Questioning the Foundations: Which of Our Basic Physical Assumptions Are Wrong? Experimenter’s Free Will by Joseph Bisognano

[deleted]

Joseph,

Citation from my article "Free will and the incomleteness of physics" published in Internet at January 30, 2010: "Usual explanation of physical laws started with word "if". If we do [some action], then we will see [some result]. But in deterministic world word "if" is senseless! Nobody can do something that is not on the unique track of the world development. In the deterministic world physics does not exist - history only exists.". Also: "Physicist makes his experiments in the places and moments written in the "main book of history". And he cannot freely repeat these experiments. He has no more freedom of experiments, than mechanical doll. Question: what is happened in the world in moments and places that are not scheduled for an observation?,- is senseless. We never will know that."

Article is at the address: http://yosefalberton.wordpress.com/article/free-will-and-the-incompleteness-of-1hm3pfkdolphw-39/

Peter Morgan

I have often thought that the Sherlock Holmes that you quote is appropriate, but I've never dared to quote it myself. The insistence on free will could be said to require classical physicists not to take the initial conditions in the past to be what they have to be to obtain (given whatever the dynamics might be) what we see now, setting up a classic straw man.

I suppose you are aware of the various attempts in the literature to take on the free will assumption, or, as it might also be called, the no-conspiracy assumption, but have chosen not to cite 't Hooft, for example, in this context. For that matter, Wolfram takes this approach in his discussion of finite automata. FWIW, you will find a discussion of this aspect in my solitary contribution to the Bell literature, "Bell inequalities for random fields", J. Phys. A: Math. Gen. 39 (2006) 7441-7455, http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/0305-4470/39/23/018, cond-mat/0403692, although I certainly cannot claim any precedence.

There are quite a few difficulties with *using* a conspiracy approach, the intractability of available deterministic models relative to Hilbert space models for a given set of experiments (that are only repeatable in a statistical sense) being the most awkward, IMO. One can take solace in the possibility of such models, without troubling oneself with actually constructing them.

Joseph Bisognano

Although absolutely proving impossibility may be beyond the realm of physical argument, I conjecture, that, after decades of work and a growing body of no-go theorems , solving the quantum measurement problem is likely impossible without dropping the assumption of an experimenter's free will. Clearly, many have realized that super determinism is the loophole (I mention Bell as just one example), but discomfort with conspiracies makes these arguments often tentative and apologetic. The core of my argument is, in the spirit of Sherlock Holmes, to grasp this idea wholeheartedly and see where it leads. I offer one example, more as a self assembly over space-time rather than teleology or a conspiracy at the beginning of time. But this is only given as an example, and other ideas such as Ellis's top-down approach may ultimately be the way forward. The main point is to urge a serious investigation (international workshops?) of where the denial of an experimenter's free will can take us.

Steve Dufourny

give me the tool of money, and I will insert harmonious parameters of universal equilibriums. 1 composting at Big scale

2 vegetal multiplication

3 opimization of soils

...

101 SPHERIZATION

Avtar Singh

Dear Joseph:

I would greatly appreciate it if you could respond to my comments above.

Thanks in advance,

Avtar

[deleted]

Joseph,

I liked your essay and believe you got it right. The observer needs to be taken into account.

If the free will of the observer is not taken into account you get the standard QM.

Here is an page from my website that gives an unorthodox view of Feynman's mysterious e.

With your essay in mind I would say that the number e is due to not taking into account the free will of the observer.

See if you agree.

http://digitalwavetheory.com/DWT/18_Feynmans_Mysterious_"e".html

Don Limuti

[deleted]

Joseph wrote:

"With all of space-time truly a unified whole, existing outside of the flow of time, determinism and quasi free will coexist."

I think wrong assumption to have space-time and flow of times\

space and time are anisotropic.

See my essay http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1413

Vladimir Tamari

Hello. This is group message to you and the writers of some 80 contest essays that I have already read, rated and probably commented on.

This year I feel proud that the following old and new online friends have accepted my suggestion that they submit their ideas to this contest. Please feel free to read, comment on and rate these essays (including mine) if you have not already done so, thanks:

Why We Still Don't Have Quantum Nucleodynamics by Norman D. Cook a summary of his Springer book on the subject.

A Challenge to Quantized Absorption by Experiment and Theory by Eric Stanley Reiter Very important experiments based on Planck's loading theory, proving that Einstein's idea that the photon is a particle is wrong.

An Artist's Modest Proposal by Kenneth Snelson The world-famous inventor of Tensegrity applies his ideas of structure to de Broglie's atom.

Notes on Relativity by Edward Hoerdt Questioning how the Michelson-Morely experiment is analyzed in the context of Special Relativity

Vladimir Tamari's essay Fix Physics! Is Physics like a badly-designed building? A humorous illustrate take. Plus: Seven foundational questions suggest a new beginning.

Thank you and good luck.

Vladimir

Sergey Fedosin

If you do not understand why your rating dropped down. As I found ratings in the contest are calculated in the next way. Suppose your rating is [math]R_1 [/math] and [math]N_1 [/math] was the quantity of people which gave you ratings. Then you have [math]S_1=R_1 N_1 [/math] of points. After it anyone give you [math]dS [/math] of points so you have [math]S_2=S_1+ dS [/math] of points and [math]N_2=N_1+1 [/math] is the common quantity of the people which gave you ratings. At the same time you will have [math]S_2=R_2 N_2 [/math] of points. From here, if you want to be R2 > R1 there must be: [math]S_2/ N_2>S_1/ N_1 [/math] or [math] (S_1+ dS) / (N_1+1) >S_1/ N_1 [/math] or [math] dS >S_1/ N_1 =R_1[/math] In other words if you want to increase rating of anyone you must give him more points [math]dS [/math] then the participant`s rating [math]R_1 [/math] was at the moment you rated him. From here it is seen that in the contest are special rules for ratings. And from here there are misunderstanding of some participants what is happened with their ratings. Moreover since community ratings are hided some participants do not sure how increase ratings of others and gives them maximum 10 points. But in the case the scale from 1 to 10 of points do not work, and some essays are overestimated and some essays are drop down. In my opinion it is a bad problem with this Contest rating process. I hope the FQXI community will change the rating process.

Sergey Fedosin

Janko Kokosar

Dear Joseph,

I see that your essay is something what I was should to read. I clarified the problem of measurement, and I got useful references. But, why did you not give reference for t'Hooft http://igitur-archive.library.uu.nl/phys/2005-0622-152928/14728.pdf He has a similar idea of determinism of quantum theory. (I hope that this is here, otherwise this is other o'Hooft article?)

Otherwise, I have a different solution to your problem. (The seventh section.) I claim that every free will decision is a fundamental quantum phenomenon. I speak in favour of panpsychism. Thus, every quantum collapse is one decision of a primitive unit of consciousness. We see them as random, because they are not connected.

Thus, I think, with this model the measurement problem disappears?

Maybe you will object that EPR experiment cannot be explained on this way, because of superluminal effects. But I claim that spacetime is emergent, thus EPR contains three decisions, of two observers, and of one electron-spin pair.

I hope for any remark, that it will give me to think.

Best regards

Janko Kokosar

[deleted]

I'm certainly not the first person to point out that superdeterminism is a loophole for the measurement problem. As I point out, Bell was quite aware of this, and most recently 't Hooft has championed this idea. Rather, my main point is that given the decades of failure to answer the measurement problem without invoking superdeterminism, in the spirit of the Sherlock Holmes quote, this improbable solution may prove to be the only possible solution. As a second point, I offer a holisitic view of an Escher-like self consistency of a space-time net rather than a conspiracy of initial conditions as a way forward.

Cristinel Stoica

Hi Joseph,

Please check this link and find how five essays, including yours, were removed from the 35 finalists. I posted some messages with attachments containing the page and screenshots at 0:01.

Good luck,

Cristi Stoica

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