Dr_Manhattan comments on Thou Art Physics - Less Wrong

40 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 06 June 2008 06:37AM

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Comment author: cousin_it 20 June 2011 01:10:07PM *  7 points [-]

From a certain point of view that may even be true :-)

If you're okay with thinking of your mind as an algorithm, then note that any algorithm exists "outside of physics", having instantiations in many different physical worlds and outputting bits into all of them. As Wei Dai once said, "there are copies of me all over math". This idea is controversial, but not obviously false.

Also, Nesov has suggested that physics might arise anthropically from the makeup of our minds ("laws of physics are as complex as minds, but complex details have too little measure to matter"). This idea is even more controversial, but also not obviously false.

None of that has any bearing on libertarian free will, though.

Comment author: Dr_Manhattan 07 July 2011 12:22:59PM 2 points [-]

Also, Nesov has suggested that physics might arise anthropically from the makeup of our minds

Interesting; do you have a reference link?