Re: Comp Bedtime Stories
On Monday, August 4, 2014 3:48:23 PM UTC-5, Brent wrote: > > On 8/4/2014 12:48 PM, Gabriel Bodeen wrote: > > > > > Mother: In fact, I bet there's somewhere far, far away where you are a > mermaid, too. And > > somewhere else, you're an intrepid scientist-athlete-princess-explorer > adventuring among > > the outer planets! > > Isn't it interesting that in these stories, like past-life regressions, > it's always better > in some other life? > > Brent > Nah, the reason for it is too obvious to be interesting. Stories of the faraway lands where you become un-noteworthy and/or miserable aren't stories that will help put your daughter to sleep. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Comp Bedtime Stories
Daughter: Daddy, daddy! Why wasn't I born beautiful and lucky like Kim Kardashian? Father: What? Surely no daughter of mine would take Kim Kardashian as a role model! Mother: But darling - she does! All outcomes happen. Somewhere. Daughter: Does that mean I'm a Kardashian somewhere? Mother: Yes, sweetie, somewhere you make the most amazing Kardashian. Daughter: Yay! Father: Mother: In fact, I bet there's somewhere far, far away where you are a mermaid, too. And somewhere else, you're an intrepid scientist-athlete-princess-explorer adventuring among the outer planets! Daughter: But I wanna be a mermaid science princess now! Father: If you study hard at school, we can make it happen. Daughter: Mother: Don't worry sweetie, there are calculations underlying your first-person experience where you can be a mermaid science princess no matter what. But if you are committed to studying hard at school, maybe a lot more of your future paths will lead in wonderful directions like that. Best get some sleep! Daughter: Can I wake up and be a Kardashian and a mermaid both? Father/Mother: No/Yes, darling. Father/Mother: Mother: You'll get every outcome, darling, even a Kardashian mermaid athlete science princess explorer. Father: But whoever you become, you'll only feel like one person at a time. One of your amazing futures will wake up right here, still our daughter, still safe at home, to grow up with us. See you there, darling. Go to sleep now. On Friday, August 1, 2014 4:08:59 AM UTC-5, Kim Jones wrote: > > Daughter: Mommy, mommy! Why wasn't I born beautiful and lucky like Kim > Kardashian? > > Mother: But darling - you were! All outcomes happen. Somewhere. > > Daughter: I was? I was! Who thinks so? > > Mother: Look, we all think you are beautiful, Mazy, it remains to be seen > as you experience your life whether you will be lucky or not. Perhaps you > will be lucky sometimes and unlucky at other times. That tends to be how it > works out. You will however, always be beautiful. Do not underestimate the > power of freewill in a deterministic universe although you may not yet > understand that at your age. > > Daughter: But how does it work that I can be lucky only sometimes yet > beautiful always? That doesn't seem to work. > > Mother: Bescause thats how life is, my love. Your beauty is a property of > your self whereas your self can go in all sorts of different directions, > some will produce good luck, others, not so good luck. > > Daughter: So then I get to keep my beauty always but not my luck. Nope. > Still doesn't seem to work. > > Mother: But yet, perhaps somewhere, as in science fiction stories, there > is a universe where you get to be beautiful and stay lucky always. > > Daughter: A! Yes, that must be the universe that Kim lives in, then. > How do I go there? > > Mother: You can't. You are in a particular branch of the multiverse and > the computations which support you cannot be predicted. I'm afraid you are > where you are until you die. Maybe then you can go to Kim's place. > > Daughter: That truly would be heaven, Kim's place! But, Mommy - I still > cannot see why Kim gets to be Kim and Mazy is stuck with being Mazy. Who > decides these things? > > Mother: That is indeed a very unanswerable question, sweetheart. I don't > even think God could answer that one. > > Daughter: But if I die It seems I might go on as Kim Kardashian, so why, > oh why am I not her right now??? > > Mother: That's the First Person Indeterminacy, my dear. > > Daughter: The what??? > > Mother: The 'FPI'. Some people hate it. Everyone understands it but some > people fake not understanding it because they are scared of who they are. > > Daughter: but what IS the 'FPI', mommy? > > Mother: The inability to know which computations are running through your > current state and which support your local first person experience of > yourself. > > Daughter: But, but - I just want to know why God is so unfair and makes > Kim Kim and makes poor little Mazy Mazy right NOW! > > Mother: You have understood, sweetness. > > --- > Someone else's go. Probably a certain Liz, I'd predict with certainty near > to probability one. > > > > > Kim Jones B. Mus. GDTL > > Email: kimj...@ozemail.com.au > kmjc...@icloud.com > Mobile: 0450 963 719 > Phone: 02 93894239 > Web: http://www.eportfolio.kmjcommp.com > > > *"Never let your schooling get in the way of your education" - Mark Twain* > > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Autism, Aspbergers, and the Hard Problem
On Wednesday, July 16, 2014 8:02:18 AM UTC-5, Craig Weinberg wrote: > > So often it becomes clear to me in debating the issues of consciousness > that they are missing something which cannot be replaced by logic. The way > that many people think, especially those who are very intelligent in math > and physics, only includes a kind of toy model of experience. ... This is > not to say that everyone who doesn't understand the hard problem has > mindblindness, but I would say it is very likely that having > mindreading-empathy deficits on the autistic spectrum would tend to result > in a strong bias against idealism, panpsychism, free will, or the hard > problem of consciousness. > That's an interesting autism study. Regarding your above speculations about "consciousness" debates, though, it's important to recognize that this is a fully reversible criticism. On the one side, empathy deficits might incline people to have a bias against idealism and so on. But on the other side, those people could equally well speculate that idealists are suffering from biases caused by overactive agency detection and an inaccurate but biologically hardwired theory-of-mind. These kind of fully reversible criticisms come up a lot whenever we're tempted to speculate about the psychological genesis of people's beliefs. Some other examples include: * Some Christians tell atheists that they're only atheists because they want to sin. This is easily reversed to atheists telling Christians that they're only Christians because they want others to want others to think they are righteous. * Some liberals tell conservatives that they're only conservatives because they hate minorities/women/poor people/etc. This is easily reversed to conservatives telling liberals that they're only liberals because they're minorities/women/poor people/etc and they are just going along with the others in that group because of shared 'tribal' sentiment. The primary point is that psychological explanations of other's beliefs, whether the explanations are correct or not, aren't actually relevant to determining the truth or falsity of the beliefs. The secondary point is that, when we find ourselves tempted to psychologize others rather than address their criticisms, all we achieve is propagating prejudice. Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: American Intelligence
I was going to say that 22 minutes is, suspiciously, the actual length of half-hour daytime TV in the U.S. once the commercials are removed. If you're judging us Americans based on our daytime TV, then indeed, it must appear there is no hope at all left for us. But since MIT doesn't have a School of Cooking, and since the U. of Missouri Extension produced this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSpQJvF6jBg , I guess it was just a bundle of humorous exaggerations. :) On Monday, June 23, 2014 6:02:48 PM UTC-5, Kim Jones wrote: > > Last week I decided to do a bit of research on the Internet because I > wanted to find out the uses of a vegetable called Kohl Rabi which has just > appeared in the shops here in Oz. Kind of a cousin of the turnip. > > So I found a YouTube video on how to cook this thing. It was by the > Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Cooking so I figured it > would be pretty good. > > The video was 22 minutes long which seemed a bit excessive but just the > same I was interested. The chef was going to do fried Kohl Rabi and onions, > nice and simple. > > For the first eight minutes of the video the chef instructed his audience > in how to peel and slice onions the correct way. For the next four minutes > he instructed how to heat a frypan the correct way and how to caremelise > the fucking onions in the butter and oil. He then proceeded to tell all > these anecdotes about how different styles of heating range had given him > differering results in caremelising onions throughout his career, say for > about three minutes. For the next five minutes he told us how to grow the > fucking Kohl Rabi. For the final two minutes of the clip, he quickly > chopped it up and threw it into the pan with the onions and said "all you > have to do is quickly soften it - he presto!" > > 22 minutes. > > > > Kim Jones B. Mus. GDTL > > Email: kimj...@ozemail.com.au > kmjc...@icloud.com > Mobile: 0450 963 719 > Phone: 02 93894239 > Web: http://www.eportfolio.kmjcommp.com > > > *"Never let your schooling get in the way of your education" - Mark Twain* > > > > > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
The Control Group is Out of Control
I thought this blog post and the ensuing comments were a fascinating perspective on the increasing problem of medical science not replicating. "The Control Group is Out of Control" http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/04/28/the-control-group-is-out-of-control/ > Trying to set up placebo science would be a logistical nightmare. You’d have > to find a phenomenon that definitely doesn’t exist, somehow convince a whole > community of scientists across the world that it does, and fund them to study > it for a couple of decades without them figuring out the gig. > > Luckily we have a natural experiment in terms of parapsychology – the study > of psychic phenomena – which most reasonable people don’t believe exists > but which a community of practicing scientists does and publishes papers on > all the time. > > The results are pretty dismal. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Pluto bounces back!
Yay! I'd be happy with a larger number of planets in our Solar System. Incidentally, since the current planet definition says that the object has to have cleared the other stuff from its orbit, that means that rogue planets aren't planets. :( And even less importantly, imagine a sci-fi story about future humans pushing Mars into sharing an orbit with Earth, thus demoting both of them from planethood. -Gabe On Tuesday, May 27, 2014 7:35:04 PM UTC-5, Liz R wrote: > > Pluto Bids To Get Back Planetary Status Pluto has at least five moons, an >> atmosphere and now a new analysis places its diameter as bigger than its >> outer solar system rival Eris. >> > > > http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/pluto-bids-for-planethood/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter > > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Pluto bounces back!
It depends on what perspective you're coming from, probably. For folk like myself who were raised with an abusive religion and left it for generic humanism, I'd recommend against reading the Quran unless you have something happier to detox your mind with afterward. I first read the Quran a couple months ago, having been requested to find sections of the Quran that would be of interest to a group of humanist Unitarian Universalists. Unfortunately, quite large portions of it do consist of graphic threats of hellfire and bloodshed. Most of the rest is, from my perspective, just boilerplate theistic superstition. That's not to say that you can't find something valuable in it, of course. Some schools of interpretation do some pretty clever things to cover over the nastiness. But if you're not interested in interpretive games, you'll get more value from the Lord of the Rings, or Disney's Frozen, or either edition of the TV show Cosmos. :) -Gabe, lurking due to too much working On Wednesday, May 28, 2014 11:43:24 AM UTC-5, Samiya wrote: > > You assume that Islam is unethical. Quranic teachings are based on > beautiful moral principles and enjoin ethical and just relations among > people. The Quran repeatedly enjoins good actions, read it and you'll be > amazed how far from truth all the negative propaganda against it is! > Whether people study and follow the scripture or not is up to them. If we > start following the guidance, most of the social evils will be weeded out. > Sadly, you confuse peoples' thoughts, behaviour and actions with the > message itself. It really doesn't matter if we label ourselves as Muslims, > Jews, or any other religion or not, or if we are a member of the clergy or > hold any leadership position in the community, it is basically our beliefs, > intentions and actions that make us who we are and which we carry with us > when we depart from this life. > > Samiya > > On 28-May-2014, at 8:52 pm, spudboy100 via Everything List < > everyth...@googlegroups.com > wrote: > > For me, its the actual physical, ethics, that need to be tuned up. Getting > to paradise, however delightful, over someone's dead body is unethical. > Morality, is between humans and God technically, but ethics is between > people. God, as he exists, can take care of himself, but the all the > humbleness in the world, devotion, passion, cannot correct issues, if the > Imams, and Muftis, instruct otherwise. Even if the Koran, Soonah, and > Bukhari are all God given and have predictions that only God would know, it > does no good if the earth gets drowned in blood by seekers of paradise. > Unhelpful indeed. > > > -Original Message- > From: LizR > > To: everything-list > > Sent: Wed, May 28, 2014 12:32 am > Subject: Re: Pluto bounces back! > > Here's page 1307 - I would prefer it if you quoted whatever it is you're > referring to rather than giving a link to a (rather difficult to access) > online book, because it doesn't mean much to me... > > > As for the second link, I don't understand what it says there either - it > certainly isn't a very succinct "summary". > > > On 28 May 2014 16:19, Samiya Illias >wrote: > >> There is a debate between the interpretation of the word s-j-d. I assume >> it also means to become lowly, humble, submissive, and not only physical >> prostration. [http://www.tyndalearchive.com/tabs/lane/ Book 1 Page 1307 >> ] >> Summary of why is can't only mean physical prostration: >> http://www.mypercept.co.uk/articles/Summary-problems-sujud-prostration-Quran.html >> >> >> >> >> On Wed, May 28, 2014 at 9:10 AM, LizR >wrote: >> >>> Does it also explain how planets prostrate themselves? >>> >>> >>> On 28 May 2014 15:51, Samiya Illias >> >wrote: >>> I won't be surprised if they eventually discover that there are a total of 11 or 12 planets in the solar system. [Al-Qur'an 12:4, Translator: Pickthall] When Joseph said unto his father: O my father! Lo! I saw in a dream eleven planets and the sun and the moon, I saw them prostrating themselves unto me. [Al-Qur'an 12:100, Translator: Pickthall] And he placed his parents on the dais and they fell down before him prostrate, and he said: O my father! This is the interpretation of my dream of old. My Lord hath made it true, and He hath shown me kindness, since He took me out of the prison and hath brought you from the desert after Satan had made strife between me and my brethren. Lo! my Lord is tender unto whom He will. He is the Knower, the Wise. Samiya http://signsandscience.blogspot.com/ On Wed, May 28, 2014 at 5:35 AM, LizR >>> >wrote: > Pluto Bids To Get Back Planetary Status Pluto has at least five >> moons, an atmosphere and now a new analysis places its diameter as >> bigger >> than its outer solar system rival Eris. >> > > >>>
Re: [foar] Amoeba's Secret now available in paperback
FWIW, on a flight this weekend I read a bit of Amoeba's Secret on my kindle while the stranger in the seat next to me was reading Tegmark's book. If plane rides didn't make me fall unconscious almost immediately, that might have been grounds for an interesting live discussion. :) On Thursday, March 27, 2014 1:35:57 AM UTC-5, cdemorsella wrote: > > Thanks Russell, just ordered a copy as well. It will dovetail in nicely > with Max Tegmark’s book, ... > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Nova Spivack on 'Consciousness is More Fundamental Than Computation'
He gives six evidences. First, he falls for quantum pseudoscience. Second, he says that he personally failed to make AI when he tried and incorrectly implies that difficulty means impossibility. Third, he brings up the hard problem and uses it to make an argument from ignorance. Fourth, he says he doesn't know how to define what he means by consciousness, and then makes another argument from ignorance. Fifth, he repeats the mistaken Berkeley's Master argument. Sixth, he falls for NDE pseudoscience. Unconvincing. On Monday, March 24, 2014 3:36:43 PM UTC-5, Craig Weinberg wrote: > > > http://www.novaspivack.com/uncategorized/consciousness-is-not-a-computation-2 > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Modality Independence
On Friday, March 21, 2014 7:04:58 PM UTC-5, Craig Weinberg wrote: > > > > On Friday, March 21, 2014 2:11:17 PM UTC-4, Gabriel Bodeen wrote: >> >> >> >> On Friday, March 21, 2014 12:42:13 PM UTC-5, Craig Weinberg wrote: >>> >>> >>> I'm not so much interested in defining CTM, as in exploding the >>> assumptions from which CTM and other mechanistic, information-theoretical >>> models of consciousness arise. >>> >> >> OK. Would you mind defining which assumptions you're thinking of? >> > > The assumptions that forms and functions can exist independently of > perception and participation. > > What "forms", "functions", and "participation"? There's only one word that has a fairly clear referent. :( It would be more helpful if, instead of talking in general about the kind of assumptions involved, you could just go ahead and list the key assumptions. > >> >>> >>> >>>> >>>> >>>>> They don't reduce to a binary code like we would expect them to in CTM. >>>>> >>>> >>>> That is not a prediction of CTM. Here's a relevant quote from the >>>> Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: "Turing himself seems to have been of >>>> the opinion that a machine operating in this way would literally be doing >>>> the same things that the human performing computations is doing—that it >>>> would be 'duplicating' what the human computer does. But other writers >>>> have >>>> suggested that what the computer does is merely a 'simulation' of what the >>>> human computer does: a reproduction of human-level performance, perhaps >>>> through a set of steps that is [at] some level isomorphic to those the >>>> human undertakes, but not in such a fashion as to constitute doing the >>>> same >>>> thing in all relevant respects." >>>> >>> >>> Again, either way the development of modality-dependence in non-humans >>> and modality-independence in humans does not support the idea that >>> consciousness is driven by logic and computation. >>> >> >> Right, modality (in)dependent communication neither supports nor opposes >> the idea that consciousness is computation. >> > > No, the fact that modality independent communication does not appear until > human experience does oppose the idea that consciousness is computation, > since computation is by definition modality independent. > Er, no, that's not true in the senses of the terms with which I'm familiar, for the reasons I gave previously. > In CTM, brains doing modality-dependent computations would have minds >> experiencing sense-data qualia, and brains doing modality-independent >> computations would have minds experiencing abstract qualia. >> >> Argh, CTM has nothing to do with brains. That would be a BTM. > OK, but then CTM_Weinberg has major differences from CTM_Others. You've stated that you're not interested in defining CTM_Weinberg and how it differs from CTM_Others, which means at this point all we know is that you're attacking some unspecified assumptions of an unspecified theory. That's not enough for meaningful communication. Would you care to fill in the missing details of precisely which assumptions you wanted to "explode"? -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Tegmark and UDA
Others worth a look: http://arxiv.org/abs/1205.0589 "Is Eternal Inflation Past-Eternal? And What if It Is?" Susskind http://arxiv.org/abs/0712.0571 "Eternal Inflation, past and future" Aguirre -Gabe On Friday, March 21, 2014 2:14:41 PM UTC-5, ronaldheld wrote: > > Bruno, I have read several over the years but do not save them. Here is > the latest one that I read: > http://arxiv.org/abs/1403.1599 > Ronald > > Wednesday, March 19, 2014 7:37:52 PM UTC-4, ronaldheld wrote: > >> Assuming chaotic inflation there is no consensus that the multiverse >> is past infinite but some papers have try to show it is do. >> Ronald >> > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Modality Independence
On Friday, March 21, 2014 12:42:13 PM UTC-5, Craig Weinberg wrote: > > > I'm not so much interested in defining CTM, as in exploding the > assumptions from which CTM and other mechanistic, information-theoretical > models of consciousness arise. > OK. Would you mind defining which assumptions you're thinking of? > > >> >> >>> They don't reduce to a binary code like we would expect them to in CTM. >>> >> >> That is not a prediction of CTM. Here's a relevant quote from the >> Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: "Turing himself seems to have been of >> the opinion that a machine operating in this way would literally be doing >> the same things that the human performing computations is doing—that it >> would be 'duplicating' what the human computer does. But other writers have >> suggested that what the computer does is merely a 'simulation' of what the >> human computer does: a reproduction of human-level performance, perhaps >> through a set of steps that is [at] some level isomorphic to those the >> human undertakes, but not in such a fashion as to constitute doing the same >> thing in all relevant respects." >> > > Again, either way the development of modality-dependence in non-humans and > modality-independence in humans does not support the idea that > consciousness is driven by logic and computation. > Right, modality (in)dependent communication neither supports nor opposes the idea that consciousness is computation. In CTM, brains doing modality-dependent computations would have minds experiencing sense-data qualia, and brains doing modality-independent computations would have minds experiencing abstract qualia. -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Modality Independence
On Thursday, March 20, 2014 8:48:30 PM UTC-5, Craig Weinberg wrote: > > > On Thursday, March 20, 2014 1:01:43 PM UTC-4, Gabriel Bodeen wrote: >> >> >> On Thursday, March 20, 2014 11:16:19 AM UTC-5, Craig Weinberg wrote: >>> >>> >>> On Thursday, March 20, 2014 11:09:39 AM UTC-4, Gabriel Bodeen wrote: >>> >>> >>>> It formed increasingly high-level associations between bundles of >>>> sensory data, eventually also combining sounds and vocal behavior into >>>> those associations. There's nothing obviously intractable about >>>> describing >>>> such data input and analysis in computational terms. >>>> >>> >>> If that were true, the oldest words would describe things like danger or >>> food, but they don't. They are concepts like I, who, two, three and five ( >>> http://media.tumblr.com/8b5d411063f5291737c4a36681474205/tumblr_inline_mmrdbhECQY1qz4rgp.png >>> ) >>> >> >> BTW, that chart is about the most-conserved words in the Indo-European >> family of languages. It says nothing either way about what the earliest >> words were. >> > > Most conserved = earliest words that are still in use. > Indeed, but that doesn't rescue the original point. The earliest words still in use today don't tell us what the earliest words were. > Computationalism need not have anything to do with the brain. It's about > consciousness arising from computation, i.e., it supports strong AI, which > would not be about brains. > Ah, that's an important comment. You are indeed talking about a specific kind of CTM that wasn't clear to me. Thanks for clarifying. The usual sense of CTM is that consciousness is literally computation, not that it arises from computation. > The brain doesn't figure into this at all. My point was that if > consciousness is computation, and qualia are just complex computational > labels, then we should expect languages to develop from simple, > modal-independent forms to modal-dependent forms in which computations > become so diversified that the lose any common vocabulary. Would you agree > that this is precisely the opposite of what is seen in nature? > Yes, I still agree about how we observe language to form. It's just that your characterization of CTM as making the predictions you mention is wrong. It only makes those predictions when supplemented with additional assumptions that are not generally part of CTM. > They don't reduce to a binary code like we would expect them to in CTM. > That is not a prediction of CTM. Here's a relevant quote from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: "Turing himself seems to have been of the opinion that a machine operating in this way would literally be doing the same things that the human performing computations is doing—that it would be 'duplicating' what the human computer does. But other writers have suggested that what the computer does is merely a 'simulation' of what the human computer does: a reproduction of human-level performance, perhaps through a set of steps that is [at] some level isomorphic to those the human undertakes, but not in such a fashion as to constitute doing the same thing in all relevant respects." -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Gravity Wave Signature Discovered
On Thursday, March 20, 2014 1:12:33 PM UTC-5, Bruno Marchal wrote: > > > It looks like you have not yet grasped the UDA. > > My post was not about the UDA; your comments are appreciated but they miss the mark widely. -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Modality Independence
On Thursday, March 20, 2014 11:16:19 AM UTC-5, Craig Weinberg wrote: > > > On Thursday, March 20, 2014 11:09:39 AM UTC-4, Gabriel Bodeen wrote: > > >> It formed increasingly high-level associations between bundles of >> sensory data, eventually also combining sounds and vocal behavior into >> those associations. There's nothing obviously intractable about describing >> such data input and analysis in computational terms. >> > > If that were true, the oldest words would describe things like danger or > food, but they don't. They are concepts like I, who, two, three and five ( > http://media.tumblr.com/8b5d411063f5291737c4a36681474205/tumblr_inline_mmrdbhECQY1qz4rgp.png > ) > BTW, that chart is about the most-conserved words in the Indo-European family of languages. It says nothing either way about what the earliest words were. > Sure, yeah I'm not saying that animals can't reason abstractly, I'm > pointing out yet another example where the computationalist theory fails to > match up with what it would predict. If we apply CTM to communications, we > should expect all language to develop independent of modality and develop > modal dependence through increasing layers of complexity. CTM demands that > qualia is complex, not simple - that something like pain is not actually a > feeling but in fact a tremendously complex computation that is labeled as a > feeling by a complex computation (for no particular reason, other than > labels could theoretically be feelings). > Pardon? The computational theory of mind is an attempt to explain what the mind is and how it relates to the brain. It doesn't make any predictions about how the brain should function unless you add a host of additional assumptions. To get to your prediction, you'd need CTM plus assumptions like these: * The mind-computation is fundamental and the brain is derivative of it. The brain is a physical reification of the mind-computation that "fleshes out" the mind-computation with somewhat arbitrary additional physical detail. * The mind-computation underlying the brain is an indepedent process from any computation underlying the brain's environment. If we keep CTM but reject these assumptions, then we can't conclude that language should develop independently of modality and develop it due to the outworking of the mind-computation adding increasing layers of complexity. If instead the mind-computation is derivative of the brain, as most advocates of CTM suppose, then the brain's development would constrain the computation, not the reverse. If the mind-computation is embedded in a larger computation, say, of the universe, then there is no reason to expect it to develop independently. All that is to say that I think you're using a very particular variation on CTM. Your conclusions are sensible regarding it, but they don't apply to CTM generally. -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Modality Independence
On Wednesday, March 19, 2014 9:25:44 PM UTC-5, Craig Weinberg wrote: > > > > On Wednesday, March 19, 2014 10:06:37 PM UTC-4, Gabriel Bodeen wrote: >> >> >> But all the forms of language do share a common logical basis, according >> to many linguists. How is it relevant to the logic of a language that it >> can be expressed in different modalities? >> > > It's not relevant to the logic of the language, its relevant to the > overall nature of language. If language were logical, then they would be > universally modality-independent, but what the evidence seems to indicate > is that pure logic or information is not the relevant aspect in developing > language. What matters is the aesthetic engagement. It's about touching and > feeling, not knowing and believing. >> >> Why would a logical language have to modality-independent? My language developed, presumably, because my brain had sensory data and reward signals it could use to form associations between useful sensory coincidences. It formed increasingly high-level associations between bundles of sensory data, eventually also combining sounds and vocal behavior into those associations. There's nothing obviously intractable about describing such data input and analysis in computational terms. > Since only humans have evolved to create an abstraction layer that cuts >> across aesthetic modalities, >> > > That appears untrue. I know birds, mammals, some molluscs, and some fish > can reason abstractly about motor behaviors and achieve the same goal with > very different kinds of motor behaviors. > > You'll have to argue with the Wiki about that... > > "Animal communication systems routinely combine visible with audible > properties and effects, but not one is modality independent. No vocally > impaired whale, dolphin or songbird, for example, could express its song > repertoire equally in visual display. Indeed, in the case of animal > communication, message and modality are not capable of being disentangled. > Whatever message is being conveyed stems from intrinsic properties of the > signal." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_speech > > 'Intrinsic properties of the signal' = aesthetic texture. > > Craig > Ah - You didn't specify at first that the "abstraction layer" had to be about communication. It looked like you were intending to make a general point about aesthetic modality and information content. As a general point it's untrue. Lots of animals reason abstractly in certain circumstances. But I could believe it's true or nearly true about communication. There are some cases even then that, even if not strictly counterexamples, stretch the humans-only claim to the breaking, and lead me to be doubtful of it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpTG3bgHLjk : dogs will communicate their desire for attention vocally and visually, depending on the situation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0iGkpLq5L5Y : Koko the gorilla is controversially claimed to understand certain signs, images, and spoken words, and to produce signs and point to pictures to communicate https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSjqEopnC9w : dolphins apparently can express and learn from each other via squeals what they learned from humans via signs, which similarly requires abstracted communication skills -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Modality Independence
On Wednesday, March 19, 2014 8:24:33 PM UTC-5, Craig Weinberg wrote: > > Another knife in the heart of CTM, IMO... > It took several minutes of Googling to find a plausible expansion of CTM, at http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/computational-mind/ . I guess objectively that's hardly any work at all compared to what would have been needed in the past, but in the modern world it feels like that makes "CTM" incredibly cryptic. :D > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_speech > > >> A striking feature of language is that it is modality-independent. Should >> an impaired child be prevented from hearing or producing sound, its innate >> capacity to master a language may equally find expression in signing >> [...] >> >> This feature is extraordinary. Animal communication systems routinely >> combine visible with audible properties and effects, but not one is >> modality independent. No vocally impaired whale, dolphin or songbird, for >> example, could express its song repertoire equally in visual display. " >> > > This would be hard to explain if consciousness were due to information > processing, as we would expect all communication to share a common logical > basis. > But all the forms of language do share a common logical basis, according to many linguists. How is it relevant to the logic of a language that it can be expressed in different modalities? > The fact that only human language is modality invariant suggests that > communication, as an expression of consciousness is local to aesthetic > textures rather than information-theoretic configurations. > "local to aesthetic textures ..." -- would you mind recasting the sentence into more concrete terms? I haven't the foggiest idea what you're trying to communicate. Since only humans have evolved to create an abstraction layer that cuts > across aesthetic modalities, > That appears untrue. I know birds, mammals, some molluscs, and some fish can reason abstractly about motor behaviors and achieve the same goal with very different kinds of motor behaviors. -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Gravity Wave Signature Discovered
I think the argument usually goes like this: Suppose there's an infinite ensemble of the computations that include a mental state that remembers having been you as you are now. There are a lot of details needed to support such a mental state. Let's say it takes a minimum of N bits. Longer programs in the universal dovetailing may contain smaller subroutines, so we might expect that a given N-bit subroutine is twice as dense as a given (N+1)-bit subroutine. In consequence, we would expect our subsequent mental states to find themselves well explained by the simplest compatible program, and [insert handwaving here] the Big Bang with subsequent inflation is that simplest compatible scenario. You can also translate the above from terms of "computations" to terms of "mathematical structures" or if you prefer a different ToE ontology. You can probably also translate into physicalist terms given the right kind of infinitely varied physical multiverse. Any ontology that you can wrangle into being isomorphic to computation should do, I suppose. In any case: yeah, it's a wonderful post-hoc rationalization, not science. Nobody's deriving real testable predictions from it yet. If we're lucky it's proto-science and maybe someday we can make it science. -Gabe On Wednesday, March 19, 2014 11:32:59 AM UTC-5, Bruno Marchal wrote: > > On 17 Mar 2014, at 22:20, ghi...@gmail.com wrote: > > Sodid anyone's ToE predict this outcome? > > So, the apparent existence of a finite past might be a trouble for the > computationalist hypothesis, below the substitution level, a first person > plural reality should look like a superposition of more and more ever > "possible states", up to the still possible inflation of "white rabbits". > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Universal Programming
On Sunday, March 16, 2014 1:10:19 PM UTC-5, Bruno Marchal wrote: > > > On 16 Mar 2014, at 17:31, meekerdb wrote: > > > On 3/16/2014 12:34 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: > >> That's correct, but we assume usually "classical" quantum > >> mechanics. Then, even if GR digitalizes the access to futures, it > >> seems to me that QM will still provide the rooms for immortality > >> (not necessarily a good news). Then, in such reasoning, QM uses > >> comp, and comp by itself leads to many forms of immortalities, if I > >> can say. > > > > But does comp lead to immortality from *every* state? Are there no > > cul-de-sac worlds? > > For the ideally correct machine, there is no cul-de-sac world *from > the first person point of view". > If there isn't already, there needs to be some fiction about Buddhist comp-believers trying to escape immortality. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Tegmark and UDA step 3
On Tuesday, March 11, 2014 10:38:23 AM UTC-5, Bruno Marchal wrote: > > OK. Me too. But modern physics has a strong mathematical flavor, and > consciousness seems more to be an immaterial belief or knowledge than > something made of particles, so, if interested in the mind body problem, > the platonic perspective has some merit, especially taking into account the > failure of Aristotelian dualism. > That's an interesting topic, to be sure. Does comp actually help at all to solve the hard problem? When I think about it qualia, I have five main questions that I'd want a philosophy of mind to propose answers for. 1. What are qualia made of? 2. Why do patterns of ions and neurotransmitters crossing bilipid membranes in certain regions of the brain correlate perfectly to qualia? 3. How is a quale related to what it is about, under normal circumstances? What about when a quale is caused by artificially stimulated neurons, dreams, hallucinations, sensory illusions, mistakes in thought or memory, etc? 4. How can qualia affect the brain's processes, such that we can act on their information and talk and write about them? 5. How could we know that belief in qualia is justified? How could our instinctive belief in qualia be developed by correct and reliable brain processes? Chalmers' ideas, for example, involve answers to 1-3 that sound reasonable, but they stumble badly on 4-5. Comp and other mathematical Platonist ideas seem to me to give interesting answers to 2-4 but flub 1 and 5. -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Tegmark and UDA step 3
On Monday, March 10, 2014 2:08:14 PM UTC-5, Bruno Marchal wrote: > > > That relativism argues against comp, and even implicitly against Church > thesis. But my point is not that comp is true, just that with comp, the > theory QM + comp is redundant, and we have to justify QM (at the least its > logic) from self-reference. And up to now, it looks it works. > > Bruno > A physicalist would presumably point out that the redundancy of QM+comp doesn't tell you which is original and which is derivative. In the terms of the Aristotle vs. Plato distinction you pointed out, I'm unaware of evidence on which to make a decision. So I don't, which is why I mentioned that ignorance prior. -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Tegmark and UDA step 3
On Saturday, March 8, 2014 2:37:50 AM UTC-6, Bruno Marchal wrote: > > A couple other accounts of how things might be that I take seriously are > (1) physicalism in the sense that arithmetical propositions might only be > true when physically realized, > > No problem, and indeed this would make comp false. of course, if you > really defend that thesis, you have to explain and prove the existence of > infinitely many prime numbers by using physics, and this without > presupposing addition and multiplication of integers. I am not even sure > how you will just defined what is prime number. > Given a correspondence theory of truth and this kind of physicalism, mathematical theorems would be true if and only if there's a corresponding physical reality. So, for example, if the universe is finite, then there wouldn't be infinitely many prime numbers. Nor would there be infinitely many integers. But there would still be integers and primes. Numbers, addition, and multiplication would be patterns that our brains recognize in material things, at first due to experience counting objects, grouping them, and counting groups. We abstract those patterns to symbolic form in our heads or our writing for convenience, and we generalize the notation to cover a wide variety of patterns. But our process of abstracting and generalizing may omit important limitations (such as finitude) of the physical reality on which it was originally based. or even (2) relativism in the sense that arithmetical propositions might > only be true for humanlike brains, > > OK, but same remark. Defined human-like brain, and give me a proof that > 1+1=2 from that definition. > Due to our shared evolutionary history, humans share nearly all their brain architecture in common. Due to our shared cultural history, many of the humans we regularly encounter share much of their set of background assumptions and beliefs in common. It appears that there's no such thing as such a perfectly lucid and detailed description or set of instructions that one person could give another that eliminates the need for the other person to grok the meaning, i.e. to connect the ideas appropriately and fill in the missing information based on their own "wiring" and their own experience. (Take Edgar as an demonstration of this apparent fact. ;) Consequently, some suppose that communication with an extraterrestrial intelligence may fail due to there being an almost total mismatch in "wiring" and experience. (When language fails, we humans resort to pointing at objects and pantomiming, but without shared sensory systems and emotional responses, even that may well fail to be grokked by the alien.) It's also possible that the symbolic structure of our mathematics is dependent on our "wiring" and experience; indeed there is some evidence that the way humans use language is due to an evolutionarily recent genetic mutation. For these two reasons, our mathematical definitions, theorems, proofs, etc may only be suitable for use by other humans, and so by a pragmaticist alethiology, only true for humans. The usual proofs then apply, because we're humans. with an alethiology of the sort preferred by the American pragmatist school > of philosophy. > > keep in mind that you mention people who are Aristotelian, and the point I > do is only that IF comp is true, THEN such approach get inconsistent or > epistemologically non sensical. > Hm. Can you elucidate what you mean by saying they are Aristotelian? What is the key contrast? > Four options plus an ignorance prior and little evidence gives me about > 25% confidence for each. :) > > ONLY IF you develop your alternate assumptions. The idea that "1+1 is > prime" independently of human is far more simple (and used) than the idea > that "1+1 is prime" is relative to the human brain. > The axiomatic of natural numbers is far more simple than anything else. > You can always propose a much more complex theory to falsify a simple set > of axioms. > I don't know that the other cases I've mentioned are more complex. Physicalism just puts some mysterious "matter" first and makes math derivative of it. That may be wrong, but it's hard to see why it's more complex than comp's reversal of it. The relativism described above isn't an additional supposition added to math; it takes ideas from biology and linguistics to see what consequences there might be when they intersect with math. -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Tegmark and UDA step 3
On Friday, March 7, 2014 10:59:06 AM UTC-6, Bruno Marchal wrote: > > > On 07 Mar 2014, at 17:05, Gabriel Bodeen wrote: > > > An argument on its own merits is presumably either valid or invalid, and > either sound or unsound. Regarding UDA's soundness: I have no problem > saying Yes Doctor. Similarly I have no problem with the Church thesis. > But when it comes to Arithmetical Realism, I don't know of any convincing > reasons to believe it. > > > You don't believe in the prime numbers? > > All theories presuppose arithmetical realism. Many notions, like the > notion of digital machine presupposes arithmetical realism. Comp or just > Church thesis don't make sense without AR. > AR is not an hypothesis in metaphysics, it is the name of the beliefs in > elementary arithmetic. It is a set of mathematical hypothesis, together > with its usual semantic the structure (N, +, *). > Heh, yes, I believe in prime numbers. But in "The Origin of Physical Laws and Sensations" you wrote of AR that it is "the assumption that arithmetical propositions ... are true independently of me, you, humanity, the physical universe (if that exists), etc." A couple other accounts of how things might be that I take seriously are (1) physicalism in the sense that arithmetical propositions might only be true when physically realized, or even (2) relativism in the sense that arithmetical propositions might only be true for humanlike brains, with an alethiology of the sort preferred by the American pragmatist school of philosophy. And a third meta-account is that reality might be a way that doesn't make sense to me. Four options plus an ignorance prior and little evidence gives me about 25% confidence for each. :) -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Tegmark and UDA step 3
On Thursday, March 6, 2014 12:32:32 PM UTC-6, Bruno Marchal wrote: > > > On 06 Mar 2014, at 16:40, Gabriel Bodeen wrote: > > Did you mean to address me, or did you mean to address Chris? > > I don't object to any step in UDA. It seems internally consistent and > plausible to me. I'm unsure what level of confidence I would assign to it > being actually true, although my gut feeling is in the vicinity of 25%. > > > A reasoning is 100% valid, or invalid. Do you mean that the truth of the > premise, comp, is in the vicinity of 25%. making perhaps its neoplatonist > consequences in the vicinity of 25% ? > > I will make a confession: for me comp only oscillates between the false > and the unbelievable. > Yes, that's what I mean. An argument on its own merits is presumably either valid or invalid, and either sound or unsound. Regarding UDA's soundness: I have no problem saying Yes Doctor. Similarly I have no problem with the Church thesis. But when it comes to Arithmetical Realism, I don't know of any convincing reasons to believe it. There are other options that seem just as sensible, and there's always the possibility that reality is quite unlike any of the ideas that seem sensible to us. In the usual Bayesian sense of probability it's fine to place a bet with a level of confidence between 0 and 1 even on fully determined unique events like whether AR is true. My bet would be about 25%. If someday I survive a bomb blast by quantum tunneling to safety, then I'll update to virtually 100%. :) Regarding validly, it's also the case that I don't have complete confidence that when I perceive an argument to be valid it actually is valid. For me this wariness developed in response to having been religious for many years in a way I no longer think was rationally justified, even if it seemed so at the time. UDA looks valid to me but it shares many of the features of other metaphysical arguments that I find suspicious, so I remain a bit suspicious of my capacity to judge it without succumbing to biases. I'd bet nearly 1 but not 1 on its validity. -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
Re: Tegmark and UDA step 3
On Thursday, March 6, 2014 1:52:56 AM UTC-6, Bruno Marchal wrote: > > > On 05 Mar 2014, at 18:45, Gabriel Bodeen wrote: > > Brent was right but the explanation could use some examples to show you > what's happening. The strangeness that you noticed occurs because you're > looking at cases where the proportion is *exactly* 50%. > > binopdf(2,4,0.5)=0.375 > binopdf(3,6,0.5)=0.3125 > binopdf(4,8,0.5)=0.2374 > binopdf(8,16,0.5)=0.1964 > binopdf(1000,2000,0.5)=0.0178 > binopdf(1e6,2e6,0.5)=0.0006 > > Instead let's look at cases which are in some range close to 50%. > > binocdf(5,8,0.5)-binocdf(3,8,0.5)=0.4922 > binocdf(10,16,0.5)-binocdf(6,16,0.5)=0.6677 > binocdf(520,1000,0.5)-binocdf(480,1000,0.5)=0.7939 > binocdf(1001000,2e6,0.5)-binocdf(999000,2e6,0.5)=0.8427 > binocdf(15,2e9,0.5)-binocdf(5,2e9,0.5)=0.9747 > > Basically, as you flip a coin more and more times, you get a growing > number of distinct proportions of heads and tails that can come up, so any > exact proportion becomes less likely. But at the same time, as you flip > the coin more and more times, the distribution of proportions starts to > cluster more and more tightly around the expected value. So for tests when > you do two million flips of a fair coin, only about 0.06% of the tests come > up exactly 50% heads and 50% tails, but 84.27% of the tests come up between > 49.95% and 50.05%. > > > > Good. So you agree with step 3? What about step 4? (*). I am interested to > know. > > the FPI is just the elementary statistics of the "bernouilly épreuve" (in > french statistics), and that is pretty obvious when you grasp the > definitions given of 1p and 3p. > > Bruno > > (*) > http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/publications/SANE2004MARCHALAbstract.html > > Did you mean to address me, or did you mean to address Chris? I don't object to any step in UDA. It seems internally consistent and plausible to me. I'm unsure what level of confidence I would assign to it being actually true, although my gut feeling is in the vicinity of 25%. I have much formal logic to learn before I have any meaningful opinion about AUDA. -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Tegmark and UDA step 3
Brent was right but the explanation could use some examples to show you what's happening. The strangeness that you noticed occurs because you're looking at cases where the proportion is *exactly* 50%. binopdf(2,4,0.5)=0.375 binopdf(3,6,0.5)=0.3125 binopdf(4,8,0.5)=0.2374 binopdf(8,16,0.5)=0.1964 binopdf(1000,2000,0.5)=0.0178 binopdf(1e6,2e6,0.5)=0.0006 Instead let's look at cases which are in some range close to 50%. binocdf(5,8,0.5)-binocdf(3,8,0.5)=0.4922 binocdf(10,16,0.5)-binocdf(6,16,0.5)=0.6677 binocdf(520,1000,0.5)-binocdf(480,1000,0.5)=0.7939 binocdf(1001000,2e6,0.5)-binocdf(999000,2e6,0.5)=0.8427 binocdf(15,2e9,0.5)-binocdf(5,2e9,0.5)=0.9747 Basically, as you flip a coin more and more times, you get a growing number of distinct proportions of heads and tails that can come up, so any exact proportion becomes less likely. But at the same time, as you flip the coin more and more times, the distribution of proportions starts to cluster more and more tightly around the expected value. So for tests when you do two million flips of a fair coin, only about 0.06% of the tests come up exactly 50% heads and 50% tails, but 84.27% of the tests come up between 49.95% and 50.05%. -Gabe On Monday, March 3, 2014 1:36:11 AM UTC-6, chris peck wrote: > > *>> If you repeated the cloning experiment from Figure 8.3 many times and > wrote down your room number each time, you'd in almost all cases find that > the sequence of zeros and ones you'd written looked random, with zeros > occurring about 50% of the time.* > > > There's something strikes me as very strange about this idea. > > Tegmark's method is just a means of writing down binary sequences. > > Being strict, already with binary sequences just 4 digits long, only 37.5% > of those contain half zeros. This drops the longer the sequences get. So, > with sequences 6 digits long, only 31.25% contain half zeros. With > sequences 8 digits long only 27% and with 16 digits only about 19%. > > If his experiment continued for a year, (365 digits) many people would > find that either room 1 or room 0 was dominating strongly. For these people > a change in room would seem very odd, a glitch in the matrix that wouldn't > be of any great concern vis a vis prediction once 'normality' kicked back > in the following night. For others, a change in room would occur at regular > intervals and would seem very predictable. There would be the guy who > changed room every night. There would be all the guys whose room changed > every night except for the one time when it stayed the same. A little > glitch is all. > > In truth, the longer you continued the game and the more people got > involved the less chance a person would have of finding room assignment > random at all. There would be increasingly few people willing to bet 50/50 > on a particular room assignment. > > -- > Date: Sun, 2 Mar 2014 17:13:23 +1300 > Subject: Re: Tegmark and UDA step 3 > From: liz...@gmail.com > To: everyth...@googlegroups.com > > "Hello, dear, looking for a bit of multi-sense realism?" > > On 2 March 2014 16:35, > wrote: > > > heh heh heh I love this place. It's like walking through an eccentric > street market where traders call out their wares > > "GETCHYOUR P-TIME 2 for 1 logico-computational really real structure > today only" > > "Assuming comp only, that's right comp only. Theology but done like > science. Madam you are ugly but I will be sober in the morning. You there, > you reek of not-comp, get lost. Ah sir, did you like the dreams? Same > again?" > > "GETCHOR P-TIME..,." > > > > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to everything-li...@googlegroups.com . > To post to this group, send email to everyth...@googlegroups.com > . > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: How would an Earth-Earth system evolve, different than the Earth-Moon
IIUC, the Moon is tidally locked to the Earth because it was initially a bit molten and due to Earth's gravity was an elongated ball shape, not quite a sphere. Then it cooled down and solidified that way. The tug of gravity keeps the Moon's bulge pointed toward us, braking the rotation of the Earth, transferring the angular momentum to the Moon which makes it move farther away. It tugs the oceans, too, but I think that effect is smaller. An Earth-Earth system with rounder planets wouldn't have to be tidally locked, I think. Even so, the oceans on both planets would still make tidal drag on both planets so the lost angular velocity, conserving angular momentum, would mean they'd still pull farther away from each other. On Sunday, February 23, 2014 2:14:40 PM UTC-6, ghi...@gmail.com wrote: > > I was just trying to imagine the effect two equal oceans, one on each > objechave? The ocean puts a heavy brake on the rotation of Earth and has > already tidally locked the moon. But what tidal drag went both .ways? Would > the planets start moving toward eachother, or pull further away? > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Eidetic memory and the comp hypothesis
On Wednesday, February 5, 2014 7:32:51 PM UTC-6, Pierz wrote: > > The phenomenon of eidetic (photographic) memory is well established as a > reality. ... > Huh, are you sure? I remember always hearing that it was a myth. I didn't find anything which settles it conclusively in a brief search, but http://psychology.wikia.com/wiki/Eidetic_imagery is worth a look. As usual, the reality is more nuanced than popular notions suggest. -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Big Bang Abandoned in New Model of the Universe
Good luck to Shu. I occasionally chat over dinner with a local professional physicist who disbelieves in the Big Bang. His alternative also stumbles over the CMB, though. I suspect that a good heuristic for inventing alternative theories is to not bother much to plumb their depths unless they (1) make a new or better prediction than the current consensus, and (2) also predict the major evidences of the current consensus. At least that way, when we tell people about our alternatives, we get disproven for less embarrassing reasons. :) Gabe On Tuesday, January 28, 2014 5:41:17 PM UTC-6, Edgar L. Owen wrote: > > All, again a post FYI, not because I necessarily believe it. Edgar > > Big Bang Abandoned in New Model of the Universe > > A new cosmology successfully explains the accelerating expansion of the > universe without dark energy; but only if the universe has no beginning and > no end. > > As one of the few astrophysical events that most people are familiar with, > the Big Bang has a special place in our culture. And while there is > scientific consensus that it is the best explanation for the origin of the > Universe, the debate is far from closed. However, it’s hard to find > alternative models of the Universe without a beginning that are genuinely > compelling. > > That could change now with the fascinating work of Wun-Yi Shu at the > National Tsing Hua University in Taiwan. Shu has developed an innovative > new description of the Universe in which the roles of time space and mass > are related in new kind of relativity. > > Shu’s idea is that time and space are not independent entities but can be > converted back and forth between each other. In his formulation of the > geometry of spacetime, the speed of light is simply the conversion factor > between the two. Similarly, mass and length are interchangeable in a > relationship in which the conversion factor depends on both the > gravitational constant G and the speed of light, neither of which need be > constant. > > So as the Universe expands, mass and time are converted to length and > space and vice versa as it contracts. > > This universe has no beginning or end, just alternating periods of > expansion and contraction. *In fact, Shu shows that singularities cannot > exist in this cosmos.* > > It’s easy to dismiss this idea as just another amusing and unrealistic > model dreamed up by those whacky comsologists. > > That is until you look at the predictions it makes. During a period of > expansion, an observer in this universe would see an odd kind of change in > the red-shift of bright objects such as Type-I supernovas, as they > accelerate away. It turns out, says Shu, that his data exactly matches the > observations that astronomers have made on Earth. > > This kind of acceleration is an ordinary feature of Shu’s universe. > > That’s in stark contrast to the various models of the Universe based on > the Big Bang. Since the accelerating expansion of the Universe was > discovered, cosmologists have been performing some rather worrying > contortions with the laws of physics to make their models work. > > The most commonly discussed idea is that the universe is filled with a > dark energy that is forcing the universe to expand at an increasing rate. > For this model to work, dark energy must make up 75 per cent of the > energy-mass of the Universe and be increasing at a fantastic rate. > > But there is a serious price to pay for this idea: the law of conservation > of energy. The embarrassing truth is that the world’s cosmologists have > conveniently swept under the carpet one the of fundamental laws of physics > in an attempt to square this circle. > > That paints Shu’s ideas in a slightly different perspective. There’s no > need to abandon conservation of energy to make his theory work. > > That’s not to say Shu’s theory is perfect. Far from it. One of the biggest > problems he faces is explaining the existence and structure of the cosmic > microwave background, something that many astrophysicists believe to be the > the strongest evidence that the Big Bang really did happen. The CMB, they > say, is the echo of the Big bang. > > How it might arise in Shu’s cosmology isn’t yet clear but I imagine he’s > working on it. > > Even if he finds a way, there will need to be some uncomfortable > rethinking before his ideas can gain traction. His approach may well > explain the Type-I supernova observations without abandoning conservation > of energy but it asks us to give up the notion of the Big Bang, the > constancy of the speed of light and to accept a vast new set of potential > phenomenon related to the interchangeable relationships between mass, space > and time. > > Rightly or wrongly, that’s a trade off that many will find hard. Let’s > hope Shu sticks to his guns, if only for the sake of good old-fashioned > debate > > Ref: arxiv.org/abs/1007.1750: Cosmological Models with No Big Bang > >
Re: Would math make God obsolete ?
FWIW, under the usual definitions, the rationals are enumerable and so are a smaller set than the reals. I'd suppose that if people can figure that out with our nifty fleshy brains, then a well-designed computer brain could, too. -Gabe On Friday, January 24, 2014 1:23:40 AM UTC-6, Brian Tenneson wrote: > > There are undecidable statements (about arithmetic)... There are true > statements lacking proof. There are also false statements about arithmetic > the proof of whose falsehood is impossible; not just impossible for you and > me but for a computer of any capacity or other forms of rational > processing. We'll never have a computer, then, that will work as a > mathematically-omniscient device. By that I mean a computer such that every > question that has a mathematically-oriented theme having an answer > truthfully can be answered by such a device. Calculators demonstrate the > concept but are clearly not mathematically-omniscient: you ask the > calculator what is 2+2 and press a button and "presto" you get an answer. > What I'm talking about would be questions like "is the set of rational > numbers equal in size to the set of real numbers", and get the correct > answer. So we will never have such a computer no matter what its capacities > are, even if computer encompasses the entire human brain. Unfortunately, > that means that even for humans, we will never know everything about math. > Unless something weird would happen and we suddenly had infinite > capacities; that might change the conclusions. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: The Singularity Institute Blog
On Friday, January 17, 2014 5:14:13 AM UTC-6, Bruno Marchal wrote: > > To be franc, I don't believe in super-intelligence. I do believe in > super-competence, relative to some domain, but as I have explained from > time to time, competence has a negative feedback on intelligence. > > Intelligence is a state of mind, almost only an attitude. Some animals are > intelligent. > "Intelligence" is one of those big broad words that can be taken different ways. The MIRI folk are operating under a very specific notion of it. In making an AI, they primarily want to make a machine that follows the optimal decision theoretic approach to maximizing its programmed utility function, and that continues to follow the same utility function even when it's allowed to change its own code. They don't mean that it has to be conscious or self-aware or a person or thoughtful or extraordinarily perceptive or able to question its goals or so on. Given that approach, then there are utility functions that would be totally disastrous for humanity, and there may be some that turn out very good for humanity. So the question of "friendliness" is how best to build an AI with a utility function that is good for humanity and would stay good for humanity even as the AI rewrote its own software. -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Retiring the universe
If any of you haven't seen it, you will likely be quite interesting the The Edge's list of responses to this year's question, "What scientific idea is ready for retirement?" Some of the answers are fascinating, some are absurd, and some are confusing. Take a look! http://www.edge.org/responses/what-scientific-idea-is-ready-for-retirement My favorite comes from Amanda Gefter. I'll reproduce it below. (Hopefully that counts as fair use.) -- Amanda Gefter Consultant, New Scientist; Founding Editor, CultureLab *The* Universe Physics has a time-honored tradition of laughing in the face of our most basic intuitions. Einstein's relativity forced us to retire our notions of absolute space and time, while quantum mechanics forced us to retire our notions of pretty much everything else. Still, one stubborn idea has stood steadfast through it all: the universe. Sure, our picture of the universe has evolved over the years—its history dynamic, its origin inflating, its expansion accelerating. It has even been downgraded to just one in a multiverse of infinite universes forever divided by event horizons. But still we've clung to the belief that here, as residents in the Milky Way, we all live in a single spacetime, our shared corner of the cosmos—our universe. In recent years, however, the concept of a single, shared spacetime has sent physics spiraling into paradox. The first sign that something was amiss came from Stephen Hawking's landmark work in the 1970s showing that black holes radiate and evaporate, disappearing from the universe and purportedly taking some quantum information with them. Quantum mechanics, however, is predicated upon the principle that information can never be lost. Here was the conundrum. Once information falls into a black hole, it can't climb back out without traveling faster than light and violating relativity. Therefore, the only way to save it is to show that it never fell into the black hole in the first place. From the point of view of an accelerated observer who remains outside the black hole, that's not hard to do. Thanks to relativistic effects, from his vantage point, the information stretches and slows as it approaches the black hole, then burns to scrambled ash in the heat of the Hawking radiation before it ever crosses the horizon. It's a different story, however, for the inertial, infalling observer, who plunges into the black hole, passing through the horizon without noticing any weird relativistic effects or Hawking radiation, courtesy of Einstein's equivalence principle. For him, information better fall into the black hole, or relativity is in trouble. In other words, in order to uphold all the laws of physics, one copy of the bit of information has to remain outside the black hole while its clone falls inside. Oh, and one last thing—quantum mechanics forbids cloning. Leonard Susskind eventually solved the information paradox by insisting that we restrict our description of the world to either the region of spacetime outside the black hole's horizon or to the interior of the black hole. Either one is consistent—it's only when you talk about both that you violate the laws of physics. This "horizon complementarity," as it became known, tells us that the inside and outside of the black hole are not part and parcel of a single universe. They are *two* universes, but not in the same breath. Horizon complementarity kept paradox at bay until last year, when the physics community was shaken up by a new conundrum more harrowing still— the so-called firewall paradox. Here, our two observers find themselves with contradictory quantum descriptions of a single bit of information, but now the contradiction occurs while both observers are still outside the horizon, before the inertial observer falls in. That is, it occurs while they're still supposedly in the same universe. Physicists are beginning to think that the best solution to the firewall paradox may be to adopt "strong complementarity"—that is, to restrict our descriptions not merely to spacetime regions separated by horizons, but to the reference frames of individual observers, wherever they are. As if each observer has his or her own universe*.* Ordinary horizon complementarity had already undermined the possibility of a multiverse. If you violate physics by describing two regions separated by a horizon, imagine what happens when you describe *infinite* regions separated by *infinite *horizons! Now, strong complementarity is undermining the possibility of a single, shared universe. On glance, you'd think it would create its own kind of multiverse, but it doesn't. Yes, there are multiple observers, and yes, any observer's universe is as good as any other. But if you want to stay on the right side of the laws of physics, you can only talk about one at a time. Which means, really, that only one *exists* at a time. It's cosmic solipsism.
Re: Why our fine tuning and not some other?
So you're assuming that "nothing" must mean "non-existence"? Why? In any case, "Existence exists because non-existence cannot exist" is really more of a slogan than an axiom, as we can't make deductions from it. While I'm quite sympathetic to Platonic-style ideas, I don't assume them axiomatically, so I see a critical difference between: (1) Intrinsically non-existent things cannot exist and (2) The abstraction "non-existence" cannot exist. because there seems to be excellent reasons (e.g. Russell's paradox and "heterologicality") to believe abstractions need not be instantiations of the property they describe. On Tuesday, January 14, 2014 7:25:48 PM UTC-6, Edgar L. Owen wrote: > > Liz, > > That is the explanation > > Edgar > > On Tuesday, January 14, 2014 3:44:00 PM UTC-5, Liz R wrote: >> >> On 15 January 2014 04:40, Edgar L. Owen wrote: >> >>> All, >>> >>> My Existence Axiom 'Existence exists because non-existence cannot >>> exist', answers the first fundamental question, namely, 'Why does something >>> rather than nothing exist?' >>> >>> Next you need to explain why nothing can't exist. >> >> >> -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Tegmark's New Book
On Monday, January 13, 2014 11:49:17 AM UTC-6, Edgar L. Owen wrote: > > Forget all other theories when you read mine and judge it only on its own > merits... Don't shoehorn! > FWIW, that's all well and good for mathematical and other formal theories. You've been insistent on not formalizing your theories, though, so it isn't possible to examine them on the basis of internal coherence -- if they were wrong, there would be no way to falsify them using only logical analysis. Instead we'd need scientific methods, and since humans are extremely prone to lots of nasty cognitive biases like confirmation bias and anchoring, we need to bring in some more careful tools. Specifically, when people are thinking about explanatory accounts and models, then it's never sensible to forget all others and consider only one on its merits. If we look at only one explanatory account, then whether it fits poorly or exactly, we find that it still in some sense fits. Even if it's definitely wrong we can't really falsify it that way. The way we can avoid getting stuck on partial or less exact theories and move on toward better theories, the rational way to do it, is to always be comparing the relative merits of two or more theories at a time. That way we can determine that theory A makes better predictions here, and theory B makes better predictions there, and so on, until we can build them into a theory that beats all the others that we know about given the current stock of evidence. -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: A Theory of Consciousness
On Friday, January 10, 2014 8:17:13 PM UTC-6, Brent wrote: > > On 1/10/2014 10:49 AM, Gabriel Bodeen wrote: > > On Tuesday, December 31, 2013 4:25:04 PM UTC-6, Brent wrote: >> >> As you've explained it above your theory makes a rock just as conscious >> as a brain. I'm >> sure you must have a more subtle theory than that, so I'll ask you the >> same thing I asked >> Bruno, if I make a robot what do I have to do make it conscious or not >> conscious? >> >> Brent >> > > Did you receive any interesting answers? > > Hm, should I take that as a negative answer, or merely as a skipped question? > I have adequate background in neuroscience but I'm mostly ignorant of AI > math, robotics work, and philosophy of mind, so excuse my rampant > speculation. This is what I'd try in design of a robotic brain to switch > on and off consciousness and test for its presence: First, I'd give the > robot brain modules to interpret its sensory inputs in an associative > manner analogous to human sensory associative regions. All these sensory > inputs would feed into the decision-making module (DMM). One of the first > steps taken by the DMM is determining how important each sensory signal is > for its current objectives. It decides to pay attention to a subset of > those signals. > > So is it conscious of those signals? How does it decide? > 1: As described in the next two sentences of the original paragraph, no. 2: The choice of function used to select the subset is unimportant to the experiment, but if we were aiming for biomimicry then each sensory module would report a degree of stimulation, and attention function would block all signals but the most stimulated 1 to 7. > Second, I'd put a switch on another input to make it part of the > attention subset or not: > > What other input would you put a switch on? What inputs are there besides > sensory? I think you've assumed "conscious" = "self aware". Is one > conscious when one is "lost in thought"? > 1: The switch would go on the signals described in the second half of the sentence that you hastily cut in half. :D 2: Inputs besides sensory associations are important to a functioning robot but not, I predict, to a robot designed only to test for consciousness. 3: I chose to address the specific matter of qualia rather than all of what people mean by "conscious", as described in the "I predict this because..." sentence of the original paragraph. :D 4: I suspect that the human experience of being lost in thought differs between specific cases. Most times for me that I'd call "lost in thought" I can still operate (drive, walk, eat) on "auto-pilot" which undoubtedly requires my senses to be engaged, but afterwards the only things I can recall experiencing are the thoughts I was lost in. Introspective evidence and memory being as bad as they are, that shouldn't be taken as a necessarily correct description. But if it is a correct description, then by my definitions in the original paragraph, I'd say that I was conscious. But if what you mean by "conscious" includes awareness of surroundings, then no, I was not conscious under that definition. > the attention's choice of signals would also an input to the DMM, and I > could turn on or off whether that attentional choice was itself let pass > through to the next processing stages. I would predict that, with the > switch turned off, the robot would be not conscious (i.e. it would have no > experience of qualia), but that with the switch turned on, the robot would > be conscious (i.e. it would experience qualia corresponding to the signals > it is paying attention to). I predict this because it seems to me that the > experience of qualia can be described as being simultaneously aware of a > sensory datum and (recursively) aware of being aware of it. If the robot > AI was sufficiently advanced that we could program it to talk about its > experiences, the test of my prediction would be that, with the switch off, > the robot would talk about what it sees and hears, and that with the switch > on, the robot would also talk about fact that it knew it was seeing and > hearing things. > > > So is a Mars Rover conscious because it processes video from it's camera > to send to JPL, AND it senses that its camera is powered and working and > that its transmitter is working AND it reports those internal status > variables to JPL too. > If there are two separate inputs to the transmitter, "the video feed" and "the camera is functional", then this does not satisfy the relationship
Re: A Theory of Consciousness
On Tuesday, December 31, 2013 4:25:04 PM UTC-6, Brent wrote: > > As you've explained it above your theory makes a rock just as conscious as > a brain. I'm > sure you must have a more subtle theory than that, so I'll ask you the > same thing I asked > Bruno, if I make a robot what do I have to do make it conscious or not > conscious? > > Brent > Did you receive any interesting answers? I have adequate background in neuroscience but I'm mostly ignorant of AI math, robotics work, and philosophy of mind, so excuse my rampant speculation. This is what I'd try in design of a robotic brain to switch on and off consciousness and test for its presence: First, I'd give the robot brain modules to interpret its sensory inputs in an associative manner analogous to human sensory associative regions. All these sensory inputs would feed into the decision-making module (DMM). One of the first steps taken by the DMM is determining how important each sensory signal is for its current objectives. It decides to pay attention to a subset of those signals. Second, I'd put a switch on another input to make it part of the attention subset or not: the attention's choice of signals would also an input to the DMM, and I could turn on or off whether that attentional choice was itself let pass through to the next processing stages. I would predict that, with the switch turned off, the robot would be not conscious (i.e. it would have no experience of qualia), but that with the switch turned on, the robot would be conscious (i.e. it would experience qualia corresponding to the signals it is paying attention to). I predict this because it seems to me that the experience of qualia can be described as being simultaneously aware of a sensory datum and (recursively) aware of being aware of it. If the robot AI was sufficiently advanced that we could program it to talk about its experiences, the test of my prediction would be that, with the switch off, the robot would talk about what it sees and hears, and that with the switch on, the robot would also talk about fact that it knew it was seeing and hearing things. -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: "The Origin of Physical Laws and Sensations"
On Monday, January 6, 2014 3:27:49 AM UTC-6, Bruno Marchal wrote: > > Hi Gabriel, > > On 06 Jan 2014, at 02:48, Gabriel Bodeen wrote: > > > Hi Bruno (& all), > > I was trying to read through your paper "The Origin of Physical Laws > > and Sensations", which I saw linked to in a conversation earlier. I > > started to get lost about page 13 of the PDF, > > Waw! Good. No problem with the UDA? > Heh, well I can't promise I understood fully and correctly, but that qualitative section seemed to pass muster in my head. When it gets down to the math, there's less room for me to be fooling myself. > What is it that you don't understand page 13? You might need to study > a good book in logic, like Mendelson, or Boolos and Jeffrey (+ > Burgess in late editions). > What is "DU accessibility"? Thanks for the suggested list of books! > The books above can help, but you can also copy and past the first > paragraph that you don't understand, and I can explain more online, > although you might need to make more solid your basic knowledge in > mathematical logic. > Quote: Going from knowledge to belief makes things much more subtle and interesting. Indeed the paradox above, for example, will occur only if the visitor (which the habitant is addressing) believes all his beliefs are true. In the case where indeed all his beliefs are true, the reasoning above will show that the reasoner can neither believe, nor know for the matter, the very fact that all his beliefs are true. So if all the propositions Bp -> p are true about you, they cannot all be believed by you. Instead of a paradox, we get an incompleteness result. And you don’t need really to go on the KK Island; it is enough some habitant asserts ‘‘Mister X or Misses X will never believe I am knight.’’ That sentence will be true, although unbelievable by X, independently of the fact X met such sentence. Imagine a native saying ‘‘the Belgians will never believe I am a knight,’’ then any Belgian believing in its own accuracy, i.e. believing in all the propositions Bp -> p, will be inaccurate, even if the Belgian didn’t know anything about the KK Island. Giving that the use of ‘‘believe’’ instead of ‘‘know’’ evacuates the paradox, such an island could well exist and the assertion of their inhabitants could have consequences on our ability or inability to believe some truth! This is a very weird situation. To reassure ourselves we can still hope such an island does not exist. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
"The Origin of Physical Laws and Sensations"
Hi Bruno (& all), I was trying to read through your paper "The Origin of Physical Laws and Sensations", which I saw linked to in a conversation earlier. I started to get lost about page 13 of the PDF, and by page 17 I was too lost to profitably continue. Can you (or anyone) suggest, based on the topics on those pages, some resources that I might find helpful for understanding the paper? -Gabe -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Another stab at the universal present moment - a gedanken..
Edgar, I asked three simple true/false questions about what your theory says. You didn't even fucking anwer "false, because the concept isn't quite right, but you'd do better by asking XYZ". If you simply won't answer basic questions about whether your theory entails something, then you probably can't. And if you can't answer whether your theory is about something, then I conclude that your theory doesn't actually exist. You'd just be playing word games. -Gabe. Sorry for the angry word -- but it was well deserved by blatantly evasive non-answers. On Saturday, January 4, 2014 9:16:43 AM UTC-6, Edgar L. Owen wrote: > > Hi Gabe, > > These questions are ill formulated but I'll take a shot at them > > 1. For every observer there is a uniquely true (actual is a better > descriptor) order of events in their own experience. All these events > always occur in their Present moment. The rate at which these events occur > is controlled by their local Clock times. Their clock times can pass at > different rates through their present moments. > > 2. All observers exist in a present moment P-time. In other words at every > moment of P-time all observers exist and are doing something no matter what > their relativistic differences.They cannot disappear out of existence and > out of the present moment. > > 3. The clock times of all NON-relativistic observers are isomorphically > mappable. Their clocks all read the same times and progress at the same > rates through a common shared universal present moment of P-time. > > 4. The clock times of observers who have NO relative motion but different > gravitational fields will progress at different rates through the common > present moment p-time in a one-to-one mappable way which those observers > all agree upon. > > 5. The clock times of observers in relative motion will each experience > the clock times of the others to be slowed. Since relative motion is in > fact relative, this effect is equal and opposite. In this case it is > impossible for the observers to agree upon which of their clock times > corresponds to the clock times of the other observers in the present > moment. Nevertheless all observers are all always in existence and doing > something in the common present moment even when it is impossible to assign > a mutually agreed clock time to it. They know what they are doing in the > common present moment but they observe what an observer in relative motion > was doing in a past present moment. > > 5a. This occurs in the same way we observe what was happening in deep > space in a present moment billions of years ago, and an observer there > observes our galaxy as it was in a present moment billions of years ago. > This is due to the finite speed of light (actually c is the finite speed of > time, light just travels at the maximum time speed possible). The relative > motion equal and opposite time dilation effect is pretty much the same > effect and also due to the finite speed of light=speed of time due to the > STc Principle that states that everything without exception always travels > through spacetime at the speed of light (again actually it's the speed of > time) > > 6. When relative motion ceases, once again clock times can be mapped and > all observers can agree what they are doing in the common present moment. > > 7. Without a common present moment in which everything exists as a > background reference, none of this would even be knowable. None of this > analysis or comparisons could be made. That's the key insight that everyone > seems to be lacking, that they actually exist in a present moment and that > present moment is the only possible basis for anything, including the > differing clock times of relativity, to even take place. > > Edgar > > > > On Friday, January 3, 2014 12:23:52 PM UTC-5, Gabriel Bodeen wrote: >> >> Hi Edgar, >> >> That response does not at all address the contradiction I asked out. >> However, if you'd like to make your meaning crystal clear, you could give >> direct answers to the following logical questions. A direct (non-evasive) >> answer includes, at a minimum, picking one of "true" or "false" for each >> question independently, and may optionally include an explanation beyond >> that if you think the explanation is helpful. An answer which excludes >> picking either "true" or "false" for each question independently is >> evasive. I'd really like to nail down a few logical fixed points of your >> theory so that we can be surer we are talking about the same thing. When I >> get direc
Re: Another stab at the universal present moment - a gedanken..
Hi Edgar, That response does not at all address the contradiction I asked out. However, if you'd like to make your meaning crystal clear, you could give direct answers to the following logical questions. A direct (non-evasive) answer includes, at a minimum, picking one of "true" or "false" for each question independently, and may optionally include an explanation beyond that if you think the explanation is helpful. An answer which excludes picking either "true" or "false" for each question independently is evasive. I'd really like to nail down a few logical fixed points of your theory so that we can be surer we are talking about the same thing. When I get direct answers to these questions, I'll better understand what you mean and will be able to move on to deeper questions. 1. According to your "P-time" notion, there is some uniquely true order of events which occur widely separated in space but in the same reference frame: True or False? 2. According to your "P-time" notion, there is some uniquely true order of events which occur widely separated in space and in different reference frames: True or False? 3. According to your "P-time" notion, there is some uniquely true order of events at the same point in space: True or False? -Gabe On Friday, January 3, 2014 10:23:57 AM UTC-6, Edgar L. Owen wrote: > > Gabriel, > > See my long most recent response to Jason for an analysis of how this > works and why this contradiction doesn't falsify Present moment P-time. > > Best, > Edgar > > On Friday, January 3, 2014 10:31:59 AM UTC-5, Gabriel Bodeen wrote: >> >> (I'm expanding on the comment by Jason.) >> >> The "P-time" notion, if it means anything at all timelike, says that >> there exists some uniquely correct ordering of events across space. >> >> Consider these events: Pam's 3rd birthday party and Sam's 4th birthday >> party >> >> The "P-time" notion says that either (A) P3bp happens before S4bp, (B) >> P3bp happens after S4bp, or (C) P3bp happens at the same time as S4bp. The >> "P-time" notion, having not developed in a scientific manner, can't offer >> any help in discovering which of A, B, or C is the case; it merely says it >> is the case that, in principle, exactly one of A, B, or C is true. >> >> By contrast, the past century of physics concludes that A is true in some >> reference frames, B is true in other reference frames, and C is true in >> other other reference frames. It is NOT the case that, in principle, >> exactly one of A, B, or C is true. >> >> So there's a direct contradiction. And "P-time" falls on the wrong side >> of the contradiction according to a whole century's worth of experimental >> work in physics. >> >> Furthermore, there is (scientific) theoretical work (c.f. >> http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/10/121002145454.htm ) that >> indicates that, by exploiting quantum behavior, we should be able to build >> a superposition of one causal order and the reverse causal order between >> two events in the same location. If that pans out empirically, then the >> "P-time" notion won't even have the appearance of being a local >> approximation to the truth. >> >> -Gabe >> >> On Thursday, January 2, 2014 5:19:52 PM UTC-6, Jason wrote: >>> >>> Edgar, >>> >>> I realized there is another problem. It is not just that we don't what >>> Sam is doing, but it seems the present moment P-time does not proceed in an >>> orderly or logical manner. >>> >>> From Pam's point of view the event of her reaching Proxima Centauri >>> happens *before *Sam's 4th birthday. But from Sam's point of view, Pam >>> reaching Proxima Centauri happens *after *his 4th birthday! >>> >>> If there is a single, orderly proceeding, present moment, then I see no >>> what whatever to reconcile the incompatibility of these views... >>> >>> Jason >>> >>> -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Another stab at the universal present moment - a gedanken..
(I'm expanding on the comment by Jason.) The "P-time" notion, if it means anything at all timelike, says that there exists some uniquely correct ordering of events across space. Consider these events: Pam's 3rd birthday party and Sam's 4th birthday party The "P-time" notion says that either (A) P3bp happens before S4bp, (B) P3bp happens after S4bp, or (C) P3bp happens at the same time as S4bp. The "P-time" notion, having not developed in a scientific manner, can't offer any help in discovering which of A, B, or C is the case; it merely says it is the case that, in principle, exactly one of A, B, or C is true. By contrast, the past century of physics concludes that A is true in some reference frames, B is true in other reference frames, and C is true in other other reference frames. It is NOT the case that, in principle, exactly one of A, B, or C is true. So there's a direct contradiction. And "P-time" falls on the wrong side of the contradiction according to a whole century's worth of experimental work in physics. Furthermore, there is (scientific) theoretical work (c.f. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/10/121002145454.htm ) that indicates that, by exploiting quantum behavior, we should be able to build a superposition of one causal order and the reverse causal order between two events in the same location. If that pans out empirically, then the "P-time" notion won't even have the appearance of being a local approximation to the truth. -Gabe On Thursday, January 2, 2014 5:19:52 PM UTC-6, Jason wrote: > > Edgar, > > I realized there is another problem. It is not just that we don't what > Sam is doing, but it seems the present moment P-time does not proceed in an > orderly or logical manner. > > From Pam's point of view the event of her reaching Proxima Centauri > happens *before *Sam's 4th birthday. But from Sam's point of view, Pam > reaching Proxima Centauri happens *after *his 4th birthday! > > If there is a single, orderly proceeding, present moment, then I see no > what whatever to reconcile the incompatibility of these views... > > Jason > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Is Roger Clough an effect of global warming?
Is there another version of this list anywhere with a lower density of Cloughisms? On Tuesday, August 13, 2013 7:48:55 PM UTC-5, Pierz wrote: > > See here: > > http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/scienceshow/the-rise-of-slime3a-jellyfish-and-algae-thrive-in-new-oceanic-/4838478 > > It seems as oceans warm and the marine environment is degraded by > overfishing and pollution, the once thriving biodiversity of the oceans is > being replaced by a near mono-culture of algae and jellyfish. Am I the only > one to see a suspicious parallel between this process and what is occurring > on the Everything List? A once thriving diversity of quality ideas is > becoming supplanted by swarms of half-baked Leibnizisms (jellyfish) and an > effluent of right-wing diatribe (algae). Could it be that Roger Clough is a > manifestation of the Rise of Slime? > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Why computer consciousness and artificial intelligence are impossible.
So in the event that somebody actually does make AI, please recall this and consider your philosophical system to have been falsified. -Gabe On Monday, November 25, 2013 6:17:15 AM UTC-6, Roger Clough wrote: > > Why computer consciousness and artificial intelligence are impossible. > > Dr. Roger B Clough NIST (ret.) [1/1/2000] > See my Leibniz site at > http://independent.academia.edu/RogerClough > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
An old "White Rabbit" attempted solution - set to music
Greetings, I came here after reading and being intrigued by Russell Standish's book. I just thought I'd share one bit of fun before I go into lurker mode. It's a little ditty about Kant's philosophy. I remembered it after reading the book because it sounds very similar to some of the anthropic ideas and "White Rabbit" problem solutions. http://www.auburn.edu/academic/liberal_arts/philosophy/kant.htm THE TRANSCENDENTAL DEDUCTION of the Pure Concepts of Understanding by Immanuel Kant Translation by Roderick T. Long Music and vocals by Paul L. Fine Let us first divide cognition into rational analysis and sensory perception (which Descartes considered valueless). Now reason gives us concepts which are true but tautological; sensation gives us images whose content is phenomenal. Whatever greets our senses must exist in space and time for else it would be nowhere and nowhen and therefore slime; the space and time we presuppose before we sense reality must have innate subjective transcendental ideality. Thus space and time are forms of our perception whereby sensation’s synthesized in orderly array; the same must hold for rational conception: in everything we think, the laws of logic must hold sway. But a problem here arises with respect to natural science: while empirical in method, on pure thought it lays reliance. Although for Newton’s findings we to Newton give the glory Newton never could have found them if they weren’t known a priori. We know that nature governed is by principles immutable but how we come to know this is inherently inscrutable; that thought requires logic is a standpoint unassailable but for objects of our senses explanations aren’t available. So let's attempt to vivisect cognition by critical analysis in hope that we may find the link between pure thought and intuition: a deduction transcendental will shed light upon the mind. You may recall that space and time are forms of apprehension and therefore what we sense has spatiotemporal extension; whatever is extended is composed of a plurality but through an act of synthesis we form a commonality. If we are to be conscious of a single concrete entity each part of its extension must be given independently combining in a transcendental apperceptive unity to which I may ascribe the term “self-conscious” with impunity. The order of our various sensations arises from connections not beheld in sense alone; our self creates the rules of their relations and of this combination it is conscious as its own. While these rules correspond to scientific causal laws the question of their constancy remains to give us pause; but once we recollect the source of our self-conscious mind, to this perverse dilemma a solution we may find. The self is nothing but its act of synthesis sublime; this act must be the same to be self-conscious over time. The rules for combination of its selfhood form the ground so what we perceive tomorrow by today’s laws must be bound. These constant laws whereby we shape experience are simply those which regulate our reason: that is plain. So don’t ask why the stars display invariance -- the Cosmos is produced by your disoriented brain! -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
