Is it the Machinery of Mathematics or the Mathematics of Machinery?

[naturalist.atheist]

It's not so much a difference, but a flip in perspective. Not something I advocate per se, but something I see going on. I also find it an interesting almost liberating perspective. And it does point out that what tools you were taught to use changes what you see as building material. And computation is a kind of mathematics, but it is something more fundamental since nature may not do math but it does perform computation.

[Crumb]

Originally Posted by naturalist.atheist

Well the idea of language only existing in human brains is one of the things that has changed with the ubiquitous use of computational devices. Now you may say that something like the IBM Watson project doesn't count for some reason, but watch the Jeopardy match and tell me that it is not using "Human" language.

...

Well sure. I didn't mean to imply that there was something special about human brains in particular. It is completely within the realm of possibility that an artificial brain could be constructed that could process language, or some other naturally arising brains for that matter. But I don't think that changes my point much.

[naturalist.atheist]

Originally Posted by Crumb

Well sure. I didn't mean to imply that there was something special about human brains in particular. It is completely within the realm of possibility that an artificial brain could be constructed that could process language, or some other naturally arising brains for that matter. But I don't think that changes my point much.

So your point as written was not that "Language still only exists in human brains?"

[Crumb]

You can just remove the word human there. I'm not precluding other types of brains. But I don't think the idea that there can be other types of brains that could comprehend language, or math somehow makes language or math inherently meaningful. The point is that you have to have some thinking and meaning imparting machine. I think the only example of that we have at this point is the human brain.

[naturalist.atheist]

I see language as a form of information. But it is not the only form information can take. And information is ubiquitous. In a sense gravity is information.

[Crumb]

Language is a way of transmitting and recording information. I'm not sure if it is really information itself. I don't see how gravity is information. It just seems to be one of the ways that matter effects matter.

[naturalist.atheist]

Gravity is information about mass.

http://www.technologyreview.com/view...ay-physicists/

[davidm]

What if there were no minds in the universe? Would gravity still be information about mass?

Is the concept of information even coherent without minds?

[naturalist.atheist]

That is getting more to the point of the opening post. There has been a flip in perspective. It's information and computation that composes reality at its most basic level. Everything is now a nail.

[Crumb]

Originally Posted by naturalist.atheist

Gravity is information about mass.

Gravity Emerges from Quantum Information, Say Physicists | MIT Technology Review

I'm not too familiar with quantum information. They don't really seem to define it. This will take more research on my part.

[davidm]

Originally Posted by naturalist.atheist

That is getting more to the point of the opening post. There has been a flip in perspective. It's information and computation that composes reality at its most basic level. Everything is now a nail.

So a photon, for instance, isn't a carrier of information, but is generated by information? Is that the basic idea?

[davidm]

Mathematical universe hypothesis

ETA: IMO this thread really should be in the Philosophy forum, if only to help suppress, a little bit, the BobSpam.

[But]

Originally Posted by ceptimus

Computing devices aren't outside of nature. They're built of atoms just the same as hammers and nails and bee's brains.

Often computing devices are as abstract and imaginary as it gets. There are extreme cases like non-deterministic Turing machines. No one has ever built one or something equivalent to one and perhaps it's absolutely impossible. Nevertheless theoretical computer scientists are quite happy to use them in proofs.

[But]

Originally Posted by naturalist.atheist

And J von Neumann was the person that brought them all to the IAS at one time or another as part his goal to create a computer that is recognized as the first modern computer.

That honor should probably go to the Z3 built by Konrad Zuse and completed in 1941.

[naturalist.atheist]

Originally Posted by But

That honor should probably go to the Z3 built by Konrad Zuse and completed in 1941.

A computer built out of relays that would only run 4 minutes at a time could hardly be called modern. It was the paper on how to build the MANIAC that was circulated around the world and used by many governments and corporations. Within a year began an exponential explosion of Von Neumann machines.

[But]

Originally Posted by naturalist.atheist

A computer built out of relays that would only run 4 minutes at a time could hardly be called modern. It was the paper on how to build the MANIAC that was circulated around the world and used by many governments and corporations. Within a year began an exponential explosion of Von Neumann machines.

That's not the point. It was arguably the first stored-program, general purpose computer, later proven to be Turing complete. How "modern" it is is too fuzzy a question anyway.

[naturalist.atheist]

Originally Posted by But

That's not the point. It was arguably the first stored-program, general purpose computer, later proven to be Turing complete. How "modern" it is is too fuzzy a question anyway.

The point is that at best the Zuse machine is a footnote. Not really important to how we got to today.

[But]

Originally Posted by naturalist.atheist

The point is that at best the Zuse machine is a footnote. Not really important to how we got to today.

Yeah, bullshit.