What Came Before the Big Bang? | Theory of Embedded Intelligence, Bill Mensch & Bernardo Kastrup

Could it be a coincidence that two founding fathers of modern day computing, independently from each other, are both coming with theories of consciousness that are idealist in nature? Or does a deep understanding of what computation is—and what it is not—inevitably lead away from physicalist ideas on consciousness? Previously Essentia Foundation presented the work of Federico Faggin, and now a legendary contemporary of his, computer engineer Bill Mensch, presents his Theory of Embedded Intelligence (TEI) to us. Mensch was a major contributor to the Motorola 6800 and became famous for his work on the MOS Technology 6502 CPU, a chip that, because of it’s efficiency, completely revolutionized computing in the 80’s. From Arcade halls to the Apple II and Nintendo 8 bit consoles, 6502s could be found everywhere. Even to this day the chip is still used in children's toys and even in pacemakers and satellites. Looking back at his career, Mensch realizes that building computer chips is in essence a form of ‘embedding’ intelligence in technology, just as nature has embedded intelligence in biological systems, like humans. In his TEI model intelligence is fundamental. This raises the philosophical question of how consciousness relates to intelligence, and for this reason Bernardo Kastrup joined in on the conversation Mensch and Hans Busstra had. The value of a theory like Mensch’s is perhaps exactly that it is not philosophically fine-tuned to the terminology commonly used in philosophy of mind. By not taking the human mind and phenomenal consciousness as its departure point, but intelligence instead, Mensch arrives at a position in which the distinction between living beings and abiotic systems is less distinct. Mensch's slides can be downloaded here: https://www.essentiafoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/Theory-of-Embedded-Intelligence-by-Bill-Mensch-2024-08-30.pptx 00:00 Introduction 03:30 Bernardo Kastrup on the importance of Bill's work 08:17 Start of Bill Mensch's presentation 11:16 The model of intelligence in the TEI 14:06 Consciousness as Sense, Process, Communicate and Actuate (SPCA) 25:36 Evolution from Free Intelligence 30:53 Collective intelligence evolution 33:41 On Machine Intelligence 35:58 Learning from Nature 38:30 Learning from Embedded Intelligence Technology 41:20 End of presentation, Start Q&A 42:07 How does Bill's theory enrich Bernardo Kastrup? 45:34 How Bill's model of intelligence relates to an analytical idealist framework 49:40 Why is intelligence embedding itself in our universe? 52:57 Phenomenal consciousness and intelligence 55:32 The distinction between living systems and abiotic systems in Bill's theory 57:07 Sensing, cognition and relevance realization 59:04 Bill on cosmology 1:02:05 The difference between living systems and technology 1:08:57 In a certain sense we are the same as computerchips 1:10:23 On Michael Levin's work 1:13:58 Is Nature's Free Intelligence, GOD? 1:21:56 On mythology in science 1:26:35 Closing remarks Copyright © 2024 by Essentia Foundation. All rights reserved.