“math = all formal languages”
Link to originalBackground for computational functionalism
Mathematics … the domain of all formal languages
Reality is math hypothesis … the universe is a mathematical object
Epistemological math hypothesis … all that can be known is mathematical (needs to be represented in a language)
Minds do math hypothesis … all mental activity can be described in mathematical terms
Classical mathematicians: “There exist mathematical objects that cannot be constructed (computed), but they nevertheless exist”
Computationalists: “That doesn’t make sense / you’re hallucinating those objects → Only constructive maths (computation) works” … At some point you run into contradictions. What you have to do instead is build up everything from a simple table of automata. There are many equivalent ways of doing this (church-turing thesis).
Some philosophers: “People can make proofs that computers cannot make”
Computational functionalist → Computers can think.