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Antiochus comments on Three questions about source code uncertainty - Less Wrong Discussion

9 Post author: cousin_it 24 July 2014 01:18PM

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Comment author: Antiochus 25 July 2014 01:25:52PM 0 points [-]

You could think of software as being any element that is programmable - ie, even a physical plugboard can be thought of as software even though it's not typically the format we store it on.

Comment author: TheAncientGeek 25 July 2014 03:43:42PM 1 point [-]

You could think of a plugboard as hardware, too, hence there is no longer a clean hardware/software distinction

Comment author: Antiochus 25 July 2014 06:08:34PM 0 points [-]

What I'm getting at is that it doesn't matter if the software is expressed in electron arrangement or plugs or neurons, if it's computable. I don't see any trouble here distinguishing between connectome and neuron.

Comment author: TheAncientGeek 26 July 2014 10:34:13AM *  -2 points [-]

What I am saying is that ifnyiu can't separate software from hardware, you are dealing with software in a reifiable sense.

Hardware is never computable, in the sense that simulated planes don't fly.