Nick said: Yudkowsky is saying that the Schrödinger equation provides a causally complete account of the program’s execution.
The Schrödinger equation, let’s agree, provides a mechanistic account of the evolution of the physical system of a computer, or brain, or whatever. But it does just as well for a random number generator, or a pile of randomly-connected transistors, or a pile of sand. Whatever makes the execution a sensible mathematical object is not found in the Schrödinger equation.
An algorithm can reduce to any of many very different physical representations. How is this any odder than saying 4 quarks and 4 apples are both 4 of something?
It isn’t. Four-ness is also odd, just not as obviously so. Like algorithms, it too is not to be found in the Schrödinger equation. I’m hardly the first person in the world to point out that the nature of mathematical objects is a difficult philosophical question.
I’m not trying to introduce new physical mechanisms, or even metaphysical mechanisms. Let’s grant that the universe, incuding the minds in it, runs by the standard physical laws. But the fact that mechanical laws produce comprehensible structures, and minds capable of comprehending them, is exceedingly strange. Even if we understood brains down to the neural level, and could build minds out of computers, it would still be strange.
Nick said: Yudkowsky is saying that the Schrödinger equation provides a causally complete account of the program’s execution.
The Schrödinger equation, let’s agree, provides a mechanistic account of the evolution of the physical system of a computer, or brain, or whatever. But it does just as well for a random number generator, or a pile of randomly-connected transistors, or a pile of sand. Whatever makes the execution a sensible mathematical object is not found in the Schrödinger equation.
An algorithm can reduce to any of many very different physical representations. How is this any odder than saying 4 quarks and 4 apples are both 4 of something?
It isn’t. Four-ness is also odd, just not as obviously so. Like algorithms, it too is not to be found in the Schrödinger equation. I’m hardly the first person in the world to point out that the nature of mathematical objects is a difficult philosophical question.
I’m not trying to introduce new physical mechanisms, or even metaphysical mechanisms. Let’s grant that the universe, incuding the minds in it, runs by the standard physical laws. But the fact that mechanical laws produce comprehensible structures, and minds capable of comprehending them, is exceedingly strange. Even if we understood brains down to the neural level, and could build minds out of computers, it would still be strange.