ChristianKl comments on 2012 Survey Results - Less Wrong

80 Post author: Yvain 07 December 2012 09:04PM

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Comment author: ChristianKl 29 November 2012 08:44:45PM 1 point [-]

John lives in a simulation. He thinks about the properties of the simulator. The simulator can't be reduced to the kind of physical objects that John can observe in his reality. The simulator is made of different stuff.

If it just about reducing the entity into multiple parts than that's possible for the Chrisitan God who's made up of three parts.

Otherwise can you point me to a good definition of ontologically basic?

Comment author: fubarobfusco 29 November 2012 11:06:52PM *  3 points [-]

If [naturalism] is true, then all minds, and all the contents and powers and effects of minds, are entirely caused by natural [i.e. fundamentally nonmental] phenomena. But if naturalism is false, then some minds, or some of the contents or powers or effects of minds, are causally independent of nature. In other words, such things would then be partly or wholly caused by themselves, or exist or operate directly or fundamentally on their own.

— Richard Carrier

It's not a matter of whether they are "made of different stuff" but if they are made of stuff at all. A simulator is no more supernatural to us than we are to a boxed AI; we're both running inside the same material universe, just in different ways.

Comment author: ChristianKl 30 November 2012 12:06:56AM -1 points [-]

The boxed AI runs inside a universe that follow the laws of Turing computing.

Nature is the stuff around us. A simulation simulates nature. The one who runs the simulation isn't part of that nature. The simulator can exist without needing anything from the nature in with John lives.

If I'm reading Harry Potter, Harry Potter lives in a world where magic happens. I don't. Those two world are fundamentally different. The magic that happens in Harry Potter's world is causally independent from myself.

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