of course I cannot answer your question of uncomputable in context of
simulatable as a cognitive scientist but I will try my best by
extending my proposal from yesterday and addressing further the
relative algorithmic mode of knowing vs. the potential absolute mode
of knowing beyond the logic of algorithms (more specifically the
Bergsonian rhythm of duration).
As you summarized ... in other words there are some processes in the
universe where there is no shorter description than the process itself
... here I would claim the uncomputable is very much the Bergsonian
duration of the process!!! Computable simulation always depends on
point of view, on initial conditions etc. It is a relative knowledge,
specific for chosen setting. What you are after if you chase the
uncomputable is the absolute knowledge.
The example you suggest – simulation of a subjective experience – each
of us is a time and information irreducible simulation – each of us is
a process in duration that runs its course - it cannot be
algorithmically reduced – there is no shorter version of it especially
if we consider the Bergsonian argument on how time must not be
artificially articulated.
So how can a knowledge about such a subjective process, for instance,
be obtained? Yesterday I mentioned Bergson would argue to disengage
from one's particular rhythm of duration in order to access rhythms
others than our own.
Now by reading about enaction, as you posted it, seems to me to be a
continuation of Bergson's thought. I am curious to what level it has
been developed and applied?
The danger of blind spots, as you put it, that we are creating by
restricting ourselves to intellectually computable is indeed growing!
With every relative viewpoint taken in an intellectually resolvable
problem there creeps in an obscure shadow. This shadow is not
reducible to the intellectual constructs of space and time where this
scientific homogeneous time is a violation of duration, Bergson would
argue it is an arbitrarily articulated, even spatialized component
compleately disregarding the specific rhythm of the process – the very
heterogeneous, irreducible reality. Bergson proposes to extend our
comprehension beyond the narrow field of intellectualization, to
return to intuition.
Here I see the opportunity of artists informing science: the access to
intuition via art is the way of simulating uncomputable.
Ziva Ljubec
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 4
> Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2011 12:35:09 +0100
> From: roger malina <rmalina@alum.mit.edu>
> Subject: Re: [Yasmin_discussions] Around Simulation II - Simulated
> Senses and the Un-Simulatable
> To: YASMIN DISCUSSIONS <yasmin_discussions@estia.media.uoa.gr>
> Message-ID:
> <AANLkTi=aF=ghV9pma1WC=J5=mLvPVGTDZW12Adc=yMGF@mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
>
> Pier Luigi , Jennifer and yasminers
>
> 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
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 11
> Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2011 23:11:14 +0100
> From: Ziva Ljubec <ziva.ljubec@gmail.com>
> Subject: [Yasmin_discussions] Around Simulation II: Sense of Empathy ?
> Simulation of Otherness within my Body
> To: yasmin_discussions@estia.media.uoa.gr
> Message-ID:
> <AANLkTik55ri184X6q60eefQaiv3b0HCz=jYLwEBLqKEK@mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1252
>
> Dear all,
>
> in response to Jennifer?s, Joshua?s and Clarissa?s discussion
> revolving around simulating the sense of empathy, questioning whether
> intuition is simulatable or not (vol 99 msg 13), investigating
> mentalists, mind reading (vol 99, msg 12) and quoting Bergson on
> possibility of telepathy (vol 100, msg 6) I propose we delve further
> in Bergson?s theory of two types of experiences - two ways of knowing
> ''a thing'':
> 1. going all around it = ''intellect'' / stops at the relative
> (depends on the viewpoint taken and symbols employed)
> 2. entering into it = ''intuition'' / attains the absolute
> (no viewpoint but within, rests upon no symbols)
> The relative algorithmic approach we have no difficulty in simulating,
> calculating, abstracting, representing ... but how do we simulate the
> absolute knowledge? If it is not an ''algo?rhythm'' the answer still
> has to do something with rhythm! Bergson would argue to disengage from
> one?s particular rhythm of duration in order to access rhythms others
> than our own.*
> *Valentine Moulard-Leonard, Bergson-Deleuze encounters: transcendental
> experience and the thought of the virtual (SUNY Press, 2008).
>
> Ziva Ljubec
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