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Author
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Topic: Cosmogony, Holography and Causality
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chimp
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Member # 333
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posted 11. November 2003 14:26
quote:
quote:
Were such a disruption to occur at the level of basic cognition or perception, reality would become impossible to perceive, recognize, or acknowledge as something that "exists".
This is a statement that I wholeheartedly disagree with. For example if cognition occurs with "neural network" like system processes, then it is inherently fuzzy, and clarity comes from a notion of approximation and not inherent crispness of "logic". Read the Churchland paper mentioned several posts before (page 12). Mr. Langan makes a false dichotomy--one does not imply the other.
Clarity[Truth] comes from the recognition of informational boundaries.
Yes or No?
[ 11. November 2003, 14:27: Message edited by: Russell E. Rierson ]
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gedanken
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posted 11. November 2003 23:11
Clarity [recognition of 'Truth'] is improved by the recognition of informational boundaries.
Read the Conceptual Relativity paper I linked to, and we can continue. I thought this had interesting points of relevance to our discussion.
[ 11. November 2003, 23:13: Message edited by: gedanken ]
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jasonyoung
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posted 11. November 2003 23:41
Before this thread peters out in a facile display of philosophical ignorance, I want to point out, in a cursory and very oblique fashion, that you're remonstrating with the premises of an imaginary theory of your own creation, gedanken, and not the one under discussion.
To repeat: if A v -A, but never both, is false, then reality cannot be coherently perceived, conceived, or internally processed. If you can prove otherwise, do so now without reference to the 'fuzzy' nature of neural networks and the majority of the concepts they engender in the minds of persons and animals(something you couldn't declare if A v -A, but never both, isn't valid). Contradictory realities cannot exist - the rock cannot be both there and not there at the same time, and you cannot perceive the rock as both being there and not being there at the same time. Can't happen. If you can prove otherwise without resorting to unconstructive skeptical arguments such as, "perhaps objects do not exist!", the sorts of arguments which undermine the scientific enterprise in toto by robbing it of legitimate authority (ID would be just as valid as RM/NS, only without the imprimatur of academia), then you're a better man than I (and, well, everyone else).
And if you even need to ask what the CTMU paper says, perhaps you shouldn't be discussing it?
[ 11. November 2003, 23:43: Message edited by: jasonyoung ]
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Rex Kerr
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posted 12. November 2003 00:05
jason, you misunderstand (at least my point, not entirely sure about gedankin's). The claim is not that A & ~A, but rather that there exists no A that is unambiguously corresponding to reality. As such, all the A | ~A-ing in the world may end up being irrelevant to the aspect of reality in question.
If this is the case, it is unwarranted to assume that, contrary to all experience with actual actual propositions A, reality consists of perfectly defined propositions that are either true or false.
To reiterate: the question is not about the law of the excluded middle, but rather about the definability of propositions.
[ 12. November 2003, 00:49: Message edited by: Rex Kerr ]
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jasonyoung
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posted 12. November 2003 00:24
Are you stating that propositions mapping veridically onto reality are impossible to conceive, or are you stating that we cannot currently do it in a significant way because our perceptual and cognitive limitations preclude exhaustive enumerations of the properties comprising concepts?
If it's the former, this is covered directly in the paper (I'll scan for quotes if necessary); if it's the latter, I will agree to an extent, but I view it as an undeniable truth that any properties and relationships we can perceive, i.e. anything which conforms to our perceptual and cognitive syntaxes, can be converted into predicates and propositions and we can then start "A|~Aing", predicating, and drawing significant conclusions. By this I mean, of course, that if we had better memories and more efficient sensory systems we could define our concepts with such precision that semantic arguments like the one gedanken presented earlier in this thread wouldn't be possible.
[ 12. November 2003, 00:36: Message edited by: jasonyoung ]
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Rex Kerr
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posted 12. November 2003 00:54
I am not fond of "undeniable truths".
I much prefer proofs, when possible; compelling evidence that distinguishes between competing hypotheses, otherwise.
I'm not saying that propositions mapping to reality are impossible to conceive of. I am saying that we cannot do it, and we have no real reason to believe that it is possible even in principle. If it is not possible in principle, then it is not possible, regardless of whether it can be conceived. And if it is conceivable and possible in principle, there is still the question of whether it is. My reading of the CTMU is that it requires conceivability, possibility, and actuality.
Added in edit: CTMU is a hypothesis with only conceivability. To be supported by reality, it seems to need the others.
[ 12. November 2003, 01:08: Message edited by: Rex Kerr ]
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jasonyoung
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posted 12. November 2003 01:56
Arbitrarily assigning sounds and symbols to precepts, series of precepts, systems of precepts, concepts, systems of concepts, etc. is conceivable, possible, and ("actual") done continually by cognitive entities such as ourselves. We map arbitrary symbols onto the semantic and syntactic content of our perceptual and cognitive systems in order to communicate our ideas to others in a compact form.
From the principle of syndiffeonesis we know that our perceptual and cognitive systems must share a common syntax with reality in order for our cognitive and perceptual systems to process it. Because we have every reason to believe that we do process it (discounting the hardline skeptic's arguments), we know that we do share a common syntax with reality. It is therefore possible (and actually done, though to a limited extent because of mnemic limitations, etc.) to construct propositions (since it's merely an arbitrary mapping of symbols) which veridically map onto reality. The fidelity of those propositions will be contingent on the abilities of the cognitive entity creating them, and in order to minimize errors an experimental methodology has been established to test the propositions of experimenters.
[ 12. November 2003, 02:07: Message edited by: jasonyoung ]
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chimp
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posted 12. November 2003 03:48
Interesting points Jason. ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
quote:
Rex:
To reiterate: the question is not about the law of the excluded middle, but rather about the definability of propositions.
A cat is placed in a box with an apparatus that releases a vial of poison gas when a radioactive nucleus decays. When the box is opened, and the contents of the box are observed, the radioactive nucleus has either not decayed and the vial of poison gas has not been released, with the cat observed to be alive. Or, the radioactive nucleus has decayed and the vial of poison gas was released with the cat observed to be not-alive.
This is an example of an exact? correspondence to observed reality. Rex , cannot observe the system[cat] be in a state of both alive, and, not-alive. The informational boundaries between "real" and "not-real" cannot be violated. That which is not real, does not exist. ![[Wink]](wink.gif)
Gedankin cannot look out the window of his living quarters, to observe the sun rising in both the east and the west at the same time.
According to Brian Greene, on the PBS series about string theory, theories of the universe have to make sense. The universe is logically consistent.
http://www.iomas.com/gina/ultrahiq/mega-society/Teleologic/main.htm
quote:
Supertautology - In a supertautological theory of reality, it is unnecessary to assume the uniformity of nature with respect to certain kinds of generalization. Instead, such generalizations can be mathematically deduced…e.g. nomological covariance, the invariance of the rate of global self-processing (c-invariance), and the internally-apparent accelerating expansion of the system.
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Rex Kerr
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posted 12. November 2003 03:48
But the mapping may be entirely synthetic rather than fundamental to the universe.
If the mapping were fundamental, then presumably there would be actual categories defined with perfect precision that we only had to find.
This is what we are missing evidence for.
It is also entirely logically consistent that the universe doesn't share syntax with our perceptual and cognitive systems any more than an arbitrary finite four-dimensional system shares syntax with embedded self-replicating units. Indeed, the fact that logic works better at understanding some aspects of the universe (e.g. particle physics) than does our intuitive, inbuilt cognition is strong indication that there is not a good intrinsic mapping between perception/cognition and the nature of the universe.
Don't be fooled by the fact that humans can perform logical operations in a limited way. We are atrociously bad at it. My watch can perform explicit logical processing faster than I can, despite the fact that the theoretical peak computational power of my brain approaches that of every manmade computational device on the planet combined. Whatever the brain does, it isn't logic. It can implement logic (though not very efficiently). Logic can be used to understand its workings. But the syntax of perception and cognition is not logic.
Why should it be? The syntax of perception and cognition should allow efficient comprehension of situations and prediction of immediate consequences on the human scale. This is what is predicted by evolution, and it is what is observed in humans. When we want to do weird things like send a man to the moon instead of hunt antelope, we have to take classes for the better part of a decade in order to train our remarkably flexible but intrinsically ill-suited cognitive machinery. We're not built to understand quantum mechanics, relativity and the like.
Added in edit: A cat being either alive or not-alive is not exact if we can't precisely define alive. And we can't: Is the cat dead if it is not breathing? How much brain activity does it need to have? What about if its heart has stopped? Etc..
[ 12. November 2003, 03:51: Message edited by: Rex Kerr ]
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chimp
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posted 12. November 2003 05:14
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A cat being either alive or not-alive is not exact if we can't precisely define alive. And we can't: Is the cat dead if it is not breathing? How much brain activity does it need to have? What about if its heart has stopped? Etc..
This is a nonsequitur.
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gedanken
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posted 13. November 2003 01:39
Russell says that Rex’s point about the Schroedinger’s cat not being clearly alive or dead (because of problems of making definitions map clearly to reality) is a “nonsequitur”. (And this point is relevant to JasonYoung’s issue which hopefully I will get to.)
Russell, have you ever heard of a condition in digital logic (circuits that use voltage or current to represent ‘1’ and ‘0’ or ‘true’ and ‘false’) that is called “metastability”?
Metastability occurs under certain conditions when a measurement is taken by a circuit that captures the state of an input at a time point that is controlled by the transition of a control or “clock” signal. If the input is in transition at the moment that the control “clock” signals the measurement to be taken, then the output state can wind up in a kind of limbo—part way between the high or ‘1’ value and the low or ‘0’ value. This occurs quite often in circuits with asynchronous real-world inputs that are not coordinated to the time clock of the digital system. When this occurs, the output enters a state like balancing a pencil upright on its point. It will fall one way or another eventually. But the more carefully it is set upright, the longer it takes to fall one way or the other.
In fact there is a degree of error parameter of the input with which one can model this sort of system in which for any chosen time T the error parameter can be set small enough that it will take at least time T for the system to come out of the “metastable” state and reach a defined ‘1’ or ‘0’ state. Now there are ways to resolve this sort of problem. The signals are reclocked in subsequent stages such that the probability of “metastability” reaching the second stage output in time T is smaller by a considerable multiplicative factor. However this condition can not be completely eliminated, even by a large number of such systems which amplify the previous results to obtain more “crisp” output. The probability of it occurring can be reduced such that less than one occurrence might be expected during the life of the universe—but that is different from theoretically eliminating the possibility.
A similar condition can befall the trigger mechanism on Schroedinger’s cat killing mechanism. It is possible for the nuclear decay to only partially trigger the detection mechanism. In fact it could put the system on edge so that subsequent circuits only weakly activate the mechanism that breaks the poison vile. In that case the poison could only partially escape. The cat could wind up sick, and not dead. Or “dead” as per one definition, but not another definition. Or in a region in which it is difficult to distinguish the parameters necessary to determine “death” by any given definition—even if we could agree on what “death” means and communicate it clearly, which is itself problematic in the real world.
Now these systems can be refined so as to lower probability of failure or “fuzzy” or “metastable” state, but they cannot in theory be refined to completely eliminate such failures. But note that this issue is all about removing a single dimension of input timing or voltage related issue. When a system deals in multiple interactions, the possible issues of non-strict or crisp attributes also grows.
Also note that these techniques that reduce “metastability” do not improve measurement. Rather they amplify the crispness of measurements without improving their accuracy. They (by degree) remove indeterminacy. And when issues of lack of clarity of definitions with regard to real-world situations include multiple dimensions, the problems undergo combinatorial explosion of refinements required to increase “accuracy”.
JasonYoung, if my point is not relevant to the CTMU, why try to refute it instead of simply stating it may be correct but irrelevant? (Or is it irrelevant to CTMU, but you also think it is incorrect?)
But of course Jason brought up the issue of “the semantic and syntactic content of our perceptual and cognitive systems in order to communicate our ideas to others in a compact form.” Note the “semantic” content. But later paragraph the “semantic” aspect was dropped.
The biggest problem I have with all this relates to the “semantic” aspect, and the issue of the variety of “logics”. The discussions seem to lapse back into notions that there is only a single “logic”, and therefore that “syntax” per se is sufficient to represent such a “logic”. For example on page 40-41 there is a discussion of use of mathematics as “language” in science. It is considered an extension of “logic”. But if there is no single “logic” then how can mathematical language be an extension of “logic” taken as singular? Now I realize that “logic” may have been defined as one specific type, but then extension of “logic” for language of science would be restricted and cannot account for all of scientifically specified mathematical relationships.
I have no problem with a Zen like appreciation of the universe as a self processing self configuring something. My doubts are about the use of terms “logic” and “language”, and whether they are used in consistent or meaningful manner. (Especially given the apparent symbolic clarity that would be inferred as being present when terms like “language” are described as obeying relationships that are specified in exacting mathematical terms. These are not consistent with the leaps of meaning that I think are most likely only defined or definable in a “fuzzy” manner in some places in the argument.)
But I make no pretension to understanding the CTMU argument. What I am mostly reacting to is statements that are made here in this thread. There are a great many statements that are made whole here in the thread, not referring to special meanings from that or other documents. In most cases my remarks have been in some way indicating a disagreement with certain statements as presented here. (And Rex has done a pretty good job of explaining issues that I also see in similar manner, so in many cases one could find Rex doing a better job of expressing difficulty that I have with some concepts than I have.) But I get the impression that the issues expressed here (at least ones which we have disagreed with) are largely premises or are otherwise relevant to the CTMU argument. Once again if the points are irrelevant, why dispute them? If relevant, then understand the disputes and show how you or CTMU document differs.
Many statements seem to be in the form: CTMU document accounts for these statements. Then: here is how (presenter) disagrees with these statements. (And these seemingly contradictory statements come from persons who seem to agree with the CTMU document claims.) I find this contradictory—for if the CTMU document handles or deals with the issues, then it is not showing that the issues are incorrect or irrelevant.
quote:
From the principle of syndiffeonesis we know that our perceptual and cognitive systems must share a common syntax with reality in order for our cognitive and perceptual systems to process it.
What does “common syntax” mean? Our perceptual systems share the same laws of elementary particle physics with the rest of reality? Or does this mean that higher level human language syntaxes are directly shared with “reality” (as opposed to having an approximate isomorphism of a production of certain and limited perceptual content to “reality”)?
[ 13. November 2003, 01:48: Message edited by: gedanken ]
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chimp
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posted 13. November 2003 03:12
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Gedankin:
It is possible for the nuclear decay to only partially trigger the detection mechanism.
The atom decays, or the atom does not decay. When the cat is observed, it is not in a superposition of two different states, one where the mechanism was triggered and one where the mechanism was not triggered. The cat is observed to be in one state or the other. Gedankin, your bogus, nonsequiturious example, is totally missing the point. It appears to be a deliberate attempt of subterfuge?
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Aliet Jacob
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posted 13. November 2003 05:21
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The atom decays, or the atom does not decay. When the cat is observed, it is not in a superposition of two different states, one where the mechanism was triggered and one where the mechanism was not triggered. The cat is observed to be in one state or the other. Gedankin, your bogus, nonsequiturious example, is totally missing the point. It appears to be a deliberate attempt of subterfuge?
Wrong tone. Wrong ideas.
The dog can be at the door of the house and be neither inside nor outside the house LEM collapses.
Indeed, the dog may be under the house (having burrowed).
Outside the house and under the house are not the same now are they?
Or if it is on the roof of the house?
Or shall we reconstruct it thus:
Dog is IN v ON the House?
Or shall we just use: IN v~ IN?
I think Gedanken's post concerning metastability is right on the spot.
Oh, so, no superposition?
Ok.
Wave v~Wave?
Wrong. Photons have wave-particle duality.
Male v~ Male?
Wrong again
And I can cite many examples where two valued logic and LEM, tautologies, aristotelian logic, or whatever you may want to call this binary splits, wrong, inadequate and simply impractical.
Fuzzy situations are all over the world. And MVL can only be used with total loss in efficiency and meaning.
This CTMU stuff, with regards to 2VL, is akin to trying to use a sledge-hammer to comb the hair.
[ 13. November 2003, 06:14: Message edited by: Aliet Jacob ]
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gedanken
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posted 13. November 2003 10:24
Russell, not only that, but a "real world" piece of equipment must include a detector, of real physical hardware such as electronics.
Only in a model concept does the atom "decay or not decay". In the real world, the decay is detected by the detector, and the issues are of the detector, not the atom.
Russell, you keep repeatedly (and I mrean repeateating over and over) constructing model situations and presenting them as though they were real-world situations. In other words you keep presenting a crisp model and saying in essence 'see--my model is crisp'. Of course you can define a crisp model--make it correspond to the real world now.
Armchair philosophy has its important points. But the advantage of scientific method is the requirememnt that aspects be checked with the real physical world. Here we are still doing "armchair" investigation, but at least requiring our models of our models to correspond to or be consistent with past observation.
[ 13. November 2003, 10:28: Message edited by: gedanken ]
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Rex Kerr
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posted 13. November 2003 11:30
And the imprecision in definitions is important, too, even in areas of apparently pure mathematics.
Let N be the smallest positive integer that cannot be defined in English in 120 characters or less.
Looks like a perfectly good definition of N to me. Now, count the characters. Oops. A & ~A?
What do you propose is going wrong here?
[ 13. November 2003, 11:31: Message edited by: Rex Kerr ]
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