Re: Why physical laws

From: Gilles HENRI <Gilles.Henri.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Fri, 11 Jun 1999 08:47:06 +0200

>
>My feeling, Gilles, is that you have an excellent understanding of my
>point. Now, for some reason you don't believe in comp, and for that
>reason, you take my counter-intuitive result as an opportunity to throw
>away
>the comp hypothesis.

Indeed I think we agree on what is the key point. Let me precise my
position with respect to comp: I indeed think that conscious properties are
related to computational properties. What I try to argue is
1) that this computation can not be duplicated like an ordinary software
like "Word6", because it is completely embedded (i.e. constantly in
interaction with) an environment, and that, contrary to what is sometimes
stated, a proper REAL simulation of the external Universe is impossible
with a machine embedded in this very Universe.
2) that our notion of identity is NOT based on the computational identity
but on the physical one (based on the apparent physical continuity of
classical worlds through a time ordering), the computational continuity
being just a secondary consequence of the physical one. In particular our
own computational properties are constantly changing with time due to our
increasing experience, although we consider that we are the same individual.

So you have in fact to POSTULATE that the physical reality is identical to
its computation, before arriving to this conclusion. This postulate is
acceptable, but it is really interesting only if it produces non trivial
results, for example demonstrating m(C)>>m(B)....


>Honestly that is a little too premature for me.
>But I'm very glad you realise the bonus: an explanation of the origin of
>physical laws.
>But indeed, with comp (which is admitted by numerous people including
>Schmidhuber, Deutsch, all cognitive scientist, etc.) we must justify
>why m(C) >> m(B).
>I don't pretend it is easy. I feel it worthwhile.

I am not working in this field, but you should admit that the "cognitive
scientists" have failed up to now to build a machine showing the slightest
evidence of consciousness, and to explain it properly by human people. They
may have missed something....


Cheers

Gilles
Received on Thu Jun 10 1999 - 23:52:23 PDT