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What if aliens have no notion of discrete numbers, what if everything is probabilistic analog math? What about an organism that can see/focus/sense multiple th

by zhynn 4y ago

What if aliens have no notion of discrete numbers, what if everything is probabilistic analog math? What about an organism that can see/focus/sense multiple things simultaneously, and a single "thing" is a set. What about a creature whose primary sensing organ is diffuse molecules (smell/taste) instead of sight and use light (instead of meat tentacles) to interact with matter. How might an organism that touches matter with laser fingers and smells the consequences count differently? I wouldn't have the first idea, honestly. There could be an entirely different paradigm to "counting" and consequently to the fundamentals of maths. The math that we invented is influenced by our biology and capacity to sense our environment. Our brains and how those brains work with our sense organs. This pattern is likely universal (all life will have methods of sensing their environment and interacting with it), but the methods might be very different.

naasking 4y ago
I'm sure you can imagine any kind of alien, but that doesn't make your imagined alien logically coherent or physically realizable and consistent with the theory of evolution by natural selection. Do you agree that these are real, physical constraints that any imagined alien species must satisfy? If not, then you have to explain how an alien species might develop that is not subject to physical constraints and evolution by natural selection. If so, then you must agree that any alien must be able to distinguish two scenarios, "I sense some food here" and "I sense no food here". The basic binary distinction is inescapable, and this is the foundation of true/false, 0 and 1, etc.
- jarpadat 4y ago
  Consider an alien which subsists on photons, which is a form of life that exists today. We know from heseinberg that the sensing of this food "here" or "there" is nonphysical. Presumably our creature's civilization would require no heisenberg to discover what anyone can see from their own photosensor. Rather it is the concept of objects remaining in a single place that would require some real mathematical innovation to a creature with no experience of such an idea. And so this distinction of entirely separate logical states, far from being basic or inescapable, is our very human invention. It is useful for creatures like us, who perceive things in one place when they are not really so, who do their computing with sand in a region where it's bountiful, and who encode abstractions as software because doing so in dedicated hardware is more costly. While it is certainly possible that all intelligent life would have these constraints, there is no particular reason to expect it. What we can expect is that humans will expect others to be too much like ourselves; it's a well-known cognitive defect in our species.
  - naasking 4y ago
    > Consider an alien which subsists on photons, which is a form of life that exists today. Plants don't just subsist on photons, there are many other ingredients. > We know from heseinberg that the sensing of this food "here" or "there" is nonphysical. I don't know what this means. How do you "non-physically" sense photons? > Rather it is the concept of objects remaining in a single place that would require some real mathematical innovation to a creature with no experience of such an idea. And so this distinction of entirely separate logical states, far from being basic or inescapable, is our very human invention. Assuming you're talking about some alien made of bosons that aren't subject to the Pauli exclusion principle, you'll note that bosons still interact with fermions in which that principle does apply, so I don't think your argument follows. I admit I don't really understand your premises though so I have no idea what you really meant.
IIAOPSW 4y ago
>What if aliens have no notion of discrete numbers, what if everything is probabilistic analog math? 0 and 1 are both valid probabilities. >What about an organism that can see/focus/sense multiple things simultaneously, and a single "thing" is a set. Its possible, using sets only containing other sets (or possibly the empty set), to construct the integers. >There could be an entirely different paradigm to "counting" and consequently to the fundamentals of maths. Systems of mathematical expressions are just like coding languages. The choice is arbitrary, one can always emulate the job of another. Just like how I did with your chosen examples, in principle one can always hack the integers out of whatever system you give me (or hack whatever system out if integers).
dbsmith83 4y ago
> what if everything is probabilistic analog math? you said every thing which implies discreteness. Also, probabilities are probabilities of an event (read: something discrete) happening

by zhynn 4y ago

naasking 4y ago

I'm sure you can imagine any kind of alien, but that doesn't make your imagined alien logically coherent or physically realizable and consistent with the theory of evolution by natural selection. Do you agree that these are real, physical constraints that any imagined alien species must satisfy? If not, then you have to explain how an alien species might develop that is not subject to physical constraints and evolution by natural selection. If so, then you must agree that any alien must be able to distinguish two scenarios, "I sense some food here" and "I sense no food here". The basic binary distinction is inescapable, and this is the foundation of true/false, 0 and 1, etc.

jarpadat 4y ago
Consider an alien which subsists on photons, which is a form of life that exists today. We know from heseinberg that the sensing of this food "here" or "there" is nonphysical. Presumably our creature's civilization would require no heisenberg to discover what anyone can see from their own photosensor. Rather it is the concept of objects remaining in a single place that would require some real mathematical innovation to a creature with no experience of such an idea. And so this distinction of entirely separate logical states, far from being basic or inescapable, is our very human invention. It is useful for creatures like us, who perceive things in one place when they are not really so, who do their computing with sand in a region where it's bountiful, and who encode abstractions as software because doing so in dedicated hardware is more costly. While it is certainly possible that all intelligent life would have these constraints, there is no particular reason to expect it. What we can expect is that humans will expect others to be too much like ourselves; it's a well-known cognitive defect in our species.
- naasking 4y ago
  > Consider an alien which subsists on photons, which is a form of life that exists today. Plants don't just subsist on photons, there are many other ingredients. > We know from heseinberg that the sensing of this food "here" or "there" is nonphysical. I don't know what this means. How do you "non-physically" sense photons? > Rather it is the concept of objects remaining in a single place that would require some real mathematical innovation to a creature with no experience of such an idea. And so this distinction of entirely separate logical states, far from being basic or inescapable, is our very human invention. Assuming you're talking about some alien made of bosons that aren't subject to the Pauli exclusion principle, you'll note that bosons still interact with fermions in which that principle does apply, so I don't think your argument follows. I admit I don't really understand your premises though so I have no idea what you really meant.

IIAOPSW 4y ago

>What if aliens have no notion of discrete numbers, what if everything is probabilistic analog math? 0 and 1 are both valid probabilities. >What about an organism that can see/focus/sense multiple things simultaneously, and a single "thing" is a set. Its possible, using sets only containing other sets (or possibly the empty set), to construct the integers. >There could be an entirely different paradigm to "counting" and consequently to the fundamentals of maths. Systems of mathematical expressions are just like coding languages. The choice is arbitrary, one can always emulate the job of another. Just like how I did with your chosen examples, in principle one can always hack the integers out of whatever system you give me (or hack whatever system out if integers).

dbsmith83 4y ago

> what if everything is probabilistic analog math? you said every thing which implies discreteness. Also, probabilities are probabilities of an event (read: something discrete) happening