CATEGORY:
It From Bit or Bit From It? Essay Contest (2013)
[back]
TOPIC:
On the Evolution of Determinate Information by Conrad Dale Johnson
[refresh]
Login or
create account to post reply or comment.
Author Conrad Dale Johnson wrote on Jun. 29, 2013 @ 15:11 GMT
Essay AbstractWheeler’s original “It from Bit” proposal focused not on the digital structure of reality, but on the question-and-answer process through which physical information gets determined by observations. He envisioned the physical world not as a computer, but as a system that defines all its own information interactively, through measurement-processes. This essay pursues that idea, developing an evolutionary concept of measurement based on the fact that every way of measuring things depends on a context of other kinds of measurements. It argues that the foundational structure of a universe like ours, that can make all its own parameters observable, must necessarily be complicated. But this is a special kind of complexity, that we can understand as evolving through random selection.
Author BioI have lived mainly in the US. I have a long-standing interest in the conceptual foundations of physics, going back to graduate-school days at the University of California at Santa Cruz, where I earned my degree in History of Consciousness. My essay "An Observable World" was entered in last year's FQXi contest.
Download Essay PDF File
Satyavarapu Naga Parameswara Gupta wrote on Jun. 30, 2013 @ 06:36 GMT
Dear Johnson,
Thank you for presenting your nice essay. I saw the abstract and will post my comments soon. So you can produce material from your thinking. . . .
I am requesting you to go through my essay also. And I take this opportunity to say, to come to reality and base your arguments on experimental results.
I failed mainly because I worked against the main stream. The...
view entire post
Dear Johnson,
Thank you for presenting your nice essay. I saw the abstract and will post my comments soon. So you can produce material from your thinking. . . .
I am requesting you to go through my essay also. And I take this opportunity to say, to come to reality and base your arguments on experimental results.
I failed mainly because I worked against the main stream. The main stream community people want magic from science instead of realty especially in the subject of cosmology. We all know well that cosmology is a subject where speculations rule.
Hope to get your comments even directly to my mail ID also. . . .
Best
=snp
snp.gupta@gmail.com
http://vaksdynamicuniversemodel.b
logspot.com/
Pdf download:
http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/essay-downloa
d/1607/__details/Gupta_Vak_FQXi_TABLE_REF_Fi.pdf
Part of abstract:
- -Material objects are more fundamental- - is being proposed in this paper; It is well known that there is no mental experiment, which produced material. . . Similarly creation of matter from empty space as required in Steady State theory or in Bigbang is another such problem in the Cosmological counterpart. . . . In this paper we will see about CMB, how it is generated from stars and Galaxies around us. And here we show that NO Microwave background radiation was detected till now after excluding radiation from Stars and Galaxies. . . .
Some complements from FQXi community. . . . .
A
Anton Lorenz Vrba wrote on May. 4, 2013 @ 13:43 GMT
……. I do love your last two sentences - that is why I am coming back.
Author Satyavarapu Naga Parameswara Gupta replied on May. 6, 2013 @ 09:24 GMT
. . . . We should use our minds to down to earth realistic thinking. There is no point in wasting our brains in total imagination which are never realities. It is something like showing, mixing of cartoon characters with normal people in movies or people entering into Game-space in virtual reality games or Firing antimatter into a black hole!!!. It is sheer a madness of such concepts going on in many fields like science, mathematics, computer IT etc. . . .
B.
Francis V wrote on May. 11, 2013 @ 02:05 GMT
Well-presented argument about the absence of any explosion for a relic frequency to occur and the detail on collection of temperature data……
C
Robert Bennett wrote on May. 14, 2013 @ 18:26 GMT
"Material objects are more fundamental"..... in other words "IT from Bit" is true.
Author Satyavarapu Naga Parameswara Gupta replied on May. 14, 2013 @ 22:53 GMT
1. It is well known that there is no mental experiment, which produced material.
2. John Wheeler did not produce material from information.
3. Information describes material properties. But a mere description of material properties does not produce material.
4. There are Gods, Wizards, and Magicians, allegedly produced material from nowhere. But will that be a scientific experiment?
D
Hoang cao Hai wrote on Jun. 16, 2013 @ 16:22 GMT
It from bit - where are bit come from?
Author Satyavarapu Naga Parameswara Gupta replied on Jun. 17, 2013 @ 06:10 GMT
….And your question is like asking, -- which is first? Egg or Hen?— in other words Matter is first or Information is first? Is that so? In reality there is no way that Matter comes from information.
Matter is another form of Energy. Matter cannot be created from nothing. Any type of vacuum cannot produce matter. Matter is another form of energy. Energy is having many forms: Mechanical, Electrical, Heat, Magnetic and so on..
E
Antony Ryan wrote on Jun. 23, 2013 @ 22:08 GMT
…..Either way your abstract argument based empirical evidence is strong given that "a mere description of material properties does not produce material". While of course materials do give information.
I think you deserve a place in the final based on this alone. Concise - simple - but undeniable.
view post as summary
report post as inappropriate
David M Reid wrote on Jun. 30, 2013 @ 07:33 GMT
Hi, Conrad,
Your thesis was extremely well argued; both the exposition and the logic (nicely clear of mathematical formalisms to make it readable for the lay person) were very clear, without any glaring gaps. Bravo!
There are, naturally, some points that one can nitpick. For example, you make an interesting case for the inability of a circular and hence infinite backward recursion...
view entire post
Hi, Conrad,
Your thesis was extremely well argued; both the exposition and the logic (nicely clear of mathematical formalisms to make it readable for the lay person) were very clear, without any glaring gaps. Bravo!
There are, naturally, some points that one can nitpick. For example, you make an interesting case for the inability of a circular and hence infinite backward recursion to be put outside the realm of mathematics. However, there are (often non-standard) mathematical systems which deal precisely with such recursions. As well, invoking complexity also does not invalidate a mathematical treatment, as fields such as Chaos Theory show. Finally, your analogy with the evolutionary process could also be used to point out that, just as evolutionary theory in biology has well-grounded mathematical bases, so too could an evolutionary universe which you envisage be based on mathematics.
(Darwinian evolutionary theory consists of two parts: the mutations, and the natural selection. To see some mathematical details connected to the latter part, one could look at the article (also inspired by Wheeler) "Quantum Darwinism and envariance" by W.H. Zurek in the collection "Science and Ultimate Reality", ed. Barrow, Davies and Harper, Cambridge University Press, 2004.)
Overall, an excellent and enjoyable essay.
Best,
David
view post as summary
report post as inappropriate
Author Conrad Dale Johnson replied on Jul. 1, 2013 @ 13:39 GMT
David - thanks! I find it very difficult to be clear about this theme, so it's lovely to think I might have succeeded, at least for some readers.
I didn't mean to suggest that a mathematical treatment wouldn't be useful for describing any aspect of the complex of information-defining processes that make up our universe. But there's a difference between using various kinds of mathematics as...
view entire post
David - thanks! I find it very difficult to be clear about this theme, so it's lovely to think I might have succeeded, at least for some readers.
I didn't mean to suggest that a mathematical treatment wouldn't be useful for describing any aspect of the complex of information-defining processes that make up our universe. But there's a difference between using various kinds of mathematics as precise descriptive tools, and imagining the world as "based on mathematics", or as being itself a mathematical entity.
The point of my last section was to suggest that what the universe can do, as an evolved system, far exceeds what we can expect from any information-processing system based on a deterministic logic. There's a tendency today to assume that mathematics and/or computation can do absolutely anything, and I wanted to point out some reasons for doubting that. But this is really incidental to my theme.
Thanks again -- Conrad
view post as summary
Antony Ryan wrote on Jun. 30, 2013 @ 17:37 GMT
Dear Conrad,
I noticed you wrote "But in our universe, equations govern on.e on-one interactions between individual entities, and what happens in any situation depends on a non-linear combination of many different kinds of interactions going on at once".
This sounds quite logical and something that isn't often considered - important point!
I like that your essay is built...
view entire post
Dear Conrad,
I noticed you wrote "But in our universe, equations govern on.e on-one interactions between individual entities, and what happens in any situation depends on a non-linear combination of many different kinds of interactions going on at once".
This sounds quite logical and something that isn't often considered - important point!
I like that your essay is built around observation plus your abstract is clear and concise. Please take a look at my
essay which is also based around observation, but from a different angle.
Best wishes for the contest,
Antony
view post as summary
report post as inappropriate
Hoang cao Hai wrote on Jul. 1, 2013 @ 06:47 GMT
Dear Conrad
It may be due to limited English proficiency of me, because I did not find the specific answer to our topics.
http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1802
report post as inappropriate
Author Conrad Dale Johnson replied on Jul. 1, 2013 @ 13:58 GMT
You're right that I neglected to answer the question as to which is the more basic, It or Bit. I would say that the existence of physical entities and their properties (It) ultimately depends on the ability of the physical interaction to communicate this information. It's this ability to define information between systems that evolves, just as in biology what evolves is the ability to reproduce...
view entire post
You're right that I neglected to answer the question as to which is the more basic, It or Bit. I would say that the existence of physical entities and their properties (It) ultimately depends on the ability of the physical interaction to communicate this information. It's this ability to define information between systems that evolves, just as in biology what evolves is the ability to reproduce information between a system and its offspring. Wheeler and others have argued that this process can be conceived in terms of asking yes/no questions, hence "It from Bit". But I think what's basic about information has more to do with the contexts that define it than with the fact that it can be cast in binary form.
view post as summary
Edwin Eugene Klingman wrote on Jul. 2, 2013 @ 02:52 GMT
Dear Conrad,
Your essay is very interesting. It almost seems you're giving Wheeler the benefit of the doubt. Your words make sense, but Wheelers are over the edge. Reality does NOT arise from the answer to yes and no questions, only our knowledge of reality. One might conclude either that Wheeler simply could not express himself well, or that he was a solipsist, or he was confused. ...
view entire post
Dear Conrad,
Your essay is very interesting. It almost seems you're giving Wheeler the benefit of the doubt. Your words make sense, but Wheelers are over the edge. Reality does NOT arise from the answer to yes and no questions, only our knowledge of reality. One might conclude either that Wheeler simply could not express himself well, or that he was a solipsist, or he was confused. You, on the other hand, express yourself well and do not seem confused. You propose that measurement can [did] evolve through accidental selection. In the 1970s, as part of my dissertation, I analyzed a robot simply randomly kicking three different sized stones, with a number generating visual system, and ask how the robot could use the arbitrary numbers to recognize patterns and derive dynamics to create a theory of physics. In short, how to derive theories from measurement numbers, assuming one initially knows nothing about what the numbers represent. I touch on this in my current essay, which I hope you will read. Obviously the observed trajectories of three different size 'kicked' stones are classical in nature. You start with the more difficult QM case, which I believe should realistically follow the development of the classical theory. You may imply this when you state: "however such a web is constituted, at bottom it's very coarsely woven."
We seem to use slightly different terminology here, but I think we agree. I particularly like your "correlation of information between systems" as superpositions of possible states and your analysis of when these superpositions "collapse". I agree that this is epistemological, not ontological, i.e., "no reason to think any objective physical collapse occurs."
I also very much like your discussion of biological processes as analogous to the evolution of measurement and your statement: "the de facto "purpose" of this process is just keep itself going." A beautiful correspondence between life and the institution of physics.
I'm not sure I understand your question about "account for the fact that there are observable phenomena in the world." If you mean why do things exist, then I agree with you. If you're asking "how do we partition the observed universe into particular phenomenon", then I provide one answer in my essay.
I agree that this kind of theory is unlikely to explain the fine tuning of physical parameters.
Your last four paragraphs are excellent, leading up to the question "so if the equations are not running the show, then why are they there?" This may relate to the process I describe elsewhere by which we recognize the patterns, form feature vectors, "tune" the feature representation and deduce dynamical relations. That is, it may all be merely an overlay!
Thanks for a stimulating essay. I hope you find time to read and comment upon my essay.
Best regards,
Edwin Eugene Klingman
view post as summary
report post as inappropriate
Author Conrad Dale Johnson replied on Jul. 2, 2013 @ 15:56 GMT
Edwin -
I very much appreciate your careful reading of my essay, and your many specific comments. I will certainly go back to look at your essay again and post my notes on your thread.
Wheeler certainly did go over the top and threw out a lot of suggestions - in those days it seems, people were groping for ideas that were "crazy enough" to fit QM. But for purposes of this contest,...
view entire post
Edwin -
I very much appreciate your careful reading of my essay, and your many specific comments. I will certainly go back to look at your essay again and post my notes on your thread.
Wheeler certainly did go over the top and threw out a lot of suggestions - in those days it seems, people were groping for ideas that were "crazy enough" to fit QM. But for purposes of this contest, his wild notion that measurement underlies reality served me well enough as a starting-point.
I realize I wasn't at all clear at the end of my essay, as to why deterministic principles can't account for the fact that there are observable phenomena. What I had in mind was my argument in Section IV, that "the observed facts themselves have to be able to define all this structure, without depending on any underlying unobservable reality... Only what's observable can contribute to the context-structure of empirical information."
In other words, the structure of the observable world has to be able to define itself in terms of itself, regardless of any underlying unobservable reality. Therefore, it can't be accounted for on the basis of any such reality. Let's say that there really are certain absolute principles that cause everything to happen just as it does. That could explain particular phenomena - but it wouldn't explain why each of these phenomena happens to have an appropriate context of very different phenomena that makes it measurable.
This argument may not be unassailable, but I think it's worth thinking about. In classical physics, and in all the other natural sciences, everything we do is an attempt to account for specific phenomena on the basis of some hypothetical underlying reality. And since this works so well - except in fundamental physics - we tend to think this is what science is all about: inventing unobservable facts to explain the observable ones.
That sort of explanation is undeniably useful, wherever it works. My point is only that it can't work to explain the most obvious feature of our universe, that at least some things about it are observable. This requires a different explanatory strategy, such as the one I'm trying to develop here.
Thanks again for your comments. I find these ideas very difficult to express, and it's very helpful to know what seems clear to a thoughtful reader.
- Conrad
view post as summary
Edwin Eugene Klingman replied on Jul. 3, 2013 @ 04:04 GMT
Conrad,
Thanks for the above comment. Indeed these ideas are very difficult, but I now have a much better idea of what you meant. I agree that it's worth thinking about.
Edwin Eugene Klingman
report post as inappropriate
Hoang cao Hai wrote on Jul. 3, 2013 @ 05:07 GMT
Send to all of you
THE ADDITIONAL ARTICLES AND A SMALL TEST FOR MUTUAL BENEFIT
To change the atmosphere "abstract" of the competition and to demonstrate for the real preeminent possibility of the Absolute theory as well as to clarify the issues I mentioned in the essay and to avoid duplicate questions after receiving the opinion of you , I will add a reply to you :
1 . THE...
view entire post
Send to all of you
THE ADDITIONAL ARTICLES AND A SMALL TEST FOR MUTUAL BENEFIT
To change the atmosphere "abstract" of the competition and to demonstrate for the real preeminent possibility of the Absolute theory as well as to clarify the issues I mentioned in the essay and to avoid duplicate questions after receiving the opinion of you , I will add a reply to you :
1 . THE ADDITIONAL ARTICLES
A. What thing is new and the difference in the absolute theory than other theories?
The first is concept of "Absolute" in my absolute theory is defined as: there is only one - do not have any similar - no two things exactly alike.
The most important difference of this theory is to build on the entirely new basis and different platforms compared to the current theory.
B. Why can claim: all things are absolute - have not of relative ?
It can be affirmed that : can not have the two of status or phenomenon is the same exists in the same location in space and at the same moment of time - so thus: everything must be absolute and can not have any of relative . The relative only is a concept to created by our .
C. Why can confirm that the conclusions of the absolute theory is the most specific and detailed - and is unique?
Conclusion of the absolute theory must always be unique and must be able to identify the most specific and detailed for all issues related to a situation or a phenomenon that any - that is the mandatory rules of this theory.
D. How the applicability of the absolute theory in practice is ?
The applicability of the absolute theory is for everything - there is no limit on the issue and there is no restriction on any field - because: This theory is a method to determine for all matters and of course not reserved for each area.
E. How to prove the claims of Absolute Theory?
To demonstrate - in fact - for the above statement,we will together come to a specific experience, I have a small testing - absolutely realistic - to you with title:
2 . A SMALL TEST FOR MUTUAL BENEFIT :
“Absolute determination to resolve for issues reality”
That is, based on my Absolute theory, I will help you determine by one new way to reasonable settlement and most effective for meet with difficulties of you - when not yet find out to appropriate remedies - for any problems that are actually happening in reality, only need you to clearly notice and specifically about the current status and the phenomena of problems included with requirements and expectations need to be resolved.
I may collect fees - by percentage of benefits that you get - and the commission rate for you, when you promote and recommend to others.
Condition : do not explaining for problems as impractical - no practical benefit - not able to determine in practice.
To avoid affecting the contest you can contact me via email : hoangcao_hai@yahoo.com
Hope will satisfy and bring real benefits for you along with the desire that we will find a common ground to live together in happily.
Hải.Caohoàng
Add another problem, which is:
USE OF THE EQUATIONS AND FORMULA IN ESSAY
There have been some comments to me to questions is: why in my essay did not use the equations and formulas to interpret?
The reason is:
1. The currently equations and formulas are not able to solve all problems for all concerned that they represent.
2. Through research, I found: The application of the equations and formulas when we can not yet be determined the true nature of the problem will create new problems - there is even more complex and difficult to resolve than the original.
I hope so that : you will sympathetic and consideration to avoid misunderstanding my comments.
http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1802
view post as summary
report post as inappropriate
James Lee Hoover wrote on Jul. 3, 2013 @ 19:19 GMT
Conrad,
If given the time and the wits to evaluate over 120 more entries, I have a month to try. My seemingly whimsical title, “It’s good to be the king,” is serious about our subject.
Jim
report post as inappropriate
Anton Biermans wrote on Jul. 5, 2013 @ 09:06 GMT
Hi Conrad,
''There's no such thing as information without a context that actually defines it.''
Yes: If there would be only a single charged particle among uncharged particles in the universe, then it wouldn't be able to express its charge in interactions. As it in that case it cannot be charged itself, charge, or any property, must be something which is shared by particles,...
view entire post
Hi Conrad,
''There's no such thing as information without a context that actually defines it.''
Yes: If there would be only a single charged particle among uncharged particles in the universe, then it wouldn't be able to express its charge in interactions. As it in that case it cannot be charged itself, charge, or any property, must be something which is shared by particles, something which only exists, is expressed and preserved within their interactions. If particles, particle properties (its) are both cause and effect of their interactions, of the exchange of bits and particles only exist to each other if and for as long as they interact, exchange information, then you cannot have one without the other nor can one be more fundamental than the other.
If the information as embodied in particle properties and the associated laws of physics (rules of behavior) must be the product of a trial-and-error evolution, then information only can become actual information if it manages to survive: when molded into particles and particle properties and tested in practice, in interactions between 'its', between actual, physical, material particles. So I agree that
''there exists here a self-defining information-structure of a very special kind – one that can define all its own facts, parameters and principles in terms of each other. This sort of system is as remarkable in its own way as a living organism''
If real particles are virtual particles which by alternately borrowing and lending each other the energy to exist, force each other to reappear again and again after every disappearance (according to the uncertainty principle: the smaller their distance, the higher the frequency they exchange energy at, pop up and disappear to pop up again, the higher their rest energy is), then they create and un-create each other over and over again. As the energy sign of a particle alternates, it is a wave phenomenon. If the energy, the rest frequency of a particle is the superposition of all frequencies it exchanges energy at with all particles within its interaction horizon, a frequency which depends on their mass, distance and motion, then the particle in its properties carries all relevant information about its entire universe, information which is refreshed in every cycle of its oscillation. The inertia of a particle, its opposition to an acceleration (its manifestation as a tangible, material object) is powered by this continuous exchange of energy, of information. If we could cut off this exchange, it would vanish without trace, just like an image on a TV screen vanishes when we pull the plug. Though the universe indeed in many respects is a living 'thing', it is not something which lives, exists as seen from without, something which has particular properties as a whole, something we may imagine to look at from without. If the universe is to obey what to me seems the most fundamental and most obvious law of physics, the conservation law which says that what comes out of nothing must add to nothing, then it doesn't exist, has no physical reality as a whole, as 'seen' from the outside, but only exists as seen from within.
In the seemingly innocuous assumption that we can regard the universe as an ordinary object which has certain properties and changes, grows older in time, big bang cosmology unwittingly but implicitly asserts that there's something outside the of it the universe interacts with, owes its properties to: that it has been created by something outside of it. Evidently, this attitude can be justified only if particles only are the cause of interactions, not also their product. As big bang cosmology describes the physics of a fictitious universe, it is science fiction, not science.
''What role do laws of physics play? And if at a deeper level things aren't fully determinate, if they turn out to obey laws only on average, then why does the world we observe end up looking so precisely factual and deterministic?''
According to the Uncertainty Principle, the smaller the distance between particles is, the higher the frequency they exchange energy at, pop up and disappear to pop up again, the higher their rest energy is. The farther apart two particles are or the lower their energy is, the less it matters where the other particle is or how it moves, what properties it exactly has, the less definite the properties of one particle are according to the other. The lower the energy of a particle, the weaker its interactions are, the greater its freedom of behavior, the less strictly it obeys laws of physics, rules of behavior. If we may associate a low energy with an early evolutionary phase, then we might say that the laws of physics evolve together with the particles the behavior of which they describe, so are, like the particles, the product of a trial-and-error evolution. It isn't so much that particles and associated laws ''aren't fully determinate'' that laws work ''only on average''; it is because the behavior of particles is less related as their energy is lower and/or they are farther apart, as the energy, the properties of one particle are less definite according to the other. The farther apart they are and/or the smaller their energy is, the less their interaction horizons overlap, coincide, the weaker their interactions are, the less they can force each other behave in a coordinated manner. That the laws particles are observed to obey enable us to predict their behavior to some extent doesn't mean that the world is deterministic, predetermined, that it can be understood in terms of cause-and-effect. If when the mass of particles are both cause and effect of their interactions, then then mass cannot causally precede gravity nor the other way around: as I argued in my essay, causality has nothing to do with science but everything with religion.
Regards, Anton
view post as summary
report post as inappropriate
Author Conrad Dale Johnson replied on Jul. 5, 2013 @ 13:55 GMT
Anton -- thanks for your comments. I'm glad you appreciate this idea that the world is a self-defining information structure -- something that's in a way so obvious, but difficult to describe clearly... since the structure is so complex and involves so many different ways of interacting.
I think I agree with most of what you say, here and in your essay, but I'm not sure of the meaning of...
view entire post
Anton -- thanks for your comments. I'm glad you appreciate this idea that the world is a self-defining information structure -- something that's in a way so obvious, but difficult to describe clearly... since the structure is so complex and involves so many different ways of interacting.
I think I agree with most of what you say, here and in your essay, but I'm not sure of the meaning of some of the language -- for example, saying particles are "both cause and effect of their interactions". The concept of causality has a clear meaning in specific contexts, though not in quantum physics. So I'm not sure why you say that big bang cosmology implies a prior cause outside the universe... apparently causality has for you a kind of a priori metaphysical sense. It is a problem in physics that so much of our terminology gets its meaning from 18th and 19th century worldviews; our current theories haven't coalesced into a new picture that could generate more appropriate language.
view post as summary
Anton Biermans replied on Jul. 6, 2013 @ 01:46 GMT
Conrad,
Well, if the universe creates itself (present tense) out of nothing, without any outside interference, then particles obviously have to create themselves, each other, so in they ultimately must be both the product and source of their interactions, of forces between them. If particles create, cause one another into existence so owe their properties to each other, if by exchanging...
view entire post
Conrad,
Well, if the universe creates itself (present tense) out of nothing, without any outside interference, then particles obviously have to create themselves, each other, so in they ultimately must be both the product and source of their interactions, of forces between them. If particles create, cause one another into existence so owe their properties to each other, if by exchanging energy they express and at the same time preserve each other's properties, existence, then a universe similarly only can exist, have particular properties as seen from the outside, if there's something outside of it the universe interacts with, it owes its properties to, so such universe must have been created by some Outside Interference. The 'nix' law according to which what comes out of nothing must add to nothing implies that a universe which creates itself out of nothing is that unique, paradoxical 'thing' which has no physical reality as a whole, as 'seen' from without, but only exist as seen from within, by an observer whose body particles are part of the sum which is to remain nil. That the sum of all debts and credits on Earth by definition is nil doesn't mean that there is no money. Though in this example there are no effects of the existence of money upon an outside observer, this wouldn’t matter for the total amount of money on Earth, so here it doesn't matter for the existence of money and its quantity whether or not it can be observed from the outside. This is different for the universe as here everything inside of it, including space and time has to add to nil in a physical sense (think: destructive interference), to cancel as seen from without: if we actually could step outside of it, we would find nothing to observe.
Only if the particles in the universe would only be the cause but not also the effect, the product of their interactions would it be justified to regard the universe as an object which has particular properties as a whole, as something which evolves in time, in which case the universe would live in a time realm not of its own making. Though it is said that time only begins at the big bang and we might concede that, indeed, as long as nothing happens, changes we cannot speak about the passing of time, a beginning requires something with respect to which it begins, so here big bang cosmology again refers to something outside of it relative to which it exists. In imagining to observe the universe from the outside (as if looking over God's shoulders at His creation), Big bang cosmology represents a religious view on the universe. In contrast, a self-creating universe has no physical reality as a whole, as 'seen' from without, so has no beginning in time, but contains and produces all time within. Whereas in a big bang universe all particles have the same birth date (according to a cosmic calendar outside the universe), in a self-creating universe the uncertainty principle says that a particle of an infinitesimal energy (but > 0) has an infinite lifetime, so it has always has existed and always will, even though the difference between its existence and non-existence also is infinitesimal. If according to the same principle the energy one particle has according to the other is greater as their distance is smaller, as the position of one particle is less indefinite according to the other, then in this universe particle acquire mass as they contract, in contrast to a big bang universe where particles contract because they have been created with a certain mass and gravity is attractive, so here mass would causally precede gravity, which of course is impossible. I am well aware how very hard it is to understand what I propose, so if you are interested in this matter you might have a peek at my
blog.
Regards, Anton
view post as summary
report post as inappropriate
Author Conrad Dale Johnson wrote on Jul. 5, 2013 @ 15:18 GMT
Looking back over my essay, I think the weakest part is page 7, where I try to sketch how this evolutionary process works. There's a lot here I wish I'd thought through more clearly, though a better presentation might have taken more space than the essay permits.
I want to point out one major issue -- at times here I'm talking about a process in which "answering questions" -- that is, agreeing on a certain outcome of a measurement -- helps set up another question or measurement-context. This is the process that constitutes the self-defining structure of the world, at a particular stage in evolution. It constantly gives rise to new situations in which new selections become meaningful.
But at other times I'm talking about a higher-level process in which one self-defining system -- made of countless such Q&A events -- becomes a context within which a new, more complex structure of facts and principles can define itself, by asking and answering new kinds of questions. I failed to distinguish these different processes, which are (very roughly) analogous to the evolution of a given biological species versus the emergence of new species.
The conclusion of this section IV -- that in the course of evolution, the world could become increasingly determinate -- would apply to the combination of these processes.
john stephan selye wrote on Jul. 14, 2013 @ 13:44 GMT
Hi Conrad,
Yours is a common sense approach that puts complex matters in perspective in a very helpful way.
I agree that our information always depends on the web of our measurements - 'There’s no such thing as information without a context that actually defines it.'
And as you point out, information is ultimately based on our evolutionary nature - and its 'tangle of...
view entire post
Hi Conrad,
Yours is a common sense approach that puts complex matters in perspective in a very helpful way.
I agree that our information always depends on the web of our measurements - 'There’s no such thing as information without a context that actually defines it.'
And as you point out, information is ultimately based on our evolutionary nature - and its 'tangle of interdependencies'. There is no information stored in the phenomena of the universe - all facts are relevant only to the observer who has evolved in such a way as to perceive them as he does.
I'm particularly interested by how you closely link the evolution of the cosmos to the evolution of organisms. In my essay I show how organisms are inevitably created from inorganic reality, and as the result of the same force - a gravitational-magnetic force that is inherent to a general field of Cosmae.
I argue that though natural selection always plays a part, in a Cosmos that results from a General Field, the evolution of both Cosmos and life are similarly impelled. Nothing happens entirely because of natural selection; a determinant force is also at work.
Furthermore, every species ultimately perceives the underlying reality in its own way, thus spinning a Species Cosmos from the greater energy field over evolutionary time.
From your description of the interdependency of our parameter systems, I assume you'd agree with my central point - that It and Bit cannot be separated, and that neither ultimately prevails over the other: they must be correlated.
All and all, an excellent effort - I hope you'll have a look at mine, and let me know what you think.
Good Luck!
John.
view post as summary
report post as inappropriate
Author Conrad Dale Johnson replied on Jul. 17, 2013 @ 13:48 GMT
Hi John -- Thanks for your comments, and I'm glad the essay made some sense to you. But the notion that "organisms are inevitably created from inorganic reality" is different from the concept of evolution through random selection that I'm working with here.
Though your approach sounds unusual, it follows the traditional route in physics of explaining the world by hypothesizing an...
view entire post
Hi John -- Thanks for your comments, and I'm glad the essay made some sense to you. But the notion that "organisms are inevitably created from inorganic reality" is different from the concept of evolution through random selection that I'm working with here.
Though your approach sounds unusual, it follows the traditional route in physics of explaining the world by hypothesizing an underlying universal pattern of some kind. My essay tries for a different kind of explanation, in terms of the interaction-patterning that's required to define and communicate information successfully.
In order for any information to be observable, it has to be able to be defined and communicated in a context of other observables. So I question whether any hypothetical underlying reality is even relevant to explaining the structure of observable information, at a fundamental level.
When we invent "forces" or other hypotheses behind the scenes, to explain what happens, we're capturing regularities in the observable phenomena that are certainly important to understand. But ultimately I think they need to be explained the way regularities in biology are understood - as arising from and helping to maintain the ongoing evolutionary process. In this case, the evolution of the system of real-time interaction that makes things observable.
view post as summary
Manuel S Morales wrote on Jul. 17, 2013 @ 03:59 GMT
Conrad,
Excellant essay and one I find in keeping with the findings of a recently concluded 12 year experiment which show how deterministic acts of selection evolve to states of matter. Much like what you have suggested in your essay.
I have some questions to run by you via email and would like to know what your email address is? My email address is msm@physicsofdestiny.com
I look forward to hearing from you.
Regards,
Manuel
report post as inappropriate
Author Conrad Dale Johnson replied on Jul. 17, 2013 @ 13:57 GMT
Hi Manuel -
You and any other readers can contact me at conraddjohnson@gmail.com - note the double "d".
I read your essay, but haven't commented on it yet, since I'm still puzzling about your basic terms - the meaning of "selection" and its relationship to "destiny". In my context, "natural selection" just refers to whatever randomly occurs, in a given situation. What makes measurement special, I think, is that quite complex situations constantly arise, in our universe, that let these (constrained) random selections contribute to the set-up of other such situations, over and over again.
Manuel S Morales replied on Jul. 17, 2013 @ 20:06 GMT
Hi Conrad,
Thank you for sharing your viewpoint regarding (constrained) random selections. Have you ever wondered how do we know if everything is random or not? Uncertainty without certainty makes uncertainty a certainty. So if our world is truly deterministic then there must be a way to establish this and that is what my findings are about.
Anyway, I truly enjoyed reading your clear and insightful essay and have rated it accordingly. I hope you do well in this competition and I hope more people in the community will read your essay.
Best wishes,
Manuel
report post as inappropriate
Vladimir Rogozhin wrote on Jul. 19, 2013 @ 19:03 GMT
Dear Conrad,
You put a good question: «And if at a deeper level things aren't fully determinate, if they turn out to obey laws only on average, then why does the world we observe end up looking so precisely factual and deterministic?» And it was in your essay a good answer, in the spirit of the ancients: "as above, so below." I wish you every success, with respect, Vladimir
report post as inappropriate
M. V. Vasilyeva wrote on Jul. 21, 2013 @ 18:40 GMT
Conrad,
I very much liked your exposé on Wheeler's ideas, especially your original take on measurement-processes presented in evolutionary terms. Your suggestion that "the process we call measurement -- including the communication of the results as the basis for setting up further measurements -- can also evolve through accidental selection" is brilliant! In this regard, have you read the...
view entire post
Conrad,
I very much liked your exposé on Wheeler's ideas, especially your original take on measurement-processes presented in evolutionary terms. Your suggestion that "the process we call measurement -- including the communication of the results as the basis for setting up further measurements -- can also evolve through accidental selection" is brilliant! In this regard, have you read the essay by Prof. McHarris? Speaking of non-linear loops, he brings up the example of evolving computer programs, modeled on the principles that drive biological systems. The implications of these programs provocative results are very much in line with the body and the conclusion of your essay.
Until I read your essay, the undisputed truth of these statements never occurred to me: "There's no such thing as information without a context that actually defines it" and "in principle, any kind of measurement is possible only because other kinds of measurements have already been made" -- even though just a week ago I had a discussion with a friend in the course of which we decided that an individual had no meaning without the context of the whole (it's funny how we tend to overlook the truths that appear self-evident).
I like the predatory spin you give to the processes underlying reality setting up "information-traps" and your vision of "the world not only as a set of facts, but also as a web of many kinds of interaction contexts that trap those facts and make them observable, defining each in terms of other relevant facts, defined in other contexts". Together with your recursive definition of "measurement", this actually resonates very well with my essay where I propose that reality is a local phenomenon perpetually generated anew by recursive processes that capture the bits of info from their environment and output them transformed.
I could offer a slightly different spin on this: "For systems in this subnetwork, interactions that happen to fit its self-defining structure do define and communicate specific information, that contributes to contexts defining other information. Interactions that don't happen to fit this structure aren't physically eliminated; they're just irrelevant to the ongoing process". One could also view this in the context of harmonic oscillations and resonances (eloquently spoken of by Dr. Carolyn Devereux in her essay).
Regarding the "storage-mechanism available within quantum systems", I actually chanced upon an idea of such a storage while writing my essay but did not expand on it, because it was so novel to me. But it boils down to a definition of a quantum process as requiring --in order to run-- a certain set of input bits. And, say, a simple process needs 3 bits of input and it has already acquired 2. It can't run without the 3rd bit and so it idles, while the 2 bits already captured can be viewed as 'stored'. The moment the 3rd bits arrives, the process runs. Isn't this in line with the definition of a quantum? I had not yet a chance to explore this idea in more detail (the only thing that occurred to me since in this regard was a neuron, which waits for the action potential to build up until a certain threshold before firing -- if the proposed definition of a quantum process turns out to be valid, one could claim that the universe exists, literally, in the Head Of God lol)
I could argue though with your conclusion, "To me at least, it seems clear that the physical world is incomparably more powerful as an information-processing system than any kind of mathematics or computational logic." Have you looked at cellular automata? Prof. D'Ariano pursues this in his essay and Maria Carrillo-Ruiz speaks of the same in her very short essay. You wrote, "Of course, physicists don't necessarily imagine the world as computing itself in real time." -- actually, some do and mean exactly that when suggesting that 'the universe is a computer'.
"So whether or not we believe in mathematical miracles, this universe hardly looks like a system based on deterministic computation." -- indeed, instead it may be based on simple processes like cellular automata that, despite their inherent simplicity give rise to great complexity. In this regard, you may also like to read Jochen Szangolies' essay (if you have not already, of course), where he discusses Leibniz' idea that one can always find a mathematical formula describing any random distribution, like in an ink blot, which however does not prove that this distribution is governed by a 'mathematical law': "This means that there exists a law simpler than just listing all the facts, from which nevertheless all the facts can be derived." This description fits the concept of cellular automata very well.
Sorry for such a long post. I gotta run now.
Again, many thanks for your thought provoking, stimulating essay!
-Marina
view post as summary
report post as inappropriate
Author Conrad Dale Johnson replied on Jul. 22, 2013 @ 14:20 GMT
Hi Marina - I'm glad you found my essay - I read yours this morning and will add some comments to your thread there. I agree that in many ways we're thinking along the same lines, maybe because we're both looking at physics from the perspective of biology.
As to your comment - "It's funny how we tend to overlook the truths that appear self-evident" - more and more I think that the whole...
view entire post
Hi Marina - I'm glad you found my essay - I read yours this morning and will add some comments to your thread there. I agree that in many ways we're thinking along the same lines, maybe because we're both looking at physics from the perspective of biology.
As to your comment - "It's funny how we tend to overlook the truths that appear self-evident" - more and more I think that the whole purpose of my work is just to point out the things that are most obvious about the world. There's a great deal that we all know about, which is nevertheless very difficult to conceptualize... such as this business of "observing" or "measuring" things.
Your idea below about "storage mechanism" is interesting. I sometimes think the one key issue for fundamental physics is just this - how does information get stored over time, in a system made of momentary interactions? These basic connection-events don't last through time, but collectively they do communicate information. And it seems to be the information-structure they produce that lasts through time, by being repeated again and again from many points of view, in different contexts. That would be the lasting reality we describe in terms of as particles and fields
What you point out is that defining any information requires other information that's may not be immediately available. So the "stretching out" of the web of momentary interactions into something like continuous time could have to do with partial contexts "waiting" to be completed by further interaction.
Thanks very much for your comments - Conrad
view post as summary
Sreenath B N wrote on Jul. 21, 2013 @ 18:45 GMT
Dear Conrad,
I have down loaded your essay and soon post my comments on it. Meanwhile, please, go through my essay and post your comments.
Regards and good luck in the contest,
Sreenath BN.
http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1827
report post as inappropriate
James Lee Hoover wrote on Jul. 21, 2013 @ 23:29 GMT
Conrad,
You have said that information has more to do with contexts that define it than that it can be cast in binary form. I'm gathering by your essay that you see information evolving from context to context as well as biological organisms.
There are a lot of good observations in your essay. You seem to speak of the macro world in your observations, not addressing the subatomic in...
view entire post
Conrad,
You have said that information has more to do with contexts that define it than that it can be cast in binary form. I'm gathering by your essay that you see information evolving from context to context as well as biological organisms.
There are a lot of good observations in your essay. You seem to speak of the macro world in your observations, not addressing the subatomic in behavioral ways. Those who advocate the Anthropic Principle speak of the characteristics of the subatomic world but often do not use it in their arguable examples, like Schrodinger's Cat, something my essay comments on.
Your essay is very sensible and lucid. I would like to hear you views on mine.
Jim
view post as summary
report post as inappropriate
Author Conrad Dale Johnson replied on Jul. 22, 2013 @ 16:15 GMT
Hi Jim -- thanks for your note. You're right that my essay doesn't deal with the many pecularities of the quantum domain... very roughly, my viewpoint is that so far as measurement-processes are concerned, there's no difference between the macro- and micro-worlds.
There's a very great difference in the extent to which these same measurement-processes can produce something like a...
view entire post
Hi Jim -- thanks for your note. You're right that my essay doesn't deal with the many pecularities of the quantum domain... very roughly, my viewpoint is that so far as measurement-processes are concerned, there's no difference between the macro- and micro-worlds.
There's a very great difference in the extent to which these same measurement-processes can produce something like a classically determinate and deterministic reality, at the level our our daily experience vs the subatomic world.
Our difficulties in understanding QM have mainly to do with our unreasonable assumptions about what the world ought to be like, at bottom - e.g. that it ought to be a logical structure of simple, well-defined elements (whether it-like or bit-like). I think the mysteries will gradually disperse as we learn to appreciate what it takes to define and communicate information through a web of momentary interactions.
I'll read your essay and leave my comments there. Thanks again!
Conrad
view post as summary
Peter Jackson wrote on Jul. 22, 2013 @ 21:16 GMT
Conrad,
Great essay. It or Bit didn't matter a bit as it hit so many important and much ignored aspects right on the nail! Also well and clearly written and organised for such a tricky subject.
My favourite key points;
"we still have no definite idea of what constitutes a measurement, or why determinate information should depend on observer participation."
"....what...
view entire post
Conrad,
Great essay. It or Bit didn't matter a bit as it hit so many important and much ignored aspects right on the nail! Also well and clearly written and organised for such a tricky subject.
My favourite key points;
"we still have no definite idea of what constitutes a measurement, or why determinate information should depend on observer participation."
"....what happens in any situation depends on a non-linear combination of many different kinds of interactions going on at once."
I certainly agree and address those myself, because;
"...this approach has the potential to explain much about the physical world that can't be explained by any theory in which deterministic laws and principles underlie the structure of observed phenomena."
and I also propose definitions and a mechanism to explain it, and also; "...at what point then does a measurement occur? When and how do superpositions "collapse" to give a factual result?" which you do of necessity leave a little open.
I do hope you'll manage to read mine and comment as you're one of the few who'se considered these things. I build a multi part ontology, which also agrees with you blog comment; "...there's a difference between using various kinds of mathematics as precise descriptive tools, and imagining the world as "based on mathematics", or as being itself a mathematical entity."
Another particular coup in yours is the recognition that "a context of other measurements is always needed", which I commend. In that regard I try to define precisely what IS being measured, particularly dynamically, and identify a wrong common assumption as causing current confusion. I also test the power of the model I propose against the EPR paradox with a very new proposal and evidence emerging. I do hope you're not too wedded to doctrine!!
Very well done for a highly pertinent, deeply incisive and easy to read work which I'm sure will be the starting point for important advances in understanding.
Very best of luck in the run in.
Peter
view post as summary
report post as inappropriate
Author Conrad Dale Johnson replied on Jul. 24, 2013 @ 13:52 GMT
Peter -
I appreciate your thorough reading of my essay and your very generous comments! I have read your essay too and left my comments, though I'm afraid I'm not nearly as well-equipped to follow your arguments as you are to understand mine.
Thanks - Conrad
Michel Planat wrote on Jul. 24, 2013 @ 06:37 GMT
Dear Conrad,
I like your essay.
You write as a summry
"Its basis is just the fact that measurements need a context of other kinds of measurements. I’ll try to show that this already implies the kind of system of interactions that can evolve through natural selection."
In my essay,
http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1789
I address the first topic...
view entire post
Dear Conrad,
I like your essay.
You write as a summry
"Its basis is just the fact that measurements need a context of other kinds of measurements. I’ll try to show that this already implies the kind of system of interactions that can evolve through natural selection."
In my essay,
http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1789
I address the first topic using the qubit language. As you suspect, it does not solve the measurement problem but helps to figure out the type of (in)compatibilities involved.
You try to establish a relation between quantum contexts and contexts in biological evolution. It is very ambitious. "In physics something similar developed, though there was no static storage-mechanism available within quantum systems" and "Essentially we’re defining “measurement” recursively, in terms of itself – a measurement takes place insofar as some other measurement results from it. But this is exactly how “reproduction” is defined in biology."
I don't think that there is such a causality, even in biology. There is probably a random selection. Anyway, I think that you are addressing fascinating questions about the deep meaning of quantum contextuality well in the spirit of Wheeler.
Thanks for your work.
Michel
view post as summary
report post as inappropriate
Author Conrad Dale Johnson replied on Jul. 24, 2013 @ 13:49 GMT
Michel -- thanks very much. I did look at your essay some time ago and found your starting-point very interesting. I didn't comment or try to rate it, because I'm not at all familiar with the technical background, and wasn't clear as to the conclusion you draw from this work.
As to causality, whether in physics or biology, I wasn't clear enough about my "recursive" definitions. The...
view entire post
Michel -- thanks very much. I did look at your essay some time ago and found your starting-point very interesting. I didn't comment or try to rate it, because I'm not at all familiar with the technical background, and wasn't clear as to the conclusion you draw from this work.
As to causality, whether in physics or biology, I wasn't clear enough about my "recursive" definitions. The reproduction of an organism becomes the basis for the *possible* reproduction of another organism, that's all. Whether its offspring also reproduces successfully is indeed a matter of chance selection. And a physical measurement is even less a "cause" of another measurement; at most it contributes certain information that may help make another measurement possible.
I'm thinking entirely in terms of random events... however, to the extent that an organism has offspring that also happen to have offspring, etc. - then life can evolve.
Likewise, to the extent that a certain set of interactions can succeed in defining a particular result, that helps set up the context in which another such event happens to define a particular result, and so on - then something like the facts and laws of physics can evolve. The point is that the "success" either of reproduction or of measurement ultimately depends on what happens in the long term.
If we take any limited set of quantum interactions, we only have an entanglement of "virtual" systems. The determinacy of physical facts and the lawfulness of interaction are only definable at a much higher level.
view post as summary
Akinbo Ojo wrote on Jul. 24, 2013 @ 14:05 GMT
Dear Conrad,
A thought provoking essay to be well rated. I also see you have good answers to questions from readers, so let me ask you one. How can you measure and conclude that something is existing? Especially if the thing has no colour, no mass, no charge, etc. That is, does existence have a measure?
Regards,
Akinbo
report post as inappropriate
Author Conrad Dale Johnson replied on Jul. 27, 2013 @ 11:50 GMT
Akinbo - thank you very much, I'm glad you could make something of this.
I would say that existence has many measures - i.e. that what we mean by existence has to do with the way all these different kinds of measures work together. But the notion of the "bare" existence of a thing in itself, apart from any communication with other things - that is a very profound idea underlying Western thought almost all the way back to its beginning. Our tradition says that all other features of things have to be built on top of this ultimate reality.
That idea works in classical physics, but I think we need to get past it in order to get to the foundational level. It's like believing in the absolute personal identity of a human being as something independent of our abilities to communicate with each other and with ourselves. It's not that thinking in terms of absolutes is bad, but that we need to learn to appreciate the depth at which communicative connections operate in the world. And to me, thinking in terms of absolutes is a substitute for that kind of understanding.
Thanks again - Conrad
Than Tin wrote on Jul. 25, 2013 @ 03:05 GMT
Dear Conrad
Richard Feynman in his Nobel Acceptance Speech (http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/19
65/feynman-lecture.html)
said: “It always seems odd to me that the fundamental laws of physics, when discovered, can appear in so many different forms that are not apparently identical at first, but with a little mathematical fiddling you can show the...
view entire post
Dear Conrad
Richard Feynman in his Nobel Acceptance Speech (http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/19
65/feynman-lecture.html)
said: “It always seems odd to me that the fundamental laws of physics, when discovered, can appear in so many different forms that are not apparently identical at first, but with a little mathematical fiddling you can show the relationship. And example of this is the Schrodinger equation and the Heisenberg formulation of quantum mechanics. I don’t know why that is – it remains a mystery, but it was something I learned from experience. There is always another way to say the same thing that doesn’t look at all like the way you said it before. I don’t know what the reason for this is. I think it is somehow a representation of the simplicity of nature.”
I too believe in the simplicity of nature, and I am glad that Richard Feynman, a Nobel-winning famous physicist, also believe in the same thing I do, but I had come to my belief long before I knew about that particular statement.
The belief that “Nature is simple” is however being expressed differently in my essay “Analogical Engine” linked to http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1865 .
Specifically though, I said “Planck constant is the Mother of All Dualities” and I put it schematically as: wave-particle ~ quantum-classical ~ gene-protein ~ analogy- reasoning ~ linear-nonlinear ~ connected-notconnected ~ computable-notcomputable ~ mind-body ~ Bit-It ~ variation-selection ~ freedom-determinism … and so on.
Taken two at a time, it can be read as “what quantum is to classical” is similar to (~) “what wave is to particle.” You can choose any two from among the multitudes that can be found in our discourses.
I could have put Schrodinger wave ontology-Heisenberg particle ontology duality in the list had it comes to my mind!
Since “Nature is Analogical”, we are free to probe nature in so many different ways. And you have touched some corners of it.
With regards,
Than Tin
view post as summary
report post as inappropriate
William Amos Carine wrote on Jul. 25, 2013 @ 17:15 GMT
Hey Conrad,
What is meant by the statement that a physical situation "makes a difference which outcome actually occurs." I would think that the outcome is as important as the progressing to the moment or the getting there. It's less stressful thinking of things that way anyways.
Can you elaborate on the sentence "There can be no such thing as a single measurement-event; a context of...
view entire post
Hey Conrad,
What is meant by the statement that a physical situation "makes a difference which outcome actually occurs." I would think that the outcome is as important as the progressing to the moment or the getting there. It's less stressful thinking of things that way anyways.
Can you elaborate on the sentence "There can be no such thing as a single measurement-event; a context of other measurements is always needed." Distance, say one makes a ruler in isolation in space, would be a measurement by itself even if nothing was observable to measure. Each atom of the ruler may be in a gravity field, and hence possibly length-wise contracted. So even if the "distance" is indeed a measure of atom's properties, that is it is self-referential, through relativity arguments, it can begin to address properties of a gradient, of structure of space, where this structure is not referring to any measurement per say between atoms that make up the ruler, but rather of some order between different states, say of another ruler in field elsewhere.
Just a side note, in Darwin's big work, love is mentioned more than the survival of the fittest idea where certain variations are beneficial. I would like to see that in science and mathematical arguments more often.
Also, not being everywhere in the universe to look, or through out its time span, how can we say life is rare. It may not be discovered, but what does that have to do with it being there? For example, we haven't even near thoroughly searched our solar system. with more astrological data, and the evidence of water almost everywhere pretty abundantly, such searches may find more fruit if instead of looking for direct evidence of organisms, which really would be a find, mass ratios or dynamics in a solar system or region of space were analyzed.
Is a superposition equivalent to particle entanglement?
How do you know DNA is Statically and linearly coded? It kind of reminds me of a common mishap scenario in building things. An intelligent workman is looking at a space, he's been working so long at his tiresome job that he's developed certain tools of analysis that he uses in his field. He may not know an ounce of math or how to design a structure according to the rules with which an engineering student once had to keep in mind when he moved his pencil for a design class. Yet this workman calculates it'll be of by inches and tells his supervisor, who relays a workers discontent to the architect who made the plans. But even on scene the architect doesn't have a feel for the problem, he says it's fine, don't you see how good it looks here on my paper. The worker knows though, and his intuition proves right, yet again. So imagine being on the scale of DNA, of a some kind of being who has to piece together these biological rods and segments to make the helix structure. The little guy messing around with the strands at that level, well to him it may be a slightly different story than our static linear picture.
And I do agree that the possibility exists that chaotic randomness does rule and there are no laws at all. Yet I just believe non-observable entities can contribute to the structure of info. I think the unseen is real and must affect the structure of cosmos and the little minute things as well.
Your rough draft is is evolutionary. Will it keep changing with human development or is there a possibility that like a unified theory, the main questions will be answered but there will always be little things to work out or incorporate, like psephology or the other arts or biology?
Best,
Amos.
view post as summary
report post as inappropriate
William Amos Carine replied on Jul. 25, 2013 @ 17:20 GMT
I forgot to ask another question. Could it be able that a theoretical and mathematical theory could also be realistic and not deterministic?
report post as inappropriate
Author Conrad Dale Johnson replied on Jul. 27, 2013 @ 12:31 GMT
Hi Amos - Please excuse me if I don't respond to all your notes and questions... I'll try to hit the high points, though.
To begin with the last question and work backwards - there certainly are mathematical theories (notably quantum mechanics) that are not deterministic. I'm not sure in what sense you mean "realistic" though. As generally understood, the mathematics of QM does not...
view entire post
Hi Amos - Please excuse me if I don't respond to all your notes and questions... I'll try to hit the high points, though.
To begin with the last question and work backwards - there certainly are mathematical theories (notably quantum mechanics) that are not deterministic. I'm not sure in what sense you mean "realistic" though. As generally understood, the mathematics of QM does not describe objects of with the kind of reality assumed in classical physics, that have intrinsically determinate states and properties independent of any context in which they might be observed.
Traditionally, it was assumed that even though we can't observe such objects as they are "in themselves", their intrinsic states and properties are the cause of all the phenomena we do observe. That's a metaphysical notion that may or may not be true in some absolute sense. But the point I wanted to make is that whether or not there exist any such unobservable things-in-themselves "behind" the phenomena, everything that can be observed must in principle be able to be defined only in terms of other observables.
That means, we know there exists a structure of observable information that can define itself entirely in terms of itself. It's this structure to which the non-observable entities can't contribute. I'm suggesting this structure may be the fundamental one, in physics.
The linear sequence of base-pairs in DNA isn't absolutely static, of course. But the DNA/RNA coding system was a very important step in evolution, enabling a vast amount of information to be stored in a medium that can exist almost unchanged over many years. In contrast, the earlier stages of life probably depended on many catalytic cycles being able to produce enough of the right molecules to keep the process going, without any such statically-encoded data to direct the process.
And whether or not life exists in many other places than on Earth, it's certainly very rare as compared with almost any other physical phenomenon. My point was that in general, physical interaction doesn't result in the mere copying of information, whether in the form of data-elements or larger dynamic structures.
When you say that "a ruler in isolation in space would be a measurement by itself" you're thinking of measurement in some other sense. I'm thinking of measurements as the structures of interaction that define and communicate information from one system to another.
The physical world is full of situations where many outcomes are possible, and the "choice" of a particular outcome makes a difference to another such situation, changing the structure of its possible outcomes, etc. Deterministic theories tell us there are really no "choices" - but to me, this overlooks the most remarkable feature of physical dynamics, that it's constantly setting up new situations in which choices can be meaningful, defining new information that sets up new choices.
Thanks - Conrad
view post as summary
William Amos Carine replied on Jul. 29, 2013 @ 17:44 GMT
Conrad,
Thanks for condensing what you mean so it's more accessible and for going over those key points! I've been taken up with this idea that the self-contained view of physics isn't the only picture. There must be laws behind which do influence the whole context that "this structure" lies in. Maybe I forgot to go over a few crevices during spring cleaning.
When it is said in essence "the only evidence we have of information are interactions of one entity with another, these interactions requiring measurements that have a certain structure, and this is what is communicated between systems," then now I agree, though perhaps without full understanding.
I attached a document if a vague visual would speak better for you.
Appreciatively,
Amos.
attachments:
Art_as_Analogy.jpg
report post as inappropriate
Login or
create account to post reply or comment.