Re: Draft Philosophy Paper

From: Alastair Malcolm <amalcolm.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Fri, 22 Feb 2002 17:11:43 -0000

----- Original Message -----
From: H J Ruhl <HalRuhl.domain.name.hidden>
> At 2/21/02, [ I ] wrote:
> >If you are saying that it is the uncountability itself of copies that
> >imparts indeterminacy, or changes the preponderancy, then effectively you
> >are also saying that random selections from all the reals between -1 and
+10
> >do not converge towards a ratio of 10:1 for positive to negative values -
> >I can't see what other result is possible.
>
> That is you model and it is one dimensional [call it x] that is it has one
> venue.
> Now add a dimension call it y that is infinite and perpendicular to your
> example's x. This is an infinite number of venues. Now randomly sample
on
> the xy plane. The area of the plane below zero on the x dimension is the
> same as the area above zero on the x dimension i.e. infinite = no bias as
> to sign mix of the resulting random sample of reals on x.

I think you may be misunderstanding the nature of the analogy - the simplest
interpretation is that of 11 separate states, as defined via NAP, each of
which has an uncountably infinite number of copies (in the only way that NAP
might permit that is compatible with what we see - see section 2). If you do
add an extra dimension (not necessary to the point of the example, but never
mind), the random sampling still produces a ratio of 10:1 across the y-axis
(ie x=0) in the x-range -1 to +10. The x-axis division is irrelevant to the
purpose of the example.

> >there is no more
> >necessity to have no preponderance of any particular type of physical
> >universe than to have no preponderance of a particular type of galaxy, or
> >grain of sand.
>
> With this I disagree when describing the Everything because on its face it
> attempts to extract information from an informationless source. Your
> example from within a particular universe [intrinsic information] is not
> applicable because here its any style you want.

Certainly not - if anything, there will be all possible styles, but this
would depend on what you mean by that word. I think you are just assuming a
different starting point - for me it is all logically possible entities (not
just universes), with no bias in favour of any one, as required by NAP. If
there happened to be some resultant lack of bias (preponderance) at the
level of physical universes (which would include those forming part of other
entities), that would just be a coincidence.
Received on Fri Feb 22 2002 - 09:24:03 PST