Re: Slashdot - The Computational Requirements for the Matrix

From: Hal Finney (hal@finney.org)
Date: Sun Jun 01 2003 - 19:52:31 MDT

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    Robin writes:
    > Why simpler things should be more likely is a deep and difficult topic,
    > which I've read a bit on. But I just don't understand this argument.
    > Why must universe A have a higher probability that universe B if the
    > string describing A is a prefix for the string describing B?

    The idea is that the strings are self-delimiting, so that the part
    after the end doesn't count. Therefore, among all infinite strings, the
    fraction of them which correspond to a particular finite, self-delimited
    string of length n is equal to 2^-n.

    You would not have two universes whose definition was a subset of each
    other, because of the self-delimiting requirement. Rather, A's definition
    would be shorter than B's, hence correspondingly more infinite strings
    would be universe A than B.

    Hal

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