If you had a Turing machine that perfectly simulated the physical laws of our universe, could an external person use that machine’s source code to derive the laws of arithmetic as they are within our universe, even if the laws of arithmetic for the external person’s universe were different?
Suppose we think about it the opposite way: what if we built a machine that simulated the physical laws of a universe where 2+3 = 6, where if you stick 2 whatsits by 3 whatsits you get 6 whatsits total. What would that universe be like? Could it even be built?
If you had a Turing machine that perfectly simulated the physical laws of our universe, could an external person use that machine’s source code to derive the laws of arithmetic as they are within our universe, even if the laws of arithmetic for the external person’s universe were different?
Suppose we think about it the opposite way: what if we built a machine that simulated the physical laws of a universe where 2+3 = 6, where if you stick 2 whatsits by 3 whatsits you get 6 whatsits total. What would that universe be like? Could it even be built?