On Aug 9, 9:48 pm, "Stephen P. King" <stephe...@charter.net> wrote:
> > Hi, > > May I chance the subject? > > I think the fundamental point here is that computers do not have a > sense of self. Not a 'sense of self in the world or just a sense of > being. They just exist. I believe that the current notion of computers > is grossly oversimplified. Exactly. Technically I would say that a microelectronic computer does have sense, but it is the sense of a single large semiconductor molecule, not of a single being that understands being. > As I see it, computation is 'the transformation of information" and > to limit the notion of information to just what can be represented by a > binary valued logical algebra is pathetic and sad. Why not consider the > idea that all forms of information, ala Bateson modulo Peirce: is 'a > difference between two referents that is a difference for a third > referent"? Sounds ok to me, although I would still say that the cosmos is more than just information. I think of Sense (+chance) as the invariance (+variance) between Essence (significance) and Existence (entropy). Which would make Significance (information) the variance between Sense and Existence. Entropy then would be the variance between Sense and Essence, ie, what is not made significant through time is lost to entropy. > All of Shannon's ideas would still work as far as I can tell. This > yields Boolean algebras a a simple case. But consider a collection of > referents that have mutual differences and relations that cannot be > reduced to 2-logics? This would fall outside of the usual Turing > A-machine ideas... Sounds interesting. I would still say that potential for any particular kind of awareness is at least 50% dependent upon the referents themselves. With better algebras you can get a better blueprint but you still can't build a glass skyscraper out of bricks and expect the same results. Unless that's not what you mean. Criag -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
