Dear Christian Corda,

Thank you for your time in reading and gratuitous comments on my essay. I have also in the meantime replied to your detailed response on your forum page. We were fortunate to have had Frank Wilczek give weekly seminars on Black Hole atmospheres in January this year at ASU. While not the core of my research interests, I do enjoy keeping up with the interesting progress being made in that regard.

Best of luck to your team in the contest as well!

Regards,

Robert

Dear Conrad,

Thank you for your time in reading my essay and for your detailed comments.

Regarding your first comment, thank you for pointing that out. I understand no lab experiments have ever occurred (yet?) where inanimate complex carbon compounds have been subject to energy sources, and something "living" has emerged. I also appreciate your second point about very rare accidents and totally agree with you that given enough time they would quite plausibly have transpired, which makes their contributions very important. As regards your third comment about senescece, I appreciate your clarification that it referes to complex organisms and more simple ones are far more hardy in the face of destructive mutations. Thank you for that.

I have really enjoyed this contest, in large part thanks to contributors like you who add value to the discussion were are having.

Kind regards,

Robert

Dear Vladimir Fedorov,

Thank you for taking the time to read my essay as well as for your kind comments. I wanted to let you know I have in the meantime also read and rated your detailed and wide reaching essay and have posted a reply on your forum. Good luck in the contest.

Regards,

Robert

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Robert,

"Macroscopic objects emerge from the quantum classical boundary. They do not exhibit any quantum behavior such as entanglement and decoherence." There are studies that make the boundaries of that world less distinct. Quantum Biology studies in "Life on the Edge" show a strange quantum coherence in the photosynthesis, making the process much more efficient. Does that show "intentions are a connection from abstractions with no existence in physical reality" The author also mentions quantum features in European Robins. We keep seeing how much we have to learn in this quantum-classical joining. I present Jeremy England's views on entropy: According to Dr. Jeremy England , a clump of atoms, when driven by some form of external energy, such as the Sun, and surrounded by a heat bath (ocean or atmosphere, for example), will always restructure itself in order to dissipate increasingly more energy into the surrounding environment.Our origination is seen less as a random,even accidental event.

I guess that is why I see this as such an inscrutable topic.

Hope you have a chance to comment on mine.

Jim Hoover

    Dear Jim,

    Thank you for taking the time to read through and comment on my essay. Yes, you are right. Thank you for pointing out that I was not clear in my essay about macroscopic objects. I intended to present them as we describe them in the Newtonian sense and merely mentioned the quantum-classical boundary to delineate a separation between two very different physical paradigms. I also appreciate the point you make about the European Robins, and indeed any birds that use the earth's magnetic field to navigate without any ferrous metals in their biology. Thank you for pointing more of Dr. Jeremy England's work out to me, I will have a closer look. I appreciate the new perspectives you have shared and I am going to read and comment on your essay in a little while.

    Regards,

    Robert

    Dear Robert,

    Thank you very much for your interest in my modest work.

    Answered your question

    «I am intrigued if there is a specific link you make connecting our physical world with the notion of intentionality?»

    in my thread of the forum.

    I wish you success in the contest.

    Kind regards,

    Vladimir

    Dear Robert,

    thank you for a well-written and well-thought out essay. I wonder weather you know off the work of Terrence Deacon---some of your remarks regarding the 'thermodynamic trail' of intentionality seem to point in a very similar direction. The basic idea appears to be that intentional action may locally contravene the tendency towards entropy maximization (at an at least equivalent cost to be paid elsewhere)---i.e. one can spot a goal-directed system by looking at its entropy balance (to simplify a bit).

    Deacon calls behavior in accord with expectations---e.g. entropy maximization---'orthograde', and consequently, the actions of a system that locally subverts such a tendency, like Maxwell's demon, 'contragrade'. He identifies three levels of such behavior, each emerging from the lower one---basic thermodynamics (homeodynamics), morphodynamics (self-organization), and teleodynamics, which is where intentional behavior comes in. This allows him to reconcile the emergent, goal-directed behavior with the lower-level maximization of entropy, which is locally subverted. I think you might find some common ground with his ideas!

    Anyway, I wish you luck in the contest.

    Cheers,

    Jochen

      Dear Robert Groess

      I invite you and every physicist to read my work "TIME ORIGIN,DEFINITION AND EMPIRICAL MEANING FOR PHYSICISTS, Héctor Daniel Gianni ,I'm not a physicist.

      How people interested in "Time" could feel about related things to the subject.

      1) Intellectuals interested in Time issues usually have a nice and creative wander for the unknown.

      2) They usually enjoy this wander of their searches around it.

      3) For millenniums this wander has been shared by a lot of creative people around the world.

      4) What if suddenly, something considered quasi impossible to be found or discovered such as "Time" definition and experimental meaning confronts them?

      5) Their reaction would be like, something unbelievable,... a kind of disappointment, probably interpreted as a loss of wander.....

      6) ....worst than that, if we say that what was found or discovered wasn't a viable theory, but a proved fact.

      7) Then it would become offensive to be part of the millenary problem solution, instead of being a reason for happiness and satisfaction.

      8) The reader approach to the news would be paradoxically adverse.

      9) Instead, I think it should be a nice welcome to discovery, to be received with opened arms and considered to be read with full attention.

      11)Time "existence" is exclusive as a "measuring system", its physical existence can't be proved by science, as the "time system" is. Experimentally "time" is "movement", we can prove that, showing that with clocks we measure "constant and uniform" movement and not "the so called Time".

      12)The original "time manuscript" has 23 pages, my manuscript in this contest has only 9 pages.

      I share this brief with people interested in "time" and with physicists who have been in sore need of this issue for the last 50 or 60 years.

      Héctor

        Dear Robert Groess

        If you believed in the principle of identity of space and matter of Descartes, then your essay would be even better. There is not movable a geometric space, and is movable physical space. These are different concepts.

        I inform all the participants that use the online translator, therefore, my essay is written badly. I participate in the contest to familiarize English-speaking scientists with New Cartesian Physic, the basis of which the principle of identity of space and matter. Combining space and matter into a single essence, the New Cartesian Physic is able to integrate modern physics into a single theory. Let FQXi will be the starting point of this Association.

        Don't let the New Cartesian Physic disappear! Do not ask for himself, but for Descartes.

        New Cartesian Physic has great potential in understanding the world. To show potential in this essay I risked give "The way of the materialist explanation of the paranormal and the supernatural" - Is the name of my essay.

        Visit my essay and you will find something in it about New Cartesian Physic. After you give a post in my topic, I shall do the same in your theme

        Sincerely,

        Dizhechko Boris

          Robert -

          I enjoyed reading your essay, and I think you have captured the essential feature of intention as fundamental to the way the world works. I also agree with the caution you exhibit in making the leap from intention to volition.

          Finally, I was amused by your closing sentences, "Their ultimate progenitors however remain elusive. Until such time as intentions find a way to know themselves." The beginning (the source of intentions) and the end (self-reflective intentional agents - us) are intimately connected, yet that connection is eminently mysterious.

          I explore identical themes in my essay (The How and The Why of Emergence and Intention) - I would appreciate you reaction if you have the chance to read it.

          Regards - George Gantz

            Dear Jochen,

            Thank you very much for the reference to Terrence Deacon's work. I will have a closer look at that. Thank you also for your time in reading my essay, and for your thoughtful comments.

            Bets of luck in the contest to you too.

            Regards,

            Robert

            Dear Héctor Gianni,

            Thank you for your comment. I will have a look at your essay and will comment on your forum.

            Regards,

            Robert

            Dear George,

            Thank you for your time in reading my essay and for your thoughtful comments. They are greatly appreciated. As regards comments on your essay, I want to take the time to read it carefully and will post comments on your forum soon.

            Regards

            Robert

            Dear Boris Dizhechko,

            Thank you for your comment. I would like to take the time to read your essay carefully, with the understanding that you have parsed it though a digital translator. I will comment on your forum shortly.

            Regards

            Robert

            Hi Robert, I copy here my reply to your last comment, because I took so long to answer (sorry about that), that you won't notice it in my entry. Sure, *time* is at the bottom of everything, I wish I had a clearer image of it...

            > all of that would be useless if not for observers who can process such information to make sense of the universe.

            Yes, this is one way to answer your question about the measurement problem, and is tightly related to the question "If a tree falls, and nobody hears it, does it make a noise?".

            There is, however, still a more fundamental level in which your question strikes me. In quantum mechanics observers actually change the story of the world. It's not just that they give relevance to the world, they actually build it. Ok, in the many world interpretation, there are many observers. But as long as we follow a single observer, there is no such thing as the objective physical world, because what happens depends on which observer we follow. As far as I know, not such thing happens in relativity: although different observers see different things (for example, they have different notions of simultaneity), all views are compatible with a single external reality. Up to what degree do observers of thermodynamic processes influence the so-called external reality? I am not sure about this question. Naively, I would answer: they change nothing. There are experiments, however, that show that the amount of information that we have about a system (an amount that depends on the observer) can be transformed into energy, see for example http://www.nature.com/nphys/journal/v6/n12/full/nphys1821.html So the natural question is: can different observers extract different amounts of energy from a system only because they have different amounts of information about it? The answer seems to be yes...

            This is not to say that thermodynamics is as weird as the many-world interpretation of quantum mechanics, nor anything of the sort. I may well not have understood the relation between information and thermodynamics quite right (I need to dedicate more time to the topic!). But I just want to mention this other level in which to interpret your question, because it goes to the heart of ontology. Hopefully in a little while I may have an answer for it!

            best!

            inés.

              Hi Inés,

              Thank you for posting on my forum page. I have replied to your post on your page and will rely on my spreadsheet to hopefully keep track of our conversation.

              Reagrds,

              Robert

              Dear Robert,

              I finally had the time to read your essay after you left your very encouraging post on my page. It was a pleasure and I have to say that this is maybe the most straight to the topic essay I have seen around. I will certainly look up the "causal entropic force" reference. The results sound intriguing and I hadn't heard of this yet.

              With respect to the connection between quantum mechanics and consciousness, I do see the appeal. However, a theory of consciousness should not only be able to explain whether there is consciousness yes or no, but also how a particular experience arises and what makes it different from other possible experiences. The components of our experiences most certainly correlate with neural interactions rather than anything that is going on in micro tubuli. If a connection can be made between QM and the content of experience, that would be great, but to date it doesn't seem promising.

              Best regards,

              Larissa

              Dear Larissa,

              Thank you for your time in reading and commenting on my essay. I greatly appreciate it. Thank you for your well grounded comments on the classical nature of consciousness too.

              My feeling is that quantum effects do play a rôle in some regard, but perhaps more in the spirit of how migratory birds are able to navigate by magnetic maps without ferrous materials in their bodies. In any event I agree with you that it doesn't seem very promising at present and there is a lot of work left to be done.

              Kind regards,

              Robert

              Dear Robert,

              My rating dropped after your visit to my threads. If it's not you, then you have the opportunity to raise the prestige of the New Cartesian Physic and extend our fellowship to the second round.

              You have successfully found a link between the origin of mind and entropy. However, to see the work demon of Maxwell's have to believe in the identity of space and matter. The movement of space-matter divides particles according to their energy. The genome accumulates is not experience, his complication is associated with the ability to complicate the mental images with which the mind interacts with the world. I appreciate your essay.

              Dizhechko Boris.

              Dear Boris,

              Thank you for coming back to my forum for comments on my essay. I can assure you that it was not my vote that brought your rating down. Besides, the contest rules state that judges will only use community ratings as a guide, and subject essays to an independent peer-review process for final evaluation.

              Your comments on my essay also appear to have had their subtleties scrambled by your translator. I do not wish to presume what it is you wanted to tell me, only that you last sentence makes it seem that it was all favorable.

              Regards,

              Robert