Re: virus: MEME UPDATE: To Censor Or Not?

Dave Pape (davepape@dial.pipex.com)
Mon, 16 Dec 1996 01:43:23 GMT


>Obvious sources of nondetermination:
> Quantum mechanics. [Granted, magnifying it to macroscopic level is
>difficult. But not impossible--cf. Schrodinger's Cat.]

Excellent point sir! I'm a real beginner in QM... almost totally hammered by
even the simplest parts of the maths. I'd very much like to know what you
think about the "universe cannot have perfect knowledge about how it works"
proposal in my last posting. Because... well, QM is very very accurate, but
not totally so... are there any physicists around who think that the reason
you get such bizarre effects as measurement collapsing the Schroedinger
equation is because... erm... we're at a level of detail where... erm...
maths can't take us any further? Where, due to the limited ability of teh
universe to compute its own nature, we're starting to get odd results? I
know this sounds like a shitty cop-out, but I'm interested in the idea of
humanity's search for truth reaching an asymptotic gap from the Truth...

> Badly posed Differential Equations. [Nonunique solutions to
>problems can just ruin the determinists' day, even in a classical
>universe.] "You need to learn Diff Eq so this doesn't happen: you
>design the space probe for Venus, send it up only to see it crash into
>the ocean, and *then* have some smart-mouth mathematician walk up and
>say, 'Oh, those equations had five different solutions from those
>initial conditions.'"

But that IS the fault of your first go at the maths, isn't it?

>I currently suspect that modern computers have souls, but not spirits.
>Under this metaphor, a successful implementation of Strong AI would endow
>the machine with a spirit.
>
>I am reluctant to describe a "soul" as "spiritual", obviously.

I get a buzz from the idea of explaining meta-spiritual
information-processing as being as deterministic and physics-bound as
chemistry... the definitions are so lax here, though.

Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose (The more things change, the more
it's a meme thing)

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