Re: Evidence for the simulation argument

From: Stathis Papaioannou <stathisp.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2007 13:03:04 +1100

I don't mean the white rabbits from the Turing machine, I mean the ones
outside it. If we accept that an abstract machine can just exist, without
benefit of a separate physical reality, why not also accept that
non-computational talking white rabbits can also just exist? That is, why
should computations have a privileged ontological status in the everything?

Stathis Papaioannou


On 3/19/07, Russell Standish <lists.domain.name.hidden> wrote:
>
>
> On Sat, Mar 17, 2007 at 03:25:51PM +1100, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
> > One response to this idea is that the non-computational worlds are
> overrun
> > with white rabbits, whereas the computational worlds allow the
> calculation
> > of a local measure, such as Russell Standish has described, which
> explains
> > the orderly universe we know. However, this doesn't explain why the
> > non-computational white rabbits don't suddenly intrude in the next
> moment:
> > what's to say that their relative measure should be less than the
> orderly
> > computational worlds' relative measure?
>
> Actually, this is exactly what I do claim, so if you think I haven't
> succeeded, I'd be very interested in learning why.
>
> Note that the non-appearance of white rabbits comes from what I call
> "robustness" of the observer, and robustness is not a general property
> of Turing machines, which is why the white rabbit problem seems so
> intractable in comp.
>
> I argue why robustness should be a very likely property of observers
> from evolutionary reasons, but perhaps the weakness of the argument is not
> yet
> calculating the relative proportion of robust observers to non-robust
> observers and relating this to the relative proportion of white
> rabbits. I certainly believe it should more than compensate, but
> perhaps I'm being overly optimistic.
>
> Cheers
>
> --
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> A/Prof Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)
> Mathematics
> UNSW SYDNEY 2052 hpcoder.domain.name.hidden
> Australia http://www.hpcoders.com.au
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> >
>

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Received on Sun Mar 18 2007 - 22:03:21 PDT

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