Bell's Theory of Beables and the Concept of `Universe' by Ian Durham

You are very welcome!

"I am only saying that the universe is not fundamental in the types of theories..." I agree. My point is, that says more about the nature of mathematical theories, than about the nature of the universe. Theories are virtually devoid of information. The universe is not. Hence, the map fails to provide anything more than a very meager description of the territory. Reality is determined by the vast information content of the initial conditions, not the exceedingly sparse information content of sets of equations; change the initial conditions, and you change the resulting reality, even if the equations remain the same.

Rob McEachern

Hi Ian,

Yay, beables! :-)

One important point about Bell's use of "local beables" that I think it's important to stress, is that every beable is *somewhere* and *somewhen*. In other words, they're parameters that are functions on spacetime. (To take Bell's example that you quote, the field values in classical E+M are clearly spacetime-localized beables.) In fact, if you take this spacetime-localization as the proper reading of his "belonging to objects" quote, the problems you note in section 1 pretty much vanish, I think.

Then, when you get to nonlocal beables like wavefunctions, it also becomes clearer that you're talking about something very different. Concepts that apply to local beables don't necessarily apply to nonlocal beables. (In my way of thinking, the latter shouldn't even be called "beables" at all -- I prefer "ontology" here, to keep beables connected to spacetime, with wavefunctions and functionals of field configurations in some broader category.)

But then I certainly come around to agreeing with your conclusion: if the universe is the sum total of all the beables, then the *universe* isn't fundamental -- the *beables* are! But would you be okay with adding the laws and boundary conditions that constrain those beables to the set of things that are "fundamental"?

Thanks for the essay! -Ken

Dear Ian Durham

Just letting you know that I am making a start on reading of your essay, and hope that you might also take a glance over mine please? I look forward to the sharing of thoughtful opinion. Congratulations on your essay rating as it stands, and best of luck for the contest conclusion.

My essay is titled

"Darwinian Universal Fundamental Origin". It stands as a novel test for whether a natural organisational principle can serve a rationale, for emergence of complex systems of physics and cosmology. I will be interested to have my effort judged on both the basis of prospect and of novelty.

Thank you & kind regards

Steven Andresen

Respected Prof Ian Durham

Wonderful conclusion..... " a universe that is a beable within the framework of some theory, cannot be fundamental." by the way....

Here in my essay energy to mass conversion is proposed................ yours is very nice essay best wishes .... I highly appreciate hope your essay and hope for reciprocity ....You may please spend some of the valuable time on Dynamic Universe Model also and give your some of the valuable & esteemed guidance

Some of the Main foundational points of Dynamic Universe Model :

-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 GR on any condition

-No Creation of matter like Bigbang or steady-state models

-No many mini Bigbangs

-No Missing Mass / Dark matter

-No Dark energy

-No Bigbang generated CMB detected

-No Multi-verses

Here:

-Accelerating Expanding universe with 33% Blue shifted Galaxies

-Newton's Gravitation law works everywhere in the same way

-All bodies dynamically moving

-All bodies move in dynamic Equilibrium

-Closed universe model no light or bodies will go away from universe

-Single Universe no baby universes

-Time is linear as observed on earth, moving forward only

-Independent x,y,z coordinate axes and Time axis no interdependencies between axes..

-UGF (Universal Gravitational Force) calculated on every point-mass

-Tensors (Linear) used for giving UNIQUE solutions for each time step

-Uses everyday physics as achievable by engineering

-21000 linear equations are used in an Excel sheet

-Computerized calculations uses 16 decimal digit accuracy

-Data mining and data warehousing techniques are used for data extraction from large amounts of data.

- Many predictions of Dynamic Universe Model came true....Have a look at

http://vaksdynamicuniversemodel.blogspot.in/p/blog-page_15.html

I request you to please have a look at my essay also, and give some of your esteemed criticism for your information........

Dynamic Universe Model says that the energy in the form of electromagnetic radiation passing grazingly near any gravitating mass changes its in frequency and finally will convert into neutrinos (mass). We all know that there is no experiment or quest in this direction. Energy conversion happens from mass to energy with the famous E=mC2, the other side of this conversion was not thought off. This is a new fundamental prediction by Dynamic Universe Model, a foundational quest in the area of Astrophysics and Cosmology.

In accordance with Dynamic Universe Model frequency shift happens on both the sides of spectrum when any electromagnetic radiation passes grazingly near gravitating mass. With this new verification, we will open a new frontier that will unlock a way for formation of the basis for continual Nucleosynthesis (continuous formation of elements) in our Universe. Amount of frequency shift will depend on relative velocity difference. All the papers of author can be downloaded from "http://vaksdynamicuniversemodel.blogspot.in/ "

I request you to please post your reply in my essay also, so that I can get an intimation that you replied

Best

=snp

Hi Ian,

I'm left a little confused. Are you a Bellist or are you not?

Dear Ian Durham,

You begin with a logician [or a general semanticist] pointing out limits on how much we can reasonably infer from a given observation. Thanks! Don't see much of that these days. You then say "quantum mechanics is ostensibly a [statistical] theory about the results of measurements."

Bell, based on dBB, investigated "objective properties - beables - assigned to objects", in the way that physically real fields E and H are beables and Maxwell's theory. My current essay reviews Hertz's extension of Maxwell's equations that Einstein based his 1905 paper on. I hope you will read it and comment on it.

If one considers an ultimately dense vortex in a self-interacting field, it might seem to shrink to a point (like a skater pulling in her arms). Before that happens it may reach a limiting point [not describable in a brief comment] where electric charge comes into being. Does all of the 'vortex' go into the charged particle, or does a remnant survive (as a neutrino)? In a comment above you refer to a neutrino as potentially not a fundamental particle, but something like a W+ boson and something else. If a boson is a vortex in an ultradense 'perfect fluid' such as created at LHC, a neutrino may be a Z boson remnant (and nothing else) which yields a left-handed Majorana 'particle'.

I'm in full agreement with Bell about real scalar fields but 'unreal' scalar electric potential. As one is the gradient or integral of the other, why should both be real? You ask "are fundamental beables knowable, and, if so how can we know them?" I suggest that if we can model them well enough to predict their mass (which SM cannot do) this might count for 'knowledge'. And yes, it is better to understand the universe we live in! Also glad you do not believe wave functions necessarily pose a problem for beables. A moving boat will induce a wave and moving mass can also. Rather than discuss your 'universe as beable', may I point out relevant aspects of Bell [copied from my response to another author]:

Referring to Bell's "momentous no-go theorem", if you look at his first paper, his very first equation determines the outcome: A = +/-1, B = +/-1, where A and B are measurements on Stern-Gerlach. This is based on the assumption of quantum qubits. But QM provides only probabilistic predictions. Many-body experiments on spin do yield qubit outcomes, as should be expected. Stern-Gerlach does not yield qubit outcomes, but smeared results that match 3D spin dynamics in an inhomogeneous field. However Pauli's mathematical projection of qubit mechanics: O|+> = +|+>, O|-> = -|-> is Bell's assumption of reality. In other words Bell claims to look for a classical (local variable) description of Stern-Gerlach, but then constrains the problem to quantum results based on the mathematical projection of Pauli, not on the empirical results of Stern-Gerlach.

Feynman later put the final nail in this coffin by assuming that his favorite two-slit photon experiment could be carried over directly to a two-slit spin analog (the SG experiment). Of course the same equations apply, because he's making the same mathematical projection, but the actual physics of the photon in two-slits is vastly different from the physics of atoms in an inhomogeneous magnetic field, and Feynman's extended SG gedanken model has never been tested. Despite that, several QM textbooks base QM on his model.

Since Feynman and Bell's math and logic have been accepted as gospel, local realism has been excluded from physics. A no-go theorem based on atoms in a magnetic field, constrained to never-tested single-qubit spin results, is then "proved" by photon-based experiments which actually do produce two-state results: on/off detections.

I repeat - the entire entanglement industry is based on the erroneous assumption that the results of the Stern-Gerlach atomic experiments are +1 and -1 deflections, "tested" by photonic experiments that use +1 and 0 detections. The atomic data produced by Stern-Gerlach clearly conflicts with Bell's initial assumption, but instead of trying sophisticated tests of Stern-Gerlach using modern technology the whole entanglement industry is based on 1922 experiments that clearly do not yield +1 and -1 results. The confusion of 1920s quantum mechanics is locked in, compounded by 1960's theoretical claims.

My suggestion is to look for the basic assumptions that violate intuition and that lead to nonsense. My current essay provides a possible example of such.

Thank you for surprising yourself with an essay on beables!

My very best regards and best wishes,

Edwin Eugene Klingman

Thank you, Ian for yet another insightful and thought-provoking essay.

I remember that late night (for me) when I, in South Africa, and you, in Maine, were scrambling to get our essays into shape. I am very glad that you succeeded.

I enjoyed the parable about the economist, mathematician, and logician. Clearly, the logician was not a Bayesian and could not incorporate his prior information about the coloring of cows. Surprisingly, the mathematician seems to have been a Bayesian; and the economist a very poor one with ridiculous priors about the nature of cows in a region.

Your discussion of Bell's beables is interesting, and after reading a few pages in I feel that I could write an essay in response to this. The idea of assigning things, beables, properties is something I have given a lot of thought to. At this point, this idea that objects have positions in space and time, or have speeds or energy and momentum is clearly not right. Each of these 'properties' is observer-dependent, which means that they are not properties possessed by the objects in question, but instead represent a relationship between the object and the observer. This makes me feel more strongly that this is one of the problems of physics. These quantities represent relationships, not properties. It is possibly this fact that has led physics astray.

You now have me thinking about how one can conceive of my influence theory, which results in an emergent space-time, in terms of beables.

Thank you for an interesting, stimulating, and thoughtful essay!

Kevin Knuth

Ian,

If both 'tentative' Maxwell's and Quantum Theory appear incomplete, which would you suggest is most lacking in it's correspondence with nature? or perhaps 'misunderstood'?

And I have a problem with Beables I hope you can help with. I liked Bell and maybe-ables, but checking for answers to the above question I added Maxwell's 4-momenta states including 'curl' into Bohr's (no) starting assumptions for pair particles led to interaction momentum transfer issues. Everything turned into damn beables! I mean the whole ontological construction, like 3 great chains of beehives with clouds of fermions everywhere! I can rotate them any way I like (x,y,z) but they never go away. You can imagine the implications (honey pouring from every crevice!)

I'm still a bit shocked and amazed. I can't seem get away from them but I hope you can show me how. I tried the detection loophole but, to make it worse, Declan Traill's short essay gives a matching computer code and violation plot with CHSH>2 and steering violation >1. I checked Bells predictions and it did seem to match, including the 'amaze' bit, so it looks right. But you're the expert. Help needed!

I enjoyed the rest of your essay too and agree on universes, though did find a consistent shape and cyclic mechanism in a published paper. Would that qualify morphologically? I'll dig it out if you're interested.

Look forward to your advice about all those might justbe-ables.

Very best

Peter

Hello Ian,

I enjoyed your essay, it was a real pleasure to read.I liked also how you see the works of Wheeler and its geometrodynamics considering the wavesfunctions, it was a relevant Reading, I learn in the same time.

All the best in this contest

Ian,

I read Bells Be-ables a little more literally, as 'something that 'IS'. My point then is that if we substitute 'guesses' about particles and interactions for actual test states and mechanisms, which then provides the ontology.

I've just been pointed to the Poincare Sphere,with the 4 orthogonal conjugate vectors I identify in my experiment. THAT is one of the string of Beables' which reproduces QM's predictions.

Of course that's impossible you say. Well Bell didn't think so, and it seems he was right. I hope as the expert you'll have a careful check through and see if you can find a flaw. It may be quite important!

Very best

Peter

Dear Ian,

I highly estimate you essay exelent.

It is so close to me. «From its earliest days nearly a century ago, quantum mechanics has proven itself to be a tremendously accurate yet intellectually unsatisfying theory to many». «A universe without structure, without elements is meaningless». «The universe's existence is independent of our observation of it».

I hope that my modest achievements can be information for reflection for you.

Vladimir Fedorov

https://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/3080

Dear Ian

If you are looking for another essay to read and rate in the final days of the contest, will you consider mine please? I read all essays from those who comment on my page, and if I cant rate an essay highly, then I don't rate them at all. Infact I haven't issued a rating lower that ten. So you have nothing to lose by having me read your essay, and everything to gain.

Beyond my essay's introduction, I place a microscope on the subjects of universal complexity and natural forces. I do so within context that clock operation is driven by Quantum Mechanical forces (atomic and photonic), while clocks also serve measure of General Relativity's effects (spacetime, time dilation). In this respect clocks can be said to possess a split personality, giving them the distinction that they are simultaneously a study in QM, while GR is a study of clocks. The situation stands whereby we have two fundamental theories of the world, but just one world. And we have a singular device which serves study of both those fundamental theories. Two fundamental theories, but one device? Please join me and my essay in questioning this circumstance?

My essay goes on to identify natural forces in their universal roles, how they motivate the building of and maintaining complex universal structures and processes. When we look at how star fusion processes sit within a "narrow range of sensitivity" that stars are neither led to explode nor collapse under gravity. We think how lucky we are that the universe is just so. We can also count our lucky stars that the fusion process that marks the birth of a star, also leads to an eruption of photons from its surface. And again, how lucky we are! for if they didn't then gas accumulation wouldn't be halted and the star would again be led to collapse.

Could a natural organisation principle have been responsible for fine tuning universal systems? Faced with how lucky we appear to have been, shouldn't we consider this possibility?

For our luck surely didnt run out there, for these photons stream down on earth, liquifying oceans which drive geochemical processes that we "life" are reliant upon. The Earth is made up of elements that possess the chemical potentials that life is entirely dependent upon. Those chemical potentials are not expressed in the absence of water solvency. So again, how amazingly fortunate we are that these chemical potentials exist in the first instance, and additionally within an environment of abundant water solvency such as Earth, able to express these potentials.

My essay is attempt of something audacious. It questions the fundamental nature of the interaction between space and matter Guv = Tuv, and hypothesizes the equality between space curvature and atomic forces is due to common process. Space gives up a potential in exchange for atomic forces in a conversion process, which drives atomic activity. And furthermore, that Baryons only exist because this energy potential of space exists and is available for exploitation. Baryon characteristics and behaviours, complexity of structure and process might then be explained in terms of being evolved and optimised for this purpose and existence. Removing need for so many layers of extraordinary luck to eventuate our own existence. It attempts an interpretation of the above mentioned stellar processes within these terms, but also extends much further. It shines a light on molecular structure that binds matter together, as potentially being an evolved agency that enhances rigidity and therefor persistence of universal system. We then turn a questioning mind towards Earths unlikely geochemical processes, (for which we living things owe so much) and look at its central theme and propensity for molecular rock forming processes. The existence of chemical potentials and their diverse range of molecular bond formation activities? The abundance of water solvent on Earth, for which many geochemical rock forming processes could not be expressed without? The question of a watery Earth? is then implicated as being part of an evolved system that arose for purpose and reason, alongside the same reason and purpose that molecular bonds and chemistry processes arose.

By identifying atomic forces as having their origin in space, we have identified how they perpetually act, and deliver work products. Forces drive clocks and clock activity is shown by GR to dilate. My essay details the principle of force dilation and applies it to a universal mystery. My essay raises the possibility, that nature in possession of a natural energy potential, will spontaneously generate a circumstance of Darwinian emergence. It did so on Earth, and perhaps it did so within a wider scope. We learnt how biology generates intricate structure and complexity, and now we learn how it might explain for intricate structure and complexity within universal physical systems.

To steal a phrase from my essay "A world product of evolved optimization".

Best of luck for the conclusion of the contest

Kind regards

Steven Andresen

Darwinian Universal Fundamental Origin