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Re:C. Elegans: The Worm That No Computer Scientist Can Crack by StopTheWorld on Sunday March 30, 2025 @10:36AM (#43524546)
> flipping quantum coins...Newsflash: neurons and digital computers both have to play by the universe's stubbornly deterministic rules

I don't really understand what this means - you obviously know at the smallest level things happen by random probability - because you mention the quantum world - but then you say the universe is deterministic.

Re:C. Elegans: The Worm That No Computer Scientist Can Crack by Aardwolf on Sunday March 30, 2025 @10:49AM (#43524638)
Computers can also include physics based random number generators so that's still simulatable. And analog computing also is possible. Quantum computing not really yet but theoretically possible.

Not sure if any other wizard hat things than those can extend classical digital computing

Re:C. Elegans: The Worm That No Computer Scientist Can Crack by nipah on Thursday April 03, 2025 @03:22PM (#43574179)
This is just partially a solution, because this assumes cognition as a whole is computable.
Re:C. Elegans: The Worm That No Computer Scientist Can Crack by FrustratedMonky on Sunday March 30, 2025 @11:08AM (#43524783)
Because randomness does not introduce agency.

Bringing up 'Quantum' effects to somehow free us from determinism and somehow introduce free will, is completely false. Somehow using the word "Quantum" explains human consciousness is wrong.

A coin flip is still determined. You don't know which way it will flip, but also, you aren't deciding which way it will flip. The future is determined either way, determined one way, or determined the other way.

Re:C. Elegans: The Worm That No Computer Scientist Can Crack by nipah on Thursday April 03, 2025 @03:19PM (#43574136)
It does not introduce, but maybe the combination of both does (see Searle points in freedom and neurobiology). You also need to prove that the future is determined, simply assuming so is an error.
Re:C. Elegans: The Worm That No Computer Scientist Can Crack by munksbeer on Tuesday April 01, 2025 @04:28AM (#43544210)
> you obviously know at the smallest level things happen by random probability

We don't actually know this. It is just what we observe that fits our map so far.

Re:C. Elegans: The Worm That No Computer Scientist Can Crack by nipah on Thursday April 03, 2025 @03:20PM (#43574161)
If you don't believe in God, actually you NEED to buy this, or buy into some other methaphysical eternalism that is as hard to prove as truly random events. The universe either started randomly or it was created, and the existence either existed eternally or it was created (both prospects are also problematic in some level, but at least it is something better than thinking you can not have a position on this and also assume that determinism is trivially true).