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The author is missing a key element in his model of life, one which significantly affects the outcome of the thought experiment: his simple loops are independen
by vannevar 15y ago
The author is missing a key element in his model of life, one which significantly affects the outcome of the thought experiment: his simple loops are independent, they have no shared state. Real existence is not so clean---living beings are constantly being altered by their environment, and conversely altering it. It would be impossible to simply 'save the state' of a living being without saving the state of the entire universe in which it resides (the virtual machine). This makes reincarnation (or at least the very simple model presented in the article) impossible.
- icebraining 15y agoOne can claim that humans are more like shared-nothing message passing processes, which can alter and be altered by their "surroundings" without sharing state per-se. Shared state/memory seems more like a representation of the Borg ;)
- vannevar 15y agoHowever you choose to model it, the fact remains that there is no clear boundary between the state of a living thing and its surroundings.