Hi George,

You replied to Fred, "I suggest that the case of bottom up and top down causation is a duality... (that) ... allows interlevel feedback loops, which are the underlying enabling factor for the emergence of true complexity in biology."

Indeed. I have not been able to formulate a more general definition of "organization" -- whether biological or inorganic -- than "order with feedback." In fact, how could causality be more clearly implied, independent of an infinite regress?

You mentioned in a post to the anonymous respondent the barrier of state preparation in the Stern-Gerlach experiment. If you're not familiar with it, you might be interested in Leslie's Lamport's treatment of the experiment. As he notes: "No real experiment, having finite precision, can demonstrate the presence or absence of continuity, which is defined in terms of limits."

Order with feedback is a demonstrably self-limiting process.

Best,

Tom

Trying again!! This linking system does not seem to work.

I only need one example to prove that top-down processes do indeed occur in physics, just as they do in many other contexts such as in digital computers and in the human brain and in evolutionary theory . My case (elaborated here ) stands undefeated.

Hi Tom

thanks for that, that is an interesting paper.

You quote "No real experiment, having finite precision, can demonstrate the presence or absence of continuity, which is defined in terms of limits." I agree. In fact I have a closely related strong position, based on a statement by David Hilbert:

(a) no physics theory or proof that relies on infinity in an *essential* way describes the real world;

one implication is that spacetime must be quantised at a small enough scale (which is supported by many other arguments);

(b) the claimed existence of infinities of anything whatever in any physical theory is not a scientific statement, as there is no way that this claim could ever be observationally or experimentally proved.

However I did not see any close link of Lamport's paper to state vector preparation. Did you mean another paper? Or is it related to the fact that state vector preparation is never perfect? - even if so, it's still non-unitary (consider a wire polarizer).

Best,

George

So I perused Lamport's very interesting set of papers, and would like to comment on #31: "On-the-fly Garbage Collection: an Exercise in Cooperation" (with Edsger Dijkstra et al.)

The point here is that garbage collection is a crucial part of computing, and is an example of the top down process of adaptive selection: that is of selecting a set of elements to be deleted, leaving behind the ones that are meaningful. This depends on a selection criterion, which (in my terms) lives at a higher level of abstraction than the elements to be selected. That is made explicit here: " starting from the roots, all reachable nodes are marked; upon completion of this marking cycle all unmarked nodes can be concluded to be garbage, and are appended to the free list". The selection criterion is reachability.

This is the key process by which meaningful information is garnered: you delete the stuff that is not meaningful, thereby creating a smaller set of stuff which has meaning. This is related for example to deleting emails and unwanted files n your computer, as well as to the fact that this process (it's essentially clearing memory) is where entropy is generated - because it's an irreversible process (assuming that deleted stuff is gone). Just like biology (deleted animals are past history) -- and like state vector preparation.

Best,

George

Ok I'm very slow. Now I see your relation of Buridan's Ass to selection, which is of course a binary decision.

Yes it's very nice. The idea of quantisation of the decision process is needed: it's based in discrete rather than continuous variables - which fits in well with Hilbert's maxim: "the infinite is nowhere to be found in reality, no matter what experiences, observations, and knowledge are appealed to." There is no continuum of any variables in the real world. Another example of the disjunction between mathematical models and reality.

George

George, it was highly interesting to see you go through the same process of comprehending Lamport's formulation of Buridan's principle as I! Whereas you did it in minutes, however, it took me years. (So you're not that slow, after all.) I had long worked with the mathematical ramifications of Buridan's Ass before stumbling across Lamport's then-unpublished paper ("Buridan's Principle") written in 1984, a couple of years ago. I found it deeply subtle. I suggested to Leslie last year that "Foundations of Physics" is a suitable venue, and after some months of refereeing, it was published in April.

I hold now, as strongly as ever, that this physical principle impacts every continuous measurement function at every scale. When Leslie and I corresponded by Email last February, he indicated that he thinks the reference he added that was suggested by a referee -- no. 7 by Busch, et al, is a "really profound analysis" of the Stern-Gerlach experiment. I bought the book and read the chapter a couple of times, though I am not sure I agree that the analysis is as profound as Lamport's, perhaps because I am looking at things from a classical viewpoint rather than that of computer design.

In another communication, he attached a PDF of a then-unpublished book by David Kinniment that I just learned has now been published posthumously (sadly, Prof. emeritus Kinniment passed away in May), as *Synchronization and Arbitration in Digital Systems* which came to me as *He Who Hesitates is Lost.* You might be interested in that one, too.

All best,

Tom

Correction: I misunderstood the information on the site I linked. *He Who Hesitates is Lost" is a separate work.

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  • Post #357

Dear Fred and George,

SECOND LAW OF THERMODYNAMICS - A 'TOP DOWN CAUSATION'.

Fred Diether wrote:"I am wondering if top-down / bottom-up causation is a duality? Could one exist without the other? I think that is what you are saying or the point you are trying to make".

'Top Down' concept is not something marginal as the author of the essay seems to think. (For instance he thinks the top down causation of the Sun on earth manifests in marginal effects like the tides. Well then lunar tides have to be considered as 'Bottom Up!!!') 'Top down' concept is far, far deeper. It is one of the basic principles in Nature.

Nature's processes are a hierarchy of self-similar structures. (Sergey Fedosin brings this out in his essay). If they are a 'hierarchy' how is the hierarchic dominance and organic links established between two adjacent levels?.

Here is Newton for you: "And thus Nature will be very conformable to herself and vey simple, performing all the great Motions of heavenly Bodies, by the Attraction of Gravity, which intercedes those Bodies, and almost all the small one of their Particles by some other attractive and repelling Powers which intercede the Particles. ...... To tell us that every Species of Things is endow'd with an occult specifick Quality (of Gravity and of magnetick and electrick Attractions and of fermentations) by which it acts and produces Effects, is to TELL US NOTHING: But to derive TWO OR THREE GENERAL PRINCIPLES of Motion from Phaenomena, and afterwards to tell us how Properties and Actions of all corporeal Things follow from those manifest Principles, would be a VERY GREAT STEP IN PHILOSOPHY...." (Query 31)

One of those GENERAL PRINCIPLES: The process below forms an organic link with the next higher level in the hierarchy. Or looked at it the other way, the two processes form an interface between the two levels by usurping a fraction of energy from the lower level.

The second law of thermodynamics comes into effect by way of this process of interfacing of the two levels of energy.

Let us look at Carnot's ideal engine, where not all the heat energy (Q = S1T1) generated gets converted into work. It is found that a fraction Q = S1T2 gets 'lost', and what is available for conversion to work is S1(T1 -T2) where T2 is the temperature of the background field. This is why the perpetuum mobile of the second kind is impossible.

Einstein understood that there is a analogical connection between the perpetuum mobile and the Lorentz transformation. (See my essay: http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1549 )

"The universal principle of the special theory of relativity is contained in the postulate: The laws of physics are invariant with respect to Lorentz transformations, ..... This is a restricting principle for natural laws, comparable to the restricting principle of the non-existence of the perpetuum mobile which underlie thermodynamics" (1, p.57).

Well if there is "an analogical connection", there has to be a GENERAL PRINCIPLE underlying both processes. Hence Einstein wrote: . "By and by I despaired of the possibility of discovering the true laws by means of constructive efforts based on known facts. The longer and the more despairingly I tried, the more I came to the conviction that only the discovery of a universal formal principle could lead to assured results. The example I saw before me was thermodynamics. The general principle was there given in the theorem: laws of nature are such that it is impossible to construct a perpetuum mobile" (1, p.53).

So what is this GENERAL PRINCIPLE: In general terms, the fraction of energy Q usurped to form the organic link with the background is given by the product of the extensive component Ea of the energy in action and the intensive component Ib of the energy of the background. Thus the fraction of energy forming the organic link with the background

Q = Ea x Ib.

When this general principle is applied to the motion of a particle relative to the background velocity field of the earth's orbital motion, a similar fraction of energy will be required to form the interface. Lorentz opens his 1904 paper (which is on the 'Lorentz transformation') recognising such a process. "The problem of determining the influence exerted on electrical and optical phenomena ..... in virtue of the Eath's annual motion....".

But the problem was how to account for the gamma-factor. See my paper to find out how the gamma-factors comes into being in equations -.http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1549

Best regards,

Viraj

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  • Post #359

O.K.

I sending just now again

Dear Dr Ellis,

First of all I would like reminding to you one quote from famous neurophysiologist Warren McCulloch, known for his work on the foundation for certain brain theories and his contribution to the cybernetics movement .

In the last century he wrote:

''As I see what we need first and foremost is not correct theory, but some

theory to start from, whereby we may hope to ask a question so that we will

get an answer, if only to the effect that our notion was entirely

erroneous. Most of the time we never even get around to asking the question

in such a form that it can have an answer."(Discussion with John von Neumann

John von Neumann Collected works, Volume 5,p.319)

It was about mind - body relationship and brain function

My question is the following:

I think this is applicable to modern physics?

I put forward 3 questions:

1) 4D space-time?

2) Gravity as a fundamental force?

3) 3 fundamental dimensional constants(G, c, h)?

My attempts to get answers see my essay

http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1413

Sincerely

Yuri Danoyan

Dear George,

When I commented above that "the definitions of "top" and "down" are both fuzzy and arbitrary. To this extent it is may be a triviality. But I think it's deeper than that", I was not referring specifically to 'your' definitions, which I had not bothered to lookup, but to the generic definition of 'top' and 'bottom'. In fact, my mind was still on Fred's excellent question and my response to him. There was no criticism of your essay intended, none at all.

And the rest of my remark to Pentcho was due to the fact that I had recently read a comment of his on another thread that contained quotes I found very interesting. I did not realize that he had been insulting you, although I do know that he pushes his own view with minimum tact. Again, there was no criticism of you implied.

These side issues distract from what was, I thought, an excellent question by Fred. I find dualities both fascinating and deep.

Edwin Eugene Klingman

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  • Post #361

George F. R. Ellis,

Edwin's message of today drew my attention to your message from which I quote this:

"If further such personal attacks are made in postings to my thread by anyone at all, I may well cease reading what is posted here and stop answering all postings. Why on earth should I put up with this kind of behaviour?"

I hope that you decide to ignore and remove offending messages instead. Earlier this morning I was thinking about your forum and felt motivated to write a thank you message. I haven't participated in discussion here that I recall, but, my thought earlier was that I appreciate that you submitted an essay and also that you give generously of your time to particpate in discussions with other authors. Your essay has been at the top or very near the top in community votes. It is the participation of the professionals that makes this contest work. Anyway, this is a thank you from someone who's ideas of which I believe you would strongly disapprove and prefer to not be bothered with. :)

James

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  • Post #362

I wish to thank George F.R. Ellis for the immense quality of the author's thread; that I, and the community, read ever with pleasure.

There is a sea of knowledge, a complete and deep quality of the answers, that all of us appreciate.

I cannot avoid that a person can attack Ellis, so I ask a great favor for the community: I don't consider important to read the attacks to Ellis, so that he can erase the attacks.

Saluti

Domenico

Dear George,

I couldn't add a new post at the end of the discussion page so I try in this thread that seems somehow related.

How robust your hierarchy depicted in Table 2 for a digital computer system is in the light of Turing's universality? From Turing universality we know that for a computation S with input i we can always write another computer program S with empty input computing the same function than S for i. Also one can always decompose a computation S into S and i, so data and software are not of essential (ontological?) different nature. I also wonder if it isn't statistical mechanics the acknowledge that the view you are arguing against is not the general assumption in the practice of science.

Dear Yuri

this is off the topic of my thread, but still:

1) 4D space-time? -- yes!

2) Gravity as a fundamental force? -- of course: but it's not a force like other forces, it's an expression of spacetime curvature, because of the principle of equivalence. Its the gravitational field (the Weyl tensor) that is more fundamental.

3) 3 fundamental dimensional constants(G, c, h)? -- well it's the dimensionless constants that really count. The "Living Review" by J-P Uzan is great on the topic: see here

I'll try to get to your essay

George

Viraj

I like that statement: "One of those GENERAL PRINCIPLES: The process below forms an organic link with the next higher level in the hierarchy. Or looked at it the other way, the two processes form an interface between the two levels by usurping a fraction of energy from the lower level. The second law of thermodynamics comes into effect by way of this process of interfacing of the two levels of energy. "

Not sure about the application to the particle motion. take it more to deal with systems of particles rather than individual particle.

George

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    • Post #366

    Dear George and Fred,

    George wrote: "Not sure about the application (of the general principle underlying 2nd law of TD) to the particle motion. take it more to deal with systems of particles rather than individual particle".

    The above comment was with reference to my earlier statement: ...." the two processes form an interface between the two levels by usurping a fraction of energy from the lower level. The second law of thermodynamics comes into effect by way of this process of interfacing of the two levels of energy. "

    This General Principle (since it is a GENERAL PRINCIPLE) should apply to particles taken separately or collectively, in the same way as gravitation applies to each an every particle in a body or the body taken as a whole.

    Newton in the Principia addressed this principle. Under the 'Definitions' he dealt with both a system of particles as well as a discrete motion of a single particle (body)

    About a systems of particles in motion:

    "It is a property of motion, that the parts, which retain their positions to their wholes, do partake of the motions of those wholes. .... if the surrounding bodies are moved, those that are at rest within them will partake of their motion.... For the surrounding bodies stand in the like relation to the surrounded as the exterior part of a whole does to the interior, or as the shell does to the kernel; but if the shell moves, the kernel will also move, as being part of the whole, without any removal from the shell.

    About the discrete motion of a particle:

    "A property, near akin to the preceding is that, if a place is moved, whatever is placed therein moves along with it. THEREFORE A BODY, WHICH IS MOVED FROM A PLACE IN MOTION, PARTAKES ALSO OF THE MOTION OF ITS PLACE ...." (p. 9)

    And under 'Axioms' Newton dealt with a system of particles in motion (in Corollary V) as follows: "The motions of bodies included in a given space are the same among themselves, whether that space is at rest or moves uniformly forwards in a right line without any circular motion" (p. 20). ..... "A clear proof of this we have from the experiment of a ship; where all motions happen after the same manner, whether the ship is at rest, or is carried forwards in a right line...".

    The above was in reference to Galileo's statement: "The CAUSE of all these correspondences of effects is the fact that the ship's MOTION IS COMMON to all the things contained in it" (p. 187).

    (And do you know what this principle is? It is GALILEO'S PRINCIPLE OF RELATIVITY. Poincare removed the CAUSE - COMMON MOTION - from this principle. And used only the apparent effect to formulate his Principle of Relativity. This distortion made by Poincare is a significant contributory factor to the present crisis in Physics).

    When a particle on earth is set in motion on earth, the effective applied energy p' =Mvc too HAS TO HAVE A COMPONENT OF COMMON MOTION WITH THE EARTH. And to determine this component, we need to apply EINSTEIN'S PRINCIPLE OF 'INERTIA OF ENERGY' to p'. Which is p'/c2 = Mv/c (extensive component of the energy).

    As discussed in the previous post the general principle is that a fraction of energy in action is usurped equal to the product of the extensive component of the energy in action and the intensive component of the background energy field (just like in Carnot's engine). For the case of a relative motion of a particle on earth, the intensive component of the background energy is the velocity of earth's orbital motion u.

    Hence the component usurped to form the organic link with the background is (Mv/c).u. Then the momentum left for relative motion is (Mv/c)(c- u).

    At near light velocities v/c tends to 1. Hence for these velocities the displacement x' = (x -ut) which is the so-called "Galilean transformation".

    But how do we get from here to Lorentz transformation? How do we account for the GAMMA-FACTOR in LT?

    Please see the last section "Geometrodynamics of the Lorentz transformation' of my essay:.http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1549

    This is why Einstein INTUITIVELY wrote: "The UNIVERSAL PRINCIPLE of the special theory of relativity is contained in the postulate: The laws of physics are invariant with respect to Lorentz transformations, ..... This is a restricting principle for natural laws, comparable to the restricting principle of the non-existence of the perpetuum mobile which underlie thermodynamics" (1, p.57).

    By discovering this Universal Principle (or "Top Down Causation") which runs through all the physical processes, we are proving Einstein to be right.

    Best regards,

    Viraj

    Well I'm delighted you have proved Einstsin right.

    Just one point: he got the gamma result direct from the relativity principle. He got it right.

    George