Re: The Anthropic Principle Boundary Conditions

From: Marchal <marchal.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Mon Jun 5 07:19:09 2000

George Levy wrote:

>Referring to Bruno and Brent's comments:
>I agree with the Bruno and Brent about the fact that our differences stem
>from operating with different "languages" and that we have to recognize the
>first person perspective and the third person perspective.

OK.

>Yet, the root of
>all knowledge must start with the basic assumption about the self, about our
>own rationality and about our own observations. I agree that it makes sense
>to talk about 3rd person, but only as a derived or deduced fact from the
>first person perspective.

I'm not sure. Perhaps at some level you are right. For exemple it is true
that our 3-person proposition are only understandable from some ultimate
first person point of view. But this ultimate 1-experience is never
communicable as such, and does not need to be communicate.
So I prefer to derive the first person from the third (using Thaetetus
trick).

>Saying that consciousness is emergent from computationalism
> is a third person statement. (Use the Turing Test for example as an
>experimental check for human-like behavior)

Well ... Right, but I'm not sure the turing test will help, here.

>
>Saying that (physical) computationalism is (anthropically) emergent from
>consciousness is a first person statement. I am referring here to the fact
>that the world is rational -- seems to be simulatable on a computer.

I'm not sure at all. (I'm not sure this is sufficiently precise to
explain why I feel like disagreeing ...).

Bruno
Received on Mon Jun 05 2000 - 07:19:09 PDT