[Wittrs] Re: Following a Rule
- From: "jrstern" <jrstern@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 24 Sep 2009 17:12:49 -0000
--- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "iro3isdx" <xznwrjnk-evca@...> wrote:
>
>
> --- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "jrstern" <jrstern@> wrote:
>
>
> > Sure, but gentlemen, might it be an easier question
> > to ask what it means to say, "my computer is computing"?
>
> Let's see if I can get close to that issue.
>
> It's election day. And there is this thingy called a "voting
> machine". I am supposed to press some buttons on that thingy
> (manufactured by Diebold).
>
> Is that thingy a computer, and is what it does computing? Or is
> that thingy an inscrutable magic black box which, through means
> unknown, announces an "election winner"?
>
> Can we say that an alleged computer is following rules, if the
> rules are inscrutable, and there is no way of auditing whether the
> announced "election winner" actually corresponds to any agreed
> following of rules?
Apparently you've kept yourself far away from the issue.
Let's start with something where you feel happy stipulating
to the fact that it is a computer.
> > I know Neil, at least, has expressed some interest in
> > whether it has a clock driving it - and presumably additional
> > electrical power, in the kinds of actual chips that we use.
>
> But that has to do with a very different issue, such as "can a
> computer have original intentionality". It seems not relevant to
> the current discussion.
Can a computer have original intentionality, without computing?
Josh
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