Sorry about the graphics... There were'nt any except some italics I think.
I'll send this one in plain text.. tell me how it goes.
Hal Finney wrote:
George Levy writes:
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Oh, sorry, I'm supposed to ignore that, aren't I? I guess you had
some neat graphics in your message
Discreteness may be important in our world for the development of
consciousness, but it is certainly not necessary across worlds. I
believe therefore that the differences between the simulations is
infinitesimal - not discrete - and therefore that the number of
simulations is infinite like the continuum.
The last part doesn't follow. It could be that the number of simulations
is infinite like the rational numbers, which would still allow for the
differences between simulations to be infinitesimal. In that case the
number of simulations is countably infinite rather than uncountable.
Personally I am uncomfortable with the infinity of the continuum, it
seems to be a much more troublesome concept than is generally recognized.
I would not want to invoke it unless absolutely necessary.
I think the rest of your argument works just as well with a countable
infinity as an uncountable one.
I only invoked the uncountable infinite because I think there is NO ANTHROPIC
REASON for using the countable infinite. Again, it's the same philosophical
argument that justifies the plenitude: if an existing instance is arbitrary
(not justified), then all instances are necessary.
This principle applied here goes as follows: If there was an anthropic reason
requiring discretness between worlds, then those other worlds would have
to be causally linked with ours. This would then be one arbitrary instance
of a cluster of linked worlds, which we would imply that many other clusters
would also exist. Hence we are led to the uncountable infinite.
We're faced with the strange possibility that the
consciousness spans an infinite number of simulations distributed over widely
different levels. Each individual simulation implementation becomes infinitesimal
and unimportant in comparison with the the whole infinite set of implementations
that the consciousness covers. A particular simulation that stops operating
(for example because the plug is pulled) will hardly affect or be missed
by the consciousness as a whole. In fact I rather think of the "simulations"
as static states in the plenitude, and consciousness as a locus in the plenitude
linking these states in a causally and logically significant manner. We
live in the plenitude, not in any particular simulation. Each point in
the conscious locus perceives the world that gives it meaning.
Richard Miller wrote
Of all the attempts to link consciousness with physics, this paradigm makes
the most sense to me. Additionally, it offers the only model of consciousness
that can be described mathematically (well, topologically)---and it even
makes sense if you happen to be a neodissociationist psychologist. I'd
like to know if George can supply some references for this model or if he
came up with it on his own.
I came up with this model myself some time ago as I tried to write a book
which has been sitting on my shelf for years, but I think others in this
list share this same point of view or may have invented this model independently.
We have been talking about this topic for years.
Neodissociationist psychologist... phieww, I had trouble typing this one.
A really scary term :-)
George
