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Craig_Morgan2 comments on Timeless Physics - Less Wrong

25 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 27 May 2008 09:09AM

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Comment author: Craig_Morgan2 28 May 2008 11:47:44AM 2 points [-]

@Nick Tarleton, anyone questioning the value of this post Prior to this post, my understanding was that there wasn't one 'me' consciously observing the unraveling of our universe over time. Instead, there were many of 'me', each observing a different universe, and with every irreversible thermodynamic event, more universes and instances of 'me' were being created.

This post blew my mind.

@Julian "Whence comes the present moment?" Now I understand that "I" am not a consciousness traveling through time. Instead, my consciousness is represented in a sub-space of the immensely-dimensional configuration space. Time is an illusion. Everywhere that my consciousness is represented within the many-world many-moment configuration space; it will feel like it is traveling through 'time'. "I" feel like I am traveling through time because "I" am a structure that models both itself and the evolution of sensory data. At every point that "I" am represented in the configuration-state, "I" IS this model of itself and the 'previous' states of the world, thereby fooling "I" into modeling and experiencing 'time'.

@Everyone Manon de Gaillande asked "Where does this configuration come from?" Seeing no answer yet, I'm also intrigued by this. Does it even make sense to ask it? If it doesn't, please help Manon and I dissolve the question.