From: Colin Hales (colin@versalog.com.au)
Date: Tue Sep 03 2002 - 00:55:45 MDT
Just in case you think I've gone and reinvented some "magic potion"
particle:
Not so.
Computrons
===========
The 'computron' is an explanatory tool, not a real particle. A way of
describing potential for emergent behaviour with a 1st person ontology. When
you get into it, however, the idea tends to take on a more realistic feel.
That's all. It's tangible and measurable too, if you set your mind to it. A
computron exists wherever there is potential for interactions with multiple
other computrons _and_ a set of rules to govern those interactions.
Structural details then add the rest of the story.
I've been thinking about this for a while and am getting used to it in a
cognitive science context. I now know, for example, that I have to build a
new chipset to do my AI - an inorganic computron is needed and von-neuman
architecture won't do it. (Well, it'll do it, but it'll make elaborate
puppets, not strong AI)
If nothing else, it has clarified this issue greatly for me. It's made the
job a real $$$ bastard, but...tough luck for me. :-(
The _real_ interesting stuff is the transformation from :
==========================================================
"Human mathematics and other descriptive tools are uncovering and describing
everything and are the only descriptive authority of our computational
universe"
to
"Computation is the ultimate description of everything and sometimes
descriptive tools can be used to characterise behavioural aspects of the
universe between humans"
===========================================================
Totally inside out compared to traditional thinking. To do science you
create stuff, you don't write about it and call the writing the end result.
The end result is the stuff. The cake, not the recipe, is the result. The
recipe tells someone else about cakes, but not what 'being a cake' is like.
Wolfram says CA is a valid descriptive tool. Yep, but not for subjective
experience ('being' the CA). Traditional science in most fields will soldier
on as usual. Those interested in the mind and complexity, however, may find
it useful to think this way. Computrons can model culture and economics, for
example, with things like 'inflation' and 'unemployment' being, in effect,
exactly the same as 'emotion' in the brain. (Again I bet someone else has
been here too - no matter...my new model for the method still stands)
====================================================
The computron kind of "popped out" as a byproduct, triggered by Prof.
Chalmers 'hard problem' paper. I don't think you need magic particles. We
just need a way to see and describe what's there already. That's what I'm
after and hope I've got. Others have thought this way, I know, I'm just
trying to get it nailed down sensibly, hoping someone else can see some use
in it.
cheers,
Colin
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