Dear Richard,

Thanks for your kind comments, and your remarks, which actually I am still trying to understand. From the classical matrix dynamics viewpoint, we are suggesting the `it' to be primary. All else - quantum theory, measurement, and the probabilities and the `bit' are treated as emergent. I will do my best to read your essay soon and try to understand what you refer as a `parallel scenario'.

My best wishes,

Tejinder

Dear Peter,

Greetings again, thanks for your kind appreciation and incisive comments whichI enjoyed reading. I fully agree that the `bit from it' we propose may not be the final answer and is restricted to the non-relativisitc regime [as for Copenhagen, honestly i am very happy to get rid of it!]. I am convinced that a consistent unification of special relativity and quantum theory will bring great surprises [and here I do not mean quantum gravity in the sense of bringing in gravity] but ssh the relation between light-cone structure and Minkowski space-time on the one hand, and the very real quantum non locality on the other.

I will definitely read your essay soon.

Best regards,

Tejinder

Dear James,

There is a school of thought according to which, if you could isolate a macro-object sufficiently then you can superpose it in different position states. `Isolate' here means cut off the noise (environment) which acts like an impurity. For instance, according to this school, it should be possible to perform a double slit experiment with billiard balls and observe an interference pattern of fringes, given sufficient isolation and sufficiently advanced technology. Something like this is actually being done in the lab nowadays, not with billiard balls, but very large molecules. If quantum theory is exact, one day it will work for billiard balls [technology]. If quantum theory is approximate, we will one day see a breakdown [no interference] if the interfering object becomes larger thame critical size.

Best regards,

Tejinder

Thank you Than Tin, for your comments and for explaining the duality viewpoint adapted in your essay.

Best regards,

Tejinder

Dear Zoran,

Thank you for your kind appreciation, and your very interesting comments. Your own outlook towards probability is refreshing and insightful.

Evolution versus progression: by evolution we meant, in the conventional sense, an arrow of time provided by the classical world: a consequence of initial conditions at the Big Bang, which for reasons we do not understand today, was an initial state of extraordinarily low entropy. It is an important point you raise - as to how this `flow of time' and the associated arrow is influenced/shaped by the proposed stochasticity in the modified quantum theory.

The environment: yes we agree that this is undoubtedly present, but the considerations presented in our essay are independent of the environment. The collapse of the wave-function during a quantum measurement is a result of the stochastic modification of quantum theory, and would take place independent of whether the environment is there or not.

Best regards,

Tejinder

Prof. Singh,

Thank you for responding to my questions. I hope you have time to read and comment on my essay (1814).

Regards and good luck.

Zoran.

Tejinder,

My essay speaks of molecules being used in the 2-slit experiment but I don't see that as the same as ascribing subatomic behavior to macro items. I would be curious to see your thoughts on my essay.

Jim

Dear prof. Tejinder Singh,

I have rated your essay on 2nd July with highest honors and it is time if you have not yet rated my essay will you, please, rate it now and inform me.

Thanks and all the best,

Sreenath

Dear Tejinder,

One single principle leads the Universe.

Every thing, every object, every phenomenon

is under the influence of this principle.

Nothing can exist if it is not born in the form of opposites.

I simply invite you to discover this in a few words,

but the main part is coming soon.

Thank you, and good luck!

I rated your essay accordingly to my appreciation.

Please visit My essay.

Dear Tejinder,

Enjoying your excellent Essay, I wonder if the following comment might help in your future work.

In my Essay, "collapse" is shown to be a convenient mathematical short-cut; see footnote 6, page 6.

Studying EPRB and Bell-tests, I show that the "dynamics" attributed to "collapse" may be directly associated with such underlying deterministic processes as "spin-torque-precession." The related theory is thus relativistically covariant.

With best regards; Gordon Watson

  • [deleted]

Hi Tejinder,

Sorry I neglected to follow up till now. I think observers associate probabilities with the measurement process because perfect information (the complete Gaussian normal distribution) is never available to an observer; an "It" continuum of wave functions from which bit things are derived has no "thingness" itself, with which to associate bounded entities. This is the principle which makes linear superposition and Bayesian analytical methods attractive -- e.g., a spinning die of six sides assigns equally likely probability to each of the sides when observed at rest.

A relative two-state universe, though (such as my essay describes), is always in a state of rest relative to every observer. This is why I don't find Everett's hypothesis so quirky -- a multitude of observers sharing one spacetime domain of continuous IT get to choose which BITs are bound variables and which remain free variables. While the bound variables come with probability 1.0 for manifest reality (quantum unitarity), IT continua don't as a result become nonlocal or in superposition -- other observers choose different bits -- so wave function collapse is illusion. As Wheeler put it: "The asking of one question precludes the asking of another." By these criteria, bifurcating answers produce new initial conditions creating new universes. These universes don't communicate (i.e., exchange physical influences) because -- like the fermions in Pauli's exclusion principle -- they cannot occupy the same state at the same time.

Although Wheeler -- who introduced Everett's hypothesis to the larger physics world -- eventually rejected it himself, I find it perfectly compatible with "Bit from It," the inverse of Wheeler's proposition. I recently found that the existence of two indefinite states implies three definite states, which gives the observer a place to stand in relation to the quantum bit.

All best,

Tom

Dear Angelo Bassi, Saikat Ghosh, & Tejinder Singh:

I am an old physician and I don't know nothing of mathematics and almost nothing of physics,

But maybe you would be interested in my essay over a subject which after the common people, physic discipline is the one that uses more than any other, the so called "time".

I am sending you a practical summary, so you can easy decide if you read or not my essay "The deep nature of reality".

I am convince you would be interested in reading it. ( most people don't understand it, and is not just because of my bad English).

Hawking in "A brief history of time" where he said , "Which is the nature of time?" yes he don't know what time is, and also continue saying............Some day this answer could seem to us "obvious", as much than that the earth rotate around the sun....." In fact the answer is "obvious", but how he could say that, if he didn't know what's time? In fact he is predicting that is going to be an answer, and that this one will be "obvious", I think that with this adjective, he is implying: simple and easy to understand. Maybe he felt it and couldn't explain it with words. We have anthropologic proves that man measure "time" since more than 30.000 years ago, much, much later came science, mathematics and physics that learn to measure "time" from primitive men, adopted the idea and the systems of measurement, but also acquired the incognita of the experimental "time" meaning. Out of common use physics is the science that needs and use more the measurement of what everybody calls "time" and the discipline came to believe it as their own. I always said that to understand the "time" experimental meaning there is not need to know mathematics or physics, as the "time" creators and users didn't. Instead of my opinion I would give Einstein's "Ideas and Opinions" pg. 354 "Space, time, and event, are free creations of human intelligence, tools of thought" he use to call them pre-scientific concepts from which mankind forgot its meanings, he never wrote a whole page about "time" he also use to evade the use of the word, in general relativity when he refer how gravitational force and speed affect "time", he does not use the word "time" instead he would say, speed and gravitational force slows clock movement or "motion", instead of saying that slows "time". FQXi member Andreas Albrecht said that. When asked the question, "What is time?", Einstein gave a pragmatic response: "Time," he said, "is what clocks measure and nothing more." He knew that "time" was a man creation, but he didn't know what man is measuring with the clock.

I insist, that for "measuring motion" we should always and only use a unique: "constant" or "uniform" "motion" to measure "no constant motions" "which integrates and form part of every change and transformation in every physical thing. Why? because is the only kind of "motion" whose characteristics allow it, to be divided in equal parts as Egyptians and Sumerians did it, giving born to "motion fractions", which I call "motion units" as hours, minutes and seconds. "Motion" which is the real thing, was always hide behind time, and covert by its shadow, it was hide in front everybody eyes, during at least two millenniums at hand of almost everybody. Which is the difference in physics between using the so-called time or using "motion"?, time just has been used to measure the "duration" of different phenomena, why only for that? Because it was impossible for physicists to relate a mysterious time with the rest of the physical elements of known characteristics, without knowing what time is and which its physical characteristics were. On the other hand "motion" is not something mysterious, it is a quality or physical property of all things, and can be related with all of them, this is a huge difference especially for theoretical physics I believe. I as a physician with this find I was able to do quite a few things. I imagine a physicist with this can make marvelous things.

With my best whishes

Héctor

Dear Angelo Bassi, Saikat Ghosh, & Tejinder Singh:

I am an old physician and I don't know nothing of mathematics and almost nothing of physics,

But maybe you would be interested in my essay over a subject which after the common people, physic discipline is the one that uses more than any other, the so called "time".

I am sending you a practical summary, so you can easy decide if you read or not my essay "The deep nature of reality".

I am convince you would be interested in reading it. ( most people don't understand it, and is not just because of my bad English).

Hawking in "A brief history of time" where he said , "Which is the nature of time?" yes he don't know what time is, and also continue saying............Some day this answer could seem to us "obvious", as much than that the earth rotate around the sun....." In fact the answer is "obvious", but how he could say that, if he didn't know what's time? In fact he is predicting that is going to be an answer, and that this one will be "obvious", I think that with this adjective, he is implying: simple and easy to understand. Maybe he felt it and couldn't explain it with words. We have anthropologic proves that man measure "time" since more than 30.000 years ago, much, much later came science, mathematics and physics that learn to measure "time" from primitive men, adopted the idea and the systems of measurement, but also acquired the incognita of the experimental "time" meaning. Out of common use physics is the science that needs and use more the measurement of what everybody calls "time" and the discipline came to believe it as their own. I always said that to understand the "time" experimental meaning there is not need to know mathematics or physics, as the "time" creators and users didn't. Instead of my opinion I would give Einstein's "Ideas and Opinions" pg. 354 "Space, time, and event, are free creations of human intelligence, tools of thought" he use to call them pre-scientific concepts from which mankind forgot its meanings, he never wrote a whole page about "time" he also use to evade the use of the word, in general relativity when he refer how gravitational force and speed affect "time", he does not use the word "time" instead he would say, speed and gravitational force slows clock movement or "motion", instead of saying that slows "time". FQXi member Andreas Albrecht said that. When asked the question, "What is time?", Einstein gave a pragmatic response: "Time," he said, "is what clocks measure and nothing more." He knew that "time" was a man creation, but he didn't know what man is measuring with the clock.

I insist, that for "measuring motion" we should always and only use a unique: "constant" or "uniform" "motion" to measure "no constant motions" "which integrates and form part of every change and transformation in every physical thing. Why? because is the only kind of "motion" whose characteristics allow it, to be divided in equal parts as Egyptians and Sumerians did it, giving born to "motion fractions", which I call "motion units" as hours, minutes and seconds. "Motion" which is the real thing, was always hide behind time, and covert by its shadow, it was hide in front everybody eyes, during at least two millenniums at hand of almost everybody. Which is the difference in physics between using the so-called time or using "motion"?, time just has been used to measure the "duration" of different phenomena, why only for that? Because it was impossible for physicists to relate a mysterious time with the rest of the physical elements of known characteristics, without knowing what time is and which its physical characteristics were. On the other hand "motion" is not something mysterious, it is a quality or physical property of all things, and can be related with all of them, this is a huge difference especially for theoretical physics I believe. I as a physician with this find I was able to do quite a few things. I imagine a physicist with this can make marvelous things.

With my best whishes

Héctor

This post got lost yesterday; here it is again:

Distinguished Professors,

thank you for your wonderful essay and for making it accessible to a nonspecialist like myself -- that you can describe the problem in accessible terms is the sure sign of clarity with which you approach the subject. I especially appreciated your essay, because it restored my faith in quantum physicists' grasp on reality. I often found it shocking to see how highly educated professionals appeared unable to distinguish the underlying _reality_ from information which, in quantum theory, often comes down to derivations based on actual lack of information. All too often, rather than admitting insufficiencies in our current understanding, they insist on describing the underlying reality in terms of Copenhagen interpretation and in doing so show that they _actually_believe_ that what they describe is IT (!) I can't relate to you the degree of cognitive dissonance I have suffered as a result -- until I read your essay :)

I found your analysis of the problem impeccable and gave it the top rate.

Leaving your blog with enriched understanding of physics and renewed hope for the future,

-Marina

PS

In my essay I dare to poke fun at Copenhagen interpretation and measurement process (the last couple of pages) and sincerely hope it could give you a laugh or two.. .. and yes, I hope one of you could find time to read and comment on my essay. Thank you!

Dear Angelo Bassi, Saikat Ghosh, & Tejinder Singh:

I am an old physician and I don't know nothing of mathematics and almost nothing of physics,

But maybe you would be interested in my essay over a subject which after the common people, physic discipline is the one that uses more than any other, the so called "time".

I am sending you a practical summary, so you can easy decide if you read or not my essay "The deep nature of reality".

I am convince you would be interested in reading it. ( most people don't understand it, and is not just because of my bad English).

Hawking in "A brief history of time" where he said , "Which is the nature of time?" yes he don't know what time is, and also continue saying............Some day this answer could seem to us "obvious", as much than that the earth rotate around the sun....." In fact the answer is "obvious", but how he could say that, if he didn't know what's time? In fact he is predicting that is going to be an answer, and that this one will be "obvious", I think that with this adjective, he is implying: simple and easy to understand. Maybe he felt it and couldn't explain it with words. We have anthropologic proves that man measure "time" since more than 30.000 years ago, much, much later came science, mathematics and physics that learn to measure "time" from primitive men, adopted the idea and the systems of measurement, but also acquired the incognita of the experimental "time" meaning. Out of common use physics is the science that needs and use more the measurement of what everybody calls "time" and the discipline came to believe it as their own. I always said that to understand the "time" experimental meaning there is not need to know mathematics or physics, as the "time" creators and users didn't. Instead of my opinion I would give Einstein's "Ideas and Opinions" pg. 354 "Space, time, and event, are free creations of human intelligence, tools of thought" he use to call them pre-scientific concepts from which mankind forgot its meanings, he never wrote a whole page about "time" he also use to evade the use of the word, in general relativity when he refer how gravitational force and speed affect "time", he does not use the word "time" instead he would say, speed and gravitational force slows clock movement or "motion", instead of saying that slows "time". FQXi member Andreas Albrecht said that. When asked the question, "What is time?", Einstein gave a pragmatic response: "Time," he said, "is what clocks measure and nothing more." He knew that "time" was a man creation, but he didn't know what man is measuring with the clock.

I insist, that for "measuring motion" we should always and only use a unique: "constant" or "uniform" "motion" to measure "no constant motions" "which integrates and form part of every change and transformation in every physical thing. Why? because is the only kind of "motion" whose characteristics allow it, to be divided in equal parts as Egyptians and Sumerians did it, giving born to "motion fractions", which I call "motion units" as hours, minutes and seconds. "Motion" which is the real thing, was always hide behind time, and covert by its shadow, it was hide in front everybody eyes, during at least two millenniums at hand of almost everybody. Which is the difference in physics between using the so-called time or using "motion"?, time just has been used to measure the "duration" of different phenomena, why only for that? Because it was impossible for physicists to relate a mysterious time with the rest of the physical elements of known characteristics, without knowing what time is and which its physical characteristics were. On the other hand "motion" is not something mysterious, it is a quality or physical property of all things, and can be related with all of them, this is a huge difference especially for theoretical physics I believe. I as a physician with this find I was able to do quite a few things. I imagine a physicist with this can make marvelous things.

With my best whishes

Héctor

Having read so many insightful essays, I am probably not the only one to find that my views have crystallized, and that I can now move forward with growing confidence. I cannot exactly say who in the course of the competition was most inspiring - probably it was the continuous back and forth between so many of us. In this case, we should all be grateful to each other.

If I may, I'd like to express some of my newer conclusions - by themselves, so to speak, and independently of the logic that justifies them; the logic is, of course, outlined in my essay.

I now see the Cosmos as founded upon positive-negative charges: It is a binary structure and process that acquires its most elemental dimensional definition with the appearance of Hydrogen - one proton, one electron.

There is no other interaction so fundamental and all-pervasive as this binary phenomenon: Its continuance produces our elements - which are the array of all possible inorganic variants.

Once there exists a great enough correlation between protons and electrons - that is, once there are a great many Hydrogen atoms, and a great many other types of atoms as well - the continuing Cosmic binary process arranges them all into a new platform: Life.

This phenomenon is quite simply inherent to a Cosmos that has reached a certain volume of particles; and like the Cosmos from which it evolves, life behaves as a binary process.

Life therefore evolves not only by the chance events of natural selection, but also by the chance interactions of its underlying binary elements.

This means that ultimately, DNA behaves as does the atom - each is a particle defined by, and interacting within, its distinct Vortex - or 'platform'.

However, as the cosmic system expands, simple sensory activity is transformed into a third platform, one that is correlated with the Organic and Inorganic phenomena already in existence: This is the Sensory-Cognitive platform.

Most significantly, the development of Sensory-Cognition into a distinct platform, or Vortex, is the event that is responsible for creating (on Earth) the Human Species - in whom the mind has acquired the dexterity to focus upon itself.

Humans affect, and are affected by, the binary field of Sensory-Cognition: We can ask specific questions and enunciate specific answers - and we can also step back and contextualize our conclusions: That is to say, we can move beyond the specific, and create what might be termed 'Unified Binary Fields' - in the same way that the forces acting upon the Cosmos, and holding the whole structure together, simultaneously act upon its individual particles, giving them their motion and structure.

The mind mimics the Cosmos - or more exactly, it is correlated with it.

Thus, it transpires that the role of chance decreases with evolution, because this dual activity (by which we 'particularize' binary elements, while also unifying them into fields) clearly increases our control over the foundational binary process itself.

This in turn signifies that we are evolving, as life in general has always done, towards a new interaction with the Cosmos.

Clearly, the Cosmos is participatory to a far greater degree than Wheeler imagined - with the evolution of the observer continuously re-defining the system.

You might recall the logic by which these conclusions were originally reached in my essay, and the more detailed structure that I also outline there. These elements still hold; the details stated here simply put the paradigm into a sharper focus, I believe.

With many thanks and best wishes,

John

jselye@gmail.com

Dear Angelo Bassi, Saikat Ghosh, & Tejinder Singh,

We are at the end of this essay contest.

In conclusion, at the question to know if Information is more fundamental than Matter, there is a good reason to answer that Matter is made of an amazing mixture of eInfo and eEnergy, at the same time.

Matter is thus eInfo made with eEnergy rather than answer it is made with eEnergy and eInfo ; because eInfo is eEnergy, and the one does not go without the other one.

eEnergy and eInfo are the two basic Principles of the eUniverse. Nothing can exist if it is not eEnergy, and any object is eInfo, and therefore eEnergy.

And consequently our eReality is eInfo made with eEnergy. And the final verdict is : eReality is virtual, and virtuality is our fundamental eReality.

Good luck to the winners,

And see you soon, with good news on this topic, and the Theory of Everything.

Amazigh H.

I rated your essay.

Please visit My essay.

Dear Colleagues

I enjoyed reading your excellent essay which I found it clarifying and thought provoking. I'd be happy if you could comment on the following issues.

Another contestant, Dr. McHarris also argues that behind the standard QM there is a nonlinear dynamics governing the micro and mesoworld. I wonder if you are following the same direction as him.

The other issue is time. You mention that time is a classical concept and therefore should be excluded from QM (which I disagree). I didn't have clear how the GTD will deal with the evolution of a system if time is not included. Is this GTD some of thermodynamical-like theory? I'd be grateful if you could comment a little more.

The other issue is that you don't have a relativistic theory. In such case, how will gravity will be included in your formulation. What role is gravity playing in your formulation? is it possible to derive Newtonian gravitation or GR from your theory?

As well, your theory tells us something at the Planck scale or below this scale?

Finally, some topic that you don't discuss and that is assumed in QM is the background dependence of the theory, which implies a preferred frame of reference. In your theory what physical entity represents this system of reference?

I'd like to invite you to read my essay and leave some comments. There I discuss about Wheeler's dream and propose a potential way to get out of the present crisis.

I'll be looking forward to hearing any comments you may have.

Regards

Israel

Dear Angelo, Saikat, and Tejinder,

I have now finished reviewing all 180 essays for the contest and appreciate your contribution to this competition.

I have been thoroughly impressed at the breadth, depth and quality of the ideas represented in this contest. In true academic spirit, if you have not yet reviewed my essay, I invite you to do so and leave your comments.

You can find the latest version of my essay here:

http://fqxi.org/data/forum-attachments/Borrill-TimeOne-V1.1a.pdf

(sorry if the fqxi web site splits this url up, I haven't figured out a way to not make it do that).

May the best essays win!

Kind regards,

Paul Borrill

paul at borrill dot com

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