Re: Bitstrings, Ontological Status and Time

From: Stephen Paul King <stephenk1.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Sat, 7 May 2005 00:11:15 -0400

----- Original Message -----
From: "Jesse Mazer" <lasermazer.domain.name.hidden>
To: <stephenk1.domain.name.hidden>; <everything-list.domain.name.hidden.com>
Sent: Friday, May 06, 2005 11:31 PM
Subject: Re: Bitstrings, Ontological Status and Time



> But what does "physical level" even mean, if universes or observer-moments
> are just elements of the set of all mathematical forms, as many on this
> list believe?

Jesse,

    With all seriousness.

    Reach out that "element of the set of all mathematical forms" that most
people call a "hand", ball it into a fist, and pull it toward your face as
hard as you can. Feel that effect, the blinding headache, please explain it
away by repeating what you wrote here.

    It didn't go away, did it? The point that I am trying to make is that
unless we can mathematically *prove* that it is NECESSARY that the results
of this demonstration must obtain given the choice of the action, how is it
that we can ignore a "physical level" that is something different from just
some combination of "elements of the set of all mathematical forms"?
    The point is that we can *prove* that we can not decide whether or not
some statement is true or false within some theory (that includes the
ability to count), thus we can be sure that we can not be sure which
"element of the set of all mathematical forms" coorespond to that action, in
fact we can't even specify the membership function of that set!
    What explanatory power does a set with no definable membership function
have with nothing else associated with it?

    I will respond to the rest of your post tomorrow. ;-)

Stephen
Received on Sat May 07 2005 - 00:16:23 PDT