Classical Spheres, Division Algebras, and the Illusion of Quantum Non-locality:

Eckard,

Thank you for your support.

I can well understand their position. One aspect of my view is that information and energy are two sides of a foundational dichotomy. Information defines energy and energy manifests information. While energy is naturally dynamic, information is necessarily static. Think about it for a moment; What would information be, if it was constantly changing? So when you consider it in those terms and were to exist in a rigorously intellectual environment with hundreds and often thousands of years of accumulated knowledge, the idea of this enormous structure of knowledge can be all-encompassing and quite solid.

Energy, on the other hand, unless it is actually knocking you down, can seem benignly ethereal. Something to experiment on and test and theorize about. It will take much more than our descriptions of reality outside the ivory tower to change this paradigm, but it is an interesting endeavor, none the less.

Regards,

John M

"You might be flummoxed."

I might.

"I consider my R model indeed the perhaps first non-static one in the sense it does not refer to an arbitrarily chosen point of reference but to the actual now."

What is the actual now and where does one find it?

"You might speculate whether or not there was something before an assumed act of Genesis/BigBang or whatsoever."

No, I'm not into that.

"I consider it more important to accept the now and scrutinize theories that arose from merely postulated symmetries."

If the "now" is asymmetrical, you will be able to say where it is and where it is pointing. So?

(We should move this particular discussion to another forum. "Alternate theories" perhaps.)

Best,

Tom

Tom,

(" ... independent in its physical properties, having a physical effect but not itself influenced by physical conditions." ~ Einstein)

And this is not static? It may have a physical effect, but if it's not influenced by physical conditions, that seems awfully unchanging.

It seems to me as a wall would be to a ball; It certainly affects the trajectory of the ball, but is itself unchanged. And quite static.

Regards,

John M

Tom,

""Blocktime is non-linear, but it is not dynamic. It is a static modeling of transitory events."

As all models are."

Does this mean you accept that blocktime is only a model, as I am using the term, ie. as only a limited description of a more extensive phenomenon?

Regards,

John M

(" ... independent in its physical properties, having a physical effect but not itself influenced by physical conditions." ~ Einstein)

"And this is not static? It may have a physical effect, but if it's not influenced by physical conditions, that seems awfully unchanging."

Right.

"It seems to me as a wall would be to a ball; It certainly affects the trajectory of the ball, but is itself unchanged. And quite static."

The wall hits the ball with the same degree of force that the ball hits the wall.

"Does this mean you accept that blocktime is only a model, as I am using the term, ie. as only a limited description of a more extensive phenomenon?"

What would you call an unlimited description?

Tom,

" but if it's not influenced by physical conditions, that seems awfully unchanging."

Right."

So you agree spacetime is inherently static? So how does a static spacetime geometry reconcile with a non-linear dynamic, such as thermodynamics, other than as a very limited model?

"The wall hits the ball with the same degree of force that the ball hits the wall."

That is a dynamic process in which the physical velocity of the ball is transferring its energy into the wall, as the wall reflects that energy back onto the ball. Neither the ball or the wall need a time vector to direct this process. Only the observers need that.

"What would you call an unlimited description?"

It's a redundant point because if I do not clarify what I'm trying to say as best as possible, you nitpick every detail, which you are now doing because of a redundancy.

Regards,

John M

John, if you had studied the principle of least action that we talked about weeks ago, you wouldn't keep making these same claims and asking these same questions.

"Neither the ball or the wall need a time vector to direct this process. Only the observers need that."

Time is a scalar, remember? You confirm what I said, that time is linearly ordered only in one's head.

" ... if I do not clarify what I'm trying to say as best as possible, you nitpick every detail ..."

What would you ask of me, otherwise?

Tom,

"Action" is still a dynamic, even if we derive a static unit of measure from it.

Regards,

John M

"'Action' is still a dynamic, even if we derive a static unit of measure from it."

Is it?

Tom,

Then provide a description of action in which it is not dynamic.

Regards,

John M

"Then provide a description of action in which it is not dynamic."

Principle of least action.

Tom,

Exactly. It's only a description of action. The map, not the territory. As I pointed out above to Eckard, energy and information are a dichotomy, with information defining energy and energy manifesting information.

For example, I could say World War 2 was between 1939 and 1946. While that information might define the years during which it occurred, there was a lot of energy and action not fully described by a listing of times.

The principle of least action isn't dynamic, but that is a principle, not action.

Regards,

John M

"Exactly. It's only a description of action. The map, not the territory."

As of course, are *all* descriptions.

"As I pointed out above to Eckard, energy and information are a dichotomy, with information defining energy and energy manifesting information."

How useful is a territory without a map?

"For example, I could say World War 2 was between 1939 and 1946. While that information might define the years during which it occurred, there was a lot of energy and action not fully described by a listing of times."

What does a list have to do with maps and terriroties?

"The principle of least action isn't dynamic, but that is a principle, not action."

So tell me -- where is the territory called "action" that is not found on any map and lacks correspondence to any principle?

I had the pleasure today of being reminded (I love the holiday season; I catch up on a lot of reading) that there are colors we know and love that are not in the spectrum of visible light.*

"Most notable is magenta--that hot pink color found on fuschia flowers and and in nearly every color printer in the world. You can easily create magenta on a computer screen by mixing red and blue light. Our eyes pick up the red and blue wavelength and our brains mix them together. The result should be halfway between red and blue, but on the light spectrum that color is green! We can tell that the color we're seeing isn't green, so, in a that-does-not-compute moment, the brain makes up a color to see: magenta."

*(David Blatner; *Spectrums: our mind boggling universe from infinitesimal to infinity.*)

Does such a color as "magenta" exist? Many if not most will say yes -- it existed and always existed, and if the computer screen can reflect it, it is real.

Believers in the reality of conventional quantum physics (Bell's theorem, nonlocality, superposition) say the same thing.

Linear superposition however, gives us red, green and blue. Never magenta.

Like the perception of "time" as an ordered sequence of events from past to future, magenta is all made up in our brain-minds. A true realist perspective, I think, would recognize that what makes the world objective actually *necessitates* the determinism of random nonlinear input. After all, that phenomenon is as native to our brain-minds as to the world outside.

Tom

Tom,

"Like the perception of "time" as an ordered sequence of events from past to future, magenta is all made up in our brain-minds."

Agreed. Remember I'm the one that keeps saying it's the changing configuration of what is, that turns future into past. Potential into residual.

"what makes the world objective actually *necessitates* the determinism of random nonlinear input."

Is it determined prior, or post input? If prior, how? As I see it, the lightcone of input is only completed by the event and it is what happens then that determines the result. Potential into residual.

Doesn't the process of input and output qualify as a somewhat linear process?

It should be noted that the sequential process of input and output applies to our physical interaction with our context and it is quite difficult to think and act non-linearly. We don't do super-position, without it getting a bit schizophrenic. It's context, the environment, that is non-linear, because it is just a lot of counter-balancing actions.

Regards,

John M

"Agreed. Remember I'm the one that keeps saying it's the changing configuration of what is, that turns future into past. Potential into residual."

Does it, though, John? If a brain-mind process linearly orders events into memories, how does one actually know "what is"? All the nonlinear events both within and outside a brain-mind still exist in a continuous state of chaos. Is "what is" only what one's brain-mind configures, or is it the aggregate of events both within and without, with no objective distinction between past and future?

That's the central question of realism. Beyond the naive version of realism, where brain-mind perception is identical to "what is", an objective realism in terms of quantum mechanics (the Bell's theorem version) is localized by a measurement event; events cannot be "real" until measured and are otherwise in a linear superposition of states and nonlocal. This is what creates the distinction between past and future events.

Such a distinction in classical physics is arbitrary; all the laws, all the equations, of classical physics work just as well backward or forward. The future is just as real as the past -- it isn't "somewhere else out there," because the determinism of nonlinearly evolving states is indifferent to the arrow of time. George Ellis' comment, that " ... without an arrow of time, there is no life" is poignant, because it acknowledges the role of consciousness in the linear order of events. By the conventional interpretations of quantum theory, we take this to be foundational.

One of the several things that makes Joy Christian's research revolutionary and important, is that it recognizes linear order is *not* foundational -- that the objective world is independent of the consciousness that orders it into past memories distinct from future events -- *yet* -- external nature *and* our brain-minds possess an identical degree of randomness. Nonlinear evolution explains why artificial computer programs remain inferior to any brain-mind process. A computer cannot calculate backward in time; a brain-mind can.

(me, previously)'A true realist perspective, I think, would recognize that what makes the world objective actually *necessitates* the determinism of random nonlinear input.'

"Is it determined prior, or post input? If prior, how? As I see it, the lightcone of input is only completed by the event and it is what happens then that determines the result. Potential into residual."

That is the conventional view of quantum theory that assumes an observer-created reality. I consider that anti-realist -- Anton Zeilinger is a main proponent of anti-realism.

"Doesn't the process of input and output qualify as a somewhat linear process?"

Not necessarily.

"It should be noted that the sequential process of input and output applies to our physical interaction with our context and it is quite difficult to think and act non-linearly."

In fact, it may be impossible. ("Without an arrow of time, there is no life.")

"We don't do super-position, without it getting a bit schizophrenic. It's context, the environment, that is non-linear, because it is just a lot of counter-balancing actions."

Superposition and nonlocality are illusions in a fully deterministic environment.

All best,

Tom

Last was mine.

Tom,

"an objective realism in terms of quantum mechanics (the Bell's theorem version) is localized by a measurement event; events cannot be "real" until measured and are otherwise in a linear superposition of states and nonlocal."

Yet that measurement event is the tick of a clock, which is that linear, past to future observation. As I keep saying, physics still incorporates the past to future experience, just distills it to a measurement and then uses lots of these measurements to construct that static four dimensional geometry.

As I keep saying, time is an effect of action and that action is dynamically non-linear, like a thermodynamic medium. If we were just one molecule in the thermodynamic medium of a body of water, we would experience it as a series of encounters. Which is how we experience life. Meanwhile lots of other molecules are constantly going all directions around us and the result is changing configuration of the medium. There is no physical past or future, though there is much residual evidence of prior activities, from the light of galaxies billions of lightyears away, to the empty coffee cup that was just finished. The future emerges from the momentum of this physical dynamic.

We incorporate much of that non-linear processing on the biological and sub-conscious level. The dream state can get pretty close. Then on the organizational and governmental level, the linear dynamic has to be enforced, much to the displeasure of those not quite in the program.

This way, we can explain why clocks run at different rates and not have to ignore the asymmetry of the processing. When physics can't explain why the fallen cup doesn't jump back up on the table, then its model is insufficient, not that we simply don't see the cup going backwards.

Regards,

John M