On 01 Mar 2012, at 14:49, Stephen P. King wrote:
On 3/1/2012 3:26 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:
Hello Stephen,
On 29 Feb 2012, at 20:26, Stephen P. King wrote:
On 2/29/2012 4:28 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:
On 28 Feb 2012, at 20:17, Stephen P. King wrote:
On 2/28/2012 10:43 AM, Quentin Anciaux wrote:
Digital physics says that the whole universe can be substituted
with a program, that obviously imply comp (that we can
substitue your brain with a digital one), but comp shows that
to be inconsistent, because comp implies that any piece of
matter is non-computable... it is the limit of the infinities
of computation that goes through your consciousness current
state.
[SPK1]
Can you see how this would be a problem for the entire
digital uploading argument if functional substitution cannot
occur in a strictly classical way, for example by strictly
classical level measurement of brain structure? Any dependence
of consciousness on quantum entanglement will prevent any form
of digital substitution.
This is not correct. It would only make the comp subst. level
lower, for we would need to Turing-emulated the entire quantum
system. What you say would be true if a quantum computer was not
Turing emulable, but it is. Sure, there is an exponential slow-
down, but the UD does not care, nor the 'first persons' who
cannot be aware of the delays.
Bruno
[SPK2]
This might not be a bad thing for Bruno's ontological argument -
as it would show that 1p indeterminacy is a function or
endomorphism of entire "universes" in the many-worlds sense -
but would doom any change of immortality via digital uploading.
Dear Bruno,
Did you not see this last comment [SPK2] that I wrote? We need
to distinguish between the actions on and by physical systems,
such as human brains, and the "platonic" level systems.
We certainly have to do that locally, when we say 'yes' to the
doctor, or when the doctor builds the artificial brain. But the
reasoning leads to a conceptual distinction between the physical
systems and the objects of Platonia.
Roughly speaking, the objects in Platonia are specific numbers and
numbers relations, while physics is a relative sum on all
computations going through my actual computational state. This
follows form step seven.
Dear Bruno,
In my thinking physics is a relative to mutual consistencies of
1p, via bisimilations. Bisimulation is explained here.
Unfortunately I don't understand. I told you at that time. You might
give examples. What does A and B denote? What is the relationship
between your notion of simulation, and the notion from computer science.
Since bisimulation algebras are "telescoping" then they seem to
include the intersection of 'infinite number of computations".
This is too much unclear.
Your remark seemed to be one that was considering my comment
[SPK1] as if it where discussing the Platonic level aspect. This
is just probably a confusion caused by our use of the same words
for the two completely different levels. For example, a physical
system is a UTM if it can implement any enumerable recursive
algorithm, aka is "programable" in the Turing Thesis sense, but
its actual behavior is limited by its resources, transition
speeds, etc.
It is the difference between a UM, and a UM implemented in some
other UM. When we implement a UM physically, we Implement a UM in
some local subparts of the physical reality, which is itself
emerging from the sum on all UMs' computations going through my
current state.
Note that the physical reality is not in Platonia. It is how the
border of Platonia looks to "me", taking into account the infinity
of UMs and computations to which I "belong".
I watched a You tube video last night on Aristotle's Metaphysics
and in it there was a comment on why Aristotle was skeptical of
Plato's Theory of Forms. My skepticism is very similar.
One has to show how the Forms necessarily give rise to the
appearances of physical worlds if we are to use Plato's theory of
ontology. This is where and why I have trouble with UDA 8.
You still don't get the point. My whole work is just a precise
formulation of "One has to show how the Forms necessarily give rise to
the appearances of physical worlds if we are to assume comp".
The work is negative. It does not explains much things, it shows that
if we are rational and willing to assume the comp hyp in the cognitive
science, then we can no more use anything found by the physicists to
explain anything else, including physics.
UDA shows that the only explanations possible have to rely on numbers
(or equivalent), and no more (than definitions). There is no choice in
the matter. It is a negative theorem showing that physics is
metaphysically wrong at the start, even if locally fertile and useful.
And I show that we can do that *only* by "interviewing universal self-
introspecting machines", and that this has to give the qualia and the
quanta, and an explanation why they look different. And on this, the
theory extracted from the introspective machine already works.
Comp is cute, because it is simple, already believed by the
rationalist, and it explains the origin of the three gods, and the
fall of soul, and the apparition of the two matters (intelligible and
sensible), but it does not explains time, space, particles, energy,
boson-fermions, etc. The math is hard. But that was not the goal. The
goal was to show that comp makes physics and theology a branch of
arithmetic. Elementary arithmetic is shown to be a theory of
everything, necessarily. Church thesis rehabilitates Pythagorus, and
UDA justifies the origin of the appearance of the physical laws. What
needs to be done is to compare those physical laws with the one we
infer from observation, and with some luck we refute comp.
Before I interviewed the machine, I said that it might take a billions
years before we get an hint how the numbers generates the relevant
dreams for getting physics. So the quantization in the Z1* and X1*
(and S4Grz1) comes as a surprise, and people makes me write a PhD
thesis, in math, on that. But this gives only the logic of
observability, which is still a long way from deriving a physical
notion, although it is an important non trivial first (tiny) step.
My goal was just to convince scientists that the mind-body problem can
be tackled with the scientific method. Nobody should be astonished
that it leads to difficult math, nor that it contradicts our
philosophical prejudices.
This does not show that there is any wrong propositions in physics,
just that those propositions must be justifiable from arithmetic, once
we do the comp hypothesis. It might be seen as radical, because it
made physics into an emerging pattern, but it is very modest. It is
just a precise recall that the mind-body problem is not solved.
An abstract Platonic Machine, such as what you consider in SANE04,
does not have any such limits.
I am not sure which one you are talking about.
Platonic "machines" do not have any limits except those of the
logic that they are defined in.
Machines does not have logic, a priori. They can use some logic or
some other logic. And if you agree that boolean logic applies on
numbers and machines, then you can use logic to prove facts about
machines, and some of them can do that too.
This is not a problem until we notice that there is not any a priori
reason why one form of logic is chosen over another.
In which logic are you asserting this proposition?
It does not makes sense for me. In science everyone use some *portion*
of classical logic.
Given that the models of Arithmetic are many and not just one, we
need to be a bit careful that we are not being parochial in our
thinking that the logic we are using is "absolute" to the
minimization of all others.
Gödel's completeness theorem makes ALL theorems in logic and
elementary arithmetic true in all models of arithmetic.
Some models are non standard, and contained very weird infinite
numbers, and weird propositions, but I am not interested in those non
standard constructs. Those non standard constructs exist for ALL first
order theory. Löbian machine avoids them by using second order axioms,
if and when they need them. You make things complex without providing
the motivation.
My contention is that we have a natural prejudice for Integer based
arithmetic and bivalent logic because those are the one that best
match the way our explanations of our physical world work.
Explanations in which logic.
Umm, my wording here is a bit ambiguous, but I hope the idea is
transmitted OK..
Comp explains from the numbers that numbers are confronted to many
different logics. To each epistemic notion (which includes now matter)
comp gives the corresponding logic (quantum logic for qualia and
quanta, intuitionist logic for the 1p view of the 1p, etc.)
With comp there is an explanation why machines develop a lot of non
classical logics, which corresponds to the different machine x-person
povs.
I think that we should consider a formal way to describe these
relations. Perhaps some one that is fluent in Category theory will
come to help us in these discussions.
I have used category theory in "Conscience et mécanisme", but it
helps only for the semantics of the 1-person (S4Grz, S4Grz1, X1*).
It is also very distracting. It is better to understand well the
problem before musing on the tools which can solve them. The
problem *is* a problem in computer science, which has already good
tools.
Yes, but the tools that one uses can enhance consideration of
some properties but occult others. As I am thinking, we have to hold
the concrete and abstract aspect of Existence on the same level and
to hold one as more primitive than the other leads only to problems.
This has been my complain of your result all along.
Then you might just abandon the idea that comp is correct. But I don't
see where your complain comes from, unless you get a mystical
experience where God told you that primitive matter exists.
Nobody has ever see primitive matter. It is a metaphysical assumption
introduced in science by Aristotle. It is not used by physicists,
which have content themselves with extrapolation on number relations.
It should be a problem only for those who believe in some religious
way in some primitive matter. It should annoy only the metaphysical
materialists, like some Marxists perhaps, and the catholics who have
reintroduced matter to justify the identity Bread = Christ's body.
It is used by animals, including us, in the everyday life as a
preprogrammed manner to avoid metaphysical vertigo, which can be an
impediment in front of preys and predators. We don't have to make it
into a law.
I have no clue of what is the problem you have with the result. Why
don't you abandon mechanism, if you find its consequences so much non
swallowable.
Or you might search for a flaw. Who knows, perhaps there is one. But
then you should try to put your finger on it, because you will never
invalidate a reasoning by criticizing the semantics of the assumptions
from philosophical grounds. By definition, and construction, a
reasoning does not depend on the interpretation of its premise. That's
the whole point of doing logic.
We need a way to define the idea of "the limit of the infinities
of computations that go through a given consciousness state" in a
way that is more clear given that "a given consciousness state" is
still a very ambiguous notion.
We can bet that some equivalence relation is at play, like all
similar 1p in non-diverging computations, yes. But this is
necessarily a non constructive notion, and that is why it is
simpler to start with the logic of measure 'one' extracted
directly from the modalities of self-reference.
Why does it have to be "non-constructive"?
In computer science, the general question if program x and y compute
the same function is provably insoluble.
I don't want to dig into the details now, but in computer science all
interesting notions are non constructive, especially in theoretical
artificial intelligence.
This seems to be a treachery or hand waving way to not address the
problem that I am pointing out!
No, it is a theorem. We have to live with that, forever. It is like
the irrationality of sqrt(5).
In the bisimulation algebra that I mentioned above we see that there
is some properties that disallow closure but this does not mean that
measures have to be non-constructive.
If that is true, it means that you are no more working in the comp
theory, but in some non-comp theory.
It just means that because there is no absolute measure on all the
possibilities that only local and relative measures obtain. This
reasoning only happens when we consider Aristotle's criticism of
Plato's theory.
You make invraisemblable jumps.
it seems that in your haste to reject Aristotle you have missed
this. :-(
Note that I do appreciate Aristotle a lot, for having the courage and
ingenuity to make scientific (refutable) physics, biology and
theology. The fact that all those have been refuted just confirms how
serious the guy was, including in theology. He was the creator of
logic, independently of Indians and Chineses.
And I agree with some Platonist scholars that he was a platonist, even
if its metaphysics appears to be incoherent with it, when we add comp
or Pythagorus.
Is Löbianity required for bare consciousness, e.g.
consciousness without self-awareness? It seems to me that our
entire discussion seems to assume that consciousness is just the
"inside aspect" of computation.
I have come to be open to the idea that bare consciousness needs
only one UM, or even less. Löbianity is required for self-
consciousness, and for the machine able to reason on all this,
making the interview enough rich to extract physics.
OK, we agree there.
You accept the idea that all computers are conscious?
I don't use this in UDA, and it seems to me a rather radical
position. I have been made open to this when swim (not me!) smoked
Salvia divinorum, where we can be completely amnesic, no more feeling
anything, nor even the time passing, literally, or the space proprio-
perception, and yet be fully conscious. Without time, neither
objective nor subjective, no space, nor anything at all. Swim might
have been temporarily reduced to the abstract virgin UM. But this,
unlike UDA, is very speculative.
But Löbianity is basically given once the machine believes in the
(arithmetical) induction axioms. All chatting UMs obeys to Gödel's
second incompleteness theorem, but only the Löbian "knows that",
that is, they can prove their own incompleteness theorem.
Yes, but we have to be more explicit as to how this "chatting"
can occur.
Not at all. This is trivial in the comp theory. It occurs because of
the laws of addition and multiplication. The UD emulates all possible
interactions between programs.
The only real problem, which I try only to formulate, is the relative
measure problem justifying why the "physical hallucination" is
persistent. The hypostases constitute a tiny beginning of a solution
on a very long path. The result is mainly the formlaution of the
problem, and the fact methodology to find the solution, preserving the
qualia and quanta distinction.
This is where the concurrency issue is important and must be
addressed.
It can be addressed, because it is quite interesting. I mentioned to
you the work by Abramski, Girard, the dagger categories, etc. This is
very convincing, logically, technically, and its shed light on both
classical and quantum computation. I might have been able to say more
with the combinators, and the Curry Howard isomorphism I have talkd
about, some times ago. But it is qucikly very technical.
Now, such works is still physics in the pre-comp sense. They cannot by
that method extract the qualia, and the quanta are still justified in
a non-comp way. They are just not addressing the mind-body problem.
Girard seems aware that his move is necessitate by incompleteness, but
then I show that it has to be derived from incompleteness (in the comp
frame).
I argue that when we take the abstract COMP and physical worlds as
being on the same level
This is meaningless. COMP is a theory. Physical worlds are objects.
but neither as ontologically primitive,
This looks like the neutral comp monist consequence.
we can easily solve the concurrency problem. This is what Pratt
showed in his papers.
I will not come back on what I have already explained to you. Pratt is
not aware of the very peculiar form that the mind-body problem get
once we postulate comp. It is interesting algebra, and perhaps someone
will use Pratt's insight to progress, but that is the more I can say.
We also solve the problem of the "motivation" of Plato's Forms by
using Bertrand Russell's idea of a neutral monism that becomes
obvious in the limit of the vanishing of the duality between the
abstract and the concrete. Just as how our physical world vanishes
into a singularity as we wind the clock backwards, the same occurs
in this ontology that I am discussing.
Well actually, between us, I have never believed in the big bang
theory, with or without comp. I doubt that the big bang is the origin
of the physical universe. I think it is just a big explosion among many.
Anyway, I cannot use physics.
The entire discussion use only the invariance of consciousness for
a set of transformation, in UDA, and from the classical theory of
knowledge and observation in AUDA. You can approximate
consciousness by an unconscious bet in self-consistency. To be
conscious is only to be in a state of believing in some reality.
Yes, but for the belief to be "true" it must have some concrete
expression that is robust.
Too vague.
Only physical worlds have that feature,
You beg the question. If you grasp comp, you grasp that we have no
clue of what is a physical universe, except as an hallucination by
machines, made persistent by having relevant relative proportions.
In fact a physical universe becomes a very abstract notion. It looks
concrete to us, because billions of neurons and glials cells makes us
believe it like that, for the struggle of life purpose.
it provides an "objective" standard for "true statements" that
otherwise would be completely contingent.
I might accept this for arithmetic. Not physics, at least not in the
fundamental studies. Provably so, once we work in comp (that's the
point).
Concreteness in comp is just complex indexical abstraction.
This is a subtle philosophical point that I may need to explain
further.
I am not so much for doing philosophy. It is even confusing in the
context of working on a "philosophical problem" with the scientific
method.
Sometimes I get the feeling that you illustrate that philosophy just
slow down science, like (pseudo) theology, which I think is partially
true (but globally false, science has its feet in philosophy).
So White Rabbits would be the abstract equivalent of a Boltzmann
Brain?
White rabbits are perception by people on aberrant computations
executed by the (concrete in step 7, abstract after step 8) UD.
Boltzmann brains are physical UMs appearing in physical universe.
The UD can be said to generalize them through the arbitrary
computations in arithmetic.
So White Rabbits are the "hallucinations" that computations can
have? I thought that White Rabbits where content of computations
that where inconsistencies or random noise....
... from the 1p machine views. They are experienced. They are
experiences belonging to the 1p-indeterminacy problem when you are "in
front" of the UD (concrete or abstract, depending of the UDA steps you
grasp). The measure problem is equivalent with hunting the White
Rabbits away. I have used the notion of 1-white rabbits, to make
precise that it is not the type of quantum white rabbit, in some
context. I have talked about the aberrant dreams, that the UD cannot
not introduce in the personal indeterminacies of the machines.
Bruno
http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/
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