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Messages - sciborg2

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811
Beyond the Machine

http://iai.tv/video/beyond-the-machine

"From Descartes’ view of the heart as a pump to Dennett’s conception of the brain as a computer, our understanding of the body is permeated with mechanical metaphors. Is it an error to believe that the body is a machine?"

eta:

Would be amusing if Live got it right in the 90s:

"These warm bodies, I sense, are not just machines that can only make money..."

812
Politically Incorrect on LSD with guest Robert Anton Wilson:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYzfSzYbmAE



813
Philosophy & Science / Re: Interesting Thoughts on Human Perception
« on: May 10, 2014, 09:53:56 pm »
Truer Perceptions Are Fitter Perceptions Should be Retired

"Those of our predecessors who perceived the world more accurately enjoyed a competitive advantage over their less-fortunate peers. They were thus more likely to raise children and to become our ancestors. We are the offspring of those who perceived more truly, and we can be confident that our perceptions are, in the normal case, reasonably accurate. There are of course endogenous limits. We can, for instance, see light only in a narrow window of wavelengths between roughly 400 and 700 nanometers, and hear sound only in a narrow window of frequencies between 20 and 20,000 Hertz. Moreover we are prone, on occasion, to have perceptual illusions. But with these provisos noted, it is fair to conclude on evolutionary grounds that our perceptions are, in general, reliable guides to reality.

This is the consensus of researchers studying perception via brain imaging, computational modeling and psychophysical experiments. It is mentioned in passing in many professional publications, and stated as fact in standard textbooks.

But it gets evolution wrong. Fitness and truth are distinct concepts in evolutionary theory. To specify a fitness function one must specify not just the state of the world but also, inter alia, a particular organism, a particular state of that organism, and a particular action. Dark chocolates can kill cats, but are a fitting gift from a suitor on Valentine's Day.

Monte Carlo simulations using evolutionary game theory, with a wide range of fitness functions and a wide range of randomly created environments, find that truer perceptions are routinely driven to extinction by perceptions that are tuned to the relevant fitness functions. The extension of these simulations to evolutionary graphs is in progress, and the same result is expected. Simulations with genetic algorithms find that truth never gets on the stage to have a chance to go extinct.

Perceptions tuned to fitness are typically far less complex than those tuned to truth. They require less time and resources to compute, and are thus advantageous in environments where swift action is critical. But even apart from considerations of time and complexity, true perceptions go extinct simply because natural selection selects for fitness not truth.

We must take our perceptions seriously. They have been shaped by natural selection to guide adaptive behaviors and to keep us alive long enough to reproduce. We should avoid cliffs and snakes. But we must not take our perceptions literally. They are not the truth; they are simply a species-specific guide to behavior.

Observation is the empirical foundation of science. The predicates of this foundation, including space, time, physical objects and causality, are a species-specific adaptation, not an insight. Thus this view of perception has implications for fields beyond perceptual science, including physics, neuroscience and the philosophy of science. The old assumption that fitter perceptions are truer perceptions is deeply woven into our conception of science. The funeral of this assumption will not be snubbed with a back-page obituary, but heralded with regime change."

814
Kauffman gives us a possible theory for consciousness that depends on the "poised realm" between the quantum and classical:

What Is Consciousness? A Hypothesis
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Quoting Malin again, "Heisenberg's interpretation implies that the collapse of a quantum state is not a process in time."

Heisenberg's view supports a "strong" version of Res Potentia and Res Extensa linked by Measurement, the former, bearing on the unitary propagation of the Schrodinger equation in Res Potentia, before measurement, and evading Aristotle's Law of the Excluded Middle, the latter, bearing on classical physics and entirely bound by the Law of the Excluded Middle. On the strong version of the dualism, Res Potentia and Res Extensia, we will NOT deduce measurement from within quantum mechanics. As Malin says, on Heisenberg, collapse is not a process in time.

I adopt Res Potentia and Res Extensia linked by Measurement, both ontologically real, as a working hypothesis, which may be true or false.

Then: What IS consciousness? The obvious hypothesis is that mind and consciousness participate in Res Potentia. Mind participates in an ontologically real Possible.

815
A good review of Nagel's Mind & Cosmos - Why the Materialist Neo-Darwinian Conception of Nature is Almost Certainly False by physicist Adam Frank:

Is There A Place For The Mind In Physics? Part I

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Now, as 13.7 readers know, I am no fan of reductionism. In its grandest claims, reductionism tends to be more an affirmation of a faith then a tenable position about ontology (what exists in the world). However, as a physicist I am more prone to the Emergentist position because it requires a less radical alteration of what we believe does exist out there. Nagel's view asks for such a dramatic reworking of ontology that the evidence better be just as dramatic and, so far, it isn't.

Still, once I got past Nagel's missteps on Darwin, I found his arguments to be quite brave, even if I am not ready to follow him to the ends of his ontology. There is a stiff, cold wind in his perspective. Those who dismiss him out of hand are holding fast to a knowledge that does not exist. The truth of the matter is we are just at the beginning of our understanding of consciousness and of the Mind.

Think about the difference between Galileo's vision of "the real" and Einstein's. At this point in our study of the Mind, are we really so sure of what can, and what cannot, be simply dismissed? Nagel may ultimately be wrong, but he is correct in articulating one limit in the range of what might possibly be right.

816
Philosophy & Science / Re: Is the Brain a Digital Computer?
« on: May 10, 2014, 05:11:48 pm »
You Can't Argue with a Zombie:

http://www.davidchess.com/words/poc/lanier_zombie.html

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I started with the usual sort of brain-replacement yarn. Your neurons are replaced one-by-one with silicon devices. That sort of thing. Young zombies-in-training assume that nothing fundamental will have changed if they are turned to silicon.

We then transferred our brains into software. Each neuron was now replaced by a software expression and they all connected together functionally in the same way as they did when they were mushy.

The zombies still felt at one with this proposed zombie-on-a-disk. It is worth pausing for a moment and noting that accepting one's ontological equivalence to some data on a disk does not necessarily banish the demons of vitalism. Zombies might still imagine their data interacting with biological humans (as we see in the Star Trek character "Data"). They might still turn to the natural world for confirmation, relying on that old ritual of vitalism, the Turing Test.

Harder core zombies are ready to leave all that behind and imagine living on a disk in which they only interact with other minds and environmental elements that also exist solely as software. It is here that we must ask a question that seems obvious to me, but seems to shock zombies: What makes this software exist? What makes the computer that it runs on exist?

There can be only one proper basis to judge the existence of computers and software. We should be able to confirm their existence empirically, using the same scientific method we use to study the rest of the natural world. As it turns out, we cannot do that, for reasons that I will make clear later in this paper. We are the only measure of the existence of computers. So the assertion that computers and software exist is a stealthy conveyor of rampant vitalism and mystical dualism.

817
From John Wheeler himself:

INFORMATION ,PHYSICS, QUANTUM:THE SEARCH FOR LINKS

http://jawarchive.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/informationquantumphysics.pdf

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This report reviews what quantum physics and information theory have to tell us about the age-old question, How come existence? No escape is evident from four conclusions:

(1)The world cannot be a giant machine, ruled by any preestablished continuum physical law.

(2) There is no such thing at the microscopic level as space or time or spacetime continuum.

(3) The familiar probability function or functional,and wave equation or functional wave equation, of standard quantum theory provide mere continuum idealizations and by reason of this circumstance conceal the information-theoretic source from which they derive.

(4) No element in the description of physics shows itself as closer to primordial than the elementary quantum phenomenon, that is, the elementary device-intermediated act of posing a yes-no physical question and eliciting an answer or, in brief, the elementary act of observer-participancy. Otherwise stated, every physical quantity, every it, derives its ultimate significance from bits, binary yes-or-no indications, a conclusion which we epitomize in the phrase, it from bit.

818
Andrew Clifton, IMHO, offers a well written argument against materialist explanations for consciousness in his essay “The Empirical Case Against Materialism”:

http://anti-matters.org/articles/126/public/126-192-1-PB.pdf

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Empirical arguments for materialism are highly circumstantial —based, as they are, upon inductions from our knowledge of the physical and upon the fact that mental phenomena have physical correlates, causes and effects.

However, the qualitative characteristics of first-person conscious experience are empirically distinct from uncontroversially physical phenomena in being—at least on our present knowledge—thoroughly resistant to the kind of abstract, formal description to which the latter are always, to some degree, readily amenable.

The prima facie inference that phenomenal qualities are, most probably, non-physical may be resisted either by denying their existence altogether or by proposing that they are properties of some peculiar sort of mysterious physical complexity, located, for example, within the functioning of the brain.

It is argued here, however, that the first, eliminative hypothesis is empirically absurd—while the second is extravagant, vague, ad hoc and (for various additional reasons) profoundly implausible.

Taken together, these considerations provide a compelling empirical case against materialism—yet its converse, mentalism, is usually regarded as subject to serious difficulties of its own.

I conclude by suggesting empirical and theoretical desiderata, respectively, for the vindication of materialism and alternatively, for the development and defense of a potentially robust and viable mentalist theory of consciousness.

819
Sadly philosopher Massimo Pigliucci will be closing his blog Rationally Speaking, but will be opening a new site. The last post of the blog goes into detail:

http://rationallyspeaking.blogspot.com/2014/03/so-long-and-thanks-for-all-fish.html

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“Scientia” is the Latin word for knowledge, broadly construed – i.e., in an ampler fashion than that implied by the English term science. Scientia includes the natural sciences, the social sciences, philosophy, logic and mathematics. And Salons, of course, were the social engine of the Age of Reason in France and throughout much of Europe.

The idea of Scientia Salon is to provide a forum for in-depth discussions on themes of general interest drawing from philosophy and the sciences. Contributors will be academics and non academics who don’t shy away from the label of “public intellectual,” and who feel that engaging in public discourse is vital to what they do and to society at large.

The initial concept was inspired in me years ago by Noam Chomsky’s famous contention that “Citizens of the democratic societies should undertake a course of intellectual self defense to protect themselves from manipulation and control, and to lay the basis for meaningful democracy” (in his Necessary Illusions: Thought Control in Democratic Societies). But more recently what spurred me into action was an article by City University of New York’s Corey Robin, on “The responsibility of adjunct intellectuals” (published in Al Jazeera America). It’s a must read, and it’s most definitely not just aimed at academic adjuncts.

820
The Forum of Interesting Things / Re: Crop circles
« on: May 05, 2014, 07:00:13 am »
It's incredible just how obsessed Pinchbeck was about this stuff in 2012: Return of Quetzacoatl.

Breaking Open the Head was an incredible book, going off into speculative paths, even into "high strangeness" where the Phenomenal pokes into the Material, but for all that still felt grounded...even if only one foot was on the ground you felt like there was metaphorical value in the encounters with spiritual entities.

Sadly 2012:RoQ sometimes feels like the baby was thrown out but Pinchbeck was still drinking the bathwater and offering it as his own Koolaid variant. He still manages to balance his Imaginal/Phenomenal encounters and discussions with metaphor, at least for awhile, but his own hipster self-pity track intertwines with his crop circle obsession which somehow excuses his infidelity and general inability to manage relationships or the responsibility of parenting...because aether currents or some shit were repressing his inner-playa....

Y U Like Crop Circles SO MUCH Pinchbeck?

821
The Control Group Is Out Of Control:

http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/04/28/the-control-group-is-out-of-control/

Interesting retrospective/critique on Bem's recently published results that purportedly demonstrated precognition as real. It shows why this stuff can be interesting even if there's nothing going on, with good discussion in the comments between Alexander and Psi proponent Johann:

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Schiltz is a psi believer whose staring experiments had consistently supported the presence of a psychic phenomenon. Wiseman, in accordance with nominative determinism is a psi skeptic whose staring experiments keep showing nothing and disproving psi. Since they were apparently the only two people in all of parapsychology with a smidgen of curiosity or rationalist virtue, they decided to team up and figure out why they kept getting such different results...

..The results? Schlitz’s trials found strong evidence of psychic powers, Wiseman’s trials found no evidence whatsoever.

Take a second to reflect on how this makes no sense. Two experimenters in the same laboratory, using the same apparatus, having no contact with the subjects except to introduce themselves and flip a few switches – and whether one or the other was there that day completely altered the result. For a good time, watch the gymnastics they have to do to in the paper to make this sound sufficiently sensical to even get published. This is the only journal article I’ve ever read where, in the part of the Discussion section where you’re supposed to propose possible reasons for your findings, both authors suggest maybe their co-author hacked into the computer and altered the results.

822
Chalmers' Thoughts on Emergence:

http://consc.net/notes/emergence.html

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Here are some thoughts on "emergence". Nothing definitive, but an attempt to get at the psychological core (or cores) of the notion. Thanks are due to others for providing a stimulating discussion.

Emergence is a tricky concept. It's easy to slide it down a slippery slope, and turn it into something implausible and easily dismissable. But it's not easy to delineate the interesting middle ground in between. Two unsatisfactory definitions of emergence, at either end of the spectrum:

(1) Emergence as "inexplicable" and "magical". This would cover high-level properties of a system that are simply not deducible from its low-level properties, no matter how sophisticated the deduction. This view leads easily into mysticism, and there is not the slightest evidence for it (except, perhaps, in the difficult case of consciousness, but let's leave that aside for now). All material properties seem to follow from low-level physical properties. Very few sophisticated people since the 19th century have actually believed in this kind of "emergence", and it's rarely what is referred to by those who invoke the term favourably. But if you mention "emergence", someone inevitably interprets you as meaning this, causing no end of confusion.

(2) Emergence as the existence of properties of a system that are not possessed by any of its parts. This, of course, is so ubiquitous a phenomenon that it's not deeply interesting. Under this definition, file cabinets and decks of cards (not to mention XOR gates) have plenty of emergent properties - so this is surely not what we mean.

The challenge, then, is to delineate a concept of emergence that falls between the deeply implausible (1) and the overly general (2). After all, serious people do like do use the term, and they think they mean something interesting by it. It probably will help to focus on a few core examples of "emergence":

    (A) The game of Life: High-level patterns and structure emerge from simple low-level rules.
    (B) Connectionist networks: High-level "cognitive" behaviour emerges from simple interactions between dumb threshold logic units.
    (C) The operating system (Hofstadter's example): The fact that overloading occurs just around when there are 35 users on the system seems to be an emergent property of the system.
    (D) Evolution: Intelligence and many other interesting properties emerge over the course of evolution by genetic recombination, mutation and natural selection.

823
Philosophy & Science / Ordinary Language Philosophy
« on: May 04, 2014, 12:24:27 am »
Ordinary Language Philosophy:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03ggc19

"Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss Ordinary Language Philosophy, a school of thought which emerged in Oxford in the years following World War II. With its roots in the work of Ludwig Wittgenstein, Ordinary Language Philosophy is concerned with the meanings of words as used in everyday speech. Its adherents believed that many philosophical problems were created by the misuse of words, and that if such 'ordinary language' were correctly analysed, such problems would disappear. Philosophers associated with the school include some of the most distinguished British thinkers of the twentieth century, such as Gilbert Ryle and JL Austin."

824
Short Stories & Others / Re: Reinstalling Eden - new short.
« on: May 03, 2014, 08:39:26 pm »
I thought about that but it is a Bakker short... it should be someplace more prominent.

If only he had others like it...

I think he does?:

What Was… And What Will Never Be

The Long Held Breath

825
General Misc. / Re: What else are you into?
« on: May 03, 2014, 08:35:10 pm »
I spend my days contemplating how I will amass enough magical energy to arrive at Copenhagen without my enemies becoming aware, ideally giving me enough time to free the Mermaid trapped in Carbonite.

"...The image to be held before one is that every act by every person has an effect on all, changing the delicate balance that keeps the universe in motion. Therefore, it was considered necessary by the alchemists to so conduct their work and their lives, which were really the same thing, as if the salvation of the world depended upon it.”

 -June Singer, Androgyny

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