If you are aware of an interesting new academic paper (that has been published in a peer-reviewed journal or has appeared on the arXiv), a conference talk (at an official professional scientific meeting), an external blog post (by a professional scientist) or a news item (in the mainstream news media), which you think might make an interesting topic for an FQXi blog post, then please contact us at forums@fqxi.org with a link to the original source and a sentence about why you think that the work is worthy of discussion. Please note that we receive many such suggestions and while we endeavour to respond to them, we may not be able to reply to all suggestions.
Please also note that we do not accept unsolicited posts and we cannot review, or open new threads for, unsolicited articles or papers. Requests to review or post such materials will not be answered. If you have your own novel physics theory or model, which you would like to post for further discussion among then FQXi community, then please add them directly to the "Alternative Models of Reality" thread, or to the "Alternative Models of Cosmology" thread. Thank you.
Please also note that we do not accept unsolicited posts and we cannot review, or open new threads for, unsolicited articles or papers. Requests to review or post such materials will not be answered. If you have your own novel physics theory or model, which you would like to post for further discussion among then FQXi community, then please add them directly to the "Alternative Models of Reality" thread, or to the "Alternative Models of Cosmology" thread. Thank you.
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RECENT POSTS IN THIS TOPIC
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Maestas Hicks: on 8/26/18 at 18:31pm UTC, wrote Another great forum you have shared with us and I am so impressed with your...
Laverne Klein: on 5/24/18 at 6:32am UTC, wrote Nice one
jiya joseph: on 4/11/18 at 11:45am UTC, wrote It is the first time I am hearing of the term RFP. What is the meaning of...
Mahetar Hasanbhai: on 3/26/18 at 11:36am UTC, wrote happy diwali Images 2018
icha moet: on 3/13/18 at 0:21am UTC, wrote www.pokerkcm.com www.beruangkutub.com
Lee Bloomquist: on 2/8/18 at 5:34am UTC, wrote Edward Witten, in an interview with WIRED ___...
Mari Moz: on 1/1/18 at 16:45pm UTC, wrote The Benefits Of Dedicated Servers For Businesses Getting the right type of...
sasa sasa: on 12/23/17 at 4:33am UTC, wrote OBAT HERNIA
RECENT FORUM POSTS
Georgina Woodward: "I did that. I just get the David Mermin abstract that you have already..." in Could Consciousness Forge...
Paul Merriam: "just go to https://arxiv.org/abs/1809.01639" in Could Consciousness Forge...
Don Foster: "Hi, I could not find a way to link to second lecture. Would like to follow..." in YouTube Video Lectures:...
Tejinder Singh: "There is likely a deep connection between the study of quantum foundations..." in YouTube Video Lectures:...
Eckard Blumschein: "Georgina, Meanwhile, you and all others careful and honest readers of the..." in Dissolving Quantum...
rosie mary: "I enjoyed the lessons from FQXi Farzad Nekoogar. thank you for sharing! ..." in Multiversal Journeys: The...
tovar linda: "I have ordered your book, it's great! angry birds" in Quickfire Cosmo Qs
rosie mary: "To prove this, this is definitely a difficult job! wuxiaworld" in Is the Past Infinite?
RECENT ARTICLES
click titles to read articles
Could Consciousness Forge the Universe?
Objective reality, and the laws of physics themselves, emerge from our observations, according to a new framework that turns what we think of as fundamental on its head.
Dissolving Quantum Paradoxes
The impossibility of building a perfect clock could help explain away microscale weirdness.
Constructing a Theory of Life
An all-encompassing framework of physics could help to explain the evolution of consciousness, intelligence, and free will.
Usurping Quantum Theory
The search is on for a fundamental framework that allows for even stranger links between particles than quantum theory—which could lead us to a theory of everything.
Fuzzballs v Black Holes
A radical theory replaces the cosmic crunchers with fuzzy quantum spheres, potentially solving the black-hole information paradox and explaining away the Big Bang and the origin of time.
FQXi BLOGS
January 22, 2019
Our mission at FQXi has always been to push boundaries, and to try to focus attention and effort of the scientific community on (what we consider to be) super-interesting areas of research that for one reason or another have gone less explored than they deserve. A new program, a joint venture with the Fetzer Franklin Fund, is no exception. Following on the heels of The Physics of the Observer, our latest program looks at the intersections between physics, information theory, biology, artificial intelligence, neuroscience, and other fields to address the question: How does Agency arise in the physical world?
How is it that some physical systems “choose” one future or the other based on internal goals or desires? As explored in our previous essay contest, Wandering Toward a Goal, explanation in terms of goals directly contradicts the standard fundamental physics description of the world as the evolution of initial data by equations of motion. But it is very clearly much more effective and efficient for some systems, especially those that are alive. How does this type of explanation co-exist with the evolving "state explanation”?
The Physics of Information program and the Physics of the Observer program brought out some hidden aspects and layers to our description of the world: that in some systems information is a key causal agent, rather than mass, force, and so on. And even in the most fundamental physics, the observer – an agent that can interact with a system and obtain information about it – cannot generally be excised from consideration. If we now ask how systems can learn, think, and act back on the physical world, we come to agency. What role do information, intelligence, emergence, inference, statistical mechanics, and hierarchy play? The new program will dive in.
After announcing the Agency in the Physical World program and launching our co-themed essay contest What Is Fundamental?, it is now time to announce our Large Grant RFP.
Our Large Grant round will award about $1.2M to researchers in academic and other nonprofit institutions for projects up to two years, starting August 2018. The mechanics of the grant application process follow FQXi’s standard routine. We invite all interested parties to submit a brief initial application via our website (now open). Initial applications are due February 1, 2018.
A team of reviewers will select finalists from this initial pool. Those selected will be invited to prepare a full-length proposal, to be submitted in early June. We will announce awards based on these full proposals in early August.
You can read the full details on the RFP site or download the RFP pdf announcement.
report post as inappropriate
How is it that some physical systems “choose” one future or the other based on internal goals or desires? As explored in our previous essay contest, Wandering Toward a Goal, explanation in terms of goals directly contradicts the standard fundamental physics description of the world as the evolution of initial data by equations of motion. But it is very clearly much more effective and efficient for some systems, especially those that are alive. How does this type of explanation co-exist with the evolving "state explanation”?
The Physics of Information program and the Physics of the Observer program brought out some hidden aspects and layers to our description of the world: that in some systems information is a key causal agent, rather than mass, force, and so on. And even in the most fundamental physics, the observer – an agent that can interact with a system and obtain information about it – cannot generally be excised from consideration. If we now ask how systems can learn, think, and act back on the physical world, we come to agency. What role do information, intelligence, emergence, inference, statistical mechanics, and hierarchy play? The new program will dive in.
After announcing the Agency in the Physical World program and launching our co-themed essay contest What Is Fundamental?, it is now time to announce our Large Grant RFP.
Our Large Grant round will award about $1.2M to researchers in academic and other nonprofit institutions for projects up to two years, starting August 2018. The mechanics of the grant application process follow FQXi’s standard routine. We invite all interested parties to submit a brief initial application via our website (now open). Initial applications are due February 1, 2018.
A team of reviewers will select finalists from this initial pool. Those selected will be invited to prepare a full-length proposal, to be submitted in early June. We will announce awards based on these full proposals in early August.
You can read the full details on the RFP site or download the RFP pdf announcement.
Dear Anthony Aguirre,
The mission of the Foundational Questions Institute is supposedly: “To catalyze, support, and disseminate research on questions at the foundations of physics and cosmology, particularly new frontiers and innovative ideas integral to a deep understanding of reality but unlikely to be supported by conventional funding sources.”
My ORCID ID 0000-0003-3988-8687. Unaffiliated. My research has determined the following: The real earth had a real visible surface for over a million years before any English language fluent person ever appeared on that real surface. It logically follows that Natural reality has nothing whatsoever to do with : “standard fundamental physics description of the world…”
The real visible Universe consists of only one single unified visible infinite surface occurring eternally in one single infinite dimension that am eternally illuminated by finite non-surface light.
My essay REALITY AM NOT ROCKET SCIENCE was submitted to FQXi.org on November 10th, 2017. I offered proof in the essay that my research am valid. Why have no essays for the ‘What is Fundamental?’ been published on line?
Joe Fisher, ORCID ID 0000-0003-3988-8687. Unaffiliated
report post as inappropriate
The mission of the Foundational Questions Institute is supposedly: “To catalyze, support, and disseminate research on questions at the foundations of physics and cosmology, particularly new frontiers and innovative ideas integral to a deep understanding of reality but unlikely to be supported by conventional funding sources.”
My ORCID ID 0000-0003-3988-8687. Unaffiliated. My research has determined the following: The real earth had a real visible surface for over a million years before any English language fluent person ever appeared on that real surface. It logically follows that Natural reality has nothing whatsoever to do with : “standard fundamental physics description of the world…”
The real visible Universe consists of only one single unified visible infinite surface occurring eternally in one single infinite dimension that am eternally illuminated by finite non-surface light.
My essay REALITY AM NOT ROCKET SCIENCE was submitted to FQXi.org on November 10th, 2017. I offered proof in the essay that my research am valid. Why have no essays for the ‘What is Fundamental?’ been published on line?
Joe Fisher, ORCID ID 0000-0003-3988-8687. Unaffiliated
Hey! Tony!
Take a look at all the bots that keep cropping up on 'Recent Forum Posts' and go back a few months and look at the pattern. Then Go To Redken and Pureology (at) Sheffield, U.K. and put a damned block on that cyber threat. I can and will call the RCMP down on Perimeter and pull in the U.S. IRS if you career climbers at FQXi don't start doing what you are being paid for. You are hosting a bunch of cranks. jrc
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Take a look at all the bots that keep cropping up on 'Recent Forum Posts' and go back a few months and look at the pattern. Then Go To Redken and Pureology (at) Sheffield, U.K. and put a damned block on that cyber threat. I can and will call the RCMP down on Perimeter and pull in the U.S. IRS if you career climbers at FQXi don't start doing what you are being paid for. You are hosting a bunch of cranks. jrc
Dear John R Cox
Please make a better effort to stay on topic. We are supposed to be commenting on the fundamentals of physics.
Joe Fisher, Realist
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Please make a better effort to stay on topic. We are supposed to be commenting on the fundamentals of physics.
Joe Fisher, Realist
Kinda difficult to comment on fundamental physics when the Recent Posts list is full of robot techtraps. Or do you have to pay your tech guy that fixes your dishwasher to tell you that?
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Edward Witten, in an interview with WIRED ___ https://www.wired.com/story/a-physicists-physicist-ponders-t
he-nature-of-reality/ ____ said "It from qubit" in natural language.
But a computer scientist would know that a software engineer versed in "formal specification languages"-- which are abstract programming tools used to specify what the real time programmers in assembly language...
view entire post
he-nature-of-reality/ ____ said "It from qubit" in natural language.
But a computer scientist would know that a software engineer versed in "formal specification languages"-- which are abstract programming tools used to specify what the real time programmers in assembly language...
view entire post
Nice one
this post has been edited by the author since its original submission
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