Dear Alfredo,

1.

Database is not intelligence, of course, but, as I said, it implies intelligence. That is why it seems circular to define intelligence through databases. The same is true for "problems", "solutions", etc.

3,4.

I would not consider a Hydrogen atom as something new compared to proton and electron, since at certain condition there must be a lot of these atoms as soon as you have enough electrons and positrons. This is not true for life: apparently probability for life origin, with all the required atoms provided, is so low, that it cannot be explained by the physical laws. Life can be considered as really new, and it is a big question if nature could produce it itself.

Cheers,

Alexey.

    Dear Alfredo,

    I wanted to add to Alexey's reply by noticing a very powerful assumption you make. "If we accept that the universe is as simple as it can be..." While working out scientific ideas, assumptions are one of the primary methods. There is no need to question them if they turn out to be supported by the results. Once the science is done though, and we step back to reflect on what it is that we've learned, assumptions themselves become the focus of explanation. This reflective thinking is the domain of philosophy.

    I know of no philosophical position that would allow for the extreme assumption that you make. Even the luminous theologies of the fathers of physics don't venture so far. Even Einstein used it only a sort of working philosophical hypothesis. Physics does make the assumption that the laws are simple (not simplest), and this assumption is justified with its success, but looking back, this is an incredible miracle that is not at all necessitated by any purely logical conclusion -- that's Wigner's point. It is, perhaps, the greatest contribution of physics to humanity's vision of the world, its greatest discovery. Don't you think that glossing it over as a mere assumption is the least appropriate way to treat it? Or did I misunderstand you?

    Our essay Genesis of a Pythagorean Universe is devoted to the philosophical consequences of this particular discovery.

    Thank you very much for your plentiful compliments and appreciation. Alexey and I will discuss your ponderous essay.

    Lev

    Dear Alexey & Lev Burov,

    Thank you very much for your enjoyable essay. Your perspective of beauty in what we perceive around us, including "mathematical beauty" is key consideration that many people ignore or choose to ignore when building abstractions to formulate problems to solve analytically. In many cases in the past, it seems they may not have been all that successful in this separation, being silently seduced by the beauty of mathematics in the first place. (For example the Copernican system insisting planets orbit in perfect circles.) I also love how you so eloquently put it in your conclusion that, "To see in mathematics nothing but a collection of all possible, value-neutral, formal systems is no better than to view the art of sculpture as a collection of all possible articles made of stone". Wonderful!

    Thank you again and I have in the meantime rated your essay too.

    Regards,

    Robert

      Dear Robert,

      Your compliments to our essay are especially pleasant, since you see the core of our text on the background of that strange blindness of the spirit of time. Thank you!

      I've learned something new from your composition and left my comments and a couple of questions on your page.

      All the best,

      Alexey.

      Dear Alexey and Lev,

      Congratulations for another strong essay! The subject of this year's contest truly called for an examination of the connection between thought and matter. In your view, thought is "cosmic, even super-cosmic", and you defend the need for a non-deceiving (Descartes), non-malicious (Einstein) God to make sense of our Universe and of the truthfulness of our thought processes. I too struggle with the search for a first principle that would ensure, among other things, the "lawfulness" of the Universe. I am willing to accept that, in the space of all possibilities, there are local domains that are shaped by god-like super-intelligences, but I cannot see how this explanation can be scaled to encompass all of reality. So I am still searching for a way to have All-that-Exists be a self-existing ensemble that is overall devoid of characteristics and information, and to have local minds and ordered worlds "co-emerge" within it. We do not share the same hypotheses about fundamental metaphysical axioms, but we do share the same yearning that made Schrodinger say that knowledge truly has value when it contributes to the synthesis toward answering the demand, "Who are we?".

      By the way, in my current essay, I refer to your "Pythagorean Universe" essay from the last contest, specifically about the difficulty in accounting for the stability of the universal constants of physics by simply invoking the Anthropic Principle. It's always a pleasure to read your essays, and I am already looking forward to the next contest. In the meantime, I wish you good luck in this one!

      Marc

        Dear Edwin,

        Thank you for the compliments and the detailed comment.

        Before Alexey and I respond to your interesting ideas, could I ask you to take another look at the way you quote me, namely, "Physics does not make the assumption that the laws are simple?"

        The original statement, I think, was exactly opposite, without the "not". Would you please confirm or correct your post in this regard?

        - Lev

        Dear Lev,

        I apologize for misquoting you. I read the several comments several times, and still managed to get it wrong. I do not know how to edit posted messages, but I apologize again for the inaccurate quote.

        We are therefore in even more agreement than I thought.

        Thank you for correcting my mistake, and thanks again for a most fascinating set of comments on your page. You seem to inspire more insight on your page than most of us can manage.

        My best regards,

        Edwin Eugene Klingman

        Dear Marc,

        Many thanks for your encouraging words and very clear reference to one of the most important ideas of our Pythagorean Universe. I just left my comments on your current essay at your page, with a hope that our compliments, supported by the score, will not be overshadowed by some criticism there.

        We wish you good luck too!

        Alexey Burov.

        Strangely for us, recent posts of Edwin Eugene Klingman disappeared from this place. Dear Edwin, if you did not intend this and wish to see there the same or updated version of your post, you are more than welcome to do that.

        Alexey.

          Dear Alexey,

          I managed to remove the post in which I misquoted you. As we seem to disagree on the Wigner issue, there is no need to revise and repost. However I've noted that there are some other issues which we do agree on that I may post later.

          Thanks for your gracious understanding, and your many meaningful posts, here and on other's threads.

          My very best regards,

          Edwin Eugene Klingman

          Dear Edwin,

          Thanks for the clarification. We are looking forward to see your new posts in our space. Please do not worry about possible disagreement with us expressed in your comments here; actually, we appreciate clear and distinctive criticism in our address, considering that as a help.

          Cheers,

          Alexey.

          Hi Alexey,

          It was refreshing and interesting to read your essay.

          I hold the view that thought and cognition are ontological and we are continuously ratifying our reality. (see my essay:"we are together, therefore I am")

          It is all embedded in the qualities of the Movements attributes, which make us unique and singular.

          Thanks again

          Yehuda Atai

            Hi Yehuda,

            Thanks for reading our essay and pointing my attention to yours; it sounds interesting, I will read it soon. Meanwhile, it would be a pleasure to see your specific comments, either critical or complimentary, and questions.

            Regards,

            Alexey.

            Dear Alexey

            Once again, I repeat that I never said that I was even trying to explain how life began; what I am explaining is how molecules of the kind of DNA were produced. Between this and life is an enormous distance and I am surprised that you made such confusion.

            Differently of your argumentation, the production of molecules of the kind of DNA has, at least, a reasonable property in the scenario I defined - this is not a guess, I calculated it.

            Concerning life, even if one believes that it was created by God, one has to think that God did not created life from nothing. Or from clay. It is more reasonable to think that the material universe provided the material components of Life. For a believer in God, the role of God is to give life to matter, not to manufacture all life components.

            So, you see, in nothing I said, God is put in question in any way - quite on the contrary. To put God in question is to pretend that the universe was made in seven days and life from clay. Would you disagree with me in this point?

            I can say to you that during my life I had a set of experiences that I cannot explain by any known physical property, or by coincidences, etc; and one of them concerns precisely something that is written in the Bible - something of the utmost importance for the near future of mankind. Therefore, I know very well that the universe is much more than the description Physics can do. And this is not a "belief", its a knowledge from experience; and as I am an experienced empiricist, I am not in mistake when I state this. For me, "God" is a way to address everything that does not belongs to the material plane but I have no idea of what it might be because I have not enough data.

            For us to know anything about any subject, we first have to be ready to accept all possibilities; if we are not, we will just be believers in something that pleases us. Jesus went to the desert to find the answer He was looking for. Only then He knew.

            Although there are arrogant physicists that consider that Physics is able to explain everything, that periodically produce statements of the kind "to know all about the universe we are just missing this small aspect", they are just stupid and ignorant persons that not even have an idea of how far you are of understanding the universe. However, that is not the case of most scientists. Physics may conflict with "religious" explanations for physical phenomena but not with the essence of Religion, i.e., with the perception that the universe is not just matter. A bad physicist thinks that what he/her does not knows, does not exist; but that is not the methodology of science; a serious scientist analyses the data available and in relation to anything else he/her has only to assume ignorance. In this way there is no possible conflict between Science and Religion because they address different fields.

            One thing that I assumed still a teenager is that to achieve some knowledge one has to drop the word "belief". Be it in Physics, Religion, whatever field. And drop it also in the negative form - we shall not "believe" or "not belief" in anything. I strictly follow Descartes method. That is a hard way, and with many problems, but is the only way for those that really want to know.

            I hope that now, after this loooong message, you may understand me better.

            All the best

            Alfredo

            Dear Alfredo,

            Thanks for the clarifications. I agree with you in many aspects, while the details can be discussed and specified. In particular, I would stress that the spheres of knowledge and beliefs cannot be fully separated; in some sense they need, support and critically help each other. To start a complicated experiment, one has to believe in its significance, in his own ability to do the hard and challenging job, in the abilities of his colleagues. Gaining knowledge requires a belief in the corresponding values. In our essay we quoted Descartes and Einstein beliefs in God who does not deceive and is not malicious; this belief is a key one for the fundamental science, notwithstanding that many scientists have no idea about that. From another side, knowledge can either support or shake beliefs. For instance, Galileo just believed that "the book of nature is written in the language of mathematics", while Wigner wrote about that as a fact of "unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics". This fact supported the old Pythagorean-Galilean belief, but did not prove, of course, that humanity will succeed to describe the new levels of physical reality by means of elegant mathematical theories.

            Thanks again,

            Alexey.

            Dear Alexey and Lev Burov,

            On another thread [Robert Groess'] you made notice of a quote from P. Anderson:

            "In fact, the more the elementary particle physicists tell us about the nature of the fundamental laws, the less relevance they seem to have to the very real problems of the rest of science, much less society."

            The statement is not unlike Steven Weinberg's remark, that

            "The more comprehensible the universe becomes, the more it also seems pointless."

            David Berlinski, a mathematician, remarks

            "He had a point. The arena of the elementary particles... is rather a depressing place, and if it resembles anything at all it rather resembles a florescent lit bowling alley seen from the interstate, tiny stick figures in striped bowling shirts jerking up and down in the monstrously hot and humid night. What is its point?"

            I suspect the 'stick figures' are Feynman diagrams. [By the way, if you have not read Berlinski's The Devil's Delusion, I think you would enjoy it very much.]

            Anyway, you then asked, "If it is so, what do you think is the value of the particle physics for the humanity?", and you discussed the high cost of particle physics research, questioning the payoff.

            The Higgs candidate has been found, as was to be expected by anyone who has read Andrew Pickering's Constructing Quarks, and supersymmetry, once felt to be a requirement for the Standard Model, is nowhere to be seen. No other particles are predicted [only resonances]. As you know from my essay, I view physics, particularly quantum physics, as mathematical projections onto physical reality. Due to its appropriateness in many physical situations the statistical nature of quantum mechanics delivers the goods. In particle systems QFT is essentially a bookkeeping system, based on a simplistic 'creation' and 'annihilation' formalism. I believe it is primarily a way to fit theory to data.

            In contrast, I've found over several years that the predominant model from which QM is often heuristically derived is Stern-Gerlach, and physicists, after approximately a century, still do not understand the physics of one silver atom in an inhomogeneous magnetic field. In fact, I am, with others, building an experiment that will significantly affect QM if our research results are positive. We're self-funded, and, if successful, will have more impact on "real world" physics than the next few years operation of the LHC is likely to. So I agree with your implied sentiment.

            My very best regards,

            Edwin Eugene Klingman

              Hi Edwin,

              Many thanks for a lot of interesting things in your post.

              Now Berlinski is in my Kindle collection, promising delicious reading tonight; thank you!

              Sorry that I have to disagree that "no other particles are predicted [only resonances]" (if I understood you correctly). Certainly many elementary particles were predicted in various years and on various grounds: positron (and thus entire anti-matter), neutrino, all quarks, weak bosons, and Higgs boson, of course. All these predictions were based on belief in mathematical elegance of the laws of nature, shared by great physicists.

              Asking the question about the value of the Particle Physics, I do not mean to diminish it; my goal is just to study opinions, circulating in the scientific community. Strangely enough, I hear only about byproducts and curiosity, as if there is no direct value and as if human curiosity does not have millions of other targets. My own vision on that is indirectly expressed in our "Moira and Eileithyia" and "Pythagorean Universe", and it seems that the value I see in the fundamental science is a top secret for the colleagues.

              I am intrigued about your planned experiment intended to clarify QM. Do you have something published on that? I wish you success, of course!

              Our best wishes,

              Alexey.

              Alexey,

              In reviewing the essays I have read, I noticed you are a scientist at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. I have been following the LHC news and noticed among other things they are looking for evidence of dark matter. I had mentioned in my comments on your essay the speculation I provided in my essay about dark matter, feeling it is a byproduct of the interactions of normal matter, its forces, and the SMBH in the center of galaxies. It is probably my amateur speculation that dark matter will only be found in the field. With your background, I would be interested in your thoughts.

              Jim Hoover

                Hi Jim,

                In that matter, I am an amateur as well; my field of expertise is different. The only thing I could confirm for sure is that physics of dark matter, for today, continues to be entirely dark.

                Soon you will see my comments on your page.

                Cheers,

                Alexey.

                Alexey,

                Your essay effectively describes the ideal beauty that should be and can be the unifying source of discovery that brings stellar order of knowledge and survival that celebrates rather than shrinks humanity. Those who puff up their importance and act to shrink humanity are liars. I think we are among many experiments in humanity in the universe. Two weeks ago, I gave you high marks for how effective your words of inspiration are.

                Thanks for checking out my essay:

                I appreciate you mentioned "life's higher meaning". Don't you think that the biggest discoveries and inventions of humanity happened in following this meaning, not the goals of survival and comfort? If so, would it be correct to try to explain the core of human beings by means of entropy and survival? In our essay we are trying to show that this approach leads to the Epimenides paradox. One more question relates to the "unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics": how it can be accounted in the framework of your paper?

                Life has a higher meaning but there are those who would destroy all life around them for their own glory. Perhaps you have more faith in this higher ideal being the imperative.

                Jim