[Wittrs] Re: Following a rule
- From: "iro3isdx" <xznwrjnk-evca@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 13 Sep 2009 02:59:10 -0000
--- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "jrstern" <jrstern@...> wrote:
>> But isn't this "high level" just a convenient fiction that we use
>> because it makes it easier for us to talk about computers and to
>> program them.
> That, of course is the question.
> But, it is the question all over town.
> Isn't "chemistry" just a convenient fiction on top of atomic physics?
> Isn't "psychology" just a convenient fiction on top of biology?
> etc.
Yes, indeed. But then the world we live in is also a convenient
fiction. I am not, at all, denying that there is a physical reality.
However, the world we live in contains banks, restaurants, highways,
and all kinds of other stuff which are really part of the
social/cultural world, and that in turn is a convenient fiction.
Shakespeare seems to have beaten us to this observation, with his "All
the world's a stage".
> I can't answer for the "levels" talk that permeates CTM and
> philosophy of mind generally.
I think it poses a problem for the more physicalist views that come up
in AI discussions - the views of Eray, for example. For it seems clear
that much of what is described in CTM occurs at the level of convenient
fictions, rather than at the physical level.
> So, I'm going to make a convenient assumption that, yes, it's
> just as real a thing as it needs to be.
I don't have a problem with that.
Regards,
Neil
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