Self-descriptive Physical Object

[mfb]

That's true, but describing he description does.

No it doesn't. You do rely on "write the letters that you read", but reading letters is okay as you said, and how to write the letters can be described as detailed as you want.

 

[valenumr]

This seems like a question of accuracy in reverse engineering. The result of the experiment depends on your accuracy of measurement as well as the ability to reproduce the product at a specific accuracy. Both of these have limits, but it shouldn't be a problem if everything is not quatum-scale, at least technically.

 

[DaveC426913]

This seems like a question of accuracy in reverse engineering. The result of the experiment depends on your accuracy of measurement as well as the ability to reproduce the product at a specific accuracy. Both of these have limits, but it shouldn't be a problem if everything is not quatum-scale, at least technically.

That's not the challenge as-stated, no.

See paragraphs 4 and 5 of the OP:

Now, I know what you're thinking "The object already contains a description of itself - in its own measurements! Just measure every relevant coordinate."

Well, that would be an analogue description, and it's pretty prone to error. The description of the object would suffer from measurement error, and that would be compounded each time.

The thought experiment is that reverse engineering the object is cheating.

 

[valenumr]

That's not the challenge as-stated, no.

See paragraphs 4 and 5 of the OP:

The thought experiment is that reverse engineering the object is cheating.

I understood, but I guess what I mean is, it seems the ability to accomplish such a task is only limited by ones ability to describe an object (or measure it) and ability to reproduce such specifications accurately. If we could do such things perfectly, perhaps we would have star trek level transporters.

I suppose your argument relating to information theory, or information encoding is more on topic, but I think the point is relevant.