Theology: God == Noise
| God is perfect | (given) |
| Being perfect, God contains no redundancy | (a less redundant being would be more perfect) |
| Being devoid of redundancy there is no other entity with the same attributes as God that can be fully described with [or which represents] less information | (definition of non-redundant) |
| Therefore God is incompressible | (compressibility would imply redundancy) |
| If something is incompressible it is functionally equivalent to perfect noise/mathematical randomness | (dude, it's all about information theory) |
| Therefore God is indistinguishable from perfect mathematical randomness (noise). | (QED) |
[This may explain a few things....]
Labels: god, information_theory, theology
posted by evtujo @ 7:59 PM
[digg]
7 Comments:
Why does redundancy = non-perfection?
Just curious.
Redundant implies an unnecessary extra-ness. I am supposing a God that is perfectly efficient in every way. If another being had the same properties as a God with redundant features then it seems that this less redundant God would be more perfect, in the sense of efficiency and minimal design. But you are correct, redundancy is a tricky issue. Many people have suggested that God is entirely redundant.
let me try this again...I think blogger ate my comment.
I understand, and that makes sense. It must depend on how one defines "redundant." You have it as an "unnecessary" extra-ness. So, there is nothing superfluous about God. That works for me.
I was thinking in terms of poetics and narrative, where redundancy/repetition is not only inherent to the genre, but integral to it. Therefore, in some instances, redundancy (defined as simple repetition), would be necessary, and participate in perfection.
God could be a poem, in which case I'd have to switch over to Post-Modern Deconstruction Theology. Please don't make me do that. It makes me happier to think of God in terms of information and complexity theory. At any rate, it's pretty clear that God is a mathematician. If we can't agree on that then I'm afraid there is no hope for further discussion...
Transitioning from the mathematical to the literary realm: God is the essence of all good things. Therefore God is happy. Therefore God is gay. Therefore God approves of gay marriage.
Like the "proofs of God" of the medieval theologians, this proof that God approves of gay marriage is convincing only to those who already believe (and probably not to most of them).
I am not sure that I can agree that God is *exclusively* a mathematician.
While I would affirm that math is probably the closest language available for the communication of certainty, I could not affirm that any language, including math, is large enough, or complex enough, or beautiful enough, or comprehensive enough, to capture God fully. I actually think poetics comes closest in this regard.
Further, why is a Post-Modern Deconstructionist approach most appropriate for poetics? Why would one want to destroy a poem through false scientific presupposition? (ie, that poetry must be subservient, or, subjected to, a scientific paradigm).
Yeah, I was kidding about God being a mathematician. He was clearly a programmer working under unreasonable deadlines with incomplete specs. But not bad for a first effort, though. I'm told Cosmos 2.0 will be fantastic, but so far there is no release date.
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