Dear Armin, I reacted on your constructive and critical post on my thread. Thank you for your time and effort, for easy find I'll give you the the link

I am still awaiting your answers of my post of 25 august, but take your time I saw on the net that you are very busy with video's and so on, sorry but here in the country of France I have only very slow internet so that viewing a video is not a pleasant thing.

best regards

Wilhelmus

    Hi Joe,

    I am honestly not sure if you are asking me in jest or if you are serious, but I will give you a serious reply: I think we have to assume certain very basic facts about our existence simply as a given in order to make sense out of our reality. One of these that I take as a given that in a normal state of mind my sense do not deceive me. Since my sense experience tells me that there are three dimensions of space and I know of no evidence to the contrary, this is sufficient for me to accept this as a basic part of reality.

    take care,

    Armin

    Hi Ben,

    Wow, I hope your piano (and the rest of your stuff) did not suffer any damage. Also, is any of your music available to listen to anywhere?

    I have noticed that many people with a predilection for math/physics are also musically talented. There should be a record label just for people like us. It could be called quantum music or something like that. Ha!

    Armin

    Hi Avtar,

    I did ask you some questions on your paper, which you were kind of enough to answer. As regards the relationship of the metatheor to dark matter and dark energy, I suspect that you may have missed the appendix of my paper, in which I present a guess, based on the overall pattern of how our theories of nature fit the schema, that these may be manifestations of higher-dimensional events/objects observable to us.

    Thank you for your comments,

    Armin

    Hi Peter,

    Thank you for your comments. I must admit your comment "I agree with most of your proposals, but do still cling on to the fundamental belief that nature IS logical and comprehensible to intelligent creatures, without 'divisions'" puzzles me a little.

    Surely you recognize that there are already 'divisions' in the domains of validity of any area of human endeavor, be they the arts, sciences, mathematics etc.? The 'division' I propose is modeled after one that is already an integral feature of Euclidean Geometry, so I'm not sure why you find that it should be avoided. But it doesn't matter because my framework makes a definite prediction: If we fail to find superposed gravity fields for objects in a quantum superposition, as predicted, we have no choice but to go with a 'division'. I see no other way to save the internal consistency of our description of nature under that circumstance.

    Thanks again,

    Armin

    Dear Colin,

    Thank you for so much for your comments. I have the impression that you have obtained a good idea about what my theory, given that you read the original paper, my essay paper and watched the talk. I find it very gratifying that someone has understood the main points of my idea. I don't nearly care as much about whether one agrees or disagrees with my ideas(though in the latter case I would care to know the reasons for disagreement) as I do about just being understood.

    thank you, Colin, and if you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask.

    Hi Anton,

    thank you for your useful criticism. The problem you point out may be partly due to the font style and the fact that some paragraphs just happened to end at the end of the line. Neverteless, it is important for me to take into account just how easily my papers can be read and I thank you for sharing your perspective.

    My knowledge of accretion disks is too little to be able to usefully comment on your second paragraph.

    thanks once more,

    Armin

    Hi Jerzy,

    Thank you for your feedback. Would you care to elaborate why you did not find it a very easy task to read my essay? Was this also because of overly long paragraphs? Having seen some of your work I suspect that instead it may be that my paper is not nearly as mathematical and precise in the expression of some of the core concepts as one would expect of a mathematical paper. But I'm not sure, and your feedback would certainly help me improve my writing style.

    I completely agree that mathematics bridges the separate domains, just as the concept of area does not suddenly become meaningless in three-space. It is just the entities that are the subject of the theory and described by it which are confined to those domains.

    As for your question about the relationship between the pictures, I take it that you are asking me about the relationship between the object in fig. 3 and that in fig.4 and how it relates to quantum theory. I think you understand the analogy correctly: fig. 3 is an analogy for a an eigenstate immediately after it has been 'measured' and fig. 4 is an analogy for the superposition state just before the measurement (also fig.5 which is an analogy for the 2-state system). the attribution of an interval along z is an analogy for a 'measurement'. note that the analogy can even to a limited extent accommodate a change in basis: Instead of 1 unit length along z, we could chose 2 or n unit length to attribute to the column, in which case fig. 4 would turn into a superposition of an infinite number of objects with unit width and depth but n-unit height.

    The purpose of these pictures and analogies is just to help develop intuition for the basic idea, which is simply that an object (really a worldline) in areatime manifests itself to spacetime observers as a superposition of spacetime worldlines which however do not have the same quality of existence as the worldlines of spacetime objects., and that a 'measurement' is what happens when the superposition of worldlines collapses to just one actual one.

    I hope I was able to answer your questions. if you have more feel free to let me know.

    take care,

    Armin

    Hi I went back to your post and saw that it contained some questions I did not see. Ok, here is my best attempt to answer your questions:

    You said: "When I read your DFR concept, it again brought me to essentials like "a square has only one side" or is two sides ? for a flatlander it has only one side , and a moebiusring does not exist in his 2 dimensional universe. On page 5 you are creating the column of squares, just as a straight line , a fixed z coordinate, however the Z coordinate can take any value, so that any form is "actualizable".

    Saying that to a flatlander a square has only one side is like saying that to us a cube (when looked at face-on) has only one face. Do you see that you are conflating perspective with dimensionality? A flat lander can go around the square and thereby establish that it has four sides and that it is not just a line segment. A moebius ring like region in flatland could exist in principle: cut at two places into sheet of paper to make a long strip without separating the strip, then twist that part between the cuts (the strip) by 180 degrees and glue the ends of the strip to the edges. You won't be able to glue the entire strip, but if it is long and narrow enough, you can glue that part that is the closest to where you started to cut. For us, this would be like a region in space for us in which if you go in and come out in a certain directions everything is mirror-reversed, but that is just exotica that I don't think is relevant to my idea. The last part of your paragraph seems to agree with my idea.

    You said:"Your page 6 is in fact the same as the theory of the collapse of the wave function, even the comparision to the Feynman path, I like your description of area time as "it manifests itself to spacetime observers as asuperposition of two actualizable matter distributions describable by ....". The only remark here is that you accept already the existance of the "observer" (!)"

    Indeed, I do already accept the existence of the (spacetime) observer. this is required by the fact that quantum mechanics goes in the (2,3) box (refer to the appendix). I could have also not accepted the existence of a spacetime observer; that would be a theory of areatime interactions when spacetime has not yet emerged, and this theory goes into the (2,2) box, such a theory is only metaphysical for us, since we cannot observe in 2+1 dimensions, so I see no problem.

    You said:"On page 7 you mention "two or more objects described by the same non-factorizable wave function who share the same wave-function, share common wave factors", I came to a different interpretation (with almost the same result) and introduced the Objective Simultaneity Speres, together forming a foam being the origin of "decoherence".

    No, in my paper I stated that"... two or more objects... described by the same non-factorizable wave function...share common *phase* factors." This is a big difference that can only be appreciated if you know something about the mathematical structure of the wave function. Also, I would be very careful in claiming that a an idea you have corresponds to a well-defined concept like "decoherence" without showing how it exactly does that. To understand decoherence you will already have to know quite a bit of quantum mechanics. Using a technical term like "decoherence" in your theory without actually showing how your theory corresponds to it will damage the credibility of your theory.

    You said:" I liked very much you schema of the "METATHEORY OF NATURE", very good , the only thing you could think about is that the dimensional frames could also go to the negative side and perhaps there all the dark energy and so on can be found."

    We use negative dimensions already all the time, they are called *densities*. For example, mass density is mass per volume or mass times length^(-3). If you look at the schema, you see that, for example area=length ^2, so a negative dimension has to be a density. If you meant negative signs in front of a dimension i.e. as a coefficient, then I don't know what that means, other than perhaps a direction in an arbitrarily defined coordinate system.

    While Dark Energy indeed appears to be a negative energy density, I don't think your suggestion will help understand it any better, because "negative" in this context has a completely different meaning:it refers to the energy not to the density.

    You said:"I hope that you take the time to comment also on my essay, this tile I took also at heart your posts wher you gave me indications how to be more clear."

    Well I did and as I said, you have greatly improved how you communicate your ideas. Communicating one's ideas is very important but it is not enough: You also have to make sure your ideas match what we know, and the only way to be certain that you can do this is to learn what we already know. I was in your situation several years ago, but I have made a sincere effort to learn what we know, and continue to do so. I am sure that you are making some effort to learn what we know, but to be effective, it should not be from a science popularization but a text book. Also, in response to our exchange I suggested to Max Tegmark that FQXi add a physics resource section, and they did. Have you seen it? If not, go to the community page and look at the upper left corner.

    Thanks for your comments and good luck in your endeavors,

    Armin

    Armin, you rock! Loved your Borodin. Have you heard of his the Little Suite? The first piece, "In a monastery" is sheer magic. Very Russian. If you find it online, please let me know. I've never heard it performed and am curious about other interpretations.

    I found your essay very interesting. Funny that you too reference Flatland. (me too, here, which makes 4 of us so far. The other essay is very good too. Check it out. I forget now who the 4th person is...)

    Re your essay: "It is created by the fact that the Euclidean plane was not assigned a z-coordinate and hence the representation of the square in 3-space requires the inclusion of all z-coordinates."

    from where does it "require"?

    Re: "What hubris to think that the description of nature in all its richness would be exhausted just by unifying a few types of interactions in our small corner and calling this a `theory of everything'."

    that was very good.

      Dear Armin,

      you yourself might think that there is no final theory of the universe, but your work as far as I know it is already moving in this direction. Take your paper: A Novel Way of Understanding Quantum Mechanics. In this paper you are attempting to clarify what Quantum Mechanics tells us about reality.

      I have no doubt an deeper understanding of Quantum Mechanics is the key to a final theory. The physicst S. Weinberg f.e. is convinced that Quantum Mechanics is that part of today's physics, that survives unchanged in a final theory. I agree..

      In your paper above-mentioned you are dealing with a simple pattern that is composed of a Square and of a Circle. And just this simple geometrical pattern is - as conceived by me - part of a space-time-picture, that allows us to understand Quantum Mechanics on a deeper level. My FQXI_2012-paper ---Is the Speed of Light c of Dual Nature?--- is implicitly talking about this space-time-picture. In my reply to your current comment I have sketched this space-time-picture in an explicit manner - at least in parts.

      Kind Regards

      Helmut

      Mi M.V.,

      Thank you for the critique and for listening. I had planned to upload more music but reading all these essays has caused me to fall behind.

      Yes, I had heard some of its pieces but not "In a monastery". I did find the link below:

      http://youtu.be/ix1t4AsQXdo

      I find Borodin's music has a very unique quality which I like a lot. Very few composers have such a distinctness pervading their work. The other composer like that who comes to mind is Chopin, whose music is also very beautiful.

      I thought that probably many readers here are familiar with flatland, and that it would not be a bad idea to start from familiar place to launch some ideas that are no doubt highly unfamiliar to many.

      About your question: I will give a mathematical and a conceptual answer.

      The mathematical answer is that if in a given coordinate system you wish to specify a lower-dimensional "surface", you just specify that part of it that you want to assign a position in space and leave the rest unspecified. Thus, x=3, for example, specifies an infinite plane that intersects the x-axis at 3. r=3 in a spherical coordinate system specifies a sphere of radius 3, and so on. So when you leave certain properties of the surface unspecified, they mathematically take on all possible values for that property.

      The conceptual answer to your question is that when you leave the property unspecified, it attains an "empty slot" for that value. This means that you cannot assign it any definite value (that would be filling the slot with a definite value), but you still wish to represent it somehow in the higher-dimensional space. If you think of an empty slot as one that is "waiting to be filled" then the representation would include all possible values, since any of those could eventually fill the slot.

      I don't know if my conceptual explanation made any sense to you, but I would appreciate your feedback on whether it did or not. I believe it is important to be able to communicate my unfamiliar ideas clearly to others, so your question is received with much gratitude.

      Thank you also for the final comment.

      All the best,

      Armin

      Dear Helmut,

      Thank you for your comments. I agree too that quantum mechanics will survive, too unchanged, in the sense that its predictions won't be proven wrong. My framework, which I'm pleased to find out you are familiar with, introduces only an additional distinction that is not present in standard quantum theory. The distinction, however, has to my mind the effect of separating the boundaries of validity of quantum theory and general relativity, as I explain in my essay. If the schema I present in the appendix to my above paper has any merit, then you could call this the outline of a "final theory' but for the reasons I discuss in my essay and the appendix I take on a different perspective.

      Incidentally, the square-circle example in my "understanding" paper was just a device to try to more easily get the concept across about how my framework explains entanglement. Originally I had instead a x and pattern in mind, but found that it was too confusing to represent in 3 dimensions. I did read your paper and lef a comment.

      Thanks again.

      All the best,

      Armin

      Thanks for the Borodin link on youtube. She needs to up the tempo and add some passion to it. Also, her.. forgot what they are called in English... are too stubby. I am afraid this was not a good intro to this magical piece. I loved your sunny variations though. They kept playing in my head for a few days.

      Thank you for answering my question and good luck to you!

      Armin,

      Hi. Great essay! My comments are:

      1. First off, you're an excellent writer!

      2. Second off, your way of thinking where you describe what things might visually look like to observers from different perspectives, like from a two-dimensional or a three-dimensional perspective, is a very good way of thinking. Because the minds of mathematicians and physicists (and everybody) are observing things from an existent, finite (not infinite), and 3-dimensional perspective, they can easily miss things that might not be finite or three-dimensional or that might be described better from a different perspective. I've tried to do something similar in one of my essays where I talk about how an infinite set of finite-sized balls spreading out in all directions might appear to a finite observer within the set and to a hypothetical, infinite observer outside the set. The different views of this set as discrete and continuous, respectively, may have relevance to our different descriptions of our universe as discrete or continuous (https://sites.google.com/site/ralphthewebsite/filecabinet/infinite-sets-ii)?

      3. The one thing I might either not understand or disagree with is that it seems like if a square were truly 2-dimensional (2-DFR), it wouldn't exist? It would flatten down to nothing and then disappear completely. I have trouble accepting that anything with one of its dimensions being zero (not just approaching zero but actually zero) could actually exist. If the square were to exist, I think it would be a very flat 3-FDR. Also, if a 2-FDR square were not associated with a z coordinate in 3-space, is it really in 3-space? It seems like that to exist in 3-space, the square must exist at some location or set of possible locations (ie, z coordinates) in 3-space?

      But, my lack of understanding of this point doesn't negate your main arguments at all. As you point out, I think it's of great importance that mathematicians, physicists, and philosophers realize that things can look totally different depending on the perspective they're being observed/thought-about from. If they could see this, I think there'd be some major progress along the lines of what you talk about in your essay.

      Anyways, I think this is one of the best essays in the contest. Nice going!

      Roger

        Armin,

        Hi. One additional comment about representing a 2-DFR square that's not associated with a a z coordinate in 3-space as an infinitely long column is this:

        Actually, I'd say that a 2-DFR square that is not associated with a z coordinate in 3-space is not yet in 3-space. Only after it appears in 3-space does it seem to us "after the fact" that it could have been in any z-plane before it appeared. But, none of these z-planes existed for the 2-DFR square before it appeared. So, we're retroactively putting a continuous column of possible z-plane locations onto the 2-DFR square even though none of these z-planes existed for the square before it appeared. I think this relates to quantum weirdness. For instance, with the cat in Schroedinger's Box, it's assumed that before the box is opened, the cat exists in all possible states. But, I'd say that the cat doesn't exist in the box at all. Once we open the box, this is equivalent to actualizing the cat (causing it to come into existence), and then we go back "after the fact" and say the cat could have been in any possible state. But, none of those states even existed until after we opened the box.

        I've been kind of thinking about this in regards to my ideas on the question of "why is there something rather than nothing?". As the fundamental units of spatial existence are created, these units are also creating spatial locations/positions. There was no space and no locations until after they were created. But, then we go back after the fact and say, well those fundamental units could have been created in any location, not realizing that there were no locations until after they were created. My thinking on this questions is at:

        https://sites.google.com/site/ralphthewebsite/filecabinet/why-things-exist-something-nothing

        Thanks! Once again, excellent essay. I think our thinking is along the same lines and, unfortunately, outside the mainstream.

        Hi Armin,

        Thanks a lot for your explanations. The difficulty which I met reading your essay was on my side - your essay is certainly perfectly written. Only in some cases when I tried to digg details more carefully the length of sentences was an obstraction to me. Simply, I am not good enough in English.

        Regarding superposition etc. I think I understand what you mean, mathematics is a little help here; but still the difference between just collection of pictures (call it superposition) organized in higher dimensional object, and the QM superposed object can be relevant. I mean that if it is not the case we could call any collection a superposition. Even we use a probability on instances it is not enough to have QM superposition. OK, you say that this is solved by considering the collection as merely potential and the instant picture as actual. Do you mean by this anything different than the relation between an operator and its eigenvalues? If not can we represent the potential collection by an self-adjoint operator and (somehow) the instances by its eigenvectors? If yes, does it reduce to the ordinary Hilbert space QM? I ask because I am realy interested in understanding of your work.

        Thanks for your explanations.

        Good luck,

        Jerzy