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What's Ultimately Possible in Physics?
Spring 2009
Special Thanks to Bruce & Astrid McWilliams
read/discuss • winners
The Nature of Time
Spring 2008
read/discuss • winners
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FQXi FORUM
March 18, 2010
CATEGORY:
The Nature of Time Essay Contest
[back]
TOPIC: Relational Resolution of Time needs Many Worlds Interpretation with Small Probability Cutoff by Sascha Vongehr [refresh]
TOPIC: Relational Resolution of Time needs Many Worlds Interpretation with Small Probability Cutoff by Sascha Vongehr [refresh]
Essay Abstract
Most once mysterious questions concerning the concept of time have been resolved satisfactorily. While reviewing the progress, many well known issues are presented in refreshingly new ways: Zeno’s arrow paradox, time in relativity theory, etc. The still unresolved issue is a fully relational resolution from which time is emergent. The concept of time is closely linked with Many World Interpretations (MWI). Reviewing problems of quantum mechanics (QM), unitarity is stressed to be the most severe, because it gives rise to religious interpretations. Extremely low probability of after-live is not enough suppression, because the “dead fraction” does not count towards the statistical ensemble in a many minds MWI. The proper decoherence mechanism will cut off extremely low probabilities, resulting in zeros (impossibility). A simple physical system, e.g. decaying nuclei, shows that these problems are closely related with the issue of synchronization and emergence of time. In the same spirit as describing a quantum computation as put together from computations performed in parallel universes, similarly time is arising from the interference of MWI branches. While trying to let time emerge in the multiverse structure, the extremely low probability cutoff directs from the outset only towards extremely small corrections to QM that do not conflict with current observations.
Author Bio
Sascha Vongehr is employed as theoretical and experimental physicist at the Department of Physics and Astronomy of the University of Nanjing. He started to study philosophy in Germany, obtained his M. Sc. in string theory at the University of Sussex, and his Ph. D. from the University of Southern California, 2005. Current areas are cosmology and nanotechnology. He worked on two-time theory, helium clusters and neuroscience of the visual system (postdoc).
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post approved
Most once mysterious questions concerning the concept of time have been resolved satisfactorily. While reviewing the progress, many well known issues are presented in refreshingly new ways: Zeno’s arrow paradox, time in relativity theory, etc. The still unresolved issue is a fully relational resolution from which time is emergent. The concept of time is closely linked with Many World Interpretations (MWI). Reviewing problems of quantum mechanics (QM), unitarity is stressed to be the most severe, because it gives rise to religious interpretations. Extremely low probability of after-live is not enough suppression, because the “dead fraction” does not count towards the statistical ensemble in a many minds MWI. The proper decoherence mechanism will cut off extremely low probabilities, resulting in zeros (impossibility). A simple physical system, e.g. decaying nuclei, shows that these problems are closely related with the issue of synchronization and emergence of time. In the same spirit as describing a quantum computation as put together from computations performed in parallel universes, similarly time is arising from the interference of MWI branches. While trying to let time emerge in the multiverse structure, the extremely low probability cutoff directs from the outset only towards extremely small corrections to QM that do not conflict with current observations.
Author Bio
Sascha Vongehr is employed as theoretical and experimental physicist at the Department of Physics and Astronomy of the University of Nanjing. He started to study philosophy in Germany, obtained his M. Sc. in string theory at the University of Sussex, and his Ph. D. from the University of Southern California, 2005. Current areas are cosmology and nanotechnology. He worked on two-time theory, helium clusters and neuroscience of the visual system (postdoc).
Download Essay PDF File
post approved
Dear Dr. Vongehr,
I loved the way you presented, in a lucid and profound manner, the problems related to the time, block time, and the many worlds interpretation. Interesting the small probability cutoff mechanism via decoherence.
Best wishes,
Cristi Stoica
Flowing with a Frozen River
post approved
I loved the way you presented, in a lucid and profound manner, the problems related to the time, block time, and the many worlds interpretation. Interesting the small probability cutoff mechanism via decoherence.
Best wishes,
Cristi Stoica
Flowing with a Frozen River
post approved
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