> On 25 Aug 2019, at 10:31, Philip Thrift <cloudver...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > > On Saturday, August 24, 2019 at 11:14:46 PM UTC-5, Russell Standish wrote: > On Sun, Aug 25, 2019 at 01:15:38PM +1000, Bruce Kellett wrote: > > On Sun, Aug 25, 2019 at 1:01 PM Russell Standish <li...@hpcoders.com.au > > <javascript:>> wrote: > > > > On Sat, Aug 24, 2019 at 07:34:26PM -0700, 'Brent Meeker' via Everything > > List wrote: > > > > > > > > > On 8/24/2019 6:31 PM, Russell Standish wrote: > > > > On Sun, Aug 25, 2019 at 10:06:38AM +1000, Bruce Kellett wrote: > > > > > On Sun, Aug 25, 2019 at 9:45 AM Russell Standish < > > li...@hpcoders.com.au <javascript:>> wrote: > > > > > > > > > > On Sat, Aug 24, 2019 at 05:18:47PM -0400, John Clark wrote: > > > > > > > > > > > > >> OK so 0=1, that's fine. > > > > > > > > > > > > > No, that is not fine. If 0=1, pigs have wings. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Yes but that's OK too, if nothing physical exists then > > pigs > > and wings > > > > > can't > > > > > > cause problems because they don't exist. And there are no > > minds that > > > > > might be > > > > > > upset by paradoxes. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > That's kind of the point, though. Minds are nonphysical > > things, > > and > > > > > there is no apriori reason why physical things need to exist > > for > > minds > > > > > to exist. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > You have evidence for disembodied minds? > > > > That's not an apriori reason. Assuming you're in principle OK with > > the > > > > concept of a brain in a vat (which is a disembodied mind), then the > > > > you too do not have an apriori reason for the existence of physical > > > > things. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > I don't see that a brain in a vat counts as a disembodied mind. Do > > you > > mean > > > a brain that has no environment to perceive or act on? I would deny > > that > > > such an isolated brain instantiates a mind. On the other hand, if > > the > > brain > > > has sensors and actuators operating, say a Mars Rover, then it isn't > > > disembodied. > > > > > > Brent > > > > > > > Yes - I know your argument. In the BIV scenario, the environment could > > be simulated. Basically Descartes' evil daemon (malin genie) > > scenario. Nothing about the observed physics (bodies and whatnot) > > exists in any fundamental sense. > > > > > > Presumably the vat is a physical object that provides nutrients, power, etc > > to > > the BIV. That does not count as disembodied in my book. > > > > Neither the brain, nor the vat is a body. The body is actually > simulated by the evil daemon, and doesn't exist ontologically. Hence > disembodied. > > Now Brent makes good arguments (and I echo simular arguments in my > book) that a body must exist phenomenally (ie exist as an experience > of the mind), but nowhere does there appear to be a requirement for > the body to exist ontologically (in the same reality as the brain and > the vat in this example). > > This is all different from John Clark's argument that something must > exist to breathe fire into all the computations. He calls that > something "matter", and strongly disavows the ability of arithmetic to > do this. Bruno Marchal claims the opposite - that arithmetic, or in > fact any abstract system capable of universal computation, is > sufficient for the job. To be quite frank, I'm a fence sitter in this > debate, as I've yet to see any physically realisable experiment that > can settle the matter.
Russell, we cannot settle the matter if Mechanism is true, but if false, we can discover it, by finding a theorem in the material modes violated by nature. It is like the dream: we can know-for-sure that we are dreaming but we cannot know-for-sure when we are awake. Of course we can know that we are awake in the Theaetus’ sense, like when we believe that we are awake and "God knows" that we are indeed awake. Concerning any reality, science offers only degrees of plausibility. Public certainty about public things is a form of madness, even if quite useful FMPP. (For Most Practical Purposes). > > > > > "settle the matter" :) > > What is weird though is the number of people who think that there are "minds" > that are some sort of non-material entities. To call them "patterns" is just > the Platonism of reifying abstractions. > > It is no different from theology or supernaturalism. Philip, give me your TOE. Either it is Turing universal and then it could redundant, or it is not Turing universal, and then it missed the main heroin of Mechanism. The point is first that Mechanism and Materialism are incompatible, then secondly, that math and physics seems to favour Mechanism and seems to refute Materialism. Bruno > > @philipthrift > > > > -- > 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 > <mailto:everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com>. > To view this discussion on the web visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/da066294-4e7d-487e-8842-abe3cc8ea312%40googlegroups.com > > <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/da066294-4e7d-487e-8842-abe3cc8ea312%40googlegroups.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>. -- 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 view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/0E82B70B-51D1-4F41-A35D-4E7E577E7049%40ulb.ac.be.
