Dear Aleksandar,

Thank you for your very interesting comments and the high grade. However, something has gone wrong with your vote, and instead of a high rating, we've received from you a very low one, a 1. We've documented our ratings and vote counts before and after your vote, so this discrepancy is definitely the case. Perhaps the easiest way to correct it would be for you to contact administration, or if you want I can do that for you. For that you can send me an email to levburov@gmail.com, which I can then forward on with the request.

Kind Regards,

Lev

The Burovs asked me also, to write to their email. Note to them and all: my email address is at the top of my essay.

I think the same thing might have happened to me. I admit I didn't check that carefully, but my score surprisingly went down after a compliment, so it might have. Is FQXi Admin checking on this?

BTW, I usually don't say much about particular ratings, or even if I already rated an essay or not, just to stay out of those concerns. I don't mind hearing from others, I just want to keep my own talk of it to a minimum. I do think, that anyone giving a low rating (3 or less) should explain or discuss first and not just take a drive-by potshot.

Alexey and Lev,

This is a very impressive essay. Your analysis of "order-from-chaos -- explanations is quite incisive with a laser focus. For example, Tegmark's "totality of mathematical forms," you immediately focus on deficiencies and logic of the view, questioning the unity of "these forms."

I avoid the profundities of explaining the why and how of thinking and try to connect the mind, math and physics in the stellar achievements of science showing their successful connections in quantum biology, mapping DNA and trying to simulate the BB: http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/2345

Thanks for your clear and crisp writing and an erudite analysis of important scientific thinkers.

Jim

    Dear Peter, dear Neil,

    I just sent an email to the both of you from my personal account fi******t@gmail.com

    Thanks and cheers,

    Alexey.

    Dear Jim,

    Many thanks for your generous compliments! You are catching the very core of our approach, when pointing to our "questioning the unity of "these forms."" To give some reasonable comments on your essay, I have to read it with sufficient attendance and think a bit after that :). I'll try.

    Cheers,

    Alexey.

    I just thought of something that may cause confusion about voting, if it's based on looking at comment times (may or may not be relevant to the above worries in particular.) The comment times are shown in GMT, which someone looking may forget to take into account (like, when trying to compare favorable comment with rating change.) Just passing it on FWIW. Actually, I want to see some kind of post-verification so voters can be more sure, and that's something political voters need more of too.

    After an exchange of emails with Aleksandar, thanks to his patience, I realized that my interpretation of my rating jumps was not correct. It is too easy to be confused by the time delay between the voting and the related comment, and by accidental coincidences between the comment and unrelated rating. Everything appears to be right in my case. I apologize to all whom I confused. As a result, I am concluding do not bother any more to check anything and trust the system. To comment on Neil's reasonable idea "to see some kind of post-verification", I would suggest a bit more: it would be helpful to see for every essay not only its average rating, but the entire list of its ratings. I do not see any reason why this should be unavailable.

    Dear Alexey and Lev,

    I found great depth in your essay and good argumentation. It's a very interesting idea that the source of order in the universe cannot be limited to the fine tuning of the constants but must be extended to a "right choice of the fundamental principles of physical laws". Another striking point that you make is the distinction between the types of observers and the theoretizability of the world. My main take away from your essay is the uniqueness of the laws. Another very interesting exercise you make is the deduction of the consequences of noise in a universe with semi-stable laws of nature.

    Cheers,

    Cristi

      Dear Alexey and Lev,

      An absolutely brilliant essay. I agree with you in many points such as your opinion on Tegmark's hypothesis. I especially liked the section "The condition of Elegance". Your essay deserves the highest rating. I would be glad to take your opinion in my essay.

      Best regards and good luck in the contest.

      Mohammed

        Dear Cristi,

        Thank you so much! It is a true pleasure to be highly appreciated by one of the experts!

        You underline that your "main take away from your essay is the uniqueness of the laws." I cannot help but quote our related conclusion:

        "Our universe is special not only because it is populated by living and conscious beings but also because it is theoretizable by means of elegant mathematical forms, both rather simple in presentation and extremely rich in consequences. To allow life and consciousness, the mathematical structure of laws has to be complex enough so as to be able to generate rich families of material structures. From the other side, the laws have to be simple enough to be discoverable by the appearing conscious beings. To satisfy both conditions, the laws must be just right. The laws of nature are fine-tuned not only with respect to the anthropic principle but to be discoverable as well. In other words, the Universe is fine-tuned with respect to what can be called as the Cosmic Anthropic Principle: its laws are purposefully chosen for the universe to be cosmically observed."

        Maybe, our laws are not unique, but they definitely belong to a very special and narrow set of mathematical structures, much more narrow than Tegmark's multiverse suggests. In other words, our laws are truly beautiful in that deep meaning of mathematical beauty which was professed by Pythagoreans of all times, from Pythagoras and Euclid to Kepler and Newton and to Einstein and Dirac.

        In that light your statement that, "Mathematics is already there, eternal and unchanging. What we invent is the discovery of mathematics," is revealed as having an even deeper meaning than it may at first seem.

        Cheers and good luck,

        Alexey and Lev

        Dear Cristi,

        Thank you so much! It is a true pleasure to be highly appreciated by one of the experts!

        You underline that your "main take away from your essay is the uniqueness of the laws." I cannot help but quote our related conclusion:

        "Our universe is special not only because it is populated by living and conscious beings but also because it is theoretizable by means of elegant mathematical forms, both rather simple in presentation and extremely rich in consequences. To allow life and consciousness, the mathematical structure of laws has to be complex enough so as to be able to generate rich families of material structures. From the other side, the laws have to be simple enough to be discoverable by the appearing conscious beings. To satisfy both conditions, the laws must be just right. The laws of nature are fine-tuned not only with respect to the anthropic principle but to be discoverable as well. In other words, the Universe is fine-tuned with respect to what can be called as the Cosmic Anthropic Principle: its laws are purposefully chosen for the universe to be cosmically observed."

        Maybe, our laws are not unique, but they definitely belong to a very special and narrow set of mathematical structures, much more narrow than Tegmark's multiverse suggests. In other words, our laws are truly beautiful in that deep meaning of mathematical beauty which was professed by Pythagoreans of all times, from Pythagoras and Euclid to Kepler and Newton and to Einstein and Dirac.

        In that light your statement that, "Mathematics is already there, eternal and unchanging. What we invent is the discovery of mathematics," is revealed as having an even deeper meaning than it may at first seem.

        Cheers and good luck,

        Alexey and Lev

        Dear Mohammed,

        My apologies for a mis-post. I'm working on my answer to you.

        Cheers,

        Alexey

        Dear Mohammed,

        Your compliments are especially important for me, since we disagree in our answers to the Wigner's question. Your high rating shows a valuable and rare ability to estimate an approach contradictory to your own. Thank you so much! As you stress in your abstract, you "try to explain the reason for this effectiveness based on the view that mathematics is invented." Our point is that such invention would not be possible without very special objective properties of our universe:

        "Such a special universe deserves a proper term, and we do not see a better choice than to call it Cosmos or to qualify it as Pythagorean, in honor of the first prophet of theoretical cognition, who coined such important words as cosmos (order), philosophy (love of wisdom), and theory (contemplation)."

        Gratefully accepting your compliments, I still wish to mention that we do not think that we just expressed an "opinion on Tegmark's hypothesis". I think we clearly refuted it on the scientific ground.

        In the time remaining, I'll try to read your essay attentively and let you know what else will come in my mind.

        Good luck in the contest and cheers,

        Alexey.

        Dear Alexey and Lev,

        I think the three points which we are discussing here are related. I find particularly insightful your criticism of indifference or chaos as the ultimate ground for existence. The way you formulate the issue is helpful to me, and I tend to believe your opinions and arguments are correct. As you state, many contemporary writers maintain in one way or another that chaos is the ontological foundation. Until I read your discussion, I had not interpreted Tegmark's theory this way, but you are right about his position. More importantly, I think you are also right that the chaosogenesis or primal-indifference view contradicts current knowledge in physics. On this comments page for your essay, you include a link to some of your presentations at the Fermi Society of Philosophy. I have not studied that material yet, but I look forward to following your work there and perhaps in other writings and presentations also.

        Sincerely,

        Laurence Hitterdale

        Dear Laurence,

        They definitely are related, and it seems their relation in this discussion is centered on the opposition of significance and indifference. That significance is a fundamental quality of being has been discussed by many philosophers and mystics in various ways. As you know the Good was the terminus for Plato, and what is "good" but a synonym of significance, especially in this context? To take this a bit further, I think that the mistake many contemporary authors make ultimately reduces to this philosophical contradiction: they are trying to deduce significance, meaning from the insignificant - the absurd.

        Alexey has presented a series of historical lectures for the Fermi society, which are the core of his work there. Those links should save you some time in digging through the material. You are also very welcome to discuss the lectures on the society's blog-space, and we are very excited to hear your philosophical ideas there.

        Kind Regards,

        Lev

        Dear Alexey and Lev,

        Your essay presents a very intriguing philosophical argument backed by empirical considerations and I appreciate that. I like how you went deeper into the analysis of the anthropic principle and ascertained tests for MUH (Mathematical Universe Hypothesis) using the fine tuning and accuracy of fundamental constants. My essay, though focusing on other topics, also discusses checks on MUH in light self-referential considerations. Your narrative is very well written, and I also appreciated the historical context. I particularly liked the balance you formulated in developing the Cosmic Anthropic Principle "to allow life and consciousness,... To satisfy both conditions, the laws must be just right. The laws of nature are fine-tuned not only with respect to the anthropic principle but to be discoverable as well." I also discuss anthropic ideas relating causality and consciousness. I've seen different perspectives on these issues, and your essay is an excellent contribution to this very interesting forum topic. I rate it very highly.

        Please take a moment to read and rate my essay as well. Although are focuses may be different, I think we both overlap in ways that are supportive.

        Best regards,

        Steve Sax

        Dear Steven,

        It is a special pleasure to meet somebody you never new appreciating your philosophy! Thank you so much for your compliments and, of course, for the high rating. In the time remaining I'll try to read your essay and respond.

        Cheers and good luck!

        Alexey.

        Dear Burovs,

        While I don't feel obliged to comment on mysticism, I would just like to ask you whether the following utterance is correct:

        "all great theories, from Copernicus, Kepler and Newton to Einstein and Dirac happened as guesses on the grounds of some fundamentally simple ideas like symmetry, conserva:on, or equivalence."

        I am rather aware of the Church having caused Copernicus to revise the calendar which led him to reinvent an ancient observation, etc.

        The Pythagorean guess "anything is number" has proven wrong by the discovery of incommensurables.

        For such reasons, I would like to defend the role of observation and reasoning instead of putting unwarranted questions that didn't prove useful. Engineers have first to look for a relevant problem and then to describe the elements of how their invention may solve it. What problem do those like you intend solving, and is there any idea how to succeed?

        Of course, Otto de Guericke dealt speculatively with the problem of what is holding the world together. Steam engine and electricity arose from the experiments that he created.

        Can you tell me likewise convincing results from the belief in purpose and soul?

        Darwin's approach didn't rest on religious belief in a mystic purpose.

        While the consistency of theories in physics can be checked to some extent by experiments, guesses in mathematics may be confirmed if they are logically flawless and useful. I consider set theory failing both.

        Sincerely,

        Eckard Blumschein

          Dear Eckard,

          It's great to see that our essay evokes interest to such fundamental questions. It seems, though, that yours are best answered by the fathers of science themselves. You can of course do your own research, but there is quite a body of respected scholarly work on the subject in existence. Alexey has created a series of lectures that through quotations of the aforementioned scientists reveals the story and content of the Pythagorean faith, which makes up the core of fundamental science.

          Also I highly recommend books by Kitty Ferguson, a historian of science who is also a consultant and biographer of Steven Hawking. The Fire in the Equations and The Music of Pythagoras are engaging and accurate narratives on this topic.

          Kind Regards,

          Lev Burov