Born to do Math 94 – Critique of IC (2)
Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen and Rick Rosner
Publication (Outlet/Website): Born To Do Math
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2018/11/01
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Rick Rosner: We are aware of three things we’ve been talking about. The math of consciousness, which we do not have a good enough math to do yet. Consciousness itself and the material world that supports consciousness on an everyday basis.
We are aware that we think. We are aware of the material world. We are not aware of any mathematical framing of the information in consciousness. Under IC, we experience the material world.
Under IC, the material world is the mathematical framing of information, probably within some vast consciousness. We don’t experience that vast consciousness. We certainly don’t expect some external framework that supports the information structure that is the universe.
We experience the material-seeming aspects of this informational map that we claim can exist. It is not the clearest thing. But IC claims the universe is made of information. That information is part of something part of a self-consistent information processing apparatus or consciousness (possibly).
In that, under IC, any sufficiently large and complicated information-processing system is generally the self-knowledge that it would experience itself in a way that is consciousness.
Jacobsen: I want to make a buffer point here too. Creationism is the dominant belief among most people. It’s wrong. The right theory is not the most accepted theory, which is unguided evolution.
Rosner: By creationism, you mean directed development of the universe and the beings in it. By creationism, you mean somebody is in charge. Some external and powerful being is running the show to some extent.
Jacobsen: I would confine creationism or directed evolution, and unguided evolution, within biology as an analogy to make with IC. IC comes from digital physics. Digital physics is a minority view within physics in a similar way string theory is a minority view within the physics community.
But it is one among several competing theories. IC would amount to a branch of digital physics. It would be considered a branch of an established physics, which simply needs further development because it is a newer take on a more established branch of physics.
Does that seem fair?
Rosner: Yes. Let’s take a detour. Creationism implies a creator. The absence of creationism implies unguided evolution. Evolution itself includes the idea that it is not guided. But the 20th century and the standard understanding of evolution is that it is this random thing.
Because if you do not have a creator, or intelligent design, or any of the things that religious people try to sneak into evolution, then what you’re left with, naively at least, is pure randomness. But! That’s not exactly the deal either.
Because evolution is nothing if not opportunistic. The systems of the world are opportunistic. In that, they take advantage of self-consistencies that work. That you don’t have people sproting tentacles randomly from their foreheads.
You do not have planets randomly exploding. The universe is not chaos. It is not directed. But the processes of the universe take advantage of things that work. It is an interplay randomness and the persistence of structures that are good at perpetuating their own existence. Right?
Jacobsen: Yes, it is based on the broader principle of persistence, of order.
Rosner: Order is a part of evolution. It is not imposed externally by some creator. But things that are good at existing continue to exist. It is an interplay between things that work.
Jacobsen: It leads to rhetorical questions too: How old are atoms? How old is DNA? How old are cells? How old are multicellular organisms? How old are individual species? There are structures that last shorter than their precursors but allow more complicated things to exist and do not last as long.
But they, if you get into a field like biology, have a tendency to live longer.
Rosner: Yes, both an IC universe and a Big Bang universe embody causality. A causal framework is an efficient way of encompassing information. But let’s get off of that before I talk myself into a really tough cul-de-sac with that.
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