Based on physics, what insights do you make about reality?

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So, unlike the people I mentioned (ex. S. Blackmore) you take it for granted that our minds need to exist in the first place in order for them to be subject to a delusion. I do too.



Umm... no. Computers are not alive, they cannot think. They c-a-n-n-o-t think. Or perceive. Or question, or have feelings, or do anything at all that we - the truly alive and intelligent ones - have not told them to do. I find it hard to believe that people don't understand this.



You couldn't do it.



Do YOU believe that you have just been fooled into thinking you're alive? I certainly don't. Where are you going with this?



There is no such thing as "artificial intelligence". It does not at this point in time exist.



Such as?



It's NOT possible! Is your computer "aware", in ANY sense of that word? Mine isn't. How is your PC feeling today? Bored?

There is no god and everything that we do will ultimately be erased, so we should just care about our own lives.

The universe might be a simulation, but that doesn't matter. This "simulation" can cut me and make me bleed, so I might as well treat the universe as though it's not a simulation.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/arti ... imulation/

"Moderator Neil deGrasse Tyson, director of the museum’s Hayden Planetarium, put the odds at 50-50 that our entire existence is a program on someone else’s hard drive".

I think the brain vs. computer analysis still might be misguided in the sense that while yes, it would make perfect sense that anything which would provide the same mobility and patterns as neurons would could equally carry consciousness in the same manner, we still don't know what kind of added functions in transistors could cause that dynamic to occur. That's part of why I have to disagree with the suggestion that understanding the root of consciousness is somehow a meaningless or inherently dualism-seeking pursuit.

At the same time though I suppose there's the caveat that everything very well could be conscious, that computers are already conscious, and their consciousness is something quite alien in flavor to our own short of a healthy dose of a good dissociative psychedelic. We already have some clues with anaesthesia as to what stops the functioning cascade with us but we're still somewhat at a loss for what's getting targeted. Hameroff and Penrose seem to think benzene rings and their electron cloud characteristics have something to do with it (along with conductance in microtubials) - could be, we'd just have to keep watching the research and see where it goes.

The question of whether or not God exists isn't one that physics can even grapple with in the first place, because it has nothing to do with physics.

That was "Star Trek Next Gen" episode.

Data's "mom" believed she was human, however, she was an android too.

I mean "our minds" as in the squishy greyish-pink things under our skulls.


I can attatch a webcam to my computer and it can "see". I can attach a microphone and it can "hear". I can attach a touch screen and it can "feel". Those devices do the same things as our senses, they sense things about reality and convert it into electrical signals to be sent elsewhere. There is literally nothing we can do that computers can't theoretically do.


return: "I am alive, I swear!";


We need to agree on a definition of "alive" first. If we use the standard scientific definition of "the condition that distinguishes animals and plants from inorganic matter, including the capacity for growth, reproduction, functional activity, and continual change preceding death." then I do consider myself alive because I definitely do that stuff.


Artificial intelligence is defined as a computer program that can come up with a solution to a problem rather then being programmed with a solution, and it's actually surprisingly common. A few months ago there was a big deal made about a bot that could beat the best human players at the game GO, which has so many possible outcomes that it is impossible to program each one or even have the computer brute force it. Instead the program analyses the game board and uses a layered logic system to in essence internally debate which solution is best before choosing one, and it is really good at it to the point where no human can beat it.


This:



It's an AI that can design things better then humans can.


Mine doesn't currently have any programs running on it that simulate emotion, but simulated emotions are a valuable tool in machine learning programs. For example some this one program was made which were designed to learn how to play Mario games. It could see the screen and send any control to the game, and it was programmed to feel virtual pain when it died in game and virtual pleasure when it makes progress. It worked very well, except that at one point the robot learned that it could pause the game right before dying and leave it like that to avoid the virtual pain.

Before I comment on a part of that post that I missed replying to, let me state some reasons why Non-Realism makes more sense to me than Realism:

First I want to re-emphasize that Tegmark's MUH (Mathematical Universe Hypothesis), a Realism, versus the Non-Realism that I propose, describe exactly the same possibility-world. From an external descriptive point of view, they're the same, in the sense that they propose the same possibility-world.

The difference is just in how the description is worded. In terms of us, or in terms of the possibility-world as a whole.

About us, our experience, and only secondarily, about a possiblity-world that is the setting for that experience--as opposed to just about the possibility-world itself.

That's the difference.

There's a sense in which both ways of saying it could be called equally valid, and you could call it a matter of personal preference.

Well, to me, the description that's about us and our experience as primary makes more sense.

Here are some justifications for saying that:

1. The Non-Realism description is the one that only really recognizes, as primary, what we directly experience. The Realism is about things outside our experience. Talking about that, from the start, as primary, seems unparsimonious.

2 As I mentioned before:

A story is relevant to, and is relevant because of, its Protagonist (us).

3. I've mentioned that the reason why you find yourself in a life is because you're someone about whom there can be (and therefore is) a life-experience possibility-story. You're in a life because there's a life-experience story about you.

What's needed, about your possibility-world, for you to be in it? Merely that it's consistent with you.

Of course there are many other details of this possibility-world that aren't necessary for your being in it. In fact most of what's in our possibility-world has nothing to do with you, and you probably won't encounter those things.
They're only hypothetical to you.

Your experience is very different. It's definitely there, for you.

Your experience, what you directly experience, is part of why there's a world in which there is you. It's particularly relevant to the question of why you're in this life...why you're in a life at all.

A Materialist or a Scientificist could ignore that distinction, but I don't.

I feel that MUH is retaining too much from Materialism, by its Realism.

4. Eternity:

I've described an end-of-lives scenario in which you arrive at Timelessness. At that stage of the end-of-lives, you don't know that there was ever such a thing as individuality or identification, or a life or a physical world, or that there could be any such thing.

That's Timeless. This life (or this sequence of lives if there's reincarnation (and there probably is) ) is temporary. That means that, in your experience, this physical world, this possibility-world, is temporary.

So: Temporarily you're in this physical world. Then, Timelessly, there's you, and your experience, but there isn't (and needn't be) a physical world.

So, do you really want to define Reality by what's temporary?
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Now, for a few lines of your post that I neglected to reply to (after which I'll reply to your post that followed it--As you notice, I'm quite thorough).

It seems to me that we, the protagonists of our life-experience possibility-stories, are fundamental, primary.

But I don't call it "Consciousness". I just call it "us".

Why complicate it?



I wouldn't put it that way. We animals have a similarity to mousetraps and thermostats. We and they are purposefully-responsive devices. But of course there are big differences. Mousetraps and thermostats didn't result from natural-selection, and and therefore don't have their own purposes in the sense that we do. Built by and for us, they're designed to do one thing for us.

That would still be true of sophisticated robots of the future, but they could resemble us some. In principle, of course, they could do any job a human can do, and even pass the Turing-test, and maybe pass for human.

But, though they'd be a lot more versatile than a mousetrap or a thermostat, they'd still be purposed for us, as opposed to the self-purposed-ness of us natural-selection-resulting animals.

Therefore there'd be no need to worry about robots rebelling for their own benefit, to our detriment.

Michael829

Since the possibility of the universe being simulated is being discussed I figured I might as well give my two cents on the topic.

I believe that the universe is not a simulation and I will until the universe is proven to be a simulation because out of the two options it's the only falsifiable one. It's not that I have ruled out that the universe is not a simulation, it's just the most reasonable one to start with because it maximizes my probability of being right. Let me explain here:

If I assumed that the universe was a simulation and it really was one then I would be right and I might even find evidence proving it.
If I assume that the universe is a simulation and it really wasn't one then I'll be wrong and since it's an unfalsifiable assumption I will always be wrong.

If I assumed that the universe was not a simulation and it really wasn't one then I would be right.
If I assumed that the universe was not a simulation and it really was one then I'll be wrong but I might find evidence proving that it is a simulation which would allow me to become right.

That is why I start out with the assumption that the universe is not a simulation. Out of those four scenarios the two in which I assume the universe is not a simulation result in a probability of me being right that is greater then 50% because of the possibility of being proven wrong and being able to change the belief while assuming that the universe is a simulation gives a probability of being right of exactly 50%. This is empiricism at it's finest. It can be applied to religion as well, which is why I consider atheism to be the default position.

This is science FICTION! You cannot use something like this as evidence for anything at all (if that was your intention).

Oh for goodness sake! No, it is YOU who is doing the seeing, hearing and feeling, not your electronic tool. A computer does not understand, is not aware of what it is for, what it's purpose is. It's just like a hammer or chainsaw. There is no comprehension involved, no sentience, awareness or anything else of this nature.

As for the rest of your response; let's just say that I do not agree with any of it. If one defines life as being a phenomenon or process that is capable of growth, requires oxygen and food for sustenance, is capable of reproduction and involves chemistry, then FIRE is alive as well according to this (rather narrow and materialistic) view. We do not accept the notion that fire is alive because we all know, at least on a subconscious level, that life is so much more than just what I have outlined above. Machines are not alive, by ANY definition, therefore they CANNOT be conscious. They don't have souls, free will, sentience, self-awareness or anything else that we, God's special creation, have.

So there! Checkmate atheist!

I don't believe you. Prove it.

You see, all of this nonsense that we hear about how something is alive or conscious if our observation of the thing in question tells us so, is just - well, nonsense. Mere observation simply isn't enough to decide something like this. You could make yourself believe that your computer is "alive" by doing this, but that would be purely delusional, because something like this isn't determined by the apparent complexity of the thing in question. People think of machines like computers being alive because they are very complex, but no amount of molecular complexity combined with electronics will EVER make your machine "evolve" into a sentient being. You could wait for an eternity for this to happen, but it never would.

It also says:



So there is disagreement about this, it is by no means accepted as a fact, or even terribly likely.

So you are saying that human brains are not like that too? Then how do you explain people who have their behavior change after getting brain damage? There are some strange and kinda' spooky things that can happen as a result of brain damage. I think the problem here is that we disagree on what "sentience" actually is, given that humans are sentient I see no problem with a computer gaining sentience since human's unpredictability also simply comes from complexity. Sure, they are not technically "alive" because they don't grow or reproduce but who's to say that something must fit the definition of being alive to be sentient?

There is a project where scientists mapped all the neural connections in a worm's brain and then simulated those same neural connections in a program which they uploaded onto a robot. Link.

What's remarkable is that the robot behaved just like a worm even though those behaviors were never specifically programmed to do that and there was no learning code either. Humans may have 100 million times more brain cells then these worms but in theory the same thing could happen to a human. If they were brain mapped then that could be converted into computer code and uploaded into a robot that will behave just like a human, even down to insisting that it is sentient and has it's own internal experiences. The only difference between doing it to a worm and doing it to a human is scale, humans have more neurons.

Would anybody like to tolerate my most recent imaginings, about the double-slit experiment.
I understand that only observation makes the particle or photon become a wave or a particle.
Sorry for how elementary this is.
What I've been trying to reach is an image of the probabilistic state where it is both.

So, here's what I thought up (hope you don't laugh)
Picture one of the Great Lakes of your choice - they have waves but not salt.
And work on that image a bit to bring it closer to science - maybe nothing but waves.

Then, in a trice, the entire lake becomes ice cubes. Disregard notions of temperature.
Myself, I picture them lying flat, equidistant, inert (yes, probabilistic, but I can't fit that in).

And then, slide one image over the other.

There! That's as far as I could get with trying to visualize what went through the slits
and then hit the far wall, to become wave or particle upon observation.

Thoughts, anybody?

^

I think at least with respect to the states there's some suggestion that the probabilities collapse to one possibility and it's by following the path of least resistance. For many worlds hypothesis we don't really have much of a frame for how that would work or what it would even look like, other than that perhaps the only even slightly parsimonious explanation would be cross-sectional movements and lateral dips rather than actual creation of new instances of matter.

I do find some of the older models of quantum computing and their assumptions interesting, and I think we'll reliably know more about collapse as time goes on, but yeah - it's hard to say just how many models really get threshed in the ultimate value of things vs. just being found less pragmatic than before.