Great post! Interesting point about computationalism being dualist. That would explain why I haven’t been able to wrap my head around the idea of physicalists being computationalists. Especially this popular idea that “information is physical”. I then wonder, well what do you mean by physical? What do you mean by information? Because clearly we have different notions of what those words mean.
Thanks! I *think* they're trying to dodge the dualism problem by saying that, well, okay, fine, *information* is abstract, but every actual instance of information is, in fact, physical. But I've never understood why that matters. The physics of the physical instance have no connection to whatever the abstraction is asserting about its reality.
Those intersecting cubes... it's impossible in the real world but requires effort and care to implement virtually.
With how you differentiate simulation and emulation, what would be your treatment of what is happening in these two scenarios?
1. After training for a month under a "swordmaster," you practice your stances at home. However, you imagine you are being attacked by adversaries with swords, and you try to emulate your teacher, both in mindset and (rather wishfully) in expertise to flow from one stance to another in response to imagined swings of adversarial blades.
2. You slam on the accelerator, feeling as if a force is pushing you back into your seat as you try to force yourself to experience the physically real fact that your seat is accelerating first and then accelerating you forward.
Emulation and simulation in this context are different approaches for numerical modeling of some object and its behaviors, and I don't think you're asking about how I would model those numerically, so I'm not sure how to answer your question.
You used the term "emulate" with regard following in a teacher's footsteps, and as best as the terms can be fit, just about anything a human does along these lines is emulation -- duplicating the functionality of, in this case, the teacher.
I think you're getting at simulation of gravity or acceleration in the second case, but the forces you feel are perfectly real. That they feel different just has to do with our perceptions, so I don't seem to see a fit for this scenario as either emulation or simulation.
I suppose I am trying to tease out whether the relationship between simulation and emulation, in their numerical treatment, are analogous to the relationship between the two in non-numerical treatments.
The two examples seem to me like special cases where we "simulate" the movement of imaginary or real objects and "respond" to our own simulation.
Would you say this is just parallel analog processing? And does simulation/emulation each have unique meanings and relations whether digital or analog? In a way I feel like you have answered this already by declaring the brain non algorithmic, but I may be having trouble separating the terminology.
It's an interesting point, I had to think about it, and I think it boils down to simulations being mechanical in some way. Think flight simulator, for example. Simulation and "model" are almost the same thing. A model airplane simulates an airplane.
But it doesn't emulate an airplane because it doesn't perform the same functions. Whereas one might say planes roughly emulate birds. Humans emulate role models, teachers, parents, even imagined future selves we want to become.
That said, they are fuzzy concepts and do blend into each other.
Great post! Interesting point about computationalism being dualist. That would explain why I haven’t been able to wrap my head around the idea of physicalists being computationalists. Especially this popular idea that “information is physical”. I then wonder, well what do you mean by physical? What do you mean by information? Because clearly we have different notions of what those words mean.
Thanks! I *think* they're trying to dodge the dualism problem by saying that, well, okay, fine, *information* is abstract, but every actual instance of information is, in fact, physical. But I've never understood why that matters. The physics of the physical instance have no connection to whatever the abstraction is asserting about its reality.
Those intersecting cubes... it's impossible in the real world but requires effort and care to implement virtually.
With how you differentiate simulation and emulation, what would be your treatment of what is happening in these two scenarios?
1. After training for a month under a "swordmaster," you practice your stances at home. However, you imagine you are being attacked by adversaries with swords, and you try to emulate your teacher, both in mindset and (rather wishfully) in expertise to flow from one stance to another in response to imagined swings of adversarial blades.
2. You slam on the accelerator, feeling as if a force is pushing you back into your seat as you try to force yourself to experience the physically real fact that your seat is accelerating first and then accelerating you forward.
Cheers!
Emulation and simulation in this context are different approaches for numerical modeling of some object and its behaviors, and I don't think you're asking about how I would model those numerically, so I'm not sure how to answer your question.
You used the term "emulate" with regard following in a teacher's footsteps, and as best as the terms can be fit, just about anything a human does along these lines is emulation -- duplicating the functionality of, in this case, the teacher.
I think you're getting at simulation of gravity or acceleration in the second case, but the forces you feel are perfectly real. That they feel different just has to do with our perceptions, so I don't seem to see a fit for this scenario as either emulation or simulation.
That make sense?
I suppose I am trying to tease out whether the relationship between simulation and emulation, in their numerical treatment, are analogous to the relationship between the two in non-numerical treatments.
The two examples seem to me like special cases where we "simulate" the movement of imaginary or real objects and "respond" to our own simulation.
Would you say this is just parallel analog processing? And does simulation/emulation each have unique meanings and relations whether digital or analog? In a way I feel like you have answered this already by declaring the brain non algorithmic, but I may be having trouble separating the terminology.
Thanks for the response!
It's an interesting point, I had to think about it, and I think it boils down to simulations being mechanical in some way. Think flight simulator, for example. Simulation and "model" are almost the same thing. A model airplane simulates an airplane.
But it doesn't emulate an airplane because it doesn't perform the same functions. Whereas one might say planes roughly emulate birds. Humans emulate role models, teachers, parents, even imagined future selves we want to become.
That said, they are fuzzy concepts and do blend into each other.