I am well aware of the Monty Hall problem and its proper solution. And we do have someone who specializes in probability on our faculty. I have simply never heard that term before.

Hi Ian,

Thanks for the link. It looks like Einstein was four years ahead of Bohr in trying to apply Planck's constant to the atom. I've bookmarked the site and should the strange thing called free time show up, I might read other articles.

Jim Akerlund

Thank you of course I understood the essence of your paper. In a way you are 'saving the phenomena' - much easier than my rashly taking the tiger by the tail given my relative lack of knowledge in physics!

Hello Mr Durham,

Happy to see you again and your papper.

Congratulations for this general essay.

all the best from Belgium

Dear Ian Durham

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 Ian,

I was amused by your author bio.

But I'm sorry, I can't get past your definition of determinism: "we can define a deterministic process as being one for which the outcome can be predicted with certainty. To put it another way, a deterministic process is one for which there is only a single possible outcome." Surely, a deterministic process is one in which, because of the rules (e.g. law-of-nature rules), there is always only one logically possible outcome whether or not (for various reasons e.g. complexity) all logically possible outcomes of these rules can be predicted. Whether a process is deterministic or not has nothing to do with whether we can predict outcomes.

    "Is free will just an illusion? Does it require randomness or does it require it require determinism? The answers to these questions undoubtedly lie in a deeper understanding of the transition from quantum systems to classical ones." In order to understand quantum theory at a deeper level it might be necessary to identify the empirically valid interpretation of string theory. I have suggested to the string theorists that Milgrom is the Kepler of contemporary cosmology.

    Dark Matter or Modified Gravity - McGaugh, YouTube 2015

    The string theorists might be correct in saying that the equivalence principle is 100% correct -- in this case, my guess is that there exist MOND-chameleon particles. These hypothetical particles would have variable effective mass depending upon the nearby gravitational acceleration. This weird hypothetical property might allow Milgrom's MOND to be approximately correct and to allow an APPARENT (but not real) violation of Newtonian-Einsteinian gravitational theory. In any case, I say that Milgrom is the Kepler of contemporary cosmology -- based upon the empirical evidence which NOW exists.

      Dear Ian,

      Good to see you back here on the contest.

      Your proposition that deterministic sysytems can arise from pure randomness is interesting.

      When a "reality" emerges from the randomness of what I called Total Simultaneity it seems for the emergent agants in this reality most of the times deterministic because time (and so cause and effect) and space were introduced (emerged also) in this relity.

      In my perception it is also consciousness that is ordering the entropy of chaos (the randomness),. When consciousness is restricted by time it sems that the pst is always deterministic.

      Of course this is only a too short introduction of my essay "The Purpose of Life" and I hope that you can find some time to read/leave a comment/and give a rating.

      I rated you high because I learned from your essay for my next article, besides of that I cannot understand the "authors" that just give ONE's without even leaving a comment (I received 4 ones)....

      best regards

      Wilhelmus de Wilde

        Hi Lorraine,

        I think you have missed the point partly. I am simply proposing a set of axioms and seeing what can be accomplished via those axioms. They may not be the correct axioms. But you have to start somewhere. And my definition of determinism is the same as the one used by D'Ariano. I agree prediction is not necessary here. Perhaps a poor choice of words on my part since it does not necessarily require an agent, but the basic idea is that there are multiple possible outcomes, none of which is oreferentially more likely to occur than any other.

        Ian

        Thank you Wilhelmus! You make a very important point. Time and space must necessarily be emergent from any such fundamental system. I think most physicists would probably agree with that, though exactly how it does remains a bit of a mystery. It's something I've been grappling with for some time now.

        Dear Ian Durham,

        Please excuse me for I have no intention of disparaging in any way any part of your essay.

        I merely wish to point out that "Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler." Albert Einstein (1879 - 1955) Physicist & Nobel Laureate.

        Only nature could produce a reality so simple, a single cell amoeba could deal with it.

        The real Universe must consist only of one unified visible infinite physical surface occurring in one infinite dimension, that am always illuminated by infinite non-surface light.

        A more detailed explanation of natural reality can be found in my essay, SCORE ONE FOR SIMPLICITY. I do hope that you will read my essay and perhaps comment on its merit.

        Joe Fisher, Realist

        Dear Chairman,

        Ritz was certainly wrong in his dispute with Einstein 1907, when he took the position of Newton's emission theory while I guess he was correct in that the past is different from the future. In this case if I recall correctly, Einstein preferred probabilistics and the belonging in principle pre-determined block universe.

        I didn't find the Einstein-Ritz dispute mentioned in your essay. Maybe it wasn't as important as I thought. Hopefully, you can nonetheless enlighten me.

        Curious,

        Eckard

        Nice essay Durham,

        Your ideas and thinking are excellent for eg...

        1. What role does chance play in the universe? Quantum theory suggests that randomness is a fundamental part of how the universe works and yet we live mostly intentional, ordered lives.

        2. For a two-outcome process whose outcomes have a 51% and 49% likelihood of occurrence respectively, one might be tempted to refer to it as `nearly random.' On the other hand, if those same likelihoods were 99% and 1% respectively, one might be tempted to say the process was `nearly deterministic.' But what if they were 80% and 20% or 60% and 40%? At what point do we stop referring to a process as nearly deterministic' or `nearly random'?

        3. In fact both Eddington and Compton argued that the randomness of quantum mechanics was a necessary condition for free will [3, 5]. On the other hand, Lloyd has argued that even deterministic systems can't predict the results of their decision-making process ahead of time [8]

        ...... Universe is working in deterministic way..................... At this point I want you to ask you to please have a look at my essay, where ...............reproduction of Galaxies in the Universe is described. Dynamic Universe Model is another mathematical model for Universe. Its mathematics show that the movement of masses will be having a purpose or goal, Different Galaxies will be born and die (quench) etc...just have a look at my essay... "Distances, Locations, Ages and Reproduction of Galaxies in our Dynamic Universe" where UGF (Universal Gravitational force) acting on each and every mass, will create a direction and purpose of movement.....

        I think intension is inherited from Universe itself to all Biological systems

        For your information Dynamic Universe model is totally based on experimental results. Here in Dynamic Universe Model Space is Space and time is time in cosmology level or in any level. In the classical general relativity, space and time are convertible in to each other.

        Many papers and books on Dynamic Universe Model were published by the author on unsolved problems of present day Physics, for example 'Absolute Rest frame of reference is not necessary' (1994) , 'Multiple bending of light ray can create many images for one Galaxy: in our dynamic universe', About "SITA" simulations, 'Missing mass in Galaxy is NOT required', "New mathematics tensors without Differential and Integral equations", "Information, Reality and Relics of Cosmic Microwave Background", "Dynamic Universe Model explains the Discrepancies of Very-Long-Baseline Interferometry Observations.", in 2015 'Explaining Formation of Astronomical Jets Using Dynamic Universe Model, 'Explaining Pioneer anomaly', 'Explaining Near luminal velocities in Astronomical jets', 'Observation of super luminal neutrinos', 'Process of quenching in Galaxies due to formation of hole at the center of Galaxy, as its central densemass dries up', "Dynamic Universe Model Predicts the Trajectory of New Horizons Satellite Going to Pluto" etc., are some more papers from the Dynamic Universe model. Four Books also were published. Book1 shows Dynamic Universe Model is singularity free and body to collision free, Book 2, and Book 3 are explanation of equations of Dynamic Universe model. Book 4 deals about prediction and finding of Blue shifted Galaxies in the universe.

        With axioms like... No Isotropy; No Homogeneity; No Space-time continuum; Non-uniform density of matter(Universe is lumpy); No singularities; No collisions between bodies; No Blackholes; No warm holes; No Bigbang; No repulsion between distant Galaxies; Non-empty Universe; No imaginary or negative time axis; No imaginary X, Y, Z axes; No differential and Integral Equations mathematically; No General Relativity and Model does not reduce to General Relativity on any condition; No Creation of matter like Bigbang or steady-state models; No many mini Bigbangs; No Missing Mass; No Dark matter; No Dark energy; No Bigbang generated CMB detected; No Multi-verses etc.

        Many predictions of Dynamic Universe Model came true, like Blue shifted Galaxies and no dark matter. Dynamic Universe Model gave many results otherwise difficult to explain

        Have a look at my essay on Dynamic Universe Model and its blog also where all my books and papers are available for free downloading...

        http://vaksdynamicuniversemodel.blogspot.in/

        Best wishes to your essay.

        For your blessings please................

        =snp. gupta

        Dear Ian,

        This was very thought-provoking! I spent quite some time after reading your essay thinking about whether it is possible to construct a causal macro system from purely random micro elements, i.e. a macro system in which the state of one macro element can causally influence other macro elements, while the micro elements are completely random.

        As you said, for a set of dice, that would not be possible, since no matter how you group the dice, the state of one macro element is independent of the state of the other macro elements.

        For the case where energy travels around, it seems different, since there is a conserved quantity. However, if this energy traveling is truly random at the micro level, i.e. every micro state is equally possible following every possible micro state, then again the macro states would be independent of each other.

        Do you agree or did I miss something?

        Best regards,

        Larissa

        Hi Larissa,

        Thanks for the comments! I think I agree. So you can get a nearly deterministic outcome from underlying randomness, but a string of such outcomes might not be deterministic because the macrostates are not correlated. Is that kind of what you're saying?

        By the way, I read your essay a couple of days ago and loved it. It takes me awhile to digest everything and I've been at a conference all week so I didn't post anything, but I did rate it. I actually wanted to talk to you about it (which I'll do via e-mail) because it relates to some of the things I've been thinking about lately.

        Cheers,

        Ian

          Hi Ian,

          Yes, the random string is a good way to express what I mean. Great! I'm waiting to here from you then.

          Cheers,

          Larissa

          Dear Ian,

          that was nice and clear! You do a great job explaining the thermodynamic limit. While reading your essay I noticed that the outlines of our essays are spookily similar :D although we start from different microscopic theories and cover different topics in the middle sections. You explain emergence of determinism from random processes and then move on to free will. I explain emergence of irreversibility from reversible dynamics and then move on to goal-oriented behavior. For the first step we both have to introduce the concept of microstates and macrostates.

          That was fun to read, cheers, Stefan

            Thanks Stefan! I will have to read your essay!

            Dear Prof. Durham,

            Your very interesting essay talks about random fluctuations leading toward order, structure, and even intentionality.

            I agree, but I think the missing link is the biological concept of evolutionary adaption. In evolution, random fluctuations provide the raw material, but they are filtered by the environment to select out structures that survive. Even consciousness may be an adaptive structure.

            I address the issue of adaptation in my own essay, "No Ghost in the Machine". I argue that recognition of self, other agents, and a causal narrative are built into specific evolved brain structures, based on neural networks, which create a sense of consciousness as part of a dynamic model of the environment. The reason that this is such a difficult problem is that we are being misled by the subjective perceptions of our own minds.

            Alan Kadin