Another object view - (was RE: copy yourself ?)
John W. Sarkela
sarkela at sbcglobal.net
Wed May 28 14:35:49 UTC 2003
Wrong. Check my post from a few days ago.
Our only understanding of and access to reality is a simulation. Period.
You have no way of accessing reality other than an internal simulation.
A simulation that organizes the patterns of changes in your sense
organs into a coherent whole.
Unless of course, you have attained that Zen-like state of
no-mind/no-distinction and have become one with all. But in that event,
consider this a message from yourself to yourself reminding you that
your sense of being in the world is a game being played in order see
oneself.
:-}> John Sarkela
On Tuesday, May 27, 2003, at 11:37 PM, Richard A. O'Keefe wrote:
> Joel Shellman <joel at ikestrel.com> wrote:
> > Computational objects do not have mass;
>
> Of course they can:
>
> Transcript show: myMassiveObject mass.
>
> No, that's not mass.
> Abraham Lincoln is said to have originated this joke:
>
> X. How many legs does a dog have,
> if you call a tail a leg?
> Y. Five.
> X. Wrong! _Calling_ a tail a leg doesn't _make_ it a leg.
>
> An object can respond to a #mass message, but it can do that as
> often as you please, and it still will NOT have physical mass.
>
> > do not occupy space;
>
> Larger than we could possibly imagine (or smaller):
>
> Transcript show: myHugeObject volume.
>
> Again, just because an object SAYS it has a volume doesn't mean it
> DOES have a volume. I'm not sure whether you are confusing
> *talking about* properties with actually possessing them
> (but no matter how often I _say_ "I have $1000000" it still isn't true)
> or whether you are confusing *simulating* properties with actually
> possessing them (but not matter how often I *pretend* to have a
> million dollars it still isn't true).
>
> > do not emit or absorb photons (so don't have colour);
>
> Any in the rainbow, or in any spectrum::
>
> Transcript show: myColourfulObject color.
> or
> myColourfulObject emitPhoton.
>
> The computer's screen can emit real photons.
> An object in the image can only talk about or simulate emitting
> photons.
>
> Was it Drew McDermott who wrote "Just because your AI program has
> a procedure called UNDERSTAND that doesn't mean it understands
> anything."
>
> > Even in Morphic, which gives a pretty good illusion of
> > reality, if you "drop" a morph, it doesn't fall.
>
> vvvvvvvv
> It can do better than fall, it can simulate all sorts of potential
> behaviors
> ^^^^^^^^
> that would be "real" in any of a huge number of potential universes,
> including the one we're most familiar with.
>
> "Simulate" is the key word here.
>
> Nobody ever said that objects couldn't *simulate* real things.
> Obviously they can. Obviously it is often very very useful to do so.
>
> But no matter how long you sit in the cockpit of a flight simulator,
> you're never going to leave the room. Simulated flight isn't real
> flight. Simulated mass isn't real mass. Simulated falling isn't
> real falling.
>
> It's all about simulation.
>
> The whole POINT of simulation is that it is NOT REALITY, only LIKE it.
>
> And my point is that vast amounts of computation are not about
> simulating the physical world, so that for lots and lots of objects
> there is no point in even trying to simulate physical objects.
>
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