Unless you’re making a use-mention distinction (and why would you?), I don’t see your point. An algorithm can be realized in a mechanism. Are you saying that he should say “you can be an implementation of an algorithm” instead?
What I mean is that the notion of algorithm is always relative to an observer. Something is an algorithm because someone decides to view it as an algorithm. She/He decides what its inputs are and what its outputs. She/He decides what is the relevant scale for defining what a signal is. All these decisions are arbitrary (say I decide that the text-processing algorithm that runs on my computer extends to my typing fingers and the “calculation” performed by the molecules of them—why not? My hand is part of my computer. Does my computer “feel it”? Only because I decided to view things like that?). Being, on the contrary, is independent on any observer and is not arbitrary. Therefore being an algorithm is meaningless.
“Algorithm” is a type; things can be algorithms in the same sense that 5 is an integer and {”hello”,”world”} is a list. This does not depend on the observer, or even the existence of an observer.
I’m not sure you understand where quen tin is coming from. He would regard integers, list and “algorithms” in your sense as abstract entities, and maintain (as a point so fundamental that it’s never spelled out) that abstract entities are not physically real. At most they provide patterns that we can usefully superimpose on various ‘systems’ in the world.
The point isn’t whether or not abstract entities are observer-dependent, the point is that the business of superimposing abstract entities on real things is observer-dependent (on quen tin’s view). And observers themselves are “real things” not abstracta.
(Not that I agree with this personally, but it’s important to at least understand how others view things.)
There is a sense in which the view of the universe that just consists of me (an algorithm) receiving input from the universe (another algorithm) feels like it’s missing something, it’s the intuition the Chinese room argument pumps. I’ve never really found a good way to unpump it. But attempts to articulate that other component keep falling apart so...
{”hello”, “world”} is a set of lighted pixels on my screen, or a list of characters in a text file containing source code, or a list of bytes in my computer’s memory, but in any case, there must be an observer so that they can be interpreted as a list of string. The real list of string only exists inside my representation.
Your code is a list of characters in a text file, or a list of bytes in your computer’s memory. Only you interpret it as a code that interprets something.
Intepreting is giving a meaning to something. Stating that the “code interprets something” is a misuse of language for saying that the code “processes something”. You don’t know if the code gives meaning to anything since you are not the code, only you give the meaning. “Interpretation” is a first-person concept.
“mathematical model involves counterfactual dependencies of qualia” → I suggest you read David Mermin’s “What quantum physics is tring to tell us”. It can be found on arxiv. Quantum physics is only about correlations between measurements—or at least it can be successfully interpreted that way, and that solves quite every “paradox” of it...
“if you dispute this metaphysics you need to explain what the disadvantage” → It would require more than a few comments. I just found your self-confidence a bit arrogant, as far as scientific realism is far from being a consensus among philosophers and has many flaws. Personnaly, the main disavantage I see is that its an “objectual” conception, a conception of things as objects, which does not account for any subject, and does not acknowledge that an object merely exist as representations for subjects. It does not address first-person phenomenology (time, …). It does not seem to consider our cognitive situation seriously by uncritically claiming that our representation is reality, that’s all, which I find a bit naive.
Intepreting is giving a meaning to something. Stating that the “code interprets something” is a misuse of language for saying that the code “processes something”. You don’t know if the code gives meaning to anything since you are not the code, only you give the meaning. “Interpretation” is a first-person concept.
Okay… well what does it mean to give meaning to something? My claim is that I am a (really complex) code of sorts and that I interpret things in basically the same way code does. Now it often feels like this description is missing something and that’s the problem of consciousness/qualia for which I, like everyone else, have no solution. But “interpretation is a first-person concept” doesn’t let us represent humans.
“if you dispute this metaphysics you need to explain what the disadvantage” → It would require more than a few comments.
You were disputing someone’s claim that ‘the universe is an algorithm’… why isn’t that reason enough to identify one possible disadvantage. Otherwise you’re just saying “Na -ahhhh!”
I just found your self-confidence a bit arrogant, as far as scientific realism is far from being a consensus among philosophers and has many flaws. Personnaly, the main disavantage I see is that its an “objectual” conception, a conception of things as objects, which does not account for any subject, and does not acknowledge that an object merely exist as representations for subjects. It does not address first-person phenomenology (time, …). It does not seem to consider our cognitive situation seriously by uncritically claiming that our representation is reality, that’s all, which I find a bit naive.
I’m really bewildered by this and imagine you must have read someone else and took their position to be mine. I’m a straight forward Quinean ontological relativist which is why I paraphrased the original claim in terms of ideal representation and dropped the ‘is’. I was just trying to explain the claim since it didn’t seem like you were understanding it- I didn’t even make the statement in question (though I do happen to think the algorithm approach is the best thing going, I’m not confident that thats the end of the story).
But I think we’re bumping up against competing conceptions of what philosophy should be. I think philosophy is a kind of meta-science which expands and clarifies the job of understanding the world. As such, it needs to find a way of describing the subject in the language of scientific representation. This is what the cognitive science end of philosophy is all about. But you want to insist on the subject as fundamental- as far as I’m concerned thats just refusing to let philosophy/science do it’s thing.
I also view philosophy as a meta-science. I think language is relational by nature (e.g. red refer to the strong correlation between our respective experiences of red) and is blind to singularity (I cannot explain by mean of language what it is like for me to see red, I can only give it a name, which you can understand only if my red is correlated to yours—my singular red cannot be expressed).
Since science is a product of language, its horizon is describing the relational framework of existing things, which are unspeakable. That’s exactly what science converge toward (Quantum physics is a relational description of measurables—with special relativity, space/time referentials are relative to an observer, etc.). Being a subject is unspeakable (my experience of existing is a succession of singularities) and is beyond the horizon of science, science can only define its contour—the relational framework.
I don’t think that we can describe the subject in the language of scientific representation, because I think that the scientific representation is always relative to a subject (therefore the subject is already in the representation, in a sense...). That is why I always insist on the subject. Not that I refuse to let philosophy do its thing, I just want to clarify what its thing exactly is, so that we are not deluded by a mythical scientific description of everything that would be totally independend of our existence (which would make of us an epiphenomenon).
1: Yes—we assume that words mean the same thing to others when we use them, and it’s actually quite tricky to know when you’ve succeeded in communicating meaning.
2: “with special relativity, space/time referentials are relative to an observer, etc.”—this is rather sad and makes me think you’re trolling. What does this have to do with language? Nothing.
3: Your belief that we can’t describe things in certain ways has you preaching, instead of trying to discover what your interlocutor actually means. “which would make of us an epiphenomenon”—so what? It sounds like you’re prepared to derail any conversation by insisting everyone remind themselves that these are PEOPLE saying and thinking these things. Or maybe, more reasonably, you think that everyone ought to have a position about why they aren’t constantly saying “I think …”, and you’ll only derail when they refuse to admit that they’re making an aesthetic choice.
I only insist that people do not conflate representation and reality. To me, stating that an object is is already a fallacy (though I accept this as a convenient way of speaking). An object appears or is conceived, but we do not know what is, and we should not talk about what we do not know. To me, uncritically assuming that their exist an objective world and trying to figure out what it is is already a fallacy. Why I think that? Because I think there is no absolute, only relations.
So I agree that whether or not an observer views something as an algorithm is in fact, contingent. But the claim is that the people and the universe are in fact algorithms. To put it in pragmatic language: representing the universe as an algorithm and it’s components as subroutines is a useful and clarifying way of conceptualizing that universe relative to competing views and has no countervailing disadvantages relative to other ways of conceptualizing the universe.
I prefer this formulation, because you emphasize on the representational aspect. Now a representation (a conceptualization) requires someone that conceptualize/represents things. I think that this “useful and clarifying way” just forget that a representation is always relative to a subject. The last part of the sentence only expresses your proud ignorance (sorry)...
The last part of the sentence only expresses your proud ignorance (sorry)...
What proud ignorance? I haven’t proudly asserted anything (I’m not among your downvoters). My point is, if you dispute this metaphysics you need to explain what the disadvantages of it are and you haven’t done that which is what is frustrating people.
I am not saying that it is meant in this way, but the following could be construed as a proud assertion:
is a useful and clarifying way of conceptualizing that universe relative to competing views and has no countervailing disadvantages relative to other ways of conceptualizing the universe.
I agree that representing the universe as an algorithm is a useful view. I am not sure what you mean by “it’s components as subroutines”, though. What are the components of the universe?
I thought you were only talking about representing the universe as algorithms, which seems like a good idea. You could also claim that “the universe is an algorithm”, but I find that statement to be too vague, what does ‘is’ mean in this sentence?
The components are you, me, the galaxy, socks, etc.
A subroutine in a program is a distinct part that can be executed repeatedly. Are you saying that the universe has a distinct part dedicated to dealing with socks? To me that sounds like the universe would somehow have to know what is and what is not a sock. (sorry for anthropomorphising the universe there.)
It is mainly the word “subroutine” that I have a problem with, not the universe-as-an-algorithm idea per se.
I thought you were only talking about representing the universe as algorithms, which seems like a good idea. You could also claim that “the universe is an algorithm”, but I find that statement to be too vague, what does ‘is’ mean in this sentence?
Quinean ontological pragmatism just paraphrases existential claims as “x figures in our best explanation of the universe”. So ‘is’ in the sentence “the universe is an algorithm” means roughly the same thing as ‘are’ in the sentence “there are atoms in the universe”.
Are you saying that the universe has a distinct part dedicated to dealing with socks? To me that sounds like the universe would somehow have to know what is and what is not a sock. (sorry for anthropomorphising the universe there.) It is mainly the word “subroutine” that I have a problem with, not the universe-as-an-algorithm idea per se.
I see what you’re saying and on reflection it might be a dangerously misleading thing to say. The best candidate algorithm would not have such subroutines, however more complex but functional identical algorithms would.
The downvote corporatist system of this site is extremely annoying. I am proposing a valid and relevant argument. I expect counter-arguments from people who disagree, not downvotes. Why not keep downvotes for not-argumented/irrelevant comments?
Your above comment could be phrased better (it makes a valid point in a way that can be easily misinterpreted as proposing some mushy-headed subjective relativism), but I agree that people downvoting it are very likely overconfident in their own understanding of the problem.
My impression is that the concept of “algorithm” (and “computation” etc.) is dangerously close to being a semantic stop sign on LW. It is definitely often used to underscore a bottom line without concern for its present problematic status.
The guideline is to upvote things you want to see more of, and downvote things you want to see less of. That leaves room for interpretation about where the two quality thresholds should be, but in practice they’re both pretty high and I think that’s a good thing. There are a lot of things that could be wrong with a comment besides being irrelevant or not being argued. In this case, I think the problem is arguing one side of a confusing question rather than trying to clarify or dissolve it.
Votes are not always for good reasons, whatever the guidelines. Getting good behavior out of people works best if people are accountable for what they do, and tends to fail when they are not. People who comment are accountable in at least two ways that people who vote are not:
1) They have to explain themselves. That, after all, is what a comment is.
2) They have to identify themselves. You can’t comment without an account.
Voters have to do neither. Now, even though commenters are doubly accountable, I think most will agree that a certain nonzero proportion of the comments are not very good. Take away accountability, and the we should expect the proportion of the bad to increase.
Unless you’re making a use-mention distinction (and why would you?), I don’t see your point. An algorithm can be realized in a mechanism. Are you saying that he should say “you can be an implementation of an algorithm” instead?
What I mean is that the notion of algorithm is always relative to an observer. Something is an algorithm because someone decides to view it as an algorithm. She/He decides what its inputs are and what its outputs. She/He decides what is the relevant scale for defining what a signal is. All these decisions are arbitrary (say I decide that the text-processing algorithm that runs on my computer extends to my typing fingers and the “calculation” performed by the molecules of them—why not? My hand is part of my computer. Does my computer “feel it”? Only because I decided to view things like that?). Being, on the contrary, is independent on any observer and is not arbitrary. Therefore being an algorithm is meaningless.
“Algorithm” is a type; things can be algorithms in the same sense that 5 is an integer and {”hello”,”world”} is a list. This does not depend on the observer, or even the existence of an observer.
I’m not sure you understand where quen tin is coming from. He would regard integers, list and “algorithms” in your sense as abstract entities, and maintain (as a point so fundamental that it’s never spelled out) that abstract entities are not physically real. At most they provide patterns that we can usefully superimpose on various ‘systems’ in the world.
The point isn’t whether or not abstract entities are observer-dependent, the point is that the business of superimposing abstract entities on real things is observer-dependent (on quen tin’s view). And observers themselves are “real things” not abstracta.
(Not that I agree with this personally, but it’s important to at least understand how others view things.)
There is a sense in which the view of the universe that just consists of me (an algorithm) receiving input from the universe (another algorithm) feels like it’s missing something, it’s the intuition the Chinese room argument pumps. I’ve never really found a good way to unpump it. But attempts to articulate that other component keep falling apart so...
I think it does.
{”hello”, “world”} is a set of lighted pixels on my screen, or a list of characters in a text file containing source code, or a list of bytes in my computer’s memory, but in any case, there must be an observer so that they can be interpreted as a list of string. The real list of string only exists inside my representation.
Pretty sure I can write code that makes these same interpretations.
Your code is a list of characters in a text file, or a list of bytes in your computer’s memory. Only you interpret it as a code that interprets something.
What does it mean to ‘interpret’ something?
Edit: or rather, what does it mean for me to interpret something, ’cause I know exactly what it means for code to do it.
I will reply several messages at once.
Intepreting is giving a meaning to something. Stating that the “code interprets something” is a misuse of language for saying that the code “processes something”. You don’t know if the code gives meaning to anything since you are not the code, only you give the meaning. “Interpretation” is a first-person concept.
“mathematical model involves counterfactual dependencies of qualia” → I suggest you read David Mermin’s “What quantum physics is tring to tell us”. It can be found on arxiv. Quantum physics is only about correlations between measurements—or at least it can be successfully interpreted that way, and that solves quite every “paradox” of it...
“if you dispute this metaphysics you need to explain what the disadvantage” → It would require more than a few comments. I just found your self-confidence a bit arrogant, as far as scientific realism is far from being a consensus among philosophers and has many flaws. Personnaly, the main disavantage I see is that its an “objectual” conception, a conception of things as objects, which does not account for any subject, and does not acknowledge that an object merely exist as representations for subjects. It does not address first-person phenomenology (time, …). It does not seem to consider our cognitive situation seriously by uncritically claiming that our representation is reality, that’s all, which I find a bit naive.
(EDIT—formatting)
Okay… well what does it mean to give meaning to something? My claim is that I am a (really complex) code of sorts and that I interpret things in basically the same way code does. Now it often feels like this description is missing something and that’s the problem of consciousness/qualia for which I, like everyone else, have no solution. But “interpretation is a first-person concept” doesn’t let us represent humans.
You were disputing someone’s claim that ‘the universe is an algorithm’… why isn’t that reason enough to identify one possible disadvantage. Otherwise you’re just saying “Na -ahhhh!”
I’m really bewildered by this and imagine you must have read someone else and took their position to be mine. I’m a straight forward Quinean ontological relativist which is why I paraphrased the original claim in terms of ideal representation and dropped the ‘is’. I was just trying to explain the claim since it didn’t seem like you were understanding it- I didn’t even make the statement in question (though I do happen to think the algorithm approach is the best thing going, I’m not confident that thats the end of the story).
But I think we’re bumping up against competing conceptions of what philosophy should be. I think philosophy is a kind of meta-science which expands and clarifies the job of understanding the world. As such, it needs to find a way of describing the subject in the language of scientific representation. This is what the cognitive science end of philosophy is all about. But you want to insist on the subject as fundamental- as far as I’m concerned thats just refusing to let philosophy/science do it’s thing.
I also view philosophy as a meta-science. I think language is relational by nature (e.g. red refer to the strong correlation between our respective experiences of red) and is blind to singularity (I cannot explain by mean of language what it is like for me to see red, I can only give it a name, which you can understand only if my red is correlated to yours—my singular red cannot be expressed).
Since science is a product of language, its horizon is describing the relational framework of existing things, which are unspeakable. That’s exactly what science converge toward (Quantum physics is a relational description of measurables—with special relativity, space/time referentials are relative to an observer, etc.). Being a subject is unspeakable (my experience of existing is a succession of singularities) and is beyond the horizon of science, science can only define its contour—the relational framework.
I don’t think that we can describe the subject in the language of scientific representation, because I think that the scientific representation is always relative to a subject (therefore the subject is already in the representation, in a sense...). That is why I always insist on the subject. Not that I refuse to let philosophy do its thing, I just want to clarify what its thing exactly is, so that we are not deluded by a mythical scientific description of everything that would be totally independend of our existence (which would make of us an epiphenomenon).
I hope this clarify my position.
To your 3 paragraphs:
1: Yes—we assume that words mean the same thing to others when we use them, and it’s actually quite tricky to know when you’ve succeeded in communicating meaning.
2: “with special relativity, space/time referentials are relative to an observer, etc.”—this is rather sad and makes me think you’re trolling. What does this have to do with language? Nothing.
3: Your belief that we can’t describe things in certain ways has you preaching, instead of trying to discover what your interlocutor actually means. “which would make of us an epiphenomenon”—so what? It sounds like you’re prepared to derail any conversation by insisting everyone remind themselves that these are PEOPLE saying and thinking these things. Or maybe, more reasonably, you think that everyone ought to have a position about why they aren’t constantly saying “I think …”, and you’ll only derail when they refuse to admit that they’re making an aesthetic choice.
I only insist that people do not conflate representation and reality. To me, stating that an object is is already a fallacy (though I accept this as a convenient way of speaking). An object appears or is conceived, but we do not know what is, and we should not talk about what we do not know. To me, uncritically assuming that their exist an objective world and trying to figure out what it is is already a fallacy. Why I think that? Because I think there is no absolute, only relations.
Who cares?
So I agree that whether or not an observer views something as an algorithm is in fact, contingent. But the claim is that the people and the universe are in fact algorithms. To put it in pragmatic language: representing the universe as an algorithm and it’s components as subroutines is a useful and clarifying way of conceptualizing that universe relative to competing views and has no countervailing disadvantages relative to other ways of conceptualizing the universe.
I prefer this formulation, because you emphasize on the representational aspect. Now a representation (a conceptualization) requires someone that conceptualize/represents things. I think that this “useful and clarifying way” just forget that a representation is always relative to a subject. The last part of the sentence only expresses your proud ignorance (sorry)...
What proud ignorance? I haven’t proudly asserted anything (I’m not among your downvoters). My point is, if you dispute this metaphysics you need to explain what the disadvantages of it are and you haven’t done that which is what is frustrating people.
I am not saying that it is meant in this way, but the following could be construed as a proud assertion:
I agree that representing the universe as an algorithm is a useful view. I am not sure what you mean by “it’s components as subroutines”, though. What are the components of the universe?
Re: the first part, that’s just what it means to assert that “the universe is an algorithm”.
The components are you, me, the galaxy, socks, etc.
I thought you were only talking about representing the universe as algorithms, which seems like a good idea. You could also claim that “the universe is an algorithm”, but I find that statement to be too vague, what does ‘is’ mean in this sentence?
Quinean ontological pragmatism just paraphrases existential claims as “x figures in our best explanation of the universe”. So ‘is’ in the sentence “the universe is an algorithm” means roughly the same thing as ‘are’ in the sentence “there are atoms in the universe”.
I see what you’re saying and on reflection it might be a dangerously misleading thing to say. The best candidate algorithm would not have such subroutines, however more complex but functional identical algorithms would.
The downvote corporatist system of this site is extremely annoying. I am proposing a valid and relevant argument. I expect counter-arguments from people who disagree, not downvotes. Why not keep downvotes for not-argumented/irrelevant comments?
I’m really curious: What work is the word “corporatist” doing in this sentence? In what sense is the downvote system “corporatist”?
Your above comment could be phrased better (it makes a valid point in a way that can be easily misinterpreted as proposing some mushy-headed subjective relativism), but I agree that people downvoting it are very likely overconfident in their own understanding of the problem.
My impression is that the concept of “algorithm” (and “computation” etc.) is dangerously close to being a semantic stop sign on LW. It is definitely often used to underscore a bottom line without concern for its present problematic status.
The guideline is to upvote things you want to see more of, and downvote things you want to see less of. That leaves room for interpretation about where the two quality thresholds should be, but in practice they’re both pretty high and I think that’s a good thing. There are a lot of things that could be wrong with a comment besides being irrelevant or not being argued. In this case, I think the problem is arguing one side of a confusing question rather than trying to clarify or dissolve it.
Votes are not always for good reasons, whatever the guidelines. Getting good behavior out of people works best if people are accountable for what they do, and tends to fail when they are not. People who comment are accountable in at least two ways that people who vote are not:
1) They have to explain themselves. That, after all, is what a comment is.
2) They have to identify themselves. You can’t comment without an account.
Voters have to do neither. Now, even though commenters are doubly accountable, I think most will agree that a certain nonzero proportion of the comments are not very good. Take away accountability, and the we should expect the proportion of the bad to increase.
It’s a category error. I am not a concept, nor an instance of a concept.
So you’re not a person?
Inside your representation, I might be a person, and I do represent myself as a person sometimes.
″… and words will never hurt me” :)