Hi Jonathan,
yes, I`ve read that TdC has spend his last years in New York City, and that he is buried in Poughkeepsie. I`ve recently found that in this period he used to walk in Central Park, where he once met a young girl, Jean Houston, with a dog called Champ (which is the name I borrowed for the dog in my essay). They had interesting conversations, as reported by a grown up Ms. Houston:
http://tcreek1.jimdo.com/mr-tayer/
. . . and thank you for the pointer to Young`s `Reflexive Universe`, and to your addendum `Playful Flow of Information`. Reading your notes made me think that it would be nice to be able to see the seven steps implemented in terms of the features of some formal model - to see whether they become the essential features of an artificial universe too. I am not familiar with Young`s book, but I`ve found on the web a summary of Chapter 4 that seems to provide this implementation in terms of particles, molecules, and the physical world. No mention to the computational aspect, though. This is all very interesting, and . . . time demanding!
By the way, I also liked your essay a lot; it was one of the first ones I've read, commented, and rated.
May it please you to learn..
There exists an algebraic system in which that progression is already encoded, the octonion algebra. There are seven imaginary dimensions in the octonions, and if you interpret imaginary components as depicting change or motion, it is easy to see this is related to process. In fact; one might even say that octonion algebra is sequentially evolutive.
P.C. Kainen comments "Of course, multiplication in the octaval arithmetic fails to be either commutative or associative, but that could be a blessing in disguise. If multiplication depends on the order of the elements being multiplied together and even on how they are grouped, then at one fell swoop, geometry enters the calculation in an organic way."
This has been a subject of my research for a number of years, and I would be happy to compare notes, save you time by directing you to known results, ... You have already saved me time by summarizing things in your essay that strongly support my work.
All the Best,
JonathanAttachment #1: 2_octophys.pdf
I meant to post here..
But my reply to you ended up below. Sorry for any confusion.
Regards,
Jonathan
Dear Tommaso,
Your essay has a delightful structure, and Tommy comes off looking quite good in it!
In your comment on my essay you ask about non-linear system stability. I suspect that you are addressing, by referring to nonlinearity, the Wolfram automata/Game of Life observation that with a change in one cell or automaton, as you say, "an avalanche of modification causally spreads across the space-time diagram." I do not find the two viewpoints exclusive. In fact, I find it supportive of the system of maximum freedom, and most likely to result in stability, as it is most likely to address threats to existence as they arise.
I very much admire your attempt to "provide some formal foundations to Teilhard de Chardin." I have felt, for 50 years, that his view of reality is the most complete. (Which of course is not to say that he has all the details right, only the big picture.) And as others have noted above:
"A stone has a soul... but a very small one."
My first FQXi essay, Fundamental Physics of Consciousness is compatible with this (somewhat pan-psychic) perspective. As you note,
"Self-modifying code may be an elegant idea, but if you equate the program with the data structure, thus to the physical universe, you end up with a piece of code as big and complex as the universe itself."
There is considerable discussion in the comments on above link, but I will summarize by saying that I distinguish between consciousness-- defined as awareness plus volition -- and intelligence, which adds logical structure. When these aspects of reality are not distinguished, things can become even more confusing. But awareness, per se, is built into the universe globally, whereas the existence of local structure (instantiating logic) provides both higher local 'density' of awareness, and a local, logical framework. My book "Gene Man's World" provides a more complete picture of what, I believe, is a unified theory of consciousness. If Chardin's view is correct, we should find the universe comprehensible, not incomprehensibly mystical.
I find the fact that more physicists are recognizing that understanding the world requires that we try to understand how consciousness fits to be a very positive sign.
Edwin Eugene Klingman
Hi Tommaso,
Great essay! I find your presentation style very interesting. I learned a lot from your essay, especially about the philosophy of Teilhard de Chardin and the work of Tononi.
Thank you, and good luck.
Mohammed
Dear Tommaso,
Sublime! I rated it a ten (10. Having self-aware Qbit like you, we have no fear of the future. Our world is Leibnitz's world, the best of all possible worlds.
Best wishes,
Leo KoGuan
Tommaso,
Complexity is also prone to instability and periodic crashes. While we cannot compute the exponential increase in complex systems, other than computing every step, we can, with some perspective of distance, estimate the likelihood of them crashing. Like individual lives, they can crash early, or they can crash late, but they will crash because complexity tends to only compound until it becomes unstable. Like computer programs or old blood, it just gets too much bad code built up to be able to sustain it within the platform.
So you don't necessarily have to view the human situation as completely unpredictable, due to its complexity. There are a number of issues, from finance to physics to population to economic growth, which are all showing signs of imminent crashing. One effect of a crashing system is that it provides a large amount of released energy. So the question I would ask, is there some way which these forces can be directed in an overall positive direction, or possibly one crash used to facilitate a positive direction for others and to be truly optimistic, I think there is.
Regards,
John Merryman
Tommaso -
The comments have slowed down but the scores are heating up. I hope you continue to do well. Not having a direct email I thought I would let you know that we just got back from a fabulous vacation in Italy - 5 days in Tuscany, 1 in Orvieto and 2 in Rome. Fabulous! Here in New England all the villages are in the valleys and the mountaintops are for viewing. Italy is upside down! This simply shows the power of the fitness landscape in directing human behavior - if you are mortally fearful of marauding bands, attacking armies or wild animals, hilltops are a place of safety and refuge. I was also overwhelmed by the sense of common purpose and commitment it took to build all those fortifications and cathedrals - or the aqueducts and magnificent fountains in Rome. If humans can do these things, then perhaps we can also determine how to steer humanity's future.
Ciao! - George
P.S., I will use the following rating scale to rate the essays of authors who tell me that they have rated my essay:
10 - the essay is perfection and I learned a tremendous amount
9 - the essay was extremely good, and I learned a lot
8 - the essay was very good, and I learned something
7 - the essay was good, and it had some helpful suggestions
6 - slightly favorable indifference
5 - unfavorable indifference
4 - the essay was pretty shoddy and boring
3 - the essay was of poor quality and boring
2 - the essay was of very poor quality and boring
1 - the essay was of shockingly poor quality and extremely flawed
After all, that is essentially what the numbers mean.
The following is a general observation:
Is it not ironic that so many authors who have written about how we should improve our future as a species, to a certain extent, appear to be motivated by self-interest in their rating practices? (As evidence, I offer the observation that no article under 3 deserves such a rating, and nearly every article above 4 deserves a higher rating.)
Hi George,
I am glad that you enjoyed your 5 days in Tuscany. You did not mention Siena, which is an excellent macro-example of a city where houses tend to climb the hill. And I agree, by looking at some of the past achievements of humanity (architecture, but also music!) one may indulge in some optimism about the future.
I see that scores are heating up and I am a bit puzzled by the current ranking. This is a somewhat unusual version of the contest, for which it is harder to establish whether an essay is relevant to the theme. I am already looking forward to the next one!
Ciao
Tommaso
Tommaso,
If only more 19-year olds and their friends were so well read, thoughtful and expressive when immersed in the digital world. Well, I too can dream, can I not?
All the dreaming aside, is this your message: As humanity isn't a totally free self-standing entity, we cannot steer its future in isolation from (a) humanity's "inside of things" like DNA and all the vast implications of DNA as software and (b) humanity's "outside of things" like "the atmosphere along with the malicious antipodal butterfly already testing humanity's steering strengths. We'll have the necessary knowledge someday in the Noosphere as a conscious entity, Omega, and only then will humanity be in a position to steer.
Your idea of "humans are social atoms" made your essay still more intriguing. I am now dreaming of a whole new genre of science fiction.
-- Ajay
Sorry, spent too much time dreaming and got logged off!
The above is from me.
-- Ajay
Tommaso,
Time is growing short, so I am revisiting and rating. Your response to my questions and comments: "You write that you `are impressed by the images` I draw: are you referring to metaphors or the actual drawing of Tommy on the couch? This drawing was inspired by a recent novel by Michele Serra (Gli Sdraiati) - unfortunately appeared only in italian - that I would recommend to anyone who has a 19-year old son, or has been 19 very recently."
I was referring to the verbal images but really liked the drawing as well. Having a humanities background, writing fiction, and columns, I tend to appreciate vivid writing and imagery of all kinds, and do take note of political events that affect us. Not to do so, condemns us to the failings of delusional leaders with agendas of self-interest.
Have you had time to read my essay?
Jim
Dear Tommaso,
what a beautiful essay. It took me very long time to comment on your essay. I wanted to prove you're wrong. The ultimate language of nature is not software! But I couldn't. (How would you prove you're wrong?)
In my essay I state that the generality and unity of physics is originated from formalizing the very precondition of the possibility of scientific knowledge. Where scientific knowledge is the ability to learn from the past to predict the future. If we can predict something, we can compute it. In my essay I ask if there is a being beyond physics. I say that each human being in its uniqueness does not comply with the definition of a physical object. He cannot be predicted. I confess I find the argument myself a bit cheap.
I had many thoughts reading your essay and I might post them in a later time. For now I just want to say that in my very short essay I talk about two topics that are also part of your essay ( in a very different although not such eloquent way): The creation of information/structure and how it is compatible with the growth of entropy and a derivation of relativistic space time from the qbit.
I hope you find the time to read and comment on my essay.
Best regards
Luca
Hi Luca,
here`s a first quick reaction to your post.
Your first question is, essentially: how could one disprove the computational universe conjecture? Very important question indeed, in light of the fact that any serious physical theory should be such as to be possibly disproved.
So far, this conjecture (recently termed `Bit Bang`) rests upon the wide experimental evidence that many simple models of computation (not only cellular automata) lead to the emergence of very complex, nature-like patterns (including particle-like, self-reproducing and pseudo-random phenomena). A second crucial argument is the typing-monkeys scenario: in essence, the output of the monkey activity is in itself a random universe (of character strings) totally unlike ours, but when interpreted as a program, and run in a universal Turing machine, the distribution of the output strings (Levin`s `miracolous` distribution) is much more aligned with that mix of order and disorder that we see around us: order, in a computational universe, becomes not only possible, but even necessary. Lloyd (and, I believe, others too) suggest that this random-like input could be represented by the quantum fluctuations of the vacuum from which the Big (Bit) Bang originated. I guess these arguments nicely interplay with yours, when you deal with the puzzle of the simultaneous growth of structure and entropy in our universe.
Ok, but how about a potential falsification? The computational universe conjecture almost by definition rests a lot on computer simulations. In particular, one tries to see whether the `particles` that might emerge from animating a Plank-scale discretized spacetime - e.g. a causal set, or directed acyclic graph - can eventually reproduce, by an upward cascade of emergent layers, some known, observable phenomena, and associated measures (e.g. mass), as detected at the scales within reach of current instrumentation. If you come up with an algorithm that sets up a spectacular architecture of emergence, with all sorts of interacting patterns, but, when reaching the scales of subatomic particles, does not reproduce the elements of the standard model, than you have disproved your `theory`, which would then turn into a nice piece of recreational mathematics, like Conway Game of Life. Admittedly, a long and winding road.
I completely agree with you that the uniqueness of each human being, and its ability to act spontaneously, makes her unsuitable for treatment as a physical object - and puts her out of the reach of traditional physics (this is a key point in de Chardin`s `The Human Phenomenon`). There is a nice quote (from Schroedinger, I think, but I could not find it back) where living things are described as ones that keep moving also when, according to physical law, they should come to rest. One of the crucial and fascinating questions related, in particular, to computational theories of the evolving cosmos based on emergence, is to spot the moment, the emergent level when this (apparent?) ability to act spontaneously appears. Following de Chardin, I believe that this agency skill should appear very soon, much before the appearance of life as traditionally conceived.
I do have the time for reading and commenting your essay, and I`ll do it very soon.
Best regards
Tommaso
Tommaso,
I had a very good time with your fine essay. I liked being reminded how important it was for me back in the 70's to discover Teilhard de Chardin, with his wonderfully grand view of the stages of being, the physical and biological and human. Though a lot of important ideas have emerged since he wrote, it's still a tremendous challenge to envision a perspective that includes these very different realms and make sense of them together.
And I'm sympathetic to your software metaphor. This is one of the many ways in which the emergence of electronic media has opened us up to new ways of thinking -- which is the theme of my own essay here.
For me though, the key thing about "software" is not the computational aspect per se. In general, software does something, it has a function beyond itself, that makes certain algorithms more useful than others. In biology, of course, the basic functionality is that of reproduction, since only if organisms replicate themselves can the DNA software they carry get itself passed on. The reproductive process involves all sorts of difficulties in coordinating internal processes and adapting to the external environment, so it ramifies into a host of subsidiary functions that the software needs to handle.
Likewise in physics -- in a previous essay in last year's contest I suggested that the many diverse laws and principles of physics have evolved as a kind of DNA that relates to the underlying functionality of measurement. I mentioned at the end of that piece that while simple algorithms can certainly give rise to very complex structures, the peculiar kinds of dynamic order we find in physics don't seem at all amenable to deterministic computation. So again, the software that runs our universe may be doing something more than computation for its own sake. At the quantum level it seems to be engaged in setting up interaction-contexts where certain choices get made at random, which are then passed on as a basis for setting up new measurement-contexts to determine further information.
As to the software that makes us humans so different from other animals, I think that's essentially the language-technology that gets installed in our brains when we first learn to talk. Like the software that runs physics, human language serves to define the world we live in by communicating about it. We learn to perceive and think about our world by talking about it, both with ourselves and with others.
It's fairly easy to understand how biological evolution works. I think that's because the process is so objective -- we can see organisms making physical copies of themselves, out there in the world. We have some distance on biology, even when it concerns our own bodies. On the other hand, the kinds of interpersonal connection by which language and thought reproduce themselves from one human brain to another aren't so easy for us to see or think about clearly. Likewise the many different ways in which things can be physically observed and measured -- whether by our sense-organs or by our lab equipment -- are all quite complex and difficult to define. We know how to do these things very well, but it's not easy to be clear about what's going on.
Of course the great attraction of the computational approach is the old idea of deriving all the complexities of our world from certain simple, basic mathematical principles or processes. And we've been able to learn a lot by following that lead. But I don't think it can take us all the way to the foundations, even in physics.
Thanks again for your very friendly and intelligent piece of work -- Conrad
Hi Tommaso,
I'm still reading your fascinating article, I will come back and comment on it soon. However, I wanted to inform you today that I've responded to your excellent questions and observations on my page, and I would very much like to receive your feedback which I know will be of the highest quality. If you do wish to comment further there, please make sure to attach your post underneath my misplaced post (i.e., place it underneath part one of my two part reply). This will ensure that part one and part two do not get separated from one another.
Also, you might enjoy my reply to George Gantz. It offers a series of very important points that I would have put in my paper if I had had more room.
You have given me a lot to think about, and I am grateful.
Warmly,
Aaron
Tommaso,
Thank you for a very well written and fascinating essay. I agree with you that the idea that our universe could have emerged from a computer program is quite intriguing: it resonates with Max Tegmark's thesis that the universe is nothing more than an abstract (mathematical) structure, that when "seen" from the inside acquires the emergent property of physicality. Have you ever looked at the work of Bruno Marchal of Université Libre de Bruxelles, and of other like-minded thinkers that hang around the Google Group "Everything List"? You might find it interesting.
Good luck in the contest!
Marc
P.S. Thank you for the comments you left on my essay's forum: I have answered you there.
