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quen_tin comments on Philosophy: A Diseased Discipline - Less Wrong
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What I mean is that the notion of algorithm is always relative to an observer. Something is an algorithm because someone decides to view it as an algorithm. She/He decides what its inputs are and what its outputs. She/He decides what is the relevant scale for defining what a signal is. All these decisions are arbitrary (say I decide that the text-processing algorithm that runs on my computer extends to my typing fingers and the "calculation" performed by the molecules of them - why not? My hand is part of my computer. Does my computer "feel it"? Only because I decided to view things like that?). Being, on the contrary, is independent on any observer and is not arbitrary. Therefore being an algorithm is meaningless.
The downvote corporatist system of this site is extremely annoying. I am proposing a valid and relevant argument. I expect counter-arguments from people who disagree, not downvotes. Why not keep downvotes for not-argumented/irrelevant comments?
I'm really curious: What work is the word "corporatist" doing in this sentence? In what sense is the downvote system "corporatist"?
Your above comment could be phrased better (it makes a valid point in a way that can be easily misinterpreted as proposing some mushy-headed subjective relativism), but I agree that people downvoting it are very likely overconfident in their own understanding of the problem.
My impression is that the concept of "algorithm" (and "computation" etc.) is dangerously close to being a semantic stop sign on LW. It is definitely often used to underscore a bottom line without concern for its present problematic status.
The guideline is to upvote things you want to see more of, and downvote things you want to see less of. That leaves room for interpretation about where the two quality thresholds should be, but in practice they're both pretty high and I think that's a good thing. There are a lot of things that could be wrong with a comment besides being irrelevant or not being argued. In this case, I think the problem is arguing one side of a confusing question rather than trying to clarify or dissolve it.
Votes are not always for good reasons, whatever the guidelines. Getting good behavior out of people works best if people are accountable for what they do, and tends to fail when they are not. People who comment are accountable in at least two ways that people who vote are not:
1) They have to explain themselves. That, after all, is what a comment is.
2) They have to identify themselves. You can't comment without an account.
Voters have to do neither. Now, even though commenters are doubly accountable, I think most will agree that a certain nonzero proportion of the comments are not very good. Take away accountability, and the we should expect the proportion of the bad to increase.
So I agree that whether or not an observer views something as an algorithm is in fact, contingent. But the claim is that the people and the universe are in fact algorithms. To put it in pragmatic language: representing the universe as an algorithm and it's components as subroutines is a useful and clarifying way of conceptualizing that universe relative to competing views and has no countervailing disadvantages relative to other ways of conceptualizing the universe.
I prefer this formulation, because you emphasize on the representational aspect. Now a representation (a conceptualization) requires someone that conceptualize/represents things. I think that this "useful and clarifying way" just forget that a representation is always relative to a subject. The last part of the sentence only expresses your proud ignorance (sorry)...
What proud ignorance? I haven't proudly asserted anything (I'm not among your downvoters). My point is, if you dispute this metaphysics you need to explain what the disadvantages of it are and you haven't done that which is what is frustrating people.
I am not saying that it is meant in this way, but the following could be construed as a proud assertion:
I agree that representing the universe as an algorithm is a useful view. I am not sure what you mean by "it's components as subroutines", though. What are the components of the universe?
Re: the first part, that's just what it means to assert that "the universe is an algorithm".
The components are you, me, the galaxy, socks, etc.
I thought you were only talking about representing the universe as algorithms, which seems like a good idea. You could also claim that "the universe is an algorithm", but I find that statement to be too vague, what does 'is' mean in this sentence?
Quinean ontological pragmatism just paraphrases existential claims as "x figures in our best explanation of the universe". So 'is' in the sentence "the universe is an algorithm" means roughly the same thing as 'are' in the sentence "there are atoms in the universe".
I see what you're saying and on reflection it might be a dangerously misleading thing to say. The best candidate algorithm would not have such subroutines, however more complex but functional identical algorithms would.
"Algorithm" is a type; things can be algorithms in the same sense that 5 is an integer and {"hello","world"} is a list<string>. This does not depend on the observer, or even the existence of an observer.
I'm not sure you understand where quen tin is coming from. He would regard integers, list<strings> and "algorithms" in your sense as abstract entities, and maintain (as a point so fundamental that it's never spelled out) that abstract entities are not physically real. At most they provide patterns that we can usefully superimpose on various 'systems' in the world.
The point isn't whether or not abstract entities are observer-dependent, the point is that the business of superimposing abstract entities on real things is observer-dependent (on quen tin's view). And observers themselves are "real things" not abstracta.
(Not that I agree with this personally, but it's important to at least understand how others view things.)
There is a sense in which the view of the universe that just consists of me (an algorithm) receiving input from the universe (another algorithm) feels like it's missing something, it's the intuition the Chinese room argument pumps. I've never really found a good way to unpump it. But attempts to articulate that other component keep falling apart so...
I think it does.
{"hello", "world"} is a set of lighted pixels on my screen, or a list of characters in a text file containing source code, or a list of bytes in my computer's memory, but in any case, there must be an observer so that they can be interpreted as a list of string. The real list of string only exists inside my representation.
Pretty sure I can write code that makes these same interpretations.
Your code is a list of characters in a text file, or a list of bytes in your computer's memory. Only you interpret it as a code that interprets something.
What does it mean to 'interpret' something?
Edit: or rather, what does it mean for me to interpret something, 'cause I know exactly what it means for code to do it.