The limit of [the effect your original prior has on your ultimate posterior] as [the number of updates you’ve done] approaches infinity is zero. In the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t matter what prior your start with. As a convenience, if we have literally no information or evidence, we usually use the uniform prior (equally likely as not, in this case), and then our first update is probably to run it through occam’s razor.
The rest of your objections, if I understand QM and its implications right, fall upon the previously unintuitive and possibly incoherent things that become intuitively true as you understand QM. As I said elsewhere:
I truly do think we can’t move further from this point, in this thread of this argument, without you reading and understanding the sequence :(
I could be mistaken, but it seems to me that the distinction you’re trying to make between what I’m saying and what I’d have to say for my answer to be [coherent] dissolves as you understand QM.
I could, of course, be misunderstanding you completely. But there also isn’t anything you’re linking that I’m unwilling to read :P
The big disconnect here is you are willing to say you’ll take my word for it about QM, but then I say “QM allows us to ‘reason about the things on the higher parts of the ladder’ without ‘knowing how consciousness emerges from the physical.’”
I could be wrong, but if I’m wrong, you’d have to dive into QM to show me how. QM provides us a conceptual black swan, I claim, and reasoning about this without it is orders of magnitude less powerful than reasoning with it, in a way that is impossible to conceive of except in hindsight.
The big disconnect here is you are willing to say you’ll take my word for it about QM, but then I say “QM allows us to ‘reason about the things on the higher parts of the ladder’ without ‘knowing how consciousness emerges from the physical.’”
I could be wrong, but if I’m wrong, you’d have to dive into QM to show me how. QM provides us a conceptual black swan, I claim, and reasoning about this without it is orders of magnitude less powerful than reasoning with it, in a way that is impossible to conceive of except in hindsight.
Well, in that case, I’m afraid we have indeed hit a dead end. But I will say this: if (as you seem to be saying) you are unable to treat quantum mechanics as a conceptual black box, and simply explain how its claims (those unrelated to consciousness) allow us to reason about consciousness without dissolving the Hard Problem, then… that is very, very suspicious. (The phrase “impossible to conceive except in hindsight” also raises red flags!) I hope you won’t take it personally if I view this business of “conceptual black swans” with the greatest skepticism.
I will, if I can find the time, try to give the QM sequence a close re-read, however.
I made an attempt to treat it as a black box in a different thread reply, but I still had to use the language of QM. I might be able to sum it up into short sentences as well, but I wanted to start with some amount of formality and explanation.
Indeed, I’ve now read those comments, and I do appreciate it. As I think we’ve agreed now, further progress requires me to have a good understanding of QM, so I don’t think I have much to add past what we’ve already gone over.
I hope, at least, that this back-and-forth has been useful?
I hope, at least, that this back-and-forth has been useful?
Absolutely. Talking to you was refreshing, and it helped me not only flesh out my ladder but also pin down my beliefs. Thank you for taking time to talk about this stuff.
so I don’t think I have much to add past what we’ve already gone over.
I did make an attempt to address your last reply. If you still feel that way after, let me know.
The limit of [the effect your original prior has on your ultimate posterior] as [the number of updates you’ve done] approaches infinity is zero. In the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t matter what prior your start with. As a convenience, if we have literally no information or evidence, we usually use the uniform prior (equally likely as not, in this case), and then our first update is probably to run it through occam’s razor.
This doesn’t address my objection. You are responding as if I were skeptical of assigning some particular prior, whereas in fact I was objecting to assigning any prior, or indeed any posterior—because one cannot assign a probability to a string of gibberish! Probability (in the Bayesian framework, anyway—not that any other interpretations would save us here) attaches to beliefs, but I am saying that I can’t have a belief in a statement that is incoherent. (What probability do you assign to the statement that “fish the inverted flawlessly on”? That’s nonsense, isn’t it—word salad? Can the uniform prior help you here?)
The limit of [the effect your original prior has on your ultimate posterior] as [the number of updates you’ve done] approaches infinity is zero. In the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t matter what prior your start with. As a convenience, if we have literally no information or evidence, we usually use the uniform prior (equally likely as not, in this case), and then our first update is probably to run it through occam’s razor.
The rest of your objections, if I understand QM and its implications right, fall upon the previously unintuitive and possibly incoherent things that become intuitively true as you understand QM. As I said elsewhere:
The big disconnect here is you are willing to say you’ll take my word for it about QM, but then I say “QM allows us to ‘reason about the things on the higher parts of the ladder’ without ‘knowing how consciousness emerges from the physical.’”
I could be wrong, but if I’m wrong, you’d have to dive into QM to show me how. QM provides us a conceptual black swan, I claim, and reasoning about this without it is orders of magnitude less powerful than reasoning with it, in a way that is impossible to conceive of except in hindsight.
Well, in that case, I’m afraid we have indeed hit a dead end. But I will say this: if (as you seem to be saying) you are unable to treat quantum mechanics as a conceptual black box, and simply explain how its claims (those unrelated to consciousness) allow us to reason about consciousness without dissolving the Hard Problem, then… that is very, very suspicious. (The phrase “impossible to conceive except in hindsight” also raises red flags!) I hope you won’t take it personally if I view this business of “conceptual black swans” with the greatest skepticism.
I will, if I can find the time, try to give the QM sequence a close re-read, however.
I made an attempt to treat it as a black box in a different thread reply, but I still had to use the language of QM. I might be able to sum it up into short sentences as well, but I wanted to start with some amount of formality and explanation.
Indeed, I’ve now read those comments, and I do appreciate it. As I think we’ve agreed now, further progress requires me to have a good understanding of QM, so I don’t think I have much to add past what we’ve already gone over.
I hope, at least, that this back-and-forth has been useful?
Absolutely. Talking to you was refreshing, and it helped me not only flesh out my ladder but also pin down my beliefs. Thank you for taking time to talk about this stuff.
I did make an attempt to address your last reply. If you still feel that way after, let me know.
This doesn’t address my objection. You are responding as if I were skeptical of assigning some particular prior, whereas in fact I was objecting to assigning any prior, or indeed any posterior—because one cannot assign a probability to a string of gibberish! Probability (in the Bayesian framework, anyway—not that any other interpretations would save us here) attaches to beliefs, but I am saying that I can’t have a belief in a statement that is incoherent. (What probability do you assign to the statement that “fish the inverted flawlessly on”? That’s nonsense, isn’t it—word salad? Can the uniform prior help you here?)
Fair enough. I don’t see them as gibberish, so treating them that way is hard. I admit I didn’t actually see what you meant.