The Simulation II discussion so far has been quite centered on
the issue that perception and experience involve the integration
of senses
i would like to put the topic of UNCOMPUTABLE back into this mix
with this quote from Chaitin about "irreducibility'
http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~chaitin/ai.html
There are two kinds of algorithmic irreducibility: time irreducibility
as in Wolfram [1], and information irreducibility as in Chaitin [2,3]
and Calude [4]. In the first case, a physical system for which there
are no computational shortcuts, for which the quickest way to see what
the system does is just to run it. In the second case, a string of
bits for which there is no theory more compact than being given the
string of bits directly as is. In other words, there is no program for
calculating the string of bits that is substantially smaller than the
string of bits itself.
In other words there are some processes in the universe where there is no
shorter description than the process itself= ie even theoretically the process
is uncomputable ( tough luck for computer scientists)
We need some cognitive scientists in this discussion, but i would think
that 'subjective experience' is uncomputable ie you could never develop
a computer simulation that correctly simulates the subjective experience
of someone else.
related to this is Varela's concept of "enaction"
http://liris.cnrs.fr/enaction/index-en.html
The term « enaction » was proposed by Francisco Varela in order to
designate a new paradigm in cognitive science, based not on the
metaphor of the computer as in classical cognitivism, but instead on
the metaphor of living organisms.
I would like to make the assertion that relying on digital simulations
is creating
a situation where we focus primarily on processes that are theoretically
simulatable or computable=
whereas there are many other processes that are just not
simulatable and there is a danger that we are developing huge blind spots
(similarly there are parts of the universe that are theoretically unobservable
eg the interior of a black hole, or the universe further away than
light could travel since the birth of the universe)
the work of artists , with its emphasis on triggering subjective
experience.and exploitation of phenomena that may be unsimulatable may
open up interesting
areas of research that computer scientists are not focused on
are there any examples ?
roger malina
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