“Gods are ontologically distinct from creatures, or they’re not worth the paper they’re written on.”—Damien Broderick
Most upper ontologies allow no such ontological distinction. E.g. my default ontology is algorithmic information theory, which allows for tons of things that look like gods.
I agree with the rest of your comment, though. I don’t know what ‘worship’ means yet (is it just having lots of positive affect towards something?), but it makes for a good distinction between religion and not-quite-religion.
Time for me to reread A Human’s Guide to Words, I suppose. But in my head and with Visiting Fellows folk I think I will continue to use an ontological language stolen from theism.
Primarily because I get a lot of glee out of meta-contrarianism and talking in a way that would make stereotypical aspiring rationalists think I was crazy. Secondarily because the language is culturally rich. Tertiarily because I figure out what smart people actually mean when they talk about faith, charkras, souls, et cetera, and it’s fun to rediscover those concepts and find their naturalistic basis. Quaternarily it allows me to practice charity in interpretation and steel-manning of bad arguments. Zerothly (I forgot the most important reason!) it is easier to speak in such a way, which makes it easier to see implications and decompartmentalize knowledge. Senarily it is more aesthetic than rationalistic jargon.
I agree, though I was describing the case where I can do both simultaneously (when I’m talking to people who either don’t mind or join in on the fun). This post was more an example of just not realizing that the use of the word ‘theism’ would have such negative and distracting connotations.
Tertiarily because I figure out what smart people actually mean when they talk about faith, charkras, souls, et cetera, and it’s fun to rediscover those concepts and find their naturalistic basis.
Except I think it’s safe to say this sort of thing typically isn’t what they mean, merely what they perhaps might mean if they were thinking more clearly. And it’s not at all clear how you could find analogs to the more concrete religious ideas (e.g. chakras or the holy trinity).
Quaternarily it allows me to practice charity in interpretation and steel-manning of bad arguments.
If the person would violently disagree that this is in fact what they intended to say, I’m not sure it can be called “charity of interpretation” anymore. And while I agree steel-manning of bad arguments is important, to do it to such an extent seems to be essentially allowing your attention to be hijacked by anyone with a hypothesis to privilege.
That advice makes sense for general audiences. Your average Christian might read a version of the Simulation argument written with theistic language as an endorsement of their beliefs. But I really doubt posters here would.
Frank Tipler actually produced a simulation argument as an endorsement of Christian belief. Along with some interesting cosmology making it possible for this universe to simulate itself! (It’s easy when the accessible quantity of computronium tends to infinity as the age of the universe approaches its limit.) In Tipler’s theory, God may not exist yet, but a kind of Singularity will create Him.
Of course, the average Christian has not yet heard of Tipler, nor would said Christian accept the endorsement. But it is out there.
One issue I’ve never understood about Tipler is how he got from theism to Christianity using the Omega Point argument. It seems very similar to the SMBC cartoon Eliezer already linked to. Tipler’s argument is a plausibility argument for maybe, something, sort of like a deity if you squint at it. Somehow that then gives rise to Christianity with the theology along with it.
It’s worth pointing out that we now know that the universe’s expansion is accelerating, which would rule out the omega point even if it were plausible before.
IIRC, Tipler had that covered. A universe of infinite duration allows us to use eons of future time to simulate a single second of time in the current era. Something like the hotel with infinitely many rooms.
But please don’t ask me to actually defend Tipler’s mumbo-jumbo.
I don’t think it can be defended any more. I picked it up a few weeks ago, read a few chapters, and thought, do I want to read any more given that he requires the universe to be closed? Dark energy would seem to forbid a Big Crunch and render even the early parts of his model moot.
Sweet! Wikipedia’s image for Physical Cosmology, including your Dark Energy link, is the cosmic microwave background map from the WMAP mission. That was the first mission I worked with NASA. My job, as junior-underling attitude control engineer, was to come up with some way to salvage the medium cost, medium-risk mission if a certain part failed, and to help babysit the spacecraft during the least fun midnight-to-noon shift. Still, it feels good to have been a tiny part of something that has made a difference in how we understand our universe.
Disclaimer: My unofficial opinions, not NASA’s. Blah, blah, blah.
If you assume a Tegmark multiverse — that all definable entities actually exist — then it seems to follow that:
All malicious deprivation — some mind recognizing another mind’s definable possible pleasure, and taking steps to deny that mind’s pleasure — implies the actual existence of the pleasure it is intended to deprive;
All benevolent relief — some mind recognizing another mind’s definable possible suffering, and taking steps to alleviate that suffering — implies the actual existence of the suffering it is intended to relieve.
It does not follow from the fact that I am motivated to prevent certain kinds of suffering/pleasure, that said suffering/pleasure is “definable” in the sense I think you mean it here. That is, my brain is sufficiently screwy that it’s possible for me to want to prevent something that isn’t actually logically possible in the first place.
Since religions are human inventions, I would guess that any comprehensive simulation program already produces all conceivable religions.
But I’m guessing that you meant to talk about the simulation of all conceivable gods. That is another matter entirely. Even with unlimited computronium, you can only simulate possible gods—gods not entailing any logical contradictions. There may not be any such gods.
This doesn’t affect Tipler’s argument though. Tipler does not postulate God as simulated. Tipler postulates God as the simulator.
I’m not sure. I only read the first book—“Physics of Immortality”. But I would suppose that he doesn’t actually try to prove the truth of Christianity—he might be satisfied to simply make Christian doctrine seem less weird and impossible.
There’s a buttload of thinking that’s been done in this language in earlier times, and if we use the language, that suggests we can reuse the thinking, which is pretty exciting if true. But mostly I don’t think it is.
(For any discredited theory along the lines of gods or astrology, you want to focus on its advocates from the past more than from the present, because the past is when the world’s best minds were unironically into these things.)
There’s a buttload of thinking that’s been done in this language in earlier times, and if we use the language, that suggests we can reuse the thinking, which is pretty exciting if true.
Theres also the opportunity for a kind of metatheology- which might lead to some really interesting insights into humans and how they relate to the world.
There’s a buttload of thinking that’s been done in this language in earlier times, and if we use the language, that suggests we can reuse the thinking, which is pretty exciting if true. But mostly I don’t think it is.
Tangentially, it’s important to note that most followers of a philosophy/religion are going to be stupid compared to their founders, so we should probably just look at what founders had to say. (Christ more than His disciples, Buddha more than Zen practitioners, Freud and Jung more than their followers, et cetera.) Many people who are now considered brilliant/inspiring had something legitimately interesting to say. History is a decent filter for intellectual quality.
That said, everything you’d ever need to know is covered by a combination of Terence McKenna and Gautama Buddha. ;)
Tangentially, it’s important to note that most followers of a philosophy/religion are going to be stupid compared to their founders, so we should probably just look at what founders had to say.
This doesn’t follow. The founder of a religion is likely to be more intelligent or at least more insightful than an average follower, but a religion of any size is going to have so many followers that a few of them are almost guaranteed to be more insightful than the founder was; founding a religion is a rare event that doesn’t have any obvious correlation with intelligence.
I’d also be willing to bet that founding a successful religion selects for a somewhat different skill set than elucidating the same religion would.
The founder of a religion is likely to be more intelligent or at least more insightful than an average follower, but a religion of any size is going to have so many followers that a few of them are almost guaranteed to be more insightful than the founder was; founding a religion is a rare event that doesn’t have any obvious correlation with intelligence.
You’re mostly right; upvoted. I suppose I was thinking primarily of Buddhism, which was pretty damn exceptional in this regard. Buddha was ridiculously prodigious. There are many Christians with better ideas about Christianity than Christ, and the same is probably true of Zoroaster and Mohammed, though I’m not aware of them. Actually, if anyone has links to interesting writing from smart non-Sufi Muslims, I’d be interested.
I’d also be willing to bet that founding a successful religion selects for a somewhat different skill set than elucidating the same religion would.
This kind of depends on criteria for success. If number of adherents is what matters then I agree, if correctness is what matters then it’s probably a very similar skill set. Look at what postmodernists would probably call Eliezer’s Singularity subreligion, for instance.
There are many Christians with better ideas about Christianity than Christ, and the same is probably true of Zoroaster and Mohammed, though I’m not aware of them.
There’s a serious problem with this in Christianity in that you have to figure out what the founder actual said in the first place, which is very much an open problem concerning Christianity (and perhaps Bhuddism as well but I am less familiar with it at the moment).
For example, just this century with the rediscovery of the Gospel of Thomas you get a whole new set of information which is .. challenging to integrate to say the least, and also very interesting.
About half of the sayings are different (usually earlier, better) versions of stuff already in the synoptics, but there are some new gems—check out 22:
When you make the two into one, and when you make the inner like the outer and the outer like the inner, and the upper like the lower, and when you make male and female into a single one, so that the male will not be male nor the female be female, when you make eyes in place of an eye, a hand in place of a hand, a foot in place of a foot, an image in place of an image, then you will enter [the kingdom]
Or 108:
Whoever drinks from my mouth will become like me; I myself shall become that person, and the hidden things will be revealed to him
Those are certainly things that weren’t in the bible before that people would have put a lot of work into interpreting if they had been, but “gems” is not the word I’d use.
Time for me to reread A Human’s Guide to Words, I suppose. But in my head and with Visiting Fellows folk I think I will continue to use an ontological language stolen from theism.
Just be careful of true believers that may condemn you for heresy for using the other tribe’s jargon! ;)
‘Worship’ or ‘Elder Rituals’ could not be reasonably construed as a relevant reply to your thread.
‘Worship’ or ‘Elder Rituals’ could not be reasonably construed as a relevant reply to your thread.
Eliezer is trying to define theism to mean religion, I think, so that atheism is still a defensible state of belief. I guess I’m okay with this, but it makes me sad to lose what I saw as a perfectly good word.
Most upper ontologies allow no such ontological distinction. E.g. my default ontology is algorithmic information theory, which allows for tons of things that look like gods.
I agree with the rest of your comment, though. I don’t know what ‘worship’ means yet (is it just having lots of positive affect towards something?), but it makes for a good distinction between religion and not-quite-religion.
Time for me to reread A Human’s Guide to Words, I suppose. But in my head and with Visiting Fellows folk I think I will continue to use an ontological language stolen from theism.
I’m curious to know why you prefer this language. I kind of like it too, but can’t really put a finger on why.
Primarily because I get a lot of glee out of meta-contrarianism and talking in a way that would make stereotypical aspiring rationalists think I was crazy. Secondarily because the language is culturally rich. Tertiarily because I figure out what smart people actually mean when they talk about faith, charkras, souls, et cetera, and it’s fun to rediscover those concepts and find their naturalistic basis. Quaternarily it allows me to practice charity in interpretation and steel-manning of bad arguments. Zerothly (I forgot the most important reason!) it is easier to speak in such a way, which makes it easier to see implications and decompartmentalize knowledge. Senarily it is more aesthetic than rationalistic jargon.
I agree that verbal masturbation is fun, but it’s not helpful when you’re tying to actually communicate with people. Consider purchasing contrarian glee and communication separately.
That’s a good point, but where do you recommend getting contrarian glee separate from communication?
Cached thoughts: Crackpot Theory (48 readers)? Closet Survey, The Strangest Thing An AI Could Tell You, The Irrationality Game? Omegle?
I wish crackpot theories were considered a legitimate form of art. They’re like fantasy worldbuilding but better.
Here, of course.
I agree, though I was describing the case where I can do both simultaneously (when I’m talking to people who either don’t mind or join in on the fun). This post was more an example of just not realizing that the use of the word ‘theism’ would have such negative and distracting connotations.
Except I think it’s safe to say this sort of thing typically isn’t what they mean, merely what they perhaps might mean if they were thinking more clearly. And it’s not at all clear how you could find analogs to the more concrete religious ideas (e.g. chakras or the holy trinity).
If the person would violently disagree that this is in fact what they intended to say, I’m not sure it can be called “charity of interpretation” anymore. And while I agree steel-manning of bad arguments is important, to do it to such an extent seems to be essentially allowing your attention to be hijacked by anyone with a hypothesis to privilege.
I think Ben from TakeOnIt put it well:
There’s definitely something deeply appealing about theistic language. That’s what makes it so dangerous.
That advice makes sense for general audiences. Your average Christian might read a version of the Simulation argument written with theistic language as an endorsement of their beliefs. But I really doubt posters here would.
Frank Tipler actually produced a simulation argument as an endorsement of Christian belief. Along with some interesting cosmology making it possible for this universe to simulate itself! (It’s easy when the accessible quantity of computronium tends to infinity as the age of the universe approaches its limit.) In Tipler’s theory, God may not exist yet, but a kind of Singularity will create Him.
Of course, the average Christian has not yet heard of Tipler, nor would said Christian accept the endorsement. But it is out there.
One issue I’ve never understood about Tipler is how he got from theism to Christianity using the Omega Point argument. It seems very similar to the SMBC cartoon Eliezer already linked to. Tipler’s argument is a plausibility argument for maybe, something, sort of like a deity if you squint at it. Somehow that then gives rise to Christianity with the theology along with it.
It’s worth pointing out that we now know that the universe’s expansion is accelerating, which would rule out the omega point even if it were plausible before.
IIRC, Tipler had that covered. A universe of infinite duration allows us to use eons of future time to simulate a single second of time in the current era. Something like the hotel with infinitely many rooms.
But please don’t ask me to actually defend Tipler’s mumbo-jumbo.
I don’t think it can be defended any more. I picked it up a few weeks ago, read a few chapters, and thought, do I want to read any more given that he requires the universe to be closed? Dark energy would seem to forbid a Big Crunch and render even the early parts of his model moot.
Sweet! Wikipedia’s image for Physical Cosmology, including your Dark Energy link, is the cosmic microwave background map from the WMAP mission. That was the first mission I worked with NASA. My job, as junior-underling attitude control engineer, was to come up with some way to salvage the medium cost, medium-risk mission if a certain part failed, and to help babysit the spacecraft during the least fun midnight-to-noon shift. Still, it feels good to have been a tiny part of something that has made a difference in how we understand our universe.
Disclaimer: My unofficial opinions, not NASA’s. Blah, blah, blah.
I think you duplicated my post.
So I did. Context in Recent Comments unfortunately only reaches so far.
How does he get from there to Christianity in particular?
If you are assuming infinite computronium you may as well go ahead and assume simulation of all of the conceivable religions!
I suppose that leaves you in a position of Pascal’s Gang Mugging.
That’s basically Hindu theology in a nutshell. Or more accurately, Pascal’s Gang Maybe Mugging Maybe Hugging.
If you assume a Tegmark multiverse — that all definable entities actually exist — then it seems to follow that:
All malicious deprivation — some mind recognizing another mind’s definable possible pleasure, and taking steps to deny that mind’s pleasure — implies the actual existence of the pleasure it is intended to deprive;
All benevolent relief — some mind recognizing another mind’s definable possible suffering, and taking steps to alleviate that suffering — implies the actual existence of the suffering it is intended to relieve.
It does not follow from the fact that I am motivated to prevent certain kinds of suffering/pleasure, that said suffering/pleasure is “definable” in the sense I think you mean it here. That is, my brain is sufficiently screwy that it’s possible for me to want to prevent something that isn’t actually logically possible in the first place.
Since religions are human inventions, I would guess that any comprehensive simulation program already produces all conceivable religions.
But I’m guessing that you meant to talk about the simulation of all conceivable gods. That is another matter entirely. Even with unlimited computronium, you can only simulate possible gods—gods not entailing any logical contradictions. There may not be any such gods.
This doesn’t affect Tipler’s argument though. Tipler does not postulate God as simulated. Tipler postulates God as the simulator.
I’m not sure. I only read the first book—“Physics of Immortality”. But I would suppose that he doesn’t actually try to prove the truth of Christianity—he might be satisfied to simply make Christian doctrine seem less weird and impossible.
Here’s a direct comparison of the two that I made.
There’s a buttload of thinking that’s been done in this language in earlier times, and if we use the language, that suggests we can reuse the thinking, which is pretty exciting if true. But mostly I don’t think it is.
(For any discredited theory along the lines of gods or astrology, you want to focus on its advocates from the past more than from the present, because the past is when the world’s best minds were unironically into these things.)
Theres also the opportunity for a kind of metatheology- which might lead to some really interesting insights into humans and how they relate to the world.
Tangentially, it’s important to note that most followers of a philosophy/religion are going to be stupid compared to their founders, so we should probably just look at what founders had to say. (Christ more than His disciples, Buddha more than Zen practitioners, Freud and Jung more than their followers, et cetera.) Many people who are now considered brilliant/inspiring had something legitimately interesting to say. History is a decent filter for intellectual quality.
That said, everything you’d ever need to know is covered by a combination of Terence McKenna and Gautama Buddha. ;)
This doesn’t follow. The founder of a religion is likely to be more intelligent or at least more insightful than an average follower, but a religion of any size is going to have so many followers that a few of them are almost guaranteed to be more insightful than the founder was; founding a religion is a rare event that doesn’t have any obvious correlation with intelligence.
I’d also be willing to bet that founding a successful religion selects for a somewhat different skill set than elucidating the same religion would.
You’re mostly right; upvoted. I suppose I was thinking primarily of Buddhism, which was pretty damn exceptional in this regard. Buddha was ridiculously prodigious. There are many Christians with better ideas about Christianity than Christ, and the same is probably true of Zoroaster and Mohammed, though I’m not aware of them. Actually, if anyone has links to interesting writing from smart non-Sufi Muslims, I’d be interested.
This kind of depends on criteria for success. If number of adherents is what matters then I agree, if correctness is what matters then it’s probably a very similar skill set. Look at what postmodernists would probably call Eliezer’s Singularity subreligion, for instance.
There’s a serious problem with this in Christianity in that you have to figure out what the founder actual said in the first place, which is very much an open problem concerning Christianity (and perhaps Bhuddism as well but I am less familiar with it at the moment).
For example, just this century with the rediscovery of the Gospel of Thomas you get a whole new set of information which is .. challenging to integrate to say the least, and also very interesting.
About half of the sayings are different (usually earlier, better) versions of stuff already in the synoptics, but there are some new gems—check out 22:
Or 108:
Those are certainly things that weren’t in the bible before that people would have put a lot of work into interpreting if they had been, but “gems” is not the word I’d use.
Point taken. I was thinking of number of adherents.
Also I should note that by ‘intelligence’ I mostly meant ‘predisposition to say insightful or truthful things’, which is rather different from g.
Just be careful of true believers that may condemn you for heresy for using the other tribe’s jargon! ;)
‘Worship’ or ‘Elder Rituals’ could not be reasonably construed as a relevant reply to your thread.
Eliezer is trying to define theism to mean religion, I think, so that atheism is still a defensible state of belief. I guess I’m okay with this, but it makes me sad to lose what I saw as a perfectly good word.
Strongly agree. Better to avoid synonyms when possible. ‘Simulationism’ is ugly and doesn’t seem sufficiently general in the way ‘theism’ does.