(August 3, 2013 at 3:29 am)genkaus Wrote: Rather than regarding them as two distinct realities, I see them as aspects of the same reality which become evident when it is considered at two different levels. Its the difference between considering parts and considering the whole.This line of reasoning sounds suspiciously familiar.
Quote:The best analogy that illustrates this difference is between software and hardware in a computer. If you are doing piece by piece analysis of the computer, then all you are going to see are small electric pulses being sent to and fro. At this level, "software" does not exist. It is only when you consider the operation as a whole that the existence of software becomes evident.It is my position that information is independent of the medium in which it acts, or is stored. That doesn't mean information can have NO medium.
Why does this matter? Because it is only when you ALREADY consider the brain (or the computer) as separate and unique to the rest of the universe that the information of "software" exists at all. The reality (in a determinist physical monism) is that all those particles are already related, even before the brain forms. There is no new information, and the fact that we see the "software" isn't an existential statement-- it's an act of the sentient mind.
I've often used the example of mp3 files. You could encode a complete song in black and white seashells arranged on a beach. It's only if you already know that it's an mp3 file that you can draw that form out of the background chatter. We have to assume that if an alien came along, he'd look at them and see only a bunch of black and white shells-- and this DESPITE it being clear to us what it is.
