speak about. And
now we have two like that. No, there are four!
In physics and math all real constant seems to be gentle and
computable (albeit often transcendent) like PI, e, gamma, etc.
I admit I'm just speculating here and might be dead wrong but maybe
the fact that physics can not exactly specify the position and
velocity of every particle and the fact that mathematics can not
specify every real number are related.
I don't think it is related. Even if space is discrete, you would
still have an uncertainty relation. Qubits are digital, but obeys to
similar uncertainty Fourier relation.
With comp, analysis and physics belongs to the natural numbers
epistemology.
Yes but if a theory of everything is really about everything then
that is insufficient.
Well Gods and angels belong also to the numbers epistemology (that's
why I think it is better named theology).
Don't panic: by gods I mean Löbian entities which are not machine.
Some particular non computable real number, or function from N to N,
with a notion of self-reference.
Am I still missing something?
Jacques Arsac is a french catholic who wrote a book against
mechanism. He is not solipsist, and he doubts mechanism. One example
is enough.
That is not a example that is a name. I have never doubted that
individuals, especially religious individuals, can be illogical and
simultaneously hold diametrically opposite views.
So you believe that non-comp is irrational?
But all theories are assumption.
And comp makes precisely impossible for any rational consistent
machine to ever know that comp is true. Frankly you talk a bit like
Craig here, I mean like if you knew the truth of your hypothesis.
We certainly don't know that comp is true.
Frankly why would a non mechanist be solipsist?
Although it can not be proven to be false no sane person can be a
solipsist, except perhaps in a philosophy classroom when they are
trying to sound provocative.
That is one reason more for saying that a non mechanist does not need
to be solipsist. You don't answer the question.
A better question would be why would anyone think it controversial
to say things happen for a reason or they do not?
That's a classical tautology. Personnaly I believe them about number,
but I am not sure it applies genuinely to set or functions. Now here
the word things and reason might be too vague to ascertain the use
of the excluded middel principle, but again, I would say that I tend
to agree.
But this does not explains why a non mechanist has to be solipsist.
Unless you really believe that mechanism is true and proved, so that a
non mechanist can only be a totally inconsistent. I don't think so. As
scientist we have to say that we don't know, and study the
consequences of our hypotheses. You might try to get a contradiction
from non-comp. Good luck.
Bruno
http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/
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Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 17 Jan 2012, at 19:47, John Clark wrote: On Tue, Jan 17, 2012 Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: You don't need to assume them. They already exists at the natural numbers' epistemological level. Then in addition to the natural numbers the non computable numbers are fundamental too. But not primitive. And are non computable real numbers fundamental? None occur in any theory. Only Omega and Post occurs in computability theory, and are not really constant but depend on the choice of a universal number. In physics and math all real constant seems to be gentle and computable (albeit often transcendent) like PI, e, gamma, etc. Just rememeber that when I use the term number, I mean a natural number. I have remembered and that's why I have a problem. Are you aware that then natural numbers + addition + multiplication + a bit of logic is already Turing universal? I can use LISP programs if you prefer, or lambda expression, with abstraction and reduction. I use natural numbers becomes laymen meets them more often than LISP programs, or lambda abstraction. Together with the laws of addition and multiplication, they are. The rest is numbers dreams (themselves recovered by number relations, definable with addition and multiplication No they are not. Turing proved in 1936 that you can NOT come arbitrarily close to most real numbers using only the natural numbers and addition and multiplication That's correct, but we don't need them at the ontological level. An idea like all real numbers belongs to the imagination of some relative natural numbers (see as a machine relatively to some universal numbers). You *can* assume them, but you don't have to assume them: it will change nothing in the laws of physics. In fact the real numbers come already from physical observation, and is better to avoid reifying them to avoid treachery, and to simplify the machines interview. This comes from the fact that elementary arithmetic (on integers) is Turing universal. But integers are very rare. From the epistemology of natural numbers, you are correct. It is cleaner to put that kind of object in the epistemology. In the theory of everything on which all self-introspecting universal machine converge: there is only numbers (or combinators, lambda expression, etc.). You need to postulate the trigonometrical function to recover the natural numbers from the real. And neither trigonometrical functions nor any other deterministic thing will help you get arbitrarily close to most real numbers, in fact such is the nature of infinite sets that if you picked a point at random on the real number line there is a 100% chance it will be non computable and a 0% chance it will be a natural number. Real numbers does not need to be real, once you assume the comp hypothesis. The term random is notoriously hard to define. With comp, analysis and physics belongs to the natural numbers epistemology. There is no axiom of infinity in arithmetic. Someone doubting mechanism is not necessarily solipsist. Why not? Jacques Arsac is a french catholic who wrote a book against mechanism. He is not solipsist, and he doubts mechanism. One example is enough. Frankly why would a non mechanist be solipsist? How would you prove that statement? In which theory? very competent people can begin to believe that their are intelligent, and that's leads to stupidity. It seems to me that both modesty and conceit leads to stupidity, if you're intelligent and you believe you are intelligent then your belief is true. I will model rational believability of the ideally (arithmetically) correct machine by its provability predicate. The belief verifies that 1) elementary arithmetical axioms are believed, and 2) the beliefs are close for the modus ponens rule (i.e. if the machine believes A and believes A - B, then the machine believes or will believe B). Such machines are consistent, but if they believe that, they become inconsistent. We have many true solutions x to Bx - ~x. Some truth, when becoming axiom or theorem, leads to inconsistency. Computationalism is itself such a true but non provable proposition, even as axiom. Bruno John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options,
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Mon, Jan 16, 2012 at 4:56 AM, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: But in computability theory we have only natural numbers. A real number like PI or e is modeled by a total computable function from N to N. Yes, but real numbers like PI or e are very much the exception, they are rare, quite literally infinitely rare oddball real numbers, because nearly all the numbers on the number line are not computable so there is no way for a Turing Machine, or anything else, to come arbitrarily close to one like you can for PI or e. By number I always mean natural number. Then numbers can not be the only thing that is fundamental. By mechanism I mean the idea that the brain (or whatever needed for consciousness) is Turing emulable. OK. Then mechanism has not been proven and will never be proven it is just assumed, and the ground that assumption is built on is exactly as strong or as weak as the assumption that you are not the only conscious being in the universe. we live in a non deterministic reality. That has been known for nearly a century. Non determinism is a simple consequence of mechanism Determinism or non-determinism has nothing to do with consciousness, its irrelevant. Universal machine can always been optimized by change of software only, and one way to do that is allowing the machine to believe in non provable propositions. Yes that makes sense but I don't see what it has to do with consciousness, that's true for any axiomatic system including Euclid's geometry. And there is a danger, the reason the proposition is non-provable may have nothing to do with Godel, it may simply be plain ordinary false. If it's false you'd better hope it's non-provable in your logical system. BTW I tend to use competence for what you call intelligence. Intelligence requires consciousness If what you call competence and Intelligence can both produce the same behavior then you might as well say that Intelligence and consciousness are synonyms because they are both equally unobservable and untestable. In common usage intelligence is simply what intelligent behavior implies, and redefining familial words in unfamiliar ways is not the path to clarity or enlightenment. Competence needs some amount of intelligence, but it has a negative feedback on intelligence. I don't know what that means. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 17 Jan 2012, at 17:26, John Clark wrote: On Mon, Jan 16, 2012 at 4:56 AM, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: But in computability theory we have only natural numbers. A real number like PI or e is modeled by a total computable function from N to N. Yes, but real numbers like PI or e are very much the exception, they are rare, quite literally infinitely rare oddball real numbers, because nearly all the numbers on the number line are not computable so there is no way for a Turing Machine, or anything else, to come arbitrarily close to one like you can for PI or e. You don't need to assume them. They already exists at the natural numbers' epistemological level. But you can assume them if you want. Just rememeber that when I use the term number, I mean a natural number. By number I always mean natural number. Then numbers can not be the only thing that is fundamental. Together with the laws of addition and multiplication, they are. The rest is numbers dreams (themselves recovered by number relations, definable with addition and multiplication, like I explained briefly in a recent post to David). This comes from the fact that elementary arithmetic (on integers) is Turing universal. Elementary (first order logical) analysis is NOT Turing universal. Real numbers are, computationally, to much simple. You need to postulate the trigonometrical function to recover the natural numbers from the real. With the natural numbers, you recover all constructive reals with only degree four polynomes (by a famous result by Matiyasevitch). Fermat formula is trivial on the reals, but it took 300 hundred years to handle the case for the natural numbers. Arithmetical truth is not axiomatisable. *all* effective theories miss infinitely many truth about them. By mechanism I mean the idea that the brain (or whatever needed for consciousness) is Turing emulable. OK. Then mechanism has not been proven and will never be proven it is just assumed, Exact. It can even be justified by mechanism, that mechanism cannot be proved (even taken as axiom). It is a necessary meta principle. It is even a theological assumption. A belief in a form of reincarnation, obeying to theological laws already intuited by the Platonists and the neo-platonist. Now, *all* theories are assumption. I am a theoretician. I don't want to argue for truth or falsity. Mechanism is just my working assumption. and the ground that assumption is built on is exactly as strong or as weak as the assumption that you are not the only conscious being in the universe. It is not that stronger. Someone doubting mechanism is not necessarily solipsist. we live in a non deterministic reality. That has been known for nearly a century. We don't know that. We infer it from QM-without collapse, itself inferred from observation. Now, I deduce it from simple mechanism. It is always a success when we prove something, especially something contentious, in a simpler theory. Non determinism is a simple consequence of mechanism Determinism or non-determinism has nothing to do with consciousness, its irrelevant. You have to study my sane04 paper, or my explanation to Elliot Temple in the FOR list, or my recurring explanations, on this list. The first person indeterminacy is based on the fact that mechanism supposes that there is a level of substitution of my parts such that my consciousness remains invariant (it is much weaker than most version of comp in the literature). Then indeterminacy is explained by self- duplication, as seen by conscious (first) person. You have just to distinguish carefully first and third person points of view notions. Universal machine can always been optimized by change of software only, and one way to do that is allowing the machine to believe in non provable propositions. Yes that makes sense but I don't see what it has to do with consciousness, that's true for any axiomatic system including Euclid's geometry. And there is a danger, the reason the proposition is non-provable may have nothing to do with Godel, it may simply be plain ordinary false. If it's false you'd better hope it's non- provable in your logical system. Right. And consciousness will be a result of integrating a non conscious bet in such a self-consistency (the idea that we don't prove false sentence). This is equivalent with a bet in the existence of a reality. (By Gödel's completeness theorem). BTW I tend to use competence for what you call intelligence. Intelligence requires consciousness If what you call competence and Intelligence can both produce the same behavior then you might as well say that Intelligence and consciousness are synonyms because they are both equally unobservable and untestable. In common usage intelligence is simply what intelligent behavior implies, and redefining familial words in
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Tue, Jan 17, 2012 Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: You don't need to assume them. They already exists at the natural numbers' epistemological level. Then in addition to the natural numbers the non computable numbers are fundamental too. Just rememeber that when I use the term number, I mean a natural number. I have remembered and that's why I have a problem. Together with the laws of addition and multiplication, they are. The rest is numbers dreams (themselves recovered by number relations, definable with addition and multiplication No they are not. Turing proved in 1936 that you can NOT come arbitrarily close to most real numbers using only the natural numbers and addition and multiplication This comes from the fact that elementary arithmetic (on integers) is Turing universal. But integers are very rare. You need to postulate the trigonometrical function to recover the natural numbers from the real. And neither trigonometrical functions nor any other deterministic thing will help you get arbitrarily close to most real numbers, in fact such is the nature of infinite sets that if you picked a point at random on the real number line there is a 100% chance it will be non computable and a 0% chance it will be a natural number. Someone doubting mechanism is not necessarily solipsist. Why not? very competent people can begin to believe that their are intelligent, and that's leads to stupidity. It seems to me that both modesty and conceit leads to stupidity, if you're intelligent and you believe you are intelligent then your belief is true. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 14 Jan 2012, at 19:00, John Clark wrote: On Sat, Jan 14, 2012 Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: OK, but today we avoid the expression computable number. Why? Seems to me that quite a large number of people still use the term. A computable number is a real number that can be computed to any finite amount of digits by a Turing Machine, however most irrational numbers, nearly all in fact, are NOT computable . So the sort of numbers computers or the human mind deals in can not be the only thing that is fundamental because most numbers can not be derived from them. All natural number are computable Yes, but very few numbers are natural numbers. But in computability theory we have only natural numbers. A real number like PI or e is modeled by a total computable function from N to N. It makes things simpler. there is no real theory of computability for the real numbers. There are no equivalent to the Church Turing thesis for them. And with comp we don't need any ontological numbers other than the natural numbers. The whole of analysis and physics is eventually made espistemological (number's ideas). With mechanism it is absolutely indifferent which fundamental finite object we admit. If by mechanism you mean determinism then your remarks are irrelevant because we don't live in a deterministic universe, and even the natural numbers are not finite. No. By mechanism I mean the idea that the brain (or whatever needed for consciousness) is Turing emulable. This shows immediately (UDA1-3) that we live in a non deterministic reality. Non determinism is a simple consequence of mechanism, which arise from self-duplication. There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence. I disagree. Consciousness has a darwinian role in the very origin of the physical realm. If Evolution can't see something then it can't select for it, and it can't see consciousness in others any better than we can, just like us all it can see is behavior. I am talking on the Evolution of the physical laws. You have to follow the whole UDA to understand the special and crucial role of consciousness. Physical reality arise from the communicable first plural part of the consciousness flux existing in elementary arithmetic as a whole. I know this is not obvious at all. That's why it is a non trivial discovery. It makes physics a branch of mathematical computer science (alias number theory). By number I always mean natural number. like relative universal self-speedin I don't know what that means. It means making your faculty of decision, with respect to your most probable environment, more quick. In other words thinking fast. The fastest signals in the human brain move at a about 100 meters per second and many are far slower, the fastest signals in a computer move at 300,000,000 meters per second. That's why consciousness plays a key role. Any slow universal machine can be arbitrarily speed up, on almost all its inputs, by change of software. This is Blum speed-up theorem. Universal machine can always been optimized by change of software only, and one way to do that is allowing the machine to believe in non provable propositions. That's why biological evolution selected conscious machine. They know much more than what they can communicate, and eventually get puzzled by such knowledge. BTW I tend to use competence for what you call intelligence. Intelligence requires consciousness in my approach and definitions. Competence needs some amount of intelligence, but it has a negative feedback on intelligence. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 15 Jan 2012, at 09:13, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: What about the Turing test for a person in that state to check if he still has consciousness? As I said in another post, the very idea of the Turing test consists in avoiding completely the notion of consciousness. I do disagree with Turing on this. We can build a theory of consciousness, including, like with comp, a theory having refutable consequences. Turing was still influenced by Vienna-like positivism. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 15 Jan 2012, at 18:14, John Clark wrote: On Sat, Jan 14, 2012 at 1:56 PM, Stephen P. King stephe...@charter.net wrote: How would you generalize the Turing Test for consciousness? By doing the exact same thing we do when we evaluate our fellow human beings, assume that there is a direct link between intelligent behavior and consciousness. I agree with this. But we cannot test directly consciousness and intelligence. We can measure and evaluate competence, but it is domain dependent, and unrelated to intelligence and consciousness. Local zombie *can* exist. Any intelligent or conscious behavior can be ascribed to something not conscious, for a short period of time. When one of our fellow creatures is drowsy they don't behave very intelligently and we assume they are less conscious than they were when they where taking a calculus exam. And when they are in a deep sleep, under anesthesia, or dead they behave even less intelligently and we assume (even though there is no proof) that their consciousness is similarly effected. With comp we can show that consciousness is never effected, but the relative manifestation of consciousness can be effected. Again, this is counter-intuitive. The brain seems gifted in making us believe in unconsciousness, but that is an illusion bring by dissociative subroutine, or even chemicals. It is weird, and I doubt it to be true, but with comp, consciousness is an inescapable prison. You can hope only for relative amnesia. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 14.01.2012 19:56 Stephen P. King said the following: On 1/14/2012 1:15 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 14.01.2012 18:12 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 13, 2012 meekerdbmeeke...@verizon.net wrote: There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence.\ That's not so clear since we don't know exactly what is the relation of consciousness to intelligence. For a social animal having an internal model of ones self and being able to model the thought processes of others has obvious reproductive advantage. To do any one of the things you suggest would require intelligence, and indeed there is some evidence that in general social animals tend to have a larger brain than similar species that are not social. But at any rate we both seem to agree that Evolution can only see behavior, so consciousness must be a byproduct of some sort of complex behavior. Thus the Turing Test must be valid not only for intelligence but for consciousness too. How would you generalize the Turing Test for consciousness? Evgenii John K Clark Hi, Perhaps we can generalize the Turing test by insisting on questions that would require for their answer computational resources in excess of that would be available to a computer + power suply in a small room. Think of the Berkenstein bound http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bekenstein_bound But the Turing Test is a bit of an oxymoron because it is impossible to prove the existence of something that is solely 1p. There is no 3p of consciousness. I recall Leibniz' discussion http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/leibniz-mind/ of this... Onward! Stephen There are experiments that demonstrate that a monkey has conscious experience, see for example a short description http://blog.rudnyi.ru/2011/08/monkey-have-conscious-visual-perception.html Hence, how would you generalize the Turing test to check if a monkey has consciousness? It well might be that between mind and consciousness there is no 1 to 1 relationship. For example let us take people with Alzheimer's disease in the advanced phase (from Wikipedia) During this last stage of AD, the person is completely dependent upon caregivers.[25] Language is reduced to simple phrases or even single words, eventually leading to complete loss of speech.[25][29] Despite the loss of verbal language abilities, people can often understand and return emotional signals.[25] Although aggressiveness can still be present, extreme apathy and exhaustion are much more common results.[25] People with AD will ultimately not be able to perform even the simplest tasks without assistance.[25] Muscle mass and mobility deteriorate to the point where they are bedridden, and they lose the ability to feed themselves.[25] AD is a terminal illness, with the cause of death typically being an external factor, such as infection of pressure ulcers or pneumonia, not the disease itself.[25] What about the Turing test for a person in that state to check if he still has consciousness? Evgenii -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 14 January 2012 18:56, Stephen P. King stephe...@charter.net wrote: But the Turing Test is a bit of an oxymoron because it is impossible to prove the existence of something that is solely 1p. There is no 3p of consciousness. I agree, and in a sense this implies the futility of all attempts to argue from 3p to 1p. But there may be other ways to get there. For example, I've always tended towards the view that Bruno often calls a universal mind (cf. Schopenhauer, Schrödinger, Hoyle, Dyson, et.al.). Think of this as a universal 1p. The argument from this point of departure begins in such uniquely present conscious instances, whose internal logic implies the possibility of other, mutually exclusive, such instances. As a first approximation, this internal logic might imply that the present instance is a selection from a uniquely personal serialisation of such instances (i.e. the RSSA). However the same logic is consistent with all possible such instances, the implied personal serialisation now playing a secondary role to some transcendental, impersonal selection (i.e. the ASSA). This insight offers an escape route from solipsism. Can one apply a view like this to the problem in hand? 3p is the label applied to our theoretical proxies for the regularities of 1p phenomena. These regularities are so compelling that for most purposes we treat them perfectly naturally as realities independent of the 1p context in which they manifest. We situate them in an ever more general explanatory framework, in terms of which we hope to trap even the 1p localisation to which all such explanation is ultimately referred. But frustratingly, attempts to achieve this by the direct 3p route seem always to rely in the end on some sort of unsatisfactory bait-and-switch. Nonetheless we cannot deny that there are subsets of the 3p schema which correlate strongly with the implied serialisation of 1p moments: those subsets we accept as our local physical embodiments. Consequently, it seems reasonable to postulate the tightest of inter-relations, short of identity, between these two domains, at least locally. Returning to the original point of departure with the inference of a tight local correlation between some appropriate 3p physical embodiment and the presently selected 1p instance, it might seem a reasonable experiment to reverse the logic. If we could but identify the relevant species of 3p embodiment - given the anti-solipsism argument derivable from a strictly 1p point of departure - we could reasonably infer its correlation with an instance of consciousness mutually exclusive of the present one, entangled with its own coherent personal serialisation (or more baldly, another person). But how to identify the relevant species? Ordinarily, we do not hesitate to ascribe this status to other human embodiments, because it seems reasonable to suppose that if our own 3p constitution is of the relevant species, so is theirs. But as we have no widely-accepted definitive account of what this entails specifically, we must rely essentially on the behavioural manifestations of intelligence. Accordingly, we have little option but to ascribe the definitively conscious 1p-3p correlation to any embodiment that displays sufficiently intelligent behaviour, by some agreed criterion such as the TT. The critical exception to the foregoing is that we would clearly wish to withdraw this ascription where there is demonstrable evidence of fraud or pretence. Hence the vanishing point for controversy may well be FAPP when the pretence of intelligence has become practically indistinguishable, by any available criterion, from its actuality. David On 1/14/2012 1:15 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 14.01.2012 18:12 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 13, 2012 meekerdbmeeke...@verizon.net wrote: There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence.\ That's not so clear since we don't know exactly what is the relation of consciousness to intelligence. For a social animal having an internal model of ones self and being able to model the thought processes of others has obvious reproductive advantage. To do any one of the things you suggest would require intelligence, and indeed there is some evidence that in general social animals tend to have a larger brain than similar species that are not social. But at any rate we both seem to agree that Evolution can only see behavior, so consciousness must be a byproduct of some sort of complex behavior. Thus the Turing Test must be valid not only for intelligence but for consciousness too. How would you generalize the Turing Test for consciousness? Evgenii John K Clark Hi, Perhaps we can generalize the Turing test by insisting on questions that would require for their answer computational resources in excess of that would be
Re: An analogy for Qualia
Hi David, On 1/15/2012 9:47 AM, David Nyman wrote: On 14 January 2012 18:56, Stephen P. Kingstephe...@charter.net wrote: But the Turing Test is a bit of an oxymoron because it is impossible to prove the existence of something that is solely 1p. There is no 3p of consciousness. I agree, and in a sense this implies the futility of all attempts to argue from 3p to 1p. But there may be other ways to get there. For example, I've always tended towards the view that Bruno often calls a universal mind (cf. Schopenhauer, Schrödinger, Hoyle, Dyson, et.al.). Think of this as a universal 1p. The argument from this point of departure begins in such uniquely present conscious instances, whose internal logic implies the possibility of other, mutually exclusive, such instances. As a first approximation, this internal logic might imply that the present instance is a selection from a uniquely personal serialisation of such instances (i.e. the RSSA). However the same logic is consistent with all possible such instances, the implied personal serialisation now playing a secondary role to some transcendental, impersonal selection (i.e. the ASSA). This insight offers an escape route from solipsism. I like your thinking here but need to point out a few things. It seems to me, and this is purely a conjecture of mine, that the 1p's are limited to being representable by Boolean algebras (or equivalently (?) lists of questions with yes or no answers). I think of this in terms of all facts that can be determined by measurements from a point of view tied to a place in space-time (using the idea that space-time is a container), a center of the universe if you will. (This idea comes from the work of Prof. Hitoshi Kitada http://arxiv.org/find/gr-qc/1/au:+Kitada_H/0/1/0/all/0/1.) How can a large number of these be woven together into a consistent narrative? My first attempt was to think of 3p as the intersection of many 1p but this does not work out so well as there are concurrency issues to be dealt with... I have found that they might be able to be uniquely woven together if the strict determinism of classical physics where to hold for all 1p at all places and epochs (as it sets up separable and unique systems of trajectories - worldtubes - for objects), but this is not the case as we see from the evidence of QM. The structure of the logic of QM systems (orthocomplete lattices) does not allow for unique decomposition into an ordered set of Boolean algebras therefore one cannot use QM to construct a universal mind that is isomorphic to ours. The escape from this would be to consider finite collections of Boolean algebras representing a plurality of 1p's having a common world, a consensus reality of sorts, and consider how to map such back into the Orthocomplete lattice of the QM system that encompasses all of our common world. Our gods that view all of Reality from on high can and should be relegated to the category of useful but ultimately incorrect explanations. If my conjecture is correct then it does not allow for an escape from solipsism, but I do not think that that is such a bad deal as I see solipsism as the natural implication that flows from the privacy of the 1p. OTOH, our ability to reason coherently (given enough effort as it is not a passive activity) allows us to jump past the isolation and even alienation of the 1p to justifiably believe in the reality of other minds. I like the way that Bruno addresses this with the Bpp and betting that p is true ideas. Can one apply a view like this to the problem in hand? 3p is the label applied to our theoretical proxies for the regularities of 1p phenomena. These regularities are so compelling that for most purposes we treat them perfectly naturally as realities independent of the 1p context in which they manifest. Yes, this is why, IMHO, people like Stephen Hawking think of physics as the mind of god. I do see the attractiveness of this idea but have discovered that there are many reasons why it is incoherent. For one thing there are theorems in network theory that show that arbitrarily large networks cannot have a single global synchronization (unless the speed of light is infinite and exact bisimulation between the nodes is possible). What we actually seem to have in our physical world is a speed of light that is finite but behaves locally as if it where infinite as it defines the maximal lengths between events.. but I digress. My questions here go back to this idea of realities independent of the 1p context in which they manifest. This independence seems to be the same kind of independence that I am wrestling with in my debate with Bruno. Is it truly independence in the sense of separability, in the sense that a coherent notion of Reality can exist completely isolated from the 1p's? I don't see how! But this takes me back to the tar pit of solipsism... Why not use solipsism constructively?
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Sat, Jan 14, 2012 at 1:56 PM, Stephen P. King stephe...@charter.netwrote: How would you generalize the Turing Test for consciousness? By doing the exact same thing we do when we evaluate our fellow human beings, assume that there is a direct link between intelligent behavior and consciousness. When one of our fellow creatures is drowsy they don't behave very intelligently and we assume they are less conscious than they were when they where taking a calculus exam. And when they are in a deep sleep, under anesthesia, or dead they behave even less intelligently and we assume (even though there is no proof) that their consciousness is similarly effected. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 15 January 2012 16:36, Stephen P. King stephe...@charter.net wrote: My questions here go back to this idea of realities independent of the 1p context in which they manifest. This independence seems to be the same kind of independence that I am wrestling with in my debate with Bruno. Is it truly independence in the sense of separability, in the sense that a coherent notion of Reality can exist completely isolated from the 1p's? I don't see how! But this takes me back to the tar pit of solipsism... Why not use solipsism constructively? This is what Andrew Soltau is attempting to do... Yes, I appreciate Andrew's thinking and gave have corresponded with him. I think the view I have outlined - albeit (as befits my limited technical abilities) in very general terms - does correspond to a species of universal solipsism (which I think is more or less equivalent FAPP to Andrew's multi-solipsism) in terms of which one can see that the selection of other, mutually-exclusive moments with entirely orthogonal personal entanglements is inevitable, whilst at the same time being able to intuit (just about!) that their content is, by that very token, constitutively inaccessible from here (like the old Irish joke). What I called the escape from solipsism is then the justified belief in the equivalence of other points of view, or to put it another way, the selective attention of a universal mind. Please forgive me for not commenting in any detail on the more technical parts of your response - which I nonetheless deeply appreciate - simply because at this point I am unable to critique them in any very sensible way. However, in general terms I’m intrigued, as well as frustrated, by the difficulties we all seem to encounter in sharing our intuitions about consciousness and its relation to whatever may be “external” to it. There is a venerable theory that as infants we do not make the distinction between self and other. This is usually interpreted as meaning that the infant lives in a solipsistic world of self, unable as yet to conceptualise “another”; the transition out of infancy correspondingly occurring when that distinction eventually dawns. But perhaps this is to get it backwards: the belief in externality is so critical to survival that it surely must be very deeply embedded. Hence it seems at least as likely that the infant lives in terms of pure “externality”, unable as yet to conceptualise an “internalised” self. At some point (quite early), the developing infant starts to correlate parts of externality with its own sensations, which, being primary and direct, do not in themselves require further elaboration. By this means, it progressively associates its sensations with a growing sense of embodiment, and the absence of them with “not-me”. The lack of such direct, personal correlation with otherwise similar embodiments implies the existence of “others who are not me”, and these various distinctions progressively become reinforced by a web of consistent mutual reference. It should be noted that at no point in this discussion is any “internalised” conception of self necessarily implied. Rather, there seems in the first place to be a direct, primary correlation of immediately intuited sensation with externally-projected forms; these forms secondarily developing stable associations with a rich variety of self/non-self distinctions. Does this imply that there could be natural variation in the extent to which, if at all, particular individuals will eventually conceptualise their own “selves” as some internal milleu independent of the unreflective correlation of sensation-externality? Julian Jaynes of course discussed a similar question in “The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind” (which, as a biographical aside, I once, in desperation, resorted to in a game of charades!). His own view was that there is substantial evidence to imply that human adults in earlier times may have lacked such an internal “self conception”, but that this earlier form of organisation had subsequently become disadvantageous, leaving perhaps only feeble traces in modern schizoid states. But perhaps the truth is more nuanced. Perhaps there is a more-or-less hard-wired spectrum of “first-person awareness”, whose variation is correlated with marked differences in susceptibility to the MB problem, even after prolonged, unprotected exposure to philosophical intercourse. David Hi David, On 1/15/2012 9:47 AM, David Nyman wrote: On 14 January 2012 18:56, Stephen P. King stephe...@charter.net wrote: But the Turing Test is a bit of an oxymoron because it is impossible to prove the existence of something that is solely 1p. There is no 3p of consciousness. I agree, and in a sense this implies the futility of all attempts to argue from 3p to 1p. But there may be other ways to get there. For example, I've always tended towards the view that Bruno often calls a universal mind (cf.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 15 January 2012 17:14, John Clark johnkcl...@gmail.com wrote: How would you generalize the Turing Test for consciousness? By doing the exact same thing we do when we evaluate our fellow human beings, assume that there is a direct link between intelligent behavior and consciousness. I agree. I reached the same conclusion, but starting from purely first-person assumptions. The distinction becomes otiose FAPP when we are completely convinced by the evidence of intelligent behaviour and the absence of evidence of pretence or fraudulence. But inevitably this means that, like all other evidential procedures, it is forever open to revision. At any point new evidence - say of highly ingenious, but context-limited, simulation - might contradict our former judgement. However, this puts us in no greater difficulties than we are already. For example, if someone is sleepwalking but still interacts more or less intelligently, as I once actually witnessed, is that person conscious of the interaction? (he said he wasn't). Or more poignantly, I am reminded of a victim of catastrophic short-term memory loss who, when shown a video of himself, at first denied it was him (after all, he couldn't remember) and subsequently said well, if it was me, I couldn't have been conscious. David On Sat, Jan 14, 2012 at 1:56 PM, Stephen P. King stephe...@charter.net wrote: How would you generalize the Turing Test for consciousness? By doing the exact same thing we do when we evaluate our fellow human beings, assume that there is a direct link between intelligent behavior and consciousness. When one of our fellow creatures is drowsy they don't behave very intelligently and we assume they are less conscious than they were when they where taking a calculus exam. And when they are in a deep sleep, under anesthesia, or dead they behave even less intelligently and we assume (even though there is no proof) that their consciousness is similarly effected. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Fri, Jan 13, 2012 at 4:39 PM, Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.comwrote: If consciousness has a survival value [...] Then consciousness must change behavior and the Turing Test works for consciousness as well as intelligence . then surely omniscience, teleportation, or the ability to turn into a diamond on command would have an even greater survival value. Yes, and if random mutation and natural selection could have produced any of those things (except perhaps for the diamond thing, the survival value is not obvious) in the 3 billion years available we would indeed have those abilities but apparently they were too hard to produce. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Jan 15, 1:51 pm, John Clark johnkcl...@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Jan 13, 2012 at 4:39 PM, Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.comwrote: If consciousness has a survival value [...] Then consciousness must change behavior and the Turing Test works for consciousness as well as intelligence . Consciousness can change behavior but it might not have to. Like a possum can play dead. But a dead possum can't play live. Think of consciousness as the yellow traffic light. When the light is green or red, the outcome is deterministic. You stop and wait or go forward. Whether the light happens to be green or red is random relative to the driver's interaction, but deterministic relative to the traffic signaling grid. The yellow light is different. It addresses the driver directly to be alert and use your judgment. You decide whether to slow down or not. Whether you do slow down or not is random relative to the traffic signal but signifying and participatory to the driver. then surely omniscience, teleportation, or the ability to turn into a diamond on command would have an even greater survival value. Yes, and if random mutation and natural selection could have produced any of those things (except perhaps for the diamond thing, the survival value is not obvious) If you could turn into a diamond and back on command, you would be pretty much predator-proof. My point though is that all of these things - teleportation, diamond impersonation, etc are no less unlikely than consciousness. Much more likely really, since they are only variations on reality, not an entirely unprecedented ontology that somehow enters reality. There is no way that mutation could produce that unless those things were already possible to produce. It's like saying a musical instrument suddenly begins producing a color instead of a sound. It's just magical thinking dressed up as 'evolution'. Life has no reason to evolve from non-life. Minerals can't suddenly need to 'survive' - whatever that would mean to minerals. in the 3 billion years available we would indeed have those abilities but apparently they were too hard to produce. It's begging the question. How can mutation produce consciousness if consciousness was not already a potential? Your answer is that it must have since consciousness exists and evolution is responsible for all properties of life. But my whole point is that awareness is inherent, and only the content and quality of it evolves. If a creature has a beak, then evolution can give it's children a longer beak, but it can't give it a magic beak that creates other worlds in midair. Craig -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 14.01.2012 03:06 meekerdb said the following: On 1/13/2012 2:50 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 13.01.2012 22:36 meekerdb said the following: On 1/13/2012 12:54 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: ... By the way in the Gray's book the term intelligence is not even in the index. This was the biggest surprise for me because I always thought that consciousness and intelligence are related. Yet, after reading the book, I agree now with the author that conscious experience is a separate phenomenon. So does Gray think that beings can be conscious without being intelligent or intelligent without being conscious? The first part is definite yes, for example But we can, I believe, safely assume that mammals possess conscious experience. There is no clear answer for the second part in the book. Well, for example Language, for example, cannot be necessary for conscious experience. The reverse, however, may be true: it may be that language (and other functions) could not be evolved in the absence of conscious experience. It depends however on the definition, I would say that a self-driving car is intelligent and a rock not, but even in this case it is not completely clear to me how to define it unambiguously. Gray's personal position is that consciousness survival values is late error detection that happens through some multipurpose and multi-functional display. This fits actually quite good in cybernetics but leaves a question open about the nature of such a display. Evgenii -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 13 Jan 2012, at 17:30, John Clark wrote: On Thu, Jan 12, 2012 Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: I am not entirely sure what you mean by computable numbers (I guess you mean function). A computable number is a number that can be approximated by a computable function, and a computable function is a function that can be evaluated with a mechanical device given unlimited time and storage space. Turing's famous 1936 paper where among other things he introduced the idea of what we now call a Turing Machine was called: On Computable Numbers, with an Application to the Entscheidungsproblem. Turing showed that a very few real numbers, like the integers and the rational numbers, have formulas to calculate their value as closely as you'd like, but for the vast majority of numbers there is no way to do this. There are a few more numbers like PI that are computable with algorithms like PI= (4/1)-(4/3)+(4/5)- (4/7)+(4/9) , but for most numbers there is nothing like that and no way to approximate their value. In fact he showed that almost all the numbers on the real number line are non-computable. There are LITERALLY infinitely more non-computable numbers than there are computable numbers; Turing proved that these numbers exist but ironically, despite their ubiquitous nature, neither Turing nor anybody else can unambiguously point to a single one of these numbers because there is no way to derive such a number from the numbers that we can point to, the computable numbers. So numbers, at least the numbers we or computers can use, cannot be the only fundamental thing, non-computable numbers must be too. My point was that if there are 2 general classes of fundamental things that can not be simplified then there might be more. I think the intelligence-consciousness link is a third fundamental thing, but unlike Turing I can not prove it. And there may be fundamental things that we can never prove are fundamental, truth and proof are not the same thing. OK, but today we avoid the expression computable number. All natural number are computable, and we use the term computable function, and we represent computable real number by computable function from N to N. With mechanism it is absolutely indifferent which fundamental finite object we admit. I use numbers, but combinatoirs or java programs would be equivalent with that regard. So many things can be judged fundamental, but once we chose the basically ontology, the other things becomes derived notions. We can even ascribe it [consciousness] a role (explaining its Darwinian advantage) There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence. I disagree. Consciousness has a darwinian role in the very origin of the physical realm. This is not obvious, and counter-intuitive, so I don't expect you to grasp this before getting familiar with the UD consequences. like relative universal self-speeding. I don't know what that means. It means making your faculty of decision, with respect to your most probable environment, more quick. I suggest that the quantum nature of the observable reality might reflect the discovery that we are in that 'digital matrix'. I don't know if that's true or not, but I do know that if I get too close to even the most beautiful and detailed picture on my computer screen I start to see individual pixels; and sometimes late at night I speculate that somebody made a programing mistake and tried to divide by zero at the singularity in the center of a Black Hole. I think that here you miss the UDA point. That is entirely possible because I am unable to follow what you call your dovetailing argument; I really don't think you have stated it as clearly as you could. I have stated in 100 step version, 15-step version, 6 step version, but since many years I stick on the 8-step version for it is the one which people understand the more easily. It is in the sane04 paper, and you can ask any question. The seven first step are rather easy and most people understand it without problem. It already show the reversal. If you want I can re-explain it step by step. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/14/2012 12:08 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 14.01.2012 03:06 meekerdb said the following: On 1/13/2012 2:50 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 13.01.2012 22:36 meekerdb said the following: On 1/13/2012 12:54 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: ... By the way in the Gray's book the term intelligence is not even in the index. This was the biggest surprise for me because I always thought that consciousness and intelligence are related. Yet, after reading the book, I agree now with the author that conscious experience is a separate phenomenon. So does Gray think that beings can be conscious without being intelligent or intelligent without being conscious? The first part is definite yes, for example But we can, I believe, safely assume that mammals possess conscious experience. But mammals are quite intelligent? More intelligent than self-driving cars for example. So then I'm left to wonder what Gray means by intelligent; except you say he doesn't even use the term. There is no clear answer for the second part in the book. Well, for example Language, for example, cannot be necessary for conscious experience. It's not necessary for awareness and perception, but I think it is necessary for some kinds of ratiocination. The reverse, however, may be true: it may be that language (and other functions) could not be evolved in the absence of conscious experience. It depends however on the definition, I would say that a self-driving car is intelligent and a rock not, but even in this case it is not completely clear to me how to define it unambiguously. Gray's personal position is that consciousness survival values is late error detection that happens through some multipurpose and multi-functional display. This fits actually quite good in cybernetics but leaves a question open about the nature of such a display. But it leaves our imaginative planning. Brent Evgenii -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Fri, Jan 13, 2012 meekerdb meeke...@verizon.net wrote: There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence.\ That's not so clear since we don't know exactly what is the relation of consciousness to intelligence. For a social animal having an internal model of ones self and being able to model the thought processes of others has obvious reproductive advantage. To do any one of the things you suggest would require intelligence, and indeed there is some evidence that in general social animals tend to have a larger brain than similar species that are not social. But at any rate we both seem to agree that Evolution can only see behavior, so consciousness must be a byproduct of some sort of complex behavior. Thus the Turing Test must be valid not only for intelligence but for consciousness too. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Sat, Jan 14, 2012 Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: OK, but today we avoid the expression computable number. Why? Seems to me that quite a large number of people still use the term. A computable number is a real number that can be computed to any finite amount of digits by a Turing Machine, however most irrational numbers, nearly all in fact, are NOT computable . So the sort of numbers computers or the human mind deals in can not be the only thing that is fundamental because most numbers can not be derived from them. All natural number are computable Yes, but very few numbers are natural numbers. With mechanism it is absolutely indifferent which fundamental finite object we admit. If by mechanism you mean determinism then your remarks are irrelevant because we don't live in a deterministic universe, and even the natural numbers are not finite. There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence. I disagree. Consciousness has a darwinian role in the very origin of the physical realm. If Evolution can't see something then it can't select for it, and it can't see consciousness in others any better than we can, just like us all it can see is behavior. like relative universal self-speedin I don't know what that means. It means making your faculty of decision, with respect to your most probable environment, more quick. In other words thinking fast. The fastest signals in the human brain move at a about 100 meters per second and many are far slower, the fastest signals in a computer move at 300,000,000 meters per second. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 14.01.2012 17:56 meekerdb said the following: On 1/14/2012 12:08 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 14.01.2012 03:06 meekerdb said the following: On 1/13/2012 2:50 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 13.01.2012 22:36 meekerdb said the following: On 1/13/2012 12:54 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: ... By the way in the Gray's book the term intelligence is not even in the index. This was the biggest surprise for me because I always thought that consciousness and intelligence are related. Yet, after reading the book, I agree now with the author that conscious experience is a separate phenomenon. So does Gray think that beings can be conscious without being intelligent or intelligent without being conscious? The first part is definite yes, for example But we can, I believe, safely assume that mammals possess conscious experience. But mammals are quite intelligent? More intelligent than self-driving cars for example. So then I'm left to wonder what Gray means by intelligent; except you say he doesn't even use the term. I agree that mammals are more intelligent than self-driving cars. Gray though does not discuss the term intelligent, so I do not know his opinion to this end. There is no clear answer for the second part in the book. Well, for example Language, for example, cannot be necessary for conscious experience. It's not necessary for awareness and perception, but I think it is necessary for some kinds of ratiocination. Yes, but it might be that ratiocination is not necessary for conscious experience. Evgenii The reverse, however, may be true: it may be that language (and other functions) could not be evolved in the absence of conscious experience. It depends however on the definition, I would say that a self-driving car is intelligent and a rock not, but even in this case it is not completely clear to me how to define it unambiguously. Gray's personal position is that consciousness survival values is late error detection that happens through some multipurpose and multi-functional display. This fits actually quite good in cybernetics but leaves a question open about the nature of such a display. But it leaves our imaginative planning. Brent Evgenii -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 14.01.2012 18:12 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 13, 2012 meekerdbmeeke...@verizon.net wrote: There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence.\ That's not so clear since we don't know exactly what is the relation of consciousness to intelligence. For a social animal having an internal model of ones self and being able to model the thought processes of others has obvious reproductive advantage. To do any one of the things you suggest would require intelligence, and indeed there is some evidence that in general social animals tend to have a larger brain than similar species that are not social. But at any rate we both seem to agree that Evolution can only see behavior, so consciousness must be a byproduct of some sort of complex behavior. Thus the Turing Test must be valid not only for intelligence but for consciousness too. How would you generalize the Turing Test for consciousness? Evgenii John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/14/2012 1:15 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 14.01.2012 18:12 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 13, 2012 meekerdbmeeke...@verizon.net wrote: There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence.\ That's not so clear since we don't know exactly what is the relation of consciousness to intelligence. For a social animal having an internal model of ones self and being able to model the thought processes of others has obvious reproductive advantage. To do any one of the things you suggest would require intelligence, and indeed there is some evidence that in general social animals tend to have a larger brain than similar species that are not social. But at any rate we both seem to agree that Evolution can only see behavior, so consciousness must be a byproduct of some sort of complex behavior. Thus the Turing Test must be valid not only for intelligence but for consciousness too. How would you generalize the Turing Test for consciousness? Evgenii John K Clark Hi, Perhaps we can generalize the Turing test by insisting on questions that would require for their answer computational resources in excess of that would be available to a computer + power suply in a small room. Think of the Berkenstein bound http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bekenstein_bound But the Turing Test is a bit of an oxymoron because it is impossible to prove the existence of something that is solely 1p. There is no 3p of consciousness. I recall Leibniz' discussion http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/leibniz-mind/ of this... Onward! Stephen -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/13/2012 8:30 AM, John Clark wrote: We can even ascribe it [consciousness] a role (explaining its Darwinian advantage) There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence. That's not so clear since we don't know exactly what is the relation of consciousness to intelligence. For a social animal having an internal model of ones self and being able to model the thought processes of others has obvious reproductive advantage. Brent O would some power the giftie gie us to see ourselves as others see us. --- Robert Burns -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 13.01.2012 19:20 meekerdb said the following: On 1/13/2012 8:30 AM, John Clark wrote: We can even ascribe it [consciousness] a role (explaining its Darwinian advantage) There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence. That's not so clear since we don't know exactly what is the relation of consciousness to intelligence. For a social animal having an internal model of ones self and being able to model the thought processes of others has obvious reproductive advantage. Brent O would some power the giftie gie us to see ourselves as others see us. --- Robert Burns In my favorite book on consciousness (by Jeffrey Gray) there is chapter 7 A survival value for consciousness that is summarized on p. 90: Whatever consciousness is, it is too important to be a mere accidental by-product of other biological forces. A strong reason to suppose that conscious experience has survival value in this. It is only by appealing to evolutionary selection pressures that we can explain the good fit that exists between our perception of the world and our actions in dealing with it, or between my perceptions and yours. Biological characteristics that are not under strong selection pressure show random drift which would be expected to destroy the fit. I assume, therefore, that consciousness has a survival value on its own right. That rules out epiphenomenalism, but leaves us with a problem of identifying the casual effect of consciousness in its own right. By the way in the Gray's book the term intelligence is not even in the index. This was the biggest surprise for me because I always thought that consciousness and intelligence are related. Yet, after reading the book, I agree now with the author that conscious experience is a separate phenomenon. Well, if to speak about evolution in general, then another quote from the book has stroked me: For the good fit between conscious experience and outside reality, the idealist philosopher Berkley called in God. In this more materialist age, it is Evolution that we must thank. Evgenii -- http://blog.rudnyi.ru -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Jan 13, 3:54 pm, Evgenii Rudnyi use...@rudnyi.ru wrote: On 13.01.2012 19:20 meekerdb said the following: On 1/13/2012 8:30 AM, John Clark wrote: We can even ascribe it [consciousness] a role (explaining its Darwinian advantage) There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence. That's not so clear since we don't know exactly what is the relation of consciousness to intelligence. For a social animal having an internal model of ones self and being able to model the thought processes of others has obvious reproductive advantage. Brent O would some power the giftie gie us to see ourselves as others see us. --- Robert Burns In my favorite book on consciousness (by Jeffrey Gray) there is chapter 7 A survival value for consciousness that is summarized on p. 90: Whatever consciousness is, it is too important to be a mere accidental by-product of other biological forces. A strong reason to suppose that conscious experience has survival value in this. It is only by appealing to evolutionary selection pressures that we can explain the good fit that exists between our perception of the world and our actions in dealing with it, or between my perceptions and yours. Biological characteristics that are not under strong selection pressure show random drift which would be expected to destroy the fit. I assume, therefore, that consciousness has a survival value on its own right. That rules out epiphenomenalism, but leaves us with a problem of identifying the casual effect of consciousness in its own right. By the way in the Gray's book the term intelligence is not even in the index. This was the biggest surprise for me because I always thought that consciousness and intelligence are related. Yet, after reading the book, I agree now with the author that conscious experience is a separate phenomenon. Well, if to speak about evolution in general, then another quote from the book has stroked me: For the good fit between conscious experience and outside reality, the idealist philosopher Berkley called in God. In this more materialist age, it is Evolution that we must thank. Evgenii --http://blog.rudnyi.ru He assumes that consciousness is a simulation from the start though. If you do that, then it seems meaningful that the simulation fits so closely with reality, whereas if you understand that sense is what reality is made of, then it's not a surprise. If consciousness has a survival value, then surely omniscience, teleportation, or the ability to turn into a diamond on command would have an even greater survival value. What he admits is the problem of identifying the casual (?) effect of consciousness in it's own right is not a problem, but a symptom of failing to see that causality supervenes upon sense and not the other way around. Cause and an effect are a kind of sense, arising from subjective memory, pattern recognition, and world realism. Craig -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 13.01.2012 22:39 Craig Weinberg said the following: On Jan 13, 3:54 pm, Evgenii Rudnyiuse...@rudnyi.ru wrote: On 13.01.2012 19:20 meekerdb said the following: On 1/13/2012 8:30 AM, John Clark wrote: We can even ascribe it [consciousness] a role (explaining its Darwinian advantage) There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence. That's not so clear since we don't know exactly what is the relation of consciousness to intelligence. For a social animal having an internal model of ones self and being able to model the thought processes of others has obvious reproductive advantage. Brent O would some power the giftie gie us to see ourselves as others see us. --- Robert Burns In my favorite book on consciousness (by Jeffrey Gray) there is chapter 7 A survival value for consciousness that is summarized on p. 90: Whatever consciousness is, it is too important to be a mere accidental by-product of other biological forces. A strong reason to suppose that conscious experience has survival value in this. It is only by appealing to evolutionary selection pressures that we can explain the good fit that exists between our perception of the world and our actions in dealing with it, or between my perceptions and yours. Biological characteristics that are not under strong selection pressure show random drift which would be expected to destroy the fit. I assume, therefore, that consciousness has a survival value on its own right. That rules out epiphenomenalism, but leaves us with a problem of identifying the casual effect of consciousness in its own right. By the way in the Gray's book the term intelligence is not even in the index. This was the biggest surprise for me because I always thought that consciousness and intelligence are related. Yet, after reading the book, I agree now with the author that conscious experience is a separate phenomenon. Well, if to speak about evolution in general, then another quote from the book has stroked me: For the good fit between conscious experience and outside reality, the idealist philosopher Berkley called in God. In this more materialist age, it is Evolution that we must thank. Evgenii --http://blog.rudnyi.ru He assumes that consciousness is a simulation from the start though. Yes, he assumes that conscious experience is created by the brain, so you may call this simulation. Well, experiments shows that it takes about a quoter of a second to make conscious experience formed, so it seems to be reasonable. If you do that, then it seems meaningful that the simulation fits so closely with reality, whereas if you understand that sense is what reality is made of, then it's not a surprise. If consciousness has a survival value, then surely omniscience, teleportation, or the ability to turn into a diamond on command would have an even greater survival value. What he admits is the problem of identifying the casual (?) effect of consciousness in it's own right is not a problem, but a symptom of failing to see that causality supervenes upon sense and not the other way around. Cause and an effect are a kind of sense, arising from subjective memory, pattern recognition, and world realism. If you mean that senses exist independently of conscious experience of a person, then you are probably close to panpsychism. Such a possibility is discussed in the book as well: p. 321. “Alternatively, no such new arrangement of the existing laws of physics and chemistry will turn out to be possible. The fundamental laws of physics themselves will need supplementation. It is difficult to see how new fundamental laws could come into play only during biological evolution, or they would not be fundamental. So it is probably inevitable that any theory which seeks to account for consciousness in terms of fundamental physical processes will involve ‘panpsychism’. That is to say, it will be a theory in which the elements of conscious experience are to be found pretty well in everything, animate or inanimate, large or small. To most people this prospect will seem even less palatable that that of consciousness in computers or brain slices. But the state of our ignorance in this daunting field is so profound that we should rule out nothing a priori on the grounds absurdity alone. Bear in mind the absurdity of quantum mechanics!” Evgenii Craig -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 13.01.2012 22:36 meekerdb said the following: On 1/13/2012 12:54 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 13.01.2012 19:20 meekerdb said the following: On 1/13/2012 8:30 AM, John Clark wrote: We can even ascribe it [consciousness] a role (explaining its Darwinian advantage) There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence. That's not so clear since we don't know exactly what is the relation of consciousness to intelligence. For a social animal having an internal model of ones self and being able to model the thought processes of others has obvious reproductive advantage. Brent O would some power the giftie gie us to see ourselves as others see us. --- Robert Burns In my favorite book on consciousness (by Jeffrey Gray) there is chapter 7 A survival value for consciousness that is summarized on p. 90: Whatever consciousness is, it is too important to be a mere accidental by-product of other biological forces. A strong reason to suppose that conscious experience has survival value in this. It is only by appealing to evolutionary selection pressures that we can explain the good fit that exists between our perception of the world and our actions in dealing with it, or between my perceptions and yours. Biological characteristics that are not under strong selection pressure show random drift which would be expected to destroy the fit. I think he may go wrong there. If you like Julian Jaynes' theory of the origin of consciousness: a kind internalized perception of speech that evolved because of co-opting brain structures used for hearing and language processing. Then, because it is sharing the same processing for inner narrative and for social exchange the two can't drift apart. I would say that before speech there was music. And without conscious experience music is not possible. How sound waves form music without consciousness? Hence Julian Jaynes' theory does not impress me. I assume, therefore, that consciousness has a survival value on its own right. Intelligence, the modeling of oneself and ones relations to others has survival value and this is tied through language to internal narratives. I think there could be intelligence which did this modeling in someway not shared with external perception and while it would be conscious in the sense of having an internal model of itself and its relations, it's consciousness might be different from ours. We can imagine this in part by considering changes to our own consciousness. If you're like me, more of your thinking is in words and images than in talking pictures. But suppose there were implanted in your brain an internet connection. Of course we developed the internet so it has a lot of written language and pictures; but suppose for some reason the internet connection in your brain only transmitted youtube.videos. So when you thought of Obama, instead of the word Obama or a picture of him springing to mind, a video of him would spring to mind. This would be a qualitative change in your consciousness. The main question here is how unconscious process in the brain produce conscious experience. Say, there is some problem and it is necessary to make choices. A person who has no idea what to do goes to sleep and in the morning he has a conscious experience of a very good solution that has been prepared unconsciously during the sleep. Then a question is how to make a border between conscious and unconscious. Or you believe that the both phenomena are the same? Evgenii Brent That rules out epiphenomenalism, but leaves us with a problem of identifying the casual effect of consciousness in its own right. By the way in the Gray's book the term intelligence is not even in the index. This was the biggest surprise for me because I always thought that consciousness and intelligence are related. Yet, after reading the book, I agree now with the author that conscious experience is a separate phenomenon. Well, if to speak about evolution in general, then another quote from the book has stroked me: For the good fit between conscious experience and outside reality, the idealist philosopher Berkley called in God. In this more materialist age, it is Evolution that we must thank. Evgenii -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/13/2012 2:50 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 13.01.2012 22:36 meekerdb said the following: On 1/13/2012 12:54 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 13.01.2012 19:20 meekerdb said the following: On 1/13/2012 8:30 AM, John Clark wrote: We can even ascribe it [consciousness] a role (explaining its Darwinian advantage) There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence. That's not so clear since we don't know exactly what is the relation of consciousness to intelligence. For a social animal having an internal model of ones self and being able to model the thought processes of others has obvious reproductive advantage. Brent O would some power the giftie gie us to see ourselves as others see us. --- Robert Burns In my favorite book on consciousness (by Jeffrey Gray) there is chapter 7 A survival value for consciousness that is summarized on p. 90: Whatever consciousness is, it is too important to be a mere accidental by-product of other biological forces. A strong reason to suppose that conscious experience has survival value in this. It is only by appealing to evolutionary selection pressures that we can explain the good fit that exists between our perception of the world and our actions in dealing with it, or between my perceptions and yours. Biological characteristics that are not under strong selection pressure show random drift which would be expected to destroy the fit. I think he may go wrong there. If you like Julian Jaynes' theory of the origin of consciousness: a kind internalized perception of speech that evolved because of co-opting brain structures used for hearing and language processing. Then, because it is sharing the same processing for inner narrative and for social exchange the two can't drift apart. I would say that before speech there was music. And without conscious experience music is not possible. How sound waves form music without consciousness? Hence Julian Jaynes' theory does not impress me. I assume, therefore, that consciousness has a survival value on its own right. Intelligence, the modeling of oneself and ones relations to others has survival value and this is tied through language to internal narratives. I think there could be intelligence which did this modeling in someway not shared with external perception and while it would be conscious in the sense of having an internal model of itself and its relations, it's consciousness might be different from ours. We can imagine this in part by considering changes to our own consciousness. If you're like me, more of your thinking is in words and images than in talking pictures. But suppose there were implanted in your brain an internet connection. Of course we developed the internet so it has a lot of written language and pictures; but suppose for some reason the internet connection in your brain only transmitted youtube.videos. So when you thought of Obama, instead of the word Obama or a picture of him springing to mind, a video of him would spring to mind. This would be a qualitative change in your consciousness. The main question here is how unconscious process in the brain produce conscious experience. That's an unhelpful way of formulating the question since the processes in the brain constitute conscious experience. That various parts of the processes are not themselves conscious is implicit in the idea of explanation. If the parts were conscious, then we'd just have moved the question to how subparts of those produced consciousness. Say, there is some problem and it is necessary to make choices. A person who has no idea what to do goes to sleep and in the morning he has a conscious experience of a very good solution that has been prepared unconsciously during the sleep. Then a question is how to make a border between conscious and unconscious. Or you believe that the both phenomena are the same? No, I don't believe they are the same. Evgenii Brent That rules out epiphenomenalism, but leaves us with a problem of identifying the casual effect of consciousness in its own right. By the way in the Gray's book the term intelligence is not even in the index. This was the biggest surprise for me because I always thought that consciousness and intelligence are related. Yet, after reading the book, I agree now with the author that conscious experience is a separate phenomenon. So does Gray think that beings can be conscious without being intelligent or intelligent without being conscious? Brent Well, if to speak about evolution in general, then another quote from the book has stroked me: For the good fit between conscious experience and outside reality, the idealist philosopher Berkley called in God. In this more materialist age, it is Evolution that we must thank. Evgenii -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Jan 13, 5:35 pm, Evgenii Rudnyi use...@rudnyi.ru wrote: On 13.01.2012 22:39 Craig Weinberg said the following: On Jan 13, 3:54 pm, Evgenii Rudnyiuse...@rudnyi.ru wrote: On 13.01.2012 19:20 meekerdb said the following: On 1/13/2012 8:30 AM, John Clark wrote: We can even ascribe it [consciousness] a role (explaining its Darwinian advantage) There is no way consciousness can have a direct Darwinian advantage so it must be a byproduct of something that does have that virtue, and the obvious candidate is intelligence. That's not so clear since we don't know exactly what is the relation of consciousness to intelligence. For a social animal having an internal model of ones self and being able to model the thought processes of others has obvious reproductive advantage. Brent O would some power the giftie gie us to see ourselves as others see us. --- Robert Burns In my favorite book on consciousness (by Jeffrey Gray) there is chapter 7 A survival value for consciousness that is summarized on p. 90: Whatever consciousness is, it is too important to be a mere accidental by-product of other biological forces. A strong reason to suppose that conscious experience has survival value in this. It is only by appealing to evolutionary selection pressures that we can explain the good fit that exists between our perception of the world and our actions in dealing with it, or between my perceptions and yours. Biological characteristics that are not under strong selection pressure show random drift which would be expected to destroy the fit. I assume, therefore, that consciousness has a survival value on its own right. That rules out epiphenomenalism, but leaves us with a problem of identifying the casual effect of consciousness in its own right. By the way in the Gray's book the term intelligence is not even in the index. This was the biggest surprise for me because I always thought that consciousness and intelligence are related. Yet, after reading the book, I agree now with the author that conscious experience is a separate phenomenon. Well, if to speak about evolution in general, then another quote from the book has stroked me: For the good fit between conscious experience and outside reality, the idealist philosopher Berkley called in God. In this more materialist age, it is Evolution that we must thank. Evgenii --http://blog.rudnyi.ru He assumes that consciousness is a simulation from the start though. Yes, he assumes that conscious experience is created by the brain, so you may call this simulation. Well, experiments shows that it takes about a quoter of a second to make conscious experience formed, so it seems to be reasonable. If you do that, then it seems meaningful that the simulation fits so closely with reality, whereas if you understand that sense is what reality is made of, then it's not a surprise. If consciousness has a survival value, then surely omniscience, teleportation, or the ability to turn into a diamond on command would have an even greater survival value. What he admits is the problem of identifying the casual (?) effect of consciousness in it's own right is not a problem, but a symptom of failing to see that causality supervenes upon sense and not the other way around. Cause and an effect are a kind of sense, arising from subjective memory, pattern recognition, and world realism. If you mean that senses exist independently of conscious experience of a person, then you are probably close to panpsychism. Such a possibility is discussed in the book as well: Yes, close. Panpsychism is a little fanciful. It could imply that rocks have human like awareness. I'm talking more about a continuum of sense which scales qualitatively, so that something like a human psyche would be as far from the sensorimotive content of minerals as a human brain is from a rock. What I suggest is a primitive private quality along the lines of participation in a contagious sense of holding and releasing - the experience associated with electromagnetic charge. p. 321. Alternatively, no such new arrangement of the existing laws of physics and chemistry will turn out to be possible. The fundamental laws of physics themselves will need supplementation. It is difficult to see how new fundamental laws could come into play only during biological evolution, or they would not be fundamental. So it is probably inevitable that any theory which seeks to account for consciousness in terms of fundamental physical processes will involve panpsychism . That is to say, it will be a theory in which the elements of conscious experience are to be found pretty well in everything, animate or inanimate, large or small. To most people this prospect will seem even less palatable that that of consciousness in computers or brain slices. But the state of our ignorance in this daunting field is so profound
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Thu, Jan 12, 2012 Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.com wrote: That's the default occidental view. You've said something like that before and I get the distinct impression that you think occidental people should be ashamed of themselves. I don't. if it was just genetics, and genetics were just digital, then identical twins would be truly identical, just like a digital file. Identical twins grew up in a different environment, both inside and outside the womb, and they have different memories too. Obviously it's a digital code. Obviously only because that's what our understanding is. Obviously if you don't understand something then its not obvious. If the ribosome could turn CAU into histadine by itself then it wouldn't need the ribosome. Nothing turns CAU into histidine, rather the 3 bases CAU in the messenger RNA means in the digital language of genetics add a histidine amino acid to the protein sequence. And yes, the mRNA just gives the order and its up to a ribosome to actually carry out the command, but the ribosome would not exist without digital instructions on how to make a ribosome in the first place, and digital instructions on how to make a transfer RNA molecule, and digital instructions on how to make aminocyl-tRNA synthetase; and all these digital instructions came from mRNA, and the digital instructions how to make mRNA came from DNA. The digital instructions to make DNA came from more DNA witch can duplicate itself without ribosomes or transfer RNA. And all of these instructions are digital. You are still talking about the code itself - I'm talking about the execution of the code - the synthesis of protein. For heavens sake, I went into quite a lot of detail about how the code is executed so that protein gets made, and it could not be more clear that the cell factory contains digital machines. They are not information. According to you nothing is information and that is one reason it is becoming increasingly difficult to take anything you say seriously. CAU does not equal histadine just as the stop light does not equal rush hour traffic. A word is not the thing, CAU is a word in the RNA language, a word that means add the amino acid histidine to the protein sequence just as CAT in the DNA language means add CAU to the RNA sequence ; and everything is digital. You generally don't lose an entire analog document because of a single error. If the document was a computer program then that single error could very well turn a valuable thing into garbage, and a gene is a computer program the tells cell machinery how to make a particular protein. Just one small change in one small gene is the difference between a healthy person and sombody who has the devastating disease of Sickle Cell Anemia, the only difference between the healthy gene and the sick one in the 17'th position in the 438 sequences of bases, the codon GAG is changed to GTG and this means that in beta chain of hemoglobin one of its 146 amino acids will be wrong, the amino acid glutamic acid is used instead of valine. So the protein folds up into the wrong shape and does not work properly. Digital is good for copying, but so what? So what? Without good genes you'd be good and dead and you can't get genes from your parents unless genes could make copies of themselves, very very very good copies. Tertiary protein structure is not digital. BULLSHIT! If the chemistry is different, it might not fold the right way. If we had some cream we could have strawberries and cream, if we had some strawberries. the conditions of temperature have a tangible, determining effect As you yourself said mRNA won't do anything in a dead cell, at the temperature an pH conditions suitable for life, the same linear digital sequence of amino acids ALWAYS FOLD UP IN EXACTLY THE SAME WAY. So no matter how complex the shape is the information on how to make that shape HAD to be in the linear sequence of amino acids, and that is digital. But the shape causes the sequence to have different functions. Yes. If the natural mutation of the sequence changes the shape so it doesn't fold in the usual way, the analog properties of the protein are changed. Yes, If you change the digital sequence of amino acids then you change the complex 3D shape of the protein, and if you change the shape you change the way the protein functions. You just said 'happenstance is the very opposite of intelligence and even emotion'. Yes. What I am saying is that you are correct in saying that. Now all you have to do is realize that intelligence and emotion is also the very opposite of determinism. The very opposite of a effect happening because of a cause is a effect NOT happening because of a cause, that's what the word not means; if I tell you not to stop I want you to go because go is the very opposite of stop. And the word for a event not happening because of a cause is random. Indeed the whole idea of
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 11 Jan 2012, at 18:07, acw wrote: On 1/10/2012 17:48, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 10 Jan 2012, at 12:58, acw wrote: On 1/10/2012 12:03, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 09 Jan 2012, at 19:36, acw wrote: To put it more simply: if Church Turing Thesis(CTT) is correct, mathematics is the same for any system or being you can imagine. I am not sure why. Sigma_1 arithmetic would be the same; but higher mathematics (set theory, analysis) might still be different. If it's wrong, maybe stuff like concrete infinities, hypercomputation and infinite minds could exist and that would falsify COMP, however there is zero evidence for any of that being possible. Not sure, if CT is wrong, there would be finite machines, working in finite time, with well defined instructions, which would be NOT Turing emulable. Hypercomputation and infinite (human) minds would contradict comp, not CT. On the contrary, they need CT to claim that they compute more than any programmable machines. CT is part of comp, but comp is not part of CT. Beyond this, I agree with your reply to Craig. In that response I was using CT in the more unrestricted form: all effectively computable functions are Turing-computable. I understand, but that is confusing. David Deutsch and many physicists are a bit responsible of that confusion, by attempting to have a notion of effectivity relying on physics. The original statement of Church, Turing, Markov, Post, ... concerns only the intuitively human computable functions, or the functions computable by finitary means. It asserts that the class of such intuitively computable functions is the same as the class of functions computable by some Turing machine (or by the unique universal Turing machine). Such a notion is a priori completely independent of the notion of computable by physical means. Yes, with the usual notion of Turing-computable, you don't really need more than arithmetic. For the 3-person view, assuming mechanism, not only we don't need more than arithmetic, but we cannot use more than arithmetic. Anything added to Robinson arithmetic is empty of explanative power, at the 3p ontological level. And for the 1-views, you need to add the induction axioms to get the Löbianity of the observer, which is needed only for interviewing them, and then you need something bigger than the whole mathematics to get the full 1-picture. It might be a bit stronger than the usual equivalency proofs between a very wide range of models of computation (Turing machines, Abacus/PA machines, (primitive) recursive functions (+minimization), all kinds of more current models of computation, languages and so on). Yes. I even suspect that CT makes the class of functions computable by physics greater than the class of Church. That could be possible, but more evidence is needed for this(beyond the random oracle). I also wonder 2 other things: 1) would we be able to really know if we find ourselves in such a world (I'm leaning toward unlikely, but I'm agnostic about this) 2) would someone performing my experiment(described in another message), lose the ability to find himself in such a world (I'm leaning toward 'no, if it's possible now, it should still be possible'). 1) is a difficult question, due to the inability to know our level of substitution. 2) is difficult for me, due to the length of your sentences and paragraphs (thanks for being patient). If hypercomputation was actually possible that would mean that strong variant of CT would be false, because there would be something effectively computable that wasn't computable by a Turing machine. OK. In a way, that strong form of CT might already be false with comp, only in the 1p sense as you get a free random oracle as well as always staying consistent(and 'alive'), but it's not false in the 3p view... Yes. Comp makes physics a first person plural reality, and a priori we might be able to exploit the first plural indeterminacy to compute more function, like we know already that we have more processes, like that free random oracle. The empirical fact that quantum computer does not violate CT can make us doubt about this. In the third person, there's no need to consider more than UD, Yes. That is why RA is enough for the theory of everything, at the 'ontological level'. which seems to place some limits on what is possible, but in the first person, the possibilities are more plentiful (if COMP). Yes. That' what I just said above. Then, remember that the physical reality *are* first person, subjective, realities, yet most plausibly first person *plural*. Everett's multiplication (entanglement) of populations of observers confirm this. Also, I do wonder if the same universality that is present in the current CT would be present in hypercomputation (if one were to assume it would be possible) Yes, at least for many type of
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 12 Jan 2012, at 06:24, John Clark wrote: Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: however we don't know that there is a explanation for everything, some things might be fundamental. In the case of elementary arithmetic, we can even explain why we cannot explain it by something more fundamental. There are logical reason for that. But this is not the case for matter and consciousness, which admit an explanation from arithmetic. But even if numbers are fundamental that does not mean there could not be other things that are also fundamental, an obvious example would be Turing's non-compatible numbers; integers and other computable numbers may be able to figure out that non-computable numbers must exist just as Turing's mind figured it out, but computable numbers can not explain them, they can not derive them, they can not calculate them. Something similar might be the case with consciousness, computable numbers can figure out that intelligent behavior produces consciousness but they don't and can never know why. I am not entirely sure what you mean by computable numbers (I guess you mean function). I might have abused of the word fundamental. I meant primitive. It means the objects which I postulate the existence in the basic theory (of everything). For example physicalist would postulate primitive matter, or point particles or strings, perhaps time and space, etc. UDA shows that we can postulate only the numbers, and that we cannot use anything more to justify the appearances. And with a mind that operates by computable numbers there might be no way to explain, no way to prove, that these other things are fundamental even though its true they are in fact fundamental. This I think may be the case with consciousness but it's just a hunch and obviously I can never prove it; but if its true but can't be proven then people will always be looking for a theory that explains consciousness but they will always fail because there is no explanation in existence to find. But I think that consciousness can be explained almost completely, with some aspect which cannot be explained, yet, by mechanism, made explicit, we can still explain why consciousness cannot be entirely explained. We just need to agree on some proposition about consciousness, like we know it to be true, we cannot define it, it has relation with truth and realities, it is not doubtable, etc. Then we can shows that self-observing machine converge to some self-feature obeying similar principles. We can even ascribe it a role (explaining its Darwinian advantage) like relative universal self- speeding. I have a hunch that consciousness is fundamental and it's just the way data feels like when it's being processed; Then it is not fundamental, and you have to search an explanation why some data, when processed, can lead to consciousness. To be more complete, I think that consciousness is the way data feels like when it's processing causes intelligent behavior. I agree. Consciousness is required for being genuinely intelligent (or stupid). Consciousness is basically the instinctive bet that there is a consistent reality. It is not far from the act of going from PA to PA + con(PA). It makes you more efficacious. It shortened the proof, and integrate more your knowldge. But it is always on the verge of identifying PA with PA+con(PA) which leads to inconsistency. The more you are intelligent, the bigger you *can* be stupid. Certainly that idea proved to be enormously successful for evolution, despite the handicap of not being able to see consciousness any better than we can it managed to produce at least one conscious being, me, and probably more, you're probably conscious too. It managed to do this because although Evolution can not see consciousness it can certainly see intelligence. OK. If you define consciousness by the undoubtable belief in at least one reality [...] A belief is a conscious acceptance that something is true, and a conscious acceptance that something is true is a belief, and round and round we go. I don't even try to define consciousness anymore because all the definitions I have ever dreamed up suck . So instead I just give examples, or rather a example, me. yes. We agree on this: consciousness is not definable. Nor is knowledge, nor truth (when too much encompassing). But then we can agree on something, and we can proceed. WE can never defined exactly what we talk about, but to do reasoning, we need only to share some propositions and reasoning rules. No need to abandon anything to churches or governments here. You seem here to have difficulties to conceive that Aristotle primary matter hypothesis might be wrong. No not at all, I don't insist that matter is at the bottom of everything and in fact I think you are right and that numbers are fundamental, it's just
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Wed, Jan 11, 2012 Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.com wrote: If you know the logic behind something then you understand it and if you understand it you know the logic behind it. That's a false assumption. I can understand something whether or not it has logic behind it. You can know something without logic but you can't understand it. The ancient Greeks knew about lightning just as well as we do but they did not understand it. If understanding X does not mean seeing the logic behind X what does the word mean? If a change 'happens' it could be because something is deciding for it to happen. They are providing the reason. OK, they did it because they wanted to do it, doing it gave them more joy than not doing it because that is the way their brain is wired; that is a perfectly legitimate deterministic reason for a perfectly legitimate cuckoo clock. The difference between biology and physics is specifically that it is neither a cuckoo clock nor a roulette wheel, it is living flesh; I'm talking about something much more fundamental than just the difference between life and death, I'm talking why things, any thing, happen at all; and there can be no doubt that things happen for a reason or they do not happen for a reason. If that were true than an identical twin would be the same person sometimes. They are natural clones, they have the same genes but different memories and I know very well they are different people, I have identical twin sisters. The genetic code can certainly be thought of as a digital code, Obviously it's a digital code. but it's execution is all analog biochemistry. BULLSHIT! The genetic code and its execution is entirely mechanical and as digital as a digital watch. When a single strand of DNA duplicates itself it forms a mirror image of itself, in the new strand the base adenine always replaces the base thymine (and vice versa) and the base guanine replaces the base cytosine (and vice versa), thus when the new strand duplicates themselves you get a exact copy of the original grandfather DNA strand. All these rules are entirely digital. Of course DNA does not make protein directly, that heavy lifting is the job of Messenger RNA (mRNA), so the DNA must make some and the digital rules for making mRNA are identical to the DNA duplication rules except that thymine is replaced by another base called uracil, but the rules are still 100% digital, and remember it is the sequence of these bases that caries the genetic information. For example, the triplet CAT in DNA makes the mRNA triplet CAU and in and in the language of the genetic code that mRNA is written in that triplet symbolizes the amino acid histidine, BUT their are no special analog chemical properties that relate that triplet to the amino acid, and yet that triplet always causes that amino acid an no other to be added to the sequence making the protein. Why? The reason for that is another very small type of RNA called transfer RNA (tRNA). One type of tRNA has an anticodon that connects to the CAU triplet of messenger RNA like a key fitting into a lock. At another part of the transfer RNA molecule an amino acid can be attached, in this case histidine. However tRNA can't tell one amino acid from another, the amino acid attachment part is IDENTICAL in all tRNA molecules, but in practice, only those that have the anticodon for CAU are attached to histidine. Why? The reason for this is an enzyme (aminocyl-tRNA synthetase). This enzyme can tell one amino acid from another, and it can tell one tRNA molecule from another, and it can a attach a amino acid to it. But this enzyme does NOT look at the anticodon at all but at another part of the transfer RNA, the DHU loop. In the lab the DHU loop from one type of tRNA has been grafted onto another type of tRNA and that changes the genetic code. It's also interesting that this enzyme is a protein encoded by, what else, the digital genetic code. So the genetic code does not reside in any one of these stages, it resides in all of them, and all of them are digital I'm not sure that analog is inherently an inferior format for copying, You're not sure?? Don't be ridiculous. When you download a program from the internet it has to be perfect, 99.99% fidelity is not nearly good enough because just one bit out of place could render the entire large program nonfunctional; you can never make a 100% perfect analog copy but such perfection is the norm in the digital realm, and even if a error is made there are error correcting algorithms that can usually correct it and get back to that 100% perfection that is required, there is nothing like that for analog copies. So analog copies are never perfect but digital copies are usually perfect. As the chain of copies of copies of copies lengthens the quality of the copies ALWAYS decreases if it's analog, but not if it's digital, and some of your genes go back millions of generations. At the
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Jan 12, 4:18 pm, John Clark johnkcl...@gmail.com wrote: On Wed, Jan 11, 2012 Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.com wrote: If you know the logic behind something then you understand it and if you understand it you know the logic behind it. That's a false assumption. I can understand something whether or not it has logic behind it. You can know something without logic but you can't understand it. The ancient Greeks knew about lightning just as well as we do but they did not understand it. It's not a binary qualifier. We understand more about lightning than the ancient Greeks, and they understood more than lizards, who understand more than salt deposits. We have additional ways of making sense of lightning, but our understanding of it is by no means complete. We also have very likely lost some understanding about lightning - lyrical, poetic sense, just as the advent of literacy was at the cost of our ability to memorize and recite long stories. If understanding X does not mean seeing the logic behind X what does the word mean? The etymology of the word understanding (from the PIE root *nter meaning inner, like entero, interior; standing from the PIE root *sta, meaning to set or place, like stable) I think rightly intuits the nature of understanding as a 'settling within'. A feeling of interior assimilation and integration of an external 'unsettled' proposition (like a question). Understanding is an emotional quality which underpins learning and weaves together the subject with the object so that there is a personal identification through familiarity realized. To understand these words is not to see 'the logic behind them' but to feel the intent of them in the sense that they make to you. You aren't seeing my logic, you are seeing yourself (with all of your human baggage, cultural conditioning, and personal idiosyncrasies) interpreting my meaning - motive - intent. If a change 'happens' it could be because something is deciding for it to happen. They are providing the reason. OK, they did it because they wanted to do it, doing it gave them more joy than not doing it because that is the way their brain is wired; that is a perfectly legitimate deterministic reason for a perfectly legitimate cuckoo clock. It doesn't have to be separated out that way. There is no actual conscious reasoning taking place. If we have an itch we can choose to scratch it or try to ignore it, but there doesn't have to be a reason to choose one and not the other. We can do either. There is determinism in how our choices are presented, and yes, it is often framed as one choice seeming to be an obvious better choice than the other, but the existence of the awareness of the choice at all is already not a reasonable or inevitable feature in a purely deterministic universe. The difference between biology and physics is specifically that it is neither a cuckoo clock nor a roulette wheel, it is living flesh; I'm talking about something much more fundamental than just the difference between life and death, I'm talking why things, any thing, happen at all; and there can be no doubt that things happen for a reason or they do not happen for a reason. That's the default occidental view. It assumes that life and death do not alter the ontological underpinnings of the cosmos. Life may not be merely a cuckoo clock that uses a roulette wheel to make more complex cuckoo clocks, it may use that mechanical elaboration to facilitate a greater bandwidth to support more possibilities in the universe itself. I think that is obviously the case. The clocks and wheels are just the diodes and wires in the radio, but the purpose of the radio is to receive radio broadcasts with listenable content. We are clocks and wheels, but also clockmaker and wheelwright. Completely different ontology. We make reasons up. We are not limited to the reasons provided to us by the microcosm beneath us. Our reasons are natural features of the cosmos at our native perceptual scope, in our own natural language terms. Our anthropmormorphic reality is as genuine and concrete as chemistry or physics. Making a funny face is as real as if there were a periodic table of faces, only it's much richer and dense with significance. If that were true than an identical twin would be the same person sometimes. They are natural clones, they have the same genes but different memories and I know very well they are different people, I have identical twin sisters. Yeah, my Dad is an identical twin too. That's what I'm saying, if it was just genetics, and genetics were just digital, then identical twins would be truly identical, just like a digital file. But they aren't. They do have similarities, but not as much as you would think a clone would have. The genetic code can certainly be thought of as a digital code, Obviously it's a digital code. Obviously only because that's what our understanding is. We understand digital
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/10/2012 17:48, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 10 Jan 2012, at 12:58, acw wrote: On 1/10/2012 12:03, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 09 Jan 2012, at 19:36, acw wrote: To put it more simply: if Church Turing Thesis(CTT) is correct, mathematics is the same for any system or being you can imagine. I am not sure why. Sigma_1 arithmetic would be the same; but higher mathematics (set theory, analysis) might still be different. If it's wrong, maybe stuff like concrete infinities, hypercomputation and infinite minds could exist and that would falsify COMP, however there is zero evidence for any of that being possible. Not sure, if CT is wrong, there would be finite machines, working in finite time, with well defined instructions, which would be NOT Turing emulable. Hypercomputation and infinite (human) minds would contradict comp, not CT. On the contrary, they need CT to claim that they compute more than any programmable machines. CT is part of comp, but comp is not part of CT. Beyond this, I agree with your reply to Craig. In that response I was using CT in the more unrestricted form: all effectively computable functions are Turing-computable. I understand, but that is confusing. David Deutsch and many physicists are a bit responsible of that confusion, by attempting to have a notion of effectivity relying on physics. The original statement of Church, Turing, Markov, Post, ... concerns only the intuitively human computable functions, or the functions computable by finitary means. It asserts that the class of such intuitively computable functions is the same as the class of functions computable by some Turing machine (or by the unique universal Turing machine). Such a notion is a priori completely independent of the notion of computable by physical means. Yes, with the usual notion of Turing-computable, you don't really need more than arithmetic. It might be a bit stronger than the usual equivalency proofs between a very wide range of models of computation (Turing machines, Abacus/PA machines, (primitive) recursive functions (+minimization), all kinds of more current models of computation, languages and so on). Yes. I even suspect that CT makes the class of functions computable by physics greater than the class of Church. That could be possible, but more evidence is needed for this(beyond the random oracle). I also wonder 2 other things: 1) would we be able to really know if we find ourselves in such a world (I'm leaning toward unlikely, but I'm agnostic about this) 2) would someone performing my experiment(described in another message), lose the ability to find himself in such a world (I'm leaning toward 'no, if it's possible now, it should still be possible'). If hypercomputation was actually possible that would mean that strong variant of CT would be false, because there would be something effectively computable that wasn't computable by a Turing machine. OK. In a way, that strong form of CT might already be false with comp, only in the 1p sense as you get a free random oracle as well as always staying consistent(and 'alive'), but it's not false in the 3p view... Yes. Comp makes physics a first person plural reality, and a priori we might be able to exploit the first plural indeterminacy to compute more function, like we know already that we have more processes, like that free random oracle. The empirical fact that quantum computer does not violate CT can make us doubt about this. In the third person, there's no need to consider more than UD, which seems to place some limits on what is possible, but in the first person, the possibilities are more plentiful (if COMP). Also, I do wonder if the same universality that is present in the current CT would be present in hypercomputation (if one were to assume it would be possible) Yes, at least for many type of hypercomputation, notably of the form of computability with some oracle. - would it even retain CT's current immunity from diagonalization? Yes. Actually the immunity of the class of computable functions entails the immunity of the class of computable functions with oracle. So the consistency of CT entails the consistency of some super-CT for larger class. But I doubt that there is a super-CT for the class of functions computable by physical means. I am a bit agnostic on that. OK, although this doesn't seem trivial to me. As for the mathematical truth part, I mostly meant that from the perspective of a computable machine talking about axiomatic systems - as it is computable, the same machine (theorem prover) would always yield the same results in all possible worlds(or shared dreams). I see here why you have some problem with AUDA (and logic). CT = the notion of computability is absolute. But provability is not absolute at all. Even with CT, different machine talking or using different axiomatic system will obtain different theorems. In fact this is even an easy (one diagonalization) consequence of
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Jan 11, 12:24 am, John Clark johnkcl...@gmail.com wrote: On Tue, Jan 10, 2012 at 8:54 AM, Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.comwrote: There is more to understanding than logic. If you know the logic behind something then you understand it and if you understand it you know the logic behind it. That's a false assumption. I can understand something whether or not it has logic behind it. I understand red but there is no logic there. I can know the logic behind something, like quantum mechanics, without understanding it. It says very clearly that the changes are not random - ie, they are intentionally edited. It's not even very clear that these changes exist, it's all very tentative, and as far as your theories go it does not matter if its random or not because one thing is certain, if the changes are real one of two things is true, the changes happened for a reason or the changes did not happen for a reason. That's only true from a passive perspective. If a change 'happens' it could be because something is deciding for it to happen. They are providing the reason. That's not about analog vs digital, You said it's not digital, I insist it must be. The facts demonstrate otherwise. it is about crushing the delusion of the machine metaphor in biology. Just like everything else a biological effect has a cause or it does not have a cause, it's deterministic or it's random, it's a cuckoo clock or a roulette wheel. That is an arbitrary prejudice. The difference between biology and physics is specifically that it is neither a cuckoo clock nor a roulette wheel, it is living flesh; desire and satisfaction. Biology cannot be understood as a passive phenomenon. But I'm not my father or grandfather or great grandfather That's right you are not them and yet you have some of the same genes that they had, (yeah I know what's coming, genes don't exist either) so the genes had to make copies of themselves to go into the next generation. If the copying process had been analog there would be so many errors in your genes that you'd be dead because the errors are cumulative, but the copying was digital so you are fine. This Email had to go through a long chain of copying and retransmitting before you got it but it was all digital so you can read it, if it had been analog it would be nothing but a big blur. If that were true than an identical twin would be the same person sometimes. Since that is never true, we know that there is more to it than that. The genetic code can certainly be thought of as a digital code, but it's execution is all analog biochemistry. Not true. Music companies had a problem with cassettes too. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Home_Taping_Is_Killing_Music. Recording devices have always been forbidden at popular movies and concerts. You only went down one generation in those examples, from a master tape to copies, good analog can handle a few generations but not dozens, and with biology you have many millions of generations so it can't be analog. You were still wrong in your assertion that record companies didn't care about copying until digital encoding was popular. I'm not sure that analog is inherently an inferior format for copying, it may depend on the physics of thw equipment. With sensitive enough equipment, there is no reason why analog copying couldn't achieve parity with digital on a human perceptual level. https://ccrma.stanford.edu/~jos/fp/Lossless_Analog_Filters.html There is nothing particularly digital about the folding problem. It is an analog process Bullshit! Every protein ever made starts out in life as a linear sequence of amino acids like beads on a string, and that linear sequence was determined by a linear sequence of bases in RNA, and that linear sequence was determined by the linear sequences of bases in DNA. Its only after the protein leaves the ribosome does this linear sequence fold up into the enormously complex shapes of the functional protein. That's where the folding problem begins. After the transcription is done. There is nothing digital about how a real molecule folds itself up. It's nothing like a program being executed from a script, it's about real world consequences of non-digital physical forces and forms. At the temperatures and pH conditions found in cells any linear protein string with the same sequence of amino acids ALWAYS folds up into exactly precisely the same shape. Different sequence different shape, same sequence same shape. If you change the temperatures and pH conditions, then they do not. Sequence isn't everything. which occurs through concrete chemical interaction Certainly, but the same linear sequence of amino acids gives you the exact same super complex shape that those hyper complex concrete chemical interactions twist those straight linear strings into. And it's true we are not very good at calculating from first principles what shape any given sequence of linear
Re: An analogy for Qualia
Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: however we don't know that there is a explanation for everything, some things might be fundamental. In the case of elementary arithmetic, we can even explain why we cannot explain it by something more fundamental. There are logical reason for that. But this is not the case for matter and consciousness, which admit an explanation from arithmetic. But even if numbers are fundamental that does not mean there could not be other things that are also fundamental, an obvious example would be Turing's non-compatible numbers; integers and other computable numbers may be able to figure out that non-computable numbers must exist just as Turing's mind figured it out, but computable numbers can not explain them, they can not derive them, they can not calculate them. Something similar might be the case with consciousness, computable numbers can figure out that intelligent behavior produces consciousness but they don't and can never know why. And with a mind that operates by computable numbers there might be no way to explain, no way to prove, that these other things are fundamental even though its true they are in fact fundamental. This I think may be the case with consciousness but it's just a hunch and obviously I can never prove it; but if its true but can't be proven then people will always be looking for a theory that explains consciousness but they will always fail because there is no explanation in existence to find. I have a hunch that consciousness is fundamental and it's just the way data feels like when it's being processed; Then it is not fundamental, and you have to search an explanation why some data, when processed, can lead to consciousness. To be more complete, I think that consciousness is the way data feels like when it's processing causes intelligent behavior. Certainly that idea proved to be enormously successful for evolution, despite the handicap of not being able to see consciousness any better than we can it managed to produce at least one conscious being, me, and probably more, you're probably conscious too. It managed to do this because although Evolution can not see consciousness it can certainly see intelligence. If you define consciousness by the undoubtable belief in at least one reality [...] A belief is a conscious acceptance that something is true, and a conscious acceptance that something is true is a belief, and round and round we go. I don't even try to define consciousness anymore because all the definitions I have ever dreamed up suck . So instead I just give examples, or rather a example, me. You seem here to have difficulties to conceive that Aristotle primary matter hypothesis might be wrong. No not at all, I don't insist that matter is at the bottom of everything and in fact I think you are right and that numbers are fundamental, it's just that I'm far less certain than you that they are the only thing that is fundamental. And there may be things that are NOT fundamental and so are made of other parts (parts like numbers for example) but there is no way to prove that to be the case, no way to prove they are not fundamental. And there may be things that ARE fundamental and thus have no parts but there is no way to prove that to be the case, no way to prove they are fundamental. That is to say although numbers cause it there is no way for those same numbers to prove that they cause it. Consciousness may be in this category. It would mean a event without a cause and I don't see why that is more illogical that a event with a cause. An event without a cause/reason, is no better than creationism. It is a way of saying don't ask, unless you can explain why it has to be so That unless in the above is very important, however it very well could be that there are some events without a cause and you can't explain why and you will never be able to explain why because there is no explanation as to why it is but it is nevertheless. I don't like that fact any better than you do but the universe does not care what our opinions are on the subject. Everett is wrong here. because, by UDA, once you postulate comp (as Everett does practically) we are not living in physical universes. It does not matter (pun intended), we may not be living in a physical universe but the physics of that universe could still be important to us. You me and our entire universe might be part of a virtual reality program running on a Mega-computer, but whatever the laws of physics are in that other universe that the Mega-computer is situated in they must be such that computation is possible. So why do we virtual beings observe that the Schrodinger Wave Equation rules our universe? Perhaps because the it also rules in the maker of the Mega-computer's universe and so they set up their simulation in the same way; that's what we do, we try hard to make our simulations obey the same laws of physics as the world we live in. Or perhaps
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 09 Jan 2012, at 19:36, acw wrote: On 1/9/2012 19:54, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Jan 9, 12:00 pm, Bruno Marchalmarc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: On 09 Jan 2012, at 14:50, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Jan 9, 6:06 am, Bruno Marchalmarc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: I agree with your general reply to Craig, but I disagree that computations are physical. That's the revisionist conception of computation, defended by Deustch, Landauer, etc. Computations have been discovered by mathematicians when trying to expalin some foundational difficulties in pure mathematics. Mathematicians aren't physical? Computations are discovered through a living nervous system, one that has been highly developed and conditioned specifically for that purpose. Computation and mechanism have been discovered by many people since humans are there. It is related to the understanding of the difference between finite and infinite. The modern notion has been discovered independently by many mathematicians, notably Emil Post, Alan Turing, Alonzo Church, Andrzei Markov, etc. With the comp. hyp., this is easily explainable, given that we are somehow made of (in some not completely Aristotelian sense to be sure) computations. They are making those discoveries by using their physical brain though. Sure, but that requires one to better understand what a physical brain is. In the case of COMP(given some basic assumptions), matter is explained as appearing from simpler abstract mathematical relations, in which case, a brain would be an inevitable consequence of such relations. We can implement computation in the physical worlds, but that means only that the physical reality is (at least) Turing universal. Theoretical computer science is a branch of pure mathematics, even completely embeddable in arithmetical truth. And pure mathematics is a branch of anthropology. I thought you already agreed that the arithmetical truth are independent of the existence of humans, from old posts you write. Explain me, please, how the truth or falsity of the Riemann hypothesis, or of Goldbach conjecture depend(s) on anthropology. Please, explain me how the convergence or divergence of phi_(j) depends on the existence of humans (with phi_i = the ith computable function in an enumeration based on some universal system). The whole idea of truth or falsity in the first place depends on humans capacities to interpret experiences in those terms. We can read this quality of truth or falsity into many aspects of our direct and indirect experience, but that doesn't mean that the quality itself is external to us. If you look at a starfish, you can see it has five arms, but the starfish doesn't necessarily know it had five arms. Yet that the fact the starfish has 5 arms is a fact, regardless of the starfish's awareness of it. It will have many consequences with regards of how the starfish interacts with the rest of the world or how any other system perceives it. If you see something colored red, you will know that you saw red and that is 'true', and that it will be false that you didn't see 'red', assuming you recognize 'red' the same as everyone else and that your nervous system isn't wired too strangely or if your sensory systems aren't defective or function differently than average. Consequences of mathematical truths will be everywhere, regardless if you understand them or not. A circle's length will depend on its radius regardless if you understand the relation or not. Any system, be they human, computer or alien, regardless of the laws of physics in play should also be able to compute (Church-Turing Thesis shows that computation comes very cheap and all it takes is ability of some simple abstract finite rules being followed and always yielding the same result, although specific proofs for showing Turing-universality would depend on each system - some may be too simple to have such a property, but then, it's questionable if they would be powerful enough to support intelligence or even more trivial behavior such as life/replicators or evolution), and if they can, they will always get the same results if they asked the same computational or mathematical question (in this case, mathematical truths, or even yet unknown truths such as Riemann hypothesis, Goldbach conjecture, and so on). Most physics should support computation, and I conjecture that any physics that isn't strong enough to at least support computation isn't strong enough to support intelligence or consciousness (and computation comes very cheap!). Support computation and you get any mathematical truth that humans can reach/talk about. Don't support it, and you probably won't have any intelligence in it. To put it more simply: if Church Turing Thesis(CTT) is correct, mathematics is the same for any system or being you can imagine. I am not sure why. Sigma_1 arithmetic would be the same; but higher
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/10/2012 12:03, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 09 Jan 2012, at 19:36, acw wrote: On 1/9/2012 19:54, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Jan 9, 12:00 pm, Bruno Marchalmarc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: On 09 Jan 2012, at 14:50, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Jan 9, 6:06 am, Bruno Marchalmarc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: I agree with your general reply to Craig, but I disagree that computations are physical. That's the revisionist conception of computation, defended by Deustch, Landauer, etc. Computations have been discovered by mathematicians when trying to expalin some foundational difficulties in pure mathematics. Mathematicians aren't physical? Computations are discovered through a living nervous system, one that has been highly developed and conditioned specifically for that purpose. Computation and mechanism have been discovered by many people since humans are there. It is related to the understanding of the difference between finite and infinite. The modern notion has been discovered independently by many mathematicians, notably Emil Post, Alan Turing, Alonzo Church, Andrzei Markov, etc. With the comp. hyp., this is easily explainable, given that we are somehow made of (in some not completely Aristotelian sense to be sure) computations. They are making those discoveries by using their physical brain though. Sure, but that requires one to better understand what a physical brain is. In the case of COMP(given some basic assumptions), matter is explained as appearing from simpler abstract mathematical relations, in which case, a brain would be an inevitable consequence of such relations. We can implement computation in the physical worlds, but that means only that the physical reality is (at least) Turing universal. Theoretical computer science is a branch of pure mathematics, even completely embeddable in arithmetical truth. And pure mathematics is a branch of anthropology. I thought you already agreed that the arithmetical truth are independent of the existence of humans, from old posts you write. Explain me, please, how the truth or falsity of the Riemann hypothesis, or of Goldbach conjecture depend(s) on anthropology. Please, explain me how the convergence or divergence of phi_(j) depends on the existence of humans (with phi_i = the ith computable function in an enumeration based on some universal system). The whole idea of truth or falsity in the first place depends on humans capacities to interpret experiences in those terms. We can read this quality of truth or falsity into many aspects of our direct and indirect experience, but that doesn't mean that the quality itself is external to us. If you look at a starfish, you can see it has five arms, but the starfish doesn't necessarily know it had five arms. Yet that the fact the starfish has 5 arms is a fact, regardless of the starfish's awareness of it. It will have many consequences with regards of how the starfish interacts with the rest of the world or how any other system perceives it. If you see something colored red, you will know that you saw red and that is 'true', and that it will be false that you didn't see 'red', assuming you recognize 'red' the same as everyone else and that your nervous system isn't wired too strangely or if your sensory systems aren't defective or function differently than average. Consequences of mathematical truths will be everywhere, regardless if you understand them or not. A circle's length will depend on its radius regardless if you understand the relation or not. Any system, be they human, computer or alien, regardless of the laws of physics in play should also be able to compute (Church-Turing Thesis shows that computation comes very cheap and all it takes is ability of some simple abstract finite rules being followed and always yielding the same result, although specific proofs for showing Turing-universality would depend on each system - some may be too simple to have such a property, but then, it's questionable if they would be powerful enough to support intelligence or even more trivial behavior such as life/replicators or evolution), and if they can, they will always get the same results if they asked the same computational or mathematical question (in this case, mathematical truths, or even yet unknown truths such as Riemann hypothesis, Goldbach conjecture, and so on). Most physics should support computation, and I conjecture that any physics that isn't strong enough to at least support computation isn't strong enough to support intelligence or consciousness (and computation comes very cheap!). Support computation and you get any mathematical truth that humans can reach/talk about. Don't support it, and you probably won't have any intelligence in it. To put it more simply: if Church Turing Thesis(CTT) is correct, mathematics is the same for any system or being you can imagine. I am not sure why. Sigma_1 arithmetic would be the same; but higher mathematics (set theory, analysis) might still be
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Jan 10, 12:40 am, John Clark johnkcl...@gmail.com wrote: Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.com wrote: No free will = no hunger. No need for it. No mechanism for it. No logic to it. Cannot comment, don't know what ASCII sequence free will means. The old 'stick your fingers in your ears and say lalalalalala' trick. Impressive, but deciding to do such a thing would require FREE WILL. That was my point. Knowing how to eat does not require logic or induction. But your question was Is it induction that provides our understanding of how to swallow?, you asked about understanding; for prediction induction alone is enough but for understanding you need logic, and for some things neither is required. A rock can stay on the ground even though it's not very good at induction and nobody has a deep understanding of gravity yet. There is more to understanding than logic. You need a subject who is motivated to make sense out of something. They can employ logic, intuition, induction, insight, memory, etc. Lots of modes of sense making. The genetic code in DNA could not be more digital, and it was good enough to build your brain and every other part of you out of simple amino acid molecules; if you look at the details of the assembly process biology uses to make complex things, like your brain, you find its amazingly computer-like. That may not be true even for DNA: http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110525/full/473432a.html http://www.sciencemag.org/content/333/6038/53 DNA translates its information into RNA It's true that the RNA bases are informed by the DNA bases (just because RNA is motivated to mirror each base of the DNA) , just as a baseball game is informed by the score in each inning, but there is no actual 'information'. and RNA tells the ribosomes what linear sequence of amino acid molecules to make, after the ribosomes are finished the linear sequence folds up into very complex shapes forming proteins, and that makes you including your brain. This controversial experiment (as I said no experiment is finished until it is repeated) says that there is a unknown mechanism that sometimes makes minor changes in the DNA to RNA part of that chain. In no place in that paper is it suggested that the unknown mechanism (assuming it even exists) is analog and for a very good reason, indeed it is very clear that there is no way it could be analog. It says very clearly that the changes are not random - ie, they are intentionally edited. That's not about analog vs digital, it is about crushing the delusion of the machine metaphor in biology. Think of your father and grandfather and great grandfather and all the millions of individuals in the past that led up to you; every one of those individuals got old and died but their genetic legacy remains as vital as is was the day they were born thousand or millions of years ago, and there is absolutely no way that could happen if the information was encoded in a analog manner. But I'm not my father or grandfather or great grandfather, nor am I a combination of my mother and father. The digital aspects are complemented - always - by analog processes. Do you remember the old analog cassette tapes, if you made a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of a music tape pretty soon the resulting tape had so many errors in it that it could no longer be called music and was unlistenable; that was because with analog copying the errors are cumulative, but that is not the case with digital copying. It doesn't matter though because eventually the music has to be output to an analog audio device to make sense to your analog inner ear. You are just talking about encoding and recording, not the qualities that the production of musicality (or life, or consciousness) entails. If the internet was based on analog technology the big music companies would have had no problem with bootleg copies of their product, but it uses digital methods so they had a very big problem indeed. Not true. Music companies had a problem with cassettes too. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Home_Taping_Is_Killing_Music. Recording devices have always been forbidden at popular movies and concerts. The primary sequence of DNA is just part of the story though. Secondary and tertiary epigenetic factors are can determine which genes are used and which are not, and they are not digital. Of course they're digital!! Cytosine and guanine are 2 of the 4 bases in DNA and it is the variation in the sequence of these 4 bases that carry the genetic code. The epigenetic factors you're talking about happens because sometimes at the point where cytosine and guanine meet a molecule called a methyl group is sometimes attached. A methyl group is a very small molecule consisting of just one carbon atom connected to three hydrogen atoms, and the existence of a methyl group changes the way the sequence of bases in DNA is translated into a sequence of amino acids in a
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 10 Jan 2012, at 12:58, acw wrote: On 1/10/2012 12:03, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 09 Jan 2012, at 19:36, acw wrote: To put it more simply: if Church Turing Thesis(CTT) is correct, mathematics is the same for any system or being you can imagine. I am not sure why. Sigma_1 arithmetic would be the same; but higher mathematics (set theory, analysis) might still be different. If it's wrong, maybe stuff like concrete infinities, hypercomputation and infinite minds could exist and that would falsify COMP, however there is zero evidence for any of that being possible. Not sure, if CT is wrong, there would be finite machines, working in finite time, with well defined instructions, which would be NOT Turing emulable. Hypercomputation and infinite (human) minds would contradict comp, not CT. On the contrary, they need CT to claim that they compute more than any programmable machines. CT is part of comp, but comp is not part of CT. Beyond this, I agree with your reply to Craig. In that response I was using CT in the more unrestricted form: all effectively computable functions are Turing-computable. I understand, but that is confusing. David Deutsch and many physicists are a bit responsible of that confusion, by attempting to have a notion of effectivity relying on physics. The original statement of Church, Turing, Markov, Post, ... concerns only the intuitively human computable functions, or the functions computable by finitary means. It asserts that the class of such intuitively computable functions is the same as the class of functions computable by some Turing machine (or by the unique universal Turing machine). Such a notion is a priori completely independent of the notion of computable by physical means. It might be a bit stronger than the usual equivalency proofs between a very wide range of models of computation (Turing machines, Abacus/ PA machines, (primitive) recursive functions (+minimization), all kinds of more current models of computation, languages and so on). Yes. I even suspect that CT makes the class of functions computable by physics greater than the class of Church. If hypercomputation was actually possible that would mean that strong variant of CT would be false, because there would be something effectively computable that wasn't computable by a Turing machine. OK. In a way, that strong form of CT might already be false with comp, only in the 1p sense as you get a free random oracle as well as always staying consistent(and 'alive'), but it's not false in the 3p view... Yes. Comp makes physics a first person plural reality, and a priori we might be able to exploit the first plural indeterminacy to compute more function, like we know already that we have more processes, like that free random oracle. The empirical fact that quantum computer does not violate CT can make us doubt about this. Also, I do wonder if the same universality that is present in the current CT would be present in hypercomputation (if one were to assume it would be possible) Yes, at least for many type of hypercomputation, notably of the form of computability with some oracle. - would it even retain CT's current immunity from diagonalization? Yes. Actually the immunity of the class of computable functions entails the immunity of the class of computable functions with oracle. So the consistency of CT entails the consistency of some super-CT for larger class. But I doubt that there is a super-CT for the class of functions computable by physical means. I am a bit agnostic on that. As for the mathematical truth part, I mostly meant that from the perspective of a computable machine talking about axiomatic systems - as it is computable, the same machine (theorem prover) would always yield the same results in all possible worlds(or shared dreams). I see here why you have some problem with AUDA (and logic). CT = the notion of computability is absolute. But provability is not absolute at all. Even with CT, different machine talking or using different axiomatic system will obtain different theorems. In fact this is even an easy (one diagonalization) consequence of CT, although Gödel's original proof does not use CT. provability, nor definability is not immune for diagonalization. Different machines proves different theorems. Although with my incomplete understanding of the AUDA, and I may be wrong about this, it appeared to me that it might be possible for a machine to get more and more of the truth given the consistency constraint. That's right both PA + con(PA) and PA + ~con(PA) proves more true arithmetical theorems than PA. And PA + con(PA + con(PA + con (PA + con PA)) will proves even more theorems. The same with the negation of those consistency. Note that the theory PA* = PA* + con(PA*), which can be defined finitely by the use of the Kleene recursion fixed point
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/10/2012 7:48 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: In a way, that strong form of CT might already be false with comp, only in the 1p sense as you get a free random oracle as well as always staying consistent(and 'alive'), but it's not false in the 3p view... Yes. Comp makes physics a first person plural reality, and a priori we might be able to exploit the first plural indeterminacy to compute more function, like we know already that we have more processes, like that free random oracle. The empirical fact that quantum computer does not violate CT can make us doubt about this. I don't think that is so clear. Nielsen has written some papers on computations in QM that are not Turing emulable, essentially relying on the fact that QM uses real numbers. He suggests that QM should be restricted to avoid this kind of hypercomputation by dropping the assumption that all unitary operators are allowed. Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/10/2012 12:48 PM, meekerdb wrote: On 1/10/2012 7:48 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: In a way, that strong form of CT might already be false with comp, only in the 1p sense as you get a free random oracle as well as always staying consistent(and 'alive'), but it's not false in the 3p view... Yes. Comp makes physics a first person plural reality, and a priori we might be able to exploit the first plural indeterminacy to compute more function, like we know already that we have more processes, like that free random oracle. The empirical fact that quantum computer does not violate CT can make us doubt about this. I don't think that is so clear. Nielsen has written some papers on computations in QM that are not Turing emulable, essentially relying on the fact that QM uses real numbers. He suggests that QM should be restricted to avoid this kind of hypercomputation by dropping the assumption that all unitary operators are allowed. Brent Hi Brent, Could we achieve the same thing by restricting the vector (Hilbert) space of linear functionals to a finite (but very large) field? Another possibility is that there is a local preference of basis for a given set of homomorphisms between the Hilbert spaces of a given pair of interacting quantum systems. Here is a nice video lecture on the math of this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkU1UdS4Dpsfeature=related Onward! Stephen -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 10 Jan 2012, at 18:48, meekerdb wrote: On 1/10/2012 7:48 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: In a way, that strong form of CT might already be false with comp, only in the 1p sense as you get a free random oracle as well as always staying consistent(and 'alive'), but it's not false in the 3p view... Yes. Comp makes physics a first person plural reality, and a priori we might be able to exploit the first plural indeterminacy to compute more function, like we know already that we have more processes, like that free random oracle. The empirical fact that quantum computer does not violate CT can make us doubt about this. I don't think that is so clear. Nielsen has written some papers on computations in QM that are not Turing emulable, essentially relying on the fact that QM uses real numbers. He suggests that QM should be restricted to avoid this kind of hypercomputation by dropping the assumption that all unitary operators are allowed. Yes. e^i * OMEGA *t is a solution of the SWE. With OMEGA = Chaitin's incompressible real number. But are the real numbers physically real? Open problem in comp, and in our observable universe. Nielsen is aware that, would we met such a quantum wave, we would be unable to recognize it or to distinguish it from quantum noise. Which follows from comp indeed. More interestingly e^i * POST *t, with POST = Post creative number, which decimal codes the stopping problem, would be a quantum universal dovetailer. Here the wave will have the computations redundancy needed to give sense to the measure problem. With the incompressible OMEGA you get a shallow description of all there is by doing a highly non constructive reduction of the measure. OMEGA evacuates the redundancy of POST. POST is deep (in Bennett sense). But I am not sure that the decimals in the wave plays any relevant computational role. Unless some very low level number conspiracy? The UD is dumb enough to dovetail all program executions with their products with *all* approximations of all real numbers, so, so some exploitation of the continuum is what to be expected for the most stable realities configuration, and it is hard to avoid, logically, that some infinite non computable constant might play a role, but why would we postulate something like that? Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Tue, Jan 10, 2012 at 8:54 AM, Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.comwrote: There is more to understanding than logic. If you know the logic behind something then you understand it and if you understand it you know the logic behind it. It says very clearly that the changes are not random - ie, they are intentionally edited. It's not even very clear that these changes exist, it's all very tentative, and as far as your theories go it does not matter if its random or not because one thing is certain, if the changes are real one of two things is true, the changes happened for a reason or the changes did not happen for a reason. That's not about analog vs digital, You said it's not digital, I insist it must be. it is about crushing the delusion of the machine metaphor in biology. Just like everything else a biological effect has a cause or it does not have a cause, it's deterministic or it's random, it's a cuckoo clock or a roulette wheel. But I'm not my father or grandfather or great grandfather That's right you are not them and yet you have some of the same genes that they had, (yeah I know what's coming, genes don't exist either) so the genes had to make copies of themselves to go into the next generation. If the copying process had been analog there would be so many errors in your genes that you'd be dead because the errors are cumulative, but the copying was digital so you are fine. This Email had to go through a long chain of copying and retransmitting before you got it but it was all digital so you can read it, if it had been analog it would be nothing but a big blur. Not true. Music companies had a problem with cassettes too. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Home_Taping_Is_Killing_Music. Recording devices have always been forbidden at popular movies and concerts. You only went down one generation in those examples, from a master tape to copies, good analog can handle a few generations but not dozens, and with biology you have many millions of generations so it can't be analog. There is nothing particularly digital about the folding problem. It is an analog process Bullshit! Every protein ever made starts out in life as a linear sequence of amino acids like beads on a string, and that linear sequence was determined by a linear sequence of bases in RNA, and that linear sequence was determined by the linear sequences of bases in DNA. Its only after the protein leaves the ribosome does this linear sequence fold up into the enormously complex shapes of the functional protein. At the temperatures and pH conditions found in cells any linear protein string with the same sequence of amino acids ALWAYS folds up into exactly precisely the same shape. Different sequence different shape, same sequence same shape. which occurs through concrete chemical interaction Certainly, but the same linear sequence of amino acids gives you the exact same super complex shape that those hyper complex concrete chemical interactions twist those straight linear strings into. And it's true we are not very good at calculating from first principles what shape any given sequence of linear amino acids will twist into because it's so astronomically complex, but we are getting better and we do know for a fact that the same sequence always gives the same shape. And its not like any of this is cutting edge news, its been known since 1953; but I guess it takes time for that sort of scientific information to trickle down so that even philosophers know about it. Oops sorry I forgot, information does not exist. There is not a person on this planet who knows what will happen if you program a computer to find the first even number greater than 2 that is not the sum of two prime numbers and then stop. That can only mean that you are admitting that the brain is not a computer. How on earth do you figure that? A brain can't know what a computer or other brain will do or even what he himself will do until he does it; and a computer can't know what another computer or a brain will do or what it itself will do until it does it. It means MWI is born of desperation to preserve the machine metaphor of the universe. All interpretations of the way things behave when they become very very small are desperate because in that realm things just act weird, your interpretation is more desperate than most, you just say nothing is real; I think you should add including this theory. Quantum mechanics predicts it [the magnetic moment of the electron] will Be 1.00115965246 and that agrees well with the experimental value of 1.00115965221. What does your theory predict the value will be? My theory predicts that electrons seem one way to electronic instruments, another way to human brains, and another way to human minds interpreting the exterior behavior of electronic instruments. The difference between a scientific theory of physics and flatulent philosophical gas is not that one is right and the other wrong
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Dec 22 2011, 12:18 pm, alexalex alexmka...@yahoo.com wrote: Hello, Everythinglisters! The below text is a philosophical essay on what qualia may represent. I doubt you'll manage to finish reading it (it's kind of long, and translated from anoter language), but if you do I'll be happy to hear your opinion about what it says. Thanks! A simpler model of the world with different points of view It can often get quite amusing watching qualophiles' self-confidence, mutual assurance and agreement when they talk about something a priori defined as inherently private and un-accessible to third-party analysis (i.e. qualia), so they say, but they somehow agree on what they're discussing about even though as far as I've been able to understand they don't display the slightest scant of evidence which would show that they believe there will ever be a theory that could bridge the gap between the ineffable what-it-is-likeness (WIIL) of personal experience and the scientific, objective descriptions of reality. The 1s and 0s that make the large variety of 3D design software on the market today are all we need in order to bring to virtual-reality whatever model of our real world we desire. Those 1s and 0s, which are by the way as physical as the neurons in your brain though not of the same assortment (see below), are further arranged into sub-modules that are further integrated into other different parts and subsystems of the computer onto which the software they are part of is running on, so their arrangement is obviously far from aleatory. One needs to adopt the intentional stance in order to understand the intricacies, details and roles that these specific particular modules play in this large and complex computer programs. If you had the desire you could bring to virtual reality any city of the world you want. Let's for example take the city of Rome. Every monument, restaurant, hospital, park, mall and police department can be accounted for in a detailed, virtual replica which we can model using one of these 3D modeling programs. Every car, plane and boat, even the people and their biomechanics are so well represented that we could easily mistake the computer model for the real thing. Here we are looking at the monitor screen from our God-like-point-of-view. All the points, lines, 2D-planes and 3D objects in this digital presentation have their properties and behavior ruled by simulated laws of physics which are identical to the laws encountered in our real world. These objects and the laws that govern them are 100% traceable to the 1s and 0s, that is, to the voltages and transistors on the silica chips that make up the computer onto which the software is runs on. We have a 100% description of the city of Rome in our computer in the sense that there is no object in that model that we can't say all there is to say about it and the movement of the points, lines and planes which compose it because they're all accounted for in the 0s and 1s saved on the hard-drive and then loaded into the RAM and video-RAM of our state of the art video graphics card. Let's call that perspective, the perspective of knowing all there is to know about the 3D-model, the third-person perspective (the perspective described by using only third-party objective data). What's interesting is that all of these 3D design programs have the option to add cameras to whatever world model you are currently developing. Cameras present a scene from a particular point-of-view (POV – or point of reference, call it how you will). Camera objects simulate still-image, motion picture, or video cameras in the real world and have the same usage here. The benefit of cameras is that you can position them anywhere within a scene to offer a custom view. You can imagine that camera not only as a point of view but also as an area point of view (all the light reflected from the objects in your particular world model enter the lens of the camera), but for our particular mental exercise this doesn't matter. What you need to know is that our virtual cameras can perfectly simulate real world cameras and all the optical science of the lens is integrated in the program making the simulated models similar to the ones that are found real life. We’ll use POVs and CPOVs interchangeably from now on; they mean the same thing in the logic of our argumentation. The point-of-view (POV) of the camera is obviously completely traceable and mathematically deducible from the third-person perspective of the current model we are simulating and from the physical characteristics of the virtual lens built into the camera through which the light reflected of the objects in the model is projected (Bare in mind that the physical properties and optics of the lens are also simulated by the computer model). Of course, the software does all that calculation and drawing for you. But if you had the ambition you could
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 09 Jan 2012, at 06:56, John Clark wrote: On Sun, Jan 8, 2012 at 3:36 AM, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: But naturalism want to explain things by reducing it to nature or natural law, If you want to explain X you say that X exists because of Y. It's true that Y can be nothing and thus the existence of X is random, but let's assume that Y is something;in that case if you don't want to call Y natural law what do you want to call it? In the case which concerns us, Y is elementary arithmetic. Computationalism asks for an explanation for the natural laws, And if found those explanations would be yet more natural laws; After all you can. Elementary arithmetic is the study of *natural* numbers. But that would be a pun. however we don't know that there is a explanation for everything, some things might be fundamental. Yes. In the case of elementary arithmetic, we can even explain why we cannot explain it by something more fundamental. There are logical reason for that. But this is not the case for matter and consciousness, which admit an explanation from arithmetic. I have a hunch that consciousness is fundamental and it's just the way data feels like when it's being processed; Then it is not fundamental, and you have to search an explanation why some data, when processed, can lead to consciousness. If you define consciousness by the undoubtable belief in at least one reality, it can be explained why numbers develop such belief. But there is a price which is also a gift: you have to explain the appearance of matter from the numbers too, and physics is no more the fundamental science. The gift is that we get a complete conceptual explanation of where the physical realities come from. the trouble is that even if consciousness is fundamental a proof of that fact probably does not exist, so people will continue to invent consciousness theories trying to explain it till the end of time but none of those theories will be worth a bucket of warm spit. That's your opinion. The fact is that we can explain, even prove, that natural numbers are not explainable from less, and we can explain entirely matter, and 99,9% of consciousness from the numbers too, and this in a testable way (I'm not pretending that numbers provide the correct explanation). And we can explain completely why it remains 0.1% of consciousness which cannot be explained, by pure number logical self-reference limitation. This does not mean it is always meaningful to ask what is that made of?. It is until you get to something fundamental, You seem here to have difficulties to conceive that Aristotle primary matter hypothesis might be wrong. then all you can say is that's just the way things are. If that is unsatisfactory then direct your rage at the universe. But perhaps you can always find something more fundamental, but I doubt it, I think consciousness is probably the end of the line. That is already refuted once you take seriously the mechanist hypothesis. Consciousness is explained by semantical fixed point of Turing universal self-transformations. It leads to a testable theory of qualia and quanta (X1* in my papers). There are no thing made of something. Good heavens, if we can't agree even that at least sometimes somethings are made of parts we will be chasing our intellectual tails forever going nowhere. Something are made of parts. But not of fundamental parts. Time, space, energy, quantum states all belong to the imagination or tools of numbers looking at their origin, and we can explain why (relative) numbers develop that well founded imagination, and why some of it is persistent and sharable among many numbers. Imagination does not mean 'unreal', but it means not ontologically primary real. The idea of things being made of something is still Aristotelian. Aristotle like most philosophers liked to write about stuff that every person on the planet knows to be obviously true and state that fact to the world in inflated language as if he'd made a great discovery. Of course most things are made of parts, although I'm not too sure about electrons, they might be fundamental. Plato invented science, including theology, by taking some distance from the animal lasting intuition that their neighborhoods are primary real or WYSIWYG. Aristotle just came back to that animal intuition, which of course is very satisfying for our animal natural intuition. But mechanism has been shown to be incompatible with it. (Weak) materialism will be abandonned, in the long run, as being a natural superstition. Matter is only the border of the universal mind, which is the mind of universal numbers. The theory of mind becomes computer science (itself branch of arithmetic), and fundamental physics becomes a sub-branch of it. If mechanism is true, there are only true number
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Jan 9, 6:06 am, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: I agree with your general reply to Craig, but I disagree that computations are physical. That's the revisionist conception of computation, defended by Deustch, Landauer, etc. Computations have been discovered by mathematicians when trying to expalin some foundational difficulties in pure mathematics. Mathematicians aren't physical? Computations are discovered through a living nervous system, one that has been highly developed and conditioned specifically for that purpose. We can implement computation in the physical worlds, but that means only that the physical reality is (at least) Turing universal. Theoretical computer science is a branch of pure mathematics, even completely embeddable in arithmetical truth. And pure mathematics is a branch of anthropology. Craig -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 09 Jan 2012, at 14:50, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Jan 9, 6:06 am, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: I agree with your general reply to Craig, but I disagree that computations are physical. That's the revisionist conception of computation, defended by Deustch, Landauer, etc. Computations have been discovered by mathematicians when trying to expalin some foundational difficulties in pure mathematics. Mathematicians aren't physical? Computations are discovered through a living nervous system, one that has been highly developed and conditioned specifically for that purpose. Computation and mechanism have been discovered by many people since humans are there. It is related to the understanding of the difference between finite and infinite. The modern notion has been discovered independently by many mathematicians, notably Emil Post, Alan Turing, Alonzo Church, Andrzei Markov, etc. With the comp. hyp., this is easily explainable, given that we are somehow made of (in some not completely Aristotelian sense to be sure) computations. We can implement computation in the physical worlds, but that means only that the physical reality is (at least) Turing universal. Theoretical computer science is a branch of pure mathematics, even completely embeddable in arithmetical truth. And pure mathematics is a branch of anthropology. I thought you already agreed that the arithmetical truth are independent of the existence of humans, from old posts you write. Explain me, please, how the truth or falsity of the Riemann hypothesis, or of Goldbach conjecture depend(s) on anthropology. Please, explain me how the convergence or divergence of phi_(j) depends on the existence of humans (with phi_i = the ith computable function in an enumeration based on some universal system). Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Jan 9, 12:00 pm, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: On 09 Jan 2012, at 14:50, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Jan 9, 6:06 am, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: I agree with your general reply to Craig, but I disagree that computations are physical. That's the revisionist conception of computation, defended by Deustch, Landauer, etc. Computations have been discovered by mathematicians when trying to expalin some foundational difficulties in pure mathematics. Mathematicians aren't physical? Computations are discovered through a living nervous system, one that has been highly developed and conditioned specifically for that purpose. Computation and mechanism have been discovered by many people since humans are there. It is related to the understanding of the difference between finite and infinite. The modern notion has been discovered independently by many mathematicians, notably Emil Post, Alan Turing, Alonzo Church, Andrzei Markov, etc. With the comp. hyp., this is easily explainable, given that we are somehow made of (in some not completely Aristotelian sense to be sure) computations. They are making those discoveries by using their physical brain though. We can implement computation in the physical worlds, but that means only that the physical reality is (at least) Turing universal. Theoretical computer science is a branch of pure mathematics, even completely embeddable in arithmetical truth. And pure mathematics is a branch of anthropology. I thought you already agreed that the arithmetical truth are independent of the existence of humans, from old posts you write. Explain me, please, how the truth or falsity of the Riemann hypothesis, or of Goldbach conjecture depend(s) on anthropology. Please, explain me how the convergence or divergence of phi_(j) depends on the existence of humans (with phi_i = the ith computable function in an enumeration based on some universal system). The whole idea of truth or falsity in the first place depends on humans capacities to interpret experiences in those terms. We can read this quality of truth or falsity into many aspects of our direct and indirect experience, but that doesn't mean that the quality itself is external to us. If you look at a starfish, you can see it has five arms, but the starfish doesn't necessarily know it had five arms. What about arabic numerals? Seeing how popular their spread has been on Earth after humans, shouldn't we ask why those numerals, given an arithmetic universal primitive, are not present in nature independently of literate humans? If indeed all qualia, feeling, color, sounds, etc are a consequence of arithmetic, why not the numerals themselves? Why should they be limited to human minds and writings? Craig -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/9/2012 19:54, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Jan 9, 12:00 pm, Bruno Marchalmarc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: On 09 Jan 2012, at 14:50, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Jan 9, 6:06 am, Bruno Marchalmarc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: I agree with your general reply to Craig, but I disagree that computations are physical. That's the revisionist conception of computation, defended by Deustch, Landauer, etc. Computations have been discovered by mathematicians when trying to expalin some foundational difficulties in pure mathematics. Mathematicians aren't physical? Computations are discovered through a living nervous system, one that has been highly developed and conditioned specifically for that purpose. Computation and mechanism have been discovered by many people since humans are there. It is related to the understanding of the difference between finite and infinite. The modern notion has been discovered independently by many mathematicians, notably Emil Post, Alan Turing, Alonzo Church, Andrzei Markov, etc. With the comp. hyp., this is easily explainable, given that we are somehow made of (in some not completely Aristotelian sense to be sure) computations. They are making those discoveries by using their physical brain though. Sure, but that requires one to better understand what a physical brain is. In the case of COMP(given some basic assumptions), matter is explained as appearing from simpler abstract mathematical relations, in which case, a brain would be an inevitable consequence of such relations. We can implement computation in the physical worlds, but that means only that the physical reality is (at least) Turing universal. Theoretical computer science is a branch of pure mathematics, even completely embeddable in arithmetical truth. And pure mathematics is a branch of anthropology. I thought you already agreed that the arithmetical truth are independent of the existence of humans, from old posts you write. Explain me, please, how the truth or falsity of the Riemann hypothesis, or of Goldbach conjecture depend(s) on anthropology. Please, explain me how the convergence or divergence of phi_(j) depends on the existence of humans (with phi_i = the ith computable function in an enumeration based on some universal system). The whole idea of truth or falsity in the first place depends on humans capacities to interpret experiences in those terms. We can read this quality of truth or falsity into many aspects of our direct and indirect experience, but that doesn't mean that the quality itself is external to us. If you look at a starfish, you can see it has five arms, but the starfish doesn't necessarily know it had five arms. Yet that the fact the starfish has 5 arms is a fact, regardless of the starfish's awareness of it. It will have many consequences with regards of how the starfish interacts with the rest of the world or how any other system perceives it. If you see something colored red, you will know that you saw red and that is 'true', and that it will be false that you didn't see 'red', assuming you recognize 'red' the same as everyone else and that your nervous system isn't wired too strangely or if your sensory systems aren't defective or function differently than average. Consequences of mathematical truths will be everywhere, regardless if you understand them or not. A circle's length will depend on its radius regardless if you understand the relation or not. Any system, be they human, computer or alien, regardless of the laws of physics in play should also be able to compute (Church-Turing Thesis shows that computation comes very cheap and all it takes is ability of some simple abstract finite rules being followed and always yielding the same result, although specific proofs for showing Turing-universality would depend on each system - some may be too simple to have such a property, but then, it's questionable if they would be powerful enough to support intelligence or even more trivial behavior such as life/replicators or evolution), and if they can, they will always get the same results if they asked the same computational or mathematical question (in this case, mathematical truths, or even yet unknown truths such as Riemann hypothesis, Goldbach conjecture, and so on). Most physics should support computation, and I conjecture that any physics that isn't strong enough to at least support computation isn't strong enough to support intelligence or consciousness (and computation comes very cheap!). Support computation and you get any mathematical truth that humans can reach/talk about. Don't support it, and you probably won't have any intelligence in it. To put it more simply: if Church Turing Thesis(CTT) is correct, mathematics is the same for any system or being you can imagine. If it's wrong, maybe stuff like concrete infinities, hypercomputation and infinite minds could exist and that would falsify COMP, however there is zero evidence for any
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Jan 9, 12:56 am, John Clark johnkcl...@gmail.com wrote: On Sun, Jan 8, 2012 at 3:36 AM, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: But naturalism want to explain things by reducing it to nature or natural law, If you want to explain X you say that X exists because of Y. It's true that Y can be nothing and thus the existence of X is random, but let's assume that Y is something;in that case if you don't want to call Y natural law what do you want to call it? Computationalism asks for an explanation for the natural laws, And if found those explanations would be yet more natural laws; however we don't know that there is a explanation for everything, some things might be fundamental. I have a hunch that consciousness is fundamental and it's just the way data feels like when it's being processed; If that were the case than having multiple senses would be redundant. What we find instead is that plugging data from a piano note into a visual graphic does not yield any sensory parity. A deaf person cannot understand sound this way. If you turn it around so that feeling is fundamental and data is just the idea our cortex has when it is analyzing experiences, then it makes sense that there would be arithmetic patterns common to many experiences that the cortex can consider - and that those patterns could be used effectively to control phenomena on other frames (so long as we have physical devices to control them). the trouble is that even if consciousness is fundamental a proof of that fact probably does not exist, That's not a problem if it's fundamental. The problem is presuming that a sense of 'proof' is fundamental. so people will continue to invent consciousness theories trying to explain it till the end of time but none of those theories will be worth a bucket of warm spit. I think consciousness is easy to explain if you stop looking so hard and forcing it into a box. It's telling us what it is every day. Craig -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.com wrote: No free will = no hunger. No need for it. No mechanism for it. No logic to it. Cannot comment, don't know what ASCII sequence free will means. That was my point. Knowing how to eat does not require logic or induction. But your question was Is it induction that provides our understanding of how to swallow?, you asked about understanding; for prediction induction alone is enough but for understanding you need logic, and for some things neither is required. A rock can stay on the ground even though it's not very good at induction and nobody has a deep understanding of gravity yet. The genetic code in DNA could not be more digital, and it was good enough to build your brain and every other part of you out of simple amino acid molecules; if you look at the details of the assembly process biology uses to make complex things, like your brain, you find its amazingly computer-like. That may not be true even for DNA: http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110525/full/473432a.html http://www.sciencemag.org/content/333/6038/53 DNA translates its information into RNA and RNA tells the ribosomes what linear sequence of amino acid molecules to make, after the ribosomes are finished the linear sequence folds up into very complex shapes forming proteins, and that makes you including your brain. This controversial experiment (as I said no experiment is finished until it is repeated) says that there is a unknown mechanism that sometimes makes minor changes in the DNA to RNA part of that chain. In no place in that paper is it suggested that the unknown mechanism (assuming it even exists) is analog and for a very good reason, indeed it is very clear that there is no way it could be analog. Think of your father and grandfather and great grandfather and all the millions of individuals in the past that led up to you; every one of those individuals got old and died but their genetic legacy remains as vital as is was the day they were born thousand or millions of years ago, and there is absolutely no way that could happen if the information was encoded in a analog manner. Do you remember the old analog cassette tapes, if you made a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of a music tape pretty soon the resulting tape had so many errors in it that it could no longer be called music and was unlistenable; that was because with analog copying the errors are cumulative, but that is not the case with digital copying. If the internet was based on analog technology the big music companies would have had no problem with bootleg copies of their product, but it uses digital methods so they had a very big problem indeed. The primary sequence of DNA is just part of the story though. Secondary and tertiary epigenetic factors are can determine which genes are used and which are not, and they are not digital. Of course they're digital!! Cytosine and guanine are 2 of the 4 bases in DNA and it is the variation in the sequence of these 4 bases that carry the genetic code. The epigenetic factors you're talking about happens because sometimes at the point where cytosine and guanine meet a molecule called a methyl group is sometimes attached. A methyl group is a very small molecule consisting of just one carbon atom connected to three hydrogen atoms, and the existence of a methyl group changes the way the sequence of bases in DNA is translated into a sequence of amino acids in a protein. But the methyl group is either at the cytosine-guanine point or it is not, the code is still purely digital as indeed it HAD to be. Synapses don't fire, neurons fire across synapses That distinction escapes me. Just because traffic lights turn from red to green before drivers move their cars forward doesn't mean that the traffic light is what is making cars move from one place to another. Huh? Traffic lights are a very important reason that cars move from point X to point Y in the way they do. An anecdotal account of being hit by a bus is not the same thing as the experience of it. True, but that anecdotal account is the best you can do unless you're ready to step out in front of a bus yourself. But digital flowers don't smell like anything or feel like anything or grow in the ground with water. That's because flowers are nouns but you're not really interested in nouns. Digital arithmetic in a computer does seem to be the same as the arithmetic you do in your head, except that the stuff in your head is much slower and much more prone to error. Surprise is relative. What a programmer might find surprising might seem inevitable to someone who has spent more time studying the program's implication. Baloney. There is not a person on this planet who knows what will happen if you program a computer to find the first even number greater than 2 that is not the sum of two prime numbers and then stop. And it only took me 18 words to describe that problem, there are a infinite number of similar
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 08 Jan 2012, at 06:06, John Clark wrote: On Sat, Jan 7, 2012 Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: You confuse naturalism (nature exists I hope we don't have to debate if nature exists or not. Of course, nature exists (very plausibly). But naturalism want to explain things by reducing it to nature or natural law, and consider that such laws are the explanations. Computationalism asks for an explanation for the natural laws, or for the beliefs in them, without using them. And it explains them from computation and self-reference (with computation used in the mathematical sense). and is fundamental/primitive) Correct me if I'm wrong but you seem to dislike naturalism Not at all. I just think that naturalism is simply incompatible with mechanism. so you think there is no such thing as a fundamental/primitive so it is always meaningful to ask what is that made of?. You could be right, or maybe not, nobody knows We know (or should know) that metaphysical naturalism is refutable, and the evidences are for mechanism, against naturalism. This does not mean it is always meaningful to ask what is that made of?. There are no thing made of something. The idea of things being made of something is still Aristotelian. If mechanism is true, there are only true number *relations*. Some represent machine's dreams, and the physical reality supervene on infinities of dreams, as seen from some point of view. and rationalism (things works by and for a reason). I don't demand that, things can be random. I was just using your definition. Now, I am not sure things can be random, nor what that would mean. But a measurement result, like self- localization after a self-duplication (à-la Washington/Moscow) can be random. if you are willing to believe that your consciousness would remain unchanged for a digital functional substitution of your parts made at some description level of your body, I do think that is true. OK. That's my main working hypothesis. then physics can no more be the fundamental science of reality We already knew that because we can at least so far sill explain physics, thus obviously we haven't gotten to the fundamental level yet, assuming there is a fundamental level, and you could be right and there might not be one. If mechanism is correct, physics becomes independent of the choice of the fundamental level, and any first order logical specification of a universal system (in Turing sense) can be chosen as being the primitive level. I use numbers+addition+multiplication as universal system because it is the simplest and best known one. and the physical universe has to be explained in term of cohesive digital machine dreams/computation. If you want a explanation then you can't believe that's the fundamental level either and a way must be found to explain that ,and there is no end to the matter. Except that for the numbers (or the first order specification of a universal system) I can prove we cannot derive it from something simpler. Thus we have to postulate it. We cannot explain anything from an empty theory. Now, actual QM (à-la Everett/Deutsch) assumes computationalism and the SWE. But computationalism has to explain the SWE. Physics becomes derivable from non physical concepts (like Everett explains the appearance of the collapse of the wave, comp explains the appearance of the wave itself). So it provides a deeper explanations, and comp explains also the difference between qualia and quanta. to believe that nature and matter is primitive gives a sort of supernatural conception of matter, of the kind don't ask for more explanation. I am not satisfied by that type of quasi-magical explanation If you're right then reality is like a enormous onion with a infinite number of layers and no first level, no fundamental level because you can always find a level even more fundamental. Not really. I can't find something more fundamental than the natural numbers (or combinators, fortran programs, etc.). basically, digital mechanism (comp) makes elementary arithmetic the theory of everything. Physics becomes a branch of elementary arithmetic. On the other hand the universe could be constructed in such a way that you will forever be unsatisfied and there is a first/ fundamental level and when we reach it we come to the end of the philosophy game, and there is nothing more to be said. But with mechanism the question of the existence of the universe is an open problem. There are only partial numbers dreams, and we still don't know if those dreams are sharable enough to provide a well defined notion of physical reality. Anyway, the whole mind-body problem is transformed into a purely arithmetical problem, in the shape of numbers' or digital machine's theology. This announce the end of the Aristotelian theology (used by atheists and
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Sat, Jan 7, 2012 at 1:31 AM, Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.comwrote: I don't see any logic or induction in the assertion that the only possible epistemological sources for Homo sapiens must be logic or induction. What other pathway to knowledge do you propose? Well OK there is direct experience. I think therefore I am, I think. Is it induction that provides our understanding of how to swallow? Only logic can provide understanding, the best that induction can do is make predictions. And the fact is I don't understand how to swallow, and not being a physiologist, I don't understand how to digest my food either, but fortunately understanding how to do something is not always necessary to do it, so I can still digest food just fine. Is it logical that a feeling that seems associated with the inside of your abdomen should indicate that your survival depends upon putting some formerly living organism in your mouth? Hunger sounds like basic survival programming to me, programming written by Evolution; organisms that did not have this programming did not live long enough to reproduce, and without exception every single one of your many millions of ancestors did live long enough to do this. You and I are both descendents of a long long line of very rare winners. All computation in nature, including the human brain is analog. The genetic code in DNA could not be more digital, and it was good enough to build your brain and every other part of you out of simple amino acid molecules; if you look at the details of the assembly process biology uses to make complex things, like your brain, you find its amazingly computer-like. And a synapse in your brain either fires or it does not. If I change the biochemistry of your brain your subjective experience will change, it you don't believe me just take a drug that is not normally in your brain, like LSD or heroin, and see if I'm right. That would be an anecdotal subjective account. Obviously. There is nothing we can see from looking at the brain's behavior that suggests LSD or heroin causes anything except biochemical changes in the neurological organs. There is nothing we can see from just looking at the brain's behavior that suggests it is conscious, you just can't detect it directly from human brains or anything else, that's why if we want to study consciousness we must do so indirectly through anecdotal subjective accounts and other forms of behavior. But if we had no access to a person's account of feeling fear or anger, the chemists detection of elevated levels of adrenaline in the brain (and body) would be meaningless. Yes but we DO have access to the person's accounts and behavior so it is not meaningless. Is it wacko to say that a plastic flower has no link to a real flower? If a plastic flower smelled, felt, tasted, grew and looked exactly like a real flower even with a powerful microscope then calling it plastic would indeed be wacko. Only the most glassy eyed computer fanatic would fail to see that an electronic puppet That is a terrible analogy! A puppeteer knows what his puppet is going to do as well as he knows what he himself is going to do, but a computer designer or programmer most certainly does NOT know what his creation is going to do and it constantly surprises him, and that is in fact the entire point of making them in the first place. And I'm not glassy eyed. is not capable of turning into a living human mind. The ultimate outcome will not be something as trivial as a living human mind. *Our* human awareness can tell when it encounters itself. Behavior has a lot to do with it, Yes. but there are other factors. Like size. If a person was the size of an ant, we would have a hard time accepting it as an equal. That's only because that's what you're accustomed to. If you lived in a world where the smaller someone was the smarter they seemed to be and all your college professors were a quarter of an inch tall then I'll bet you'd have very different views about the consciousness potential of an ant. It is entirely probable that we have a sense of a person that is direct but not reducible to easily identified intellectual understandings. Then you would have to concede that if a computer passes the Turing test then the computer is a conscious being, or else your above speculation is incorrect. A dog is probably not going to be fooled by an android. Then it has failed the dog Turing test and you need better android designers for version 2.0, so fire your old designers and get new ones. I just finished the Steve Jobs biography and I think that's what he'd do. An intelligent computer is designed to seem conscious though. That doesn't make a difference to you? How on Earth could it make a difference to me?! I have no way of detecting consciousness other than my own, all I can do is detect things that seem to be conscious and if that's not good enough then so be it because that's
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 8 January 2012 04:57, John Clark johnkcl...@gmail.com wrote: Yes Turing was persecuted but his unjust treatment was caused by his privet life and had nothing to do with his scientific ideas. Interesting...I didn't know that Turing was persecuted for his unpopular views about hedging. David From Wikipedia: Turing's homosexuality resulted in a criminal prosecution in 1952, when homosexual acts were still illegal in the United Kingdom. He accepted treatment with female hormones (chemical castration) as an alternative to prison. He died in 1954, just over two weeks before his 42nd birthday, from cyanide poisoning. Yes Turing was persecuted but his unjust treatment was caused by his privet life and had nothing to do with his scientific ideas. If Turing had been a famous athlete he would have been in just as much trouble, and if he'd been a well known literary figure and wit he would have been in even more trouble because they tend to make more powerful enemies than mathematicians; just ask Oscar Wilde. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Jan 8, 12:03 pm, John Clark johnkcl...@gmail.com wrote: On Sat, Jan 7, 2012 at 1:31 AM, Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.comwrote: I don't see any logic or induction in the assertion that the only possible epistemological sources for Homo sapiens must be logic or induction. What other pathway to knowledge do you propose? Well OK there is direct experience. I think therefore I am, I think. Yes, and our experience is also not limited to just thinking. We experience all kinds of conditions and truths that we are not directly conscious of but which subconscious and unconscious parts of us are aware. Is it induction that provides our understanding of how to swallow? Only logic can provide understanding, the best that induction can do is make predictions. And the fact is I don't understand how to swallow, and not being a physiologist, I don't understand how to digest my food either, but fortunately understanding how to do something is not always necessary to do it, so I can still digest food just fine. That was my point. Knowing how to eat does not require logic or induction. To say that it is instinct is a sufficient label for common purposes, but if you are discussing consciousness, we have to ask what is instinct really made of? Is it logical that a feeling that seems associated with the inside of your abdomen should indicate that your survival depends upon putting some formerly living organism in your mouth? Hunger sounds like basic survival programming to me, programming written by Evolution; organisms that did not have this programming did not live long enough to reproduce, and without exception every single one of your many millions of ancestors did live long enough to do this. You and I are both descendents of a long long line of very rare winners. That's a 'just-so story'. If evolution could program organisms to seek food when they are low on nutrients, the experience of hunger would be superfluous. Also, it's not clear that organisms lacking hunger would not survive. I would not guess that hunger would improve a plant's chance of survival. Seems like any organism which is passively anchored into the soil or drifting in the water would have no use for hunger. Hunger really has no possible purpose outside of informing a subjective agent about conditions which it can choose to act upon voluntarily...using free will. No free will = no hunger. No need for it. No mechanism for it. No logic to it. All computation in nature, including the human brain is analog. The genetic code in DNA could not be more digital, and it was good enough to build your brain and every other part of you out of simple amino acid molecules; if you look at the details of the assembly process biology uses to make complex things, like your brain, you find its amazingly computer-like. And a synapse in your brain either fires or it does not. That may not be true even for DNA: http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110525/full/473432a.html http://www.sciencemag.org/content/333/6038/53 The transmission of information from DNA to RNA is a critical process. We compared RNA sequences from human B cells of 27 individuals to the corresponding DNA sequences from the same individuals and uncovered more than 10,000 exonic sites where the RNA sequences do not match that of the DNA. All 12 possible categories of discordances were observed. These differences were nonrandom as many sites were found in multiple individuals and in different cell types, including primary skin cells and brain tissues. Using mass spectrometry, we detected peptides that are translated from the discordant RNA sequences and thus do not correspond exactly to the DNA sequences. These widespread RNA-DNA differences in the human transcriptome provide a yet unexplored aspect of genome variation. The primary sequence of DNA is just part of the story though. Secondary and tertiary epigenetic factors are can determine which genes are used and which are not, and they are not digital. Synapses don't fire, neurons fire across synapses, but that doesn't make the brain a binary computer. Far from it. It's a living thing. Just because traffic lights turn from red to green before drivers move their cars forward doesn't mean that the traffic light is what is making cars move from one place to another. There is a lot more going on in the brain than neurons firing. If I change the biochemistry of your brain your subjective experience will change, it you don't believe me just take a drug that is not normally in your brain, like LSD or heroin, and see if I'm right. That would be an anecdotal subjective account. Obviously. So it wouldn't be evidence. There is nothing we can see from looking at the brain's behavior that suggests LSD or heroin causes anything except biochemical changes in the neurological organs. There is nothing we can see from just looking at the brain's behavior that suggests it is conscious, you just
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Sun, Jan 8, 2012 at 3:36 AM, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: But naturalism want to explain things by reducing it to nature or natural law, If you want to explain X you say that X exists because of Y. It's true that Y can be nothing and thus the existence of X is random, but let's assume that Y is something;in that case if you don't want to call Y natural law what do you want to call it? Computationalism asks for an explanation for the natural laws, And if found those explanations would be yet more natural laws; however we don't know that there is a explanation for everything, some things might be fundamental. I have a hunch that consciousness is fundamental and it's just the way data feels like when it's being processed; the trouble is that even if consciousness is fundamental a proof of that fact probably does not exist, so people will continue to invent consciousness theories trying to explain it till the end of time but none of those theories will be worth a bucket of warm spit. This does not mean it is always meaningful to ask what is that made of?. It is until you get to something fundamental, then all you can say is that's just the way things are. If that is unsatisfactory then direct your rage at the universe. But perhaps you can always find something more fundamental, but I doubt it, I think consciousness is probably the end of the line. There are no thing made of something. Good heavens, if we can't agree even that at least sometimes somethings are made of parts we will be chasing our intellectual tails forever going nowhere. The idea of things being made of something is still Aristotelian. Aristotle like most philosophers liked to write about stuff that every person on the planet knows to be obviously true and state that fact to the world in inflated language as if he'd made a great discovery. Of course most things are made of parts, although I'm not too sure about electrons, they might be fundamental. If mechanism is true, there are only true number *relations*. I don't see your point. What's the difference from saying that gear X in a clock moved because of its relation to spring Y in the same clock, and saying that the clock is made of parts and 2 of those parts are gear X and spring Y? I am not sure things can be random, nor what that would mean. It would mean a event without a cause and I don't see why that is more illogical that a event with a cause. If mechanism is correct, physics becomes independent of the choice of the fundamental level, Choice of the fundamental level? There can only be one fundamental level, or none at all. for the numbers (or the first order specification of a universal system) I can prove we cannot derive it from something simpler.[...] I can't find something more fundamental than the natural numbers OK then numbers are fundamental, and the lifeblood of computers are those very same numbers, so if asked how computers produce consciousness there may be nothing to say except that's just what numbers do. actual QM (à-la Everett/Deutsch) assumes computationalism and the SWE. But computationalism has to explain the SWE. Numbers can certainly describe the Schrodinger Wave Equation, the question you're really asking is why does the universe operate according to that equation and not another? Everett has a answer, it may or may not be the correct answer but at least it's a answer, because that's the universe you happen to be living in and you've got to live in some universe. Another explanation is that the link between Schrodinger's equation and matter is fundamental, after all, you said numbers are fundamental but you didn't say that's the only thing that is. God created the natural numbers, all the rest are (sharable) dreams by and among relative numbers. I am not saying that this is true, but that it follows from the belief that consciousness is invariant for digital functional substitution OK, I'm not sure I agree but I see your point. I suppose it comes back to the old question, were the imaginary and irrational numbers invented or discovered? John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 06.01.2012 20:44 meekerdb said the following: On 1/6/2012 10:14 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: Bruno, I have recently finished listening Prof Hoenen's Theorien der Wahrheit where he has also reviewed Feyerabend's Science in a Free Society. Today I wanted to learn more about that book and have found in Internet Paul Feyerabend, 1975 How To Defend Society Against Science http://www.galilean-library.org/manuscript.php?postid=43842 You may like it. Just two quote: The lesson is plain: there does not exist a single argument that could be used to support the exceptional role which science today plays in society. Science is just one of the many ideologies that propel society and it should be treated as such. Other quotes that I like are at http://blog.rudnyi.ru/2012/01/feyerabend-against-science.html /In society at large the judgement of the scientist is received with the same reverence as the judgement of bishops and cardinals was accepted not too long ago. /I guess Feyerbrand was looking the other way when scientist said microscopic animals caused disease, lightning was just electricity, condoms will prevent HIV, and cigarette smoking caused cancer. I wonder what he would make of the reverence with which warnings of global warming are being received. And it is still bishops and cardinals who are interviewed on television when there are questions of ethics and public policy. Brent The Feyerbrand's paper is not about that. Rather take Hugh Everett III, the creator of many-worlds interpretation. Wikipedia says Discouraged by the scorn[4] of other physicists for MWI, Everett ended his physics career after completing his Ph.D. In my view this is in agreement with Feyerbrand Heretics in science are still made to suffer from the most severe sanctions this relatively tolerant civilization has to offer. Evgenii -- http:/blog.rudnyi.ru -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 06.01.2012 23:11 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 at 12:33 PM, Bruno Marchalmarc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: In fact I do agree often with John Clark, but then he exaggerates also very often the point. I've told you a million times I never exaggerate. The church was asking to Galileo to present his view as a theory or conjecture What do you suppose would have happened if Galileo asked the church to present its views as a theory or conjecture?! Actually Galileo was not tortured but he was shown the instruments for it, as the worlds greatest expert on mechanics at the time he certainly understood how such machines operated, as a result he publicly apologized for his scientific ideas and said in writing that the church was right, the Earth was the center of the universe after all. I certainly don't hold this against Galileo, instead I look at it as yet another example of the man's enormous intellect. Only 20 years before, another astronomer Giordano Bruno, said that space was infinite, the stars were like the sun only very far away and life probably filled the universe, but Bruno was not as smart as Galileo, he refused to recant his views. For the crime of telling the truth Bruno was burned alive in the center of Rome so all could see, according to custom green wood was used because it doesn't burn as hot so it takes longer to kill. I imagine Feyerabend would say that the church's verdict against Bruno was rational and just too. I am afraid, that what you are talking about is just an example of mass culture that enjoy widespread use in the modern highly educated society. Below there are some quotes from Wikipedia on Bruno as the martyr for modern science. As for Feyerabend, I believe this his quote is appropriate: Do not be misled by the fact that today hardly anyone gets killed for joining a scientific heresy. This has nothing to do with science. It has something to do with the general quality of our civilization. Heretics in science are still made to suffer from the most severe sanctions this relatively tolerant civilization has to offer. Evgenii From Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giordano_Bruno the Roman Inquisition found him guilty of heresy [Giordano Bruno] for his pantheism Some assessments suggest that Bruno's ideas about the universe played a smaller role in his trial than his pantheist beliefs, which differed from the interpretations and scope of God held by the Catholic Church. However, today, many feel that any characterization of Bruno's thought as 'scientific' (and hence any attempt to position him as a martyr for 'science') is hard to accept. e.g. Ever since Domenico Berti revived him as the hero who died rather than renounce his scientific conviction of the truth of the Copernican theory, the martyr for modern science, the philosopher who broke with medieval Aristotelianism and ushered in the modern world, Bruno has been in a false position. The popular view of Bruno is still roughly as just stated. If I have not finally proved its falsity, I have written this book in vain Frances Yates, Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1964, p450; see also: Adam Frank, The Constant Fire: Beyond the Science vs. Religion Debate, University of California Press, 2009, p24 Galileo did endorse the modern view of naturalism, Another reason Galileo was a great man. and that science *has* to be naturalist If there are things about the universe that are not naturalistic (and there might be), that is to say if there are things that do not work by reason then science has nothing it can say about them, so yes science *has* to be naturalistic. and this *is* a scientific error (as comp illustrates) which has not yet been corrected (excepting the study of comp). I don't know what that means. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 06.01.2012 22:28 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 at 11:54 AM, Evgenii Rudnyiuse...@rudnyi.ru wrote: This does not mean that everybody has to agree with him [Feyerabend] but a statement about an idiot looks exaggerated. If one can not use the word idiot to refer to someone who says things like The church at the time of Galileo was much more faithful to reason than Galileo or Its verdict against Galileo was rational and just then the word idiot should be removed from the English language because it would never be appropriate to use that word against anyone under any circumstances; but unfortunately it turns out that the word can be useful a appalling number of times in everyday life and even more often if the subject is philosophers. It's especially ironic to hear criticism of my criticism of Feyerabend's criticism of Galileo when Feyerabend, being a idiot, believed that all criticisms were of equal value. You are free to express your opinion and I am free to express mine. Don't you agree? Otherwise in my view when we talk about history it would be good to follow historical events. I have read Against Method a long time ago but then my impression was that Feyerabend respects historical research. As usual, one can imagine different interpretations of historical events but while contrasting them I personally find the use of the word 'Idiot' inappropriate. This term is more appropriate for propaganda but not for science. If you believe that Feyerabend contradicts with historical research, it would be more meaningful instead of using propaganda to show his mistakes in history. Evgenii His book Against method has been cited more than 6000 times according to Google Scholar I don't doubt that for an instant, and I don't doubt that every one of those 6000 scholars who spoke about Feyerabend in a positive light wrote philosopher on the line on their tax return that asked about occupation, which means that not one of them has made a contribution to philosophy. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 06 Jan 2012, at 23:11, John Clark wrote: On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 at 12:33 PM, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: In fact I do agree often with John Clark, but then he exaggerates also very often the point. I've told you a million times I never exaggerate. The church was asking to Galileo to present his view as a theory or conjecture What do you suppose would have happened if Galileo asked the church to present its views as a theory or conjecture?! Actually Galileo was not tortured but he was shown the instruments for it, as the worlds greatest expert on mechanics at the time he certainly understood how such machines operated, as a result he publicly apologized for his scientific ideas and said in writing that the church was right, the Earth was the center of the universe after all. I certainly don't hold this against Galileo, instead I look at it as yet another example of the man's enormous intellect. Only 20 years before, another astronomer Giordano Bruno, said that space was infinite, the stars were like the sun only very far away and life probably filled the universe, but Bruno was not as smart as Galileo, he refused to recant his views. For the crime of telling the truth Bruno was burned alive in the center of Rome so all could see, according to custom green wood was used because it doesn't burn as hot so it takes longer to kill. I imagine Feyerabend would say that the church's verdict against Bruno was rational and just too. You might give reference to corroborate this. At first sight, the case of Galileo and Bruno does not seem comparable. Galileo did endorse the modern view of naturalism, Another reason Galileo was a great man. and that science *has* to be naturalist If there are things about the universe that are not naturalistic (and there might be), that is to say if there are things that do not work by reason then science has nothing it can say about them, so yes science *has* to be naturalistic. You confuse naturalism (nature exists and is fundamental/primitive) and rationalism (things works by and for a reason). The first is the main axiom of Aristotle theology, the second defines the general scientific attitude. Today we know that they oppose each other. Indeed nature might have a non natural reason. For example nature, or the belief in nature, might have a logical and/or an arithmetical reason independent of its reification. and this *is* a scientific error (as comp illustrates) which has not yet been corrected (excepting the study of comp). I don't know what that means. It means, in a nutshell, that if you are willing to believe that your consciousness would remain unchanged for a digital functional substitution of your parts made at some description level of your body, (comp), then physics can no more be the fundamental science of reality, and the physical universe has to be explained in term of cohesive digital machine dreams/computation. Physics becomes one of the internal aspect, from the relative point of view of numbers/ program/digital-machine, of arithmetic. We have been discussing this a lot on this list. You might have also followed the first six steps of the reasoning (the universal dovetailer argument) on the FOR list perhaps. If not you might read my sane04 paper(*). I don't oppose natural with supernatural, but with computer science- theoretical or logico-arithmetical. In fact, to believe that nature and matter is primitive gives a sort of supernatural conception of matter, of the kind don't ask for more explanation. I am not satisfied by that type of quasi-magical explanation, and besides, I can explain in all details why that position is irrational once we bet that we are digitalizable machine. In fine, computationalism forces to recognize that Plato's theology might have been, with respect to the fundamental questions, more rational than Aristotle's materialist theology (used by christians and their atheists variants). The simple dream argument shows already that observation is never a proof of existence, and that the *primitive* existence of a physical universe is a scientific hypothesis, not an undoubtable fact (unlike consciousness here-and-now). Bruno (*) http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/publications/SANE2004MARCHALAbstract.html http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
Hi Evgenii, On 06 Jan 2012, at 19:14, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: Bruno, I have recently finished listening Prof Hoenen's Theorien der Wahrheit where he has also reviewed Feyerabend's Science in a Free Society. Today I wanted to learn more about that book and have found in Internet Paul Feyerabend, 1975 How To Defend Society Against Science http://www.galilean-library.org/manuscript.php?postid=43842 You may like it. Just two quote: The lesson is plain: there does not exist a single argument that could be used to support the exceptional role which science today plays in society. Hmm... Not sure I agree with this, but I have a larger conception of science that most scientist today. Personally I consider that science is natural, and practiced by virtually all animals. Babies makes theories and update them all the time. Science becomes good science when it stays modest and conscious of the hypothetical character of all theories. In fact I do not believe in Science, I believe only in scientific attitude, which is really nothing more than curiosity, doubting and modesty. Science is just one of the many ideologies that propel society and it should be treated as such. I disagree a lot with this, although some modern view of science might be like that, notably naturalism. A lot of naturalist seems to take for granted the primitive existence of a universe, or of matter or nature. Once we take *anything* for granted, we just stop doing science for doing ideology, which is only bad religion. Of course human science is not scientific most of the time, and I am talking about ideal science. Hmm... I agree with Feyerabend on Galileo, but that might be the only point where I agree with him, to be honest. Other quotes that I like are at http://blog.rudnyi.ru/2012/01/feyerabend-against-science.html I took a look, and I really think that Feyerabend confuses science and science-done-by-weak-human in search of food, position and power. In a sense I believe that the scientific era has existed among a few intellectual only from -500 to +500. After that, the most fundamental science, which I think is theology, has been politicized. The enlightenment period was only 1/2 enlightened, because its main subject, the reason why we are here, has remained a political taboo. The whole human science remains in practice based on the worst of all arguments: the boss is right.. Bruno On 06.01.2012 18:33 Bruno Marchal said the following: On 06 Jan 2012, at 17:54, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 06.01.2012 17:08 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 Evgenii Rudnyiuse...@rudnyi.ru wrote: If to talk about Galileo, then it would also good to remember Feyerabend (for example Against method). Feyerabend has studied the way Galileo has made science a lot and his conclusion: The church at the time of Galileo was much more faithful to reason than Galileo himself, and also took into consideration the ethical and social consequences of Galileo's doctrine. Its verdict against Galileo was rational and just, and revisionism can be legitimized solely for motives of political opportunism. I believe those remarks could be summarized more concisely if he had said I Paul Feyerabend am an idiot. I love philosophy but hate philosophers because very little philosophy comes from professional philosophers, it comes from scientists and mathematicians. Every time I think I'm being too hard on philosophers somebody mentions a person like Feyerabend and I remember why I dislike them so much. John K Clark This statement contradict to a normal scientific world view but it is based on historical facts. Hence it well might be that you have to read more about Galileo. As for Feyerabend (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Feyerabend) Feyerabend became famous for his purportedly anarchistic view of science and his rejection of the existence of universal methodological rules.[1] He is an influential figure in the philosophy of science, and also in the sociology of scientific knowledge. His book Against method has been cited more than 6000 times according to Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Feyerabend This does not mean that everybody has to agree with him but a statement about an idiot looks exaggerated. I agree. In fact I do agree often with John Clark, but then he exaggerates also very often the point. I am probably very close to him on philosophers, especially continental one, and on Feyerabend. But, actually, in this Galileo case, I have come to similar conclusion as Feyerabend, and I think it is an important point. The church was asking to Galileo to present his view as a theory or conjecture, and the church agreed that such a theory explain better the facts. The church asks him only to accept that it was only a theory, but Galileo refused (or accepted it but only to avoid trouble, cf e pur si muove). Of course, Galileo should have answered
Re: An analogy for Qualia
I took a look, and I really think that Feyerabend confuses science and science-done-by-weak-human in search of food, position and power. I would agree in a sense that Feyerabend states that in the human society there is science-done-by-weak-human in search of food, position and power only. At least his empirical search has found nothing else. Could you please give examples of the first alternative that you mention? Evgenii On 07.01.2012 12:51 Bruno Marchal said the following: Hi Evgenii, On 06 Jan 2012, at 19:14, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: Bruno, I have recently finished listening Prof Hoenen's Theorien der Wahrheit where he has also reviewed Feyerabend's Science in a Free Society. Today I wanted to learn more about that book and have found in Internet Paul Feyerabend, 1975 How To Defend Society Against Science http://www.galilean-library.org/manuscript.php?postid=43842 You may like it. Just two quote: The lesson is plain: there does not exist a single argument that could be used to support the exceptional role which science today plays in society. Hmm... Not sure I agree with this, but I have a larger conception of science that most scientist today. Personally I consider that science is natural, and practiced by virtually all animals. Babies makes theories and update them all the time. Science becomes good science when it stays modest and conscious of the hypothetical character of all theories. In fact I do not believe in Science, I believe only in scientific attitude, which is really nothing more than curiosity, doubting and modesty. Science is just one of the many ideologies that propel society and it should be treated as such. I disagree a lot with this, although some modern view of science might be like that, notably naturalism. A lot of naturalist seems to take for granted the primitive existence of a universe, or of matter or nature. Once we take *anything* for granted, we just stop doing science for doing ideology, which is only bad religion. Of course human science is not scientific most of the time, and I am talking about ideal science. Hmm... I agree with Feyerabend on Galileo, but that might be the only point where I agree with him, to be honest. Other quotes that I like are at http://blog.rudnyi.ru/2012/01/feyerabend-against-science.html I took a look, and I really think that Feyerabend confuses science and science-done-by-weak-human in search of food, position and power. In a sense I believe that the scientific era has existed among a few intellectual only from -500 to +500. After that, the most fundamental science, which I think is theology, has been politicized. The enlightenment period was only 1/2 enlightened, because its main subject, the reason why we are here, has remained a political taboo. The whole human science remains in practice based on the worst of all arguments: the boss is right.. Bruno -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Sat, Jan 7, 2012 at 4:11 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi use...@rudnyi.ru wrote: You are free to express your opinion and I am free to express mine. Don't you agree? Yes, and Feyerabend should be free to say anything that pops into his head no matter how silly, and I should be free to call him an idiot for doing so. If you believe that Feyerabend contradicts with historical research, it would be more meaningful instead of using propaganda to show his mistakes in history. The problem is not historical research, I have no disagreement with any of the facts Feyerabend presents, I do however have a massive disagreement with his opinion regarding those facts, such as: The church at the time of Galileo was much more faithful to reason than Galileo himself or its verdict against Galileo was rational and just. Frankly it just boggles my mind that well into the 21'st certury somebody could read those lines and NOT call their author a complete idiot. I personally find the use of the word 'Idiot' inappropriate. Would fool be more appropriate, how about moron? Apparently you do think the word idiot should be removed from the English language, I disagree. I believe there is solid evidence that idiots do in fact exist and the language needs a word to describe someone who behaves idiotically and idiot is a excellent candidate for such a word. And off the top of my head I can't think of a better example of an idiot than Feyerabend; assuming he was not just trying to be provocative and get attention, in which case he was not a idiot but only a hypocrite. This term is more appropriate for propaganda but not for science. OK but why change the subject, what's Feyerabend got to do with science? John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
Feyerabend Wrote: Do not be misled by the fact that today hardly anyone gets killed for joining a scientific heresy. This has nothing to do with science. It has something to do with the general quality of our civilization. Heretics in science are still made to suffer from the most severe sanctions this relatively tolerant civilization has to offer. The most severe sanctions that Feyerabend is talking about is not getting tenure, that is to say not getting a well paid cushy job for the rest of your life where its almost impossible to get fired. How barbaric! In any form of human activity there is a general consensus on if someone is doing a good job or not, and science is no exception. The scientific consensus, being composed of human beings, is not perfect and sometimes it gets it wrong, but the beauty of science is it's self correcting and big errors usually don't last for very long. Probably the longest was the consensus about Alfred Wegerner, he developed his theory of continental drift in 1912 but most scientists did not think he was right until the 1960s. But in defense of the scientific consensus until the 1960s the evidence for continental drift was not very good. As for those most severe sanctions Wegerner continued to make a living as a scientist and published books and papers until his death. I'd say that science treats its heretics a bit better than the way religion treats theirs. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 07.01.2012 17:21 John Clark said the following: On Sat, Jan 7, 2012 at 4:11 AM, Evgenii Rudnyiuse...@rudnyi.ru wrote: You are free to express your opinion and I am free to express mine. Don't you agree? Yes, and Feyerabend should be free to say anything that pops into his head no matter how silly, and I should be free to call him an idiot for doing so. If you believe that Feyerabend contradicts with historical research, it would be more meaningful instead of using propaganda to show his mistakes in history. The problem is not historical research, I have no disagreement with any of the facts Feyerabend presents, I do however have a massive disagreement with his opinion regarding those facts, such as: The church at the time of Galileo was much more faithful to reason than Galileo himself or its verdict against Galileo was rational and just. Frankly it just boggles my mind that well into the 21'st certury somebody could read those lines and NOT call their author a complete idiot. The conclusion that Feyerabend made is based on his historical research. I personally have found his book quite logical, so I go not get what you are saying. I personally find the use of the word 'Idiot' inappropriate. Would fool be more appropriate, how about moron? Apparently you do think the word idiot should be removed from the English language, I disagree. I believe there is solid evidence that idiots do in fact exist and the language needs a word to describe someone who behaves idiotically and idiot is a excellent candidate for such a word. And off the top of my head I can't think of a better example of an idiot than Feyerabend; assuming he was not just trying to be provocative and get attention, in which case he was not a idiot but only a hypocrite. We have two opinions, one is yours and ones is Feyerabend's. They are different, and I find it normal. Yet, if we talk about science then you have to explain with the historical facts why you believe that Feyerabend is idiot. So far from your side, there were just emotions, that is pure propaganda. If you have made a research on Galileo where you have shown the opposite, please make a link. Brent has recently made a good statement: That's why progress in knowledge relies on empirical evidence, not ratiocination. So it would be good to consider real historical events without ideology. This term is more appropriate for propaganda but not for science. OK but why change the subject, what's Feyerabend got to do with science? It depends on a definition. I personally consider Feyerabend as a scientist. Evgenii John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 07.01.2012 18:15 John Clark said the following: Feyerabend Wrote: Do not be misled by the fact that today hardly anyone gets killed for joining a scientific heresy. This has nothing to do with science. It has something to do with the general quality of our civilization. Heretics in science are still made to suffer from the most severe sanctions this relatively tolerant civilization has to offer. The most severe sanctions that Feyerabend is talking about is not getting tenure, that is to say not getting a well paid cushy job for the rest of your life where its almost impossible to get fired. How barbaric! In any form of human activity there is a general consensus on if someone is doing a good job or not, and science is no exception. The scientific consensus, being composed of human beings, is not perfect and sometimes it gets it wrong, but the beauty of science is it's self correcting and big errors usually don't last for very long. Probably the longest was the consensus about Alfred Wegerner, he developed his theory of continental drift in 1912 but most scientists did not think he was right until the 1960s. But in defense of the scientific consensus until the 1960s the evidence for continental drift was not very good. As for those most severe sanctions Wegerner continued to make a living as a scientist and published books and papers until his death. I'd say that science treats its heretics a bit better than the way religion treats theirs. John K Clark Let me give you another example from the recent history (I will not even touch the science in the atheistic Soviet Union under Stalin). So on this list people quite often refer to Alan Turing. From Wikipedia Turing's homosexuality resulted in a criminal prosecution in 1952, when homosexual acts were still illegal in the United Kingdom. He accepted treatment with female hormones (chemical castration) as an alternative to prison. He died in 1954, just over two weeks before his 42nd birthday, from cyanide poisoning. Who treated Turing with female hormones? The Church or the medical science? Now the society is much more tolerant, I agree, but I am not sure if this could be ascribed to the science. Or you mean the sexual revolution was made by scientists? Evgenii -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/7/2012 12:59 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 06.01.2012 23:11 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 at 12:33 PM, Bruno Marchalmarc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: In fact I do agree often with John Clark, but then he exaggerates also very often the point. I've told you a million times I never exaggerate. The church was asking to Galileo to present his view as a theory or conjecture What do you suppose would have happened if Galileo asked the church to present its views as a theory or conjecture?! Actually Galileo was not tortured but he was shown the instruments for it, as the worlds greatest expert on mechanics at the time he certainly understood how such machines operated, as a result he publicly apologized for his scientific ideas and said in writing that the church was right, the Earth was the center of the universe after all. I certainly don't hold this against Galileo, instead I look at it as yet another example of the man's enormous intellect. Only 20 years before, another astronomer Giordano Bruno, said that space was infinite, the stars were like the sun only very far away and life probably filled the universe, but Bruno was not as smart as Galileo, he refused to recant his views. For the crime of telling the truth Bruno was burned alive in the center of Rome so all could see, according to custom green wood was used because it doesn't burn as hot so it takes longer to kill. I imagine Feyerabend would say that the church's verdict against Bruno was rational and just too. I am afraid, that what you are talking about is just an example of mass culture that enjoy widespread use in the modern highly educated society. Below there are some quotes from Wikipedia on Bruno as the martyr for modern science. As for Feyerabend, I believe this his quote is appropriate: Do not be misled by the fact that today hardly anyone gets killed for joining a scientific heresy. This has nothing to do with science. It has something to do with the general quality of our civilization. Heretics in science are still made to suffer from the most severe sanctions this relatively tolerant civilization has to offer. When the most severe sanction is not having your theory accepted I don't know how any less severe sanctions can become. It's good to be open minded, but not so open minded your brains fall out. Evgenii From Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giordano_Bruno the Roman Inquisition found him guilty of heresy [Giordano Bruno] for his pantheism Some assessments suggest that Bruno's ideas about the universe played a smaller role in his trial than his pantheist beliefs, which differed from the interpretations and scope of God held by the Catholic Church. However, today, many feel that any characterization of Bruno's thought as 'scientific' (and hence any attempt to position him as a martyr for 'science') is hard to accept. e.g. Ever since Domenico Berti revived him as the hero who died rather than renounce his scientific conviction of the truth of the Copernican theory, the martyr for modern science, the philosopher who broke with medieval Aristotelianism and ushered in the modern world, Bruno has been in a false position. The popular view of Bruno is still roughly as just stated. If I have not finally proved its falsity, I have written this book in vain Frances Yates, Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1964, p450; see also: Adam Frank, The Constant Fire: Beyond the Science vs. Religion Debate, University of California Press, 2009, p24 Oh, well that's OK then if they burned him to death slowly for a theological disagreement. Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/7/2012 2:58 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: You confuse naturalism (nature exists and is fundamental/primitive) and rationalism (things works by and for a reason). The first is the main axiom of Aristotle theology, the second defines the general scientific attitude. Today we know that they oppose each other. Indeed nature might have a non natural reason. For example nature, or the belief in nature, might have a logical and/or an arithmetical reason independent of its reification. I would say you confuse them. There's no conflict between naturalism and things work for a reason. The conflict was when rationalism meant drawing conclusions from pure rationcination, without reference to empiricial support. Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/7/2012 10:16 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 07.01.2012 18:15 John Clark said the following: Feyerabend Wrote: Do not be misled by the fact that today hardly anyone gets killed for joining a scientific heresy. This has nothing to do with science. It has something to do with the general quality of our civilization. Heretics in science are still made to suffer from the most severe sanctions this relatively tolerant civilization has to offer. The most severe sanctions that Feyerabend is talking about is not getting tenure, that is to say not getting a well paid cushy job for the rest of your life where its almost impossible to get fired. How barbaric! In any form of human activity there is a general consensus on if someone is doing a good job or not, and science is no exception. The scientific consensus, being composed of human beings, is not perfect and sometimes it gets it wrong, but the beauty of science is it's self correcting and big errors usually don't last for very long. Probably the longest was the consensus about Alfred Wegerner, he developed his theory of continental drift in 1912 but most scientists did not think he was right until the 1960s. But in defense of the scientific consensus until the 1960s the evidence for continental drift was not very good. As for those most severe sanctions Wegerner continued to make a living as a scientist and published books and papers until his death. I'd say that science treats its heretics a bit better than the way religion treats theirs. John K Clark Let me give you another example from the recent history (I will not even touch the science in the atheistic Soviet Union under Stalin). So on this list people quite often refer to Alan Turing. From Wikipedia Turing's homosexuality resulted in a criminal prosecution in 1952, when homosexual acts were still illegal in the United Kingdom. He accepted treatment with female hormones (chemical castration) as an alternative to prison. He died in 1954, just over two weeks before his 42nd birthday, from cyanide poisoning. Who treated Turing with female hormones? The Church or the medical science? The government, who considered that his homosexuality made him a security risk because he could be blackmailed. Why could he be blackmailed? Because homosexuality was reviled. Why was it reviled? Because the Church taught that it was a sin - but they had given up stoning. Brent Now the society is much more tolerant, I agree, but I am not sure if this could be ascribed to the science. Or you mean the sexual revolution was made by scientists? Evgenii -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 07 Jan 2012, at 21:54, meekerdb wrote: On 1/7/2012 2:58 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: You confuse naturalism (nature exists and is fundamental/primitive) and rationalism (things works by and for a reason). The first is the main axiom of Aristotle theology, the second defines the general scientific attitude. Today we know that they oppose each other. Indeed nature might have a non natural reason. For example nature, or the belief in nature, might have a logical and/or an arithmetical reason independent of its reification. I would say you confuse them. There's no conflict between naturalism and things work for a reason. I think UDA presents such a conflict. I mean with metaphysical naturalism (not instrumentalist naturalism, which might be a good idea, at least for awhile. UDA shows that nature is secondary on some properties of universal machines/numbers. The conflict was when rationalism meant drawing conclusions from pure rationcination, without reference to empiricial support. I am an empiricist, in the sense that theories must be tested, including comp, despite it says that the physical reality is in your head, indeed in the head of all universal numbers. So let us compared the two physics. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 07 Jan 2012, at 13:13, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: I took a look, and I really think that Feyerabend confuses science and science-done-by-weak-human in search of food, position and power. I would agree in a sense that Feyerabend states that in the human society there is science-done-by-weak-human in search of food, position and power only. At least his empirical search has found nothing else. Could you please give examples of the first alternative that you mention? The comp honest answer to this is that it is only *you* who can find the pieces of ideal science *in* the science-done-by-weak-human in search of food, position and power. You are the only judge. Now, if you trust Peano Arithmetic, then the set of its theorems is a pretty good example of ideal science. The same with PA + some facts *you* agree on, or that you can assume conditionally. You can take anything which look like a scientific story success (to you) as an example. Humans, by being humans, are not well placed to put an easy frontier between the ideal science, and its relatively human concretization. Bruno Evgenii On 07.01.2012 12:51 Bruno Marchal said the following: Hi Evgenii, On 06 Jan 2012, at 19:14, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: Bruno, I have recently finished listening Prof Hoenen's Theorien der Wahrheit where he has also reviewed Feyerabend's Science in a Free Society. Today I wanted to learn more about that book and have found in Internet Paul Feyerabend, 1975 How To Defend Society Against Science http://www.galilean-library.org/manuscript.php?postid=43842 You may like it. Just two quote: The lesson is plain: there does not exist a single argument that could be used to support the exceptional role which science today plays in society. Hmm... Not sure I agree with this, but I have a larger conception of science that most scientist today. Personally I consider that science is natural, and practiced by virtually all animals. Babies makes theories and update them all the time. Science becomes good science when it stays modest and conscious of the hypothetical character of all theories. In fact I do not believe in Science, I believe only in scientific attitude, which is really nothing more than curiosity, doubting and modesty. Science is just one of the many ideologies that propel society and it should be treated as such. I disagree a lot with this, although some modern view of science might be like that, notably naturalism. A lot of naturalist seems to take for granted the primitive existence of a universe, or of matter or nature. Once we take *anything* for granted, we just stop doing science for doing ideology, which is only bad religion. Of course human science is not scientific most of the time, and I am talking about ideal science. Hmm... I agree with Feyerabend on Galileo, but that might be the only point where I agree with him, to be honest. Other quotes that I like are at http://blog.rudnyi.ru/2012/01/feyerabend-against-science.html I took a look, and I really think that Feyerabend confuses science and science-done-by-weak-human in search of food, position and power. In a sense I believe that the scientific era has existed among a few intellectual only from -500 to +500. After that, the most fundamental science, which I think is theology, has been politicized. The enlightenment period was only 1/2 enlightened, because its main subject, the reason why we are here, has remained a political taboo. The whole human science remains in practice based on the worst of all arguments: the boss is right.. Bruno -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
From Wikipedia: Turing's homosexuality resulted in a criminal prosecution in 1952, when homosexual acts were still illegal in the United Kingdom. He accepted treatment with female hormones (chemical castration) as an alternative to prison. He died in 1954, just over two weeks before his 42nd birthday, from cyanide poisoning. Yes Turing was persecuted but his unjust treatment was caused by his privet life and had nothing to do with his scientific ideas. If Turing had been a famous athlete he would have been in just as much trouble, and if he'd been a well known literary figure and wit he would have been in even more trouble because they tend to make more powerful enemies than mathematicians; just ask Oscar Wilde. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Sat, Jan 7, 2012 Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: You confuse naturalism (nature exists I hope we don't have to debate if nature exists or not. and is fundamental/primitive) Correct me if I'm wrong but you seem to dislike naturalism so you think there is no such thing as a fundamental/primitive so it is always meaningful to ask what is that made of?. You could be right, or maybe not, nobody knows and rationalism (things works by and for a reason). I don't demand that, things can be random. if you are willing to believe that your consciousness would remain unchanged for a digital functional substitution of your parts made at some description level of your body, I do think that is true. then physics can no more be the fundamental science of reality We already knew that because we can at least so far sill explain physics, thus obviously we haven't gotten to the fundamental level yet, assuming there is a fundamental level, and you could be right and there might not be one. and the physical universe has to be explained in term of cohesive digital machine dreams/computation. If you want a explanation then you can't believe that's the fundamental level either and a way must be found to explain that ,and there is no end to the matter. to believe that nature and matter is primitive gives a sort of supernatural conception of matter, of the kind don't ask for more explanation. I am not satisfied by that type of quasi-magical explanation If you're right then reality is like a enormous onion with a infinite number of layers and no first level, no fundamental level because you can always find a level even more fundamental. On the other hand the universe could be constructed in such a way that you will forever be unsatisfied and there is a first/fundamental level and when we reach it we come to the end of the philosophy game, and there is nothing more to be said. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 05.01.2012 06:29 John Clark said the following: On Tue, Jan 3, 2012 at 9:53 PM, Craig Weinbergwhatsons...@gmail.comwrote: Sure, our belief in simulations can make them seem quite realistic to us. That doesn't make them real though. And so simulators join a long long long list of things that you say are not real. If X contradicts your philosophy you just declare that X is not real; that's what the opponents of Galileo did, they insisted that everything rotated around the Earth but when they looked through Galileo's telescope they could clearly see that Jupiter's moons rotated around Jupiter NOT the Earth. So what was their response to this powerful evidence? You guessed it, things seen through a telescope were not real. If to talk about Galileo, then it would also good to remember Feyerabend (for example Against method). Feyerabend has studied the way Galileo has made science a lot and his conclusion The church at the time of Galileo was much more faithful to reason than Galileo himself, and also took into consideration the ethical and social consequences of Galileo's doctrine. Its verdict against Galileo was rational and just, and revisionism can be legitimized solely for motives of political opportunism. Evgenii -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 Evgenii Rudnyi use...@rudnyi.ru wrote: If to talk about Galileo, then it would also good to remember Feyerabend (for example Against method). Feyerabend has studied the way Galileo has made science a lot and his conclusion: The church at the time of Galileo was much more faithful to reason than Galileo himself, and also took into consideration the ethical and social consequences of Galileo's doctrine. Its verdict against Galileo was rational and just, and revisionism can be legitimized solely for motives of political opportunism. I believe those remarks could be summarized more concisely if he had said I Paul Feyerabend am an idiot. I love philosophy but hate philosophers because very little philosophy comes from professional philosophers, it comes from scientists and mathematicians. Every time I think I'm being too hard on philosophers somebody mentions a person like Feyerabend and I remember why I dislike them so much. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 06.01.2012 17:08 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 Evgenii Rudnyiuse...@rudnyi.ru wrote: If to talk about Galileo, then it would also good to remember Feyerabend (for example Against method). Feyerabend has studied the way Galileo has made science a lot and his conclusion: The church at the time of Galileo was much more faithful to reason than Galileo himself, and also took into consideration the ethical and social consequences of Galileo's doctrine. Its verdict against Galileo was rational and just, and revisionism can be legitimized solely for motives of political opportunism. I believe those remarks could be summarized more concisely if he had said I Paul Feyerabend am an idiot. I love philosophy but hate philosophers because very little philosophy comes from professional philosophers, it comes from scientists and mathematicians. Every time I think I'm being too hard on philosophers somebody mentions a person like Feyerabend and I remember why I dislike them so much. John K Clark This statement contradict to a normal scientific world view but it is based on historical facts. Hence it well might be that you have to read more about Galileo. As for Feyerabend (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Feyerabend) Feyerabend became famous for his purportedly anarchistic view of science and his rejection of the existence of universal methodological rules.[1] He is an influential figure in the philosophy of science, and also in the sociology of scientific knowledge. His book Against method has been cited more than 6000 times according to Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Feyerabend This does not mean that everybody has to agree with him but a statement about an idiot looks exaggerated. Evgenii -- http://blog.rudnyi.ru -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 06 Jan 2012, at 17:54, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 06.01.2012 17:08 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 Evgenii Rudnyiuse...@rudnyi.ru wrote: If to talk about Galileo, then it would also good to remember Feyerabend (for example Against method). Feyerabend has studied the way Galileo has made science a lot and his conclusion: The church at the time of Galileo was much more faithful to reason than Galileo himself, and also took into consideration the ethical and social consequences of Galileo's doctrine. Its verdict against Galileo was rational and just, and revisionism can be legitimized solely for motives of political opportunism. I believe those remarks could be summarized more concisely if he had said I Paul Feyerabend am an idiot. I love philosophy but hate philosophers because very little philosophy comes from professional philosophers, it comes from scientists and mathematicians. Every time I think I'm being too hard on philosophers somebody mentions a person like Feyerabend and I remember why I dislike them so much. John K Clark This statement contradict to a normal scientific world view but it is based on historical facts. Hence it well might be that you have to read more about Galileo. As for Feyerabend (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Feyerabend) Feyerabend became famous for his purportedly anarchistic view of science and his rejection of the existence of universal methodological rules.[1] He is an influential figure in the philosophy of science, and also in the sociology of scientific knowledge. His book Against method has been cited more than 6000 times according to Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Feyerabend This does not mean that everybody has to agree with him but a statement about an idiot looks exaggerated. I agree. In fact I do agree often with John Clark, but then he exaggerates also very often the point. I am probably very close to him on philosophers, especially continental one, and on Feyerabend. But, actually, in this Galileo case, I have come to similar conclusion as Feyerabend, and I think it is an important point. The church was asking to Galileo to present his view as a theory or conjecture, and the church agreed that such a theory explain better the facts. The church asks him only to accept that it was only a theory, but Galileo refused (or accepted it but only to avoid trouble, cf e pur si muove). Of course, Galileo should have answered all right, but then you should accept that God and all that is only a theory, too, which was not diplomatically possible. But by refusing the status of theory (conjecture) for its own findings, Galileo did endorse the modern view of naturalism, and that science *has* to be naturalist, and this *is* a scientific error (as comp illustrates) which has not yet been corrected (excepting the study of comp). Even Aristotle did not commit that error explicitly, although he paved the road for it. Most scientists, even layman, believes today that the existence of a primary physical reality is a *scientific fact*, where it is only either a gross animal extrapolation, or an aristotelian assumption, which can be refuted (as comp illustrates, at the least). A pity is that more or less recently the catholic church has done a work of rehabilitation of Galileo, where they endorse that very mistake, showing how much the catholic Church want weak materialism and naturalism to be dogma. That is not new, Catholics even differ from protestants on the importance of the notion of primitive matter, notably to be able to say that bread is, in concreto, the flesh of Jesus. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
Bruno, I have recently finished listening Prof Hoenen's Theorien der Wahrheit where he has also reviewed Feyerabend's Science in a Free Society. Today I wanted to learn more about that book and have found in Internet Paul Feyerabend, 1975 How To Defend Society Against Science http://www.galilean-library.org/manuscript.php?postid=43842 You may like it. Just two quote: The lesson is plain: there does not exist a single argument that could be used to support the exceptional role which science today plays in society. Science is just one of the many ideologies that propel society and it should be treated as such. Other quotes that I like are at http://blog.rudnyi.ru/2012/01/feyerabend-against-science.html Evgenii On 06.01.2012 18:33 Bruno Marchal said the following: On 06 Jan 2012, at 17:54, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 06.01.2012 17:08 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 Evgenii Rudnyiuse...@rudnyi.ru wrote: If to talk about Galileo, then it would also good to remember Feyerabend (for example Against method). Feyerabend has studied the way Galileo has made science a lot and his conclusion: The church at the time of Galileo was much more faithful to reason than Galileo himself, and also took into consideration the ethical and social consequences of Galileo's doctrine. Its verdict against Galileo was rational and just, and revisionism can be legitimized solely for motives of political opportunism. I believe those remarks could be summarized more concisely if he had said I Paul Feyerabend am an idiot. I love philosophy but hate philosophers because very little philosophy comes from professional philosophers, it comes from scientists and mathematicians. Every time I think I'm being too hard on philosophers somebody mentions a person like Feyerabend and I remember why I dislike them so much. John K Clark This statement contradict to a normal scientific world view but it is based on historical facts. Hence it well might be that you have to read more about Galileo. As for Feyerabend (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Feyerabend) Feyerabend became famous for his purportedly anarchistic view of science and his rejection of the existence of universal methodological rules.[1] He is an influential figure in the philosophy of science, and also in the sociology of scientific knowledge. His book Against method has been cited more than 6000 times according to Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Feyerabend This does not mean that everybody has to agree with him but a statement about an idiot looks exaggerated. I agree. In fact I do agree often with John Clark, but then he exaggerates also very often the point. I am probably very close to him on philosophers, especially continental one, and on Feyerabend. But, actually, in this Galileo case, I have come to similar conclusion as Feyerabend, and I think it is an important point. The church was asking to Galileo to present his view as a theory or conjecture, and the church agreed that such a theory explain better the facts. The church asks him only to accept that it was only a theory, but Galileo refused (or accepted it but only to avoid trouble, cf e pur si muove). Of course, Galileo should have answered all right, but then you should accept that God and all that is only a theory, too, which was not diplomatically possible. But by refusing the status of theory (conjecture) for its own findings, Galileo did endorse the modern view of naturalism, and that science *has* to be naturalist, and this *is* a scientific error (as comp illustrates) which has not yet been corrected (excepting the study of comp). Even Aristotle did not commit that error explicitly, although he paved the road for it. Most scientists, even layman, believes today that the existence of a primary physical reality is a *scientific fact*, where it is only either a gross animal extrapolation, or an aristotelian assumption, which can be refuted (as comp illustrates, at the least). A pity is that more or less recently the catholic church has done a work of rehabilitation of Galileo, where they endorse that very mistake, showing how much the catholic Church want weak materialism and naturalism to be dogma. That is not new, Catholics even differ from protestants on the importance of the notion of primitive matter, notably to be able to say that bread is, in concreto, the flesh of Jesus. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/6/2012 1:23 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 05.01.2012 06:29 John Clark said the following: On Tue, Jan 3, 2012 at 9:53 PM, Craig Weinbergwhatsons...@gmail.comwrote: Sure, our belief in simulations can make them seem quite realistic to us. That doesn't make them real though. And so simulators join a long long long list of things that you say are not real. If X contradicts your philosophy you just declare that X is not real; that's what the opponents of Galileo did, they insisted that everything rotated around the Earth but when they looked through Galileo's telescope they could clearly see that Jupiter's moons rotated around Jupiter NOT the Earth. So what was their response to this powerful evidence? You guessed it, things seen through a telescope were not real. If to talk about Galileo, then it would also good to remember Feyerabend (for example Against method). Feyerabend has studied the way Galileo has made science a lot and his conclusion The church at the time of Galileo was much more faithful to reason That's why progress in knowledge relies on empirical evidence, not ratiocination. Brent than Galileo himself, and also took into consideration the ethical and social consequences of Galileo's doctrine. Its verdict against Galileo was rational and just, and revisionism can be legitimized solely for motives of political opportunism. Evgenii -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/6/2012 8:54 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 06.01.2012 17:08 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 Evgenii Rudnyiuse...@rudnyi.ru wrote: If to talk about Galileo, then it would also good to remember Feyerabend (for example Against method). Feyerabend has studied the way Galileo has made science a lot and his conclusion: The church at the time of Galileo was much more faithful to reason than Galileo himself, and also took into consideration the ethical and social consequences of Galileo's doctrine. Its verdict against Galileo was rational and just, and revisionism can be legitimized solely for motives of political opportunism. I believe those remarks could be summarized more concisely if he had said I Paul Feyerabend am an idiot. I love philosophy but hate philosophers because very little philosophy comes from professional philosophers, it comes from scientists and mathematicians. Every time I think I'm being too hard on philosophers somebody mentions a person like Feyerabend and I remember why I dislike them so much. John K Clark This statement contradict to a normal scientific world view but it is based on historical facts. Hence it well might be that you have to read more about Galileo. As for Feyerabend (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Feyerabend) Feyerabend became famous for his purportedly anarchistic view of science and his rejection of the existence of universal methodological rules.[1] He is an influential figure in the philosophy of science, and also in the sociology of scientific knowledge. His book Against method has been cited more than 6000 times according to Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Feyerabend This does not mean that everybody has to agree with him but a statement about an idiot looks exaggerated. I'm sure Leviticus has been cited even more times. Brent The philosophy of science is just about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds. --- Steven Weinberg -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 06.01.2012 20:13 meekerdb said the following: On 1/6/2012 8:54 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 06.01.2012 17:08 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 Evgenii Rudnyiuse...@rudnyi.ru wrote: ... This statement contradict to a normal scientific world view but it is based on historical facts. Hence it well might be that you have to read more about Galileo. As for Feyerabend (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Feyerabend) Feyerabend became famous for his purportedly anarchistic view of science and his rejection of the existence of universal methodological rules.[1] He is an influential figure in the philosophy of science, and also in the sociology of scientific knowledge. His book Against method has been cited more than 6000 times according to Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Feyerabend This does not mean that everybody has to agree with him but a statement about an idiot looks exaggerated. I'm sure Leviticus has been cited even more times. Just run Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Leviticus and you see that Leviticus looses to Feyerabend. As you have mentioned previously we should rely on empirical evidence, not ratiocination. Evgenii Brent The philosophy of science is just about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds. --- Steven Weinberg -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/6/2012 11:26 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 06.01.2012 20:13 meekerdb said the following: On 1/6/2012 8:54 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 06.01.2012 17:08 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 Evgenii Rudnyiuse...@rudnyi.ru wrote: ... This statement contradict to a normal scientific world view but it is based on historical facts. Hence it well might be that you have to read more about Galileo. As for Feyerabend (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Feyerabend) Feyerabend became famous for his purportedly anarchistic view of science and his rejection of the existence of universal methodological rules.[1] He is an influential figure in the philosophy of science, and also in the sociology of scientific knowledge. His book Against method has been cited more than 6000 times according to Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Feyerabend This does not mean that everybody has to agree with him but a statement about an idiot looks exaggerated. I'm sure Leviticus has been cited even more times. Just run Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Leviticus and you see that Leviticus looses to Feyerabend. As you have mentioned previously we should rely on empirical evidence, not ratiocination. Evgenii Brent The philosophy of science is just about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds. --- Steven Weinberg Using your URL, my result is Leviticus 49000 Feyerabend 32500. And that's just on the internet. Leviticus was cited some before the internet. Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/6/2012 10:14 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: Bruno, I have recently finished listening Prof Hoenen's Theorien der Wahrheit where he has also reviewed Feyerabend's Science in a Free Society. Today I wanted to learn more about that book and have found in Internet Paul Feyerabend, 1975 How To Defend Society Against Science http://www.galilean-library.org/manuscript.php?postid=43842 You may like it. Just two quote: The lesson is plain: there does not exist a single argument that could be used to support the exceptional role which science today plays in society. Science is just one of the many ideologies that propel society and it should be treated as such. Other quotes that I like are at http://blog.rudnyi.ru/2012/01/feyerabend-against-science.html /In society at large the judgement of the scientist is received with the same reverence as the judgement of bishops and cardinals was accepted not too long ago. /I guess Feyerbrand was looking the other way when scientist said microscopic animals caused disease, lightning was just electricity, condoms will prevent HIV, and cigarette smoking caused cancer. I wonder what he would make of the reverence with which warnings of global warming are being received. And it is still bishops and cardinals who are interviewed on television when there are questions of ethics and public policy. Brent Evgenii On 06.01.2012 18:33 Bruno Marchal said the following: On 06 Jan 2012, at 17:54, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 06.01.2012 17:08 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 Evgenii Rudnyiuse...@rudnyi.ru wrote: If to talk about Galileo, then it would also good to remember Feyerabend (for example Against method). Feyerabend has studied the way Galileo has made science a lot and his conclusion: The church at the time of Galileo was much more faithful to reason than Galileo himself, and also took into consideration the ethical and social consequences of Galileo's doctrine. Its verdict against Galileo was rational and just, and revisionism can be legitimized solely for motives of political opportunism. I believe those remarks could be summarized more concisely if he had said I Paul Feyerabend am an idiot. I love philosophy but hate philosophers because very little philosophy comes from professional philosophers, it comes from scientists and mathematicians. Every time I think I'm being too hard on philosophers somebody mentions a person like Feyerabend and I remember why I dislike them so much. John K Clark This statement contradict to a normal scientific world view but it is based on historical facts. Hence it well might be that you have to read more about Galileo. As for Feyerabend (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Feyerabend) Feyerabend became famous for his purportedly anarchistic view of science and his rejection of the existence of universal methodological rules.[1] He is an influential figure in the philosophy of science, and also in the sociology of scientific knowledge. His book Against method has been cited more than 6000 times according to Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Feyerabend This does not mean that everybody has to agree with him but a statement about an idiot looks exaggerated. I agree. In fact I do agree often with John Clark, but then he exaggerates also very often the point. I am probably very close to him on philosophers, especially continental one, and on Feyerabend. But, actually, in this Galileo case, I have come to similar conclusion as Feyerabend, and I think it is an important point. The church was asking to Galileo to present his view as a theory or conjecture, and the church agreed that such a theory explain better the facts. The church asks him only to accept that it was only a theory, but Galileo refused (or accepted it but only to avoid trouble, cf e pur si muove). Of course, Galileo should have answered all right, but then you should accept that God and all that is only a theory, too, which was not diplomatically possible. But by refusing the status of theory (conjecture) for its own findings, Galileo did endorse the modern view of naturalism, and that science *has* to be naturalist, and this *is* a scientific error (as comp illustrates) which has not yet been corrected (excepting the study of comp). Even Aristotle did not commit that error explicitly, although he paved the road for it. Most scientists, even layman, believes today that the existence of a primary physical reality is a *scientific fact*, where it is only either a gross animal extrapolation, or an aristotelian assumption, which can be refuted (as comp illustrates, at the least). A pity is that more or less recently the catholic church has done a work of rehabilitation of Galileo, where they endorse that very mistake, showing how much the catholic Church want weak materialism and naturalism to be dogma. That is not new, Catholics even differ from protestants on the importance of the notion of primitive
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 06.01.2012 20:35 meekerdb said the following: On 1/6/2012 11:26 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 06.01.2012 20:13 meekerdb said the following: On 1/6/2012 8:54 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 06.01.2012 17:08 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 Evgenii Rudnyiuse...@rudnyi.ru wrote: ... This statement contradict to a normal scientific world view but it is based on historical facts. Hence it well might be that you have to read more about Galileo. As for Feyerabend (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Feyerabend) Feyerabend became famous for his purportedly anarchistic view of science and his rejection of the existence of universal methodological rules.[1] He is an influential figure in the philosophy of science, and also in the sociology of scientific knowledge. His book Against method has been cited more than 6000 times according to Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Feyerabend This does not mean that everybody has to agree with him but a statement about an idiot looks exaggerated. I'm sure Leviticus has been cited even more times. Just run Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Leviticus and you see that Leviticus looses to Feyerabend. As you have mentioned previously we should rely on empirical evidence, not ratiocination. Evgenii Brent The philosophy of science is just about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds. --- Steven Weinberg Using your URL, my result is Leviticus 49000 Feyerabend 32500. And that's just on the internet. Leviticus was cited some before the internet. Brent I do not know, I cannot exclude that German authorities have some censorship in Internet (or Google censors its content to Germany) but when I run Google scholar http://scholar.google.com/ and then search there Leviticus, on the first page the maximum count that I observe [ZITATION] Leviticus: a book of ritual and ethics: a continental commentary[HTML] von interpretation.orgJ Milgrom - 2004 - Fortress Pr Zitiert durch: 311 For Feyerabend on the other hand, I observe [BUCH] Against method P. Feyerabend Zitiert durch: 6338 Evgenii -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/6/2012 12:07 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 06.01.2012 20:35 meekerdb said the following: On 1/6/2012 11:26 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 06.01.2012 20:13 meekerdb said the following: On 1/6/2012 8:54 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: On 06.01.2012 17:08 John Clark said the following: On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 Evgenii Rudnyiuse...@rudnyi.ru wrote: ... This statement contradict to a normal scientific world view but it is based on historical facts. Hence it well might be that you have to read more about Galileo. As for Feyerabend (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Feyerabend) Feyerabend became famous for his purportedly anarchistic view of science and his rejection of the existence of universal methodological rules.[1] He is an influential figure in the philosophy of science, and also in the sociology of scientific knowledge. His book Against method has been cited more than 6000 times according to Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Feyerabend This does not mean that everybody has to agree with him but a statement about an idiot looks exaggerated. I'm sure Leviticus has been cited even more times. Just run Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Leviticus and you see that Leviticus looses to Feyerabend. As you have mentioned previously we should rely on empirical evidence, not ratiocination. Evgenii Brent The philosophy of science is just about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds. --- Steven Weinberg Using your URL, my result is Leviticus 49000 Feyerabend 32500. And that's just on the internet. Leviticus was cited some before the internet. Brent I do not know, I cannot exclude that German authorities have some censorship in Internet (or Google censors its content to Germany) but when I run Google scholar http://scholar.google.com/ and then search there Leviticus, on the first page the maximum count that I observe [ZITATION] Leviticus: a book of ritual and ethics: a continental commentary[HTML] von interpretation.orgJ Milgrom - 2004 - Fortress Pr Zitiert durch: 311 For Feyerabend on the other hand, I observe [BUCH] Against method P. Feyerabend Zitiert durch: 6338 Evgenii Whatever the numbers I'm sure you take my point that the number of citations has very little to do with the correctness or importance of an author. Nobody cites Isaac Newton in physics papers anymore. Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 06.01.2012 21:15 meekerdb said the following: On 1/6/2012 12:07 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: ... I do not know, I cannot exclude that German authorities have some censorship in Internet (or Google censors its content to Germany) but when I run Google scholar http://scholar.google.com/ and then search there Leviticus, on the first page the maximum count that I observe [ZITATION] Leviticus: a book of ritual and ethics: a continental commentary[HTML] von interpretation.orgJ Milgrom - 2004 - Fortress Pr Zitiert durch: 311 For Feyerabend on the other hand, I observe [BUCH] Against method P. Feyerabend Zitiert durch: 6338 Evgenii Whatever the numbers I'm sure you take my point that the number of citations has very little to do with the correctness or importance of an author. Nobody cites Isaac Newton in physics papers anymore. Brent Run Isaac Newton in the Google Scholar and you will be surprised. For example [BUCH] Newton's Principia: The mathematical principles of natural philosophy Zitiert durch: 1369 and there are other works, Optics for example is quite close. As for correctness, I would agree. As for importance not. When the scientific community cites something, then it is indeed important for the scientific community. Evgenii P.S. I think I have understood where you have seen your numbers. This is for example for Feyerabend Ergebnisse 1 - 10 von 34.000 in the right top angle. Well, it would be necessary to exclude people with the same family, but after some research, I would agree with you. It seems that in the academic circles represented by Google Scholar Leviticus is a bit more popular than Feyerabend if we take this count. Anyway I am eased now - there is no censorship in Germany. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/6/2012 12:37 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: Whatever the numbers I'm sure you take my point that the number of citations has very little to do with the correctness or importance of an author. Nobody cites Isaac Newton in physics papers anymore. Brent Run Isaac Newton in the Google Scholar and you will be surprised. For example [BUCH] Newton's Principia: The mathematical principles of natural philosophy Zitiert durch: 1369 and there are other works, Optics for example is quite close. As for correctness, I would agree. As for importance not. When the scientific community cites something, then it is indeed important for the scientific community. Evgenii It is of current interest, as there are many papers now citing the CERN paper on detection of faster-than-light neutrinos at Gran Sasso. But it is important only if true, which is very doubtful. I doubt the scientific community has ever cited Feyerabend. In fact I can't think of any citation of a philosopher in a physics paper that I have read. But you are right, Feyerabend is no idiot. He is insightful. He knows that reputation in philosophy is most easily gained by taking a position contrary to common wisdom. Brent They laughed at Bozo the Clown too. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 at 11:54 AM, Evgenii Rudnyi use...@rudnyi.ru wrote: This does not mean that everybody has to agree with him [Feyerabend] but a statement about an idiot looks exaggerated. If one can not use the word idiot to refer to someone who says things like The church at the time of Galileo was much more faithful to reason than Galileo or Its verdict against Galileo was rational and just then the word idiot should be removed from the English language because it would never be appropriate to use that word against anyone under any circumstances; but unfortunately it turns out that the word can be useful a appalling number of times in everyday life and even more often if the subject is philosophers. It's especially ironic to hear criticism of my criticism of Feyerabend's criticism of Galileo when Feyerabend, being a idiot, believed that all criticisms were of equal value. His book Against method has been cited more than 6000 times according to Google Scholar I don't doubt that for an instant, and I don't doubt that every one of those 6000 scholars who spoke about Feyerabend in a positive light wrote philosopher on the line on their tax return that asked about occupation, which means that not one of them has made a contribution to philosophy. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 at 12:33 PM, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: In fact I do agree often with John Clark, but then he exaggerates also very often the point. I've told you a million times I never exaggerate. The church was asking to Galileo to present his view as a theory or conjecture What do you suppose would have happened if Galileo asked the church to present its views as a theory or conjecture?! Actually Galileo was not tortured but he was shown the instruments for it, as the worlds greatest expert on mechanics at the time he certainly understood how such machines operated, as a result he publicly apologized for his scientific ideas and said in writing that the church was right, the Earth was the center of the universe after all. I certainly don't hold this against Galileo, instead I look at it as yet another example of the man's enormous intellect. Only 20 years before, another astronomer Giordano Bruno, said that space was infinite, the stars were like the sun only very far away and life probably filled the universe, but Bruno was not as smart as Galileo, he refused to recant his views. For the crime of telling the truth Bruno was burned alive in the center of Rome so all could see, according to custom green wood was used because it doesn't burn as hot so it takes longer to kill. I imagine Feyerabend would say that the church's verdict against Bruno was rational and just too. Galileo did endorse the modern view of naturalism, Another reason Galileo was a great man. and that science *has* to be naturalist If there are things about the universe that are not naturalistic (and there might be), that is to say if there are things that do not work by reason then science has nothing it can say about them, so yes science *has* to be naturalistic. and this *is* a scientific error (as comp illustrates) which has not yet been corrected (excepting the study of comp). I don't know what that means. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Thu, Jan 5, 2012 at 12:59 PM, Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.comwrote: Only one reason, we can't make a good enough simulation for that because we don't have enough INFORMATION. If our contemporary knowledge of physics is so complete, then that should be all the information we need. I don't know where you got the idea that our information was that complete, if it was scientists would be out of a job because they'd already know everything that was worth knowing. They don't. Just because the logic of my conscious intellect dictates that it cannot know anything unless it has been explicitly told doesn't mean that there aren't other epistemological resources at our disposal. Besides logic the only other resource at our disposal in dealing with a very complex world is induction, making use of the fact that in the universe we inhabit things usually continue; but I don't see how that can help us directly study consciousness in other people any better than logic can, and at best all induction can say is X is probably true. Not analog computing...analog in the sense of 'comparable or conceptually similar'. But that's exactly how analog computing works, they use something conceptually similar to the thing you're interested in and measure that thing in various ways to give you a answer that will be of the same magnitude as the thing you want. Rather than count analog computers work by measuring, or I should have said that's the way they worked in the olden days, they're obsolete, nobody makes analog computers anymore. generating subjectivity is what the brain is doing. As far as we can tell, the brain is doing nothing except biochemistry and physics. If I change the biochemistry of your brain your subjective experience will change, it you don't believe me just take a drug that is not normally in your brain, like LSD or heroin, and see if I'm right. Also if you experience intense fear or anger a chemist will be able to detect elevated levels of adrenaline in your brain. So if consciousness can change brain chemistry and brain chemistry can change consciousness then clearly the two do have something to do with each other and are in fact closely linked. You think that subjectivity was invented by computerphobics? I think the claim that there is no link between intelligence and consciousness was indeed invented by computerphobics. And as if that wasn't crazy enough you take it a ridiculous step even further into wacko land, you say there is no link between intelligent behavior and intelligence. I don't think there is any way anybody would advocate such counterintuitive and downright nutty ideas unless they were desperately looking for a reason to dislike computers. Deciding that subjectivity must provide external evidence of itself to itself to support your prejudice is not the path to understanding, I don't need evidence to prove to myself that I am conscious, the idea is ridiculous because I have something much better than scientific evidence, direct experience. As for your consciousness, I will never have direct evidence for that and so must learn to make do with evidence that you at least behave as if you were conscious . it's a category error. Category error is #11 on my list of odious phrases. To get on my list the phrase must be used in polite society and seem to many to be perfectly acceptable and even clever, but to me seem incorrect, insipid, evil, stupid, or just never used to support a position I agree with. The other 10 on my list are: #10) You can't cry FIRE in a crowded theater. #9) A huge quantum leap. #8) Life is sacred. #7) The exception proves the rule. #6) level the playing field. #5) Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country. #4) Almost infinite. #3) Free will. #2) There is a reason it's random. #1) God wants. I don't know what anything is; I only know how it seems to me at this moment. — Robert Anton Wilson Nothing, is, it only seems. I agree, you seem to be conscious and a intelligent computer seems to be conscious and that's all I know and that's all I will ever know on that subject. The problem with physics is it has no tolerance for 'seems'. Actually the opposite is true, physics has elevated the status of seems and demoted the status of IS. That photon over there seems like it has no polarization because you haven't bothered to measure it, but modern physics says until you measure it and it seems to be polarized in one particular direction the photon has no polarization. Until it is measured it does not just seem to have no polarization it really has none. And the way you do the measurement is crazy but the universe is crazy so it works; take a pair of polarized sunglasses and spin them at random, lets say the sunglasses end up at 137 degrees, if the photon makes it through the sunglasses (and there is a 50% chance it will) then the photon is polarized at 137 degrees has always been at 137, if
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Fri, Jan 6, 2012 at 3:55 PM, meekerdb meeke...@verizon.net wrote: But you are right, Feyerabend is no idiot. He is insightful. He knows that reputation in philosophy is most easily gained by taking a position contrary to common wisdom. If Feyerabend believed what he said about Galileo then he is an idiot, and if he didn't then he's a hypocrite. I find nothing wrong with trying to sound provocative, but not at the expense of making statements that are just plain dumb. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Jan 6, 10:33 pm, John Clark johnkcl...@gmail.com wrote: On Thu, Jan 5, 2012 at 12:59 PM, Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.comwrote: Only one reason, we can't make a good enough simulation for that because we don't have enough INFORMATION. If our contemporary knowledge of physics is so complete, then that should be all the information we need. I don't know where you got the idea that our information was that complete, if it was scientists would be out of a job because they'd already know everything that was worth knowing. They don't. I get that idea from other people on this board. Many people who I have debated with on these issues are quite confident that our knowledge of particle physics is sufficient to simulate all phenomena in the universe. (Obviously I don't share that view, hah). Just because the logic of my conscious intellect dictates that it cannot know anything unless it has been explicitly told doesn't mean that there aren't other epistemological resources at our disposal. Besides logic the only other resource at our disposal in dealing with a very complex world is induction, making use of the fact that in the universe we inhabit things usually continue; but I don't see how that can help us directly study consciousness in other people any better than logic can, and at best all induction can say is X is probably true. I don't see any logic or induction in the assertion that the only possible epistemological sources for Homo sapiens must be logic or induction. It's just a naked assumption with no basis either in neurology or psychology. Not trying to criticize you personally but this view of consciousness is a caricature. How do you know that you are hungry? Is it logical that a feeling that seems associated with the inside of your abdomen should indicate that your survival depends upon putting some formerly living organism in your mouth? Is it induction that provides our understanding of how to swallow? All of our logic and induction is a pale shadow of our native epistemology: sense. Not analog computing...analog in the sense of 'comparable or conceptually similar'. But that's exactly how analog computing works, they use something conceptually similar to the thing you're interested in and measure that thing in various ways to give you a answer that will be of the same magnitude as the thing you want. Rather than count analog computers work by measuring, or I should have said that's the way they worked in the olden days, they're obsolete, nobody makes analog computers anymore. All computation in nature, including the human brain is analog. Still, that's not what I was talking about. generating subjectivity is what the brain is doing. As far as we can tell, the brain is doing nothing except biochemistry and physics. If I change the biochemistry of your brain your subjective experience will change, it you don't believe me just take a drug that is not normally in your brain, like LSD or heroin, and see if I'm right. That would be an anecdotal subjective account. There is nothing we can see from looking at the brain's behavior that suggests LSD or heroin causes anything except biochemical changes in the neurological organs. Also if you experience intense fear or anger a chemist will be able to detect elevated levels of adrenaline in your brain. But if we had no access to a person's account of feeling fear or anger, the chemists detection of elevated levels of adrenaline in the brain (and body) would be meaningless. There would be no possibility of imagining there could be a such thing as fear or anger. At best there would be physiological associations which relate to evolutionary biology. The brain tells us nothing about consciousness by itself. We need consciousness to begin with to learn anything about it. Same goes for consciousness - we can learn nothing about the brain just by trying to imagine what is going on physically in our minds. This is the 'explanatory gap' - no common ground between neuroscience and subjectivity. So if consciousness can change brain chemistry and brain chemistry can change consciousness then clearly the two do have something to do with each other and are in fact closely linked. Absolutely. You think that subjectivity was invented by computerphobics? I think the claim that there is no link between intelligence and consciousness was indeed invented by computerphobics. I think the claim that computation is intelligence was invented by futurists and computer enthusiasts. And as if that wasn't crazy enough you take it a ridiculous step even further into wacko land, you say there is no link between intelligent behavior and intelligence. Is it wacko to say that a plastic flower has no link to a real flower? That a photograph of fire has no link to actual fire? don't think there is any way anybody would advocate such counterintuitive and downright nutty ideas unless they were desperately
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Jan 5, 12:29 am, John Clark johnkcl...@gmail.com wrote: On Tue, Jan 3, 2012 at 9:53 PM, Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.comwrote: Sure, our belief in simulations can make them seem quite realistic to us. That doesn't make them real though. And so simulators join a long long long list of things that you say are not real. Simulators are real, and the experience generated by them is real, but the experience is not really what we are led to believe is what is being simulated. That's why they are called 'flight simulators' and not 'aircraft'. If X contradicts your philosophy you just declare that X is not real; that's what the opponents of Galileo did, they insisted that everything rotated around the Earth but when they looked through Galileo's telescope they could clearly see that Jupiter's moons rotated around Jupiter NOT the Earth. So what was their response to this powerful evidence? You guessed it, things seen through a telescope were not real. I think I'm actually playing the Galileo role. What I am pointing out is not real is the obsolete misinterpretations of observations, not the observations themselves. I am questioning the assumption of their reality, revealing the emperor's nakedness, and suggesting a coherent alternative worldview which explains the observations more completely. Why even have robots? Why not just make a simulation of outer space and decide that it's real? Only one reason, we can't make a good enough simulation for that because we don't have enough INFORMATION. If our contemporary knowledge of physics is so complete, then that should be all the information we need. We don't have to guess Incorrect, you should have said I don't have to guess, you have no way of knowing if I or anybody else really understands anything, all you know is that sometimes we behave as if we do. Not necessarily. Just because the logic of my conscious intellect dictates that it cannot know anything unless it has been explicitly told doesn't mean that there aren't other epistemological resources at our disposal. We don't have to question that people who seem to be human might not be human. that neurons have understanding, because we are associated with them and we have understanding. There are about 100 billion neurons in the human brain, if you divide understanding into 100,000,000,000 parts is the the result still understanding? If you divided even the largest library on Earth into 100 billion parts you'd be lucky to have a part that contained even one single letter. Is the letter Y a library? Dividing human subjective understanding into fragments isn't the same as dividing an object into fragments. I think what you get is a qualitative change in the depth and richness of experience. If you take a mirror reflecting the sun and break it into a thousand pieces, each piece still reflects the sun and can be used as a mirror also. It's not really important to know how it feels on these other levels of perception external to ourselves, but it is important to see the difference between sense, feeling, or detection, and a physical mechanism. The mistake our modern view makes is to gloss over the insurmountable chasm that separates subjective experience on any level and objective mechanics of any complexity. We do have to doubt that transistors have understanding because they don't produce any results which remind us of an organism which has understanding like ours. Solving equations playing Chess winning at Jeopardy and asking Siri questions on a iPhone certainly reminds me of organisms which have understanding like I do, but I have no way and will never have a way of knowing if any of these thing's understanding is really real, and given what a good job they do there is no reason for me to care. And I could say exactly the same thing about my fellow human beings. The reason to care is the same reason to care whether the Earth revolves around the Sun or not, only this is much more important since it is the difference between a worldview which sees us as we actually are and one which denies any possibility of life, order, awareness, or significance. It's [the brain] nothing like a computer which drops the contents of RAM as soon as electricity is cut off As anyone who has ever used a flash drive could tell you not all RAM acts that way. I didn't say all RAM. My point is that there are many ways that the brain is nothing like a computer. There are no discrete registers used as memory locations, no computations being completed and stored as fixed values. It doesn't work like that. It's a biological community. Mind is doing things too. It has analogs to current and power (sense and motive), relativity (perceptual frame), entropy (negentropy-significance) which relate to electromagnetism in an anomalous symmetry. Analogs? Ah, so you're a fan of analog processes, then welcome to the exciting world of analog computing. Not analog
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On Tue, Jan 3, 2012 at 9:53 PM, Craig Weinberg whatsons...@gmail.comwrote: Sure, our belief in simulations can make them seem quite realistic to us. That doesn't make them real though. And so simulators join a long long long list of things that you say are not real. If X contradicts your philosophy you just declare that X is not real; that's what the opponents of Galileo did, they insisted that everything rotated around the Earth but when they looked through Galileo's telescope they could clearly see that Jupiter's moons rotated around Jupiter NOT the Earth. So what was their response to this powerful evidence? You guessed it, things seen through a telescope were not real. Why even have robots? Why not just make a simulation of outer space and decide that it's real? Only one reason, we can't make a good enough simulation for that because we don't have enough INFORMATION. We don't have to guess Incorrect, you should have said I don't have to guess, you have no way of knowing if I or anybody else really understands anything, all you know is that sometimes we behave as if we do. that neurons have understanding, because we are associated with them and we have understanding. There are about 100 billion neurons in the human brain, if you divide understanding into 100,000,000,000 parts is the the result still understanding? If you divided even the largest library on Earth into 100 billion parts you'd be lucky to have a part that contained even one single letter. Is the letter Y a library? We do have to doubt that transistors have understanding because they don't produce any results which remind us of an organism which has understanding like ours. Solving equations playing Chess winning at Jeopardy and asking Siri questions on a iPhone certainly reminds me of organisms which have understanding like I do, but I have no way and will never have a way of knowing if any of these thing's understanding is really real, and given what a good job they do there is no reason for me to care. And I could say exactly the same thing about my fellow human beings. It's [the brain] nothing like a computer which drops the contents of RAM as soon as electricity is cut off As anyone who has ever used a flash drive could tell you not all RAM acts that way. Mind is doing things too. It has analogs to current and power (sense and motive), relativity (perceptual frame), entropy (negentropy-significance) which relate to electromagnetism in an anomalous symmetry. Analogs? Ah, so you're a fan of analog processes, then welcome to the exciting world of analog computing. Thanks to the new Heath Kit Home Study Course, you can build your very own analog computer in the privacy of your own home. Make big bucks! Amaze your friends! Be a hit at parties! This is a true analog computer, no wimpy pseudo analog stuff here, this baby can handle infinity. Before you begin construction of your analog computer there are a few helpful hints I'd like to pass along. Always keep your workplace neat and clean. Make sure your computer is cold, as it will not operate at any finite temperature above absolute zero. Use only analog substances and processes, never use digital things like matter, energy, momentum, spin, or electrical charge when you build your analog computer. Now that we got those minor points out of the way we can start to manufacture your analog computer. Step One: Repeal the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. Step Two: Use any infinitely accurate measuring stick you have handy and ... . . Step Infinity: ... When we assume that mind is what brain tissue is doing, then we are jumping to the wrong conclusion and leaving no room in the cosmos for subjectivity. Nonsense, generating subjectivity is what the brain is doing. Traditionally the words mind and subjectivity were almost synonyms, until very recently everybody just assumed that if something behaved intelligently then it had a mind and if it had a mind then it had consciousness and subjectivity. But then computers got too good and some were uncomfortable with the idea that they could become aware, so they decided to embrace what they wished was true not what reason told them was true. Deciding on what is true and only then start looking for evidence to support your prejudice is not the path to enlightenment. The cosmos has only presentations. Nothing else. A presentation needs an audience, so does the moon exist when nobody is looking at it? Nobody existed 13.2 billion years ago and on January 27 2011 astronomers first looked at a galaxy that was 13.2 billion light years away; did that galaxy really exist before January 27 2011? Call me crazy but I think it probably did. There is nothing that broken glass can be except for the presentations of it from every perspective But if broken glass is consistent and symmetrical under changes in perspective then it must have some existence independent of perspective. So what IS broken glass that causes the
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 1/4/2012 9:29 PM, John Clark wrote: It's [the brain] nothing like a computer which drops the contents of RAM as soon as electricity is cut off As anyone who has ever used a flash drive could tell you not all RAM acts that way. Anyone who's hit their head really hard can tell you brains do act that way. Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: An analogy for Qualia
On 31 Dec 2011, at 20:27, meekerdb wrote: On 12/30/2011 12:41 PM, John Clark wrote: If we found a brain growing in the attic and we had never seen one before, we would put gloves on and throw it in the trash. Ah...,well...,OK,but what is your point? I'm sure it's not Craig's point, but it illustrates my point that while a brain is an organ of intelligence/consciousness it needs a body and an environment in which to perceive and act in order to be intelligent/conscious. I agree. But eventually a body is nothing more than a relative description of infinities of programs, and an environment (in which you can be digitalised) will be a relatively probable local universal number/machine. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
