Tryk
Born on December 16, 2021•365 Karma
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/19/elon-musk-tesla-will-have-al...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_predictions_for_autono...
This is a circular definition. In order to properly define the concept, we must be able to word it without using "computing devices" in the definition.
Finding a satisfactory definition for what constitutes a "Computation" is actually an interesting debate goes back to the 1600s. Currently, the mainstream definition (from wikipedia) gives that: "A computation is any type of arithmetic or non-arithmetic calculation that is well-defined".
One way to understand the author is to learn more about the "The mapping account" theory behind computation: "a physical system can be said to perform a specific computation when there is a mapping between the state of that system and the computation such that the 'microphysical states [of the system] mirror the state transitions between the computational states.'"
For example, you can say that Firefox is a human-centric abstraction, and that my computer isn't running Firefox right now in an objective sense, that this is is just a human-centric interpretation of what the physical device is doing, and that there exist other computations that we could assign to it.
But what you can't say is that the device is not affecting the physical world in ways that are consistent with performing the Firefox computation, such as causing certain specific wavelengths of light to be emitted by the screen based on state that is stored in a server in the YCombinator data center. This is a measurable fact of the physical world that is independent of the model of computation you chose to ascribe to the physical device - any consistent mapping will have to preserve this same physical property.
> A single physical vehicle (bottom) possesses a fixed causal trajectory. However, it does not instantiate a unique computation. Depending on the alphabetization key applied (fA or fB ), the same physical states can be mapped to entirely different abstract computations (Top Left vs. Top Right). Therefore, computation cannot be intrinsic to the physics (p).
So yes there is a physical process generating your Firefox browser, but there is also a mapping function taking that program and interpreting that it should display your Firefox browser. There are any number of mapping functions that could be applied to the physical state in order to display other things on your screen besides the browser. Therefore, the Firefox browser being displayed is not inherent or intrinsic to the physical state of your computer. If we did not have the right mapping function, we would have no way of knowing or inferring or discovering which mapping function is correct.
This is in fact very similar to the notion of text - text is a physical medium, that provably contains a message that one human intended to convey to other humans. The same physical text can be interpreted in an infinite number of ways, and they are all equally valid in that they are self-consistent, but only one is the intention of the original author.
> Consider an analog clock. Physically, the device is a collection of gears and springs governed by continuous dynamics (P). It only “computes” time because a mapmaker intervenes, mapping a specific set of continuous angles to a semantic concept (e.g., “3:00 PM”). Without this semantic imposition, the clock is just metal moving in accordance with Hamilton’s equations; it contains no intrinsic “time.” Thus, the physical substrate does not “process information” absent a prerequisite alphabet of intrinsic symbols; rather, it generates continuous dynamics that an external mapmaker interprets as information.
In this example the time "3:00 PM" is instantiated in the mind of the person reading the clock, it is not a real physical property of the clock itself.
With that out of the way, in my opinion the response from the position of the paper would be something along these lines. The problem with your claim that a clock intrinsically contains a time keeping algorithm/computation is that by this definition, almost anything you can imagine is a clock. For example, given the right mapping function, a rock can perform all computations necessary to be a clock. It may sound extreme but this is an internally consistent position, if you want you can look up the Putnam triviality argument for more info. Under this argument, not only can a rock perform all the computations necessary to be a clock, it can in fact implement every possible computation imaginable (given the right mapping function). This next bit isn't essential to the argument but just because I find it fascinating, we can take this point a step further. If you imagine an organism/mind capable of using a rock as a clock, it isn't impossible but it would require such a radically different way of perceiving reality that they may in fact not recognize our versions of clocks as clocks at all.
Backing out, the examples above clarify just how essential the mapping function is to imputing meaning to a physical process, and makes it harder to see how the physical processes taking place in our computers have any intrinsic meaning whatsoever. To put my cards on the table, the whole reason I ended up on this thread in the first place is because I have become somewhat obsessed with this paper in the past week or so. I did not expect to agree with it or even to find it particularly convincing. Not that I had given it tons of thought but if you asked me, my operating assumption has always been that the human brain is some form of a computer and, more to the point, that consciousness experienced by human brains is a result of some form of computation. Taken on its own terms, I believe this paper really does challenge that view fundamentally, and in a manner that cannot be easily dismissed.
In a vacuum (Without an observer/mapmaker) there would be no way to derive the semantic content of an analog clock purely from its real physical properties. Additionally, the physical state of an analog clock that we read (map) to say 3PM could be representative of any time whatsoever, because it is purely dependent on the mapping function. The same physical properties could mean "3pm" or "4pm" or "5:48:00 AM" etc etc.
To put it differently, think about (instantiate the concept of) the time 3:00PM right now. Okay, so that thought just existed. When it existed it was comprised of physical processes. Those physical processes bear no relation to the analog clock set to "3PM". Neither are less real, they are just completely distinct physical phenomena. There is no reason in particular to think that a machine capable of computing the time "3PM" bears resemblance to a machine capable of having the thought "It is 3pm" or "[thinking about] the time of 3pm". By the same token there is no particular reason to think that a mind capable of having the thought "It is 3pm" necessarily contains a computer in it, or that a computer is a necessary, constitutive component of that physical thought.
It may be the case that it will be impossible for us to understand a particular alien artifact if we came across it because it is too complex for us to understand, but that doesn't mean that we wouldn't be able to understand all alien artifacts that have ever existed (if they exist)
One could say that hieroglyphs are different because they were made by people, so they have a mapmaker but all that indicates is that meaning can persist across the lifespan of the creators and then if that's the case it's just a question of for how long, and through what casual chains can that meaning persist.
You might also suggest that the function of the Antikythera mechanism is just something that we arbitrarily project onto it but that's not likely. The gear ratios correspond to actual astronomical periods that we didn't just arbitrarily decide, instead we discovered them. That means that the meaning as an astrological clock was fixed into the mechanism by the creators and transmitted to us.
It's the same thing with DNA. It has no mapmaker and yet it contains meaning, meaning that we've made tremendous strides to understand. How is that possible for a thing that doesn't have a mapmaker to have meaning?
"[...] Identifying which side of the marketplace is more scarce and focusing on supplying that."
:D