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Lorraine,

quote: If "free will" is the result of deterministic processes, then clearly it is not free will. Free will is not just about deterministic processes that are so complex that no one can predict the outcome, and so its called "free will". That is a type of self-deception.

Just musing

If we live as part of an infinite non-deterministic system of causality. Then our...

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Lorraine,

quote: If "free will" is the result of deterministic processes, then clearly it is not free will. Free will is not just about deterministic processes that are so complex that no one can predict the outcome, and so its called "free will". That is a type of self-deception.

Just musing

If we live as part of an infinite non-deterministic system of causality. Then our universe is a sub-state of that infinitely larger system. To singularly exist makes little sense. So likely there are infinitely more node of other universes that are of different dimensional states many more than our own. But infinity means there are an infinite number of similar universes that are close to ours. An infinite number where we each make every alternate decision and live with the consequences. And an infinite number of universes that are exactly the same as ours.

In this scenario systems evolve. Repeated Big Bangs as universes slip into other dimensional states to maintain consistency with entropy (proceeding from one set of states to another). So in this system there is no free will, but no one knows the difference. Because of the infinite space, we have an infinite number of exact replicas. We live eternally in an infinite number of universes, concurrently making every alternative decision.

Free Will is both fatalist and non-deterministic at the same time.

Now let's consider a finite closed set of causality that only supports our universe. Non-relative causality cannot be directly observed. Everything that is observable is relative and evolving. At fundamental considerations try to find a contradiction. Photon's en-route do not evolve and have no entropy. Photons travelling billions of years across the universe are stable; and cannot be seen. Mass has entropy, and can be seen. Quantum Entanglement is only observable indirectly. This is more complex but just citing generalities for discussion.

So a finite universe has both non-relativistic and relativistic components. A causal system of states that evolve transforms, but does NOT end. A perpetual engine.

Time is modeled in this system as quantum step events that evolve.

Space is modeled as quantum step events that do not evolve.

So space/time or m/s are moderated ratios that form momentum, force, energy, power, and every other observable consideration. QESdunn

This may not be how cosmology actually is, it is just the model I am working with at present.

So in this system of observable and non-observable causality are the physics constants that moderate the systems of subatomic particles. The subatomic particles have dominance over most observable macroscopic interactions, but non-relativistic influences still have some influence as "noise".

Nothing observable is exact except when considering probability. Which is why quantum mechanics in its present state has self-limiting use. Differing systems of causality are hidden (grouped together) in probability and error analysis.

So in this closed system of causality, some but not everything evolves as indicated by entropy and photons en-route, then eventually physics constants will no longer dominate aliasing of our subatomic particles and related observable fields. At this point our causal system slips into another dimensional state and the next Big Bang occurs forming a new system of relativity; different than ours.

This happens over and over, with almost inconceivable numbers of different dimensional spaces evolving. But eventually, our physics constants (singularities) are exactly as before. However, our galaxy does not exist the majority of times our physics constants are repeated. But eventually, a Big Bang forms our galaxy, but the Earth does not exist in the majority of times our galaxy forms. But eventually the Earth is formed, but the majority of times humans do not evolve, but eventually they do. Eventually, through extraordinarily large numbers of Big Bangs humans evolve and with each vast numbers of cycling of Big Bangs, humans come to experience every alternate decision that is possible and lives with the consequences. Eventually, after untold numbers of Big Bangs, every subatomic particle in the universe repeats exactly. Then depending upon non-relativistic causality, the whole broader cycle repeats.

So we have no Free Will from a deterministic point of view, but that we ultimately make every potential alternate decision, all of us, and every intelligence everywhere in our relativistic universe, then we have expressed free will in that we have made every alternate decision.

Because we repeat, we live eternally.

Such are my thoughts on the subject of Free Will. Free Will exists concurrently with lack of Free Will. A non-deterministic universe exists concurrently with a fatalist universe.

.

.

.

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Let me sort something out..

Concerns were raised above about the criteria applied for evaluation of our essays. There were also statements made that politics is involved in assigning winners, and this is likely true, but at a different level or for other reasons than have been impugned. The thing is; FQXi is conducting this and all of their contests using grant money - which means they...

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Let me sort something out..

Concerns were raised above about the criteria applied for evaluation of our essays. There were also statements made that politics is involved in assigning winners, and this is likely true, but at a different level or for other reasons than have been impugned. The thing is; FQXi is conducting this and all of their contests using grant money - which means they must justify all their decisions to the grantors, in their final report.

However; there is a real danger - and evidence already on the table - that this induces a bias for the reasons articulated by Phil Gibbs in his essay, based on the need to show evidence to the sponsors that the winning essay authors are qualified to produce the quality of work they created in their essays. It seems there is a concern on the part of FQXi that the ideas of a candidate author have already achieved a certain level of acceptance. That is; the organizers want to be able to sell their choices to the boss - those providing the funding - that the people chosen to win create good PR for both FQXi and the underwriters. So in effect; we are applying for jobs as poster children.

The thing is; misleading metrics skew any attempt to create a profile for individual entrants, or to assess the quality of their prior work. What is worse is that we're supposed to be judged on the quality of the submission, and if the essay we submitted to FQXi is our best work to date, this should count much more heavily than any measure of our prior performance, qualifications, employment or academic affiliations, membership in professional organizations, having a popular blog, or receiving prior awards and honors.

What should count is the quality of the essay we submitted, and the fact that it is legitimately our work. If there are genuine doubts about whether an author created an essay, or if the works cited as foundational are seen as faulty in evidence or logic - then such metrics provide an essential means to restore order and fairness! However; when Google Scholar stopped including papers on viXra, and given the widespread reports of abuse of editorial privilege by arXiv, I am certain that a lot of metrics are skewed, and can be used against us - to disqualify otherwise worthy authors and prize-deserving efforts. But I will keep trying anyhow.

All the Best,

Jonathan

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Stuart,

Could it be that black holes are just a mathematical description of a gravitational vortex and as you say, nothing falls in, but rather than the larger ones accumulating this energy, it is essentially what is radiated out the poles as those enormous jets of cosmic rays?

I am not a fan of the Big Bang theory and think we will eventually find that redshift is an optical...

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Stuart,

Could it be that black holes are just a mathematical description of a gravitational vortex and as you say, nothing falls in, but rather than the larger ones accumulating this energy, it is essentially what is radiated out the poles as those enormous jets of cosmic rays?

I am not a fan of the Big Bang theory and think we will eventually find that redshift is an optical effect, by which the intergalactic medium is essentially lensing that light in a way that it effectively expands, but the universe as a whole does not, because those gravity wells of galaxies perform the opposite function and cause the measure of space to contract, such that these two effects naturally balance out to the overall flat space, which we do observe, according to measurements of the CMBR.

Now Einstein did originally propose the cosmological constant as a way to balance gravity from collapsing the universe and especially since the discovery of the need for dark energy to make the theory work, this expansion has been compared to a cosmological constant. If it is a lensing effect, then dark energy is not necessary, since those galaxies are not actually being moved apart.

One of the points I keep making is that when they say those distant galaxies will eventually recede from view, they are still assuming a stable speed of light across this expanding space, such that it would take light longer to cross it. So if they are going to use C as the denominator, that would make the expansion a numerator, which means it is not expanding space, but simply an increasing amount of stable space.

So I think we will eventually find it to be a cosmic convection cycle of expanding radiation and contracting mass. Since we know when mass turns to energy, it expands, the question is whether when energy turns to mass, it contracts, creating a vacuum, otherwise known as gravity. This would make gravity an effect of energy condensing into mass and further coalescing into ever more dense forms of matter, rather than just a property of mass. They can't find that dark matter on the periphery of galaxies, but there is a lot of excess cosmic rays to be explained and the first generation stars seem to mostly be on the outer fringes of galaxies, suggesting an inwardly evolving process, before the final stage of whatever is left to fall into the swirl at the center and be jetted back out, to start the process again.

Now it is much easier to believe in the Big Bang, Inflation, Dark Matter, Dark Energy and Multiverses, because that is what the rest of the herd believes, but since my career isn't dependent on that particular clique, I'm allowed to believe in simply what makes sense.

Regards,

John Merryman

Ps,

An interesting discussion of the topic on FQXI blogs.

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Now that the contest has developed its form, I'm going to allow myself a rant:

There used to be a time when men of science were natural polymaths, but with this era of specialization, that seems to have passed. This planet and its functions, from the geologic to the human social and cultural, are vast and dynamic systems and while there is a fairly broad array of entries in this contest,...

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Now that the contest has developed its form, I'm going to allow myself a rant:

There used to be a time when men of science were natural polymaths, but with this era of specialization, that seems to have passed. This planet and its functions, from the geologic to the human social and cultural, are vast and dynamic systems and while there is a fairly broad array of entries in this contest, they do seem to focus on sets of topics of particular interest to what might be called the STEM crowd. While members of this community naturally consider themselves on the cutting edge of human progress, sometimes the cutting edge lacks a certain degree of depth.

For those of us who do read the general news, there are many significant and serious issues which seem as though they will only grow more serious in the not too distant future, so I had thought they would be addressed with much more depth and analysis than is apparent, in this contest.

Now some do consider such issues as over population, resource depletion and environment degradation, though in a fair number of cases, simply to compel moving off the planet. Which in all realistic consideration of the distances, time, inhospitableness, lack of serious lunar development, mostly filling low earth orbit with debris, etc, this just does not seem a very logical option.

Only two, myself and Stefan Weckbach even directly address the issue of the world financial and monetary systems being used as giant resource and value vacuums to drain the planet of all monetizable wealth, but out there in the larger community, it should be noted that Thomas Piketty's rather dense tome, "Capital in the Twenty-First Century" is at the top of the best seller lists, so it is not that many sensible people do not recognize the issue.

Personally I would say his solution of a global wealth tax would only direct this enormous jet of extracted value back into various governmental functions, when the real need is to slow the rate of extraction and thus resource destruction, but that is an issue which will have to wait for a more interested audience.

As it is, it should be noted that intense focus on a limited number of very specialized topics, Bell's theorem and questions of non-locality come to mind, do tend to create otherwise distorted perceptions, as that search light of focus can over illuminate one aspect of a situation, but obscure its larger context, so that debates rage on, with little hope of resolution and lost intellectual resources which might otherwise be better deployed. The consequence seems to be that when members of the STEM community do engage in the larger economy, it is not to effectively analyze how it might better function, but to facilitate some of its worst behaviors, such as concocting ever more elaborate systems of financial leverage, or more powerful weaponry to not only further subdue sections of the world not yet being siphoned of value, but also to spend the public debt which must be incurred to support the value of all this notational wealth.

Normally I don't come down so hard on people just going about their lives, but this is a serious question which FQXI choose to ask and the participants in this contest are members of the larger community.

Rant over. Thank you for your time.

Regards,

John M

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As an extension of my prior rant, I'm going to post part of a recent comment I made on Don Limuti's thread:

"The process of education goes in cycles. We are a form of swarm intelligence, so this is just one more stage of trying out multiple systems, to find which work best. If you really sit back and look at how these processes function from a natural, rather than an anthropocentric...

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As an extension of my prior rant, I'm going to post part of a recent comment I made on Don Limuti's thread:

"The process of education goes in cycles. We are a form of swarm intelligence, so this is just one more stage of trying out multiple systems, to find which work best. If you really sit back and look at how these processes function from a natural, rather than an anthropocentric perspective, a lot of our behaviors and their likely consequences are quite predicable.

Consider it in terms of the dichotomy of energy as inherently dynamic and thus constantly pushing outward, while information emerges from the interactions and thus is a stabilizing form of these energies, thus creating the effect of mass.

So then superimpose this relationship on various aspects of biological activity. Such as the relationship of youth to age; Youth is constantly pushing out and trying to expand, with often little regard for past lessons, while age, having been through much of this, is focused on all those structures and strictures we learn in life, due to all the conflicts created by everyone trying to create their own space and expanding out as best as possible.

We could then extend that to the dichotomy of liberal and conservative, with the natural youthful expectation of freedom, enlightenment and progress motivating the basic liberal mindset.

Meanwhile the conservative mind is much more focused on all those hard edges of reality which insist on making themselves felt.

Now there are multitudes of feedback loops of each reflecting off the other, such as political correctness, which is conservative attributes manifesting in formerly liberal assumptions. Or libertarianism, which is more expansionist tendencies manifesting from a conservative mindset.

Then consider the dichotomy my entry focused on, that of government as the social central nervous system and thus processing information, while the financial sector, as the economic circulatory system, is the mechanism by which economic energy/capital, is pushing out in all possible directions, looking for ways to increase its own leverage and power/energy.

How in a healthy relationship, the function of government is to channel these forces in ways which are productive, or at least not destructive, in the longer term. Much as the brain tries to channel the body's energies and impulses in positive and nondestructive manners.

Yet when there isn't apparent positive directions to go, these energies turn inward and start corroding the structural integrity of the system, whether it is corruption in the public sphere, or bad personal vices for the individual.

What we need to learn and educate society to, is the need to be able to channel those necessary elements in a far sighted fashion. Consider all the various systems devised by societies over the ages to channel their public energies. It's safe to say the pyramids arose because there was lots of surplus energy in ancient Egyptian society between the growing and harvest seasons. Most wars over the ages, either interstate, or civil, have been due to the pot boiling over in various communal interactions.

We have been extremely fortunate in the United States, primarily for those of European descent, to have about four hundred years of room to expand, first geographically, then technologically and then using these advantages globally.

Right now, we are about to get serious pushback.

One of the primary sources of our global influence and thus power, has been that the world has used our currency as the global exchange medium, which means we have been able to issue far more than we personally need and thus reap the trade benefits of essentially manufacturing this paper. The really big problem is that it has become a bit of a Ponzi scheme, in that it has to keep growing, or it will start to contract, if not collapse. Much of those middle eastern wars of the last decade have been a function of this necessity to keep the bubble of our monetary empire whole, but our military failures have exposed a serious weakness on the Eurasian continent, which various countries over there can make very effective use of, simply by joining in trade federations that don't use the dollar. Then a lot of those surplus dollars will start returning home and have to be absorbed by our economy.

So what is now happening in the Ukraine has deep financial consequences and neither side can really afford to back down easily. Short of war though, the US will have to. Europe is fundamentally more dependent on Russian gas, than it is on US dollars and banking, even if the banks think and act otherwise.

China is dependent on our markets, but they will have to adjust their economic model, since we largely pay them with raw materials and printed forms of currency, both of which they are starting to have in excess.

So we are at a tipping point and it is the monetary, specifically dollar bubble which is most vulnerable to reality, since it amounts to nothing more than a bunch of contractual agreements that cannot be paid in full and the resulting ill will will break down the basis of trust on which they are based anyway.

So this is why I think the issue of the nature of money, as a contract, not a commodity, is so important in our immediate future and the lack of interest, or knowledge, among the otherwise quite intelligent members of this contest is so depressing to me and evidence of the extent to which people are profoundly deceived by those actually running things.

How can they be educated?"

Regards,

John Merryman

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Dear Brendan and competitor colleagues,

About Science-Religion convergence in the essays.

I dare to think that a sign of goodness, quality of the solutions proposed by us, the participants is convergence- kind of all (or at least more) roads lead to Rome. That mans good ideas will be discovered independently by more of us, using very different premises and approaches. Especially the...

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Dear Brendan and competitor colleagues,

About Science-Religion convergence in the essays.

I dare to think that a sign of goodness, quality of the solutions proposed by us, the participants is convergence- kind of all (or at least more) roads lead to Rome. That mans good ideas will be discovered independently by more of us, using very different premises and approaches. Especially the more effcctive ideas would result both from the highest level scientific thinking and from ethical superior religious principles.

I am very contented because my pragmatic approach has three pillars Interestigness of the World, Incompleteness of the Truths and Priority of the negative. OK, a great man of science and of religion, Freeman Dyson has also

found that our Universe is the most interesting of all possible universes. A most pleasant surprise recently he has found that the scientific ideas are as I also describe Pareto Truths. see please

https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.sou
ndcloud.com/tracks/148014458%3Fsecret_token%3Ds-7fDb7&color=
0066cc&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_artwork=true

P
hysics Legend Freeman Dyson On The One Thing We Just Don't Get About Science (PODCAST)

[The whole point of science is that most of it is uncertain. That's why science is exciting--because we don't know. Science is all about things we don't understand. The public, of course, imagines science is just a set of facts. But it's not. Science is a process of exploring, which is always partial. We explore, and we find out things that we understand. We find out things we thought we understood were wrong. That's how it makes progress.

Theories are ideas in progress and you never can know when a theory is nailed down.}

I hope he will also arrive to the rather unpopular idea of the priority of the negative.

May I give you the most timely example of the idea that it is more important to NOT do than to do. Today hundreds of millions people on our continent are voting for the European Parliament- they have many choices however it is essential they should NOT vote for neo-nazis- we have to avoid to see 1933 repeated.

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Quote from the article John linked to ("It's simple. If we can't change our economic system, our number's up", http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/may/27/if-we-c
ant-change-economic-system-our-number-is-up):

"

On Friday, a few days after scientists announced that the collapse of the west Antarctic ice sheet is now inevitable, the Ecuadorean government decided to allow...

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Quote from the article John linked to ("It's simple. If we can't change our economic system, our number's up", http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/may/27/if-we-c
ant-change-economic-system-our-number-is-up):

"

On Friday, a few days after scientists announced that the collapse of the west Antarctic ice sheet is now inevitable, the Ecuadorean government decided to allow oil drilling in the heart of the Yasuni national park. It had made an offer to other governments: if they gave it half the value of the oil in that part of the park, it would leave the stuff in the ground. You could see this as either blackmail or fair trade. Ecuador is poor, its oil deposits are rich. Why, the government argued, should it leave them untouched without compensation when everyone else is drilling down to the inner circle of hell? It asked for $3.6bn and received $13m. The result is that Petroamazonas, a company with a colourful record of destruction and spills, will now enter one of the most biodiverse places on the planet, in which a hectare of rainforest is said to contain more species than exist in the entire continent of North America.

The UK oil firm Soco is now hoping to penetrate Africa's oldest national park, Virunga, in the Democratic Republic of Congo; one of the last strongholds of the mountain gorilla and the okapi, of chimpanzees and forest elephants. In Britain, where a possible 4.4 billion barrels of shale oil has just been identified in the south-east, the government fantasises about turning the leafy suburbs into a new Niger delta. To this end it's changing the trespass laws to enable drilling without consent and offering lavish bribes to local people. These new reserves solve nothing. They do not end our hunger for resources; they exacerbate it.

The trajectory of compound growth shows that the scouring of the planet has only just begun. As the volume of the global economy expands, everywhere that contains something concentrated, unusual, precious, will be sought out and exploited, its resources extracted and dispersed, the world's diverse and differentiated marvels reduced to the same grey stubble.

Some people try to solve the impossible equation with the myth of dematerialisation: the claim that as processes become more efficient and gadgets are miniaturised, we use, in aggregate, fewer materials. There is no sign that this is happening. Iron ore production has risen 180% in 10 years. The trade body Forest Industries tells us that "global paper consumption is at a record high level and it will continue to grow". If, in the digital age, we won't reduce even our consumption of paper, what hope is there for other commodities?

Look at the lives of the super-rich, who set the pace for global consumption. Are their yachts getting smaller? Their houses? Their artworks? Their purchase of rare woods, rare fish, rare stone? Those with the means buy ever bigger houses to store the growing stash of stuff they will not live long enough to use. By unremarked accretions, ever more of the surface of the planet is used to extract, manufacture and store things we don't need. Perhaps it's unsurprising that fantasies about colonising space - which tell us we can export our problems instead of solving them - have resurfaced.

...

The inescapable failure of a society built upon growth and its destruction of the Earth's living systems are the overwhelming facts of our existence. As a result, they are mentioned almost nowhere. They are the 21st century's great taboo, the subjects guaranteed to alienate your friends and neighbours. We live as if trapped inside a Sunday supplement: obsessed with fame, fashion and the three dreary staples of middle-class conversation: recipes, renovations and resorts. Anything but the topic that demands our attention.

Statements of the bleeding obvious, the outcomes of basic arithmetic, are treated as exotic and unpardonable distractions, while the impossible proposition by which we live is regarded as so sane and normal and unremarkable that it isn't worthy of mention. That's how you measure the depth of this problem: by our inability even to discuss it.

"

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[I had to resort to formatting that was not intended, otherwise the output was garbled, so please ignore unusual formatting conventions.]

You will have to excuse me if I am a bit clued out. I have not written any essay, nor have I read any. There are so many to read that my time will not permit to even start. But I felt compelled to enter this post after reading many (well, it seemed like...

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[I had to resort to formatting that was not intended, otherwise the output was garbled, so please ignore unusual formatting conventions.]

You will have to excuse me if I am a bit clued out. I have not written any essay, nor have I read any. There are so many to read that my time will not permit to even start. But I felt compelled to enter this post after reading many (well, it seemed like many) comments on this blog topic. Not that I thought I had better ideas, but rather that I thought what I am now going to say may improve the ideas of others. So this is how it goes:

Whenever you have a question that says How the answer to that has to contain the implied (or explicit) intent of what you are trying to accomplish. I realize that the FQXi question may have been intentionally left vague (open) in that regard, to elicit a wide variety of intents and values. And that is OK. But then I thought that there might be a value that most, if not all, readers could endorse. And that is, ensuring a permanent and infinite survival of humanity. It is a tall order, and we are not up to the task of defining this with any amount of precision. But there are certain generalities that are likely to obtain for a very long time (if not forever). One is that we need to apply science to every aspect of life, and decisions cannot be made on faith (nor based on intuition). That would be the long-term view.

Apart from that, for a much shorter view, we need to balance immediate needs (say, energy) with slightly longer needs (say, environment). There is a right balance, and neither politicians nor billionaires (yes, that Samuel Clemens admonishment applies equally to billionaires, of all things) are smart enough to find that balance. But scientists are, under the right circumstances. In some cases or for some problems not any one of them (there can be exceptions), but a sufficiently large and sufficiently expert group of them might be. The risk under such group circumstances is that personalities and politics will dominate, and prevail over what otherwise could have been a wise consensus, so safeguards against that have to be built in. But it is really only the scientific community that can observe nature, figure out how the aspect they are investigating works, and devise an optimal way to deal with the challenge at hand. It may fail at times, so we will have to go back to the drawing board and figure it out. The only faith I hold is that we can do it. But it is more than hope.

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Dear Brendan,

Community and public voting being over and resulting in two different pre-taxonomies (preliminary evaluations) of our 153 essays,

perhaps it would be useful and ethically correct to evaluate these two methods of evaluation. Both are forms of “wisdom of crowds”

- an external crowd, in principle unlimited and unregulated; in practice relatives, friends,...

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Dear Brendan,

Community and public voting being over and resulting in two different pre-taxonomies (preliminary evaluations) of our 153 essays,

perhaps it would be useful and ethically correct to evaluate these two methods of evaluation. Both are forms of “wisdom of crowds”

- an external crowd, in principle unlimited and unregulated; in practice relatives, friends, supporters, personal enemies of the participants plus the usual e-mob from nice people to sadistic trolls-and e-bravos

- the internal crowd of participants who get the possibility to evaluate their peers’ opuses

In an ideal world this is fine and promotes meritocracy.

In our real world- realism is enhanced by the Prizes, money- I dare to think we have to analyze the results. From practical reasons I think first we could take a look to the extremes- say 3 essays judged as the very best vs. the 3 worst essays – verdicts of public and of the community.

I want to emphasize that based both on my research and life (including politics!) I have a very negative enthusiasm for the

Wisdom of Crowds and I have criticized repeatedly Surowiecki’s book- illo tempore. In the shortest formulation, one of my Septoes

http://egooutpeters.blogspot.ro/2012/06/100-septoes.h
tml says:

15. Wisdom of crowds lies in their diversity. Not more, not less and it is not fair to oppose Experts who are not replaceable with a populist slogan in action .In overly complex, intractable and not predictable situations, both the experts and the crowds do the same stupid things as mixing dissimilar or incompatible things, ideas and abusing of false analogies, logical fallacies combined.

PUBLIC VOTING:

The 3 ‘very best’ essays are:

Higgs Field and Quantum Gravity by George Rajna

Public rating 8.6 – 252 (!) votes vs. community rating only 3.2 by only 12 votes- can we apply democracy here- majority always right?

Actually it is a pure physics paper and I don’t see how the uber-popular Higgs Boson and the Graviton are related to the Subject of the essays. Strange situation.

Open Peer Review to Save the World by Philip Gibbs

Both the public (8.4 from 34 ratings) and the community (53 ratings) seem to like the idea: yes, classic peer review is flawed. So is democracy and marriage too- however I hope you will agree, nothing better was invented! The author masterfully shows the features of the problem. As regarding the solution it is like having a hole in the bottom of the ship where water flows in, and you make a second hole nearby for letting water to flow out. It does not! We see what has done the Internet with its genuinely open peer review: amateurs will discuss aggressively with experts, science smatterers will judge scientific papers, technology illiterates will release expert opinions. Open peer review, open to WHOM? As a constant reader of Scientometrics I dare to tell that open peer review will not save anything. Mainstream science is still using peer review with success- and troubles, but will not accept to open it.

LIVING IN THE SHADOWS OF THE SUN: REALITIES, PERILS ESCAPADES MAN, PLANET AND KARDASHEV SCALE. MAKING THE GREAT TRANSITION by Michael Muteru

Also a more unanimously appreciated paper: public rating: 7.4 (10 ratings) community rating: 4.9 (12 ratings)

Clearly a good, smart, multi-cultural (it is about scientific cultures) paper well written that has to be compared with other similarly good papers. My unique objection- too much emphasis on solar energy that makes great progress but cannot solve the global energy problem.

The worst papers:

Our Fictions and the practicable Way out by David Levan

Community Rating: 4.2 (6 ratings) Public Rating: 1.3 (3 ratings)

Symptomatically few ratings, who knows why? The negative catch-phrase in the Abstracts: “substantially reduce their food consumption”? Most simple explanation, the author has no friends around.

“Our illusions”- good classification. It happens- an other solar energy lover- see please the former essay. Summa summarum. a quite decent essay

The Arrow of Time by Andrej Rehak

Public rating: 1.3 (4 ratings), community rating: 4.9 (15 ratings)

Perhaps Time is not a popular subject. More than trying to change the “paradigm of linear notion of past, present future” we, poor mortals want plenty of time. If possible kairos not just chronos. It seems this author has offended a sacred cow.

About the possibility to solve the main problems of theoretical physics by Murat Asgatovich Gaisin

Public Rating: 1.0 (3 ratings), community Rating: 4.7 (13 ratings)

I like this because it is about high level problem solving, however it is restricted to the main problems of physics. We also need solutions for biology, psychology, sociology and technologies. - all in global sense and full diversity all these being necessary in order to steer the future.

COMMUNITY VOTING

The 3 best papers

Not surprisingly, two of these are about metaknowledge and education, indeed we need to be much smarter in order to be able to steer ourselves toward a bright future. Education (to teach people to cope with any situation) is both the way and the vademecum to the desired future, but it has to be supported by and associated with actions as technological progress and by avoiding the deadly perils of counter-education as systemic dumbing down by fanship see: http://egooutpeters.blogspot.ro/2011/07/dirtiest-f-word.html


Undeniable, as an other Septoe says: The 21st Century is the 12th, resurrected. Education is necessary but not sufficient.

I have stated – in my essay, the inexorable principle of the priority of the negative- in this case counter-education is so harmful that the first task is removing anti-intellectualism, celebrity cult, fundamentalisms and the similar destructive memeplexes- education will be able to prepare the future only combined with these actions. Do not forget: proper education is not only for elites.

To Steer Well We Need to See Clearly: the Need for a Worldwide Futurocentric Education Initiative by Marc Séguin

Community Rating: 6.5 (31 ratings), public Rating: 3.8 (9 ratings)

IQ > 180 essay, the Futurocentric Curriculum is a treasure. It would be fine to add advices how to explicitly help education to climb much higher on the DIKWP scale (data-information-knowledge- wisdom- prediction).

How to avoid steering blindly: The case for a robust repository of human knowledge by Jens C. Niemeyer

Community rating: 6.5 (36 ratings), public rating: 2.6 (13 ratings)

This essay describes a very necessary action- the creation of a modern equivalent of Borges\s Infinite Library. Is this really a problem? Or the formidable development of the World Wide Web

the fast and reliable development of information storage makes it

possible and somewhat natural? Or is not sufficiently robust? Again, I think we have to focus on the DIKWP scale. The most important thing we have to learn from the past is how to not repeat

errors and how to not make, new ones even greater ones. Errorology has to be taught in schools.

Societal Path Integral by Douglas Alexander Singleton

Admirable creative bisociation between the quantum path and our societal paths. A great idea, fundamental physics used for a fundamental problem. For me it is easier to admire it than to understand how it can be applied in the real world.

The worst papers:

Light Without Energy by John-Erik Persson

Community rating: 3.7 (11 ratings) public Rating: 2.7 (10 ratings)

This essay is about relativity. Quantum theory of light and tries to convince us that the ether exists and is quite special. Fine but not relevant for this contest.

The Spiritual Big Bang: Origin of Universe by Damon Joseph Sprock

Community rating: 2.9 (9 ratings), public rating: 3.8 (5 ratings)

From the start of the abstract: “Humanity cannot steer the future without understanding our origin and how God consciousness has a quantum connection to human consciousness via the subconscious mind hologram, giving humanity all preexisting potential originating from Spiritual DNA” it is obvious that the author mixes immiscible and incompatible things. Or- mea culpa! I do not understand them.

Higgs Field and Quantum Gravity by George Rajna

Community rating: 3.2 (12 ratings) public Rating: 8.6 (252 ratings)

The great star of public rating! No more comments on this.

Raw conclusions: public rating not fair, community rating better

however more correlation factors have to be calculated.

For example a strong correlation between the rating and the number of ratings would suggest that the ratings are quasi-random and not very honest and objective. Only rating by professionals can distinguish between good and excellent essays.

Peter Gluck

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FQXi Contest 2012-2014: general conclusions.

Extremely hot topic of the Contest FQXi Essay 2014 "How Should Humanity Steer the Future?" gives the chance to sum up the results of Cotests 2012-2014 and discussions in which I took part.

Today is a very serious time for Humanity. 100 years passed since the beginning of the 1st World war. 75 years passed since the beginning of...

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FQXi Contest 2012-2014: general conclusions.

Extremely hot topic of the Contest FQXi Essay 2014 "How Should Humanity Steer the Future?" gives the chance to sum up the results of Cotests 2012-2014 and discussions in which I took part.

Today is a very serious time for Humanity. 100 years passed since the beginning of the 1st World war. 75 years passed since the beginning of the 2nd World war. For the period of "Cold war" 1946-1991 occurred 108 local wars and the military conflicts. For the last 23 years - 23 wars and the conflict. In 1962 the Mankind endured "Caribbean Crisis". Here is a message to start a new Cold war .

The world and Humanity is again on the verge of a split that could lead to nuclear war, "nuclear winter", death of humanity and all life on Earth. Homo ludens again prepares the "big game", as Homo sapiens sapiens was asleep again. Humanity must remember today all earthlings killed in all the wars in history.

In basic science "crisis of representation and interpretation" (T.Romanovskaya), "crisis of understanding" (K.Kopeykin).

FQXi Essay Contest 2014 gives the chance to answer a question immemorial and especially actual today: "What to do?"

I. Global security. Creation of new Global System of Existential security on the new principles, overcoming of the closed block mentality XVI-XX centuries. Restart the UN from "UN 2.0" to "3.0 UN.". Revitalization of the UN towards global nuclear disarmament, national cultures, international cooperation and public diplomacy. Creation of the World Programme of joint exploration of outer space and the World Ocean. Introduction of Esperanto as the official language of the UN and the international language. Relocation of the UN headquarters in Iceland. Deepening of democracy, conscious transition from "Democracy 2.0" to "Democracy 3.0" - democracy of the Information age. Creation of system of global existential taboos. I completely agree with Flavio Mercati "U-turn or u die".

II. Science. Refouding of Knowledge. The transition from "Paradigm parts" ("paradigm segment") to integrative paradigm ("over generalizing") - "The whole paradigm" ("The Great Paradigm"). New return to the sources and primordial senses: logos-topos-ontos-eidos-ethos-nomos, "grasp" primordial structure of space, understanding the nature of time and information. Ontological (structural, cosmic) memory - core, the semantic attractor of the new conceptual structure of the Universum. Creation of the "general framework structure"(D.Gross, an interview "What is in the space-time") establishes ontological foundation, framework and carcass of knowledge. Creation of a new eidos of the Universum ("Sky eidos"), new scientific picture of the world of the Information age in the spirit of the great philosophers of the 20th century Pierre Teilhard de Chardin and Edmund Husserl, which will include the limit meanings of the "LifeWorld" and Human: «The true physics is that which will, one day, achieve the inclusion of man in his wholeness in a coherent picture of the world." Overcoming the semantically poor picture of the world based on the hypothesis "In the Beginning was Big Bang ..." and the transition to the picture of the world on the basis of ontological Superaxiom "In the Beginning was Logos ..." ("Metalaw," «Universal law». «The law of laws", "Law sky"). Conscious transition from "Closed science" to "Open Science" with open competitive basis and principles aimed at accelerating the development of knowledge.

III. Education. The transition from the medieval closed system of education to the creative open education system of the Information age, forming an open ethical personality. Introduction of the principle of historicity in fundamental education. Philosophy and Ethics should be basic disciplines in the education system. I support the great idea of «the Worldwide Futurocentric Education Initiative» by Marc Séguin.

IV. Economy. Transition from an economy of existential chaos, opposing Nature to the Ethical Eco-Economy, that saves the environment and people.

V. Europe - peace outpost. Creation of a New European Security System on new existential principles, promotion and development of the idea of "Greater Europe" as a "union of the peoples"(E.Kant) from the Azores in the west to the east of the Diomede Islands.

John Wheeler and Henry David Thoreau left all Earthlings good covenants to more reliably steer the Future: "Philosophy is too important to be left to the philosophers". "It is by a mathematical point only that we are wise, as the sailor or the fugitive slave keeps the polestar in his eye; but that is sufficient guidance for all our life. We may not arrive at our port within a calculable period, but we would preserve the true course."

We need a Big Dream and Great Common Cause for reliable steer the Future, to save Peace, Nature and Humanity. Great Dream always go alond with Freedom without fear, Hope, Love, Justice.

Philosophy is very good and faithful navigator on the way. New "Generation SkyPe» says all Humanity: "We start the path...".

I thank all contestants, FQXI's team and Contest Partners for the opportunity to participate in the Contests.

Sincerely,

Vladimir Rogozhin

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Dear Lorraine, Eckard, John and all the contestants,

This week I read an important document Pugwash and two articles: «Hiroshima Declaration of the Pugwash Council», «Dünyanin direksiyonunda kimse yok..»/«The wheel of the world doesn't have anybody» and «Indications...»...

The first stage of the Contest FQXi "How Should Humanity Steer the Future?" completed. But all...

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Dear Lorraine, Eckard, John and all the contestants,

This week I read an important document Pugwash and two articles: «Hiroshima Declaration of the Pugwash Council», «Dünyanin direksiyonunda kimse yok..»/«The wheel of the world doesn't have anybody» and «Indications...»...

The first stage of the Contest FQXi "How Should Humanity Steer the Future?" completed. But all global existential risks for Humanity only increased. The main danger for Humanity, created by man - weapons of mass destruction and nuclear war.

2014 is a year centuries since the First World War beginning, this 75-year anniversary since the beginning of the Second World War. Humanity split again. The Earth is becoming more like a spaceship without a rudder in the Ocean-space. The Information revolution has a chance to Humanity, to all people of the Earth be heard. All people of the world can hear the voice of the Earth. 59 years ago was published The Russell-Einstein Manifesto. The world for these years very strongly changed, but danger of nuclear war remains.

This week I wrote a letter to the Russian Pugwash Committee to initiate a convening of the Extraordinary Congress of the Pugwash movement of scientists and creation of the new manifesto - "Manifesto of peace for the XXI Century". This manifesto, which should be open for signature by all the people of Earth. It is open to ideas and to sign the manifesto has a deep and comprehensive synergistic effect. Scientists of the world, all people of the Earth must act today more actively. There are all possibilities. Now there are already many organizations and people who need to act jointly. Many participants in the Contest FQXi, which represent these important organizations for the world.

And what is your opinions on the idea of "The Open Manifesto of peace for the XXI century"? It may be necessary to create a special FQXi blog?

Sincerely,

Vladimir Rogozhin

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Eckard,

Sorry, of course "I am a simple engineer too". GOOGLE not yet captures all the freedom of the Russian language. Perhaps once international contest will in Esperanto.

Yes, I saw the inscription in Danish only now. Ibid in English: «This song is dedicated to all victims of human rights violations worldwide» Lovely, deep song. It gives hope for a more just world for new...

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Eckard,

Sorry, of course "I am a simple engineer too". GOOGLE not yet captures all the freedom of the Russian language. Perhaps once international contest will in Esperanto.

Yes, I saw the inscription in Danish only now. Ibid in English: «This song is dedicated to all victims of human rights violations worldwide» Lovely, deep song. It gives hope for a more just world for new generations of earthlings.

Yes, indeed, Eckard, history of XX century and our historical memory makes us take a new look at the present and future of mankind. You wrote the beautiful words: «Germany and Russia had and will now hopefully continue to have close relationships.»

Yes, Eckard, our people need as much as possible to make large and small joint projects to promote peace throughout the world. We, the common people, must and can help governments to build a new larger Europe, as bequeathed Immanuel Kant - "union of peoples» This will be the most extensive public diplomacy in action.

In 1968 I was a student of diplomacy program in Germany. I remember how we, together with our German friends were singing: «Sag mir, wo du stehst und welchen Weg du gehst?» ... In the new structure of the Universum of the Information era concepts "topos" and "path" one of the main. It's time - time for the nations of Germany and Russia to start a new path. The past, the memory of the XX century have very strongly «pushes me forward":

Tired in my way I asked the destiny:

"Who pushes me in my back so ruthlessly?" -

"Look back!" - I look - and the complaint ceases:

It is my past who pushes me forward.

(Rabindranath Tagore)

I hope that the new generation will make a "great turn" and start the new path.... Otherwise, who will help us, if we do not help ourselves? Extraterrestrial intelligence?

As for the "existential taboo" that eg prohibition of nuclear weapons and its complete destruction - I understand it as "existential taboo."

Vladimir

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