Re: Amoeba's Secret openly available under CC-BY license

[Liz R]

On Friday 13 September 2024 at 11:47:31 UTC+12 Bruce Kellett wrote:

On Fri, Sep 13, 2024 at 9:28 AM Liz R wrote:

Yes I wondered about that, but it's possible that physics isn't 
*intrinsically* random.


No, that isn't possible. Randomness is intrinsic, and not derivable from 
anything else.


This is the sort of thing that made me think of "oracles". What sort of 
physical (or mathematical) process could, at least in principle, be 
intrinsically random? (Rather than apparently random due to ignorance of an 
underlying lower-level deterministic mechanism.) An oracle that delivers 
the next digit in Chaitin's constant, as mentioned by Russell, might be the 
sort of thing - which could mean a suitable source of randomness in physics 
is the "universal dovetailer" or something similar.


It could be based on something computable, and only appear random from our 
perspective - presumbly some versions of many-worlds would fit the bill.


No, many-worlds is a decided failure as far as randomness is concerned. You 
cannot get intrinsic randomness as exhibited by quantum phenomena from a 
deterministic theory such as many-worlds.


I thought you could get the appearance of randomness from a first-person 
perspective in MW? Has that been shown to not work?


Also, although various attempts to show hidden variables have fallen down, 
it's always possible something of that sort might be involved that we 
haven't thought of yet.


That is just a cheap let-out: "It could be something we haven't thought of 
yet. There are very good reason to think that intrinsic randomness cannot 
arise from a deterministic theory.  You can get randomness from ignorance, 
as in classic statistical mechanics, but that is not intrinsic -- things 
are still deterministic if you have complete knowledge. Which is not the 
case in QM.

Well, yes - by definition, intrinsic randomness can't arise from a 
deterministic theory. However, I will wait for your ideas on the types of 
physical or mathematical processes that could lead to intrinsic randomness 
before commenting on this further, as I can't get past that first hurdle 
yet!


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Re: Amoeba's Secret openly available under CC-BY license

[Liz R]

On Friday 13 September 2024 at 12:20:01 UTC+12 Russell Standish wrote:

One of the consequences of the universal dovetailer argument is that 
if conciousness is computational, then physics is not.


That's interesting. I don't see how that could happen, would you mind 
elaborating? (I've read "The Amoeba's Secret" thanks to you but I can't 
remember this part).

 

Intrinsic 
randomness arises from the first person view of the operation of the 
dovetailer. 


I can see that, at least, I think it's similar to the idea of apparent 
randomness in many-worlds?
 

Perhaps what you're thinking of is oracles solving computationally 
impossible problems, such as delivering the successive digits of the 
Chaitin probablility Ω. 

A corrolary of this is that a computational physics à la Konrad Zuse's 
Rechnender Raum would rule out computationalism, and consequently 
physical supervenience. 


I can see how that follows from the first paragraph, but as mentioned I 
can't think how computational consciousness leads to non-computational 
physics (or exactly what that means).

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Re: Amoeba's Secret openly available under CC-BY license

[Liz R]

Yes I wondered about that, but it's possible that physics isn't 
*intrinsically* random. It could be based on something computable, and only 
appear random from our perspective - presumbly some versions of many-worlds 
would fit the bill. Also, although various attempts to show hidden 
variables have fallen down, it's always possible something of that sort 
might be involved that we haven't thought of yet. It's also possible that 
time symmetry could act in that sort of way, making apparent randomness 
from a failure to take all the boundary conditions into account 
(entanglement becomes far less spooky if you allow for quantum objects not 
distinguishing between directions in time, for example).

On Friday 13 September 2024 at 10:39:26 UTC+12 Brent Meeker wrote:

> But physics isn't computable, it includes quantum mechanics which 
> introduces randomness.  
>
> Brent
>
>
>
> On 9/12/2024 3:10 PM, Liz R wrote:
>
> On the subject of whether consciousness is computation (or is it 
> "supervenes on computation" or something? Anyway...) - if it turns out that 
> physics is computable, that undercuts that question, in that assuming 
> consciousness is the product of physics, it must also be. the product of 
> computation (possibly at a level far below that of frain cells)
>
> On Tuesday 10 September 2024 at 06:14:22 UTC+12 Brent Meeker wrote:
>
>>
>> On 9/9/2024 5:25 AM, John Clark wrote:
>>
>> *No. Mathematics can describe computation, but it is not computation. 
>> That’s why the semiconductor industry exists, software alone is not 
>> sufficient, in fact, software alone can’t do anything.  If you actually 
>> want to DO something, if you want something to change over an interval of 
>> time, then matter is required. That's why the information in a book can't 
>> do anything if it's just sitting on a shelf, that information can only 
>> cause something to change if a person or, as we've seen very recently, an 
>> AI, reads it.  And both the person and the AI are made of atoms. And atoms 
>> are physical.  * 
>>
>> *Computation involves the manipulation of information, and the minimum 
>> amount of energy needed to perform a calculation is greater than zero.  
>> Also, the amount of information that you can stuff into a volume of space 
>> is finite, if there is too much information then the volume turns into a 
>> Black Hole where the information, if it still even exists, is 
>> inaccessible. So information is physical and computation is a physical 
>> process. *
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> *I generally agree with John, but I would point out that computation is a 
>> physical process that realizes a mathematical process.  Sure it's more 
>> complicated because it depends on the physics, but that is incidental to 
>> the computation.  So it's kind of the reverse of using mathematics to 
>> describe something.  In a computational process it's the mathematics that's 
>> essential. That, in itself doesn't answer the question of whether 
>> consciousness is computation, but nerves are physiological structures whose 
>> essential function is transmitting information.  So I would say 
>> consciousness originates with the evolution of nerves and eventually the 
>> central nervous system.  I see consciousness has having several levels from 
>> simple detecting and reacting to immediate surroundings, to internal models 
>> of self versus others, to planning and projection, to language and 
>> abstraction.  So conscious is implicitly information processing, but not 
>> all of it is what humans think of as being conscious, having an inner 
>> narrative. Brent*
>>
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Re: Amoeba's Secret openly available under CC-BY license

[Liz R]

On the subject of whether consciousness is computation (or is it 
"supervenes on computation" or something? Anyway...) - if it turns out that 
physics is computable, that undercuts that question, in that assuming 
consciousness is the product of physics, it must also be. the product of 
computation (possibly at a level far below that of frain cells)

On Tuesday 10 September 2024 at 06:14:22 UTC+12 Brent Meeker wrote:

>
> On 9/9/2024 5:25 AM, John Clark wrote:
>
> *No. Mathematics can describe computation, but it is not computation. 
> That’s why the semiconductor industry exists, software alone is not 
> sufficient, in fact, software alone can’t do anything.  If you actually 
> want to DO something, if you want something to change over an interval of 
> time, then matter is required. That's why the information in a book can't 
> do anything if it's just sitting on a shelf, that information can only 
> cause something to change if a person or, as we've seen very recently, an 
> AI, reads it.  And both the person and the AI are made of atoms. And atoms 
> are physical.  * 
>
> *Computation involves the manipulation of information, and the minimum 
> amount of energy needed to perform a calculation is greater than zero.  
> Also, the amount of information that you can stuff into a volume of space 
> is finite, if there is too much information then the volume turns into a 
> Black Hole where the information, if it still even exists, is 
> inaccessible. So information is physical and computation is a physical 
> process. *
>
>
>
>
>
>
> *I generally agree with John, but I would point out that computation is a 
> physical process that realizes a mathematical process.  Sure it's more 
> complicated because it depends on the physics, but that is incidental to 
> the computation.  So it's kind of the reverse of using mathematics to 
> describe something.  In a computational process it's the mathematics that's 
> essential. That, in itself doesn't answer the question of whether 
> consciousness is computation, but nerves are physiological structures whose 
> essential function is transmitting information.  So I would say 
> consciousness originates with the evolution of nerves and eventually the 
> central nervous system.  I see consciousness has having several levels from 
> simple detecting and reacting to immediate surroundings, to internal models 
> of self versus others, to planning and projection, to language and 
> abstraction.  So conscious is implicitly information processing, but not 
> all of it is what humans think of as being conscious, having an inner 
> narrative. Brent*
>

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Re: Amoeba's Secret openly available under CC-BY license

[Liz R]

In order to test Bruno's hypothesis, it would be necessary to know if 
reality is Turing complete ("computable" for short). Hence my mention of 
oracles and singularities, which presumably aren't computable. I would 
imagine that reality is in principle computable, given its quantum nature 
and discoveries like black hole entropy and information content - though 
probably at a level below what we can currently access.

Interesting that this limits our ability to know the foundational basis of 
reality - or do you think we might be able to get around that one day?

On Thursday 12 September 2024 at 19:10:55 UTC+12 Russell Standish wrote:

> On Wed, Sep 11, 2024 at 11:48:02PM -0700, Liz R wrote:
> > Thanks, Russell. Bruno tried to explain this to me a while ago but I 
> probably
> > didn't take it all in. Am I right in thinking this has something to do 
> with "no
> > oracles" - that is, reality contains no sources of infinite 
> unpredictable data?
> > A naked signularity would presumably count as an oracle, while it 
> appears any
> > area of space-time contains finite data (the Deckenstein bound?) - does 
> that
> > make it Turing complete, in principle? Or am I talking nonsense?
>
> It sounds vaguely plausible, but could well be the latter :). At least
> its not egregious nonsense like immigrants eating you pets :P.
>
> Cheers
>
> -- 
>
>
> 
> Dr Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)
> Principal, High Performance Coders hpc...@hpcoders.com.au
> http://www.hpcoders.com.au
>
> 
>

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Re: Amoeba's Secret openly available under CC-BY license

[Liz R]

Thanks, Russell. Bruno tried to explain this to me a while ago but I 
probably didn't take it all in. Am I right in thinking this has something 
to do with "no oracles" - that is, reality contains no sources of infinite 
unpredictable data? A naked signularity would presumably count as an 
oracle, while it appears any area of space-time contains finite data (the 
Deckenstein bound?) - does that make it Turing complete, in principle? Or 
am I talking nonsense?

On Thursday 12 September 2024 at 18:39:30 UTC+12 Russell Standish wrote:

> On Wed, Sep 11, 2024 at 09:40:32PM -0700, Liz R wrote:
> > Well, exactly. It's Peano or whatever, so a small subset. Bruno and 
> Tegmark
> > have this idea - I find Tegmark easier to follow personally - that 
> because
> > physics is possibly isomorphic to some set of equations that describe 
> reality,
> > Occam suggests that we don't actually need reality to exist, only the
> > equations.
> >
>
> It is more that whatever foundational basis of reality is, so long as
> it is Turing complete, a computationlist mind cannot distinguish it
> from any other Turing complete substrate. It is almost assuredly not
> the reality we see. In another sense, our reality supervenes on all
> possible universal Turing machines. The question of what is the
> foundational reality has no answer - epistemologically equivalent to
> asking how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.
>
>
>
> -- 
>
>
> 
> Dr Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)
> Principal, High Performance Coders hpc...@hpcoders.com.au
> http://www.hpcoders.com.au
>
> 
>

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Re: Amoeba's Secret openly available under CC-BY license

[Liz R]

Well, exactly. It's Peano or whatever, so a small subset. Bruno and Tegmark 
have this idea - I find Tegmark easier to follow personally - that because 
physics is possibly isomorphic to some set of equations that describe 
reality, Occam suggests that we don't actually need reality to exist, only 
the equations.

YMMV...!

On Thursday 12 September 2024 at 16:35:04 UTC+12 Brent Meeker wrote:

> What do you conceive of as "true".  I think of all mathematics as having 
> the form: Given these axioms and these rules of inference then these 
> theorems follow.  Bruno only posits a small part of mathematics as true.  
> I'm not sure how he relates "true" and "exists".
>
> Brent
>
>
>
> On 9/11/2024 8:36 PM, Liz R wrote:
>
> The question is whether or not maths exists independently of the material 
> universe. Some people think it does (that it's true in all worlds, 
> regardless of their laws of physics) while others think that it's a human 
> invention approximating to physical phenomena. Personally I'm inclined to 
> think that maths is true regardless of which universe you're in, or indeed 
> true whether or not any universes exist. This is Max Tegmark's view, for 
> example, as described in his book "Our Mathematical Universe". His idea 
> (which is in the same ballpark as Bruno's, but approaching it from, as it 
> were, the opposite direction) is that maths is necessarily true, and 
> therefore makes a foundation on which to build an ontology that gets 
> "somethig from nothing".
>
> I'm not sure how one can test this, however.
>
> On Wednesday 11 September 2024 at 08:53:55 UTC+12 John Clark wrote:
>
>> On Tue, Sep 10, 2024 at 4:44 PM Brent Meeker  wrote:
>>
>> *>* *Given any sequence of states you can label them so as to represent 
>>> a computation.  So I think the physics is really incidental to the 
>>> computation.*
>>>
>>
>> *You need to make the labels, and making something involves a change, and 
>> a change cannot happen without the involvement of matter and the laws of 
>> physics.  *
>>
>>   John K ClarkSee what's on my new list at  Extropolis 
>> <https://groups.google.com/g/extropolis>
>> uwx
>>
>>
>>
>>
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>
>
>

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Re: Amoeba's Secret openly available under CC-BY license

[Liz R]

The question is whether or not maths exists independently of the material 
universe. Some people think it does (that it's true in all worlds, 
regardless of their laws of physics) while others think that it's a human 
invention approximating to physical phenomena. Personally I'm inclined to 
think that maths is true regardless of which universe you're in, or indeed 
true whether or not any universes exist. This is Max Tegmark's view, for 
example, as described in his book "Our Mathematical Universe". His idea 
(which is in the same ballpark as Bruno's, but approaching it from, as it 
were, the opposite direction) is that maths is necessarily true, and 
therefore makes a foundation on which to build an ontology that gets 
"somethig from nothing".

I'm not sure how one can test this, however.

On Wednesday 11 September 2024 at 08:53:55 UTC+12 John Clark wrote:

> On Tue, Sep 10, 2024 at 4:44 PM Brent Meeker  wrote:
>
> *>* *Given any sequence of states you can label them so as to represent a 
>> computation.  So I think the physics is really incidental to the 
>> computation.*
>>
>
> *You need to make the labels, and making something involves a change, and 
> a change cannot happen without the involvement of matter and the laws of 
> physics.  *
>
>   John K ClarkSee what's on my new list at  Extropolis 
> 
> uwx
>
>
>
>
>>

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Re: Amoeba's Secret openly available under CC-BY license

[Liz R]

Thanks Russell. Hope you are all well on the Everything list.

On Monday 29 April 2024 at 17:04:14 UTC+12 Russell Standish wrote:

> I did get a response from him when I suggested making Amoeba's Secret
> open access.
>
> According to Kim Jones, who visited him 2022, he is well and taking a
> break from the Everything List.
>
> Cheers
>
> On Mon, Apr 29, 2024 at 03:09:22PM +1200, LizR wrote:
> > Hi Russell,
> > 
> > Do you have any news of Bruno? I see his last contribution here was a
> > couple of years ago.
> > 
> > Best wishes,
> > Liz
> > 
> > On Sat, 12 Aug 2023 at 22:15, Russell Standish  
> wrote:
> > >
> > > Hi guys,
> > >
> > > I finally got around to doing something I meant to do years ago - I
> > > have released the English translation of "Amoeba's Secret" as a freely
> > > downloadable PDF under the Creative Commons CC-BY license at
> > > https://www.hpcoders.com.au/docs/amoebassecret.pdf .
> > >
> > > Bruno Marchal was a long time contributer to this list, and this
> > > semi-autobiography is also one of the clearest explanations of his
> > > ideas.
> > >
> > > Enjoy,
> > >
> > > --
> > >
> > > 
> 
> > > Dr Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)
> > > Principal, High Performance Coders hpc...@hpcoders.com.au
> > > http://www.hpcoders.com.au
> > > 
> 
> > >
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> .
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> 
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>
> 
>

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My son the mathematician

[Liz R]

Here is his first co-authored paper (at the age of 20).

Topology and its Applications 

Volume 254 
, 1 
March 2019, Pages 85-100

Extending bonding functions in generalized inverse sequences
Iztok Banič, 
 
SimonGoodwin and 

MichaelLockyer 

 


(he's the one in the middle)

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0166864118304449


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Re: Black holes and the information paradox

[Liz R]

I thought QM was deterministic, at least mathematically - and I guess in 
the MWI?

I mean everyone can't have forgotten quantum indeterminacy when discussing 
the BHIP, surely?

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Re: What is the largest integer you can write in 5 seconds?

[Liz R]

I have a simpler answer!

"the largest integer you can write in 5 seconds"

...can be written in 5 seconds.

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Re: What is the largest integer you can write in 5 seconds?

[Liz R]

Graham's number tetrated Graham's number times? That took about 5 seconds, 
does it come close?

On Wednesday, 6 March 2019 07:06:24 UTC+13, John Clark wrote:
>
> It's easy to prove that the Busy Beaver Function grows faster than *ANY* 
> computable function because if there were such a faster growing function 
> you could use it to solve the Halting Problem. So if you're ever in a 
> contest to see who can name the largest integer in less than 5 seconds just 
> write BB(9000) and you'll probably win.
>
> John K Clark
>
>

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Is Google groups shutting down?

[Liz R]

If so is the EL going somewhere else?

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Re: How can a grown man be an atheist ?

[Liz R]

On Saturday, 28 December 2013 06:18:26 UTC+13, Edgar L. Owen wrote:
>
>
> Many worlds is probably the most outlandishly improbable theory of all 
> time, and should have been laughed out of existence as soon as it was 
> proposed. Do
>

Fortunately, science is not decided on what seems probable to humans, or we 
would never have realised that there is anything except the Earth and some 
lights in the sky. The MWI is very far from the most outlandishly 
improbable theory of all time, I can name a dozen ontological theories that 
are more outlandish without even asking WIkipedia, such as the idea that 
the world was created by the shenannigans of various gods.

you actually understand what it says or implies? Basically that every 
> quantum event that ever occured in the history of the universe spawns an 
> entire new universe of all its possible outcomes and every event in every 
> one of those new universes does the same. This immediately exponentially 
> escalates in the first few minutes of the universe into uncountable new 
> universes and has been expanding exponentially ever since over 14.7 billion 
> years! Just try to calculate the
>

The MWI is a straight interpretation of our best theory of matter - an 
interpretation that removes any extra assumptions (wave function collapse, 
pilot waves, wave-particle duality etc). It is simply what the relevant 
equations say, converted without interpretation to human language (if one 
leaves aside the actual phrase "many worlds", which is misleading). The 
equations imply that all possible outcomes occur for a given quantum event, 
or to be exact that the entities we regard as particles are in fact waves, 
capable of interfering with themselves, but only detectable (I suppose 
"entanglable" would be a better word) by a process of localisation that is, 
I'm told, neatly explained by decoherence. This implies that the universal 
wavefunction is constantly spreading and differentiating. This is generally 
characterised as "parallel universes coming into existence" but that isn't 
a completely accurate description (and in any case it is quite possible 
that space and time are emergent properties of the universal wavefunction).
 

> number of new universe that now exist. It's larger than the largest number 
> that could ever be imagined or even written down. There is not enough paper 
> in the universe, or enough computer memory in the entire universe to even 
> express a number this large! Doesn't anyone ever use common sense and think 
> through these things to see how stupid they are? And it violates all sorts 
> of conservations since energy eg. is multiplied exponentially beyond 
> counting. Geeez, it would be impossible to come up with something dumber, 
> especially when it is completely clear that decoherence theory falsifies it 
> conclusively.
>

If that was a correct description of the MWI, you might have a point, but 
it isn't. Oddly enough clever people *have* thought about this, some of 
them on this very list. Have you read "The Fabric of Reality" by David 
Deutsch? That's what Americans would call "MWI 101" or "The MWI for 
dummies". If you have, you will know that the MWI posits a continuum of 
"worlds" which can only ever differentiate, not "split" or "branch" or any 
of the other common misconceptions. The fact that the universe can generate 
greater and greater detail indefinitely (or possibly only to certain 
physical limits, like the Bekenstein bound) is no more surprising than the 
fact that in GR a finite universe can expand to infinite size (under 
certain conditions), or that the centre of a black hole (according to GR) 
is a singularity of infinite density. These are all properties of the 
continuum, a mathematical object that may or may not describe space-time 
(if it doesn't, it does so to very high precision, apparently many orders 
of magnitude smaller than the Planck length). The idea that the MWI 
violates the conservation of energy was laid to rest a long time ago. A 
simple example is a quantum computer factoring a 500 bit number. The 
equations of QM say that this is physically possible, even if we have 
trouble doing it in practice - it requires 500 qubits to be suitably 
prepared and then shaken down somehow (with Shor's algorithm, I think) to 
obtain the result. QM says this happens by generating a superposition of 2 
to the power of 500 quantum states, which according to my trusty calculator 
is quite a lot. These superpositions are in fact capable of decohering into 
2^500 possible states, although Shor's algo or whatever ensures that 
99.999...% of these give the right answer. The question is, how or where do 
all these states exist? QM says they all exist right here, in "our 
universe" (which the MWI claims is a convenient fiction, of course) - but 
how can 2^500 states exist at the same time for the same qubits (which are 
normally atoms, but could in theory be photons, electrons, etc) ? Where is 
the calculation perform

Re: Unexpected Hanging

[Liz R]

If someone told me that I was going to be hung, I can assure you I would be 
expecting it every day. I wouldn't bother with any logical analysis.

(The unexpected exam, on the other hand...)


On Thursday, 12 September 2013 21:33:24 UTC+12, telmo_menezes wrote:
>
> Time for some philosophy then :) 
>
> Here's a paradox that's making me lose sleep: 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unexpected_hanging_paradox 
>
> Probably many of you already know about it. 
>
> What mostly bothers me is the epistemological crisis that this 
> introduces. I cannot find a problem with the reasoning, but it's 
> clearly false. So I know that I don't know why this reasoning is 
> false. Now, how can I know if there are other types of reasoning that 
> I don't even know that I don't know that they are correct? 
>
> Cheers, 
> Telmo. 
>

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