Re: Dennett and others on qualia
On 24 Dec 2012, at 00:31, meekerdb wrote: On 12/23/2012 8:29 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 26 Oct 2012, at 21:22, meekerdb wrote: On 10/26/2012 6:40 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 25 Oct 2012, at 18:57, meekerdb wrote: Good points. The contrast is usually qualia-v-quanta. I think color can be communicated and we have an RGB language for doing so that makes it more quanta than qualia. So extending your point to Schrodinger, if you're a wine connoisseur you have a language for communicating the taste of wine. Most of us don't speak it, but most people don't speak differential equations either. But those are all things that can be shared. The pain of a headache generally can't be perceived by two different people. But there are experiments that use small electric shocks to try to produce objective scales of pain. So I think you are right that it is a matter of having developed the language; I just don't think color is the best example. I disagree here. No qualia are communciable in the sense that quanta, or numbers, are communicable. We can talk and understand talk on color only because we bet that we share similar experience in front of electromagnetic wave with certain wave- length. We only agree on numbers and counting because we distinguish objects in the same way. We only can distinguish objects in the same way because we have brain which can use numbers and count, in the universal way. We bet it is universal and that seems to work (most of the time) - but the same is true of representing colors by numbers. We do it that way, instead of representing numbers by colors, because our discrimination of colors is not quite as good as our discrimination of objects (e.g. some people are color blind). We don't have to bet the brain is (Turing universal), we can prove it. We bet on Church thesis, simply. Bruno Brent Otherwise your mother could not have taught you to count. I still feel guilty how much I made my mom suffering on this. 1, 2, What!?!, I stopped already at 2. What is that? Why? With the amoeba I got acquainted with the 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, ... idea. But it will take me the reading of Nagel Newman Gödel's proof to get the 0, 1, 2, 3, ... profoundness, and to decide to study mathematics instead of biology. Bruno 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 . 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 . 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: Re: Dennett and others on qualia
Hi Bruno Marchal No doubt you are right, except that the brain is physical, while, as I understand it, a UTM is mental. [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/24/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Bruno Marchal Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-24, 05:36:51 Subject: Re: Dennett and others on qualia On 24 Dec 2012, at 00:31, meekerdb wrote: On 12/23/2012 8:29 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 26 Oct 2012, at 21:22, meekerdb wrote: On 10/26/2012 6:40 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 25 Oct 2012, at 18:57, meekerdb wrote: Good points. The contrast is usually qualia-v-quanta. I think color can be communicated and we have an RGB language for doing so that makes it more quanta than qualia. So extending your point to Schrodinger, if you're a wine connoisseur you have a language for communicating the taste of wine. Most of us don't speak it, but most people don't speak differential equations either. But those are all things that can be shared. The pain of a headache generally can't be perceived by two different people. But there are experiments that use small electric shocks to try to produce objective scales of pain. So I think you are right that it is a matter of having developed the language; I just don't think color is the best example. I disagree here. No qualia are communciable in the sense that quanta, or numbers, are communicable. We can talk and understand talk on color only because we bet that we share similar experience in front of electromagnetic wave with certain wave- length. We only agree on numbers and counting because we distinguish objects in the same way. We only can distinguish objects in the same way because we have brain which can use numbers and count, in the universal way. We bet it is universal and that seems to work (most of the time) - but the same is true of representing colors by numbers. We do it that way, instead of representing numbers by colors, because our discrimination of colors is not quite as good as our discrimination of objects (e.g. some people are color blind). We don't have to bet the brain is (Turing universal), we can prove it. We bet on Church thesis, simply. Bruno Brent Otherwise your mother could not have taught you to count. I still feel guilty how much I made my mom suffering on this. 1, 2, What!?!, I stopped already at 2. What is that? Why? With the amoeba I got acquainted with the 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, ... idea. But it will take me the reading of Nagel Newman G?el's proof to get the 0, 1, 2, 3, ... profoundness, and to decide to study mathematics instead of biology. Bruno 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 . 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 . 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. -- 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: Arithmetic as true constructions of a fictional leggo set
On 24 Dec 2012, at 15:35, Roger Clough wrote: Hi Bruno Marchal It helps me if I can understand arithmetic as true constructions of a fictional leggo set. Why fictional? Immaterial OK, but ffictional? From what you say, the natural numbers and + and * (nn+*). What is (nn+*)? are not a priori members of Platonia (if indeed that makes sense anyway). They are. Either as basic citizens, or as existing object if we start with a universal system different from arithmetic, but in all case all truth about all digital machines are a priori members in all Platonia rich enough for comp. They can simply be invoked and used as needed, as long as they don't produce contradictions. Alas, after Gödel that is not enough. In arithmetic you can depart a lot from truth, and still be consistent. That being the case, don't you need to add =, - , and / to the Leggo set ? Then we have (nn+-*/=). = is there. But - and all other computable function and programs can be defined from the axioms I gave, + a very small amount of logical axioms. If you want I can give explicit presentation(s) some day. I wonder if somebody could derive string theory from this set. Trivially, in a weak sense of string theory. Non trivially, in the stronger sense as deriving string theory, and only string theory from comp. That should be the case if string theory is the ultimate correct theory of the physical. Then we might say that the universe is an arithmetic construction. Probably an absurd idea. Actually yes. As comp implies that physics, although derivable in arithmetic + comp, is not an arithmetical construction. We already know that arithmetical truth is not an arithmetical notion, so this should not be so astonishing. Hi Bruno Marchal No doubt you are right, except that the brain is physical, while, as I understand it, a UTM is mental. But the physical is mental, or immaterial, with comp. So, no problem :) I have to go for prepare Xmas, I have a lot of nephews and little nephews ... Happy Xmas to you Roger, and to everyone, Bruno [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/24/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Bruno Marchal Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-23, 09:17:09 Subject: Re: Can the physical brain possibly store our memories ? No. On 22 Dec 2012, at 17:05, Telmo Menezes wrote: Hi Bruno, On Thu, Dec 20, 2012 at 1:01 PM, Roger Clough wrote: The infinite set of natural numbers is not stored on anything, Which causes no problem because there is not a infinite number of anything in the observable universe, probably not even points in space. Perhaps, we don't know. It causes no problem because natural numbers does not have to be stored a priori. Only when universal machine want to use them. Why do the natural numbers exist? We cannot know that. Precisely, if you assume the natural numbers, you can prove that you cannot derived the existence of the natural number and their + and * laws, in *any* theory which does not assume them, or does not assume something equivalent. That is why it is a good reason to start with them (or equivalent). Somehow, the natural numbers, with addition and multiplication, are necessarily mysterious. With the natural numbers and + and *, you can prove the existence of all universal machines, and vice versa, if you assume any other universal system (like the combinators K, S (K K), (K S), ...) you can prove the existence of the natural numbers and their laws. We have to assume at least one universal system, and I chose arithmetic because it is the simpler one. The problem is that the proof of its universality will be difficult, but at least it can be found in good mathematical logic textbook, like Mendelson or Kleene, etc. 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 . 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
Re: Re: Against Mechanism
Hi Jason Resch Since 1p has the property of perspective, and no two people can be at the same place at the same time, 3p has multiple perspectives. That is the only multiworld theory that I can believe in. [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/24/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Jason Resch Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-22, 14:56:13 Subject: Re: Against Mechanism On Sat, Dec 22, 2012 at 12:54 PM, John Clark wrote: On Sat, Dec 22, 2012 Bruno Marchal wrote: In a world with duplicating chambers there is no such thing as the future 1p view. Of course there is. There are two such future 1-view. Then as I said,? there is no such thing as the future 1p view, there is only a future 1p view. The 1-view of the M-man, and the 1-view of the W-man. Please note the use of the word and. that is why if you predict W and M, both will rightly admit having been wrong. Yes, the Moscow Man would say it was wrong if he thought (as no doubt many would) that only he is the Helsinki Man and the Washington Man is just some kind of fake; however I believe the Moscow Man is NOT right about the nature of the Washington man and there is no reason to think the Moscow Man is any sort of final authority on the Washington Man. the one that sees Washington is the Washington Man and the Washington Man is the one who sees Washington. What more do you want to know about it? What more is there to know? ? The technic to predict the future when we are multiplied, In the above I gave the precise technique for determining which city will be seen by who. What more do you want to know about it? What more is there to know? the Helsinki man will see both cities. In the 3p view, that's correct, And as John Clark has said over and over, if something seems identical in the 3p view it is certainly identical in the 1p view, although the reverse is not necessarily true. You are misapplying this rule.? This rule is most often comes up in philosophy of mind, where it is usually agreed that two brains in the same physical state will possess the same minds and the same consciousness.? That is not what is at issue here and it is not being disputed by anyone. Your error is that you are generalizing this rule beyond its domain and you wrongly conclude it means there can never be any experimental outcome regardless of whether it is analyzed and observed by an external third person, or experienced first-hand through the first-person.? This is plainly wrong, as Bruno pointed out in the quantum suicide experiment, or even just Schrodinger's cat from the cat's perspective. Once you see this is true, perhaps then you will finally try to put yourself into the shoes of the H-man, and perhaps then you will make some progress. ? ? but fail to answer the question asked. Bruno Marchal does not understand the question asked so it's not surprising that John Clark is unable to give a answer that satisfies Bruno Marchal. Take the QS as example: the most probable 3p outcome is the guy died. If many worlds is correct then from the 3p quantum view everything happens and the very meaning of probability becomes fuzzy. And by the way I think that is the major reason that the many world's interpretation is not more popular than it is. Deutsch et al. have solved the probability problem.? As Tegmark commented: The critique of many worlds is shifting from 'it makes no sense and I hate it' to simply 'I hate it'. Jason -- 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: Re: How visual images are produced in the brain. Was Dennett rightafter all ?
Hi Jason Resch I would define consciousness as perception, either internal or external, by any of the senses. So it is an activity, a verb, not a thing or noun. [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/24/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Jason Resch Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-22, 16:21:17 Subject: Re: How visual images are produced in the brain. Was Dennett rightafter all ? On Sat, Dec 22, 2012 at 2:57 PM, meekerdb wrote: On 12/22/2012 11:36 AM, Jason Resch wrote: As to how computation might lead to consciousness, I think it helps to start with a well-defined definition of consciousness.? Take dictionary.com's definition: awareness of one's own existence, sensations, thoughts, surroundings, etc. Well what is awareness?? dictionary.com defines it as: having knowledge dictionary.com's simplest non-circular definition of knowledge is simply information. As discussed earlier, you can have information in the Shannon sense, but that is just measure over different possible messages.? For it to be information *about* something, to be knowledge, it has to be grounded in the ability to act. Right.? But how do you define act?? I think changing states within the process is sufficient.? That is to say, a brain in a vat, an AI in a virtual reality, a person dreaming, etc. can all be conscious even though they have no externally visible actions.? All the necessary action is internal to the mind itself. ? ? This means that an aware system in the GoL must be able to interact with it's environment based on its knowledge. The Turing machine in the GoL could of course run an emulation of any mind in any virtual reality.? The mind would never know its true incarnation is a vast grid of cells changing states.? It is a little reminiscent of the holographic principal and how it might apply to ourselves: In a larger and more speculative sense, the theory suggests that the entire universe can be seen as a two-dimensional information structure painted on the cosmological horizon, such that the three dimensions we observe are only an effective description at macroscopic scales and at low energies. -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holographic_principle ? Jason -- 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: Re: How visual images are produced in the brain. Was Dennett rightafter all ?
Hi Jason Resch Consciousness or perception is simply 1p. [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/24/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Jason Resch Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-22, 20:10:05 Subject: Re: How visual images are produced in the brain. Was Dennett rightafter all ? On Sat, Dec 22, 2012 at 3:48 PM, meekerdb meeke...@verizon.net wrote: On 12/22/2012 1:21 PM, Jason Resch wrote: On Sat, Dec 22, 2012 at 2:57 PM, meekerdb meeke...@verizon.net wrote: On 12/22/2012 11:36 AM, Jason Resch wrote: As to how computation might lead to consciousness, I think it helps to start with a well-defined definition of consciousness.? Take dictionary.com's definition: awareness of one's own existence, sensations, thoughts, surroundings, etc. Well what is awareness?? dictionary.com defines it as: having knowledge dictionary.com's simplest non-circular definition of knowledge is simply information. As discussed earlier, you can have information in the Shannon sense, but that is just measure over different possible messages.? For it to be information *about* something, to be knowledge, it has to be grounded in the ability to act. Right.? But how do you define act?? I think changing states within the process is sufficient.? I don't.? That leads to the paradox of the conscious rock. I disagree.? There is no process within the rock that gives any indication that it has information of its own existence, sensations, thoughts, or surroundings.? The computations, if you can call them that, are only the simplest linear operations of particle collisions, there are no stable structures and no long running coherent computations. Do you not deny that a paralyzed person can be conscious (as is the case with total locked-in syndrome: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locked-in_syndrome )? ? ? The states within only have meaning by virtue to external actions and perceptions.? Who is the judge of externality?? Why can't the independent modules in the brain be considered actors in a larger environment?? This seems to lead to a turtles all the way up situation, where there have to ever greater levels of external observers or actions.? What if our whole universe were a computer emulation, would that make us into zombies because the giant computer has no external actions? ? The whole evolutionary advantage of having a 'within' is that the brain can project and anticipate (e.g. 'simulate') the external world as part of its decision process.? Yes brains and consciousness evolved so we can better interact with the world, but that doesn't mean interaction with the external world is necessary for consciousness.? We evolved the ability to perceive pleasure for (eating, sleeping, mating, etc.), but we can achieve pleasure directly (using direct brain stimulation or drugs) without needing to eat, sleep, mate, etc. I don't think I've met a materialist who rejects the idea that a brain in the vat could be conscious. Jason -- 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: Re: Against Mechanism
On Mon, Dec 24, 2012 at 10:52 AM, Roger Clough rclo...@verizon.net wrote: Hi Jason Resch Since 1p has the property of perspective, and no two people can be at the same place at the same time, But could there be two places that are identical to each other which contain the same first person perspectives? Jason 3p has multiple perspectives. That is the only multiworld theory that I can believe in. [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/24/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Jason Resch Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-22, 14:56:13 Subject: Re: Against Mechanism On Sat, Dec 22, 2012 at 12:54 PM, John Clark wrote: On Sat, Dec 22, 2012 Bruno Marchal wrote: In a world with duplicating chambers there is no such thing as the future 1p view. Of course there is. There are two such future 1-view. Then as I said,? there is no such thing as the future 1p view, there is only a future 1p view. The 1-view of the M-man, and the 1-view of the W-man. Please note the use of the word and. that is why if you predict W and M, both will rightly admit having been wrong. Yes, the Moscow Man would say it was wrong if he thought (as no doubt many would) that only he is the Helsinki Man and the Washington Man is just some kind of fake; however I believe the Moscow Man is NOT right about the nature of the Washington man and there is no reason to think the Moscow Man is any sort of final authority on the Washington Man. the one that sees Washington is the Washington Man and the Washington Man is the one who sees Washington. What more do you want to know about it? What more is there to know? ? The technic to predict the future when we are multiplied, In the above I gave the precise technique for determining which city will be seen by who. What more do you want to know about it? What more is there to know? the Helsinki man will see both cities. In the 3p view, that's correct, And as John Clark has said over and over, if something seems identical in the 3p view it is certainly identical in the 1p view, although the reverse is not necessarily true. You are misapplying this rule.? This rule is most often comes up in philosophy of mind, where it is usually agreed that two brains in the same physical state will possess the same minds and the same consciousness.? That is not what is at issue here and it is not being disputed by anyone. Your error is that you are generalizing this rule beyond its domain and you wrongly conclude it means there can never be any experimental outcome regardless of whether it is analyzed and observed by an external third person, or experienced first-hand through the first-person.? This is plainly wrong, as Bruno pointed out in the quantum suicide experiment, or even just Schrodinger's cat from the cat's perspective. Once you see this is true, perhaps then you will finally try to put yourself into the shoes of the H-man, and perhaps then you will make some progress. ? ? but fail to answer the question asked. Bruno Marchal does not understand the question asked so it's not surprising that John Clark is unable to give a answer that satisfies Bruno Marchal. Take the QS as example: the most probable 3p outcome is the guy died. If many worlds is correct then from the 3p quantum view everything happens and the very meaning of probability becomes fuzzy. And by the way I think that is the major reason that the many world's interpretation is not more popular than it is. Deutsch et al. have solved the probability problem.? As Tegmark commented: The critique of many worlds is shifting from 'it makes no sense and I hate it' to simply 'I hate it'. Jason -- 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. -- 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: Re: How visual images are produced in the brain. Was Dennett rightafter all ?
On Mon, Dec 24, 2012 at 11:10 AM, Roger Clough rclo...@verizon.net wrote: Hi Jason Resch I would define consciousness as perception, either internal or external, by any of the senses. So it is an activity, a verb, not a thing or noun. Language is very flexible. Often nouns are formed to describe what are fundamentally activities (e.g., a party, a dance, Brownian motion, (radioactive) decay, a race, etc.). I agree with you that consciousness is fundamentally an activity. Jason -- 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.
Flies and ultimate reality
Hi Stephen P. King IMHO Only the Supreme Monad (the One, God), and perhaps flies to some extent can clearly see ultimate reality, which means from all perspectives at once. How do flies unify their vision ? We ourselves are incapable of that, we can only see reality only from our perspective, and with some distortions. [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/24/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Stephen P. King Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-22, 12:59:35 Subject: Re: How visual images are produced in the brain. Was Dennett rightafter all ? On 12/22/2012 7:11 AM, Telmo Menezes wrote: We defeat Dennett by showing that the regress cannot occur when there are physical resources required by the computations for each level of the recursion. We can cutoff recursions in our algorithms with code: if count of loops is 10, stop. But physical systems can not count, they just run out of juice after a while Yes. For example, in the simulation argument, you still end up having to have an ultimate reality which is no longer a simulation. Hi Telmo, Why? Why does there need to be a ultimate reality that is some kind of irreducible ground? It is unnecessary to postulate such if we look at things from a non-well founded or Net of Indra point of view. Any set of objects can act as a ground for some other, objects are, ultimately, just bundles of relatively stable persistent properties. This way of thinking is very different from the atoms in a void view... But if there is no display, we do not need an observer self, and are possibly ending up with Michael Dennett's materialist concept of the self. This might be called epi-phenominalism. The self is simply an expression of the brain. I don't believe it is just an expression of the brain (I suspect you don't either), but part of the reason why I don't believe is 1p, so I cannot communicate it (can I?). I don't know. I tried at dinner parties and got funny looks. I do think that the consciousness is an expression of the brain *and* all of its environment that molds its behavior. It is silly to think that skin is the boundary that a mind associates with! Agreed. OK! ;-) We cannot forget causal closure in our reasoning about 1p! Telmo, can't you see that the defining characteristic of 1p is that one cannot communicate it? I can. Only I can know exactly what it is like to be me. So I can infer or bet that you have a what it is like to be Telmo but I cannot know it, by definition and this relation is symmetrical between any pair of conscious entities. Ok, but why shouldn't I just believe in solipsism then? Because solipsism is self-contradictory, we can believe in it tacitly, but once we think of yourself actively, it falls apart as a theory. Even the self that one was previously, that one can recollect or remember, is not oneself now. The self v other relation actively denies solipsism, and yet we cannot have certainty of what we cannot directly experience. The trick is to understand that we can only have certainty of our own experience of self-in-the-moment, as Descartes explained so well in Meditations. I do not at present know the answer. Consider dual aspect monism! It works! What's the best place to read about it? The Conscious Mind by David Chalmers is the best source. -- 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: Re: How visual images are produced in the brain. Was Dennett rightafter all ?
Hi Telmo Menezes Consciousness does not emerge from anything. It is simply the act of perception. [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/24/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Telmo Menezes Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-22, 07:11:19 Subject: Re: How visual images are produced in the brain. Was Dennett rightafter all ? Hi Stephen, On Fri, Dec 21, 2012 at 3:41 AM, Stephen P. King stephe...@charter.net wrote: On 12/20/2012 6:17 AM, Telmo Menezes wrote: Hi Roger, ? I accidentally sent the previous email before I was done, sorry. Please consider this more complete version of the intended whole: ? Hi Telmo, ? Those images in the videoclips, while still remarkable, probably were constructed simply by monitoring sensory MRI signals just as one might from a video camera,? and displaying them as a raster pattern, artificially converting the time voltage signal into a timespace signal. Ok. We're not even sure what we're looking at. The brain is a gigantic^n kludge. We are seeing stuff happening in the visual cortex that can be meaningfully mapped to images. This stuff correlates with what the subject is seeing, but in a weird way. Hi Telmo, ?? As I was watching the brain scan image video I noticed a lot of weird text like stuff mixed into the image. What was that? Artifacts? I think so. I believe they are caused by the new images being constructed from samples of the original images shown to the subjects. ? So we can speculate that we're watching, for example, a pattern matching process taking place. The most spectacular thing for me is when we see the?nticipation?f the ink blot explosion. That's something you wouldn't get from a video camera (but you could get from a computer running a sophisticated AI). ? ? Perception of the moving image from a given perspective by the brain might take place in the following way : ? 1)?IRSTNESS (The eye). The initial operation in processing the raw optical signal is reception of the sensory signal. This is necessarily done by a monad (you or me), because only monads see the world from a given perspective. In my opinion you are conflating intelligence and consciousness. I see two separate issues: 1) The human being as an agent senses things, assigns symbols to them, compares them with his memories and so on. The brain tries to anticipate all possible futures and then choses actions that are more likely to lead to a future state that it prefers. This preference can be ultimately reduced to pain avoidance / pleasure seeking. In my view, the fundamental pain and pleasure signals have to be encoded some how in our DNA, and were selected to optimise our chances of reproduction. All this is 3p and can be emulated by a digital computer. Some of it already is. 2) There is a me here observing the universe from my perspective. I am me and not you. There's a consciousness inside my body, attached to my mind (or is it my mind)? I suspect there's one inside other people too, but I cannot be sure. This is a 1p phenomena and outside the realm of science. It cannot be explained by MRI machines and clever algorithms - although many neuroscientists fail to realise it. This mystery is essentially what makes me an agnostic more than an atheist. If there is a god, I suspect he's me (and you). In a sense. You can have 1 without 2, the famous zombie. ?? I disagree! The very act of fulfilling the requirements of 1 connects it to? the #2 version of itself. The isomorphism between 1 and 2 is just a fact of how logical algebras can be represented as spaces (sets + relations) and vice versa! What gets glossed over is that Human beings (and any other physical system that has the potential to implement a universal machine) are not static structures. The logical algebra that represents them cannot be static either, it has to evolve as well. ?? Think of how you would model a neural network X as it learns new patterns The propositions of your logical algebra for X would have to be updated as the learning progresses, no? Ok, I agree that humans beings and neural networks are not static structures. This is trivially true. I still don't get how consciousness is supposed to emerge out of a dynamic process. Are you claiming, for example, that if I start running game of life it will become conscious and have a 1p perspective? I'm not using this as a counter-example, I am honestly asking. I don't know the answer to that. ? ? This is not a visual display, only? a complex sensory signal. ? 2) SECONDNESS (the hippocampus ? the cerebellum? ). The next stage is intelligent processing of the optical?ignal and into a useable?xpreswion of the visual image. ? (From the monadology, we find that each monad (you or me) does not ?erceive the world directly, but is given such a perception by the supreme monad (the One, or God). This supreme
Re: Re: More on reconstruction from brain activity
Hi Telmo Menezes This is truly amazing wizardry. [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/24/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Telmo Menezes Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-22, 07:27:42 Subject: Re: More on reconstruction from brain activity Hi Roger, On Fri, Dec 21, 2012 at 1:07 PM, Roger Clough wrote: Hi Telmo Menezes You're right, I got the scanning part all wrong. You can find sites that may tell more by Googling on Reconstruction from brain activity Apparently they use complex brain modelling programs with complex AI to somehow get images. Yup, there are other applications too: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain%E2%80%93computer_interface While they have had some (presumably limited) success on moving images, trying to do that with static images would be the first thing to try, I am not a neuroscientist (just a computer scientist), but from my understanding of how the brain works, static images might actually be harder. The brain is constantly trying to do pattern matching and anticipating future states, so it might never really work with static images (unless you read directly from the optic nerve). Have you ever had this thing where you're sitting in a room and an object suddenly seems to appear out of nowhere? Some people do, and the reason is that the brain is only paying attention to a subset of your visual field, and making up all the other stuff from pattern matching with previous experiences. Suddenly it notices the object and has to update your visual representation in a less-graceful way. but even that looks like voodoo to me. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thought_identification gives an overall treatment of reading thoughts. One of my lady friend's relatives is doing brain modelling at U MD in Baltimore, I suspect that he might be into such stuff. Well, marry Christmas to you and your lady friend (from an annoying agnostic/atheist). [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/21/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Telmo Menezes Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-20, 06:17:25 Subject: Re: How visual images are produced in the brain. Was Dennett rightafter all ? Hi Roger, I accidentally sent the previous email before I was done, sorry. Please consider this more complete version of the intended whole: Hi Telmo, Those images in the videoclips, while still remarkable, probably were constructed simply by monitoring sensory MRI signals just as one might from a video camera, and displaying them as a raster pattern, artificially converting the time voltage signal into a timespace signal. Ok. We're not even sure what we're looking at. The brain is a gigantic^n kludge. We are seeing stuff happening in the visual cortex that can be meaningfully mapped to images. This stuff correlates with what the subject is seeing, but in a weird way. So we can speculate that we're watching, for example, a pattern matching process taking place. The most spectacular thing for me is when we see the anticipation of the ink blot explosion. That's something you wouldn't get from a video camera (but you could get from a computer running a sophisticated AI). Perception of the moving image from a given perspective by the brain might take place in the following way : 1) FIRSTNESS (The eye). The initial operation in processing the raw optical signal is reception of the sensory signal. This is necessarily done by a monad (you or me), because only monads see the world from a given perspective. In my opinion you are conflating intelligence and consciousness. I see two separate issues: 1) The human being as an agent senses things, assigns symbols to them, compares them with his memories and so on. The brain tries to anticipate all possible futures and then choses actions that are more likely to lead to a future state that it prefers. This preference can be ultimately reduced to pain avoidance / pleasure seeking. In my view, the fundamental pain and pleasure signals have to be encoded some how in our DNA, and were selected to optimise our chances of reproduction. All this is 3p and can be emulated by a digital computer. Some of it already is. 2) There is a me here observing the universe from my perspective. I am me and not you. There's a consciousness inside my body, attached to my mind (or is it my mind)? I suspect there's one inside other people too, but I cannot be sure. This is a 1p phenomena and outside the realm of science. It cannot be explained by MRI machines and clever algorithms - although many neuroscientists fail to realise it. This mystery is essentially what makes me an agnostic more than an atheist. If there is a god, I suspect he's me (and
Fw: the world as mathematical. was pythagoras right after all ?
My idea below is no doubt off-base, but suggests the following idea. As I understand quantum mechanics, it uses only quantum (mathematical) fields, so, at least as far as I can understand, the physical (not the mental) universe is a mathematical construction (perhaps of strings in quantum form). [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/24/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Roger Clough Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-24, 09:35:00 Subject: Arithmetic as true constructions of a fictional leggo set Hi Bruno Marchal It helps me if I can understand arithmetic as true constructions of a fictional leggo set. From what you say, the natural numbers and + and * (nn+*). are not a priori members of Platonia (if indeed that makes sense anyway). They can simply be invoked and used as needed, as long as they don't produce contradictions. That being the case, don't you need to add =, - , and / to the Leggo set ? Then we have (nn+-*/=). I wonder if somebody could derive string theory from this set. Then we might say that the universe is an arithmetic construction. Probably an absurd idea. [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/24/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Bruno Marchal Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-23, 09:17:09 Subject: Re: Can the physical brain possibly store our memories ? No. On 22 Dec 2012, at 17:05, Telmo Menezes wrote: Hi Bruno, On Thu, Dec 20, 2012 at 1:01 PM, Roger Clough wrote: The infinite set of natural numbers is not stored on anything, Which causes no problem because there is not a infinite number of anything in the observable universe, probably not even points in space. Perhaps, we don't know. It causes no problem because natural numbers does not have to be stored a priori. Only when universal machine want to use them. Why do the natural numbers exist? We cannot know that. Precisely, if you assume the natural numbers, you can prove that you cannot derived the existence of the natural number and their + and * laws, in *any* theory which does not assume them, or does not assume something equivalent. That is why it is a good reason to start with them (or equivalent). Somehow, the natural numbers, with addition and multiplication, are necessarily mysterious. With the natural numbers and + and *, you can prove the existence of all universal machines, and vice versa, if you assume any other universal system (like the combinators K, S (K K), (K S), ...) you can prove the existence of the natural numbers and their laws. We have to assume at least one universal system, and I chose arithmetic because it is the simpler one. The problem is that the proof of its universality will be difficult, but at least it can be found in good mathematical logic textbook, like Mendelson or Kleene, etc. 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: Fw: the world as mathematical. was pythagoras right after all ?
Roger, Quantum mechanics is not physical nor is string theory. How the physical world comes from the quantum world is a matter of conjecture called interpretations. Richard On Mon, Dec 24, 2012 at 11:49 AM, Roger Clough rclo...@verizon.net wrote: My idea below is no doubt off-base, but suggests the following idea. As I understand quantum mechanics, it uses only quantum (mathematical) fields, so, at least as far as I can understand, the physical (not the mental) universe is a mathematical construction (perhaps of strings in quantum form). [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/24/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Roger Clough Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-24, 09:35:00 Subject: Arithmetic as true constructions of a fictional leggo set Hi Bruno Marchal It helps me if I can understand arithmetic as true constructions of a fictional leggo set. From what you say, the natural numbers and + and * (nn+*). are not a priori members of Platonia (if indeed that makes sense anyway). They can simply be invoked and used as needed, as long as they don't produce contradictions. That being the case, don't you need to add =, - , and / to the Leggo set ? Then we have (nn+-*/=). I wonder if somebody could derive string theory from this set. Then we might say that the universe is an arithmetic construction. Probably an absurd idea. [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/24/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Bruno Marchal Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-23, 09:17:09 Subject: Re: Can the physical brain possibly store our memories ? No. On 22 Dec 2012, at 17:05, Telmo Menezes wrote: Hi Bruno, On Thu, Dec 20, 2012 at 1:01 PM, Roger Clough wrote: The infinite set of natural numbers is not stored on anything, Which causes no problem because there is not a infinite number of anything in the observable universe, probably not even points in space. Perhaps, we don't know. It causes no problem because natural numbers does not have to be stored a priori. Only when universal machine want to use them. Why do the natural numbers exist? We cannot know that. Precisely, if you assume the natural numbers, you can prove that you cannot derived the existence of the natural number and their + and * laws, in *any* theory which does not assume them, or does not assume something equivalent. That is why it is a good reason to start with them (or equivalent). Somehow, the natural numbers, with addition and multiplication, are necessarily mysterious. With the natural numbers and + and *, you can prove the existence of all universal machines, and vice versa, if you assume any other universal system (like the combinators K, S (K K), (K S), ...) you can prove the existence of the natural numbers and their laws. We have to assume at least one universal system, and I chose arithmetic because it is the simpler one. The problem is that the proof of its universality will be difficult, but at least it can be found in good mathematical logic textbook, like Mendelson or Kleene, etc. 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. -- 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: Fw: the world as mathematical. was pythagoras right after all ?
What do you think of Tegmark's version of a mathematical Platoia? -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msg/everything-list/-/6WzRUmWbHY0J. 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: Dennett and others on qualia
On 12/24/2012 2:36 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: We don't have to bet the brain is (Turing universal), we can prove it. Can we? How would you prove than every person's brain can compute every computable function? 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: Against Mechanism
On 12/24/2012 8:13 AM, Jason Resch wrote: On Mon, Dec 24, 2012 at 10:52 AM, Roger Clough rclo...@verizon.net mailto:rclo...@verizon.net wrote: Hi Jason Resch Since 1p has the property of perspective, and no two people can be at the same place at the same time, But could there be two places that are identical to each other which contain the same first person perspectives? Jason If you had two 'brains in vat' you could arrange for the same external signals to them, e.g. from a camera at a particular location, and thus have 'the same' visual perspective. But I expect that their *perceptions* will still be quite different and you could do as well by just having them stand close together or look at the same TV screen. 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: Flies and ultimate reality
On 12/24/2012 11:22 AM, Roger Clough wrote: Hi Stephen P. King IMHO Only the Supreme Monad (the One, God), and perhaps flies to some extent can clearly see ultimate reality, which means from all perspectives at once. How do flies unify their vision ? Dear Roger, Flies can unify their vision because the distance between their individual eyes is small and the number is finite. One can still manage to get a mutually commuting set of observations in these conditions. When one has an arbitrarily large distance between a pair of eyes and the number of them is infinite then it is impossible to have a mutually commuting set of observations. This is the problem of omniscience. We ourselves are incapable of that, we can only see reality only from our perspective, and with some distortions. [Roger Clough], [rclo...@verizon.net] 12/24/2012 Forever is a long time, especially near the end. -Woody Allen - Receiving the following content - From: Stephen P. King Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-12-22, 12:59:35 Subject: Re: How visual images are produced in the brain. Was Dennett rightafter all ? On 12/22/2012 7:11 AM, Telmo Menezes wrote: We defeat Dennett by showing that the regress cannot occur when there are physical resources required by the computations for each level of the recursion. We can cutoff recursions in our algorithms with code: if count of loops is 10, stop. But physical systems can not count, they just run out of juice after a while Yes. For example, in the simulation argument, you still end up having to have an ultimate reality which is no longer a simulation. Hi Telmo, Why? Why does there need to be a ultimate reality that is some kind of irreducible ground? It is unnecessary to postulate such if we look at things from a non-well founded or Net of Indra point of view. Any set of objects can act as a ground for some other, objects are, ultimately, just bundles of relatively stable persistent properties. This way of thinking is very different from the atoms in a void view... But if there is no display, we do not need an observer self, and are possibly ending up with Michael Dennett's materialist concept of the self. This might be called epi-phenominalism. The self is simply an expression of the brain. I don't believe it is just an expression of the brain (I suspect you don't either), but part of the reason why I don't believe is 1p, so I cannot communicate it (can I?). I don't know. I tried at dinner parties and got funny looks. I do think that the consciousness is an expression of the brain *and* all of its environment that molds its behavior. It is silly to think that skin is the boundary that a mind associates with! Agreed. OK! ;-) We cannot forget causal closure in our reasoning about 1p! Telmo, can't you see that the defining characteristic of 1p is that one cannot communicate it? I can. Only I can know exactly what it is like to be me. So I can infer or bet that you have a what it is like to be Telmo but I cannot know it, by definition and this relation is symmetrical between any pair of conscious entities. Ok, but why shouldn't I just believe in solipsism then? Because solipsism is self-contradictory, we can believe in it tacitly, but once we think of yourself actively, it falls apart as a theory. Even the self that one was previously, that one can recollect or remember, is not oneself now. The self v other relation actively denies solipsism, and yet we cannot have certainty of what we cannot directly experience. The trick is to understand that we can only have certainty of our own experience of self-in-the-moment, as Descartes explained so well in Meditations. -- 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: Fw: the world as mathematical. was pythagoras right after all ?
On 12/24/2012 9:07 AM, Richard Ruquist wrote: Roger, Quantum mechanics is not physical nor is string theory. How the physical world comes from the quantum world is a matter of conjecture called interpretations. Richard On Mon, Dec 24, 2012 at 11:49 AM, Roger Cloughrclo...@verizon.net wrote: My idea below is no doubt off-base, but suggests the following idea. As I understand quantum mechanics, it uses only quantum (mathematical) fields, so, at least as far as I can understand, the physical (not the mental) universe is a mathematical construction (perhaps of strings in quantum form). QM is a mathematical *description*, or more accurately a schema for a description. Don't take the map to be the territory. 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: Dennett and others on qualia
Bruno and Brent: we T H I N K we have an idea what 'qualia' may be and ACCEPT our figment on 'quanta' (i.e numbered 'objects' - figments as well). None of the two(?) are closer to the essence (read: 'truth') we just got better used (evolved?) to quantitative thinking and language concerning such because it seemed simpler to follow in primitive life. Now, with Bruno's highly developed apparatus in arithmetics, quanta (numbers!) look like a 'reality' as compared to our still flimsy ideas about *other *qualia. Yet *qualia* they are (in a quantizing sense) Language development went in parallel with a mental development. This asymmetry may be the base for Bruno's: *No qualia are communicable in the sense that quanta, or numbers, are communicable.* No OTHER qualia, that is - as Brent remarked. Turing (universal) and Church (thesis) are compatible products of the presently developed state of the human mind, evolved as some justification (base?) for the workings of the latest and still holding) version. They comfort the finite thinking (even in the infinite inclusions) which is our restricted way to apply human logic and 'ascertainable' reality. \ John M On Mon, Dec 24, 2012 at 5:36 AM, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: On 24 Dec 2012, at 00:31, meekerdb wrote: On 12/23/2012 8:29 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 26 Oct 2012, at 21:22, meekerdb wrote: On 10/26/2012 6:40 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 25 Oct 2012, at 18:57, meekerdb wrote: Good points. The contrast is usually qualia-v-quanta. I think color can be communicated and we have an RGB language for doing so that makes it more quanta than qualia. So extending your point to Schrodinger, if you're a wine connoisseur you have a language for communicating the taste of wine. Most of us don't speak it, but most people don't speak differential equations either. But those are all things that can be shared. The pain of a headache generally can't be perceived by two different people. But there are experiments that use small electric shocks to try to produce objective scales of pain. So I think you are right that it is a matter of having developed the language; I just don't think color is the best example. I disagree here. No qualia are communciable in the sense that quanta, or numbers, are communicable. We can talk and understand talk on color only because we bet that we share similar experience in front of electromagnetic wave with certain wave-length. We only agree on numbers and counting because we distinguish objects in the same way. We only can distinguish objects in the same way because we have brain which can use numbers and count, in the universal way. We bet it is universal and that seems to work (most of the time) - but the same is true of representing colors by numbers. We do it that way, instead of representing numbers by colors, because our discrimination of colors is not quite as good as our discrimination of objects (e.g. some people are color blind). We don't have to bet the brain is (Turing universal), we can prove it. We bet on Church thesis, simply. Bruno Brent Otherwise your mother could not have taught you to count. I still feel guilty how much I made my mom suffering on this. 1, 2, What!?!, I stopped already at 2. What is that? Why? With the amoeba I got acquainted with the 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, ... idea. But it will take me the reading of Nagel Newman Gödel's proof to get the 0, 1, 2, 3, ... profoundness, and to decide to study mathematics instead of biology. Bruno 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.**comeverything-list@googlegroups.com . To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscribe@**googlegroups.comeverything-list%2bunsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/** group/everything-list?hl=enhttp://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~**marchal/ 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.**comeverything-list@googlegroups.com . To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscribe@**googlegroups.comeverything-list%2bunsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/** group/everything-list?hl=enhttp://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~**marchal/ 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.**comeverything-list@googlegroups.com . To
Re: Flies and ultimate reality
On 12/24/2012 11:41 AM, Stephen P. King wrote: Dear Roger, Flies can unify their vision because the distance between their individual eyes is small and the number is finite. One can still manage to get a mutually commuting set of observations in these conditions. When one has an arbitrarily large distance between a pair of eyes and the number of them is infinite then it is impossible to have a mutually commuting set of observations. This is the problem of omniscience. I have two eyes and no problem unifying them. Vision takes place in the brain, not the eyes. 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: Against Mechanism
On Mon, Dec 24, 2012 at 2:17 PM, meekerdb meeke...@verizon.net wrote: On 12/24/2012 8:13 AM, Jason Resch wrote: On Mon, Dec 24, 2012 at 10:52 AM, Roger Clough rclo...@verizon.netwrote: Hi Jason Resch Since 1p has the property of perspective, and no two people can be at the same place at the same time, But could there be two places that are identical to each other which contain the same first person perspectives? Jason If you had two 'brains in vat' you could arrange for the same external signals to them, e.g. from a camera at a particular location, and thus have 'the same' visual perspective. But I expect that their *perceptions* will still be quite different and you could do as well by just having them stand close together or look at the same TV screen. Put two identical uploaded minds each in the same deterministic simulation. Then their perceptions should be identical. Jason -- 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: Flies and ultimate reality
On 12/24/2012 3:43 PM, Stephen P. King wrote: On 12/24/2012 3:22 PM, meekerdb wrote: On 12/24/2012 11:41 AM, Stephen P. King wrote: Dear Roger, Flies can unify their vision because the distance between their individual eyes is small and the number is finite. One can still manage to get a mutually commuting set of observations in these conditions. When one has an arbitrarily large distance between a pair of eyes and the number of them is infinite then it is impossible to have a mutually commuting set of observations. This is the problem of omniscience. I have two eyes and no problem unifying them. Vision takes place in the brain, not the eyes. Brent -- Hi Brent, I think you missed the point I was trying to make. Apparently. You are basing this impossibility on a literal infinity - not just very very many? In that case I'd agree because the literal infinity is itself impossible. 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.
