Helmut,

I must be mistaken; I have always assumed that the spelling, Hansen, indicated Danish ancestry while, Hanson, indicated German. Regardless, I would imagine both names are somehow closely related.

I followed the link to Ole Nydahl's website which is very interesting indeed. Here in Houston, Texas, we have the Dawn Mountain Temple, a temple in the Tibetan tradition. I've been practicing various forms of Hatha Yoga, Mantra Yoga, and Pranayama for a number of years but have never had any formal training. In spite of the lack of training I have realized some rather formidable results. I did engage in some informal studies (Pali chanting and meditation primarily) at Buumon Temple in Port Arthur, Texas. The Most Reverend Viet, the founder and senior Abbot of Buumon is a first class gardener! He has some exquisite lotus and lily ponds and over 30 varieties of bamboo growing; he even has a Bodhi tree on site!

My spiritual journy was really inspired by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. I read a book by the philosopher, Renee Weber, A Dialogue Between Scientists and Sages, several years ago in which she included an interview with His Holiness and the Quantum Physicist, David Bohm. Dr. Bohm asked His Holiness if there was ever a situation in which a Buddhist was justified in taking another human's life. His Holiness answered that there was a situation in which a Buddhist would be, not only spiritually justified, but spiritually responsible for taking another human's life. This situation would be if the Buddhist had prior knowledge that another human planned to take the lives of multiple beings (more than one human). In such a situation the Buddhist would be Karmically required to shoulder the Karmic burden of the one death in order to spare the would be killer the tremendous Karmic burden of multiple deaths. Of course proper and improper motivation also plays a role. I found His Holiness' answer rather profound and decided I had better start reading some of his books! The rest is, shall we say, synchronicity . . .

Best regards,

Wes Hansen

Hi Helmut and Hoang,

Why do you still say... "we are still looking for a fundamental particle that is really indivisible... If atomism is rigorously based on terms of spatial divisibility we will never know, if a discovered particle is really indivisible or not".

Such a particle obviously cannot be detected by any instruments since it will be smaller than any technique or device to measure it. It can only be detected by logic and reductio ad absurdum arguments, some of which I proposed in my essay. What do have against Leibniz's monads being that particle?

Visited here before. Just visiting again.

Cheerio,

Akinbo

7 days later

Hi Akinbo,

I've read your paper, in which monads are introduced as foundational elements of reality. You are defining monads explicitly in a binary way. But by doing this, monads can only exist in two possible states of equal propability: 50 : 50. A Universe that would be built up in this way is a dead Universe, something like a big crystal, because nothing can change. If the two possible states of the monads does possess exactly the same probability of existence resp. emergence then nothing can change their symmetry.

In my FQXi-Paper 2012 (Can the Universe be completely digitized?) I have highlighted this argument. It is admittedly not a strong argument, but it is an argument.

Regards

Helmut

P.S. I've rated your paper.

Thanks Helmut for reading and rating my paper. I will be doing likewise.

The probability is not 50:50 and the universe will be full of activity, with monads constantly emerging, some annihaling to nothing and some staying permanently on. Indeed, you can make a monads appear and disappear by taking a walk! I tried to demonstrate this with 'digital motion'.

I will check your 2012 paper and comment later.

Regards,

Akinbo

Hi Helmut,

You said: "In FQXi's 2011 essay contest I asked: Can the Universe Be Completely Digitized? I denied this possibility - and I still denies it. If the Universe were physically built up by bits (h = bit) nothing could happen in our Universe, because the two possible states would have the same probability: 50:50. In other words, a Universe built up by BITS (as a sort of logical atoms) would be a perfect crystal."

I agree with you that both states would have the same probability but if you consider that the universe is a growing sphere of information, this is not geometrically possible. Take a look at my essay and you will see what I mean.

I also agree with you that metaphysics can be conducted as an exact science like nuclear physics. You might want to read the end of my 3D Universe Theory, I propose a possible "scientific" explanation of the soul.

Cheers,

Patrick

Helmut,

If given the time and the wits to evaluate over 120 more entries, I have a month to try. My seemingly whimsical title, "It's good to be the king," is serious about our subject.

Jim

4 days later

Hi Helmut,

Yes. In blackbody radiation there are more energy levels per unit energy interval at higher temperatures, so we need increasingly more decimals to distinguish successive energy levels at higher energies, temperatures. If there can be no maximum to the energy or temperature, then size of the energy gap between two subsequence levels can become arbitrarily small. Though energy is quantified, there is no minimum limit to the size of the quantum, so the Planck length and Planck time etc. have no special significance. The Planck constant h is like the number 1 in mathematics, encompassing all values between 0.5 and 1.5. If we can measure the Planck constant to the next decimal at a higher energy, a higher temperature, then we can write that number as 1.0, which encompasses all numbers between 0.95 and 1.05. So if we set h = 1 in our equations, then every time we improve the accuracy of the Planck constant, we increase the magnifying power of our microscope with a factor 10.

Cheers, Anton

6 days later

Paul responds above to Jochen:

"The real question at present is whether Planck is concerned with (for want of better phrases) the reality as occurred, or the reality as represented by light."

This question appears to be related to one of the basic issues of my essay on the collapse of causal theory in the philosophy of science, namely that believers in Biblical worldview which first inspired the development of the empirical sciences in the late middle ages became incapable of (or unwilling to) defend their own worldview based on the existence of God as the ultimate cause of the cosmos.

Western science was built, necessarily I think, on such a worldview with an Intelligent Designer. Not a popular idea today, but making a comeback (no, I am not a "young earther"). As the first scientists said, "We are thinking God's thoughts after Him." The secular view prevailed, but then the collapse of God as the causal explanation left us with no substantial explanation at all. We have been inventing substitutes ever since, but seem to have run out. That has led to the current essay question: "Its from Bits, or Bits from Its" Which causes which? My response to the title question is neither can cause either. Neither information nor things are adequate causal concepts.

All that seems to me relevant to the question of ultimate cause because boundary concepts, such as the speed of light, are favorite places to look for such a substitute.

"Reality as represented by light" is a phenomenal perception of reality. But that means that, as George Berkeley noted of Newtons' world of massey atoms, there is no possibility of observing those atoms other than via the sensory world. We never see the "actual" world of Newtons atoms any more than we actually see the "light" behind our visual perceptions. So there is no way to check whether our perceptions are accurate, or even whether those atoms (or light) actually exist to cause our perceptions. The "as it occurred" aspect of Paul's quote thus becomes metaphysically opaque.

Paul replies to Helmut...:

"c is not the speed of light, as in what is utilised in observation, when deployed by Einstein. It is just a constant, ie the theoretical speed of light in vacuo, used to calibrate distance and duration, nobody sees with it."

Is there an unseen thing called "light" by which we see? That has been the common sense assumption. Paul's reply to Helmut seems to support the notion that the speed of light is a boundary concept which helps define the nature of visually perceived reality. But I think that does not help solve the need for a causal concept by which to understand the existence of (or our perception of) a world which is contingent (not logically necessary), and thus in need of an explanation for its existence. At best, it only shifts the burden back to atoms or light or whatever.

I would be interested in whether anyone thinks my 9-page case on these issues (backed up by doctoral degree) has substance.

Earle Fox

Dear Helmut,

Good to see your essay here. I have some questions:

1) I am familiar with Zeilinger's Urprinzip but I have always wondered why it has not gained more popularity as the It from Bit view became more prevalent. Do you know why?

2) I am getting an incorrect result when I rewrite your derivation:

[math]A*=\frac{S*h}{k}=\frac{S}{H}\frac{h}{k}=k\ln{2}\frac{h}{k}=h \ln2[/math]

whereas according to equation (10), the natural log should be in the denominator. My suspicion is that the problem lies between equations (3) and (4) because there you seem to imply by virtue of the numerical and dimensional value

[math]\mu=S*[/math]

Is that what you really meant?

Also, assuming that it all works out I must admit that I did not quite follow the significance that you attribute to the mathematical derivation because the natural log of 2 factor is one of the two factors by which H and S differ from each other. If you could show that the inclusion of the natural log in the definition of H is not a matter of convention, then it would seem to me that your case would be stronger.

Finally, when I was still in the thinking stages about the contest, I thought about titling my entry "It and bit- two sides of the same coin?" and I saw that you had thought of a similar phrase at the end of your essay.

All the best,

Armin

    Helmut,

    Reading comments section, I want to suggest you the following view on Special Relativity.

    Minkowski space has a critical speed parameter, called c. Massless things happen to fly at this critical speed. In fact we are lucky that light, something used be humanity for ages, happened to travel at this critical for our space speed. This allowed us to discovere pretty quickly that spacetime is more of a pseudo-Riemannian manifold, which must have this special critical speed, which is called speed of light do to historic inertia.

    Cheers,

    Mikalai

    Dear Helmut,

    It and Nit are like two sides of the same coin, sounds very reasonable to me. I like your approach and found your essay very interesting. Planck units are certainly fundamental in nature I agree with that.

    Nice work.

    Please take a look at my essay if you get chance.

    Best wishes,

    Antony

    Dear Armin,

    thank you very much for your comment and your questions.

    To your questions:

    (1) Zeilinger's Urprinzip does not really explain anything. It describes the internal limitation of quantum mechanics only in a different language. To put it pointedly: It is a sort of shadow philosophy of the Kopenhagen Interpretation. That's possibly the reason, why it gained no more attention.

    (2) You got indeed a correct result: If you calculate the expression of h x ln2 (i.e. h x 0.693...), you get the value of A* = 4, 592.. x ... erg/sec.

    You are right, to unveil equation (5) as a fundamental resp. meaningful one, we have to show that the natural log in the definition of H is not a matter of convention. A German theorist states that equation (5) in connection with Euler's number e is able to explain the mass spectrum of the quarks.

    http://www.necnet.de/planckwelt/Skaleninvarianz.html

    I am not sure, whether this conviction turns out to be right or not, but in equation (5) there is some truth in it - no doubt. As you know Einstein was deeply convinced, too, that pure numbers like e are the genuine universal constants, because they appear in some sense with necessity in the logical evolution of mathematics as unique individual formations, which have nothing to do with conventional units. Euler's number e f.e. generates the sequence e = 1 1 1/2! 1/3! ...

    However, I will read your paper and comment it later.

    Kind Regards

    Helmut

    Dear Helmut,

    Thanking you to think the h as NIT. Then why c and other physical constant magnitudes would not have that similar characteristic?

    I invite you in my essay as well to read there some relevant ideas, which are almost closer of yours.

    Regards

    Dipak

    Dear Helmut,

    I have down loaded your essay and soon post my comments on it. Meanwhile, please, go through my essay and post your comments.

    Regards and good luck in the contest,

    Sreenath BN.

    http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1827

    Helmut,

    Great little essay and much bigger big ('little!') thesis, with which I agree and think is excellently derived.

    You point out; "...we are still looking for a fundamental particle that is really indivisible", and "the fundamental logic underlying our visible Universe is ...- not a bivalent one, it is of multivalent nature." Which I also base my own essay on (though I do charge off and test the power of 'multi valued spaces' down to the planck limit.

    And I very much liked and agreed:

    "...an important insight about the most deep nature of the Universe... If the natural digit (nit) is the fundamental modus operandi how the Universe processes its internal information then the quantum of action (i.e. Plancks constant) is nothing else than the physical resp. visible side of this process"

    I can't understand why so few have scored it, or why it's so low, but a top score coming from me to help. Very well earned. I do hope you can similarly read, score and comment on mine in the extra time we now have.

    Very best wishes.

    Peter

    Dear Helmut,

    I have read with great interest your article, and I must say that (contrary to most of the other articles) I agree with it and find it very interesting.

    However, allow me say that I have a complain. You write at the beginning that Wheeler's idea of informational theoretical foundation of physics has "gained renewed interest" with Zeilinger paper. I have great respect for Zeilinger and his ideas, and maybe he himself was not aware of my work in the previous years, but I think that that the attention to these ideas started with my 1996 work:

    C Rovelli: ``Relational Quantum Mechanics", International Journal of Theoretical Physics, 35, 1637 (1996). Arxiv: quant-ph/9609002

    This is the paper that is cited by several of the first articles that begun to focus on information foundations in physics.

    I am happy to recognize Zeilinger ideas and contributions, but please do not rewrite history and do not forger this paper, which is the one that started the attention on information theory at the basis of quant theory, after Wheeler.

    Best, Carlo

    5 days later

    Dear Helmut,

    I have reread (and re-rated!) your essay. As we have observed something happen with program and last posts/rating has ben deleted. So, I do it again succesful.

    Sincerely

    George

    Dear Helmut,

    Contests FQXi - is primarily a new radical idea. "The trouble with physics" push ... You have a new radical idea. In your essay deep original ontological analysis in the basic strategy of Descartes's method of doubt, given new ideas, new concepts and conclusions.

    I totally agree with you:

    «... That metaphysics can be conducted as an exact science like nuclear physics.»

    «If the Universe were physically built up by bits (h = bit) nothing could happen in our Universe, because the two possible states would have the same probability: 50:50.»

    «... The fundamental logic underlying our visible Universe is - as far as I can see - not a bivalent one, it is of multivalent nature.»

    In modern physics, "fundamental constants" is not interpreted at the deepest level, do not find out exactly what "constants" are "fundamental." Their understanding of the methodological, not ontological. Their understanding of the need for the construction of the ontological basis. Here the principle of simplicity is key. "Occam's Razor" should be very sharp. A small number of constants should be sufficient to describe the set of complex phenomena. The constants that must lie in the ontological basis of physics - it SUOERCONSTANTS. So think of mathematics as "close physics" (mathematician Ludwig Faddeev interview in the magazine "Expert" - "The equation of the evil spirit" http://expert.ru/expert/2007/29/faddeev/), then perhaps these superconstants are purely mathematical. Aspiration of physics to a deep understanding of the nature of information suggests that the basic (unconditional) FORMS of EXISTENCE od MATTER should be the basis for the "seizure" of the constants at all levels of matter and their relation to information as a multivalent phenomenon. Build a basic structure of the fundamental of knowledge - the "GENERAL FRAMEWORK STRUCTURE" (David Gross «Expert» №6 08.02.2013 http://expert.ru/expert/2013/06/iz-chego-sostoit-prostranstvo-vremya/) - the most important task of modern fundamental physics since the information revolution.

    Constructive ways to the truth may be different. One of them said Alexander Zenkin in the article "Science counterrevolution in mathematics":

    «The truth should be drawn with the help of the cognitive computer visualization technology and should be presented to" an unlimited circle "of spectators in the form of color-musical cognitive images of its immanent essence.»

    http://www.ccas.ru/alexzen/papers/ng-02/contr_rev.htm

    In the russian version of a article: «The truth should be drawn and should be presented to" an unlimited circle "of spectators.»

    Do you agree with Alexander Zenkin?

    Please look also my essay and essay FQXi 2012 related to the ontological justification of "Absolute generating structure"

    http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1796

    http://www.fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1362

    We have the spirit of close reserch.

    Best regards,

    Vladimir

    ideabank@yandex.ru

    Hi dear Helmut,

    I have read your essay (thanks to advice of my friend) and I have find there things which is really close to my spirit. Main thing is you well know about drama of de Broglie, as well as of Einstein's efforts to bring physics back on the natural way of development. I am also talking on this questions in my work that may interesting for you Es text. I am going to rate your work properly!

    I am very hope get your comments in my forum.

    Best wishes,

    George

    Hi Helmut,

    Your essay is an elegant exposition of a very intriguing idea. You wrote:

    > If the natural digit (nit) is the fundamental modus operandi how the Universe processes its internal information then the quantum of action (i.e. Plancks constant) is nothing else than the physical resp. visible side of this process.

    My essay Software Cosmos puts forward a computational model for the universe, which would need just this sort of thing.

    You may also enjoy Branko Zivlak's essay. He shows an unusual information-based equation links the electron, proton, and neutron masses. Perhaps you can find an interpretation for it.

    Hugh