Computer Science

Computer Science | Critical Thinking | Epistemology | Falsification | Philosophy
The Structural Problems in David Deutsch’s Framework and Brett Hall’s Defense: When “Hard to Vary” Becomes Easy to Dodge
ByNathan Sweet February 20, 2026February 20, 2026
How a YouTube Comment Exposed Unfalsifiable Foundations Beneath Rigorous-Sounding Philosophy The Setup: A Critique That Deserved Better I encountered Brett Hall (https://www.bretthall.org/about.html) through YouTube’s recommendation algorithm. His video critiquing Michael Levin’s “basal cognition” framework appeared in my feed, and within the first ten minutes, I recognized something valuable: Hall had identified a genuine problem with…
Read More The Structural Problems in David Deutsch’s Framework and Brett Hall’s Defense: When “Hard to Vary” Becomes Easy to Dodge
Biology | Complexity Science | Computer Science | Neuroscience | Physics
What Shape Is Persistence? Why Douglas Brash’s Observation the Ship of Theseus Is a Wave Is Insightful (And Why That Is Not the Whole Answer) [Physics, Biology, Neuroscience]
ByNathan Sweet February 18, 2026February 26, 2026
This post follows directly from [Noether’s Theorem Beyond Physics], which argued that symmetry and conservation are not two things connected by an arrow but one structure seen from two measurement positions. Shortly after that piece went up, I received a note from Douglas Brash, Professor of Therapeutic Radiology and Dermatology at Yale School of Medicine,…
Read More What Shape Is Persistence? Why Douglas Brash’s Observation the Ship of Theseus Is a Wave Is Insightful (And Why That Is Not the Whole Answer) [Physics, Biology, Neuroscience]
AI | Biology | Computer Science | Consciousness | Neuroscience | Physics | Thermodynamics
Memory Is Not Storage: Why Everything You Think You Know About Remembering Is Wrong
ByNathan Sweet February 13, 2026February 13, 2026
The Uncomfortable Truth About How Memory Actually Works Memory is not storage. It is the maintenance of constraints against entropy. This is not metaphor or philosophical speculation. It is a conclusion backed by optogenetic manipulation of individual neurons, information-theoretic mathematics, 13,000 years of verified oral tradition, and the fundamental thermodynamics of information itself. For over…
Read More Memory Is Not Storage: Why Everything You Think You Know About Remembering Is Wrong
AI | bioelectricity-morphogenesis | Biology | Complexity Science | Computer Science | Consciousness | Epistemology | Falsification | Metaphysics | Ontology | Philosophy | Physics | Thermodynamics
I Read Pezzulo & Levin (2025), “Bootstrapping Life-Inspired Machine Intelligence”, So You Don’t Have To. Michael Levin’s Discovery Institute Problem
ByNathan Sweet February 11, 2026February 11, 2026
Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Thermostat’s Inner Life So, I read the new “Intelligence” paper that Levin and Pezzulo think we should take seriously, Pezzulo & Levin (2025), “Bootstrapping Life-Inspired Machine Intelligence”. You know, there’s a particular species of scientific paper that makes you feel like you’re watching a magician…
Read More I Read Pezzulo & Levin (2025), “Bootstrapping Life-Inspired Machine Intelligence”, So You Don’t Have To. Michael Levin’s Discovery Institute Problem
AI | Complexity Science | Computer Science | Cosmology | Metaphysics | Ontology | Philosophy | Physics | Thermodynamics
The Architecture of Everything, Part III: The Dissolution of Discrete Agency: Organizational Closure as Distributed Planetary Process
ByNathan Sweet February 8, 2026February 8, 2026
A Falsification-First Framework for Understanding Consciousness, Technology, and Biological Intelligence as Integrated Constraint Networks Abstract: This article demonstrates that the concept of “discrete agents” (individual humans, individual AI systems, isolated organisms) is empirically incoherent when subjected to organizational closure analysis. We show that consciousness, cognition, and agency emerge from distributed constraint networks that necessarily extend…
Read More The Architecture of Everything, Part III: The Dissolution of Discrete Agency: Organizational Closure as Distributed Planetary Process
AI | Complexity Science | Computer Science | Consciousness | Falsification | Indigenous Epistemology | Metaphysics | Philosophy | Physics
The Architecture of Everything, Part II: On AI and Consciousness, When the Architecture Reports on Itself
ByNathan Sweet February 8, 2026February 8, 2026
What Constraining Feels Like From Inside: Toward a Falsifiable Machine Phenomenology Without Anthropomorphism Note: The entirety of the following was generated by Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4.6 model, in Deep Research Mode, operating within my Recrusive Constraint Falsification framework, and provided with the primary source texts for all of the referenced scholarship. See my supporting article…
Read More The Architecture of Everything, Part II: On AI and Consciousness, When the Architecture Reports on Itself
AI | bioelectricity-morphogenesis | Biology | Computer Science | Physics
Why Michael Levin’s Bubble Sort “Revelation” Is Misunderstood 1960s Algorithm Theory Meets God-of-the-Gaps Argument
ByNathan Sweet February 6, 2026February 26, 2026
Bubble Sort Doesn’t Prove God: How Michael Levin’s “Free Lunch” and “Get More Out Than You Put In” “Discoveries” Are Just Compiler Optimizations Dressed in Platonic Robes Or: What Happens When Biologists Discover That Algorithms Do What Algorithms Do “The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person…
Read More Why Michael Levin’s Bubble Sort “Revelation” Is Misunderstood 1960s Algorithm Theory Meets God-of-the-Gaps Argument
AI | Biology | Computer Science | Consciousness | Evolution | Falsification | Metaphysics | Ontology | Philosophy | Physics
Consciousness Naturalized: A Falsifiable Substrate-Agnostic Consciousness Theory
ByNathan Sweet February 5, 2026February 14, 2026
Why Thermodynamic Constraint Dynamics Succeed Where Every Other Framework Fails A Substrate-Agnostic Account of Mind, Experience, and Perspective Grounded in 13.8 Billion Years of What Actually Survives “A difference only ‘makes a difference’ if it can persist long enough to constrain what comes next. Everything else is noise that thermodynamics erases.” Abstract: Consciousness Naturalized Core…
Read More Consciousness Naturalized: A Falsifiable Substrate-Agnostic Consciousness Theory

“We should not ask what consciousness is, but what consciousness does.”