After the Transition “from It to Bit”: Is This the Science Formerly Called Physics? by Lev Goldfarb

Lev

Although the notion of spacetime is incorrect (because physical existence occurs in one spatial state at a time in sequence, timing being the calibration of the rate at which change occurs), I do think some context, ie spatial position and time of occurrence, is ultimately necessary.

This is because physical influence cannot 'jump' physical circumstance. That is, something cannot be a cause, unless the effect and it are not 'next to'. And in terms of timing, the states need to be consecutive. Only direct cause/effect must be considered, as everything is ultimately interrelated, so without this limit it is meaningless, the 'butterfly flaps its wings' syndrome.

Otherwise, as said previously, there is a danger of abstraction taking on a 'life of its own'. From the 'information' perspective, weight, size, shape, texture, brightness, noise level, colour, movement, temperature, etc, etc, etc, are not physically existent. All are manifestations of something else, ie what is actually occurring. Why, especially 'out of context' is organisation/structure special?

Paul

Lev,

Regarding Fig. 6 and in the Conclusion "If this structure will be experimentally corroborated, ...": Are you offerring something that goes beyond a representation and suggests or introduces answers about properties that do not belong to theoretical physics? I recognize that theoretical physics is incapable of explaining the most important effects of the universe. What I am wondering is if you are proposing that your structural representation reveals new properties or offers new explanations, outside the purview of theoretical physics, for the causes of unexplained intelligent effects? I could be asking more questions, but I want to understand the purview of your system.

James Putnam

So fig. 6 depicts an event that casn be viewed both from the mechanical viewpoint and from your new structural viewpoint. What is it about the class that changed? What is it that goes beyond the mechanical viewpoint? It seems that the figure and your explanation could be interpreted as another mechanical explanation. I am certain you intended it to represent more than that. Are you introducing an intelligent property in fig. 6? This probably seems trivial; however, I am looking for the clear break with the mechanical perspective.

Is it your position that entanglement cannot be explained by mechanical means? I look at the figure and think that it could be depicting mechanical forces and their effects. I don't believe it is intending to do only that; but, your separation between mechanics and intelligence is not yet clear to me from that figure. Your use of the words 'interacting' and 'modifying' leave me wondering exactly what do they mean?

I have been interested in your work since I became aware of it. I do not doubt that we must go far beyond the mechanical perspective or the spatial perspective. I am looking to understand that clear break in your work. It appears to me that your structural representation could be applied without explaining the means of the 'interactions' and 'modifications'. It is probably my fault, but, I don't see the explanation of the means with regard to your presentation of fig. 6.

Here you make the point that, "...the vague appeals to "self-organization" and "top-down causation", nothing short of a fundamentally new scientific language will do." I am asking what here goes beyond the language? I am not wondering if information is flowing around. I am wondering what is it that you are saying is making use of it? Is it an intelligent property that understands the meaning of the information?

I don't mean to be misrepresenting your work, just saying what it looks like to me. In this passage it it appears to me that you are conceding that the development of recognition, the intelligent use of information, could have evolved substantially on its own: "In fact, the proposed organization is supposed to explain why an organism endowed with the capability--inherent in the entire Universe--to construct the representations of some classes in its environment (e.g. of the class of snakes) is then able to recognize members of those classes not encountered previously (new snakes). It is most unlikely that such highly nontrivial informational capability could have evolved fully on its own, especially considering the independence of the structure of (evolving) classes in an organism's environment." How much could have evolved on its own? Is it your position that you are adding the means by which recognition exists or are adding something new that is a catalyst that extends the means?

I will end my questions with these. Sorry for dragging it out. Thank you.

James Putnam

"James, I'm not quite sure what escapes you in Fig.6, but put simply, there is a conventional spatial realm and there is a fundamentally different, let's call it, for lack of a better word,"informational" realm. The later provides blueprints for the former. ..."

"Keep in mind that according to my view of ETS, for each spatial process there exists its original ("informational") blueprint in the form of the corresponding struct."

With regard to entanglement, how would one test for the difference? Even if the example had been DNA, or RNA, encoding for particular proteins, the mechanical, mechanical for me means without the aid of intelligence, explanation would suffice. However, the forms and functions of organs that are produced are not possible in the abilities of mechanical properties. This is, of course, my opinion. I think a different example from entanglement might have clarified the difference between a a spatial process and its blueprint. I wonder if you mean that it is the spatial process that produces the effects and that the blueprint is guiding it by hidden means?

If I appear to be just way off on this with little prospect of understanding you, please just say so. I can let it go.

James Putnam

Lev,

Thank you for your explanation. I understand. Good luck in the contest. :)

James Putnam

Lev

Aha, so who is being naïve now?? I commented on this when you first raised it in the essay topic, agreeing that the notion of competitors rating each other was absurd, and more importantly, stymies the ensuing debate. Which would have otherwise been a very useful mechanism for what was being said to be clarified/enhanced. Note how some have virtually no posts, and no posts have been made by the author, yet people have been 'moved' to rate the essay. And whilst I agreed with the essence of your resolution to the problem, ie poor quality essays should be screened out by a panel,the real resolution to this, which you told me I was naive about, is that a panel should judge both the essays and postings. I am not interested in the resource implications of this, if a contest is organised then that encompasses a responsibility of judging it properly.

Paul

Roll the dice, pick a number. 7 looks good, its not been used yet!!

Lev

Congratulations for an exceptionally well-written paper in which you guided us to the new horizons of your ETS concepts. From the outset I realized that I can completely agree with some of your ideas, but of others I can say "he knows what he is talking about but I just do not want to go in that direction". Examples:

You said " how many physicists are prepared to start the development ofphysics more or less anew". Count me in. The subtitle of my Beautiful Universe Theory (BU) is "Reconstructing Physics from Simple New First Principles."In my model of the universe the internal causal exchanges of angular momentum between the lattice nodes are well described by two of your statements:

"...development of a radically different - non-numeric, or structural-scientific language" and "evolving transformations systems". In other words in (BU) matter, energy, space and time all emerge from something more basic, and self-evolve according to internal exchanges of momentum (a 'language') much as in a quantum computer.

Having said that I then began to shy away from the structs representation you propose. It may well eventually work to describe how nature and thought work and interact, but using classes seems an artificial top-down coarse approach to describe what in the end would be the most delicate operations of nature at the sub-atomic level.

Yes your scheme may be " radically different from all known representations mainly because it is addressing the formative, rather than any apparent, structure." But understanding and dealing in space and structure is part of our human heritage. Is ETS a language invented for robot physicists?

I was intrigued by your enigmatic Figure 5 of a "schematic event-based version of the Huygens' view of light, which now removes the waveparticle mystery". How? I know Huygens' principle quite well and have shown in my de-diffraction research described in papers here that it is not a physically correct representation of how diffraction occurs in nature - as streamlined flow. I also know that Eric Reiter has now definitively explained particle-wave duality by debunking the point photon concept. Your comments on this and other issues here as well as on my current fqxi paper would be welcome!

With admiration for your combination of bold initiative with technical expertise in your field, I wish you the best.

Vladimir

Lev

From the brief description of informational classes in your essay I could not imagine how they can be used for example to describe the motion of a particle in a gravitational field - what kind of math would be used there?

Oh my reference to robot physicists was my attempt at a humorous expression of my bafflement about your scheme. An experience of space is a fundamental human sensation so the laws of our physics are geared to that. Humans are not necessary for the universe to function of course, and it seemed to me that if some mechanical artificial intelligence (robots) were to derive the laws of physics they might use a scheme such as the one you are advocating.

@"the spatial 'propagation' of the instantiated ETS events might be similar to the process of wave propagation as proposed by Huygens."

I now understand what you are saying but not how ETS events can describe the propagation of light.