tnf, you have a mission

Post by **[xeno]Julios** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:14 am

Another way of critiquing ID, is by reflecting it's proponents' accusations of arrogance right back at them.

Many ID proponents consider it arrogant of non-ID's to suppose they are smart enough to know all the answers. But ID's are arrogant to suppose they are smart enough to make that inference a necessary condition.

It's like: we can't think of any other use for that flagellum's component, so obviously no other use can conceivably exist.

Or, more fundamentally, we can't think of any reason behind the fine tuning of the universe, therefore an intelligence must exist.

I admit, it's a very powerful form of evidence in favour of an intelligence, but it's not conclusive.

Understanding complexity will allow you to see that complexity can emerge (on biomolecular scales) without recourse to an intelligence, so long as you take the fundamental properties of the universe for granted. What understanding complexity will not allow you to do, is to explain these fundamental properties.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:25 am

You know... if we programmed an universe inside of a computer to the finest detail just like our universe so that a virtual universe exploded in a pc what would you tell them if they asked the same question about intelligent design?

Keep It Real · Post by **Keep It Real** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:26 am

Kracus wrote:You know... if we programmed an universe inside of a computer to the finest detail just like our universe so that a virtual universe exploded in a pc what would you tell them if they asked the same question about intelligent design?

what are you talking about, programming a universe to the finest detail just like our universe. how would that ever be executed you loser?

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:36 am

No that's an argument FOR intelligent design.

Not that I beleive in that shit.

Post by **[xeno]Julios** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:44 am

Kracus wrote:You know... if we programmed an universe inside of a computer to the finest detail just like our universe so that a virtual universe exploded in a pc what would you tell them if they asked the same question about intelligent design?

This is a good question.

There are a couple ways of addressing it:

*just because something can be intelligently mimicked doesn't entail that the original was intelligently designed. It is not inconceivable that some unintelligent system be mimicked by an intelligence.

*it may not be a valid thought experiment, in that it assumes that the nature of the universe is amenable to computational modeling. We may have to expand the metaphor of "computing" to a level at which we would have to be gods in order to program it.

Keep It Real · Post by **Keep It Real** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:46 am

thats what i said, [xeno]Julios

Keep It Real · Post by **Keep It Real** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:47 am

i just realized what the op meant by ID, intelligent design.

there is no intelligent design vs evolution "batttle" :lol:

Post by **[xeno]Julios** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:49 am

Keep It Real wrote:thats what i said, [xeno]Julios

no, you just blindly assumed it couldn't be executed, and called him a loser.

That's not addressing the question with any detail - it's taking a position of a radical skeptic without offering any critique about why it might not be possible to program it.

Keep It Real · Post by **Keep It Real** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:51 am

[xeno]Julios wrote:
Keep It Real wrote:thats what i said, [xeno]Julios
no, you just blindly assumed it couldn't be executed, and called him a loser.

That's not addressing the question with any detail - it's taking a position of a radical skeptic without offering any critique about why it might not be possible to program it.

come on man, a computer exactly like our universe. wouldn't that mean that our universe is a computer program too if that was possible.

kracus is an idiot

Post by **[xeno]Julios** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:53 am

Keep It Real wrote:come on man, a computer exactly like our universe. wouldn't that mean that our universe is a computer program too if that was possible.

That's exactly the beauty of his thought experiment.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:55 am

[xeno]Julios wrote:
Kracus wrote:You know... if we programmed an universe inside of a computer to the finest detail just like our universe so that a virtual universe exploded in a pc what would you tell them if they asked the same question about intelligent design?
This is a good question.

There are a couple ways of addressing it:

*just because something can be intelligently mimicked doesn't entail that the original was intelligently designed. It is not inconceivable that some unintelligent system be mimicked by an intelligence.

*it may not be a valid thought experiment, in that it assumes that the nature of the universe is amenable to computational modeling. We may have to expand the metaphor of "computing" to a level at which we would have to be gods in order to program it.

Yeah obviously the comlexity invovled with computing a universe is retarded but placing that aside I think it's perfectly logical. But you're right, even though a person could theoreticaly program a universe in an ultra powerful pc and make a virtual universe (they already do this in games on a much more primitive level) it doesn't mean that anything that evolved from this is the direct responsibility of the programmer that made the universe. AI in this case or basicly a self aware being is only a byproduct of the universe the programer made....

Hell... maybe intelligence is actualy the cause of all universes when a race in a universe manages to create a virtual universe which is multiplied via infinity since each subsequent universe has creatures like us creating technology capable of mimicing our own universe. It's the way we're headed anyway. Weird...

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:56 am

So maybe the edge of our universe is really bound by the programing language it's built on.

You can't leave the program!

Post by **[xeno]Julios** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:57 am

besides - the idea that the universe is a computer, calculating it's each and every successive state, is not an unreasonable idea, nor is it new.

One of the most prominent thinkers of our time (Stephen Wolfram), has written a book called

Is the Universe a Computer?

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/15762

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Wolfram

Post by **Massive Quasars** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:58 am

[xeno]Julios wrote: This is a good question.

There are a couple ways of addressing it:

*just because something can be intelligently mimicked doesn't entail that the original was intelligently designed. It is not inconceivable that some unintelligent system be mimicked by an intelligence.

*it may not be a valid thought experiment, in that it assumes that the nature of the universe is amenable to computational modeling. We may have to expand the metaphor of "computing" to a level at which we would have to be gods in order to program it.

If universes can be modelled, then it's quite possible we live in such a simulated universe. It's also possible that simulated universes could contain simulated universes which also contain simulated universes... ad infinitum (or something approaching that).

Keep It Real · Post by **Keep It Real** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 2:00 am

Kracus wrote:
[xeno]Julios wrote:
Kracus wrote:You know... if we programmed an universe inside of a computer to the finest detail just like our universe so that a virtual universe exploded in a pc what would you tell them if they asked the same question about intelligent design?
This is a good question.

There are a couple ways of addressing it:

*just because something can be intelligently mimicked doesn't entail that the original was intelligently designed. It is not inconceivable that some unintelligent system be mimicked by an intelligence.

*it may not be a valid thought experiment, in that it assumes that the nature of the universe is amenable to computational modeling. We may have to expand the metaphor of "computing" to a level at which we would have to be gods in order to program it.
Yeah obviously the comlexity invovled with computing a universe is retarded but placing that aside I think it's perfectly logical. But you're right, even though a person could theoreticaly program a universe in an ultra powerful pc and make a virtual universe (they already do this in games on a much more primitive level) it doesn't mean that anything that evolved from this is the direct responsibility of the programmer that made the universe. AI in this case or basicly a self aware being is only a byproduct of the universe the programer made....

Hell... maybe intelligence is actualy the cause of all universes when a race in a universe manages to create a virtual universe which is multiplied via infinity since each subsequent universe has creatures like us creating technology capable of mimicing our own universe. It's the way we're headed anyway. Weird...

they don't do this in games at any level. Are you saying Mario Kart creates tons of little Mario Kart universes while we sleep at night

:icon27:

Post by **[xeno]Julios** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 2:01 am

Kracus wrote:Yeah obviously the comlexity invovled with computing a universe is retarded but placing that aside I think it's perfectly logical.

Degree of complexity is not the issue. It's the core "mechanism" of the universe that we don't understand well enough to be able to say whether it can even in principle be "computed".

We don't even understand whether "mechanism" is a good enough term to describe "what goes on in the universe".

What we do seem to be able to tell is that it somehow evolves - we don't understand the process of this evolution. All we have are inferential laws that predict events under certain conditions.

We are at a loss for language, because language is metaphor based, and the process of the universe is the ultimate metaphor.

Your other points I agree on.

Post by **[xeno]Julios** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 2:03 am

Massive Quasars wrote:
If universes can be modelled, then it's quite possible we live in such a simulated universe. It's also possible that simulated universes could contain simulated universes which also contain simulated universes... ad infinitum (or something approaching that).

Kracus wrote: Hell... maybe intelligence is actualy the cause of all universes when a race in a universe manages to create a virtual universe which is multiplied via infinity since each subsequent universe has creatures like us creating technology capable of mimicing our own universe. It's the way we're headed anyway. Weird...

Post by **Massive Quasars** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 2:04 am

I try to avoid Kracus posts.

Post by **[xeno]Julios** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 2:05 am

Keep It Real wrote:
they don't do this in games at any level. Are you saying Mario Kart creates tons of little Mario Kart universes while we sleep at night

:icon27:

assuming you're being serious:

Where did anyone claim that all computers have this property of computing the existence of intelligence, which in turn creates its own intelligence through computation.

The point here is that it may be conceivable that a universe be computed, and that ours is one such example.

Perhaps you should take the effort in trying to actually understand what's being said here, instead of trolling/being an ass

Post by **[xeno]Julios** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 2:05 am

Massive Quasars wrote:I try to avoid Kracus posts.

me too, but I got ambushed here

Keep It Real · Post by **Keep It Real** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 2:05 am

i don't think any technology mimics reality, its our brains that create the reality we see in a video game

Post by **[xeno]Julios** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 2:07 am

Keep It Real wrote:i don't think any technology mimics reality, its our brains that create the reality we see in a video game

whatever is being mimicked/computed is part of reality. The idea behind this train of thought is that there is no "baseline reality".

Keep It Real · Post by **Keep It Real** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 2:08 am

all right

Post by **R00k** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 2:17 am

I've wondered before, why hasn't anybody made a simulated world in a PC -- like an FPS -- in which every natural law we've discovered is programmed? It seems like this would be a wonderful tool to test new scientific theories.

And I know that our theories and laws are tested on computers all the time already, but I'm talking about a programmed world, where every accepted scientific theory we have is applied.

It would also be useful for driving/testing computing benchmarks. Deep Blue playing chess would seem primitive in comparison, I would think.

Keep It Real · Post by **Keep It Real** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 2:22 am

R00k wrote:I've wondered before, why hasn't anybody made a simulated world in a PC -- like an FPS -- in which every natural law we've discovered is programmed? It seems like this would be a wonderful tool to test new scientific theories.

And I know that our theories and laws are tested on computers all the time already, but I'm talking about a programmed world, where every accepted scientific theory we have is applied.

It would also be useful for driving/testing computing benchmarks. Deep Blue playing chess would seem primitive in comparison, I would think.

we can't even predict tomorrows weather, a birds wings across the world affect that. This will never be possible!