Re: UDA, Am I missing something?

From: <Daddycaylor.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Sat, 9 Jul 2005 02:56:18 EDT

>> Bruno,
>> After reading your Universal Dovetailer Argument (UDA) I'd like to give
you my reaction.

> Thanks,

>> It seems to me that the trick is hidden in your assumptions.

> Certainly. In a mathematical theory the theorems are always "hidden" in
the axioms.

As such, I appreciate your willingness to have a discourse on the
assumptions in the UDA.

>> I think you've even stated that before (using “embedded” rather than “
hidden”), referring especially to comp. But I'd say that the trick is hidden in
your assumptions about the universe or “physical reality”. It is the
assumption that “physical reality” is limited to what we can imagine (“
communicable physical laws”, with emphasis on communicable) and sense (“incommunicable
physical knowledge”) it to be, i.e. in our conscious brains.

> Be careful. At that stage I don't have conscious brain. Actually I don't
have brain, which are physical object and physics is not yet derived from the
relation between numbers.

Instead of "conscious brain" I should have said "consciousness". The
yes-doctor hypothesis in comp tells me that you are assuming the existence of
consciousness. Also, is not the "psychology" that you are reducing physics to
"consciousness" (or an equivalent approximation)?

>> This is stated in your definition of “Fundamental Physics” as being “the
 correct-by-definition discourse about observable and verifiable anticipation
of possible relatively evolving quantities and/or qualities.”

> This is a very neutral definition of a "perfect physics". At that stage
the "correct physics" could still be even a Newtonian physics, like "there is
universe and objects in it obey such and such laws." At that stage, that could
be the correct physics. In the word "discourse" I include its intended
meaning. It can still be a physicalist discourse! But then, through comp,
physicalism will be jeopardized in a completely testable way.

Is not your use of the word "discourse", even though it is a
"correct-by-definition discourse", and also your use of the words "observable" and
"verifiable", meant to portray something that can be observed by, imagined by, and
encoded into our consciousness? So is not your assumption that we can fit this
"fundamental/perfect physics" into our consciousness?

>> So if A=“physical reality” and B=“consciousness”, then the assumption
is A=B.

> This is much too vague. You identify physics and discourse. But I said
"correct discourse" and this includes the semantics (meaning) of the discourse.

(Actually I should have said that the assumption seems to be that A is a
subset of B.) Are you saying that "correct-by-definition discourse" refers to a
discourse that does not necessarily fit into our consciousness? If so, then
why call it "discourse"?

>> It seems that the rest is extraneous because with A=B you've already
practically reached your conclusion, even without comp.

> You would be right if I was defining literally physics by the physical
discourse, but I define it by the correct discourse. It could be "string theory"
or "QM", etc. Then comp shows we have no choice, and eventually the
comp-physics is given by a precise things all lobian machine can find by
introspection. To test comp we can then compare that "comp-physics" with the
verified part of empirical physics. If the comp-physics predicts Bell's
inequality cannot be violated then comp would be refutated, etc. This shows the rest
is not extraneous.

I am not assuming that our consciousness is necessarily physical, but again
I still don't see why you use the term "discourse" if it does not refer to
something that can be grasped by our consciousness. Why not just say "correct
physics" or "the way things really are, independent of our consciousness"?
But then, if you did that, wouldn't you lose any chance of coming to the
conclusion of the UDA?

>> Am I missing something?

> You have make a confusion between "discourse" and "correct (by definition)
discourse." I know it is subtle (and many thanks to point to the fact that a
misunderstanding can occur already there). I would say that by progressing
in the UDA could help you to see this subtle point. When I translate the UDA
in the language of a Lobian machine, a similar difficulty appears making at
first sight believe that physics will just be the "classical tautologies" (and
that would make physics, with comp, a purely geographico-historical matter,
but then incompleteness entails it is not so, we get sort of quantum
tautologies.
> Bruno

I've read the UDA but not the second part of the SANE paper where you
interview the machine. Is not the result from the UDA needed to start the second
half? I am wary of being persuaded by an argument further down the line
where the UDA is assumed. It would seem that I should be able to understand the
assumptions/axioms of the UDA first.

Tom Caylor
 
Received on Sat Jul 09 2005 - 02:57:26 PDT