Born to do Math 117 - Forms of Order: Universe as Computer, Feedbacks and Feedarounds
Scott Douglas Jacobsen & Rick Rosner
April 22, 2019
[Beginning of recorded material]
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: Okay, we were talking about forms of order.
Rick Rosner: We talk about various aspects of the universe as a computer.
Jacobsen: Informational cosmology.
Rosner: We move on in our discussions without locking things down in precise mathematics. Right now, we have been talking about if micro events - particularly the events that happen on our planet - are registered by the computational entity that is the entire universe.
It almost seems too literal to think that every little thing that happens to us is an informational event in the computational awareness of the overall entity that is the universe. You can argue about whether the universe is conscious or not.
You can argue about whether consciousness is an emergent - which we believe - property and a technical property of sufficiently large broadband information processing. Whether or not if the universe is conscious, it is reasonable to think the universe is some kind of information processor and the information that we live in and are made of is, at base, information.
Information whose existence is made possible by an external framework. That is, matter in an external universe, the information that the universe consists of is a model of that external world, regardless of whether the universe itself is conscious.
For the sake of the discussion, let's say, the universe is an information processor.
Jacobsen: From my knowledge of you, you lean towards tentatively conscious...
Rosner: ...Not just tentatively, strongly, I strongly believe, once you get up to a certain level. Max Tegmark posits a measure of mind. It has something to do with bandwidth. I haven't read his stuff in a while.
If you can somehow make a cross-section of the computations taking place in a human mind at any given moment, that informational cross-section - that is, the number of computations going on and the braidedness/number of places the information is coming from - becomes a metric of the computational magnitude and complexity.
While not agreeing with his methodology entirely, I don't remember what it was. I think that consciousness is generally an emergent property when you have sufficient computational magnitude and complexity.
That is, the computers that we use and are familiar with in our phones and laptops. They may process a lot of information, but the information is mostly processed linearly. It is just a straight flow-through of information.
It is different than the way information flows through our brains. In our brains and minds, there is a central arena. That is a bunch of linked subsystems that are all, at least, roughly aware of the overall state of what is being considered, which is our moment to moment awareness.
What is generally being considered is the reality that we are in and that we are modelling moment to moment along with our self-talk, the words that we use in our heads, and the other tools that we use in our head to help conceptualize what we're experiencing, it is our model of the external world and our commentary on that model through various apps.
The verbal app, whether or not we are talking out loud, we are talking to ourselves, "That motherfucker," or, "What is that dude doing?", or, "That is a shapely ankle," if we're in 1802 and see a women lift her skirt and see her ankle.
There is a commentary. There is a sense of beauty app or an aesthetic app. An app for a sense of fairness and then you decide if it is fair in general, "Is that guy a dick?" If a guy is acting in a way that is impinging on other people, that guy is a dick or an asshole.
It differs if he is acting like a dick or an asshole to you personally, e.g., acting like an asshole in traffic. There is the feeling being tired, of being wrapped in cotton or as if drunk when tired. There is the perspective app.
It is so much a part of our reality that we just experience three dimensionality most of the time as just the way that the world is. Even though, the three-dimensionality is part of our brain constructing the world for us, so that we can understand it.
All of these apps working simultaneously and working with each other moment to moment about this set of sensory input - this flow of sensory input - is unlike how our computers, our mechanical computers, work, which do not have this broad sharing of information among subroutines.
That is changing as various things like Google Translate and machine learning algorithms - I'm sure - is not conscious, but a baby step closer to consciousness than straightforward non-machine learning computing because you have all sorts of feedback and feedarounds.
Rick Rosner: We talk about various aspects of the universe as a computer.
Jacobsen: Informational cosmology.
Rosner: We move on in our discussions without locking things down in precise mathematics. Right now, we have been talking about if micro events - particularly the events that happen on our planet - are registered by the computational entity that is the entire universe.
It almost seems too literal to think that every little thing that happens to us is an informational event in the computational awareness of the overall entity that is the universe. You can argue about whether the universe is conscious or not.
You can argue about whether consciousness is an emergent - which we believe - property and a technical property of sufficiently large broadband information processing. Whether or not if the universe is conscious, it is reasonable to think the universe is some kind of information processor and the information that we live in and are made of is, at base, information.
Information whose existence is made possible by an external framework. That is, matter in an external universe, the information that the universe consists of is a model of that external world, regardless of whether the universe itself is conscious.
For the sake of the discussion, let's say, the universe is an information processor.
Jacobsen: From my knowledge of you, you lean towards tentatively conscious...
Rosner: ...Not just tentatively, strongly, I strongly believe, once you get up to a certain level. Max Tegmark posits a measure of mind. It has something to do with bandwidth. I haven't read his stuff in a while.
If you can somehow make a cross-section of the computations taking place in a human mind at any given moment, that informational cross-section - that is, the number of computations going on and the braidedness/number of places the information is coming from - becomes a metric of the computational magnitude and complexity.
While not agreeing with his methodology entirely, I don't remember what it was. I think that consciousness is generally an emergent property when you have sufficient computational magnitude and complexity.
That is, the computers that we use and are familiar with in our phones and laptops. They may process a lot of information, but the information is mostly processed linearly. It is just a straight flow-through of information.
It is different than the way information flows through our brains. In our brains and minds, there is a central arena. That is a bunch of linked subsystems that are all, at least, roughly aware of the overall state of what is being considered, which is our moment to moment awareness.
What is generally being considered is the reality that we are in and that we are modelling moment to moment along with our self-talk, the words that we use in our heads, and the other tools that we use in our head to help conceptualize what we're experiencing, it is our model of the external world and our commentary on that model through various apps.
The verbal app, whether or not we are talking out loud, we are talking to ourselves, "That motherfucker," or, "What is that dude doing?", or, "That is a shapely ankle," if we're in 1802 and see a women lift her skirt and see her ankle.
There is a commentary. There is a sense of beauty app or an aesthetic app. An app for a sense of fairness and then you decide if it is fair in general, "Is that guy a dick?" If a guy is acting in a way that is impinging on other people, that guy is a dick or an asshole.
It differs if he is acting like a dick or an asshole to you personally, e.g., acting like an asshole in traffic. There is the feeling being tired, of being wrapped in cotton or as if drunk when tired. There is the perspective app.
It is so much a part of our reality that we just experience three dimensionality most of the time as just the way that the world is. Even though, the three-dimensionality is part of our brain constructing the world for us, so that we can understand it.
All of these apps working simultaneously and working with each other moment to moment about this set of sensory input - this flow of sensory input - is unlike how our computers, our mechanical computers, work, which do not have this broad sharing of information among subroutines.
That is changing as various things like Google Translate and machine learning algorithms - I'm sure - is not conscious, but a baby step closer to consciousness than straightforward non-machine learning computing because you have all sorts of feedback and feedarounds.
[End of recorded material]
Authors[1]
Rick Rosner
American Television Writer
RickRosner@Hotmail.Com
Rick Rosner
(Updated March 7, 2019)
According to semi-reputable sources, Rick Rosner has the world’s second-highest IQ. He earned 12 years of college credit in less than a year and graduated with the equivalent of 8 majors. He has received 8 Writers Guild Award and Emmy nominations, and was named 2013 North American Genius of the Year by The World Genius Registry.
He has written for Remote Control, Crank Yankers, The Man Show, The Emmys, The Grammys, and Jimmy Kimmel Live!. He worked as a bouncer, a nude art model, a roller-skating waiter, and a stripper. In a television commercial, Domino’s Pizza named him the "World’s Smartest Man." The commercial was taken off the air after Subway sandwiches issued a cease-and-desist. He was named "Best Bouncer" in the Denver Area, Colorado, by Westwood Magazine.
Rosner spent much of the late Disco Era as an undercover high school student. In addition, he spent 25 years as a bar bouncer and American fake ID-catcher, and 25+ years as a stripper, and nearly 30 years as a writer for more than 2,500 hours of network television. He came in second or lost on Jeopardy!, sued Who Wants to Be a Millionaire over a flawed question and lost the lawsuit. He won one game and lost one game on Are You Smarter Than a Drunk Person? (He was drunk). Finally, he spent 37+ years working on a time invariant variation of the Big Bang Theory.
Currently, Rosner sits tweeting in a bathrobe (winter) or a towel (summer). He lives in Los Angeles, California with his wife, dog, and goldfish. He and his wife have a daughter. You can send him money or questions at LanceversusRick@Gmail.Com, or a direct message via Twitter, or find him on LinkedIn, or see him on YouTube.
Scott Douglas Jacobsen
Editor-in-Chief, In-Sight Publishing
Scott.D.Jacobsen@Gmail.Com
In-Sight Publishing
(Updated September 28, 2016)
Scott Douglas Jacobsen founded In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal and In-Sight Publishing. He authored/co-authored some e-books, free or low-cost. If you want to contact Scott: Scott.D.Jacobsen@Gmail.com, Scott.Jacobsen@TrustedClothes.Com, Scott@ConatusNews.Com, scott.jacobsen@probc.ca, Scott@Karmik.Ca, or SJacobsen@AlmasJiwaniFoundation.Org.
He is a Moral Courage Webmaster and Outreach Specialist (Fall, 2016) at the UCI Interdisciplinary Center for the Scientific Study of Ethics and Morality (Ethics Center), Interview Columnist for Conatus News, Writer and Executive Administrator for Trusted Clothes, Interview Columnist for Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN), Councillor for the Athabasca University Student Union, Member of the Learning Analytics Research Group, writer for The Voice Magazine, Your Political Party of BC, ProBC, Marijuana Party of Canada, Fresh Start Recovery Centre, Harvest House Ministries, and Little Footprints Big Steps International Development Organization, Editor and Proofreader for Alfred Yi Zhang Photography, Community Journalist/Blogger for Gordon Neighbourhood House, Member-at-Large, Member of the Outreach Committee, the Finance & Fundraising Committee, and the Special Projects & Political Advocacy Committee, and Writer for Canadian Students for Sensible Drug Policy, Member of the Lifespan Cognition Psychology Lab and IMAGe Psychology Lab, Collaborator with Dr. Farhad Dastur in creation of the CriticalThinkingWiki, Board Member, and Foundation Volunteer Committee Member for the Fraser Valley Health Care Foundation, and Independent Landscaper.
He was a Francisco Ayala Scholar at the UCI Ethics Center, Member of the Psychometric Society Graduate Student Committee, Special Advisor and Writer for ECOSOC at NWMUN, Writer for TransplantFirstAcademy and ProActive Path, Member of AT-CURA Psychology Lab, Contributor for a student policy review, Vice President of Outreach for the Almas Jiwani Foundation, worked with Manahel Thabet on numerous initiatives, Student Member of the Ad–Hoc Executive Compensation Review Committee for the Athabasca University Student Union, Volunteer and Writer for British Columbia Psychological Association, Community Member of the KPU Choir (even performed with them alongside the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra), Delegate at Harvard World MUN, NWMUN, UBC MUN, and Long Beach Intercollegiate MUN, and Writer and Member of the Communications Committee for The PIPE UP Network.
He published in American Enterprise Institute, Annaborgia, Conatus News, Earth Skin & Eden, Fresh Start Recovery Centre, Gordon Neighbourhood House, Huffington Post, In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal, Jolly Dragons, Kwantlen Polytechnic University Psychology Department, La Petite Mort, Learning Analytics Research Group, Lifespan Cognition Psychology Lab, Lost in Samara, Marijuana Party of Canada, MomMandy, Noesis: The Journal of the Mega Society, Piece of Mind, Production Mode, Synapse, TeenFinancial, The Peak, The Ubyssey, The Voice Magazine, Transformative Dialogues, Treasure Box Kids, Trusted Clothes.
Endnotes
- Bold text following “Scott Douglas Jacobsen:” or “Jacobsen:” is Scott Douglas Jacobsen & non-bold text following “Rick Rosner:” or “Rosner:” is Rick Rosner.
- Session article conducted, transcribed, edited, formatted, and published by Scott.
- Footnotes & in-text citations in the interview & references after the interview.
- This session article has been edited for clarity and readability.
For further information on the formatting guidelines incorporated into this document, please see the following documents:
- American Psychological Association. (2010). Citation Guide: APA. Retrieved from http://www.lib.sfu.ca/system/files/28281/APA6CitationGuideSFUv3.pdf.
- Humble, A. (n.d.). Guide to Transcribing. Retrieved from http://www.msvu.ca/site/media/msvu/Transcription%20Guide.pdf.
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Based on a work at www.in-sightjournal.com and www.rickrosner.org.
Copyright
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