There’s a problem with choosing the language for Solomonoff/MML, so the index’s goodness can be debated. However, I think in general index is sound.
When I hear about Solomonoff Induction, I reach for my gun :)
The point is that you can’t use Solomonoff Induction or MML to discriminate between interpretations of quantum mechanics: these are formal frameworks for inductive inference, but they are underspecified and, in the case of Solomonoff Induction, uncomputable.
Yudkowsky and other people here seem to use the terms informally, which is an usage I object to: it’s just a fancy way of saying Occam’s razor, and it’s an attempt to make their arguments more compelling that they actually are by dressing them in pseudomathematics.
The reason human understanding can’t be part of the equations is, as EY says, shorter “programs” are more likely to govern the universe than longer “programs,” essentially because these “programs” are more likely to be written if you throw down some random bits to make a program that governs the universe.
That assumes that Solomonoff Induction is the ideal way of performing inductive reasoning, which is debateable.
But even assuming that, and ignoring the fact that Solomonoff Induction is underspecified, there is still a fundamental problem:
The hypotheses considered by Solomonoff Induction are probability distributions on computer programs that generate observations, how do you map them to interpretations of quantum mechanics?
What program corresponds to Everett’s interpretation? What programs correspond to Copenhagen, objective collapse, hidden variable, etc.?
Unless you can answer these questions, any reference to Solomonoff Induction in a discussion about interpretations of quantum mechanics is a red herring.
So the Copenhagen view essentially say “actually, even though the equations say there’s another world, there is none, and on top of that we are gonna tell you how this collapsing business works”. This extra sentence is what causes the Razor to favor MWI.
Actually Copenhagen doesn’t commit to collapse being objective. People here seem to conflate Copenhagen with objective collapse, which is a popular misconception.
Objective collapse intepretations generally predict deviations from standard quantum mechanics in some extreme cases, hence they are in principle testable.
When I hear about Solomonoff Induction, I reach for my gun :)
The point is that you can’t use Solomonoff Induction or MML to discriminate between interpretations of quantum mechanics: these are formal frameworks for inductive inference, but they are underspecified and, in the case of Solomonoff Induction, uncomputable.
Yudkowsky and other people here seem to use the terms informally, which is an usage I object to: it’s just a fancy way of saying Occam’s razor, and it’s an attempt to make their arguments more compelling that they actually are by dressing them in pseudomathematics.
That assumes that Solomonoff Induction is the ideal way of performing inductive reasoning, which is debateable. But even assuming that, and ignoring the fact that Solomonoff Induction is underspecified, there is still a fundamental problem:
The hypotheses considered by Solomonoff Induction are probability distributions on computer programs that generate observations, how do you map them to interpretations of quantum mechanics?
What program corresponds to Everett’s interpretation? What programs correspond to Copenhagen, objective collapse, hidden variable, etc.?
Unless you can answer these questions, any reference to Solomonoff Induction in a discussion about interpretations of quantum mechanics is a red herring.
Actually Copenhagen doesn’t commit to collapse being objective. People here seem to conflate Copenhagen with objective collapse, which is a popular misconception.
Objective collapse intepretations generally predict deviations from standard quantum mechanics in some extreme cases, hence they are in principle testable.