The Laws? of Physics by Kevin H Knuth

Dear Kevin,

Thanks for a very interesting meditation on the nature of fundamental laws and where they come from. You make an excellent point, that it can be hard even to distinguish between what's determined by some underlying logic and what's just accidental.

I see that the main theme of your work gets mentioned only briefly - i.e. that much of the mathematical structure of physics is derivable from consistency requirements inherent in the nature of quantitative information. The question you raise here at the end is whether this kind of approach can possibly explain the "fine-tuning" of many different physical parameters needed to support a habitable universe.

My current essay deals with many of the same questions, and also focuses on fine-tuning, though not in relation to the existence of life. I try to show that the contingent aspects of physics - those not derivable from consistency - can in principle be explained by another basic requirement relating to information, its contextuality. I argue that no kind of information can be measured, or even meaningfully defined, apart from a context of other related kinds of information. Since this contextual information must also be empirically determinable, in other contexts, this sets very strong constraints on the structure of any universe that can define and measure any type of information.

I hope you'll take a look and let me know if the argument makes sense to you. Among other things, it offers an interesting perspective on your opening question - how and why do things "obey" the laws of physics?

Thanks again for your thoughtful and entertaining contribution.

Conrad

Author Kevin response to James Rose objections on the use of the word' God the Creator'.He still did not use the word but only as godhead! May i say that Nature is supreme and it has logic in its cosmic thinking of creating this beautiful Universe and then chosing Man to appear billion of years after the creation. There too is a logic behind the creation of the Earth around the star , our Sun.We have done nothing as human beings to even add an iaota to this logical creation. To add to Rose objections, may i add the ancient ancestors of ours in the Indian continent like Bhaskar who gave the correct value for the speed of light by just meditating and looking inwards hard and full of sacrifice and conscientious labour. Similar is the recognition to such anonymous wise men we have had who could visualise the force concept of gravity long before it was so recorded by modern science, as developed only during past atmost 1000 years. I too am an experimental Physicist and we know the history how philosophy gave rise to Physics and other sciences, as we branched of Physics from philosophy. Man is a thinker and thoughts have their own neurons working behind in the brain. Man has understood the understanding of such marvels of Nature gradually and i feel we have a lot of work ahead left in differnt branches of science.Best thinking bu us too takes place between gaps in the train of thoughts when cosmos is free to interact with us more effectively. Einstein alimony in support of this argument!

In our age group, we consider Biology to depend on Physics as primary to the tools used to understand basically what happens in living systems , relative to what goes on natural processes we observe through using Physics. One day, it may become possible for a Physicist to learn from a Biologist as to how things need to be understood!

Hope author and other commentators react to my posting here and i do not mind even a strong rebuttal and criticism of views experessed by me!

Dear Kevin,

I liked your essay very much. Wheeler said that the greatest advance in science by Newton was, that he was able to separate the contingent properties from the lawful properties.

The connections of the physical constants is very interesting. And in the current paradigm they cannot be questioned, since they are part of the god given laws. What is your personal view? What mechanism could fix these constants to the values they have?

In my essay essay, I adopt some sort of conventionalism like Poincaré: Newton's first law is conventional and enables us to define the fundamental properties of the system: mass and momentum. Only then the second law becomes an empirical law. In my essay I assume that in order to make the first law possible, the universe/environment of a system must be approximately infinite and homogenous or almost empty. By changing universal conditions or near a black whole, the fundamental concepts would change and hence our laws would change. In that sense the laws themselves are contingent depending on the state of the universe.

I hope you find time to read and comment on my essay.

Luca

Hi Kevin,

Very cool essay -- quite interesting examples!

I will say you piqued my interest when you started off talking about our laws as 'anthropomorphic', and wished you had gotten back to that issue a bit more. Varying constants is interesting, but doesn't really seem to fall in the 'anthropomorphic' category as I see it. What else did you have in mind when you used that term?

Also, I suspect you're not merely interested in the values of the constants, but rather other aspects of fundamental physics. I wonder whether you think even the form of our dynamical equations might be too anthropomorphic...?

Finally, you seem to be considering the possibility that these constants are changing with *time*. Does that mean you see time itself as being more fundamental than the laws we see obeyed at any one moment in our universe? What about space? (Constants could vary over space as well, presumably...)

Cheers! -Ken

Nice thinking about gravity Dr Kevin H Knuth

You are asking Very important questions...."The laws of physics distinguish the probable from the improbable, and separate the possible from the impossible. But is this law-based description of the universe too anthropomorphic? Are we really to believe that when we release a rock from our hand that it is somehow compelled by this decree and thus obliged to fall to the ground? Or are there deeper reasons why the rock does what it does every time it is released?....."

Hope you will have a look at another Gravity based essay also...

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

Dear Prof. Knuth,

very interesting essay, congratulation! I feel that what you say is a good attitute towards a relaxation of classical determinism, still maintained by a major part of the physicalist program.

Concerning this, I think you might appreciate my essay (https://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/3017)

Good job, high rating.

Best wishes,

Flavio

Hi Kevin,

One section of your essay caught my attention:

"Kepler was inspired by a comment attributed to Socrates in Plato's Politeia VII where he notes that musical harmony is the sister science to astronomy (vander Schoot, 2001), Kepler worked to relate each of the spheres to a musical harmony."

Not quite realizing I was relating cosmology to music, I created the graviton as the cosmological equivalent to a guitar string. It surprised me how far I was able to take this.

Check out my essay "The Thing That is Space-Time" perhaps it should have been titled "The Music of the Ether". I think you will find it interesting and fits with your "Laws?".

Appreciate it if you can take the time to let me know what you think.

Thanks for your thought provoking essay on what is fundamental.

Don Limuti

Hi Kevin,

Your essay this time is fine, but going over what you wrote before and all the references made me believe that you have similar idea/conclusion to mine, although mine looks very strange and different. Particularly I think you are basing your system on "causal sets", so I think the relations between events(probabilities build up in my system) is the key to the structure. I appreciate if you take look at my essay. Thanks.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causal_sets

An earlier FQXI contest essay by you which I really like

https://fqxi.org/data/essay-contest-files/Knuth_fqxi13knuthessayfinal.pdf

another paper that resembles our systems

https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1411/1411.2072.pdf

Nice essay Kevin.

It's good to see someone else writing on the observer aspects of laws. You might look to some of later Eddington (as I'm sure you have before) on how your consistency conditions for the laws come from aspects of measurement - not sure this would resolve the biophilic aspect, but might be relevant.

I think Ken above spotted a terminological issue relating to "anthropomorphic". I assume you mean just "anthropic" in cases such as varying constants?

Best,

Dean

Nice essay Kevin.

It's good to see someone else writing on the observer aspects of laws. You might look to some of later Eddington (as I'm sure you have before) on how your consistency conditions for the laws come from aspects of measurement - not sure this would resolve the biophilic aspect, but might be relevant.

I think Ken above spotted a terminological issue relating to "anthropomorphic". I assume you mean just "anthropic" in cases such as varying constants?

Best,

Dean

" ... the Koide formula remains a curiosity, much like the Titius-Bode Law." Is the Koide formula somehow related to the fact that some quarks have charge 2/3 ? Is there a Koide-variant-formula with 1/3 instead of 2/3 that is somehow related to the fact that some quarks have charge 1/3 ?

Dear Kevin

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

Kevin,

Your abstract comments about laws; 'these concepts are part of the dogma of science as a belief system' and that 'In this sense reductionism, as an act of seeking simple underlying explanations, is ultimately critical to our understanding'. Seemed to give way to a mostly historical resume and analysis of origin. Interesting, fundamental and nicely written indeed but was I wrong to feel a little disappointed not to find ways to escape dogma? Or do you accept we're doomed to live with it?

I also argue and exemplify a specific reductionist approach and though you only touched in it's value was more sated by your examples, a worthwhile reminder for those caught up in the more fashionable emergence.

I know you've considered QM but avoid it here. Maybe wisely, but is it not the prime case of illogical laws? I ask as I've tested parameters for 3yrs and seem to have broken through to a classical mechanism by changing a hidden assumption; using the Poincare sphere (4 vectors inc. orthogonal 'curl') instead of singlet states, and all as Bell predicted.

Very few so far have read carefully enough to follow the complex ontological mechanistic 'measurement' sequence (part due to embedded dogma!) but I hope you can. Declan Trails short code & plot confirms the CHSH>2 Cos^2 derivation. (also Gordon Watson's partial algorithm heads the right way). A few redefinitions emerge and non-locality disappears.

I hope you can help.

Well done for yours. Very Best of luck in the judging.

Peter

The assumption that laws of nature are permanent isn't a dogma. It has been confirmed by any experiment made. Obviously laws could be changing so slow that cannot be measured, but then the claim they are really changing is a metaphysical claim and we will continue assuming that they don't change.

There is no logical reason to invoke a Creator, even less when the Universe is defined as an isolated system.

I see no reason supporting the idea that the design of the universe couldn't be other. So questions as "why is the universe the way it is and not something completely different?" don't make any sense to me.

An algebra of kind 2x2 = 22 is relatively easy to imagine.

Masses aren't "initial conditions"; the state space is (p,q). Masses are parameters. Also in one sense initial conditions aren't accidental, because they are final conditions for previous trajectory.

I don't find anything surprising on Newtonian laws describing the motions of planets orbiting the Sun, but not the number of the resulting planets, and their respective orbits. Newtonian laws don't describe the number of particles neither their mass or energy.

I always find interesting to see some physicists considering the possibility of multiverses, which is a non-physical hypothesis. Discussions about multiverses would be better left to philosophers.

Information Physics is a buzzword. There is no central role of information in physics, and the work of people as Jaynes has simply added confusion and nonsense to physics. I recall here Balescu criticism of the thermononsense school: "Jaynes' and coworkers theory is based on a non-transitive evolution law that produces ambiguous results. Although some difficulties of the theory can be cured, the theory "lacks a solid foundation" and "has not led to any new concrete result"".

Knuth' work is another rehash of older and debunked ideas introduced in the early times of quantum theory about "observers playing a central role" in Nature, and taken to its extreme by Wheeler's nonsensical "it from bit".

Professor Knuth,

Thank you for an excellent overview of the curious role that patterns of numbers have played in the history of mathematics and science, with an emphasis on questioning the depth to which these patterns are fixed within what we observe.

I will readily confess to being both a bit of a tolerant pragmatist regarding most such patterns. I am both a pragmatist in the skeptic that the more broadly a pattern is found in diverse types of data, the more likely it is to be attached deeply within the infrastructure behind that data. Thus words in Europe lead back "only" back to Proto-Indo-European, while the spectral element signatures of elements on the other side of the visible universe lead all the way back to the shared particle and space physics of our universe. In many ways, what we really seem to be doing there is (as you note) not so much looking for "laws" as we are looking for points of shared origins in space and time of such patterns.

I am a skeptic in the sense that it's exceedingly unwise both in everyday life and in data analysis to assume that just because you see a pattern that it's necessarily meaningful or even real. We humans are particularly prone to seeing exactly what we want to see, a phenomenon that itself is a pattern that emerges from our need to make fast, efficient use of relatively slow and limited-capacity neural circuitry. Our brains take a lot of shortcuts.

The delicacy of the fine-structure constant is just the tip of the anthropic tuning mystery. Lee Smolin estimates that when you take the product of all of the tunings needed create a life-as-we-know-it tolerant universe, the odds fall to 1 in 10229. For some perspective, that is almost as low as the odds of our President saying just the right words in a multicultural sensitivity training session.

I was not aware of the Koide pattern. Since I am currently working on a paper with strong geometric implications for fermions when represented in the right space, such a vaguely geometric pattern might well prove relevant (or not!) So, my thanks for alerting me to it.

Cheers,

Terry

Fundamental as Fewer Bits by Terry Bollinger (Essay 3099)

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