On 27 Oct 2015, at 23:14, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
Sent from my iPhone
On 28 Oct 2015, at 4:49 AM, Brent Meeker <meeke...@verizon.net> wrote:
On 10/26/2015 11:00 PM, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
On 27 October 2015 at 16:57, Bruce Kellett <bhkell...@optusnet.com.au
> wrote:
On 27/10/2015 4:50 pm, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
On 27 October 2015 at 14:22, Bruce Kellett <bhkell...@optusnet.com.au
> wrote:
On 27/10/2015 1:13 pm, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
On 27 Oct 2015, at 12:15 PM, Bruce Kellett <bhkell...@optusnet.com.au
> wrote:
On 27/10/2015 12:05 pm, Jason Resch wrote:
On Mon, Oct 26, 2015 at 7:37 PM, Bruce Kellett <bhkell...@optusnet.com.au
> wrote:
On 27/10/2015 10:52 am, Jason Resch wrote:
On Monday, October 26, 2015, Bruce Kellett <bhkell...@optusnet.com.au
> wrote:
> On 27/10/2015 8:16 am, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
>
> On Tuesday, 27 October 2015, John Clark
<johnkcl...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> so where does semantic content come from?
>>
>> From examples in the physical world. You can give as many
botanical definitions
of the
word "tree" as you want but it will just be a word defined
by other words that are themselves defined by yet more words
that are.... If you tried to dig for meaning all you'd find
is a endless loop, it would just be a game where words are
manipulated according to the rules of botany until somebody
forgot about definitions and pointed to the ASCII string "t-r-
e-e" and then pointed to a large photosynthesizing organism
made
largely of cellulose that exists in the physical world. Then
even a martian would notice a correspondence between this
game of manipulating symbols called "botany" that humans had
invented and the way these large photosynthesizing organism
made largely of cellulose live.
>
> What about a virtual world with trees and observers, and no
I/O devices connecting it to outside trees?
>
> I think Brent answered this in his response to Russell. The
trees of the ordinary physical world do not connect with
anything outside this world either in order to have semantic
content. A virtual world would be no different in this
respect. The point is that the content comes from something
other formal symbol manipulation -- things such as pointing
and sensory responses. There has to be something other than
the consciousness with which the consciousness can interact.
I take it you've never played video games.
Not with any regularity. But I take it that when you play such
games, you interact with the simulated environment via the
provided interface -- the game only interacts with itself in
so far as the original programmers designed it to. The
semantic content is provided from outside in either case.
So what do you think would happen if an AI, or uploaded mind
were uploaded into a virtual reality that was fully
disconnected from the physical world? Would that mind no
longer be conscious?
Difficult to tell because, by construction, you can't ask it.
But if both the AI and the VR are programmed by some external
intelligence, semantic content might be provided in that way.
But once programmed, there may be no further evidence of
semantic content. The computer could be fired into space, and
the programmers and their entire civilisation might die. If
aliens find it and somehow work out the syntax, there is no way
for them to work out the meaning behind it, since there is no
intrinsic meaning in circuits turning on and off. So what is the
explanation here: the meaning is still there because the long-
dead programmers had thought about it in a particular way?
Could be. If the program is no longer running, the meaning might
not be recoverable.
The program is running, but the programmers and their
civilisation are gone. How is the meaning recoverable?
Not by the outsider, certainly. But to the insider......who can
tell? It depends on what the programmers originally built in.
Then that means that there is meaning intrinsic to a certain
pattern of circuits turning on and off.
I take your meaning, but I think that's a misleading way of putting
it. If we are living in The Matrix then everything is patterns of
circuits switching on and off. Whether the is some meaning to that
switching can only be known by the programmer of The Matrix. But
as denizens within The Matrix each of us finds meaning in
interaction with other parts of The Matrix. That meaning is not
intrinsic to the The Matrix, it's intrinsic to each of us as a part
of The Matrix. The subset of patterns that instantiates Brent
within The Matrix "understands" other parts of The Matrix by
interacting with them.
OK, but that removes the requirement that a computation must be a
computation relative to the real world, which makes it difficult to
place limits on what can count as implementing a computation, which
I think leads to the idea that all computations are necessarily
implemented by virtue of their status as platonic objects.
All you need is one universal system.
Then it happens that elementary arithmetic is already a universal
system, so we can take it to describe and study all the others, and
their incredibly complex relationships they develop with each other,
and the first person fluxes (due to the FPI).
Bruno
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