Marc, I do not argue with 'your half' of the 'answer' you gave to the conference announcement of Jürgen Schm , I just ask for the 'other part': what should we call "a computer"?
'Anything' doing Comp? (meaning: whatever is doing it)? Will the conference be limited to that technically embryonic gadget - maybe even on a binary bases - we use with that limited software-input in 2006? a Turing machine? John M ----- Original Message ----- From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Everything List" <everything-list@googlegroups.com> Sent: Thursday, November 02, 2006 10:09 PM Subject: Re: Zuse Symposium: Is the universe a computer? Berlin Nov 6-7 > > Ah the famous Juergen Schmidhuber! :) > > Is the universe a computer. Well, if you define 'universe' to mean > 'everything which exists' and you're a mathematical platonist and grant > reality to infinite sets and uncomputables, the answer must be NO, > since if uncomputable numbers are objectively real (strong platonism) > they are 'things' and therefore 'part of the universe' which are by > definition not computable. > > But if by 'universe' you just mean 'physical reality' or 'discrete > mathematics' or you refuse to grant platonic reality to uncomputables > or infinite sets (anti-platonism or weaker platonism) then the answer > could be YES, the universe is a computer. > > Cheers! > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
