Re: Fw: Something for Platonists

From: Eric Hawthorne <egh.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Mon, 16 Jun 2003 23:57:22 -0700

Lennart Nilsson wrote:

>> But in fact, the only thing that privileges the set of all
>>computational
>>
>>operations that we see in nature, is that they are instantiated by
>>
>>the laws of physics. It is only through our knowledge of the physical
>>
>>
>world
>
>
>>that we know of the di.erence between computable and not computable. So
>>
>>it's only through our laws of physics that the nature of computation can
>>
>>
>be
>
>
>>understood. It can never be vice versa."
>>
>>
I don't agree. I think computability is a pure abstract property
describing the reachability of some states (or state descriptions)
from others via a set of incrementally different states (or
state descriptions). I think computability is tied to
notions of locality. But computability may define locality
and not the other way around.

Eric

-- 
    "We are all in the gutter,
     but some of us are looking at the stars."
          - Oscar Wilde
Received on Tue Jun 17 2003 - 02:52:46 PDT

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