On Nov 30, 2008, at 3:19 AM, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
> Yes, and I think of consciousness as an essential side-effect of the
> computation, as addition is an essential side-effect of the sum of two
> numbers.
Ok, I'm with you so far. But I'd like to get a better handle your
concept of a computation in Platonia. Here's one way I've been
picturing "platonic computation":
Imagine an infinite 2-dimensional grid filled with the binary digits
of PI. Now imagine an infinite number of 2-dimensional grids on top of
that one, with each grid containing the bits from the grid beneath it,
as transformed by the Conway's Life rules. This is a description of a
platonic computational object. Of course, my language is somewhat
"visual", but that's incidental. The point is, this is a precisely
defined mathematical object. We can "point at" any cell in this
infinite grid, and there is an answer to whether or not this bit is on
or off, given our definitions. (More formally, we can define an
abstract computational function that accepts any integer and returns
the state of that bit, given all of our definitions.)
Do you find this an acceptable way (not necessarily the only way) of
describing a computational platonic object? How would you talk about
how consciousness relates to the conscious-seeming patterns in this
platonic object? Would you say that consciousness "supervenes" on
those portions of this platonic computation?
-- Kory
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Received on Sun Nov 30 2008 - 14:20:57 PST