God\'s Dice and Einstein\'s Solids by Ian Durham

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

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

Hi Ian,

I would dispute what you say about free will:

I was a bit surprised at the non-sequitur: "It's clear that the emergence of determinism and free will in this model is not solely due to the combinatorics alone.", because there was no previous justification for the proposition that free will had "emerged", and no suggestion about what it might have emerged from, if anything. On the contrary, the ability to freely choose broccoli rather than carrots was earlier seemingly assumed as a given: "if I choose to have carrots", "Free will thus generally involve choices about macroprocesses...".

But I wouldn't have said that "...the essence of free will is that...if I choose to have carrots I can have confidence that ...the carrots won't randomly and inexplicably turn into a potato...": the online Oxford dictionary defines free will as "The power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate". The definition is all about the power to freely move oneself with respect to the rest of reality, not about whether carrots might unexpectedly turn into potatoes, causing a loss of confidence.

Clearly choosing carrots, that then have to be retrieved from the fridge, is more like choosing a goal to work towards: it is a multi-step process, not an instantaneous outcome, but also not what you suggest i.e. a single macroprocess arising from a multiplicity of random microprocesses.

Lorraine

Ian,

Great. 'We learn then we die!' I wonder if you might be similarly incisive (and more critical if you like) with my essay. I've come to what looks like a very important geometrical derivation and can't disprove it, so need help.

Very best

Peter

Hello Ian,

Thank you for such an enjoyable and interesting read. From the outset, you argue it is 'processes' that make the universe interesting - which maps quite nicely in agreement with what I argue with my coauthor in our essay that fundamental interactions/forces engender the rich structures in the universe. Indeed as you develop micro vs macro processes I agree is a good way to think about natural phenomena. This is in harmony with how we argued renormlisation essentially generates a hierarchy of processes of largely independent effective theories at different scales.

In my daily particle physics work, I remain astonished how well simulations based on quantum amplitudes predict collider data. These probabilities are pre-determinined (though non-trivial to calculate!), and indeed from your combinatoric/statistical mechanics perspective, can give rise to seemingly goal-directed macrostates. My electron seems to always recede from the collision point, never returning to it. Reading your essay where you discuss issues of randomness and determinism in wonderful detail and clarity, it got me thinking again about how even mathematically deterministic theories can lead to experimentally unpredictable phenomena notably chaotic dynamics. I wonder how this can be distinguished from the seeming randomness of quantum theory (which may conceal a similarly deterministic formalism)?

It seems like what information/knowledge we have about a system and even its scale has a deep impact as to whether we view the phenomenon as deterministic or stochastic. The weather is notoriously difficult to predict precisely because of chaotic dynamics, but at a smaller level, it is governed by deterministic Navier-Stokes. I suppose one of the workarounds you mention is long term aggregates such as climate modelling, or coarse-grained macrostate as extracting thermodynamics from Einstein solids would. Though it is interesting whether knowledge/information about the system affects how we assign what exactly constitutes a micro vs macrostate.

Thanks again for a though-provoking essay!

Best,

Jesse

Dear Sir,

Chance is a possibility of something happening. It depends upon the knowledge of all possible outcomes. Otherwise, whatever is happening will appear to be natural cause and effect relationship. Random is proceeding, made, or occurring without definite aim, reason, or pattern, or, done or happening without method or conscious decision - or as you say: 'unpredictable'. But is there any proof that the universe appears to be decidedly random? Can the randomness not be attributed to our inability to "know" the secrets or the subtleties of Nature? Or as you say: "something more fundamental and less ordered"? After all, everything is interconnected and interrelated at the fundamental level and there is order behind the seemingly chaos represented by the butterfly effect. Each step precedes the following step in a cause and effect relationship. If could somehow know the steps, it would be purely deterministic. However, the intermittent external effects bring in the uncertainties that make it appear random.

But are these uncertainties really unpredictable? If we focus only on the trajectory of one event, it appears unpredictable, as we do not know when something will interfere. But if we could somehow know ALL factors contributing to the uncertainties, it no longer looks uncertain or random. Think of a car accident happening in front of you, where you are standing at a vantage point to see everything clearly. We have seen many such cases. The persons involved in the accident did not foresee it. For them, it was random - a chance. But from our vintage position, we could see how one or the other deviated from the predicted path to meet with the accident. With a further query on their mental or physical condition, we could pin point the exact cause.

While one of the two may be aware of the likelihood of accident by watching the behavior of the other, we would be confident about the outcome, because we observing the behavior of both. Thus, each step in every action is precisely deterministic, but not always revealed to us. This makes the determinism to have two variants: fully deterministic as we see the totality from our vantage point, and partly (or as you say nearly) deterministic, as one of the participants who tries to avoid the accident immediately before it occurred sees. He could have avoided the accident had he seen it earlier or as you say: nearly random. You also describe this in a different language: "the actual occurrence of the process" and "outcomes of that process".

Your part II is a brilliant analysis and needs no comment. But in part III, we wish you could have considered a more practical example like the three quarks inside a proton or neutron and the neutrino/anti-neutrino. At a certain level, even conscious actions are mechanical. We "feel" a "need" to "rectify some deficiency". If we have the "knowledge" about the "mechanism for rectifying the needs", then only we will have a "desire to act". This is the goal. The determination to translate the goal to achievement in a specific way, is our freewill. The freewill determines the action to be executed. Only thereafter, the readiness potential is developed in the brain, which signals the different body parts to execute that command through the network of genes. In the quantum or inert macro world, a particle "feels" a "need" to "adjust to some energy". If it had the "mechanism for rectifying the needs", then only we will "desire to act" within permissible limits in permissible ways to achieve a new state.

Finally, the randomness of quantum mechanics are not necessary condition for freewill. But it offers choices to choose from - hence appears random. Also you have pointed out correctly that "even deterministic systems can't predict the results of their decision-making process ahead of time". Thus, time also is one of the causes for everything.

You have shown that the seeds of such an understanding might be found in simple combinatorics. This is absolutely essential. In our essay here, we have shown the 10 dimensions needed for string theory and M theory can be physically derived without entering into the complexities of abstract mathematics.

Regards

basudeba

Dear Ian Durham

A good account of probability, at one level, related to simple macro states, at a different level.

Something to consider: If I choose carrots, how is this macro state decision carried back down to the micro state level? This is one of the disconnects I see with such arguments - are macro level 'intentions' defined by micro level states or processes? If so, how is a macro level decision defined, and decided, at the micro level?

If the reductionist hypothesis of physics is correct, all actions derive from the micro (or smaller) level. While you have shown how random micro states can produce macro state semi-determinism, this begs the issue of intentionality possibly originating from the macro level.

One other comment is a concern over the mathematical tools used for this (and a number of other) physical models: Both statistics and probability only allow operations from the smaller to the larger levels. This is fine if all actions only stem from the smaller to the larger levels. However, if this assumption is not correct, then using these mathematical tools will prevent any attempt to show influence from the higher to the lower levels.

I will suggest that physicists creating experiments that drive change at 'micro' levels (human intentional actions) is a good indication that all actions do not stem from the smaller to the larger and the reductionist assumption is incorrect. This would require changes to the mathematical models and tools we have today.

Don

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