The structure you are looking for is an identity - a mathematical space/expression/set of operations that is always true.
Counting numbers originate from the fact that the identity self-distributes its own Boolean algebra. The set in its entirety (unity) corresponds to "1" and the empty set to "0". Subsetting allows the construction of von Neumann ordinals - sets that correspond to counting numbers.
Because physics consists of a set of points with trajectories in a mathematical space, this structure is everywhere-distributed in physics. That explains the connection between your "starting-point physical entity" and your "starting-point counting number". They do not "begin" simultaneously though - every physical fact depends on facts about this mathematical structure, but not vice versa.

It seems logically possible for syntax to be sufficient for semantics. It just turns out when we investigate with thought experiments like the Chinese room argument, that syntax is actually insufficient for semantics. But without knowing that beforehand, it appears possible that we might understand the meaning of some symbol purely by looking at the instructions of which it is a part.

It's logically possible for reductionism to be the case, but not metaphysically possible.
There has to be a whole binding all the parts of something from the top-down for it to be coherent, you can't actually building anything by "combining parts" without that, despite what a pragmatic heuristic it is to think so.

what do you think the best arguments for it are? — frank

I think I've only ever seen one kind of argument for it, and it is fallacious. They all depend entirely on setting up definitions about the world so as to define any non-physical phenomena out of existence. That's question begging and that's irrational.

A non-simulated world is a set of objects in space. But if that's the case, then a simulated world is not a set of objects in space. — Philosophim

What I said to you above, was:

A world is a set of objects in a space. The decision of whether something is simulated versus non-simulated would rest on whether something emerges from information processing. — Hallucinogen

A set of objects in a space that is not emergent from information processing is a non-simulated world.
A set of objects in a space that is emergent from information processing is a simulated world.

These really aren't separate issues though. — Philosophim

If we have no information then we can begin from the premise that they are. "Space is either mental or physical" assuming that the physical = non-mental, and the mental = non-physical.

A mind is not itself a simulation right? Meaning that it is a non-simulated bit of reality that simulations can run in. — Philosophim

Correct.

An accurate simulation of a non-simulated world can be applied to a non-simulated world without difficulty. — Philosophim

Why is it of importance to point out what we can simulate about a non-simulated world?

That doesn't mean the world is simulated, it just means that simulation of the actual world is accurate. — Philosophim

I'm not sure what you're rebutting here. The world is emergent from information processing, exactly because our models that treat it as such have more explanatory power than those that don't.

All that we can conclude from this is that our simulations of the world accurately reflect how our minds function. — Philosophim

Are you using "our simulations of the world" to mean what theoretical physicists do? What we can conclude is that the information processing space emerges from and the kind that minds produce are the same thing.

The only way you can validly claim 4 is based on one is to state, "A simulated world is either..." Because that's what you stated in 1. — Philosophim

I'm not following this. Claim 4 isn't subject to exceptions about simulations existing in mechanical space because of claim 2. There doesn't need to be an "either" because of 2.

There has to be something non-simulated to simulate right? — Philosophim

There has to be something non-simulated to do the simulating. Those are minds.

Otherwise there isn't a non-simulated world — Philosophim

Yes, there isn't.

and thus the simulation cannot be accurate or inaccurate, it just is. — Philosophim

I don't know what you are referring to when you say "accurate". There isn't a non-simulated world, so the fact that space is emergent from information processing isn't "accurate" to anything other than the information processing in God's mind.

But if it is an accurate simulation, it is not indistinguishible — Philosophim

It isn't indistinguishable from what? Information processing from which physical space is emergent is scientifically indistinguishable from the information processing that occurs in a mind.

because it lacks the key property that you defined a non-simulated world as being: A set of objects in space — Philosophim

I defined a world as a set of objects in a space.

If a simulated world is a set of objects in space, then it is not a simulated world. — Philosophim

Why have you decided this? Every simulated world is a set of objects in a space.

What I meant is that without defining what a non-simulated world is — Philosophim

But I just did this? A world is a set of objects in a space. The question is whether it emerges from information processing or not.

its turned out like:

A. Its given that the world is simulated.
B. Therefore the world is simulated. — Philosophim

That's not the conclusion of the argument. And it leaves out the rest of the argument, which establishes the connections between space, information processing and minds.

The possibility of a non-simulated world existing is implicit in the first part of premise 1.

Then you're really only arguing Spinoza's position.. — Vaskane

The conclusion of Cosmological or DPA arguments doesn't specifically identify Spinoza's God. Neither entail that God has infinite properties, for example.

The rest of what you said is right.

If the universe is a manifestation within the mind of God that's more of a pantheistic view of God. — Vaskane

Panentheistic. Pantheism would mean the universe is all God is, instead of a program-output relationship.

If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there, something still happens as a thing in itself. — Philosophim

But this assumes its own conclusion. If it's true, it's true. The question is if it's true in reality. The observer effect seems to imply otherwise -- interactions don't take place in the absence of conscious observation.

The mental tries to define and create identity in the sea of existence, but the sea of existence is still there whether we are or not. — Philosophim

But this just presupposes that there isn't a mind containing and observing the whole sea of existence.

We can invent whatever definitions and concepts we want inside of our head. — Philosophim

This is what I wanted you to say. So, since we can imagine or define whatever we want, does that mean there's an any-to-any relationship between the thing defined and the symbol we attach to it (e.g., the meaning, the concept)?

there is nothing prior to the alpha existence's self, so that is why I do not say "prior reason". — Philosophim

Gotcha.

Did you mean that the concept of infinity comes from a mind? — Philosophim

I mean both -- I don't believe anything has a non-mental origination.

As the infinite is unprovable — Philosophim

Would you say that you can decide whatever it is you mean?

Except this doesn't follow — Vaskane

It doesn't follow it because I didn't put the two into a syllogism. If you meant though, that the two contradict, then give a reason. Bear in mind the conclusion of the DPA is that space emerges within a mind.

without first contrasting what a simulation is vs what a non-simulated world is, its mostly circular. — Philosophim

A world is a set of objects in a space. The decision of whether something is simulated versus non-simulated would rest on whether something emerges from information processing.
I haven't spotted the circularity, could you point it out to me?

OP is valid. All I can do is nitpick at semantics like this:

4. Alpha logic: An alpha cannot have any prior reasoning that explains why it came into existence. An Alpha's reason for its existence can never be defined by the Z's that follow it. If an Alpha exists, its own justification for existence, is itself. We could say, "The reversal of Z's causality logically lead up to this Alpha," But we cannot say "Z is the cause of why Alpha could, or could not exist." Plainly put, the rules concluded within a universe of causality cannot explain why an Alpha exists. — Philosophim

Of course the Alpha does have prior reasoning why it came into existence: itself. Inference to the Alpha allows its interior universe to have logical basis on which to explain its own existence and that of the Alpha.

If there exists an X which explains the reason why any infinite causality exists, then its not truly infinite causality — Philosophim

Causality isn't infinite but there has to be reasonable grounds on which we include infinity in a model or not. That means that infinity does have a criteria for being explained within a certain structure. Well, we conceptualize infinity and we have minds, so it seems that the infinite has a mind.

I don't follow the logic of your discussion, but that doesn't matter, since I don't see why this is true. — T Clark

There's only 2 options: either all objects are contingent/caused from the outside or at least 1 isn't.

The holographic principle is a reductio ad absurdum as proven by Nietzsche — Vaskane

You're absolutely right, we need to tell Susskind et al

Point out the exact statement I made that is "god of the gaps". — Hallucinogen

Your thread title!!!! and most of the statement made in your opening! — universeness

An X of the gaps fallacy is when there's an unknown connection between 2 things and someone makes an inference from the unknown to some 3rd entity. That's not anywhere in my reasoning nor in the title.

supposing simulation is true. Which you can't prove. — Vaskane

It was proven in the second premise, which had a substantial amount of supporting text below the argument.

The burden of proof regarding posits you put forward, as supposed evidence for the existence of a god lies with you the proposer, not me the sceptic, the atheist. — universeness

You claimed that a statement I made was a jump. Your claim is about the reasoning of my statemen, and you have that reasoning in front of you, so the burden of proof is in fact on you to justify your claim about what you are reading. The only thing that carries no burden of proof is "I don't know", which is not what you said. You misunderstand the burden of proof, as if it means "I get to claim that someone else's reasoning is fallacious without responsibility" which is not what it means.

inflating and projecting scientific findings into god of the gaps woo woo posits — universeness

Point out the exact statement I made that is "god of the gaps".

The conclusions can be anything you like when the whole of the argument amounts to pure flights of fancy. — universeness

This is a description of the quality of your own reasoning. You simply declare assertions about reasoning that you dislike to be incorrect with no substantive basis. Whenever you are challenged, you simply switch to a new form of denial without supporting what you previously denied.

Why in God's mind rather than in say, Tod's laptop? — wonderer1

Points (3), (4) and (5) should tell you why. The information processing from which space emerges is indistinguishable from the information processing that takes place inside minds. Laptops are physical matter in space to start with, so they are emergent along with it, and they don't exhibit the quantum cognition that human minds do.

And you accuse me of making irrational jumps! — universeness

Prove that it's a jump.

No human being knows what physical space IS, and the facts about physical space that we do know do not implicate a mind at source. — universeness

Asserting baseless skepticism about scientific findings isn't a response I see often.

What do you think qualifies as the most compelling point you make in your OP as evidence that a god exists? — universeness

Conclusions tend to rely on the whole of the argument, not just one isolated part of it.

this one — Vera Mont

?

The conclusion of a deductive argument isn't a hypothesis, if that's what you mean.

seems entirely superfluous, since it's either a tenet of unsupported faith or an infinite regression — Vera Mont

You didn't understand the argument. I dealt with the objection regarding infinite regression above. There is no grounds on which to argue that minds are simulated here, just physical space. No infinite regression. It's an incorrect inference you're making.

Our mind does not read bits. — L'éléphant

Firstly, it should be obvious that we can read, understand and interpret bits. Second, our perception is literally composed of what a bit is - a binary distinction. You either see an object or your don't. You either distinguish something from another, or you don't. Our perception is completely dependent on binary distinctions.

We use perception to view the world. In pictures -- which means a complete picture. — L'éléphant

I'm not sure you understood what I said. I said "Pictures can be represented in bits and bits can be processed to produce a picture." and therefore bits and pictures aren't mutually exclusive. You then replied as if they are mutually exclusive things, without proving that they are. You just asserted again that our mind doesn't read bits, but pictures instead. That isn't a response that gets us anywhere.

If you want to respond to it, you have to prove that our perception taking the form of images or anything else is somehow independent of the notion of informational bits. But I just explained that it isn't, so to make a valid response, you have to address what I said.

Information processing is perception in humans — L'éléphant

Good. Information processing takes place on bits, so perception is composed of perceptual bits.

Computers do not perceive. There is no vantage point with computers. — L'éléphant

Hence why I put "reads" in quotation marks. They can both be said to process information but only one of them perceives.

No, I'm the one confused with the above comment. I pointed that the computer does not read the way our mind reads — L'éléphant

You didn't. All you said regarding computers and minds was:

if computers use bits, our mind reads the world as pictures. — L'éléphant

This doesn't state that a computer does not read the way our mind reads, since it does not prove that pictures and bits are mutually exclusive. It doesn't necessarily follow that if computers process one way, then our minds process a different way.

Pictures can be represented in bits and bits can be processed to produce a picture. So I don't recognise the mutual exclusivity that serves as the basis of your reply.

You are arguing that the mind reads like how a computer does.
This is false. — L'éléphant

They both use information processing. Saying that one of them "reads" some substrate that isn't information isn't going to be defensible.

we humans can produce simulations/emulations to the extent that we even call them 'virtual' reality! — universeness

Yes, this is what's referred to in premise (1).

So according to any simulated universe theory, we are simulations that create simulations. — universeness

This is an irrational jump. By "we", you mean our minds, but no reason to concluide that minds are simulated has been presented here. I said I didn't see the reason to apply the property of being simulated to minds doing the simulating, and you respond by pointing out that minds simulate simulations. That does not prove that minds are simulated, so your conclusion is a jump.

The problem is that we have not established 'a mind,' — universeness

Then you missed premise (3). Minds exhibit the kind of information processing (specifically, "quantum") that physical space emerges from. So a mind is implicated from facts about what physical space is.

In other words, no human has any compelling evidence whatsoever about the existence of god — universeness

I'm confused why you think this is what I am saying. I am replying to your question "and how do you know whether or not that mind is simulated?" by saying that the grounds for that mind being simulated aren't present in the evidence or the argument. The argument doesn't depend on the idea that minds are simulated, so me admitting that there's no answer to your question doesn't count in favor or against the argument, nor show that the evidence for the conclusion is lacking.

You are simply using gaps in current scientific knowledge — universeness

I didn't say anything like this. I'm saying digital physics explains how physical phenomena are related in ways other theories fail to, hence physical space is emergent as per the holographic principle.

Which hypothesis do you mean?

By speculation, you mean like random guessing which makes no indication about how cognition takes place?

Whose mind? — universeness

All we're establishing here is a mind, hence the conclusion in (6).

and how do you know whether or not that mind is simulated? — universeness

The grounds for that possibility aren't given. The scientific evidence is that physical space is simulated.

I don't see an evident basis on which to generalize the property of being simulated to the mind that is simulating the physical space (especially since it is minds in which information processing occurs).

So, that's a simulation. What's the original template? — Vera Mont

The simulation is the world, the template is information processing in a mind.

if computers use bits, our mind reads the world as pictures — L'éléphant

I'm confused why you mention this - computers do "use" bits, and our minds do understand the world in pictures. This is an example of why my points are rushed and undefined?

You can assume I'm using standard dictionary definitions.

Towards Quantum Integrated Information Theory

"The holistic IIT approach is in principle applicable to any information-processing dynamical network regardless of its interpretation in the context of consciousness. In this paper we take the first steps towards a formulation of a general and consistent version of IIT for interacting networks of quantum systems." — Towards Quantum Integrated Information Theory

A quantum-like information processing model with memory noise for question order effect

Recently, many studies have applied quantum mathematical formalism to the modeling of quantum-like phenomena in human decision-making — A quantum-like information processing model...

Quantum Cognition: A New Theoretical Approach To Psychology
(no quote)

Quantum cognition and decision theories: A tutorial (no link)

Quantum theory provides an alternative probabilistic framework for modelling decision
making compared with classical probability theory, and has been successfully used to address behaviour considered paradoxical or irrational from a classical point of view. — Quantum cognition and decision theories: A tutorial

Contextuality and context-sensitivity in probabilistic models of cognition

In contrast, quantum cognition holds that a cognitive property maybe indeterminate, i.e., its properties do not have well established values prior to observation. We argue that indeterminacy is sufficient for incompatibility between cognitive properties. — Contextuality and context-sensitivity in probabilistic models of cognition

What Is Quantum Cognition, and How Is It Applied to Psychology?

In this introduction, we focus on two quantum principles as examples to show why quantum cognition is an appealing new theoretical direction for psychology: complementarity, which suggests that some psychological measures have to be made sequentially and that the context generated by the first measure can influence responses to the next one, producing measurement order effects, and superposition, which suggests that some psychological states cannot be defined with respect to definite values but, instead, that all possible values within the superposition have some potential for being expressed. — What Is Quantum Cognition, and How Is It Applied to Psychology?

Quantum like modeling of decision making: Quantifying uncertainty with the aid of Heisenberg–Robertson inequality

In the quantum-like framework the brain is a black box, such that its information processing can be described by the formalism of quantum theory. “Mental observables”, e.g., in the form of questions, are represented by Hermitian operators (and in more general framework by so-called positive operator valued measures, Asano et al., 2015). The mental state (or the belief state) of an agent is represented like a quantum state ... Therefore we can apply the Heisenberg uncertainty principle to characterize interrelation of uncertainties of two incompatible questions — Quantum like modeling of decision making: Quantifying uncertainty with the aid of Heisenberg–Robertson inequality

OK, I agree.

traditional definition of knowledge is 'justified true belief' — Janus

I'd say that belief presupposes knowledge, rather than knowledge being some condition on belief. In order to believe in something, you have to know something about that in which you believe. If you know no details about "it", you cannot rationally believe in "it". What I'm trying to say here is that we don't arrive at knowledge through belief, rather the other way around.

if we need to appeal to interpretation and belief (processing) and truth (correctness) — Janus

You mean if the definition contains these aspects?

According to Christian theology, the answer is 'humility'.

Necessity and contingency in Aquinas's sense don't exist because a thing doesn't have form\matter — Gregory

Form is what unifies some matter into a single object; it's how you can refer to something that has properties as a single thing.

An object is one thing composing necessity and contingency and everything is related to something else. — Gregory

I didn't understand this. Are you saying objects can be contingent in relation to one another?

his arguments presupposes God's existence although he is trying to prove it — Gregory

None of his arguments do this.

It says there is design which by definition means "done by an intellect". So he assumes God's mind in trying to prove it — Gregory

No, it only presupposes a relationship between deisgn and (our) intellects.

the first 3 ways assume contingency and God's necessity in the premises. — Gregory

No they don't.

I'm not sure if this gets directly at what you are asking for, but "religious particularism" is a relevant term — wonderer1

Thanks, it seems to be a variant of exclusivism.

with "ecumenicalism" having somewhat the opposite meaning. — wonderer1

Yes it's a form of reducible plurality, the view that I hold.

I think you will find most religions have a common thread under/through them. — Benj96

I agree.

There are several concepts that parallel across all religions. God is not one of them. Not all religions have a godhead. Taoism speaks in favour of flow of nature that is ultimately not reducible to human language/description. — Benj96

Indeed, but the implication we could take from this is that religions that aren't reconcilable, aren't so because they reject a feature of reality whereas the others don't. God might be that feature of reality.

I think religions as well as science are all fundamentally reconcilable with one another for a simple reason - they all study/ponder reality — Benj96

Correct.

In essence the reconcilability of the study of the universe as "self/conscious" (spirituality) — Benj96

I believe it is.

How can one reconcile Christianity with Hinduism or Islam or even Judaism? — Alkis Piskas

They all believe in spirits and the afterlife.

Words used in a theory — 180 Proof

By this, you mean atheism?

You agreed that atheism can be used to explain a particular state of affairs and you said theories are "explanations of how states of affairs change or formal abstractions work". Unless there's a distinction I'm missing, that seems to place atheism within the definition of a theory.

But you said that theories are "explanations of how states of affairs change or formal abstractions work".

Someone could coherently use atheism to explain why there are (on their view) no spirits or afterlife.