Re: Rationalizing is something we *all* do

On 02 Nov 2012, at 23:02, Rami Rustom wrote:

> On Nov 1, 2012 1:10 PM, "Bruno Marchal" <[email protected]> wrote:
> >
> >
> > On 31 Oct 2012, at 16:07, Rami Rustom wrote:
> >
> > > On Oct 28, 2012 2:43 PM, "Bruno Marchal" <[email protected]>  
> wrote:
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > On 27 Oct 2012, at 18:38, Rami Rustom wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > On Sat, Oct 27, 2012 at 9:46 AM, Bruno Marchal <[email protected] 
> >
> > > > > wrote:
> > > > > >
> > > > > > On 26 Oct 2012, at 20:04, Rami Rustom wrote:
> > > > > >
> > > > > >> On Fri, Oct 26, 2012 at 10:59 AM, Bruno Marchal <[email protected]
> > > >
> > > > > >> wrote:
> > > > > >>>
> > > > > >>> On 25 Oct 2012, at 20:32, Rami Rustom wrote:
> >
> > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > >
> > > > > >>
> > > > > >>
> > > > > >>> That error is not only done often, if not systematically  
> at the
> > > > > >>> political level, in the domain of Health, it is done in  
> other parts
> > > > > >>> of
> > > > > >>> politics, and frequently in racist discourses,  
> defamation, and fake
> > > > > >>> sciences.
> > > > > >>>
> > > > > >>> That error has even a Darwinian explanation, as simple  
> neural
> > > > > >>> associative nets do that error, and yet can solve  
> problem and needs
> > > > > >>> very few K. Some 'mistaken theory' are efficacious in  
> the short term
> > > > > >>> (like robbing a bank, to solve the money problem).
> > > > > >>>
> > > > > >>> Stupidity is not in the mistake, it is in the doing of  
> the same
> > > > > >>> mistake again and again and again and again (usually for  
> problem of
> > > > > >>> image of oneself by some people indeed, or just for  
> perpetuating a
> > > > > >>> fear selling technic to steal your money, something sad,  
> bad, but
> > > > > >>> 'natural' like robbing a bank).
> > > > > >>
> > > > > >> Sometimes people make the same mistakes repeated because  
> of anti-
> > > > > >> rational memes.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Yes. The problem is that something anti-rational for the  
> long term can
> > > > > > be completely rational in the short term. Typically  
> "stealing money".
> > > > > > It works well in the short term, but only because it is  
> bad and it is
> > > > > > done by a minority. If stealing money was encouraged and  
> taught in
> > > > > > high school, the society would quickly degenerate in many  
> mafia type
> > > > > > of wars. You need enough honest people doing "real money"  
> to be stolen
> > > > > > by others, which acts rationally for their limited  
> personal purpose.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > There are often conflicts between the short term, the  
> middle term and
> > > > > > the long term, which are conflicts between different type  
> of rational
> > > > > > reason. The frontier between rational and non rational is  
> like the
> > > > > > Mandelbrot set: very complex and intricate. That is why,  
> in actual
> > > > > > context, usually with only very partial information, we  
> have to trust
> > > > > > our guts. I think.
> > > > >
> > > > > That implies that our gut feelings are not discoverable. But  
> that is
> > > > > wrong.
> > > > >
> > > > > A gut feeling is the feeling one gets when there is a  
> conflict of
> > > > > ideas in his mind, where one of those ideas is conscious and  
> explicit,
> > > > > and the other idea is subconscious and inexplicit. But there  
> is
> > > > > nothing permanent about the status of that subconscious and  
> inexplicit
> > > > > idea. One can put forth effort to discover it, thus making it
> > > > > conscious and explicit. This allows one to criticize it.
> > > > >
> > > > Hmm... What makes you sure we can know all the roots of our guts
> > > > feeling?
> > >
> > > A subconscious idea *is* instantiated in the brain. It physically
> > > exists there.
> > >
> > Hmm.... OK. Can be quite implicit though, and not recognizable as  
> such.
>
> What does that mean?
>

That there are no algorithm to decide what a piece of code or matter  
can compute or do.



>
> >
> >
> >
> > > Why would it be off limits from being discovered?
> > >
> > There is no algorithm to decode what a program can do, from its code
> > (Rice theorem). The set of programs doing a particular task is not
> > recursive. With neural nets, it is worst, as the information can be
> > distributed in tiny difference of excitation level of billions of
> > neurons.
>
> When speaking of software, one does not need to speak of hardware. The
> hardware doesn't affect the software, unless the hardware gets
> damaged. Agreed?
>
Yes. But Rice theorem concerns both software, and possible hardware.



>
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > >
> > > > This can be contradicted in the mechanist theory + classical
> > > > theory of knowledge: it shows that the ideally arithmetically  
> correct
> > > > machine can never know "who she is", and in that theory the guts
> > > > feeling originates from the "who" we are.
> > >
> > > I don't know what the "who somebody is" means nor how that is  
> relevant
> > > to this discussion.
> > >
> > If we are machine, we cannot know which machine we are. We can only
> > bet on some level of description, in case we accept a digital brain
> > prosthesis, for example. Even if the guess is correct, we still  
> cannot
> > recognize the genuine program which constitutes our identity. The
> > relevance of this is that for the gut feelings, we might be unable  
> to
> > decide if some idea is a prejudice of the parents, or of the  
> mammals,
> > or of all universal machines. In the mater case, we can't change it
> > without loosing consistency or soundness.
>
> I still don't know what that means nor why its relevant to our
> discussion. Consistency of what? Soundness of what?
>
Of us, assuming we are machine. All machine looking inward discover  
that they have an irrational part, in the sense that their knowledge  
grows bigger than what they can prove. That is also why the will  
change, in a way that they cannot predict.




>
> >
> >
> >
> > >
> > > > Without going that far in
> > > > the theory, I doubt we can be conscious of all the subconscious
> > > > processing. A machine can refer to itself integrally, but not  
> to its
> > > > integral behavior.
> > >
> > > I don't understand your idea that some subconscious ideas are off
> > > limits.
> > >
> > Intuitively it seems obvious, if only because our brain have  
> plausibly
> > a very long complex history, and nature does not make explicit
> > programs with readable comment.
>
> You are using the theory of the mind that says that certain brain
> parts cause certain mind parts. But that theory has been refuted by
> DD. That refutes evolutionary biology (which is the field you're
> referring to).
>
Where did I talk on brain parts? The conscious mind is not even  
related to the brain, which in fine is a construct of the mind. Now if  
you use mind in a large sense, then yes, the part of the brain or of  
the computer which clean up this of that memory can be attributed to  
some part of the computer. If not, your point above that if the  
hardware is damaged it has consequence on the mind, would not follow.



>
> What you're saying is that some of our software is hardcoded. And that
> hardcoding evolved over millions of years. But, humans don't have any
> hardcoding. Its all softcoded. All of it changes.
>
This does not make sense for me (despite comp implies non materialism,  
but only globally). At some level the brain changes itself, but  
through the material behavior of neurons. Then some part of the brain  
are more hardcoded than others, like the cerebral stem, the limbic  
system. But even the cortical system has an hard coded part, and the  
change of itself will be hard changes.




>
> > Then, although machine can represent
> > itself entirely, it can't represent its behavior entirely, almost  
> for
> > reason akin to the reason that nobody can see directlmy his/her own
> > back. there are blind spot in self-reference, for logical reasons.
>
> Do you agree that we can guess about them?
>
About some of them, yes. I doubt we can guess all of them.



>
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > >
> > > Consider this. Decades from now we create the first AGI. It  
> programs
> > > its own code. No?
> > >
> > This is ambiguous. Programs can easily modify, even completely their
> > own code, but it cannot create one from nihilo.
>
> Whats nihilo?
>
Nothing. You need the program to start with, and some contexts.




>
> > There is always
> > another universal program or reality needed, even if it is the
> > arithmetical reality, or physical reality, which are highly
> > undecidable set (probably in the first case, plausibly in the second
> > case).
> > It is like our wanting. We have few control about what we want,
>
> False. Our wants depend on our values. We have control over our
> values. Our values are ideas. We guess ideas and criticism them.
> Sometimes we're doing this with our value-type ideas. And when we make
> changes to our values, we've changed our wants.
>
I have to pee now. Oh, I will change that, so I can continue the talk.
I want to be happy? Oh, I will change that, life will be so much  
simpler.
I am afraid to die. Oh I will change that, so that I can kill myself  
in peace.
...
I am not sure that our values are only ideas. That seems a bit too  
much constructivist for my appreciation of the comp hypothesis.



>
> > nor do
> > we have control on the way events can hurt us.
>
> Physical hurt or mental hurt? We have a lot of control over mental
> hurt.
>
Hurt is always mental. "physical hurt" is a manner of speaking, of  
mental hurt related to low level sensation coming from the periperical  
(hardcoded too) nervous system (including glial cells).



> Mental hurt is TCS-coercion. TCS-coercion occurs when someone is
> acting on a theory while another conflicting theory is active in his
> mind. An example of TCS-coercion is someone gets offended when someone
> else says a racial slur to him. So the one who gets hurt doesn't want
> to be called by that racial slur but it happened. Do you think he has
> no control over getting hurt by this?
>
Here he has control. But that's a special case. And then he has  
control but he need some education, so even if that is in principle  
controllable, most of the time in "real-life" he will not.



>
> > In fact we control very
> > few things, but yet, we do have a non negligible partial control,  
> but
> > it is only a window, so to speak.
>
> It is a window. But, that window can be made bigger without limit. Or,
> is the limit 100%? Can someone be absolutely conscious of *all* his
> ideas such that none of them are subconscious/inexplicit?
>
No, it cannot. In fact consciousness needs some unconsciousness. You  
can make a machine referring to 100% of its body (this is not trivial  
to prove), but you can't make a program referring to all its possible  
behavior.
This has been intuited by Hofstadter, and proved by Solovay, and others.



> Doesn't that
> imply perfection?
>
> No it doesn't. Because he could be wrong about any of them.
>
Not on all of them. There is a fixed point which cannot be doubted,  
like consciousness itself.

Bruno

> 

http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/





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