From: Phillip Huggan (cdnprodigy@yahoo.com)
Date: Wed Jan 04 2006 - 21:48:08 MST
Maybe a trivial detail, but "all possible worlds" isn't really that much diversity. The vast majority of potential worlds will not give rise to three physical dimensions early on in their evolutions. In those that do, there won't be unicorns and leprechauns. Psi either will exist in some of them or it won't. The odds against psi occuring in some other universe if ours clearly does not demonstrate the physics for it (assuming it won't for the sake of this argument), are very high. If we were to allocate our attention portfolios for studying magic, the figure wouldn't be 5% or 1%, it would be a total allocation much less than one second of our spare time. An exception is in post-singularity (sentient-guided) light cone volumes, or designer universes/simulations. And I have very, very strong philosophical arguments against why we aren't living in a simulation (I will uncork them if psi is deemed worthy, but would prefer to wait until H+ is until mainstream attack). Many reduce
to the theistic problem of "why is there evil".
Mitchell Porter <mitchtemporarily@hotmail.com> wrote:
These are all contingencies. I call them "extreme possibilities". If one
thinks that all possible worlds actually exist, or that they all have an
equal a-priori chance of existing, then potentially one can reason about
such possibilities, and factor them into pragmatic strategies. It's the
cognitive equivalent of "adventure investment"; you could make them 1% or 5%
or 10% of your attentional portfolio.
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