(comment written after only reading the introduction and the “Napoleonic exemplar” section)
In contrast the fourth process is literally insane. It’s mental process correspond to nothing in reality (or at least, nothing in its reality). It emerges by coincidence, its predictions are wrong or meaningless, and it will almost certainly be immediately destroyed by processes it has completely failed to model. The symbols exist only within its own head.
I’m not so sure about this. You say that it’s “literally insane” and that its thought processes happen to exactly mimic Napoleon’s “by sheer coincidence”. But I don’t see a way for its thought processes to exactly mimic Napoleon’s unless it started in the same state as Napoleon’s brain and then proceeded to carry out the same calculations, while (by sheer coincidence) happening to receive the exact same sensory data throughout the 24-hour period as Napoleon did.
Yes, the Boltmann brain’s reasoning doesn’t actually model anything in its immediate (objective) surroundings, but it does process the data it’s given correctly, and make the correct predictions from it—at least to the same extent that we presume Napoleon to have been processing his sense data correctly and making correct predictions from it.
It’s true that it will soon be destroyed by processes it has completely failed to model. But anybody might be destroyed by processes they have completely failed to model—that just means they haven’t been subjected to the right information sources.
I think an analogy to math might be useful here. In one sense, you could say that mathematicians are reasoning about things that are totally divorced from the world—there’s no such thing as a perfect circle or an infinitely thin line in real life. Yet once you have assumed those things as axioms, you can still do completely sane and lawful reasoning on what would follow from those axioms. Similarly, the Boltzmann brain accepts the sensory data it gets as axiomatic (as do most of us), and then proceeds to carry out lawful reasoning based on that.
I’m not sure if you can argue that the Boltzmann brain is insane without also arguing that mathematicians are insane. Though, to be fair, I have noticed that the professors in the math department tend to be more colorful than the ones in other departments… :-)
Even if the Boltzmann brain is completely chaotic, internally it contains the same structures/processes as whatever we find meaningful about Napoleon’s brain. It is only by external context that we can claim that those things are now meaningful.
For us, that may be a valid distinction—how can we talk to or interact with the brain? It’s essentially in it’s own world.
For the Boltzmann!Napoleon, the distinction isn’t remotely meaningful. It’s in it’s own world, and it can’t talk to us, interact with us, or know we are here.
Even if the internal processes of the brain are nothing more than randomised chance, it maps to ‘real’, causal processes in brains in ‘valid’ ontological contexts.
The question is—do those contexts/brains exists, and is there any real distinction between the minds produced by Boltmann!Napoleon, Virtual!Napoleon, etc.? I would say yes, and no. Those contexts exist, and we are really discussing one mind that corresponds to all those processes .
As to why I would say that, it’s essentially Greg Egan’s Dust hypothesis/Max Tegmark’s Mathematical Universe thing.
I think an analogy to math might be useful here. In one sense, you could say that mathematicians are reasoning about things that are totally divorced from the world—there’s no such thing as a perfect circle or an infinitely thin line in real life. Yet once you have assumed those things as axioms, you can still do completely sane and lawful reasoning on what would follow from those axioms. Similarly, the Boltzmann brain accepts the sensory data it gets as axiomatic (as do most of us), and then proceeds to carry out lawful reasoning based on that.
I can’t say I like the analogy. The point of modeling an infinitely thin line is to generalize over lines of any actual thickness. The point of modeling a perfect circle is to generalize over all the slightly ellipsoid “circles” that we want to be perfectly round. We pick out mathematical constructions and axioms based on their usefulness in some piece of reasoning we want to carry out, check them for consistency, and then proceed to use them to talk about (mostly) the real world or (for fun) fake “worlds” (which occasionally turn out to be real anyway, as with non-Euclidean geometry and general relativity).
(comment written after only reading the introduction and the “Napoleonic exemplar” section)
I’m not so sure about this. You say that it’s “literally insane” and that its thought processes happen to exactly mimic Napoleon’s “by sheer coincidence”. But I don’t see a way for its thought processes to exactly mimic Napoleon’s unless it started in the same state as Napoleon’s brain and then proceeded to carry out the same calculations, while (by sheer coincidence) happening to receive the exact same sensory data throughout the 24-hour period as Napoleon did.
Yes, the Boltmann brain’s reasoning doesn’t actually model anything in its immediate (objective) surroundings, but it does process the data it’s given correctly, and make the correct predictions from it—at least to the same extent that we presume Napoleon to have been processing his sense data correctly and making correct predictions from it.
It’s true that it will soon be destroyed by processes it has completely failed to model. But anybody might be destroyed by processes they have completely failed to model—that just means they haven’t been subjected to the right information sources.
I think an analogy to math might be useful here. In one sense, you could say that mathematicians are reasoning about things that are totally divorced from the world—there’s no such thing as a perfect circle or an infinitely thin line in real life. Yet once you have assumed those things as axioms, you can still do completely sane and lawful reasoning on what would follow from those axioms. Similarly, the Boltzmann brain accepts the sensory data it gets as axiomatic (as do most of us), and then proceeds to carry out lawful reasoning based on that.
I’m not sure if you can argue that the Boltzmann brain is insane without also arguing that mathematicians are insane. Though, to be fair, I have noticed that the professors in the math department tend to be more colorful than the ones in other departments… :-)
Even if the Boltzmann brain is completely chaotic, internally it contains the same structures/processes as whatever we find meaningful about Napoleon’s brain. It is only by external context that we can claim that those things are now meaningful.
For us, that may be a valid distinction—how can we talk to or interact with the brain? It’s essentially in it’s own world.
For the Boltzmann!Napoleon, the distinction isn’t remotely meaningful. It’s in it’s own world, and it can’t talk to us, interact with us, or know we are here.
Even if the internal processes of the brain are nothing more than randomised chance, it maps to ‘real’, causal processes in brains in ‘valid’ ontological contexts.
The question is—do those contexts/brains exists, and is there any real distinction between the minds produced by Boltmann!Napoleon, Virtual!Napoleon, etc.? I would say yes, and no. Those contexts exist, and we are really discussing one mind that corresponds to all those processes .
As to why I would say that, it’s essentially Greg Egan’s Dust hypothesis/Max Tegmark’s Mathematical Universe thing.
I can’t say I like the analogy. The point of modeling an infinitely thin line is to generalize over lines of any actual thickness. The point of modeling a perfect circle is to generalize over all the slightly ellipsoid “circles” that we want to be perfectly round. We pick out mathematical constructions and axioms based on their usefulness in some piece of reasoning we want to carry out, check them for consistency, and then proceed to use them to talk about (mostly) the real world or (for fun) fake “worlds” (which occasionally turn out to be real anyway, as with non-Euclidean geometry and general relativity).