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These are excerpts and elaborations from my book "The Nature of Consciousness"
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Infinite Knowledge And so the Israeli physicist
David Deutschcounters that we used to live in a world of supernatural entities.
Then we discovered that we are capable of explaining how the world works
because the world obeys mathematical laws that our brain can master. Therefore
we became universal beings, capable of understanding anything that happens in
the universe ruled by those laws of nature. A higher intelligence
(incomprehensible to us) can only exist if the universe is not explicable, i.e.
if there exist supernatural beings. In other words, the cognitive closure of
human brains would imply that the ancient superstitions were correct. It is the scientific "explanation"
that allows us to create a long chain of interpretation that allows us to
understand phenomena that are very far from our everyday experience. For
example, astronomical observation consists of, in practice, just looking into
devices built out of humble materials found here on Earth but, ultimately,
allows the mind to visit distant worlds. The mind can "leave" the
body for this spectacular voyage because of the "explanations" that
guarantee it is not just being tricked by drugs. There is something special
about this process that makes humans truly unique. Deutschdisagrees with those who think
that there is nothing special with this typical planet of a typical star of a
typical galaxy (the principle of mediocrity): humans have created conditions
(for example, low-temperature refrigerators) that are very rare in the
universe. Deutsch emphasizes that most of the universe is very different from
the environment that humans created in their cities, homes and especially
laboratories. What made humans unique is that they can use technology to expand
the capabilities of their brains. Whatever caused their brains to evolve the
way they did, those brains are now capable of going beyond their original
survival functions. And the reason that technology does that is the explanatory
knowledge that only humans have learned to master. What is unique about
explanatory knowledge is obvious if one considers that humans managed to
survive in an extremely hostile biosphere and even moved to environments that
are not the ones in which they were shaped by natural selection. Other species
have knowledge too, but the kind of straightforward knowledge that limits their
reach to their habitat. The explanatory knowledge of humans allows them to do
things that their brains were not programmed for and their bodies could not do
without help from technology. Thus Deutschcalls humans "universal
constructors": humans can transform anything into anything as long as they
understand the natural laws that govern the universe and then build technology
according to those laws. If the universe is governed by deterministic rules,
then the human brain can eventually (explanation after explanation) get to
understand everything. We are capable of everything, and in particular of
understanding everything. There is nothing that obeys the laws of nature that
we cannot understand. If such a thing existed, it would have to be
"supernatural" by definition: not obeying the laws of nature. In a
universe governed by mathematical laws, the reach of explanatory knowledge is
infinite, and therefore so is the reach of a brain that is capable of acquiring
explanatory knowledge recursively (one explanation leading to another one).
There is no limit to human knowledge. There is no limit to human creation. Historically, it wasn't
always this way. At some point humans became what their brain made possible:
universal constructors. He links this conceptual revolution with the
Enlightenment, that spawned rebellion against authority in many fields,
including science: those rebels looked for explanations, not just dogmas.
Furthermore, the Enlightenment introduced the notion that progress is good and
should be a universal ideal to achieve by society. So the chain of explanations
that leads to more and more knowledge became not only possible but an explicit
goal of humankind. The effect of brains like
ours (brains that can deal with explanatory knowledge and therefore become
universal constructors who can alter their environment at will) is significant.
Deutschpoints out that astrophysics is
incomplete without a theory of people because people can alter the course of
events that the laws of nature alone would cause. If we don't consider the
actions of people, we can't understand why the Earth is the way it is. Furthermore, the effect of a
knowledge-processing brain is profound also because an intelligent deliberate
transformation is actually more likely to happen than a spontaneous one: the
chances that an object is changed by a spontaneous transformation (one caused
only by the laws of nature) are relatively low in the grand scheme of things,
whereas the chances that an object is changed by an intelligent being for
whatever purpose are very high. In other words: the
universality of the laws of nature coupled with a universal constructor like
the human mind yields unlimited knowledge growth. Deutschargues that the well-known
limitations on mathematics and computations (Godel's Theorem and the likes) do
not affect his claims that humans can extend knowledge indefinitely: one can
understand a mathematical statement without proving it. Basically, the proof is
a technicality. If you can't prove it, it doesn't mean you don't
"know" something. The only limit to human knowledge that Deutsch sees
is the impossibility to predict future knowledge: the fact that we can find
solutions to any problem does not mean that we already know those solutions. The physics of knowledge
representation is that the physical system of the brain somehow contains a
model of the physical system of the entire universe. As more and more knowledge
is acquired that model becomes a better and better approximation of the
universe (and viceversa). The world is knowledge-friendly because it obeys the laws
of nature. The human brain is knowledge-capable. Starting with the
Enlightenment, the human brain decided to exploit this capability. The spirit
of the Enlightenment provided the motivation that was missing. Knowledge allows
the brain to build technology to help acquire more knowledge even about facts
that the brain cannot experience directly. This chain reaction leads to an
endless creation of knowledge. Deutsch's argument that, assuming the universe is run by deterministic regular
"laws of nature", a mind that can understand those laws of nature can
in principle understand everything, is persuasive. However, he doesn't talk
about the one feature of this universe that no science has been able to
express, describe and predict with mathematical laws: human consciousness;
which also happens to be the one that i'm sure about, and the one i care most
about. Colin McGinnhas argued convincingly that the human mind just might not be
capable of understanding it, no matter what. Deutsch provides a general
framework in which the human mind can understand everything that can be
expressed in mathematical laws, but the doubt remains that some things will
never be expressed in a formal, mathematical form. Back to the beginning of the chapter "Consciousness: the Factory of Illusions" | Back to the index of all chapters |
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