On Wed, Mar 26, 2008 at 04:19:44PM -0000, Alastair Malcolm wrote:
> >
> > The minimal specification including all OMs in a universe could not be
> > sufficient to specify the OMs completely. There must always be some random
> > component to the complete specification of an OM.
>
> Bang goes AI! I can't actually see the necessity for unspecifiable or
> random-content OM's, but here again I should see if I can unearth an
> explanation for your above assertion in TON (rememember I am talking about
> OM occurrences when I refer to OM's - part of my probably erroneous
> assumptions about your approach). I am guessing there will be some premise
> somewhere I can't agree with.
The simplest way of seeing this is Bruno's UDA, which necessarily
implies that OMs have some randomness (subjective indeterminancy). Of
course, this argument assumes computationalism, but I believe the UDA
also generalises to functionalism, as it mainly depends on the assumption
of consciousness surviving the copy operation.
In ToN, I also explore the relationship between randomness and
creativity in chapter 6.
As to your pessimism about AI, I don't share that. It is quite
feasible to add sources of quantum randomness to machines, and indeed
there is already quite a bit of literature on this subject, mostly for
cryptographic applications.
>
> (Pb01 and Pa01 have never changed substantially; you may be thinking of
> P105/111/112, no longer available; all of the modules have the same
> fundamental approach in this area.)
>
> This is part of the same mutual misunderstanding I suspect. I say nothing
> about *interpretation* of data, or rejection of noise in Pb01 (or anywhere
> else). For me, random data is very unlikely to be *encountered*, since I am
> most likely to be in an ordered universe. If 'invisibles' were to occur
> (which the program analogy lends itself more towards), they would stay
> invisible.
>
> At least I can understand a *little* better what you are trying to do, which
> is why I am more satisfied our approaches are fundamentally different.
Fair enough. I don't share the literary scholar's enthusiasm to get
positions and differences that occurred in the past correct. All that
matters to me are ideas, and if your current position differs from
mine, it is interesting to explore that. If I have misrepresented your
position circa 1999 in ToN, I apologize for that, but I don't regard
this as an important mistake.
>
> A final brief point in an attempt to help clarify matters. The failure of
> induction problem is about the next OM's, fine, but the applicability of the
> minimal specification of a universe (bit string, axiom set, whatever, and
> akin to a TOE if such exists) *itself* ensures that there is no failure of
> induction (in general) - there is nothing special about now, or the next few
> OM's.
>
This only works in deterministic universes. I don't think we live in one.
> Alastair
>
>
> >
> > --
> >
> > ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > A/Prof Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)
> > Mathematics
> > UNSW SYDNEY 2052 hpcoder.domain.name.hidden
> > Australia http://www.hpcoders.com.au
> > ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> >
>
>
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
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 Thu Mar 27 2008 - 21:09:50 PDT