Thanks Jason I love that series! Yes, Minsky makes the point very well. He's obviously an everythingist of the so-called platonic sort (sorry Brent). "If you have the idea of the program and its processes, then that's enough to determine everything that happens in it." This general trend, of some species of everything-ism with observer selection, seems destined either to fizzle out as not even wrong or else turn into a paradigm shift that shows our former views (once again) in a far too parochial light. Probably nothing in between though.Your points are spot on, and point 3 in particular is I think very helpful in thinking about otherwise extremely puzzling concepts that the interviewer was clearly struggling with. As you must know by now I'm rather partial to Fred Hoyle's way of conceptualising this. There's something rather compelling for me about his subjectively monopsychic serialisation of moments. Amongst other things, it makes the much-abused old philosophical position of solipsism respectable. But also it rationalises the unobservability of consciousness in the concrete world, since according to this heuristic it is uniquely an epistemological characteristic of the universal experiencer. We cannot observe it because there's no "it" to be observed; instead it is an epistemological term of art which refers to the "mode of observation" itself, or alternatively the manner in which an "observable" is subjectively manifested. So at each momentary juncture, and to that extent only, it becomes epistemologically "real" or "actual". The sense of actual that Minsky declines to accept, to the obvious consternation of his host, is by contrast ontological. This attribution is, as he rightly says, entirely supernumerary and consequently can add only confusion.
David On 21 May 2017 at 23:54, Jason Resch <jasonre...@gmail.com> wrote: > David, > > I always appreciate your e-mails. Your comments regarding the term > "existence" reminds me of what Minsky says of the word (2 minutes 50 > seconds in): > https://www.closertotruth.com/series/what-are-possible-worlds#video-2729 > > I agree that humans have an innate prejudice against the reality of things > we can't see. Even the idea that objects continue to exist when we no > longer see them has to be learned > <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Object_permanence>, through repeatedly > witnessing objects that have fallen out of our sight. > > I think this may explain: > 1. Why humans gravitate towards presentism rather than eternalism, > (because we don't revisit past points in time), despite what relativity > tells us <https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/11921131.pdf> on the matter. > 2. Why people resist the many worlds interpretation, (because we don't see > the other branches) against what the mathematics* of the theory should lead > them to believe. > 3. Why some find the idea of a singular "universal > experiencer/person/soul" bewildering, (because we don't recall being > others), despite the failures > <https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Arnold_Zuboff/publication/233329805_One_Self_The_Logic_of_Experience/links/54adcdb60cf2213c5fe419ec/One-Self-The-Logic-of-Experience.pdf?origin=publication_detail&ev=pub_int_prw_xdl&msrp=cR_Vf6yO0w0TxJLfXpxJsT4Bu9N4y1OCBbZRtI5V6s9RyXBkRLN7tKs7eBghPMvO5mY0j-jih4ZXHvndC_kXmKLwoxcnwnlaiiz5pj-E6y8.GCSsZWt0E3f67EyFl-vMGFvAlLNCffh4TQC9Dpsp05YlGsjWWaJF7q3zvst2PqInB3MpVTlQ1yplnlQY8aLYlQ.aAIvUJAPeRBi6jtU13bB9jmlARn1T5u4oa9haeIpqbW7mdY4AugPadt0A-5dKB3LWh6UL41fzbmCCCdFXF20aQ.ln9En2cg8QGzfO07gQHu-9T3YLouB3QhZCQR3hAh4CFePZRTOyF98AfMIgJ8bPF7INoFF2YtFopam7Z1q2NZiQ> > of conventional theories of personal identity. > > > * “Schrödinger also had the basic idea of parallel universes shortly > before Everett, but he didn't publish it. He mentioned it in a lecture in > Dublin, in which he predicted that the audience would think he was crazy. > Isn't that a strange assertion coming from a Nobel Prize winner—that he > feared being considered crazy for claiming that his equation, the one that > he won the Nobel Prize for, might be true.” -- David Deutsch > > > > Jason > > On Sun, May 21, 2017 at 11:06 AM, David Nyman <da...@davidnyman.com> > wrote: > >> Recent discussions have got me thinking again about these categories. >> ISTM in particular that there's a lot of probably unhelpful worrying about >> the application of the term "existence". For example, it's held in some >> quarters that physics exists in a sense that mathematics or computation >> doesn't. However, I've become more and more convinced that such confusion >> arises from a fundamental mis-categorisation of concepts. For example, when >> we speak of physics we typically don't parse it into its component >> concepts, but perhaps it's important that we should. In my view, these >> components are a perceptual or concrete one - the observable part, and an >> abstract, mathematical or mechanistic component - the theoretical or >> reductive part. ISTM that any putative "theory of everything" must stand on >> both of these legs or be left seriously lame. Now, the odd thing is that >> most people are convinced that the observables of the first component >> "exist" in a sense they are more reluctant to grant to the ontological >> constituency of the unobservable, abstract or theoretical one. Seeing is >> believing, apparently, in this instance. But surely it is obvious, at least >> after a little reflection, that the observable part isn't properly an >> "existent". It's not in itself a "thing" that can be decomposed into >> constituent parts. That decomposition always takes place in terms of the >> second or theoretical component, which is FAPP the putative existent - i.e. >> the assumptive, reductive ontology of the theory in which the reasoning >> takes place. The second and all subsequently derivative parts lie within >> the domain of an epistemology, not an ontology, and as such are more >> tractable in terms of an adequate theory of knowledge. >> >> If the foregoing is valid (and obviously I think it may well be) then a >> more illuminating criterion to be applied in matters within the observable >> or perceptual spectrum is not whether they exist in an ontological sense >> but rather whether they are true in an epistemological one. By true I don't >> mean necessarily "veridical" in the conventional sense that all, or indeed >> any, inferences that might be drawn from them are thereby accurate. The >> sense of truth I'm using here is more or less equivalent to Descartes' >> realisation that the primary characteristic of experience (pace Brent's >> parsing of the precise grammar of this claim) is that it is logically >> indubitable. Veridicality in the more general sense relies on much more >> than primary perceptual indubitability. But does anyone in fact doubt any >> of this? Well, yes, if their claims are to be taken at face value, the >> school of Patricia Churchland and Daniel Dennett et al do believe that such >> experiences (or in their terms mere claims to experience) only "seem" to be >> true but in fact are illusory. However, it isn't too hard to unravel such >> language games; in these cases, "seemings" or "illusions" do work that is >> in no way distinguishable from the experiences their (largely implicit) >> theory requires them to sweep under the rug. In the sense they seem to >> intend, the entire concrete, observable world only seems to exist, or is an >> illusion. I wouldn't actual object too much to this terminology so long as >> it's made clear that these are illusions that seem to be true! Nevertheless >> I think we can see that proponents of these ideas are willy-nilly using >> terminology that does indeed fall within the epistemological scope of a >> general theory, rather than within its ontological part. >> >> So in terms of the computationalist framework the assumptive ontology is >> computation based in arithmetic and its basic combinatorial relations >> (*,+). These then are the reductive "existents" of the theory in terms of >> which everything else is to be inferred. However, such inferences cannot >> add further existents, or even relations, to the ontology. Rather, whatever >> else is added must be explicable in terms of composite entities and >> relations arising out of an adequate epistemological analysis deriving >> solely from the original ontological assumptions. From the perspective of >> computationalism, this amounts to whatever is computable and thus emulable >> within the mechanist framework. However, since what is emulable encompasses >> a logic of self-reflection or subjectivity, there is a crucially >> determinative "internal" or truth-related view that will ultimately be >> related to an uncomputable superposition of such subjective perspectives. >> The initial criterion of validity of any such epistemological analysis will >> lie in correspondence with (perceptual) fact or, equivalently, primary >> experiential truth. Beyond this, for such provisional facts or truths to be >> consistent with the unfolding of events as experienced, this correspondence >> must in turn be consequent on the epistemological singularisation, or >> "observer selection", of a stable, pervasive and consistent physical >> mechanism. Such a self-selecting mechanism is what the general theory must >> invoke to explicate the stabilisation of the concrete observables in terms >> of which it is perceivable and describable. In this sense its ultimate >> justification must reside in a similar logical space to that of >> "everythingist" theories in physics itself. >> >> To state all this is not of course to demonstrate its ultimate >> feasibility or correctness. Rather it is to set the boundaries of the >> problem in an intelligible and hopefully tractable manner. But there does >> seem to be a prize here worth at least some effort in this direction. And >> perhaps especially worth the candle on a list devoted to the contemplation >> of everything. >> >> David >> >> -- >> 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 https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. >> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. >> > > -- > 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 https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. 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