An Accidental Universe

Anonymousse

I cannot be bothered with this anymore. You do not address what I am saying. So please keep on wasting your time trying to solve the mystery.

Paul

Constantinos

No. I do not even have "a view of math". Somewhat obviously, it is important to know first, in generic terms, what it is that is being investigated, ie what physical process determines awareness, and how can that occur. Then, assuming due process, and correspondence with that, maths, as with any other representational device, can be deployed to represent it. Maths, by virtue of its more specific character, ie as opposed to narrative, is less subject to flaws when applied. However, it is still easy to construct a flawed representation of something, if the presumptions about it are flawed. In other words, a maths model can be intrinsically correct, but extrinsically it does not actually correspond with what it is supposed to be depicting. In simple language, it is philosophy by numbers.

Paul

I don't address what you're saying?

First you said optical illusion:

"...light conveying the existent sequence, so that it can be observed, will take ever longer to reach the recipient observer, thereby creating the impression, to the observer, that the sequence is slowing down."

Then I said no, clocks would agree if so, but they don't:

"then if we chose to turn the receding source object around and bring it back to the observer, we'd find that their clocks were in exact agreement."

Then you said, ok, maybe you're right:

"Let us assume, for the sake of this argument that this occurs. That is, movement affects the rate at which timing devices tick. The question then is, so what."

So having had your argument clearly shown to be wrong (and therefore your point addressed), you then tried denying that there's a mystery in an entirely different way.

Face it, there's a mystery. Those who deny it are doing physics for different reasons than those who admit it. They're often doing physics for self-esteem from the idea that they know things. But the good physicists, like Newton, Einstein, and many, many others, have always admitted what we don't know before they start. These good physicists simply want to know what's out there, and are not afraid of admitting what they don't know.

" ... it seems the real question, that which is overlooked, what is the absolute, ie. zero."

John, if you just knew a little analysis, you would know that zero is not overlooked.

Tom

Paul,

We are talking in circles now! Of course any representation of "what is" will be wrong and will ultimately fail. I said so in my last two FQXi essays. Specifically in The Metaphysics of Physics. This is so, as I argue there, here and elsewhere, because any description of "what is" is metaphysical. Whether such is mathematical or not.

So I think we have agreement here. But one wont know from your long convoluted replies. In a previous comment to you I argued though Math as Math has 'inherent validity' the application of Math in Physics to describe "what is" does not. You disagreed! In light of your views now, I wonder why! Shifting position standing over quicksand?

My disagreement with you is that you think we can know "what is" as being that sensory 'input' we receive from outside. Though I agree to an outside 'physical existence' independent of us, in my view we cannot know it. Just as we cannot know another human being. Since knowing involves our minds. And anything we can say we observe is what our mind has made aware. I have understood you disagree with that. And you feel our 'sense experience' is "what is". But whose 'sense experience'? Yours? Do we have a common 'sense experience'? How do we 'know' that? That is the problem. And that is what prompted my comment in the 'other thread' you have objected to.

There is not much to be added or subtracted. So lets leave it at a more agreeable point.

Constantinos

Tom,

A while back, you wrote "one binary choice from among an infinite set of initial conditions implies continuously branching probabilities."

Consider the very first binary branch point, at *the beginning of time*, before life existed anywhere. One branch leads to the condition "life will ultimately emerge somewhere", and the other branch leads to the condition "life will never emerge anywhere".

The multiverse hypothesis ignores the latter, because, if the two conditions are equally likely, *a priori*, that is "in the beginning", then the hypothesis can never explain why the *a posteriori*, that is "at the present time", probability of life = 1. In essence, in order to make the hypothesis work, rather than prove that the emergence of life is inevitable, it had to assume (by ignoring the other branch) that the emergence of life is *necessary*, right from the start. It thus assumes the very thing it claims to prove.

If one is going to simply assume that the emergence of life is *necessary*, one might as well assume that is necessary for a *universe*, and dispense with the then unnecessary *multiverse*.

Rob McEachern

Rob,

You write, "A while back, you wrote 'one binary choice from among an infinite set of initial conditions implies continuously branching probabilities.'

Yes.

"Consider the very first binary branch point, at *the beginning of time*, before life existed anywhere. One branch leads to the condition 'life will ultimately emerge somewhere', and the other branch leads to the condition 'life will never emerge anywhere'."

That is not an example of continuously branching probabilities. You assume but two logical possibilities, and assign probability 1 to one and 0 to the other. A continuously branching schema of equally likely universes does not assume the excluded middle -- what we can say with probability 1, though, is that at least one branch will produce life as we know it. After all, it did.

"The multiverse hypothesis ignores the latter, because, if the two conditions are equally likely, *a priori*, that is 'in the beginning', then the hypothesis can never explain why the *a posteriori*, that is 'at the present time', probability of life = 1."

Oh yes, it can. If Albrecht is right, the "beginning" is ambiguous.

"In essence, in order to make the hypothesis work, rather than prove that the emergence of life is inevitable, it had to assume (by ignoring the other branch) that the emergence of life is *necessary*, right from the start. It thus assumes the very thing it claims to prove."

Not at all. The many worlds hypothesis is not a tree with just two mutually exclusive branches. That's a strawman argument.

"If one is going to simply assume that the emergence of life is *necessary*, one might as well assume that is necessary for a *universe*, and dispense with the then unnecessary *multiverse*."

You're neglecting that the multivers is a sufficient condition for life, not necessary. The necessary condition is the equally likely hypothesis. The multiverse may, in fact, be the *only* domain where the equally likely hypothesis applies. (Personally, I think so.)

Tom

Tom,

How then do we get from multiples of zero to "something?"

It certainly seems possible, given how the banking system functions, but that does seem like a large confidence game. I'm just wondering if physics isn't using complexity in a similar fashion.

Rob, Tom,

It seems like various issues are being mixed into a muddle here. Consider the earlier discussion of whether all probability is ultimately random. The first question there is whether there is ultimately a wave collapse into one state, or if multiworlds are emerging. If the multiworlds scenario, then the probability is.5 and we just happen to be in the one where life is allowed. If it does actually collapse into one, then the probabilty of life is 1.

It seems that issue is between the quantum and classical worlds and how probabilities actually resolve themselves. As I keep arguing, it boils down to how we view time. Say the future probabilities of a coin toss are 50/50, but after the coin is tossed, it is 100. So what had been a future probability became a past certainty. What changed? The coin was tossed. For that particular coin/event, the wave did collapse. The is no need for multiverses to explain this classic relation between probability and actuality, only that it is a function of physical occurrence and not points on a time vector.

Professor Andreas Albrecht:

"Time is fundamental to our interpretation of the world yet we very rarely question our choice of timekeeper. All that is required is something that can serve as a clock, preferably with a regular rhythm, whether that is the steady trickle of sand in an hourglass, the gentle swing of a pendulum or the quantum vibrations of an atom".

I suppose you said those lines that I wrought above and were cited by Bob Swarup on the "Accidental Universe" article.

As a) "Time is fundamental to our interpretation of the world"

b) "Our choice of timekeeper"

c) "All that is required is something that can serve as a clock, preferably with a regular rhythm whether that is the steady trickle of sand in an hourglass, the gentle swing of a pendulum or the quantum vibrations of an atom".

a)If "time" is fundamental to our interpretation of the world". I were wandering about, what you think "time" is ?, how you define it ?. If you know the experimental meaning of "time" ?. If you can't do that, I don't know how you can state that is fundamental for us in the interpretation of the world ?

b) If you offer to choice a timekeeper I suppose there is a significative difference between the different clocks. I am wandering which are the possible differences between those clocks? And what these have in common? Not that those are variable ,because the whole universe is variable.

c) To serve as a clock, what are the necessary conditions to be one? The regular rhythm is preferable or is indispensable ?

I suppose a clear substantial, convincing and reasoned answers to the points a),b),c) are necessary to be able to continue with your following statements.

With my best whishes

Hector Daniel Gianni

Jim:

general relativity mathematically proved, that velocity and gravity slow time, later on were also experimentally proved with several experiences, also reach technology with the GPS (time dilation). Tell me if you ever read, or some physicist friend told you How speed and gravity slow time? How gravity as a force act on "time"?. We already know that "time" can be slower or faster, how anybody can explain to you, on which part of the invisible untouchable parts of "time" speed and gravity acts slowing it. Nobody would do it, even Einstein couldn't do it, because to explain why, we should have prove of "time" existence to know what it is, and we don't . But if we know that "time" is "movement" we already know how gravity and inertia can slow movement. That it is why I think is so important to understand that we have to replace "time" by "movement".

Hector

Tom,

Regarding "You assume but two logical possibilities, and assign probability 1 to one and 0 to the other."

I did not assume anything. I merely stated that there are two mutually exclusive alternatives. I did not assign probabilities to either. I merely pointed-out that the multiverse hypothesis *does* assign the probabilities you indicated, thereby ignoring all conventional logic. And that is the problem.

Rob McEachern

John,

The issue of concern in the earlier discussion was not "whether all probability is ultimately random", but whether or not such a probability model is the correct model for all of the major processes at work in the universe. I am arguing that it is not.

Regarding: "So what had been a future probability became a past certainty. What changed? The coin was tossed."

If the probability of some unlikely event is equal to "d", then, after "N" independent trials, the probability of never observing the event is (1-d) raised to the Nth power. This approaches zero, as N becomes large. In other words, the event will almost certainly be observed eventually. But this will not be the case if d=0.

Rob McEachern

Rob,

You write, "'I did not assume anything. I merely stated that there are two mutually exclusive alternatives.'"

You *assumed* that there are two mutually exclusive alternatives. In logic, this is called the principle of the excluded middle.

"I did not assign probabilities to either. I merely pointed-out that the multiverse hypothesis *does* assign the probabilities you indicated, thereby ignoring all conventional logic. And that is the problem."

Not all conventional logic is two-valued. Allowing the excluded middle is consistent with all forms of probability theory -- not only those dealing with perfect information, or the assigning (Bayesian style) of definite probabilities to an interval, based on personal belief. A continuously branching probability function is the only way to assure objective correspondence between expected outcome values and continuous input values from a range of random variables. In that case, the equally likely hypothesis applies only to the initial condition, and every subsequent probability calculation within that system of continuous measurement functions is a conditional result of broken symmetry.

The kicker is, there is every reason to think that Poincare recurrence renews the initial condition at every measurement event. This would be equivalent to clock ambiguity in Albrecht's terms -- so that time reversible analysis identifies a different initial condition for every system of continuous measurement.

Tom

Rob,

Sorry about that. I meant to say the discussion was about whether all probability/randomness is ultimately quantum. The issue of multiworlds arises from whether the quantum wave function collapses. I was just pointing out how classic probabilities collapse into actualities and suggesting this might also apply to quantum probabilities. Remember QM still uses an external timeline(past to future) and Albrecht's observation is that using different such timelines results in different outcomes. So my point is to eliminate the external timeline and just let time emerge from the physical process. Then you are not trying to project from the actualized past into the probabilistic future, but allowing the physical process to select which path to follow.

Tom,

What is the "excluded middle", that lies between proposition (1) life is possible, and proposition (2) life is not possible? Or more generally, what is the excluded middle between proposition "A" and not "A"? It cannot have anything to do with probability; "not possible" means probability = 0, not just some infinitesimally small value.

Rob McEachern

John,

"So my point is to eliminate the external timeline and just let time emerge from the physical process. Then you are not trying to project from the actualized past into the probabilistic future, but allowing the physical process to select which path to follow."

I think you have the basic idea, but it is important to distinguish between "reality" and our "descriptions of reality". The "external timeline" is external to "reality", in the sense that it is part of our "descriptions of reality", but those descriptions are part of "reality" per se.

Physical processes do simply proceed. But how should one attempt to describe those proceedings? Physics has adopted a multi-step description process:

(1) Fit an equation to the past observations.

(2) Hypothesis that the equation may succeed in describing new data, observed under circumstances that differ from those of the original data, such as at different (future) times.

(3) Collect new data under the altered circumstances, and compare it to the Hypothesized results.

(4) Modify the equation if it does not fit the new data.

(5) Repeat 1-4.

We do not have to "allow the physical process to select which path to follow." It will do so, whether we allow it to or not. We cannot control the laws of nature, but we can control our descriptions of them. The process described above, is designed to produce Hypotheses that do not have to be continually modified, every time some new data is collected; it is to be hoped that the description "converges", in the sense that eventually, new data no longer necessitates modification of the description.

The issue of time, boils down to this: If the equation being used to describe the data, uses a "clock" that differs from the clock being used to collect the data, then the description will probably fail.

Rob McEachern

Rob,

I agree with your position. For example; "but those descriptions are part of "reality" per se."

As mobile points of reference, we still experience time as a sequence of events, even if the larger reality is non-linear. Think in terms of Newtons's observation that "For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction." Necessarily an action is linear, but the reaction by the environment is non-linear. Such as a boat moving trough water, by pushing it out of the way in front and having it fill in behind, an equal volume/weight is effectively moving in the opposite direction, thus counterbalancing the motion of the boat. Our environments ultimately do the same thing, in many, non-linear ways.

As we go from past to future events, these events go in the opposite direction, from being in the future to being in the past. To the hands of the clock, the face moves counterclockwise.

Then again, we still see the sun as moving from east to west, even though we know it is the earth rotating west to east.

" Physics has adopted a multi-step description process:..

We gather information inductively, as events emerge from possibilities, then use the cause and effect sequence deductively. Particular events go future to past, as the sequence of events goes from past to future.

"The issue of time, boils down to this: If the equation being used to describe the data, uses a "clock" that differs from the clock being used to collect the data, then the description will probably fail."

Aka; Garbage in, garbage out.

Constantinos

"Though I agree to an outside 'physical existence' independent of us, in my view we cannot know it...Since knowing involves our minds"

If we cannot even know that, then why bother to embark on science at all? And if it is independent of us, which it obviously is, we can't we know that? You continue to conflate logical possibility and existence as is knowable to us (either directly or indirectly). Or, put another way around, are confusing two meanings of the verb know. The first one revolves around physical reception. By virtue of the fact that there is an independent existence and physical process, we receive physical input. The second meaning of know relates to the subsequent processing of that input by the brain/sensory system. That results in a perception/interpretation of what was received, in effect we are enabled to be aware that we were aware of (received) something. The brick was aware (knew) of existence, as it too received physical input, ie light struck it. But a brick cannot then process this. That processing is not part of the physical circumstance.

What physics is endeavouring to explain is what was physically received, which was then processed, and what physically caused that. And given that we are part of that existence, we can only be aware of it in one form, ie that which is potentially experienceable. Which has a definitive and identifiable form, ie we cannot presume the abstract as that is effectivey a metaphysical stance. What we must not do is presume how that form actually manifests, ie within the closed system we must establish what is happening.

Paul