On 16/02/2008, Kaj Sotala <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > However, despite what is claimed, not every physical process can be > interpreted to do any computation. To do such an interpretation, you > have to do so after the fact: after all the raindrops have fallen, you > can assign their positions formal roles that correspond to > computation, but you can't *predict* what positions will be assigned > what roles ahead of the time - after all, they are just randomly > falling raindrops. You can't actually *use* the rainstorm to compute > anything, like you could use a computer - you have to first do the > computation yourself, then assign each state of the rainstorm a > position that corresponds to the steps in your previous computation.
Sure, you can't interact with the raindrop computation, but that doesn't mean it isn't conscious. Suppose a civilization built a computer implementing a virtual environment with conscious inhabitants, but no I/O. The computer is launched into space and the civilization is completely destroyed when its sun goes nova. A billion years later, the computer is found by another civilization which figures out how the power supply works and starts it up, firing the virtual inhabitants into life. As far as the second civilization is concerned, the activity in the computer could mean anything or nothing, like the patterns in a rainstorm. Just as the space of all possible rainstorms contains one that is isomorphic with any given computer implementing a particular program, so the space of all possible computers that an alien civilization might build contains one that is isomorphic with any sufficiently large rainstorm. It doesn't matter that manual for the computer represented by the rainstorm has been lost, or that the computer was never actually built: all that matters for the program to be implemented is that it rain. -- Stathis Papaioannou ------------------------------------------- singularity Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/11983/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/11983/ Modify Your Subscription: http://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=4007604&id_secret=96140713-a54b2b Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
