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

[deleted]

Tom,

Epicycles correspond to measurement events for the very basic reason that we are our center of the universe. The problem was that our point of view is not objective.

Now I argue that we experience time/change as a sequence of events, because we are individual points of spatial reference in a dynamic context, which physics distills to a measurement of intervals between events and then relates this to measures of distance between spatial points. Unfortunately the resulting geometric model does not distinguish between static distances and dynamic actions, so it cannot explain basic phenomena, such as why the effect of time is asymmetric and while prior events are inherently ordered, potential ones are not. So the point I make is that while we subjectively experience change as linear sequence and so regard it as the present moment moving from past to future, the larger, more objective reality is that it is the changing configuration of what physically exists is creating and dissolving these extremely subjective events, such that they go from future potential, to past circumstance. This view can easily explain why the process only goes in one direction, since the physical inertia on which it is based doesn't naturally stop and go backward. Along with a host of other issues, such as why we only perceive the present physical configuration, if the other ones supposedly still exist.

Yet you will completely deny any and every aspect of this as even being comprehensible, even though others in these discussions can process it logically, to varying degrees of agreement. I do not see it as any form of malice on your part. I understand the concept of spacetime is so subconsciously foundational to your paradigm that any attempt to question it is inherently erroneous. I respect that you are so devoted to the model that you willing continue these discussions and only assign naivete to me, rather than malice, for daring to raise the issue. By and large, while I find most people outside of theoretical physics willing to engage, even to the point of being mentally unsettled by this idea, with most inside the community, it is a brick wall of essentially mindless rejection, since anyone daring to have opinions about the nature of time, that doesn't prostate before 'The Fabric of Spacetime,' is obviously too ignorant to even acknowledge.

So when dealing with other's views, keep in mind there are structures within that are not movable. As the old saying goes, "Change happens, one funeral at a time."

Learning nature is learning patience.

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

John, if I hear you bring up epicycles one more time, I am going to scream. The epicycle model *is* obective. It just isn't easy to work with. One can choose any arbitrary point of space to calculate changes in relations among objects.

"Yet you will completely deny any and every aspect of this as even being comprehensible ..."

I comprehend it. It's just wrong.

Thanks for giving me credit for being absent malice, for I certainly feel the same toward you and the other respondents. And I very well do understand the linear model you are promoting; it's the same self-centered simple arithmetic that Bell's theorem believers use. You think that nature has no objective role to play in the choice function; as Richard Gill puts it, "My own opinion about quantum foundations is summarized by statements that (1) the real world is real, and its past is now fixed (2) the future of the real world is random, (3) the quantum state is what you need to know about the past in order to determine the probability distribution of the future (so it's just as real as the real world, if you like, since the past real world is real and the probability distribution of the future is real too). ... you could ... say that this is just a rigorous Copenhagen approach in which we don't talk about things which we don't need to, and in which we admit the necessity of defining quantum physics on a platform of naive classical physics."

Except that classical mechanics -- and I see a paucity of understanding for that subject here -- is not naive. The truly naive belief is that continuous functions can somehow emerge from discrete observations. Just another of those things that we don't need to talk about, I suppose.

Best,

Tom

Robert McEachern

Take a deep breath Tom:

My old CD music player does create music, such that "continuous functions can somehow emerge from discrete observations".

Now relax and exhale. And reflect upon how your discrete breathes enable continuous life.

Rob McEachern

John Merryman

Tom,

"And I very well do understand the linear model you are promoting;"

Why do you see it as linear? Is thermodynamics linear, or just particular subsets? My argument is that the change is very much non-linear and continuous, but that we, as singular entities, process it as linear and sequential. Sort of like frames of a movie camera.

I'm afraid Gill does make sense in my book;

"the quantum state is what you need to know about the past in order to determine the probability distribution of the future (so it's just as real as the real world, if you like, since the past real world is real and the probability distribution of the future is real too)."

So there is difference between past and future, but it is the model that doesn't distinguish. I would emphasize though, that the past is not real, only the quantum state.

Regards,

John M

John Merryman

" we, as singular entities, process it as linear and sequential. Sort of like frames of a movie camera."

Otherwise it would just be all white light. All noise and no signal.

John Merryman

"Otherwise it would just be all white light. All noise and no signal."

"It" being the quantum state, present and undifferentiated.

It is our framing/modeling which selects the signal, giving it form, direction, focus. Much like the settings on a camera. Otherwise it is just inertial momentum, without past or future.

We think of the present in terms of a particular configuration, since we need to frame particular details, but the state of what is physically real is elementally dynamic and all of it going at different rates, in different directions. The notion of the universe being in a particular configuration state is at best proximate. If it were frozen at a particular point, ie. an instant, this would mean having to stop the very dynamic creating form. It would not be a still frame of everything, but an unfluctuating vacuum, ie. absolute zero and reality would not just stop, but vanish. Yet if we go the opposite direction and try to encompass everything, it becomes the white noise. So we exist in that middle ground between absolute and infinity. Between order and chaos. It is past and future, circumstance and potential, which are our windows in either direction.

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

"Now relax and exhale. And reflect upon how your discrete breathes enable continuous life."

Rob, since breath depends on atmospheric pressure, a continuous phenomenon, inhaling and exhaling is a continuous process, not discrete. Consider a fish extracting oxygen from water through its gills. Same continuous function as breathing air.

Thomas Ray

"I'm afraid Gill does make sense in my book"

As I said, I knew that. The naive realism of conventional quantum theory, however, is simply another "just so" narrative of how nature works. It doesn't correspond to the actual physical world.

John Merryman

Tom,

And blocktime does 'correspond to the actual physical world?'

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

"And blocktime does 'correspond to the actual physical world?'"

John, do you feel you truly understand what blocktime describes?

John Merryman

Tom,

That time is physically more than just an effect of action.

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

"That time is physically more than just an effect of action."

So why, then, do you have a problem with spacetime being physically real?

John Merryman

Tom,

You asked what blocktime describes. The point is that I don't think time is anything other than an effect of action, like temperature.

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

"The point is that I don't think time is anything other than an effect of action, like temperature."

Then John, a physically real spacetime -- as opposed to time or space being independently real -- conforms to your thought.

John Merryman

Tom,

Not quite. I see space as simply space. The problem is that it is treated as a measure and any possible physical attribute to measure is in some sense dynamic and relative, which leads to spacetime.

Yet if time is simply an effect of action, there is no property to actually shrink or expand space, just the contents of space, ie, mass and energy. Which do contract and expand. So we have this convection cycle of expanding radiation and contracting mass. Einstein originally proposed that gravity contracts space, yet what it is doing is pulling mass points together, thus the measure contracts.

As an effect of action, measures of time also vary, because actions occur at different rates in different contexts. Gravity slows action, yet doesn't it make sense that as mass and the energy contained, becomes more dense, that processes would slow?

As an effect of action, time is the rate at which events occur, such as the peaks of waves, cycles of rotation, swings of a pendulum, etc. This is a dynamic process. It requires the prior event to have released the energy, moved on, etc, in order for the next to occur. It is the events which come into being and fade, or pass by, not the present moment in which the measuring is taking place to move. So the duration is not an extension in the same way that an extension in space is. The space is inherently static and both points on it co-exist, unlike with time, where the points are being created by a process that also dissolves them. The present is not a point on a line of duration, rather duration is the rate the process is occurring in the present.

We could use ideal gas laws to relate temperature and volume, to create a relationship similar to spacetime. Think of it as a four dimensional bubble, using an ideal gas, instead of light, so that when you squeeze the spatial volume, the temperature parameter goes up proportionally and vice versa. Does that really mean temperature is another dimension, or it is, like distance, volume and time, simply a form of measurement. With distance and volume, we are measuring space, while with time and temperature, we are measuring action.

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

"I see space as simply space."

What does it look like?

John Merryman

Tom,

Lacking physical properties to move, bend, or limit it, I would describe space as absolute and infinite.

Absolute as in the vacuum at absolute zero, sans fluctuation and what light crosses at a constant rate. Any description of light being relativistically slowed involves some material medium, or a frame in motion. If you balance out the presumably infinite number of frames, it still adds up to an inertial vacuum, as all cosmic expansion and contraction cancel out to flat space and positive and negative energies balance out.

As for the notion that the universe is expanding, based on relativistic math, no one has explained to me why the speed of light doesn't increase proportionally, in order for it to remain constant to this expanded space. Of course, if it actually did, there would be no redshift to explain. It's one thing for theorists to completely edit out much of the reality from their equations, but when they just start using mathematical assumptions completely out of context, it's a bit over the line.

Regards,

John M

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

"Lacking physical properties to move, bend, or limit it, I would describe space as absolute and infinite."

In other words: Newtonian.

"As for the notion that the universe is expanding, based on relativistic math, no one has explained to me why the speed of light doesn't increase proportionally, in order for it to remain constant to this expanded space."

They have, but it apparently didn't take. It boils down to this: All physics is local.

Best,

Tom

John Merryman

Tom,

Yes. Newton's problem was absolute time, that universal flow from past ot future. Einstein threw out the baby with the bath water.

Consider Barbour's winning essay in the Nature of Time contest:

"You choose in U two points - two conп¬Ѓgurations of the universe. These are to remain п¬Ѓxed."

"Now comes the wonderful thing. For one of the trial curves, the action will be smaller than

for any other. For this extremal curve, and in general for no other joining the п¬Ѓxed end points,

the particles obey Newton's laws with the emergent time deп¬Ѓned by (3). This is a timeless law; it

determines a path, or history, in U. The key thing is that no time is assumed in advance. A time

worthy of the name does not exist on any of the non-extremal curves. Time emerges only on the

extremal curves.

It is not only Newton's laws that can be obtained in this timeless way. There is an interpretation

of Einstein's general relativity in which it and time arise in much the same way [4]. I will not claim

that time can deп¬Ѓnitely be banished from physics; the universe may be inп¬Ѓnite, and black holes

present some problems for the timeless picture. Nevertheless, I think it is entirely possible -indeed likely - that time as such plays no role in the universe."

So here is the winning theory of time, according to FQXI's experts, in which time is measured between what amount to simultaneous states of the universe, which Einstein presumably banished.

So I'm also banishing that 'absolute flow' and saying time is simply actions within that absolute space, which is necessarily universal, ie a 'conп¬Ѓguration of the universe.'

" All physics is local."

And an absolute space is very much local. What you can't get around is this still boils down to basic doppler effect, ie. expansion within a constant measure. Much as the train moves away in space, thus putting more distance in stable units, so do those galaxies, since it will take light longer to reach us, the further they go away. It is being denominated in space measured by the speed of light, if the light is going to take longer to travel between the source and the receptor. You have the numerator/the distance and the denominator/the units of distance. Which is space? The expanding distance, or the units being used in comparison? Normal math would say it is the denominator.

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

"Consider Barbour's winning essay in the Nature of Time contest:

'You choose in U two points -- two configurations of the universe. These are to remain fixed.'"

I have considered it, John. It suffers from the same flaw as conventional quantum mechanics, the assumption that the observer's choice of direction (or shape) is identical to nature's choice. That reference coordinates are fixed.

One cannot assume fixed ccordinate points. Only one point -- at infinity -- guarantees a globally consistent reference. Which begs a topological model. Which supports Joy Christian's framework of continuous measurement functions.

" ... an absolute space is very much local."

No it isn't; it's infinite. Only spacetime is physically real.

"What you can't get around is this still boils down to basic doppler effect ...,"

That has nothing to do with the question, in spite of ceaseless cranky assertions on this forum.

"You have the numerator/the distance and the denominator/the units of distance."

There is no difference of principle in the units of distance and "the" distance. This is just arithmetic. All physical measurements are reduced to common units to get a consistent result. Apples to apples.

"Which is space? The expanding distance, or the units being used in comparison? Normal math would say it is the denominator."

John, I doubt you understand math, whether "normal" arithmetic or the nonlinear continuous functions that nature apparently generates. In any case, continuous spacetime resolves your confusion and special relativity explains why all physics is local.

Best,

Tom

John Merryman

Tom,

I don't say I fully agree with Barbour's point, because an infinite configuration isn't computable.

" Only one point -- at infinity -- guarantees a globally consistent reference."

"" ... an absolute space is very much local."

No it isn't; it's infinite."

So the absolute is infinite....and the 'point' at infinity "guarantees a globally consistent reference?"

"There is no difference of principle in the units of distance and "the" distance."

So when the distance requires more units to measure the expanding space, you don't see that the units are the constant and the distance is not? I get the impression your understanding of math is 'subjective.'

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

"I don't say I fully agree with Barbour's point, because an infinite configuration isn't computable."

Sure it is, John. In fact, that's the advantage that models of space such as Barbour's group, and Renate Loll's groups' causal dynamic triangulation (CDT) have over many others. A simple algorithm that produces observed configurations without time dependence. If one believes that computability = reality.

" 'Only one point -- at infinity -- guarantees a globally consistent reference.'"

"" ... an absolute space is very much local."

'No it isn't; it's infinite.'"

"So the absolute is infinite....and the 'point' at infinity 'guarantees a globally consistent reference?'

It does. Understand that the point at infinity bounds a finite spacetime.

"'There is no difference of principle in the units of distance and 'the' distance.'"

"So when the distance requires more units to measure the expanding space, you don't see that the units are the constant and the distance is not? I get the impression your understanding of math is 'subjective.'"

John, a metric sequence of linear units does not describe expanding spacetime. I am not going to attempt explaining that to you again.

Best,

Tom

Robert McEachern

Tom and John,

Ahhh.. now you are starting to see the problem:

"the assumption that the observer's choice of direction (or shape) is identical to nature's choice"

"Only one point -- at infinity -- guarantees a globally consistent reference"

Both of those assumptions are false, not just the first.

If I have two parallel or anti-parallel entities, coins, spins, polarizations, then they are each other's reference. That is what is meant by the word "parallel". Hence the state of either cannot be known by any external entity, such as an observer, until one of them is observed. Then the other's state becomes known, to the observer, but not via a change of state of the observed, but by a change of state in the 'mind' of the observer, which now "knows" the one and only reference of any significance to the observation; the state of one of the two things that the word "parallel" refers to. Almost all modern communication systems use such self-referential references, since it reduces the required information content in the bit-stream. One does not need to waste bandwidth transmitting a reference, if the reference can somehow be extracted from the "non-reference" portion of a signal.

Rob McEachern

Thomas Ray

"If I have two parallel or anti-parallel entities, coins, spins, polarizations, then they are each other's reference. That is what is meant by the word 'parallel'. Hence the state of either cannot be known by any external entity, such as an observer, until one of them is observed."

Not even then. The relative states do not admit an external observer (collapse of the wavefunction). This is the key to Everett's many-worlds hypothesis.

"Then the other's state becomes known, to the observer, but not via a change of state of the observed, but by a change of state in the 'mind' of the observer, which now 'knows' the one and only reference of any significance to the observation; the state of one of the two things that the word 'parallel' refers to."

If you're not a quantum mystic, the internal state of the system is identical to the external state (the system with which it is interacting). Bell's theorem supports the mystic point of view -- proving that a quantum configuration space cannot be mapped to a physical space without a nonlocal model. (Which also proves the fundamental incompleteness of conventional quantum theory.) A classical framework such as Joy Christian's doesn't beg any "knowing" by a specially configured quantum "mind." The classical randomness of the physical space is identical to the classical randomness of the measure space; i.e., there is no boundary between quantum and classical domains; the measurement function is continuous, nonlinear and complete.

"Almost all modern communication systems use such self-referential references, since it reduces the required information content in the bit-stream. One does not need to waste bandwidth transmitting a reference, if the reference can somehow be extracted from the 'non-reference' portion of a signal.

Sure. I agree. That does not militate against the foundational principle of continuous functions (deterministic chaos) in nature, however.

Best,

Tom

Robert McEachern

Tom,

"the internal state of the system is identical to the external state"

True, but irrelevant. The question is, at least for physics, does my subjective, externally known *estimate* of the "external state", which may be quite different from any objective "external state", actually correspond to the latter. Since Bell misconstrued the fundamental nature of what needed to be estimated, in the first place, it is not even possible for his estimate to correspond to anything other than his own misconception; he attempted to measure correlations between things, that do not even exist, except within his own mind - they are not part of ANY external state.

Rob McEachern

John Merryman

Tom,

"Understand that the point at infinity bounds a finite spacetime."

Wouldn't that point at infinity be an absolute? The state at which everything(infinity) is balanced.

"a metric sequence of linear units does not describe expanding spacetime.'

Yet the space between two points, ie. distant, redshifted galaxy and observer, is only one dimension, not four.

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

Well heck, Rob, I heartily agree -- and so does Joy Christian, whose whole program is based on Bell's incorrect choice of the measure space.

It's not irrelevant, though, to those who adhere to a belief that reality is observer-created. That's what we're up against.

Tom

Thomas Ray

"Wouldn't that point at infinity be an absolute? The state at which everything(infinity) is balanced."

No. A naive way to think of it, is the horizon of your 2-dimension space. If you take the actual 3-dimension space in which you observe the horizon and imagine that everything is flattened out and compactified into a point on the horizon, you get the gist; you can see that you're living on the 2-dimension surface of a 3-dimension ball embedded in 4-dimension spacetime. In topological terms, the point at infinity corresponds to the one simple pole of S^3. That gives the continuous topology the property of orientiability, which is critical to Joy's measurement framework.

"'a metric sequence of linear units does not describe expanding spacetime.'

"Yet the space between two points, ie. distant, redshifted galaxy and observer, is only one dimension, not four."

So what? I keep telling you to stay away from the cranky dialogue and learn the real thing -- expanding spacetime *has nothing to do* with shifts in the electromagnetic spectrum, Doppler effect or any other measurement of changes in relation between bodies.

I don't know how to explain this without calculus, and tensor calcus is very difficult anyway. The coordinates are co-moving in curved spacetime. That's how we get that expanding "ballon" analogy. The relative changes among points of the balloon are not 1-dimensional -- they are a 4 dimension expansion on the 2 dimension surface of a 3 dimension object.

Best,

Tom

John Merryman

Tom,

I'm still not completely with you on that fourth dimension thing. To the extent time creatively moves forward, it also covers its tracks, ie, the past is dissolved/recycled.

In cosmology, what is expanding between galaxies appears to fall into them. There are various arrows of time. Einstein's observation that gravity causes space to collapse to a point amounts to an arrow of time, pointing toward this collapse of structural mass. Hawking describes the expansion of the universe/space as an arrow of time. Considering these two effects, gravitational contraction and spatial expansion, appear to balance out to overall flat space, there seems to be a balance between these two directions of time. One of the energy/expansion marching forward into the future, while the structure collapses back into the past, falling into gravitational vortices.

As I keep pointing out, the present, as the conserved energy, is constantly creating and filling out new forms, while dissolving and recycling old ones. So it goes past to future. Meanwhile the forms and their defining temporal existence, beginning and end, go from being in the future/potential, to being in the past/residual.

The hands of the clock go past to future, while the units on the face go future to past.

So it's not that I don't see what your model entails, but that being static, it is missing half the equation. Those dimples in your expanding dimension are galaxies and they are not just inert points of reference. If you need a spherical model, think of the earth with its ocean ridges creating new crust, as the old crust slides under the continents. Or possibly the atmosphere, with hot air expanding out and up, while cool air contracts and settles down.

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

You don't have to be with me on the fourth dimension thing or any other physical fact, John. You'll just never know what you're missing, that's all.

John Merryman

Tom,

I have some idea what I missing.

Blocktime, inflation, dark energy, multiverses....

Regards,

John M

Robert McEachern

Take another deep breath Tom:

I spent much of my career designing highly specialized hardware computing systems, because no existing hardware, including the biggest supercomputers of the day, could run my software. If any old hardware could run all possible software (I was involved in real-time processing) there would never be any need for new hardware.

Concerning John's comment about the "cup of hemlock", Plato, over 2000 years ago, gave a pretty good analysis of what motivates people to merely seem to be good rather than actually be good.

But I do not think one has to attribute "malice aforethought" to "The Establishment" in order to predict/model the reason they are disinclined to accept new ideas. As Josh Billings put it, over a century ago, "It ain't what a man don't know that gets him in trouble, it's what he knows that ain't so."

This is the reason why Shannon gave his definition of information as "Information = New Information". A definition that remains seemingly unknown, within the world of physics. Reflecting upon the ramifications of that self-referential definition would provide a bit of enlightenment to the physics world. It is the ultimate connection between the observer and the observed.

Rob McEachern

Robert McEachern

Eckard,

I believe I have free-will, so nothing is telling me what to do next. As I stated in any earlier post, the past has been "Determined", but the future is not "Determined", Determinism is based on a false premise - that all the relevant initial conditions can, at least in principle, be "Known".

Rob McEachern

Eckard Blumschein

Rob,

I agree. The idea that anything is calculable is definitely wrong. I will give up discussing with Tom who didn't even realize that I do only conjecture causality but do not believe in the Past, in God, or the like.

My free will is certainly based on a variety of influences that are are not at all mysterious but often unknown, even to me. Therefore I don't see any justification for claiming determinism as a putative basis for mathphysicists who are hoping by means of C, H, and O to eventually Feynmanify nature. I see the whole pointless confusion about free or not free will an indication of an anthropic, i.e. naive view.

Einstein gave perhaps a bad example (I quote from MathPages, The End of My Latin): "When asked what he would have done if the eclipse observations had disagreed with the prediction of general relativity for the bending of light, Einstein replied "Then I would have felt sorry for the dear lord, because the theory is correct."

Eckard

John Merryman

Robert, Eckard,

I see the notion of free will as a bit of an oxymoron. To will is to determine. We don't go to the effort of distinguishing between options, good, bad, etc, in order to then randomly chose. We are part of the process of determination. We are input and output. There is no line between what is us and what is our context, other than one being inside out and the other being outside in. We affect it, as it affects us. We are part of the process that turns future potential into past circumstance.

Regards,

John M

Robert McEachern

John,

An oxymoron? Not to me. There is a line between what is us and what is our context:

1) Despite some of the opinions to the contrary, found on this web-site, I remain convinced that the context is capable of continuing its existence without me, but my continued existence is entirely dependent upon the continued existence of that context.

2) There has also been much debate about what constitutes "The Self" as opposed to "The Context". To me, the self is what I can directly control. I cannot control the rising of the sun, so that is not me. I have little conscious control of the growth of my hair or finger-nails, so they do not contribute much to my own personal sense of self either. My arms and legs are a bigger part, but, following Descartes, I think, therefore I am. My ability to think, is the one thing, controlled by my will, that if it were to be lost, I would have to say that "I" would no longer "Be".

Rob McEachern

John Merryman

Robert,

I have adult onset epilepsy. Falling off too many horses and motorcycles. Fortunately medicinally controlled, or I wouldn't be able to do what I do, but I can tell you there is a distinction between what is 'you' and what you think. As a comparison, a good example is of a movie projector light shining through the frames of a film. Your sense of self is like that light, while what you think is the images on the film. What you are aware of and your awareness are intimately connected, but not necessarily identical. That they can become disconnected and reconnect in odd ways, goes a long way, I think, to explaining a lot of mental afflictions. Consider schizophrenia for one. That sense of awareness is looking out through discordant frames/models/lenses. I have long tended to think Descartes had it backwards. I am, therefore I think.

Also I work a lot with animals, where the light and the complexity of the image it shines through, are quite different from ours.

Also, on a number of occasions, it seems to me, it is the same light looking out through different individuals, ie. hive mind.

Regards,

John M

Robert McEachern

John,

I agree that I am, therefore I think, but that does not preclude Descartes version. I view consciousness as analogous to the CEO of a corporation. The body is the corporation. But like many a CEO, I view the CEO as the one in charge. Sure, the CEO may be replaceable, the corporation will not go into stasis if the CEO goes to sleep or takes a vacation, but the CEO is still in control, at least in a well run corporation.

I learned long ago that there is a big difference between being irreplaceable and being indispensable. It is similar to the distinction between being necessary and being sufficient. To me, a body is necessary but not sufficient for "ME" to exist.

Rob McEachern

Florin Moldoveanu

It's a small world after all.

After casually browsing recent comments, I ran across Tom's complaint about Wikipedia. I read the talk history on Bell's theorem since I was not aware the dispute went there as well.

However, this comment caught my eye: "Lev Vaidman would not be allowed to rewrite the Aharanov-Bohm effect article based on his recent article, at least not yet. At most a brief mention might be possible (I would support that), but even that would probably not be supported by most of the editors there. Count Iblis (talk) 02:55, 3 June 2012 (UTC)" The paper was http://arxiv.org/abs/1110.6169 and I heard Lev give a talk at a conference and subsequently I had an extensive correspondence with him about it. Why do I find mistakes in most papers I read?

It is amazing how Wikipedia reached the right conclusions in both cases although they are not experts.

Thomas Ray

"Determinism is based on a false premise - that all the relevant initial conditions can, at least in principle, be 'Known'."

Rob, while that was certainly true of the Newtonian world of absolute space and time, I don't think that form of determinism applies to the relativistic model.

Saying that everything is determined does not to me imply globally perfect knowledge of initial conditions -- it implies a local sensitive dependence on initial conditions, i.e. deterministic chaos.

I think that that empirical fact implies absolute free will. A simple molecule, let alone a conscious being, has a binary choice of direction at every moment.

From an earlier post in this thread:

If some event in physical space were the random cause of an event in measure space, then the probabilistic measures of conventional quantum theory would apply both to the physical space and the measure space. On the other hand, if classical randomness (coin-toss probability) is a property of both the physical space and the measure space -- the world is deterministic; as Joy's framework shows, nonlinear random input to the continuous measurement results in a smooth function. This could only hold if the randomness of the metaphysically real physical space were equal to the randomness of the real physical measure space.

The difference between "random" and "probabilistic" is critical. Binary random events imply perfect information, as if nature and observer independently posses a qubit and are free to choose one value or the other for any measurement event. Nature's choice is the hidden variable -- and because it is equally random with the observer's choice, the continuous sinusoidal function is smooth with probability 1. "Relative becoming" is a deterministic schema, as is chaos theory.

That the observer is also part of the complete physical space makes the case for deterministic randomness. Both free-will-determinism, and no-free-will determinism, are absolute. In neither case can probabilism apply. ("Either everything is a miracle, or nothing is a miracle.")

Best,

Tom

Thomas Ray

"If any old hardware could run all possible software (I was involved in real-time processing) there would never be any need for new hardware."

That's why I asked John to make a disctinction between human (I mean, human engineered and manufactured) hardware, and nature's hardware.

No matter what substrate nature provides, the software of inorganic chemistry, and organic life, adpats to it.

Thomas Ray

"This is the reason why Shannon gave his definition of information as 'Information = New Information'. A definition that remains seemingly unknown, within the world of physics. Reflecting upon the ramifications of that self-referential definition would provide a bit of enlightenment to the physics world. It is the ultimate connection between the observer and the observed."

Sure, Rob. And it's not unknown to physics -- that's the view of conventional quantum theory -- that reality is observer-created by introducing new information from the act of observing (measuring).

I find no enlightenment by that standard, because it assumes a priori that the world is probabilistic, made of infinite bits of information in superposition, until measured.

Demonstrably, however, that is not how nature actually works. Physical information is traded between mutual observers, leading to Wheeler's participatory universe, not to a world of continuously created new information in linear sequence.

Best,

Tom

Robert McEachern

Tom,

See my take on information and randomness on the Public Television, Nova website:

Do black-holes destroy information

Rob McEachern

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