[ExI] digital simulations, descriptions and copies

[Damien Broderick]

On 1/23/2010 11:21 AM, Gordon Swobe wrote:

> The book about the apple describes the apple, and the digital simulation acts only as a translation of the book. No matter whether the description exists in book form or in digital form, it only describes the apple and descriptions of things do not equal the things they describe.

Ah, so you *almost* get it. But you still confuse yourself by conflating 
emulation and description. The Apple apple is just another description; 
it can't be an emulation. But a calculator represented on a computer 
monitor can be both, if it serves as a GUI to a series of algorithmic 
processes that emulate or in this case instantiate calculations. A 
child's plastic telephone might have buttons and a small device that 
pings, but all it does is represent some surface aspects of a real 
phone. But a phone image on a computer monitor can make real phone 
connections because it is the GUI to an actual digital phone system. A 
monitor display of a true human mind emulation would be an iconic 
representation of an immensely complex program copying the functionality 
of biological sensors, effectors and internal processors. Stop looking 
at the finger and consider what it's pointing to.

Damien Broderick