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Measuring Free Will: Ian Durham at the 6th FQXi Meeting
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Blogger Ian Durham wrote on Aug. 14, 2019 @ 19:08 GMT
It feels a bit odd blogging about myself, but here goes...
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The author at the 6th FQXi Meeting |
For most of the history of modern science the debate over free will has been largely left to the realm of philosophy. Indeed, the debate is as old as philosophy itself. But, increasingly, free will has gained in importance in certain areas of science. For example in quantum mechanical tests of Bell’s inequalities, it is assumed that the “choices” made regarding the settings on the measurement devices are “freely” made by whatever is operating those devices (FQXi member Nathan Argaman argues that this is merely freedom in the variables themselves, but this is a debatable point). This led mathematicians John Conway and Simon Kochen to develop a
free will theorem that posits that if we have free will, then, subject to certain assumptions, so do elementary particles. Specifically they take free will in this context to be the fact that our choices do not depend on the past. Their theorem is often interpreted as showing that science is incompatible with determinism.
Nobel laureate physicist and FQXi member Gerard ‘t Hooft disagrees with this sentiment. In his view, the “choices” in a Bell test are ultimately determined from the entire history of the universe up until the point at which the choice is ultimately made. This is sometimes referred to as
superdeterminism. FQXi member Anton Zeilinger strongly opposes this view as antithetical to the entire scientific enterprise as he sees it as undermining falsifiability.
What is notable about both these views is that neither is particularly favorable toward free will as a concept. While Conway and Kochen certainly argue against determinism, by concluding that elementary particles must have free will if we do, it seems as if they are, through the apparent absurdity of that conclusion, arguing against free will.
This debate is far from purely academic. The modern legal system in many countries assumes that human beings have some level of free will while modern science seems to be pushing back on this assumption. Understanding the actions of our fellow humans entails a better understanding of consciousness and, by extension, free will. The fact is, whether or not we actually have free will, we behave as if we do. But what are the characteristics of this behavior? What does it mean to have (or behave as if we have) free will and can we quantify it?
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What is free will? |
This is a question that I addressed at the recent FQXi conference in Tuscany.
Free Podcast
Measuring Free Will. To what degree are our choices really free, rather than determined? And how much control do we have over them? Quantum physicist Ian Durham presents a new mathematical model for free will. From the 6th FQXi Meeting, in Tuscany.

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I began with a simple example. Suppose that I open my refrigerator in order to have a snack and am presented with the option of having either carrots or peppers. What would it mean from a behavioral standpoint for either choice to be seen as being “free”? In other words, what do we really mean when we say a choice is “free”?
For one thing, we need to have the confidence that whatever choice we make, that choice needs to have a high probability of actually occurring. That is, suppose that I choose to have a carrot. For that choice to really be free I need to have the confidence that at some point between making the choice and actually eating the carrot, it doesn’t spontaneously turn into a pepper or a potato or a chair.
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What are we actually doing when we choose, say, between carrots and peppers from a refrigerator? |
If the latter happened with any regularity, we would simply throw up our hands and stop making choices altogether because we could never be certain of the outcomes. Choices could just as easily be made by throwing darts at a wall. Outcomes would be completely random regardless of what we thought we chose. This is not free will. As philosopher Robert Nozik pointed out, “An action’s being non-determined is not sufficient for it to be free–it might just be a random act.”
This also suggests that we weigh our options against one another. Again, if we didn’t, we could accomplish the same thing by throwing darts at a wall. This, in turn, suggests that the options we didn’t choose generally don’t change once we’ve made our choice (and started to act on it) either. Again, if it routinely did, we would simply give up in frustration.
None of this necessarily means that our choices are about fitness. I may simply “be in the mood” for carrots rather than thinking that carrots are somehow a more optimal choice than peppers at the time. But the point is that I have the time and ability to think about them. That is, I have “read” them into my memory and then contemplated them. In order to do so, however, the number of all possible choices must be processed in a finite amount of time or we have to consciously eliminate some without really processing them.
In order to quantify all of this in some way, we nevertheless need to recognize the fact that, at the most fundamental level, the universe is random. Whether or not we actually have free will, it is clear that there is a deterministic element to our behavior concerning choices, namely that those choices have a high likelihood of occurrence once chosen. But that level of determination has to arise from something more fundamentally random. How is this possible? A simple example provides a hint.
One of the more popular games at casinos around the world—and one of the oldest games of chance known—is the game of craps. The game of craps is relatively simple. It simply involves rolling a pair of dice and betting on the outcome. But not every outcome of the roll of a pair of dice is equally probable. Anyone who has ever played a board game knows that a roll of 12 (“double boxcars”) or 2 (“snake eyes”) is much less common than other rolls. But why is that?
The roll of each individual die is assumed to be completely random. That is, each number from 1 to 6 is assumed to be equally likely to arise. In fact, to try to ensure this is the case in the long run, casinos paint the dots on their dice rather than use dice whose dots are little holes as is common in most dice. This is to ensure that the center of gravity is as close to the physical center of the die as possible which helps keep the die balanced.
So if each number on a single die is equally likely to occur over the long run, how is it that a roll of 12 or 2 is less common than, say, a roll of 7 (which happens to be the most common)? The answer is that there are more combinations that give a 7 than give a 2 or 12. In fact, there is only one way to roll a 2 or 12—both dice have to be 1 or both dice have to be 6 respectively. But there are six ways to get a 7. So the probability of getting a 7 is higher because there are more configurations that lead to a 7.
While a 7 is more likely than a 2 or a 12, it isn’t that much more likely in the grand scheme of things. Most people have rolled a 2 or a 12 while playing a board game at some point in their lives. We call the number rolled on the pair of dice (between 2 and 12) the macrostate and we call the number rolled on each die individually the microstate. But there are physical systems with macrostates that are overwhelmingly more likely than nearly every other macrostate such that the system almost always ends up in this state. Examples include two-state paramagnets and interacting Einstein solids (I discussed some of these in
a recent FQXi essay). In other words, it would be like having a pair of dice that, despite the individual dice ending up on a random number each roll, the pair would always end up on the same overall roll. This isn’t a strange quantum behavior. It’s simply how combinations work when the number of combinations is very, very large.
The point of all this is to show that it is possible to get a nearly deterministic macrostate from a large collection of entirely random microstates. In fact, in statistical mechanics, this is known as the thermodynamic limit. There is nothing mysterious about it.
How does this help with modeling free will? Let’s go back to the refrigerator again. What am I actually choosing when I choose carrots over peppers? The fact is that the carrots and peppers are in different places in the refrigerator. As such, the act of getting a carrot out of the refrigerator is an entirely different process than the act of getting a pepper. So when we make a choice, we are choosing between two different processes. Each of these processes has a probability distribution such that one macrostate is overwhelmingly more likely than any other—the chance that the act of choosing a carrot leads to eating a pepper is vanishingly small. That is, the variances of the probability distribution for each process is very small. This seems in line with the what we might think of as a “free choice” since it ensures that our choice is very likely to occur.
If all of our choices have probability distributions, we can represent the ensemble of possible choices with what is called a mixed distribution. There are a number of interesting properties of such distributions including something known as the Mahalanobis distance which can be construed as measuring just how distinct a pair of choices is. The Mahalanobis distance between two different carrots is going to be smaller, for example, than the corresponding Mahalanobis distance between a carrot and a pepper since the carrots are more “alike”. One assumes that the freer the choice, the larger the Mahalanobis distances to all the other possible choices.
So one possible measure of “free choice” would be some function (which I call the zeta-function) of the minimum Mahalanobis distance between that choice and any other choice in the ensemble. Likewise it would be proportional to a time function that ensures that the full ensemble of choices can be read into our memory and processed in a finite amount of time. The zeta-function should also be inversely proportional to the variance of the choice (the smaller the variance, the greater the freedom as I just described).
The zeta-function is a measure of the freedom of an individual choice. It is safe to say that sometimes our choices are not free. Many actions in our life are instinctual. But it’s safe to say that if a certain number of our choices are free we might say we have free will. So a measure of free will itself, which I call the Z-function, would be some function of the collection of zeta-functions for all the choices we have.
There are a lot of details that can’t be captured by a blog post or a simple twenty minute talk (a paper is forthcoming). Certainly there are valid criticisms of such a model. But my aim was really to stimulate discussion and hopefully research into formal models of free will as it is becoming increasingly important in science, particularly in areas like quantum foundations and consciousness studies. So one can view this work as me throwing down the gauntlet and challenging the scientific community to start thinking about this in some depth. Hopefully I will have at least succeeded in that.
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FQXi Administrator Zeeya Merali wrote on Aug. 14, 2019 @ 21:56 GMT
This is probably not the most important thing to have taken away from this, but I did not know that little fact about casinos painting the dots on dice.
Saibal Mitra wrote on Aug. 14, 2019 @ 23:07 GMT
Within the MWI one can also address this issue by invoking the fact that our subjective state (everything that we're aware at some instant), doesn't fully specify the exact physical state of our brain. The number of distinct physical brain states is so astronomically large that your mindset and how you are feeling about everything isn't going to be consistent with only one physical brain state. This means that given your subjective state, the physical state of your MWI sector should be described as a very complex superposition involving a large number of brain states that are entangled with the environment.
It's then possible for you to find yourself in a physical state where you really have different choice. While one can attribute that to a lack of knowledge, the "you" as an entity that has a subjective feeling of who you are and what you are experiencing, may only exist as an entangled superposition. A problem within the computational theory of mind is the relevance of counterfactuals. Suppose that a computer running an AI program is generating consciousness. Then the fact that this AI is conscious at any given time is due to the algorithm being run.
But at some moment in time, the physical state of the computer is just transitioning from one particular state to another state. If consciousness is related to the actual physical state of the computer, then replacing the computer by a dumb device that doesn't compute anything, which simply cycles through physical states that the computer would move through given some particular set of inputs, should also be conscious.
This absurd conclusion is hard to avoid, somehow getting counterfactual actions as a response to counterfactual inputs must be relevant, but there is no room to do that within classical physics. But a realistic MWI picture as described above does get around this problem.
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Aug. 15, 2019 @ 01:31 GMT
When oh when will physics stop the utter nonsense about free will: THE PHYSICISTS MODEL OF THE WORLD DOES NOT PERMIT GENUINE FREE WILL. Genuine free will is about a living thing having “the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate” [1].
Apparently, physicists think it is OK to massage the true nature of their model of the world, and redefine determinism as “free will”. Now they have added the laughable concept of “probability distributions”, as if a “probability distribution” ever caused a single actual outcome.
Either the physics model of the world is correct, in which case no free will exists
OR free will exists, in which case the physics model of the world is incorrect. Clearly, the physics model of the world IS incorrect: the physicists view of the world is very badly mistaken.
1. https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/free_will (Oxford dictionary).
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 15, 2019 @ 17:39 GMT
I do not redefine determinism as free will. Actually, my claim is that free will (at least as we seem to experience it) lies somewhere between full determinism and full randomness. But, as I point out in my response to your second comment below, I am actually not attempting to define free will here. I am simply mathematically modeling the behavior we most commonly view as attributable to free will. I am not saying that probability distributions themselves have any causal agency. They are simply a way to model data. That's all I'm doing.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 15:08 GMT
I agree that you personally didn’t try to “redefine determinism as free will”, but a lot of physicists and philosophers
do try to “redefine determinism as free will” (e.g. philosopher Daniel Dennett, who seems to be admired by a lot of physicists).
See my question below.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 17:25 GMT
Yes, many do try to do this. Many also define its exact opposite---indeterminism---as free will. I think both are misguided.
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Aug. 15, 2019 @ 03:05 GMT
The world is burning; environmental catastrophe is looming. But all physics can say is that the laws of nature caused it, or “probability distributions” caused it. According to physics, matter itself (e.g. matter in the form of human beings and other living things) has no power over outcomes: only laws of nature and “probability distributions” have power over outcomes. Is it any wonder that many people have no respect for science?
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FQXi Administrator Zeeya Merali replied on Aug. 15, 2019 @ 17:14 GMT
Hi Lorraine,
I understand your frustration. Many scientists and philosophers would agree that it's tough to come up with a version of libertarian free will that fits with physics. But I think Ian would be the first to agree that environmental catastrophe is looming -- he highlighted the climate change crisis as the biggest issue of 2018 on a
previous edition of the podcast.
I don't think his intention with his model is to explain away our moral responsibility for our actions, so we can all just give up and blame our powerlessness in the face of the laws of nature for climate change.
Whether we can come up with a physical account of free will that can deal with moral accountability, that I don't know. But I think it's reasonable for Ian and others to try and take steps towards framing the puzzles surrounding free will in a mathematical way.
Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 15, 2019 @ 17:36 GMT
Thank you for that comment Zeeya. Yes, I absolutely think the climate crisis is a looming disaster that we are entirely responsible for. In fact I do not actually attempt to explain free will with my model. I am simply mathematically modeling the behavior of free will. My model works regardless of whether or not free will actually exists (I, personally, think it does). Again, I am in no way attempting to absolve anyone of responsibility in this. We are
all responsible through our actions (or lack thereof).
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 11:40 GMT
Hi dear FQXi friends,
Lorraine,what you tell is a reality. I Don't understand the high sphères of power.They must take their responsabilities because they exist these solutions.Here is a global solution in all humility. We must industrialise the solar system in liberating the funds of this world bank.That will catalyse the 197 governements and they shall be able to give water,food,energy,jobs,hopes to majority. On earth we adapt due to climate and others problems and we harmonise the ecosystems on earth on soils and océans with the vegetal multiplication and composting at big global scale.For space too we need these ecosystems.This solution is deterministic,we are obliged to adapt us.We opeouhumanity,this earth to our universe,it's a logic step of evolution,a new era.Economically speaking too it's important to tell that all wins without exception.We are obliged to change,if not we shall add chaotical exponentials.If they didn't exist these solutions,I could understand,but no they exist and are rational,we does not lack norbspace,nor Energy,nor potential.We lack of a real responsible ONU taking its responsabilities.We can do it,we must convice this ONU.Maybe FQXi can create a system,it will be the biggest revolution of all times.We can do it.The hour is serious after all,for us and the next générations.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 15:12 GMT
Hi Zeeya and Ian (and Steve),
Do you agree, or not, that the act of choice/free will (representable as assigning a new number to a variable) can only be represented algorithmically? Equations can’t do it: equations can only ever represent relationships between variables.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 15:38 GMT
Hi Lorraine,
What is this free will,this act of choice,thought? Don't forget that we live in an universe superdeterministic about its laws.So our free wills are correlated,but can they be predicted? all is there about the logic too and how consider the different interprétations due to this free will. When you tell that free will can only be represented algorithmically,it's true in logic,it's limited in fact and even must be ranked.So yes lol I agree not with équations
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 17:30 GMT
Hi Lorraine,
No, I don't think there is only an algorithmic solution. I think an algorithmic model does exactly what you say it does: it represents relationships between variables. What I
do think is that some algorithmic model of the behavior that we commonly call "free will" may be useful in helping us to better understand it and tease out exactly what it is and what it means. I look at my model as simply that. It's a model intended to provoke discussion and further research, specifically in the hard sciences. As a topic free will has often been the domain of philosophy. But I think there is room for a scientific study of it as well and that's what I'm trying to jump start here. But you are absolutely right that equations will never capture everything.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 22:22 GMT
Ian,
I was tired when I wrote the above. I should have added that algorithms can handle situations, but equations can’t. E.g.:
IF (the recipe calls for carrots) AND (I bought carrots at the farmer’s market) AND (carrots are stored in the fridge) AND (I am certain that carrots don’t transmogrify) THEN (New Relative Direction = towards fridge)
The entire world has changed: new information has been added to the world i.e. the New Relative Direction variable has been reset to a new value. This reset of a variable is a top-down cause of a chain of events.
You can’t duplicate what algorithms do with equations, or with the numeric situation that results from equations. And algorithms don’t “emerge” from situations.
What do you say to that?
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 22:29 GMT
P.S.
Also, I note that the equations of physics already contain algorithmic steps e.g. the delta symbol represents algorithmic steps.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 23:07 GMT
Hmm. I'd have to think about that. I think I agree that algorithms can capture some things that equations cannot, but there's also a part of me that says equations are nothing more than short-hand for plain language.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 23:40 GMT
Algorithms represent a different type of thing:
With equations, numeric outcomes are decided by relationships between variables. Equations don’t care about the overall numeric situation.
Algorithms handle numeric situations by analysing the numeric values of multiple variables to arrive at numeric outcomes.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 17, 2019 @ 09:27 GMT
Hi thinkers of free will,
Here is the answer on facebook to cristi Stoica about this free will.
We are limited in fact,we cannot explain with équations or algorythms this free will.The superdeterminism is a reality due to our foundamental équations,that said free will in logic cannot be compute ,too much parameters to consider.The psychology,education,personality are important parameters about the personal choices but they are more than complex….
Have we a mathematical method for all this? no I beleive Simply.We cannot confound AI and free will it seems to me.The real question arriving is so"can an AI have a freewill?
why the choices are foundamental,why a person prefer the color blue to the red for example?if a person can explain this mathematically,so he has encoded all the parameters of evolution of the person perfering this blue,where is this code,why and how it is encoded in brains ? All is there…
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 17, 2019 @ 09:35 GMT
Well,let's go farer and Bell being our friend. How to explain mathematically the personality and psychology,why some understands this universalism and others no,they have chosen to be like that.The same to explain the human comportments like Vanity or the universal love.Is is a question of education and encodings? How to interpret so this education,psychology and their correlated personal comportments? Can we generally or can we only work in surfaces about spherical informations? How are encoded so these informations in function of the psychology,education,encodings and why?
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 17, 2019 @ 09:39 GMT
lol,questions? I have many questions :),
The codes in our particles giving ADN for example are deterministic but the senses and education,psychology encodes in surfaces ,but is encoded farer?
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 18, 2019 @ 09:02 GMT
The works of Lamarck about will and evolution are it seems to me important considering the codes,informations,wills of evolution.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 14:52 GMT
We must act,Fqxi can do it,me alone no.Complementarity is essential.
ONU,USA,CHINA,INDIA,EUROPA,....The world,this globality like it exists is not foundamental and universal and humanity does not accept it in general. The global psychology is correlated and we cannot continue like that.We are governed by a system which is not able to reach the points of equilibrium. Already now with 7,5...
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We must act,Fqxi can do it,me alone no.Complementarity is essential.
ONU,USA,CHINA,INDIA,EUROPA,....The world,this globality like it exists is not foundamental and universal and humanity does not accept it in general. The global psychology is correlated and we cannot continue like that.We are governed by a system which is not able to reach the points of equilibrium. Already now with 7,5 billions of humans we have difficulties,so imagine the future générations.I t's not acceptable for us and these future lifes of this wonderfull planet SphereEarth.If they didn't exist these global solutions where all wins without exception I could understand,but no they exist and we can solve all our global problems.The ecosystems,this climate and adaptation,this industrialisation of our solar system,this liberation of funds,.....It's time to act,ONU please wake up….
The most sad and odd is that these global solutions are a reality.So what is the problem at this ONU and for the leaders of governments? Is it the lack of generality? is it a kind of lack of consciousness?Is it a problem of lack of skillings? is it due to pression and corruptions? is it due to a lack of discussion between these leaders and choice of a global project where all wins?
Lol all we live in this global system like if it was normal and logic, like if it was like that and that's all.But no ,it's not logic,we evolve badly and we have inserted parameters which do not converge with our universal laws. I am repeating,it's not deterministic our actual global reality. We must be all conscious that we can evolve correctly in harmony with these foundamental universal laws.We Don't lack matters,energy,space,and even time considering this evolution. We lack Simply of a global universal concrete governance.If they aren't skillings,so why they work at ONU?This planet must be governed by real universalists,people well and altruist having concrete scientific solutions.If not we shall add the problems and we shall not reach these points of equilibrium.
The most important point is that we just adapt the global system in inserting new concrete universal parameters.The fact that all wins is essential,the richs shall win more and the poors them shall be richer Simply and so shall buy.The entrepreneurial mind being essential with determinism and universalism,so it's relevant to give jobs to this global majority,like water,food,energy,technology too.If we Don't liberate these funds to catalyse these 197 governments and industrialise this solar system,we cannot arrive to solve this Earth and its major main problems
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 11:18 GMT
I will insist until this goal is achieved. The global solution that I explained is deterministic and rational.So what is the problem? we have several roads which explain why people are not conscious of this. Maybe it's just due to fact that all are in their systems accepting this reality like if it was normal and logic,no it's not. Maybe it'due to a lack of consciousness,or due to individualism or Vanity too.It's complex psychologically speaking. If we have these parameters at ONU,we are on a bad boat generally and globally speaking. I don'understand ,I give the solutions and people does not understand. In these conditions we are really on a bad boat if the rational deterministic solutions are not understood in the high sphères of power,governances.How is it possible,at this point? the unconsciousness,vanity,individualism ???? It is odd in fact even if the educated people aren't conscious of this reality.Let's pray so for the future générations and us on earth and its lifes.The problem is so simple and so complex.Vanities of vanities ,all is Vanity in fact Simply.All persuaded and in his system without a global general universal consciousness.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 11:36 GMT
Let's make this deterministic global revolution,there we shall mark this Earth.I am repeating,me alone I cannot.We must create a system to convice this ONU,world bank and all governments.We are obliged to do it,if not,all we shall loose.All without exception. With the MIT FQXi and partners,we can do it,the world is sick and evolves badly,we must act and all universal generalists understand this.If we Don't act,we shall add the chaotical exponentials soon.Is it acceptable? no,we cannot accept that.If people does not understand this,it's sad,really sad and odd.They exist these solutions that I cited.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 3, 2019 @ 15:32 GMT
I am repeating,I am obliged to repeat. this planet and its past have forgotten many universal foundamentals,we have seen and we see still the crazzyness,the unconsciousness,the Vanity,the evil.We are still youngs considering the evolution,and we are obliged to change this planet in inserting these said universal foundmentals.We have created a system which has reached its limits and we cannot accept this knowing that the solutions exist with determinism and an universal altruism correlated.The high sphères of power,this UN must take its responsabilities for the well of all.My solution is very simple generally,we must work all together,all governments in liberating the funds of this world bank,FMI,and industrialise our solar system ,and on earth we harmonise our ecosystems with the vegetal multiplication,the composting at big global scale.And we depollute too our soils and océans.This solution will permit to catalyse the 197 governments and they shall be able to give Jobs ,water,food,energy,technology,hopes to the majority.We are obliged to do it for all lifes.This solar system is an obliged step of evolution,and and important point is that all wins,the richs like the poors,the big societies,like the small enterprises,all wins. It's that or all we loose soon
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Eric Aspling wrote on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 00:44 GMT
Professor Durham,
Your talk and related blog were very fascinating. I enjoyed them very much. I have some "novice" cautions that I am curious to know your thoughts on:
Time certainly can't be treated like an independent variable. It's not so obvious with the carrot/pepper example (though valid). However, the decision to charge a burning car to save a life is directly tied to time as...
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Professor Durham,
Your talk and related blog were very fascinating. I enjoyed them very much. I have some "novice" cautions that I am curious to know your thoughts on:
Time certainly can't be treated like an independent variable. It's not so obvious with the carrot/pepper example (though valid). However, the decision to charge a burning car to save a life is directly tied to time as it passes. At one time t you may have that option, some t + epsilon later you may not. One might want to talk about the "locality" of the Mahalanobis distance (Md). Maybe, I'm not understanding this Md well enough, but if its simply a measure of how distinct two choices are than that measurement can have properties of its own. There is observably a locality in the carrot/pepper example which I assume is why Md is a good model foundation, but what about a scenario with more quantum. Disclaimer: I acknowledge the waiting until the length of the universe blah blah, this is different though. This would be a butterfly effect issue as opposed to a "my carrot is now a bunny" issue. So, can you ensure locality of the Md regardless of the butterfly effect given the circumstance of quantum uncertainty? If you cannot, is that okay?
Forgive my brutish stubbornness driven by being too inquisitive early in my career, but I don't think we know enough about the thermodynamic limit in regards to the questions at hand. This is again because there is no progress in a direct correlation of temperature mapped to time in Thermodynamics. One should be able to complete all thermodynamics with time as a variable in place of temperature (this is probably already doable on some closed systems). Simply stating time as entropy and entropy as time is clearly incomplete. Our universe utilizes temperature and time in some exclusive partnership that we do not understand yet. At first glance I would think a better understanding of this correlation would help your cause not hurt it but I'm unsure. Seemingly, it could add some restraints that contain locality to the model.
I think the tldr would read something like, "Can you treat time as an independent variable, if you cannot guarantee locality of Md?"
one more thought: In thermodynamics you can choose to hold a variable (depending on it's type) as constant and progress the system with an independent variable. Pathria and Beale have a nice treatment of this when defining variables in the first chapter (I don't have my text on me but I can look into this tomorrow). I wonder if there is a way to make a variable constant and then treat time as independent so that you can continue the model calculation.
Anyways your ideas presented are very thought provoking and for that, thank you.
Eric
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 17:40 GMT
Hi Eric,
Those are some really awesome observations. You are right that the Mahalanobis distance is a temporally fixed quantity. I think I need to flesh out the locality issues in a bit more depth.
Regarding the thermodynamic limit, I think you are partly right about that. We certainly don't understand it enough. I'm not convinced it matters here, but I could be wrong.
I definitely think you have nailed some of the issues with the role that time plays in this and I have been thinking a lot about how to incorporate it into the theory. In the write-up I am working on I took out the inverse-dependence on the time function because some folks at the conference made some similar observations. I just have to figure out how to come up with a clearer model.
Speaking of which, if you have any further ideas or insights, feel free to drop me an e-mail. One of my goals in this work is the stimulate further work by people other than myself. Basically I'm trying to get the scientific community to think about free will in a different way.
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Steve Dufourny wrote on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 11:19 GMT
Hello Professor Durham,
Thanks for sharing,this article is a pleasure to read and your interprétations of free will too. I d like share a thought,general,here is the idea.
We have this general relativity considering this gravitation like a curvature of our spacetime due to mass.It's not really a force for this GR which has been recognised like correct.The newtonian mechanics correct...
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Hello Professor Durham,
Thanks for sharing,this article is a pleasure to read and your interprétations of free will too. I d like share a thought,general,here is the idea.
We have this general relativity considering this gravitation like a curvature of our spacetime due to mass.It's not really a force for this GR which has been recognised like correct.The newtonian mechanics correct too at its scale considering it like an instaneous force between all mass. But we cannot explain this dark Energy,this dark matter,this quantum gravitation.The general relativity is not sufficient and we have problems to explain this DM and quantum gravity in a newtonian reasoning. We must unify this quantum theory and this GR but we cannot with our actual models. Gravitons have been predicted by the strings like particles of quantum gravitation. But we cannot prove because that needs a lot of Energy at LHC to reach the planck scale and this quntum gravitation. I have not considered gravitons in my theory of spherisation,but spherons not bosonic of spin2 in the cold correlated with this DM encoded in nuclei. Dark Energy ,it,is difficult to interpret and GR does not predict it but we can see it instead of a BB,like an anti gravitational push,spherical from our universal central spherical object. DM ,DE need to be inserted,superimposed to our GR and Standard model to explain,reach these unknowns,the DM,DE,quantum gravitation.How to consider the actions? tensors? spinors?vectors,Scalars?
Verlinde is a relevant general thinker but I Don't agree with some of his ideas. The MONDs for example modifying this newtonian mechanics instead of DM to explain the motions of galaxies.His other idea is about the quantum gravity like entropical.Maybe still the fact to not consider this matter non baryonic at cosmological and quantum scales is an error. Others attempts,assumptions,essays have been formalised but they cannot quantize this quantum gravitation and unify G c and h.Here are a small list, the strings,branes,Mtheory and these gravitons and ADs CFT correspondance.The twistors of Penrose,the loop quantum gravity,the non commutativity of Connes,the E8 lie exceptional group,.....All are beautiful essays but cannot explain this quantum gravitation and unify the scales and explain DM,and DE.
Friendly,regards
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 17, 2019 @ 11:02 GMT
Professor Durham,
sorry ,it's not about your mathematical free will,but I d like to have your point of vue about this quantum gravitation.
Here are still reasoning correlated.
This Dark matter probably has a mechanism at quantum and cosmological scales. We have in logic annihilation of this matter giving particles and antiparticles,but how at this cosmological scale?
This implies that so they are bosons if they are encoded in nuclei,of SPIN 2 so like this quantum gravitation.
Now let's imagine that this matter is correlated with the cold and permits to balance these two scales about heat.Like if gravitation balanced electromagnetism,like the cold balances the heat.
That implies that we have a kind of standard model encircled,balanced with this entropical cold gravitation.The same for our cosmological scale.
Now we arrive at a paradox about this gravitation.This force is the weakest quantum force,but too the strongest if we insert a serie of quantum BHs farer than our nuclear forces and its quarks,gluons.
Like Simply our cosmological scale and its DM and BHs supermassive. This can explain our quantum gravitation,bosonically speaking more this serie of quantum BHs.
Regards
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 17, 2019 @ 13:48 GMT
hope my equation can be proved,experimented.It's intuitive about this dark matter encoded.So I have Simply added to E=mc².That gives E=mc²+X l² ,X is a parameter unknown that I consider correlated with the cold and l is the linear Velocity of particles of DM.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 19, 2019 @ 09:25 GMT
Lie groups, there are SU(N),SO(N),Sp(N), and the exceptional G_2, F_4, E_6, E_7, and E_8.
About Lie groups,it's Indeed a wonderful tool for the ranking and fractalisation. That said ,I have suggested to Klee Irwin to consider these finite serie of sphères with cold and heat instead of points and strings.The distribution between the zero absolute and the planck temperature due to codes Inside these finite series of this gravitational aether can give relevant resulsts it seems to me humbly.
Imagine the combinations,infinite if we insert the volumes,surfaces,densities,senses of rotations,oscillations,.....We have a concrete general road to rank and explain all our forces,mass,energy transformations,encodings…..synchroniztions,superimposings
, sortings appear with the good mathematical methods.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 20, 2019 @ 09:15 GMT
Here is a wonderful paper of Joy Christian published today.
https://arxiv.org/pdf/1908.06172.pdf
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 20, 2019 @ 09:53 GMT
See the geometrical products and isomorphisms to R,C and H.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 20, 2019 @ 10:11 GMT
I am not against these strings,just that I Don't consider them like foundamental objects at this planck scale and too I Don't consider cosmic strings,and a 1D main field implying our topologies,geometries,properties of matters. I consider codes in our particles giving our properties.It's an enormous difference philosophically speaking,that is why I consider a coded gravitational aether instead of this fashion of strings,fields,waves.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 21, 2019 @ 13:53 GMT
Roger Penrose published 25/04/19 About this quantum gravitation,GR and BEC.To read ,really he is very relevant.Probably one of the best on this planet.There are too like writers of this paper,Ivette Fuentes and Richard Howl.
https://arxiv.org/pdf/1812.04630.pdf
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 27, 2019 @ 09:48 GMT
E=mc²+Xl²...This Dark Matter is a new road of revolution for our physics.My equation considering the encodings of this matter in nuclei is E=mc²+Xl². We have more Energy that we imaginated.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 4, 2019 @ 08:03 GMT
It's a very difficult,complex puzzle. The Works of verlinde merits the respect ,that said I Don't consider this modification of our newtonian mechanics,I prefer this DM balancing all this. Maybe and it's hypothetical that this matter is in the cold permitting to blance this thermo and electromagnetism. I have thought about these neutrinos,fermions of charges 0 and spin 1/2(Ve,mu and tau) but it seems not sufficient because this matter does not seem to be fermionic. It's not easy all this.Now my second hypothesis is that this matter is too encoded in nuclei and differently with an other mechanism permitting with this cold to balance this standard model.Why not a link with this quantum gravitation even,it's hypothetical but seems relevant to analyse deeper. I beleive that this matter is a new road for our physics ,our general and special relativity are correct, it's just that we need to superimpose new parameters completing our standard model.It's the meaning of my hypothetical intuitive equation E=mc²+Xl² with two unknowns X a parameter correlated with the cold and l their linear Velocity.
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Member Tim Maudlin wrote on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 16:13 GMT
Free will—as a characterization of some human actions—has indeed been discussed by philosophers for millennia. John Locke and David Hume correctly pointed out that there is no incompatibility at all between complete determinism and the existence of "acts of free will". One could have a discussion of their conceptual analysis, but that would really be counterproductive here. Because the main...
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Free will—as a characterization of some human actions—has indeed been discussed by philosophers for millennia. John Locke and David Hume correctly pointed out that there is no incompatibility at all between complete determinism and the existence of "acts of free will". One could have a discussion of their conceptual analysis, but that would really be counterproductive here. Because the main place the words "free will" come up in contemporary physics are in discussions of Bell's Theorem, and there the entire issue of whether humans have free will plays zero role. It is just a red herring.
Bell's conclusion relies on treating the choice of experimental situations in the different labs as "sufficiently free for the purposes at hand" in Bell's words. And that, in turn, is just a straightforward mathematical claim about the statistical independence of the state of the particles being experimented on and the setting of the apparatuses, in the long term. In order to be rationally assured of that statistical independence, it is indeed best *not* to use the "free will" of the experimenter—which would be very practically inconvenient and preclude the settings being made at space-like separation—but instead something like a deterministic pseudo-random number generator, as Bell suggests. There is no issue at all about whether such a machine (which may, for example, output the parity of the digits in the decimal expansion of pi) has "free will". It certainly doesn't. But to claim that the sequence of 1s and 0s produced by such a machine would fail to be statistically independent of the state of the particles experimented on is—in technical terminology—loopy.
Bell laid all this out with his characteristic clarity in "Free Variables and Local Causality". Unfortunately, most of the people discussing this issue appear to be unfamiliar with that paper. It should be required reading before continuing to suggest that the issue of free will has anything at all to do with Bell's result.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 16, 2019 @ 17:24 GMT
Hi Tim, if you listen to the podcast you will see that my work has nothing to do with Bell's theorem. And I fully agree with you that the concept of free will has done nothing but muddy the waters with regard to Bell's theorem (I have read all of Bell's works multiple times---my copy of "Speakable and Unspeakable..." is literally falling apart). My work here is nothing more than a mathematical model of the behavior that we associate with what we colloquially refer to as free will. I take no stance on whether free will actually exists or not. Neither do I make any claims about compatibilism or incompatibilism. It's simply a mathematical model of behavior. That's it.
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 12:11 GMT
I agree with Tim Maudlin. If we want to design a mathematical methodology to “calculate” free will, we must know exactly what free will is. If our universe is “super deterministic” it has no sense to relate the proposed mathematical model to “free will” (the model will be applicable to every behavior, even pigs eating out of the manger). Moreover, it seems to me that the proposed model represents just another phenomenological point of view. Like nearly all theoretical physics is about phenomenological reality.
We need insight in the underlying mathematical structure of the universe at the quantum level, independent from the created phenomena. It is time FQXi lives up its “foundational aim”.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 13:04 GMT
Hello Mr Grimm,
It's very difficult in fact to compute this freewill and explain it mathematically.Like said Ian,it's a model of comportment,a sphere with inputs and outputs and different parameters. The superdeterminism and consciousness have Something to do with all this. We must maybe rank with sphères of different parameters,equations,algorythms.The densities,volumes of sphères,and oscillations can be relevant with the superimposings,sortings,synchronisations of informations. Many systems can be ranked and with different équations,algorythms.The quantum computing seems maybe too in this logic. In all case all this is very complex,the works of Max Tegmark,Ian Durham are very difficult,they try to formalise mathematically all this puzzle about consciousness,freewill,neural networks,AI.They make a good job for AI.I said me too that this intuition too could be a relevant parameter,a different sphere too where Always it's a question of determinism and randomness,in fact it's like if we had Always for each sphere a specific pourcentage about both,some sphères have more determinism,others less.That can be ranked.Like too convergences with consciousness correlated with this determinism showing the universal truths.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 14:21 GMT
Sydney,
You say that "If we want to design a mathematical methodology to “calculate” free will, we must know exactly what free will is". I agree.
So how would you describe/ define free will in terms that could be translated into a mathematical methodology?
Obviously, if you think that free will is such a difficult subject that 200 words or an essay or a book is required to describe/define it, then it won't be able to be translated into a mathematical methodology.
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 17:52 GMT
Lorraine,
Free will is a kind of human feeling (the examination of the origin of our preferred choices of emotional and/or unaware induced behavior). Therefore, a realistic mathematical model of free will isn’t possible because reality isn’t restricted to phenomenological reality.
In physics we know that observable reality represents only a small part of our universe. There is...
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Lorraine,
Free will is a kind of human feeling (the examination of the origin of our preferred choices of emotional and/or unaware induced behavior). Therefore, a realistic mathematical model of free will isn’t possible because reality isn’t restricted to phenomenological reality.
In physics we know that observable reality represents only a small part of our universe. There is consensus that observable reality is created by the underlying structure of the basic quantum fields (the “body” of our universe). That’s the general concept of quantum field theory. QFT isn’t new concept either because the ancient Greek philosophers (especially Parmenides) used a similar concept.
If we cannot determine the underlying (quantum) reality with the help of observations we have to “construct” the underlying field structure with the help of the general properties of our universe. Like universal constants, conservation laws and general behavior (e.g. non-locality). Because these properties represent spatial mathematical structures. Moreover, we can verify the results with the help of phenomenological physics. For example, if the model cannot produce the Higgs field and the electric field (basic quantum fields) or cannot solve known problems like quantum gravity we can conclude that we have to start a new try (a new conceptual model).
The “ultimate” model is a conceptual mathematical construction, like the ancient Greek philosophers proposed (and Max Tegmark brought back to live with his paper “The mathematical universe”).
The fact that our universe has conservation laws, universal constants – and shows to be non-local – proves that Gerard ‘t Hooft’s opinion about “super determinism” is correct. That’s why “free will” is a feeling and pigs that eat out of the manger will have the same feelings: “Mmm, yummy! I will eat everything I can get!” For the observer “free will” is equal to individual behavior. However, even microbes show individual behavior. That’s the problem with the mathematical model of Ian Durham. In my opinion it isn’t about free will, it is about observable individual behavior (phenomenological reality).
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 22:54 GMT
Sydney,
So what you are saying is that what people label as “free will” is just a feeling: there is no genuine free will. All behaviours/ outcomes are individual, which observers might mistake for genuine free will. The world is superdeterministic, so whatever Ian’s model might show, it is not genuine free will.
But how would you describe/ define/ model
genuine free will (if it were to exist)? Surely, we need to check if genuine free will might exist, despite what Gerard ‘t Hooft’s model of the world might say?
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 07:20 GMT
Lorraine,
Sorry, I was too vague. We don’t know what free will is, because our universe is deterministic (there is no “free choice”). Simply because there cannot exist an all-inclusive model with general and universal properties like conservation laws and constants (and non-locality) that is random.
The origin of our observable reality (daily live) is an underlying structure of basic quantum fields. We don’t know exactly how it is dynamical structured but we know for sure that this underlying reality creates our observable reality (humans, planets, forces, etc.).
So “free will” is created by the underlying reality of the basic quantum fields (100% deterministic). Now if we want to develop a mathematical model of “free will” we have to know exactly how observable reality is created (a) and we have to know the “position” of the proposed free will in relation to our own existence (b).
Now (a) is what physics is all about, searching an all inclusive model. Therefore (b) is totally out of sight. However the universe is deterministic so we can understand that free will is a human feeling. Of course this feeling is caused by our unawareness about all the influences (non-local) that determine human behavior.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 08:50 GMT
In fact people speaks about freewill,but nobody has a real mathematical model,we just discuss and repeat Always the same with this superdetrminism and randomness. If searchers do not understand that this freewill is Under this superdeterminism correlated with consciousness.So it's odd,and the danger is to put this freewill at the same level than this consciounsess.We understand so the people lacking of universalism and prefering Vanity.Is it a global hidden camera? if yes it's time to tell us.And You Lorraine we wait all your paper of expert about computing,you like the 0 and 1,so show us your splendid mathematical method and correlted incredible algorythms showing the truths.We wait.Discuss is one thing,ponder papers an other.Put it here this paper.But you haven't Lorraine,just no?
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 09:01 GMT
Sydney,you have spoken about this quantum gravitation,this weakest quantum force.Indeed we need a new road to explain it.There are several approachs like the works of Penrose and twistors,or Connes and his non commutatiity,or the lie exceptional group E8 and its fractalisation of forces,or the loop,or this or that but nobody like for the freewill has a real quantization of this quantum gravitation.This force needs an other logic,an other conceptual model,mathematical,algebrical,geometrical. Now the real ask is what are these gravitational informations and how they are encoded in nuclei and what are their real properties.How to consider these informations and the links with our consciousness.Imagine that our standard model is encircled by a cold gravitation.Imagine too a serie of quantum BHs.
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 13:21 GMT
Steve Defourny,
You are linking “free will” with consciousness. Now forget physics for a moment and try to concentrate on “free will”.
If we feel tired we make the decision to go to sleep. If we feel hungry we are looking for something to eat, etc., etc. In other words, we make choices because of feelings inside. However, feelings are not only related to the condition of our body. Simple examples are feelings of love and hate, happiness and sadness. But if I am doing theoretical research and I try to solve a problem it is because of a feeling that I chose for a solution in a certain direction. We call this intuition but we can name it a mental feeling too. Because it is a feeling.
Can we have thoughts without feelings? That’s a difficult question because if we go to sleep we are still thinking about problems, expectations, etc., etc. I can try to unbend my body and mind so memories and expectations have less influence on my feelings, but I am still thinking. Although we call it meditation. And I cannot argue that it is not because of a feeling because I have unbend myself “to change my mood”.
If a person states: “I think so I exist”, we can reply with: “I feel so I exist”. Both statements are complementary (strong feelings => strong thoughts; like the electric field and the magnetic field). So it is really hard to distinguish between consciousness and feelings in relation to the illusion of “free will”.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 14:52 GMT
Sydney,
It's a beautiful description of freewill. I beleive that freewill Indeed is correlated with consciousness. The feelings Indeed are important and too intuition. But we must consider too genetic,education,psychology,sociology,neurology,environment
s,external catalysts….more these feelings,biological needs,personality…..so we can rank the choices. The choices are in function of many parameters. This freewill cannot be chaotical for a person wanting the universal determinism.Of course this freewill has a small sphere of activity,like the correlated choices,but they are limited,this free will is limited because the consciousness and determinsitic parameters cited above are more foundamentals.Freewill exists,it's just that this parameter is not foundamental considering the main codes and encodings of evolution. Our brains are a result of evolution,and brain is the most complex creation, the consciousness appears due to all this,the number of particles encoded creating fields. This freewill is for all animals and in function of locomotion,nutrition,reproduction to make simple. The freewill so appears and can be ranked. Of course it exists but has no real universal objectivity.If we can have the freewill,it's because we are conscious. This freewill is Simply limited. A kind of universal objectivity,determinism exist and is the main chief orchestra,when a person understands the physical laws and universe,so his choices are correlated. Randomness and freewill are limited,they are just spheres of comportments.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 15:57 GMT
Sydney,
Re Sydney Ernest Grimm replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 07:20 GMT:
The words “free will” may or may not refer to a fictional thing, but this thing can still be described, just like a fictional story can be told. It doesn’t really matter if a fictional story is backed up by a physics hypothesis about the nature of the world.
So, what do you think of the Oxford dictionary definition of free will: a person having free will has “the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate” [1]? Does this definition describe what you later call "the illusion of “free will”"?
1. https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/free_will
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 17:14 GMT
Lorraine,
“
The words “free will” may or may not refer to a fictional thing, but this thing can still be described, just like a fictional story can be told. It doesn’t really matter if a fictional story is backed up by a physics hypothesis about the nature of the world.”, isn’t part of my comment on Sep. 9, 2019 @07:20 GMT. May be you have read it in the comment of another person.
The illusion of “free will” is the word “free”. As I typed before, the cause behind choices are feelings. Feelings are not illusions but they are not “free”.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 21:19 GMT
Good point Sydney. Feelings come from the limbic system of the brain not the cerebral cortex, rational thinking, executive part of the brain. They can be automatic, instinctual and are (at least for most people) not fully subservient to the rational mind.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 10, 2019 @ 12:27 GMT
Sydney,
If I was quoting you, I would have put quotes round it. I wasn’t saying that that was part of your comment:
clearly there were no quotes around it (except for the words “free will”)!!!
I put “Re Sydney Ernest Grimm replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 07:20 GMT” because there had been 4 intervening comments.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 10, 2019 @ 14:07 GMT
Sydney,
What I was attempting to say, before it seemed to go horribly wrong, was this: The Oxford and other dictionaries have entries for “free will”, but your view of “free will” is very different to the dictionary view. In fact, you say that “free will” is an illusion, and “free will is a human feeling”.
But you fail to elaborate on exactly what the illusion is, and exactly what the feeling is. So, without further explanation from you, I must assume that you mean the dictionary definition of free will.
I.e. I must assume that you are saying this: “
It is an illusion to think that a person has the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate" ; and “
People have the feeling that they have the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate, but it is nothing more than a feeling”.
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 10, 2019 @ 20:02 GMT
Lorraine,
You have formulate it in a perfect way (English is not my native language).
“Free will” is the feeling that we have a free will. Or – to say it in a different way – the feeling that we can choose our actions (and thoughts) on the score of our own decisions.
Our feeling of “freedom of choice” is caused by the impossibility to be aware of everything that influences us at any moment. Therefore we have the illusion that we can freely make decisions although our universe is 100% deterministic. That is why I commented about the necessity to understand the underlying structure of the basic quantum fields because it is this structure and its properties that creates everything in the universe (the observable phenomena). In other words, if you know the mathematical properties of the underlying field structure you can recognize known concepts like free will and consciousness.
In my comment to Steve Dufourny I hinted on the complementary relation between feelings and thoughts and the complementary relation between the electric field and the magnetic field. That was not without a purpose. Nevertheless you have to be familiar with the humanities too.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 10, 2019 @ 22:19 GMT
Sydney,
Most,
but not all, physicists might agree with your view of the physics of the world. But (e.g.) quantum Bayesianism (QBism) is a very different
interpretation of the physics of the world. And the view that people have “the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate” is a radical, but not untenable, interpretation of quantum mechanics!!
What do you mean by “if you know the mathematical properties of the underlying field structure you can recognize known concepts like free will and consciousness”?
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 11, 2019 @ 07:10 GMT
Lorraine,
In science there is a lot of confusion about the phenomenological point of view and the “all-inclusive” point of view. The phenomenological point of view is our natural way to do observations (our senses are measuring instruments). Observing is detecting differences so we cannot observe “ultimate reality”. That’s why phenomenological physics is about reduced reality:...
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Lorraine,
In science there is a lot of confusion about the phenomenological point of view and the “all-inclusive” point of view. The phenomenological point of view is our natural way to do observations (our senses are measuring instruments). Observing is detecting differences so we cannot observe “ultimate reality”. That’s why phenomenological physics is about reduced reality: detecting phenomena, relate them to each other and try to explain the differences and the similarities (controlling the results with the help of predictions). Most physicists are phenomenological physicists because the main theories in physics are phenomenological oriented. Like the theory of relativity (SR and GR) and quantum mechanics. The general concept of quantum field theory represents the all-inclusive point of view but in practice the Standard model of elementary particles and forces is just phenomenological physics (except the gauge theories).
So don’t wonder about opinions that differ from other opinions. Most opinions in science are about reduced reality (phenomenological reality). Determinism is about the all-inclusive point of view (general and universal underlying properties of the whole universe, inclusive vacuum space).
Feelings can be distinguished from thoughts because of differences. We know that because we can observe ourselves (introspection). A feeling is like a volume that can change its centre (centre of concentration). We can “expand” the centre too (meditation). Every language have expressions about the displacements of the “centre of concentration”. For example: the courage sank into his shoes, etc., etc. So I can conclude that feelings are not the result of a local configuration of a scalar field or a vector field. Read the comment of Georgina Woodward on Sep. 9, @21:19 (same thread).
Thoughts are quite different. I can answer a comment of Lorraine Ford without knowing anything about her. Nevertheless my thoughts are concentrated “towards” the opinion of Lorraine Ford that she expressed in her comment. It is like I am selecting a certain connection and send information. That’s all about true vectors. We cannot think about something that has no dedicated position somewhere in the universe.
Reality is created by the underlying field structure. Therefore every macroscopic phenomenon – humans too – reflects the basic properties of the underlying structure they represent. These basic properties are mathematical properties (Max Tegmark: “The mathematical universe”).
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 11, 2019 @ 09:55 GMT
Hi ,an important parameter that people forgets is this Vanity. What about this Vanity like a freewill.We know all that Inside the sciences Community and specially in maths and physics,we have an enormous Vanity.The thinkers so have chosen to act with this parameter.Is it a problem? is it a parameter decreasing the complementarity and the real roads towards our foundamentals? this Vanity must be taken into account,all are sure lol ,but after all only this pure determinism is a reality.People have the choices of freewill in hands Indeed but Don't forget this Vanity,and too the intuition correlated with our feelings and thoughts.Have you an equation to explain this ?
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 11, 2019 @ 10:00 GMT
That's why evolution and adaptation in function of this universal altruism seem essential.Can a person vanitious or stupid improve his general mind in synchronization with this said universal altruism,? It's the question,can a person change in encoding deterministic içnformtions implying so a better perception of our universe and its splendid créations.The freewill you said ? lol me I want well but….
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 11, 2019 @ 10:07 GMT
So,all this is correlated with our consciousness,more a consciousness is developped due to deterministic encodings,more this mind will act in function of this universal Truth. There is so an opposite to this Vanity,we name it the humility in front of this infinite Eternal consciouness creating this physicality.The freewill is correlated and must be ranked Simply.Not need of long long discourse about the method …..
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 11, 2019 @ 10:20 GMT
Me I want well but have you seen this globality on Earth? we have created a system dividing instead of uniting,unifying really.The individualism,the Vanity,the lack of universal sciences Learning imply all this.The most serious is that it's considered like logic,no it's not rational and universal.And that continues still and Always like if it was normal.It's sad Simply,a few number understands really this pure universal altruism correlated with an universal love.A freewill for example seeing a Dangerous insect is that we have several choices,kill it or respect it.A person without consciousness will kill it.This planet must change,if not this unconsciounsess,this Vanity and individualism shall destroy all.So the global freewill must act in function of these universal parameters.Have you seen the state of this planet,the animals,vegetals suffer and live in a system odd and not foundmental.The freewill of the sciences Community must act and convice this UN,It'simple,if persons Don't see this reality,so they lack of universalism,or have too much Vanity or lack of consciousness Simply,so that implies the jealousy,the Vanity and the stupidity.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 11, 2019 @ 10:35 GMT
If my words irritate a number of persons Inside this Community on FQXi,it's normal,they cannot fight their intrinsic Vanity Simply.So how can these persons respect the ideas of others in respecting this universalism.So in your team too FQXi ,pay attention ,be sure that you have chosen the good persons.Because this Vanity is a reality. Do you see now what are our global problems and why ? it's very simple,the real keys of governances must be given in good hands.But this Vanity is a wall which does not permit the real universal evolution of this Sphere Earth. The freewil you said? yes the freewill ….
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 11, 2019 @ 21:52 GMT
Sydney,
I like your very good explanation of the phenomenological point of view and the “all-inclusive” point of view, and I like your general analytical approach.
However, is our sense of experience and our sense of free will to be believed, i.e. taken seriously as part of an “all-inclusive” point of view? Or, are these 2 seemingly anomalous aspects of the world an outcome of a mathematical universe? Surely you must admit that there is no satisfactory explanation for how these 2 anomalous aspects can miraculously “emerge” from nothing but maths?
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 11, 2019 @ 22:01 GMT
(continued)
Is there any reason why someone should support one all-inclusive view of the physics of the world as opposed to another very different (potentially) all-inclusive view of the physics of the world like QBism [1]? The QBist view is the only view of the physics of the world in which people themselves have a genuine causal impact on the world, as opposed to a mathematical universe view in which the ONLY causal factors are the mathematical rules (and some might include “quantum randomness” as a causal factor): the mathematical rules cause everything.
The QBist view is the only view of the physics of the world in which people could have
genuinely had an effect on the climate of the earth. What do you think about the climate change issue, as it relates to the physics of the world?
1. I don’t necessarily agree with all aspects of QBism, or with what QBist physicists say.
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 12, 2019 @ 08:09 GMT
Lorraine,
Our sense of experience – and our feeling that we have free will – are real. These feelings and thoughts are real because of our specific configuration in relation to everything around in the universe. If I type that something is an illusion, it only means that the concept it represents – the causal origin of the idea – is an illusion.
The origin of a concept is the...
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Lorraine,
Our sense of experience – and our feeling that we have free will – are real. These feelings and thoughts are real because of our specific configuration in relation to everything around in the universe. If I type that something is an illusion, it only means that the concept it represents – the causal origin of the idea – is an illusion.
The origin of a concept is the point of view. So if you have the opinion that you are a “solid” dynamical object that moves from A to B, I can tell you it is an illusion. Because your opinion is based upon a “solid” object that pushes everything – like the air molecules – away during the movement. But that’s not correct. Our universe – the underlying structure of the basic quantum fields – is creating us “from point to point”. Therefore you don’t represent the same “stuff” in B like the “stuff” you represented in position A.
But if your opinion is that you are a stable concentration of mutual “stress” within the structure of our universe, it is not an illusion. In fact you are saying that you represent only local properties of the underlying structure. So your second opinion represents the right point of view (all-inclusive point of view).
The all-inclusive point of view is always correct, no matter how we observe the situation. The phenomenological point of view is only correct in relation to the other phenomena (reduced/simplified reality).
In other words, there is only one all-inclusive point of view. (At the moment I cannot remember exactly what QBism represents. I have read something about it a couple of years ago and concluded that “for me” it isn’t worth to spend time on it.)
Mathematics is only a precise language. Moreover, it doesn’t differ much from physics. Most mathematics is about simplified reality so it has limited applications. Actually, mathematics share the same foundational problems as theoretical physics (same paradigm).
Now look at the member list of FQXi (https://fqxi.org/members). The members I know are phenomenological thinkers. That’s why you can conclude that the questions FQXi is exploring are mainly about the foundations of phenomenological reality.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 12, 2019 @ 22:19 GMT
Sydney,
If you don’t mind me saying so, you haven’t answered my questions:
How can mathematics give rise to feelings and thoughts and knowledge (e.g. knowledge of “our specific configuration in relation to everything around in the universe”)? Do feelings and thoughts and knowledge “emerge” from the mathematics,
or did feelings and thoughts and knowledge always exist in a proto form?
What do you think about the climate change issue, as it relates to the physics of the world? If the
only causal factors are the mathematical rules, if the mathematical rules cause everything, then surely the mathematical rules are the sole cause of climate change?
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 03:10 GMT
Loraine,
You are right, sorry! Try to imagine an enormous structure (like Archibald Wheeler’s “foam”). The units of the structure have properties we can describe in a mathematical way. For example every unit has an invariant volume and a variable surface area (there are more properties). All the units tessellate space so if one unit changes its shape, all the other units have to...
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Loraine,
You are right, sorry! Try to imagine an enormous structure (like Archibald Wheeler’s “foam”). The units of the structure have properties we can describe in a mathematical way. For example every unit has an invariant volume and a variable surface area (there are more properties). All the units tessellate space so if one unit changes its shape, all the other units have to change their shape too, otherwise the volume of all the units cannot be invariant. If all the units act synchronously there is a constant “speed” of change (we call it speed of light) and a constant amount of change (we call it Planck’s constant). Actually the total amount of change – energy – everywhere within the structure must be conserved (main law in physics) and because of the synchronization time is a constant too (quantum time).
What have I done? I describe the underlying reality of a mathematical field structure with the help of terms we know in physics. But I can use mathematical symbols too. I can write down an equation that describes the topological deformation of every unit of the field structure. I can calculate the amount of change within 1 m
3 of space and the number of units 1 m
3 of space envelopes. Etc., etc.
If the properties of the field structure create local configurations that differ from the other units around because of the transfer of a part of a property – e.g. the size of the surface area of every unit – and the local configuration is quite stable the field structure has created something we call a phenomenon. For example a particle. Enormous amounts of particles tend to cluster together and this “act of concentration” we call gravity, electromagnetic force or electrostatic attraction, etc.
If every change of the shape of a unit has the speed of light, we have to conclude that the only velocity in our universe is the speed of light (transfer of topological deformation to one or more units around). Actually, every physicist knows that change is energy and every quantum of energy has the same velocity. But in daily live we never realize ourselves that “all the stuff around” – inclusive humans – is constantly changing with the speed of light. In other words, reality is really strange to imagine. But I suppose that you can imagine that a field structure that can be described with the help of mathematics, can create “feelings and thoughts and knowledge” too. Some comments before I hinted that consciousness is related to the vectorized flat Higgs field (scalar field) and feelings to the electric field (topological field). Both fields are basic quantum fields. Actually, the electric field is the deformed part of the scalar field (because of tessellation). That's why the Higgs field and the electromagnetic field can exchange energy (Higgs mechanism) because the boundary of every unit of the field structure envelopes 1 (partly deformed) scalar.
Your conclusion that the climate change issue is created by the underlying field structure is 100% correct. However, if the underlying field structure will change in a way that the issue is no longer a problem for us, it will happen “in the future”. And we will be the “actors” that change our behavior. That’s determinism.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 09:47 GMT
Hi,
Sydney??
What is this flat scalr higgs field correlated with consciousness??, the higgs are just a bosonic mechanism explaining maybe 10percent of our mass.That is all ,that has Nothing to do with our consciousness.It's easy to see that consciousness is Simply an emergent property due to our brains and all its complexity due to number of entangled particles implying a biological Chemistry and pshycis with fields.We cannot fractalise this consciousness ,it's a whole which must be analysed.
Regards
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 10:44 GMT
That said,I liked this thread of discussions about freewill,consciousness,determinism. After all it's Always relevant to see the different points of vue of thinkers.So Indeed good discussions dear friend thinkers.Don't stop so :)
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 11:23 GMT
Steve Defourny,
The flat Higgs field is the spatial scalar structure where every scalar has the same magnitude. Every volume in the universe where the Higgs field is flat, is called “vacuum space”. There is not so much volume where the scalars are decreased. You find decreased scalars within rest mass (nuclei) and within black holes.
All the scalars in vacuum space have the...
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Steve Defourny,
The flat Higgs field is the spatial scalar structure where every scalar has the same magnitude. Every volume in the universe where the Higgs field is flat, is called “vacuum space”. There is not so much volume where the scalars are decreased. You find decreased scalars within rest mass (nuclei) and within black holes.
All the scalars in vacuum space have the maximum magnitude, because the limitation of a scalar to increase its magnitude are the other scalars around. That means that nearly everywhere our universe is “filled” with a structure of identical scalars. (The only real scalar that exists, is the geometrical sphere.)
Nevertheless, the Higgs field is not the only basic quantum field in the universe. The electric field “occupies” the other part of the volume of our universe. Known fields like the magnetic field and the field of gravity are not basic quantum fields. That’s because these fields are mediated by the Higgs field and the electric field. For example, if rest mass is created by the local concentration of quanta – a property of the electric field – one or more enclosed scalars can decrease. The result is rest mass. Therefore, if rest mass is created, the flat scalars get vectorized.
But vectorized scalars don’t transfer energy because true vectors are like 1 dimensional push forces (true vectors). That means there is no limitation in relation to the velocity and “reach” of the vectors. And that’s exactly a property of our consciousness. Thoughts seem to violate the speed of light and have no spatial limitation. If you are familiar with the humanities you can find a lot of experiments that show these properties.
For example. You sit in front of a computer display and if you see a new image on the screen you have to push a button. There are electrodes connected to your body and the sensors are measuring your neural and muscle activity. But just some milliseconds before you see a new image your body is reacting like you see the new image. That means that our consciousness is generated by an influence that violates the speed of light. Our brain is just an organ, not the center of consciousness. Actually, everything in the universe has consciousness and every phenomenon is part of the configuration of a much larger phenomenon. So our consciousness is part of a much larger consciousness... (and so on and so on).
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 11:46 GMT
Thanks for sharing a deeper general thought.I liked it,and how you interpret these scalars,vectors and fields. All these parameters are relevant. That said of course I see differently about this consciousness. The geometrical algebras are a wonderful Tools and strings theorists too have pondered relevant mathematical extrapolations for the rankings of our forces,mass,electric fields,magnetic...
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Thanks for sharing a deeper general thought.I liked it,and how you interpret these scalars,vectors and fields. All these parameters are relevant. That said of course I see differently about this consciousness. The geometrical algebras are a wonderful Tools and strings theorists too have pondered relevant mathematical extrapolations for the rankings of our forces,mass,electric fields,magnetic fields...I have suggested to Klee Irwin ,with his team and Garreth Lisi too working about this E8 exceptional Lie group, to consider series finite of spherical volumes,spheres instead of points and strings,many convergences could appear with these series in motions,rotations,oscillations,the poincrré conjecture is relevant and the deformations of sphères too.We could converge too with Kaluza Klein and Yang Mills.It exists a kind of universal partition in logic with these spherical volumes sphères.The mathematical methods with these vectors and scalars too seem Under this partition. I ask me too how to consider this Dark Energy and dark matter. I said me that if this matter exists so in logic it is too encoded in nuclei,but how and where ? difficult because this matter does not interact with our ordinary matter for both scales,quant and cosmol.But in logic it exists a mechanism ,probably that the good geometrical algebras and rankings exist to reach all these unknowns. The same for our quantum gravitation,it exists a partition and fractal,Lie groups and these coded finite series of sphères can maybe solve several things when we consider this zero absolute and the planck temperature.This cold is maybe more than we can imagine. Returning about consciousness,I beleive that we cannot consider particles of consciousness,it seems more complex. About what you said for this light speed, I Don't beleive that we can break c with our brains,thoughts,because all is Under this relativity about the interactions and informations,c is sufficient to imply an emergent consciousness.It's really about codes ,informations,encodings of evolution all this puzzle.Our brains after all are fascinating,a result of evolution,so complex and so Evolved in encodings.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 11:57 GMT
What is really this vacuum,this space,this aether even? it seems that we have so many unknowns to discover. We have a deeper universal logic about matter and Energy.This photonic thermodynamic electromagnetic relativity is of course correct,just that we need to superimpose new parameters.
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 13:51 GMT
Steve Defourny (your last comment),
Like I wrote in my first comments, we don’t know the “stuff” our universe is made off. We can only derive the general and universal properties and construct a mathematical model. Scalars, vectors, topological deformations, etc. are mathematical concepts. But we can verify our model with the help of the results of phenomenological physics. So if our model can prove in a mathematical way the existence of constants like Planck’s constant, the constant speed of light, the conservation of energy and general properties like non-locality we can conclude that the model is correct.
Relativity is phenomenological physics. Therefore relativity cannot describe the mechanism behind “ultimate reality”. For example the twin paradox. One twin brother encircles the earth in a rocket and the other one stays at home. “Time” goes slower in the speeding rocket and when the twin brother is back on earth he is a bit younger than his brother. Unfortunately quantum time is a constant (if c and
h are constants, time is a constant too).
Every observable change in the universe is caused by the transfer of quanta (the transfer of a mathematical property from one point to an adjacent point in space). Quanta transfer has the speed of light thus if the velocity of one object is higher than the velocity of another object the first object has a decreased amount of “internal” change. So it seems that “time” was slowing down. But that is wrong because quantum time is a constant. Actually, Newton’s axioms about absolute time and absolute space describe reality more accurate than Einstein’s concept. However, our scientific culture is obsessed by the phenomenological point of view - we even call it "the scientific method" - so there are a lot of imaginary “weird” problems.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 14:52 GMT
Sydney,indeed we Don't know many things even. We just know some effects of relativity, electromagnetism,heat. We evolve with details of course but we are Indeed limited about the "stuff"like you said. I agree with your last words about newton,it's my favorite thinker with planck,einstein. I consider even a gravitational aether instead of a luminiferous one.Maybe this gravitation is instantaneous but we are in a different mechanic. The phenomenological physics are relevant considering our relativity,special and general more the Tools permitting to encircle the minkoski spacetime with poincarré groups for example,or at our quantum scale for our standard model.Lie and Lorentz groups too. Philosophically and generally if I can say we have many secrets to discover.We know a so small part of our universal laws. This ultimate reality like you said is far,very far.But a good new is that we evolve too :)
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Steve Agnew wrote on Aug. 17, 2019 @ 04:16 GMT
So the title is about measuring free will, which would be very interesting, and then the talk denies any way to measure free will.
Is this helpful?
We all act as if we have free will and we therefore we all do have free will. We all act as if we are conscious and so we are therefore conscious as well. This is just how the universe is.
Then people argue that free will and consciousness are illusions and not therefore "real" as if there is any difference between reality and illusions. Most of what we think we sense is actually an illusion and so what? That is just how the universe is and the whole point is survival and so if we survive, reality is what is real.
Clearly evidence shows that free will is subconscious and some therefore argue that free will is not purposeful since it is not part of conscious reasoning. However, our subconscious feeling and emotions are what make us who we are and are hardly random. Morality is not random and has taken thousands of years and morality is decidedly not random or it would have been established thousands of years ago.
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Steve Agnew replied on Aug. 17, 2019 @ 15:52 GMT
Nevertheless, I do find this discussion of free will interesting since it is very revealing of how very smart people think. In fact, people make very reasoned arguments for free will as an axiom and free will as an illusion of consciousness. Of course, since nearly everything that we think we sense we make up anyway because of the complexity of sensation, it turns out that most of consciousness is really an illusion anyway.
We are subject to our subconscious archetypes for most of reality and that includes free will. Likewise, our morality derives from our archetypes and therefore are all subject to the same free will and responsibility for all of our choices. Regardless of the circumstances of our lives, we always have a choice between carrots and peppers from the fridge. Right now, I would choose peppers but then I don't happen to have carrots right now.
Durham argues that random choices are not free choices, but we did freely decide to throw the dart and we did freely decide to roll the dice. So some choices are just 50:50 propositions, but we do make decisions even for these.
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Steve Agnew replied on Aug. 17, 2019 @ 15:57 GMT
The technical reason that we have free will is that we actually cannot always know the reasons why we make the choices that we make even though those reasons do exist in a causal universe. What we do is first make a decision based on our subconscious feeling and then we tend to rationalize that choice with conscious reasoning that may or may not have had anything to do with our choice.
In very technical terms, we each live in our own quantum universe of matter, action, and quantum phase and while matter and action are how things change, quantum phase is also an important part of how things change and we also have quantum phase. In fact, the very nature of neural action potentials has to do with quantum phase so our quantum phase affects how we see matter action and then how we perceive reality.
It is because of quantum phase that some precursors are not knowable even though they do exist as superpositions of quantum phase. We can only know the outcomes of free choice, which, as Durham states, are very certain to happen whether or not you believe in free choice.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 17, 2019 @ 17:34 GMT
I'm confused. I give a very specific measure of free will that I call the Z-function which is a concatenation of what I call the zeta-function which measures a the freedom of an individual choice. So I certainly don't deny any way to measure free will. The entire point of the talk was the exact opposite.
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Steve Agnew replied on Aug. 18, 2019 @ 22:52 GMT
Yes...you did propose that a z-function would be a measurable freedom of choice, but then you failed to say how to measure a z-function. You say it would be the shortest distance in some phase phase or another, but that simply does not help at all.
Please say exactly how to measure free will. All you supposed that there is a measure of free will, not how exactly free will would be measured. I like how you do not deny a way to measure free will, but please give us the way.
But anyway I enjoyed your talk and keep up the good work...
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Steve Agnew replied on Aug. 19, 2019 @ 03:31 GMT
There might indeed be a way to measure free will just like there is a way to measure wavefunctions, but free will has to do with neural action potentials. People who measure neural action predict our choice before we are conscious of a choice. They then imply that we do not have conscious free will, but that assumes that our subconscious choices are somehow random or otherwise not causal.
That seems unlikely since our subconscious is very important for consciousness and for making decisions. Just because we do not have a conscious rationale for a choice, does not mean that we do not have free choice.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 20, 2019 @ 19:29 GMT
Right, well as I think I pointed out in my talk, I'm still working on the details of the actual equation itself (specifically I'm working on a proportionality constant). I hope to have a testable equation relatively soon. Glad you otherwise enjoyed the talk.
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Steve Agnew replied on Aug. 21, 2019 @ 04:09 GMT
I did enjoy your talk and you are a very smart person and you do favor free will...I like that. Just remember...if you can predict choice it is not free choice but rather determine by precursors. What you need is a function that comes down to a superposition of precursors and outcomes. That is as close as you can hope to get, thank goodness.
I wish you good fortune and long life...
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Robert H McEachern wrote on Aug. 17, 2019 @ 18:29 GMT
"In other words, what do we really mean when we say a choice is “free”?"
It means that the entity that made the choice is an essential "actor" in the causal chain: In other words, no other entity, could either produce or even reliably predict, the choice the entity would make, before the entity made it.
Free will exists precisely because even the universe, in its entirety, is not vast enough to predict some things, in any other manner, than by simply enabling them to happen in real-time; in that sense, the occurrence of the event and its prediction are one-and-the-same thing. It is the vast information content of the initial conditions, not the negligible content and properties of the physical laws, that is ultimately responsible for the existence of free-will.
"we nevertheless need to recognize the fact that, at the most fundamental level, the universe is random." No it is not. At the most fundamental level, the universe consists of entities that encode exactly one bit of information, as Shannon, not physicists, define the term. A single isolated bit cannot exist without noise being present. But the fact that each such bit is a combination of both signal, and noise, and not JUST random noise, is what ultimately makes all repeatable (hence predictable) behaviors possible.
Rob McEachern
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Aug. 20, 2019 @ 03:10 GMT
Ian Durham,
Your way of measuring “free will” is based on an unconvincing model of free will.
Your model doesn’t say why you should be considered to be different to the fridge or the carrot: what, if anything, distinguishes you from the fridge or the carrot?
Your model has no way of distinguishing free will from random numeric outcomes and deterministic numeric outcomes and combinations thereof. You say: “We are
all responsible through our actions (or lack thereof)”, but your model of random and deterministic numeric outcomes fails to explain how this could make a person responsible for his actions, i.e. responsible for causing the numeric outcomes.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 20, 2019 @ 19:31 GMT
You're absolutely right and that is a valid criticism. I'm working on shoring up that part of the model using downward causation (see George Ellis' talk). There are still some issues to be worked out, but all research is work in progress anyway.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 20, 2019 @ 23:37 GMT
Ian,
Living things having free will is against the religious beliefs of physicists because free will means that matter is active rather than passive.
Genuine free will means that matter itself is the cause of at least some number-jump change in the universe. This type of thing can only be modelled by algorithms. The response of living things to wider numeric situations can only be modelled by algorithms: equations can’t do it. And algorithms do not “emerge” from equations.
But physicists religiously believe that all number change in the universe just happens with no actual cause (though the numeric outcomes must conform to law of nature equations, or the numeric outcomes are random number jumps).
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 21, 2019 @ 22:00 GMT
So Ian,
The equations of physics assume a perfectly working machine of number change, where number change in one variable is “caused” by relationships between number changes in other variables. But physics says that there is no real reason for number change to ever occur; number change just happens.
On the other hand, physics denies that matter is active, i.e. that matter could cause number-jump change.
Physics is looking for free will in human beings; but shouldn’t physics be looking at free will as a necessary part of the functioning of the system?
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Georgina Woodward wrote on Aug. 21, 2019 @ 06:52 GMT
It seems there is layer upon layer of obstacles, things beyond sufficient personal control as not to affect free will and 'built in'. Environment, upbringing, circumstances, other people, other organisms, societal rules, family values,learned behaviour, habits, reflexes, personality, health/illness, mental health, disability, biochemistry,nerve function. Some overlap of items on the list and some acting together as a combined influence. I'm no longer as confident in the idea of free will as I used to be. I have developed a functional neurological balance and movement disorder. Body and mind are no longer 'on the same page', working together as one. Besides that try as I might I don't make the progress I would like and it doesn't seem to me lack of persistence or will.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 21, 2019 @ 19:56 GMT
Further obstacles to free will; climate, weather, economics, politics, war, famine, imprisonment, culture, need of social acceptance, subconscious biases, history, unknown consequences of former choices.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 22, 2019 @ 00:00 GMT
Georgina,
According to you, the world is full of special cases that have nothing in common. So, don't expect your readers to do your work; it's up to you to do the work: describe in one single sentence what you think all your special cases have in common.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 22, 2019 @ 05:36 GMT
They all have an effect on the choices I make or would if they applied to me.
Other organisms is a bit vague- How about ants in the kitchen? I don't want to have to deal with them but will or the problem gets worse. I'm not choosing freely. Their behaviour makes me choose to deal with them . I am, I think, free to choose how many dead ant bodies will make me wipe them away. 1 or 2 maybe not, 6 or more almost certainly. though it will also depend on other circumstances. Or a sizable shark swimming next to the boat I'm on as I'm contemplating a swim. I'm hot and the water looks cool and refreshing.Also vague, unknown consequences of former choices- As unknown I am likely not prepared but they will affect what i choose to do when they happen.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 22, 2019 @ 06:48 GMT
To wipe away dead ants or not was an oversimplification. It depends on where the ants are located. 2 ants on the chopping board are likely going, especially if I'm about to use it. 10-15 ants next to the bait can stay or I'd be forever dealing with dead ants. 6 close together at a location other than bait or chopping board are most likely going. So it is not a completely free choice of number of ants but I'm being influenced by where the ants "choose" to die.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 22, 2019 @ 09:56 GMT
Re. ant behaviour: More ants are attracted by the chemical trails left by earlier ants. Trails leading to the bait are useful and so best not clean around the bait too often. But trails leading elsewhere are not wanted so cleaning them away helps deter more ants. What the ants are doing affects my choice of what I do.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 22, 2019 @ 14:08 GMT
Georgina, I have replied below.
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Aug. 22, 2019 @ 14:07 GMT
Georgina,
What you do about the ants is up to you. The issue is whether you have genuine free will or not. The options are:
1) The world is such that people make a genuine difference to the world i.e. the world is such that people genuinely played a part in causing climate change; OR
2) The world is such that people don’t make a genuine difference to the world i.e. the world is such that nothing but the laws of nature and randomness is causing everything including people’s thoughts and actions and climate change.
Despite what they might say, all the physicists at the recent FQXi conference believe in option 2: the physicists’ mathematical model of the way the world works (together with associated explanatory bits) means that people can’t possibly make a genuine difference to the world.
This is a bit embarrassing for physics. Physicists don’t want the general public to know the truth about what they think about climate change. They are trying to find some magic topology that will twist and turn their theories into something compatible with people making a genuine difference to the world, but it can’t be done, seemingly because their core beliefs are that matter is a passive puppet, not an active actor.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 22, 2019 @ 19:17 GMT
I'm going to kick myself later for asking this, but what is it that we physicists supposedly think about climate change?
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 22, 2019 @ 22:29 GMT
Lorraine, You asked me to give one sentence explaining what the "special cases" have in common. I did that. The ants were just an example of how my choices could be affected by other organisms. What I do about the ants is up to the ants, too. I'm responding to them.The human race is affecting climate, by various means, but I have no personal control over the energy policies of China and USA or Amazon deforestation, for example. My personal contribution to climate change is minuscule. Climate is a chaotic system. Small changes can have big effects. Necessary Truncation of variables makes predictions uncertain. Working with the idea of a space-time continuum, climate change outcomes are already part of it. Past, Present and Future are relative to the observer. In contrast, Uni-temporal existence has an open unwritten future.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 22, 2019 @ 23:22 GMT
Ian,
What physicists think is that:
People can’t possibly make a genuine difference to the world because (physicists think that) matter is a passive puppet, i.e. matter is
100% puppeted by laws of nature and “randomness”. It makes no difference what the law of nature equations are: matter is a passive puppet.
The alternative is that matter is
not a passive puppet: matter has a genuine role in the system.
So, what is the nature of the world?
1) Do law of nature equations represent a perfect engine that single-handedly drives the world, or does new number change fuel have to be continually/ intermittently input to make the system work? and
2) If new numbers are in fact continually being input to the system, then is “randomness” the cause or is matter the cause?
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 22, 2019 @ 23:55 GMT
Georgina,
The issue is not whether your “personal contribution to climate change is minuscule”.
The issue is whether the world is such that you can make any contribution to anything at all.
If you are 100% a puppet of laws and nature and “randomness”, then it’s nothing but the laws of nature and “randomness” making a contribution.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 23, 2019 @ 00:39 GMT
So that is absolutely NOT what physicists think AT ALL. Almost every single physicist I know is actively involved in causes such as fighting climate change, standing up for equal rights, fighting against creeping authoritarianism, etc. If we really believed that matter is nothing more than a "passive puppet" we wouldn't be doing these things.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 23, 2019 @ 02:15 GMT
Ian,
It's physicists'
models of the way the world works that say that matter is a "passive puppet". What you do in your leisure time contradicts your models of the way the world works.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 23, 2019 @ 02:29 GMT
Except I don't even think *that* is true. I would hardly say that quantum mechanics, for instance, models matter in this way.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 23, 2019 @ 04:57 GMT
Ian,
Basically, matter is seen by physics as a set of variables and numbers. According to physics, matter has no additional qualities:
- Matter has no effect on the numbers associated with the variables; only law of nature relationships and/or randomness affects the numbers associated with the variables;
- Matter knows nothing of the variables, numbers and relationships; a Platonic realm external to the system is the only thing that might be aware of the variables, numbers and equations.
I would think that matter has additional qualities.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 23, 2019 @ 05:10 GMT
Lorraine, I am providing a framework that allows the possibility of making a difference to outcomes. I was trying to put the amount of control I have over climate change into some perspective.. i also said the human race is affecting climate. I think the laws of nature and equations used to model systems are 'distilled' from observation, ideal. Large numbers of tests are needed to find behaviour on average or statistically significant correlations. The real world is not ideal but there are many influences, some synergistic , some competing. Making it difficult to model nature as it really is. Not isolated systems, more like a network of chains of influence. Like the interdependence of ecosystems.It might seem a'perfect engine' if all the 'noise' of influences not part of the specific investigation are eliminated.
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Blogger Ian Durham wrote on Aug. 23, 2019 @ 15:01 GMT
Well, Lorraine, if you insist on seeing it that way, I doubt anything I say will change your mind. I wonder, however, given your intense criticism of the way you seem to think physicists think, why you spend so much time hanging out on a site ostensibly dedicated to physics.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 23, 2019 @ 22:49 GMT
Ian,
I’m sorry for going overboard on the “physicists think that” bit, but you’ve got to admit that there’s something in what I’m saying.
Physics wants us to believe that miracles happen: life, agency, consciousness and charitable works logically “emerge” out of deterministic/random processes; then there’s loony Max Tegmark (and loony philosopher Susan Schneider) telling us that consciousness and intelligence “emerge” out of bits of circuit board; and even George Ellis agrees with Tegmark i.e. he equates living things to computers (“muscles move according to an abstract plan”, “computer algorithms [are abstract entities that] are a definitive example again of the causal power of abstract entities”).
Of course, there are lots of very gullible people around who will unthinkingly believe anything physics tells them.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 24, 2019 @ 18:29 GMT
"Loony" Max Tegmark is the director of the organization that runs this site. I don't agree with him on a lot of things, but his hard work is directly responsible for the fact that you have a forum on which to criticize him. You might consider toning it down a bit.
As for physics, I think you fundamentally misunderstand both physics and physicists. But, as I said, nothing I say will change your mind. You just might want to reconsider your approach, however.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 00:38 GMT
I am aware that Max Tegmark is the director of the organization that runs this site, and I am aware that his hard work is directly responsible for the fact that I and others have this forum.
Which is more the pity because, like Trump, he and others are criminally misleading gullible people by suggesting that intelligence and consciousness "emerges" from circuit boards. It's gullible physicists and philosophers that "might want to reconsider [their] approach" to the nature of the world.
And by the way, I did actually study computer science, maths and physics at university, a long time ago.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 16:22 GMT
I don't care if you have ten PhDs in physics. To come onto this forum and compare the people who run it to a racist, misogynist monster is uncalled for. Especially on false pretenses.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 16:30 GMT
Hello,
I must agree with you Ian. Fqxi has Always been transparent in accepting all persons. It's a little bit strong there Lorraine about him.He is relevant and has permitted with Aguirre to create this platform.He does not merit this critic.
Regards
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 22:34 GMT
I am aware that Max Tegmark is the director of the organization that runs this site, and I am aware that his hard work is directly responsible for the fact that I and others have this forum.
Which is more the pity because, like Trump, he and others are criminally misleading gullible people by suggesting that intelligence and consciousness "emerges" from circuit boards. It's gullible physicists and philosophers that "might want to reconsider [their] approach" to the nature of the world.
And by the way, I did actually study computer science, maths and physics at university, a long time ago.
(Repeat of: "Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 00:38 GMT", which someone has deleted)
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 04:12 GMT
Lorraine Ford wrote on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 23:08 GMT I am aware that Max Tegmark is the director of the organization that runs this site, and I am aware that his hard work is directly responsible for the fact that I and others have this forum.
Which is more the pity because, like Trump, he and others are criminally misleading gullible people by suggesting that intelligence and consciousness "emerges" from circuit boards. It's gullible physicists and philosophers that "might want to reconsider [their] approach" to the nature of the world.
And by the way, I did actually study computer science, maths and physics at university, a long time ago.
(This is a repeat of: "Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 00:38 GMT", which Georgina has censored)
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 01:58 GMT
Free will means that living things/ matter has “the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate” [1].
To model free will (using a set of variables and associated numbers to represent outcomes) requires that:
1) At least one number will look random (from the point of view of an observer) in the sense that the number was not determined by the laws of nature (represented by the equations of physics); and 2) Matter itself caused the number assignment to the variable.
In essence, Ian Durham’s analysis [2] does not disagree with the above. But he then goes on to model a “free will” which he admits is indistinguishable from non-free will [3].
Free will is a revolutionary idea for physics. The idea is that matter itself
causes the assignment of numbers to variables, in addition to law of nature relationships determining the numbers. I.e.: 1) Matter is a separate thing to (what is represented by) equations and numbers; and 2) Matter causes outcomes, but cause itself is not representable as equations and numbers.
But Ian Durham seemingly does not separate matter from fields i.e. platonically existing sets of numbers, equations, statistics, probabilities and random fluctuations. So his analysis of the nature of the world doesn’t have the necessary requirements to make free will possible.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 01:59 GMT
(continued)
Notes:
1. https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/free_will (Oxford dictionary).
2. “…A completely random outcome is where you can have multiple outcomes and they are all equally likely… now all realistic processes that we encounter in real life are somewhere between the two… we rarely encounter fully random processes… and we rarely deal with fully deterministic processes either. Going back to essence of free will, there are some things we can say about free will: first of all… choices have to be free, and free will is going to be some sort of amalgam towards this… a choice can only be said to be free if an agent can make some sort of judgement about all the possible choices… in order to weight them against one another...it’s got to have some meaning to us otherwise the choice is just random…”
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fqxi-podcast/id5237873
76
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 02:02 GMT
(continued)
3. “…so this is what defines a free choice : the Zeta function, and that’s for a single free choice , so there are lots of choices that could be free , and they could be made by systems that don’t have free will , but the point is: what is free will then, so a measure of free will would be …some partition function that is function of all the Zetas for different choices meaning the level of free will depends in some way on the freedom of the choices under consideration and the expectation of this is that there are going to be different levels of free will for different systems …I would expect that an increasing level of complexity is going to lead to an increasing level of free will ..from a bumble bee to a computer to my wife …I assume that the level of free will goes up that way…This leaves a bunch of questions, and the first is can this model produce real measurable results ; does it necessarily presuppose a dualist view of consciousness - it certainly is panpsychist , but whether it is dualist or not, I haven’t decided , it certainly seems like it ought to be…”
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fqxi-podcast/i
d523787376
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 15:33 GMT
I do not define free will in the same way it is defined in [1].
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 23:20 GMT
So, define “free will” Ian.
It’s obvious that you are not talking about a free will where people could have contributed to climate change: your version of “free will” is all randomness and determined outcomes.
I.e. people are thrown round by the vagaries of randomness, and the iron laws of determinism: only spaghetti logic can turn this situation into “free will”.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 30, 2019 @ 17:02 GMT
As I have repeatedly said, I actually don't really *define* free will outside of behavioral observation. Reread my post and listen to the podcast. It's all there.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 30, 2019 @ 23:14 GMT
Ian,
The only valid “definition” of free will is whether or not people make a genuine
difference to the world, i.e. a genuine
INPUT to the world.
Either people make a genuine input to the world, i.e. people played a part in causing climate change OR it was just laws of nature that caused these climate change outcomes.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Sep. 1, 2019 @ 01:51 GMT
Lorraine,
So I think there are a few things going on here. In order to parse this discussion out a bit better, it might be helpful to discuss this in terms of philosophy of the mind. Not sure how much you've read in that field, but it helps frame discussions of these kinds.
Regarding my talk, it seems pretty clear to me that my definition of free will is one that requires genuine input to the world. That is why I mention near the end of my talk that my interpretation might require a dualist or panpsychist view. From what I can gather from your posts, you would likely fall under the category of dualism or panpsychism. Your contention concerning physics appears to be that physics logically (depending on which type of logic one appeals to---see my comment below) leads to a form of hard reductionist monism.
I think the latter is a misguided assertion and here is why. While physics itself is largely reductionist, there is nothing about physics that logically
prevents a dualist or panpsychist interpretation. Physics itself (especially quantum physics) has limits to its own knowledge baked into itself (e.g. the uncertainty relation). In fact, so does mathematics (e.g. Gödel's theorems). Neither physics nor mathematics can be the basis for all knowledge. I will admit that some physicists do claim this (e.g. Sean Carroll), but the logical support for that view is on shaky ground and I would (unscientifically) claim that most physicists do not hold to this view.
That, in no way, should prevent physicists from continuing to employ physics in the manner we tend to employ it. As George Ellis (who definitely does NOT subscribe to the Sean Carroll view) suggests in many of his recent writings on complexity, complex phenomena require both upwardly causal (reductionist)
and downwardly causal explanations. So your either/or statement is a false dichotomy.
Finally, what physicists actually think and what physics itself says are two entirely different things. In several posts you have said "physicists think X" but later said "physics logically leads to X". These are not the same thing.
this post has been edited by the author since its original submission
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 1, 2019 @ 16:55 GMT
Ian,
Many people vehemently deny that they have free will. But what many others call “free will” is not free will [1]: they believe in a Daniel Dennett-type pseudo-free will, which they call “free will”, but which is actually just re-badged determinism.
These people deny that genuine free will exists because physics and philosophy has drummed a certain view of the world into their heads, a view of the world that originates in the theories of physics, and also comes directly from physicists like Sabine Hossenfelder who recently (May) wrote a blog post entitled “How to live without free will”.
The basic idea coming from physics, and inhabiting people’s heads, is that law of nature relationships and/or randomness is the only cause of all their actions and outcomes. Physics does not provide any backup for the idea that living things, cells and molecules could partially cause their own outcomes, i.e. could in effect create their own
new number assignment relationships.
I agree that there is nothing about the
equations of physics “that logically
prevents a dualist or panpsychist interpretation”, or a free will interpretation. It’s the
ideas of physics about the nature of matter that prevents a free will interpretation.
1. Free will: “The power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate”, https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/free_will (Oxford dictionary).
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Sep. 2, 2019 @ 01:51 GMT
"The basic idea coming from physics, and inhabiting people’s heads, is that law of nature relationships and/or randomness is the only cause of all their actions and outcomes. Physics does not provide any backup for the idea that living things, cells and molecules could partially cause their own outcomes, i.e. could in effect create their own new number assignment relationships.""
I think my biggest beef with this is the part about it inhabiting people's heads. That's simply not true. If you still doubt this, read George Ellis' book.
That said, it is true that physics, as a discipline, does not provide for the causal effectiveness of certain complex systems under certain conditions, at least in the way you mean it. George talks about this extensively in his book. But that is why physics, as a discipline (rather than a way of thinking which is different), is just one of many ways to look at the world. A complete view of the world necessarily requires input from all these various disciplines.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 2, 2019 @ 23:08 GMT
Ian,
Physicist George Ellis’ views descend into: magic and mystery and blackboxing; a parallel universe of abstract Platonic entities controlling a puppet-matter; and miracles of emergence rising from the dead.
The physics’ view then becomes: the world is a closed system encompassing magic Platonic entities where absolutely everything is system generated, including puppet-people, pseudo-free will and climate change.
Sorry, but
physics says that: people make no genuine input to the world; people can play no part in causing climate change – it was just the system with its magic Platonic entities that caused climate change outcomes.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 3, 2019 @ 00:46 GMT
I.e. physics outsources cause to magic Platonic entities, leaving matter as a puppet.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Sep. 3, 2019 @ 20:22 GMT
Let the record show that I tried. But you seem to want to disagree with me simply for the sake of disagreeing with me. So I'm done here.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 3, 2019 @ 22:29 GMT
Sorry Ian,
But I think it is time that physicists admitted, to the people of the world, the truth about what physics says about the nature of the world.
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Georgina Woodward wrote on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 02:14 GMT
Hi Ian, I've been thinking about choice of carrot or pepper. Behaving in a habitual way takes less mental effort than trying something new and the outcome of the habitual choice is more certain. Done it before, turned out well, likely to do it again. I'm thinking of a person who only uses carrots for cooking and only uses peppers for scooping cold savory dip. This person's habit and intention when going to the fridge decide what is chosen. Free will would be in the very slim chance of doing something completely different-the opposite choice for the intended purpose. The probability distribution for different choices seems a tricky thing, with so many influences. E.g. food price, culture, appetite. My own choice of pepper or carrot for scooping dip depends on the colour of the pepper. Yellow or red trumps carrot. Carrot trumps green pepper.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 07:45 GMT
I see you are suggesting modeling each process of choosing. Such as reaching for foods in different places. Do you think enacting the choice (or what appears to be a choice) is sufficient to demonstrate or model free will? Or is the ability to make a choice part of it too? A robot picking items for dispatch in a warehouse isn't really demonstrating free will. What it will do is predetermined by its programming and abilities. Although it appears to choose and enact the choice. For a creature of habit there might not be choosing at all, just doing. The same action strengthened by multiple repetitions.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 15:31 GMT
Hi Georgina, that first point you make is a good one. At what point does something simply become habitual and how can that be modeled? I'm not sure about either of those. My thought is that the time we take to ponder our choices matters. It seems like a habitual choice, on average, is made more quickly than a non-habitual choice.
I don't think that enacting a *single* choice is sufficient to demonstrate free will. I think free will is a statistical phenomenon. I think it is possible for a computer or a robot to make a singular free choice from time to time, but I don't know if it has free will. My guess is not precisely because so many of their choices are essentially determined by programming or habitual choices.
This brings up an important point that my wife made at one point (she's a political scientist). Free will requires the capacity to learn. If something like a computer or robot has the capacity to learn, then perhaps it could demonstrate some level of free will.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 20:59 GMT
Ian,
I'm not sure about this "The zeta-function should also be inversely proportional to the variance of the choice (the smaller the variance, the greater the freedom as I just described)."Ian Durham. It seems counter intuitive, in that the less different, most restrictive circumstance, is giving more freedom. The choice between two carrots might seem easier than carrot or pepper. However if asked to choose the very best carrot it becomes harder because all of the attributes of the carrots need considering. The individual carrots are no longer just generic vegetables but unique in their own way. I think like market research, what you get will depend very much on the question asked.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 22:48 GMT
An individual's response to the problem of best carrot could be anything from a very quick choice, with the reasoning,"its just a carrot, who cares?" to analysis paralysis, with the reasoning "its too difficult to decide between them".(Best in who's opinion?, what is meant by best? what will the carrot be used for? etc.. Another factor that would influence the way the choice is made is whether there is a reward (or perceived reward) for the 'correct' choice and if there is a negative consequence (real or perceived) for the 'wrong' choice. Bigger consequences will probably lead to more careful decision making,(or to analysis paralysis).
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 04:52 GMT
Re. learning; maybe it's a specific kind of learning. Learning what doesn't work and continuing a trial and error approach does not necessarily lead to the right action for the chosen outcome. However learning what does work the action necessary can be implemented. A robot could have a number of different protocols that it tries in order. Maybe 3 attempts then on to the next protocol if it hasn't worked. That isn't free will. If it already 'knows' which protocol to use from prior attempts, and implements the correct one that does look like free will.(Is it?) Even more so if it has learned how to act rather than that action being pre-programmed.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 07:25 GMT
Georgina,
What does "000010100011110101111111110000011101110101010" mean?
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 07:26 GMT
Or even simpler:
What does 001100 mean?
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 21:30 GMT
Lorraine,
It looks like machine code but it could just be a random selection of 1s and 0s you have written. If machine code it is a sequence of on,offs that operate the hardware i.e. allow it to function. I could ask you, what do the sequence of nerve impulses in one of your nerves mean?
this post has been edited by the author since its original submission
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 22:25 GMT
Hi Ian, I have posted 3 relies to you, prior to Lorraine's question to me.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 23:08 GMT
Georgina,
On the subject of computers/ robots/ "AIs", which is what you were talking about, what does 001100 mean?
Perhaps Ian or Steve could tell us, if you don't know what 001100 means.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 23:34 GMT
Re Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 15:31 GMT..."Free will requires the capacity to learn. If something like a computer or robot has the capacity to learn, then perhaps it could demonstrate some level of free will.":
This is an example of the low point that physics has reached at this point in time: physics is completely incapable of envisioning or modelling free will because physics’ models of the world make free will impossible. I.e. physics is incapable of modelling a world where people could have contributed to climate change.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 27, 2019 @ 00:12 GMT
Lorraine, "In general, machine languages are based on the binary code".." For example, the number 13 would be represented as 1101. Similarly, a particular address in the computer's memory might be represented as 01100011, and an instruction in the computer's instruction set might be represented as 001100." Programming Languages, http://turing.cs.trincoll.edu/~ram/jjjnotes/ch0/node12.html
It is also used in Futurama;"The time code is a sequence of binary numbers which initiates a paradox-correcting timesphere. It is also a Level 87 code. This timesphere allows for one-way travel backwards through time, while simultaneously correcting any paradoxes that might ensue" Futurama wiki, https://futurama.fandom.com/wiki/Time_Code
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 27, 2019 @ 00:47 GMT
Georgina,
You haven't answered the question: what does 001100 mean i.e. precisely, what meaning do the symbols 001100 represent? You seem to be trying to guess at various options for what 001100 could potentially represent, but that doesn't answer the question.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 27, 2019 @ 05:17 GMT
Lorraine, it depends on the context and you have given no context. It could be the combination lock code for someone's suitcase. It's like asking what a combination of letters that don't form a a word mean. They could be book classification code, they could be a person's initials, they could represent a company's name, they could be an abbreviation for a common phrase like BTW, PTO, and so on.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 27, 2019 @ 05:55 GMT
"In binary language it goes something like this 001100111011000111100, which roughly translated means, 'Don't stand around jabbering when you're in mortal danger.'"Kryten, RED DWARF Series V Episode 3, "Terrorform" series created by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor, Recorded: 22.11.1991
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 27, 2019 @ 22:22 GMT
Georgina,
I’ll leave you to ponder what meaning a string of symbols represents. If you can find one, let me know.
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 22:36 GMT
I am aware that Max Tegmark is the director of the organization that runs this site, and I am aware that his hard work is directly responsible for the fact that I and others have this forum.
Which is more the pity because, like Trump, he and others are criminally misleading gullible people by suggesting that intelligence and consciousness "emerges" from circuit boards. It's gullible physicists and philosophers that "might want to reconsider [their] approach" to the nature of the world.
And by the way, I did actually study computer science, maths and physics at university, a long time ago.
(This is a repeat of: "Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 00:38 GMT", which someone has deleted)
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 23:08 GMT
I am aware that Max Tegmark is the director of the organization that runs this site, and I am aware that his hard work is directly responsible for the fact that I and others have this forum.
Which is more the pity because, like Trump, he and others are criminally misleading gullible people by suggesting that intelligence and consciousness "emerges" from circuit boards. It's gullible physicists and philosophers that "might want to reconsider [their] approach" to the nature of the world.
And by the way, I did actually study computer science, maths and physics at university, a long time ago.
(This is a repeat of: "Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 00:38 GMT", which seemingly Georgina has censored)
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 23:38 GMT
Re Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 15:31 GMT..."Free will requires the capacity to learn. If something like a computer or robot has the capacity to learn, then perhaps it could demonstrate some level of free will.":
This is an example of the low point that physics has reached at this point in time.
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 23:12 GMT
Censorship warning: if you say something she doesn't like, Georgina will censor you, by deleting your post.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 03:55 GMT
Lorraine, I do not censor other people's posts but I do sometimes report them for moderation. Usually advertisements. I did so for your repeat postings of a post already sent for moderation or deleted by FQXi
Look at terms of use, left hand side panel.
"Per the scientific and educational purposes of the forums, users should adhere to a code of conduct where they discuss in a civil, helpful, and constructive way. Users should only post comments or questions that they would also make in person, in a professional public setting, such as a classroom or seminar hall." FQXi.org
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 04:25 GMT
Georgina,
Max Tegmark is (deleted*) misleading gullible people by suggesting that intelligence and consciousness "emerges" from circuit boards. I would say that in any public forum, because this is an extremely serious issue.
(*Post edited by Zeeya on August 26 to remove ambiguous wording that could be interpreted as libellous.)
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 04:09 GMT
(Content of post deleted for repetition, by Zeeya, 26 August 2019.)
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 11:05 GMT
(Content of post deleted for repetition, by Zeeya, 26 August 2019.)
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FQXi Administrator Zeeya Merali wrote on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 11:29 GMT
Hi all,
I've had complaints about the posts on this thread both for their content and also for being censored. Lorraine, your post from August 25th has now been reinstated, so please stop reposting it. Just to clarify, other posters can't delete your posts, but they can flag them for review -- at which point they will temporarily disappear. In this case, I can understand why whoever flagged the post was concerned.
Could everyone please be respectful of other posters' views and also (especially) of people who are not taking part in this discussion?
I will delete/edit posts if they are rude to other people or potentially libellous. I would suggest, for instance, re-thinking whether people want to claim in a public forum that anyone's actions are "criminal". I would suggest re-thinking the wording in that case, and retracting any potentially libellous wording before I have to come in and remove that wording. I would prefer not to have to come in an censor portions of posts, so please edit these yourselves.
It's absolutely fine to strongly criticise people's work (even if they are one of FQXi's scientific directors), if it is relevant to the topic of the thread. But please steer clear of language that may cause legal issues.
Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 11:55 GMT
Hi Zeeya,it's important Indeed to moderate correctly and universally this wonderful platform. I beleive strongly that FQXi and its team has the potential to convice this UN with concrete global solutions.We are obliged to do it.A time for all ,we must act and forget sometimes our lifes for this universalism. We are of course all focus on our own works,like me too with my theory of spherisation,but I beleive that we must act and I am repeating a time for all.We have a global system which is not able to reach the points of equilibrium.Can we accept this when we can predict the future with our actual parameters? no we cannot.It's a responsability for all real universlists,altruists.A time for all after all.Please Zeeya ,convice your team that we must act.The MIT is the best,so we can do it.The UN will understand.Friendly
this post has been edited by the author since its original submission
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 12:04 GMT
We can save this planet Zeeya,it's important and it will be the most important revolution of all times. Imagine the potential that we have. FQXi,MIT can do it with rationalism,determinism,universalism,logic,objectivity.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 14:26 GMT
Thanks Zeeya.
I would have hoped that it was obvious from the context of my sentence that I meant:
“Criminally”, adverb, 2.
informal [as submodifier] “To a shocking degree”, https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/criminally (Oxford dictionary)
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FQXi Administrator Zeeya Merali replied on Aug. 27, 2019 @ 11:27 GMT
Hi Lorraine.
It seems I was mistaken yesterday. I thought I had reinstated your original post, but it looks like the original post had already permanently been deleted by another FQXi administrator.
I accidentally reinstated one of your repeated postings instead, which I have now deleted because it includes an unwarranted accusation against another poster.
If you would like to continue discussing the merits and flaws of Tegmark's work, then I would like to invite you to re-post the substance of your criticism of his research. However, please avoid using ambiguous words like "criminally" when describing anyone's research. If you don't, chances are your high that the posts will just be deleted again.
Please also refrain from offending your fellow posters by making accusations against them.
Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 27, 2019 @ 22:29 GMT
I’ll try to be good, Zeeya.
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 22:39 GMT
Physics says that climate change was not caused by people. I say it again: The world is burning, environmental catastrophe is looming, but physics says that people could not have contributed to climate change. Because:
1. Physicists have absolutely no conception of a valid model of free will, and physicists have no model of a world in which free will could exist.
2. All physics’ models can say is that deterministic laws of nature or “probability distributions” or randomness is the
sole cause of human behaviours. I.e. physics’ models say that people themselves are not responsible for their behaviours. Some physics models say that people ARE the embodiment of deterministic and random forces, for which they bear no responsibility.
3. Therefore, physicists and their models of the world clearly say that people could not have contributed to climate change.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 27, 2019 @ 23:51 GMT
This is a patently false claim. Physics DOES NOT SAY THIS AT ALL. Repeating a false claim over and over does not make it true.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 00:38 GMT
Yes Ian,
Your claim is a patently false claim. Physics DOES SAY THIS. Your repeating a false claim over and over does not make it true.
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Rick Lockyer replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 14:39 GMT
The most critical existential threat is not “climate change”, it is hate. Too many people today suppress logic and reason in the decision process, replacing them with emotional reaction. This methodology is being taught to our children in high schools and universities, diminishing their “free will” and enhancing their susceptibility to manipulation by the *agency* of hate used by those looking for their own ideology and/or biases to *emerge*.
Lorraine, you need to apologize to Georgina, she did not flag your posts as inappropriate, I did. I reported your dump on Trump comments post and Ian Durham’s post calling him a racist.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 14:55 GMT
I keep a copy of every comment I have ever made, and I have never made any racist comments about anybody. I also keep a copy of every comment people make to me.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 15:05 GMT
Also, I do not apologize to Georgina, because she is an adult and can speak for herself, and she did not deny that she had deleted my comments.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 22:22 GMT
This is a repeat of a comment I made which someone has deleted:
Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 15:05 GMTAlso, I do not apologize to Georgina, because she is an adult and can speak for herself, and she did not deny that she had deleted my comments.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 22:40 GMT
I do believe that Rick Lockyer must have been on some sort of substance in order to have made the above ranting and inaccurate comments and accusations about racism and hate.
This is a repeat of a comment I made to Rick which someone (Rick? Georgina?) has slyly deleted:
Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 15:05 GMT:Also, I do not apologize to Georgina, because she is an adult and can speak for herself, and she did not deny that she had deleted my comments.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 29, 2019 @ 01:26 GMT
I do believe that Rick Lockyer must have been on some sort of substance in order to have made the above ranting and inaccurate comments and accusations about racism and hate. I.e. seemingly he was obliquely accusing me of racism and hate. Also the implication is that Georgina is such a weak person that he personally needs to stand up and demand that I apologise to her.
This is a repeat of a comment I made to Rick which someone has slyly deleted:
Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 15:05 GMT:Also, I do not apologize to Georgina, because she is an adult and can speak for herself, and she did not deny that she had deleted my comments.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 29, 2019 @ 01:42 GMT
Seemingly Rick Lockyer was obliquely accusing me of racism and hate, but he was not capable of saying it to me directly.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 29, 2019 @ 02:30 GMT
This is a repeat and extension of a comment I made which some proudly anonymous person has slyly deleted:
I do believe that Rick Lockyer must have been on some sort of substance in order to have made the above ranting and inaccurate comments and accusations about racism and hate.
Seemingly Rick Lockyer was obliquely accusing me of racism and hate, but he was not capable of saying it to me directly.
Also Rick's implication was that Georgina is such a weak person that he personally needs to stand up and demand that I apologise to her (there's a lot of old-style men out there who believe that women need a big stwong man to stand up for them). So this is a repeat of a comment I made to Rick which someone has slyly deleted:
Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 15:05 GMT:Also, I do not apologize to Georgina, because she is an adult and can speak for herself, and she did not deny that she had deleted my comments.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 29, 2019 @ 17:15 GMT
Lorraine,
Please give me a citation then to a source where I can see for myself that physics says this.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 29, 2019 @ 22:52 GMT
Ian,
I’m arguing a case
against the physics view: I am saying what the
logical implications of the physics view are:
The only causal factors physics sees in the whole system are randomness, equations (including the equations that calculate statistics and probabilities in the system) and numbers. People are essentially randomness, equations and numbers or matter ruled by randomness, equations and numbers.
The
logical implication of what physics says is that people are no more causal factors in the system than dry leaves blown around by the wind are causal factors in the system: logically, physics can’t distinguish people from dry leaves blown around by the wind.
I was about to post to another FQXi blog page, but I’ll post part of it here:
… physics makes the mistake of thinking that a set of equations and numbers,
without algorithmic drivers, constitutes a system. It doesn’t. This is why physics continues to look for ever more weird statistical and probabilistic solutions to the issue of causality.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 30, 2019 @ 17:06 GMT
Logic has a very specific meaning. In fact there are many forms of logic. So when you say that the "logical implications of the physics view are..." which form of logic are you using? As someone trained in computer science, math, and physics, you should be able to answer this. Only then can we actually ask if the logical implications of physics really are what you say they are.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 30, 2019 @ 22:33 GMT
Oh, very amusing Ian!
You are using the old “denying that your opponent is using valid forms of logic” trick.
I would like you to please explain how physics distinguishes people from dry leaves blown around by the wind.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Sep. 1, 2019 @ 01:53 GMT
I was not attempting to be amusing. I was asking a serious question. At any rate, please see my reply above where I laid out what I think is the disagreement here (it's under the thread where you asked me to define free will).
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Georgina Woodward wrote on Aug. 27, 2019 @ 06:15 GMT
Hi Ian, I'm re-posting these thoughts as they have got buried where I wrote them.
Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 20:59 GMT
Ian, I'm not sure about this "The zeta-function should also be inversely proportional to the variance of the choice (the smaller the variance, the greater the freedom as I just described)."Ian Durham. It seems counter intuitive, in that the less...
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Hi Ian, I'm re-posting these thoughts as they have got buried where I wrote them.
Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 20:59 GMT
Ian, I'm not sure about this "The zeta-function should also be inversely proportional to the variance of the choice (the smaller the variance, the greater the freedom as I just described)."Ian Durham. It seems counter intuitive, in that the less different, most restrictive circumstance, is giving more freedom. The choice between two carrots might seem easier than carrot or pepper. However if asked to choose the very best carrot it becomes harder because all of the attributes of the carrots need considering. The individual carrots are no longer just generic vegetables but unique in their own way. I think like market research, what you get will depend very much on the question asked.
Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 25, 2019 @ 22:48 GMT
An individual's response to the problem of best carrot could be anything from a very quick choice, with the reasoning,"its just a carrot, who cares?" to analysis paralysis, with the reasoning "its too difficult to decide between them".(Best in who's opinion?, what is meant by best? what will the carrot be used for? etc.. Another factor that would influence the way the choice is made is whether there is a reward (or perceived reward) for the 'correct' choice and if there is a negative consequence (real or perceived) for the 'wrong' choice. Bigger consequences will probably lead to more careful decision making,(or to analysis paralysis).
Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 26, 2019 @ 04:52 GMT
Re. learning; maybe it's a specific kind of learning. Learning what doesn't work and continuing a trial and error approach does not necessarily lead to the right action for the chosen outcome. However learning what does work the action necessary can be implemented. A robot could have a number of different protocols that it tries in order. Maybe 3 attempts then on to the next protocol if it hasn't worked. That isn't free will. If it already 'knows' which protocol to use from prior attempts, and implements the correct one that does look like free will.(Is it?) Even more so if it has learned how to act rather than that action being pre-programmed.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 27, 2019 @ 23:49 GMT
Hi Georgina,
I agree with your point about the carrots. My theory is that the Mahalanobis distance between two carrots is smaller than, say, the Mahalanobis distance between a carrot and a pepper. But as long as there is some difference between the two carrots, they will still be distinguishable in some way. But you are right that it may also depend on the question asked. This is a definite problem in some of these issues, i.e. how to capture certain qualia in a formal theory.
One thing I did notably not include was the consequences. At least not directly. I assume that consequences are accounted for in the weights assigned to the various choices. But this is why I ask if my approach is necessarily dualist or pan-psychist because it seems to suggest an external agent with the capability of deciding on weights.
Regarding learning, it very likely is a specific kind of learning. It's an area that I need to purse in more depth.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 02:18 GMT
Hi Ian, thanks for your reply. Peppers don't turn into carrots and vice versa. However, there will be some ending with wrong vegetable, if enough trials are conducted or fatigue or distraction, or high consequence with very short time limit (stressors), are also at play. I know I have on occasion taken the wrong thing out of the fridge. I don't know if there is as name for that free will gone awry. Insufficient conscious supervision of the motor functions/ mind 'elsewhere' or inhibited. I understand that it is more likely to end with the consciously chosen vegetable when the choice is two carrots rather than carrot or pepper. Because you can only have a carrot with no other choice available, and if it doesn't matter which one. I don't understand why there is greater'freedom' with less choice. I'm guessing it is a mathematical meaning of freedom.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 02:54 GMT
Hi Ian, I don't think panpsychism is necessary. Physics compatible with itself and without paradox needs there to be 'reality' generated by brains (and some kinds of input processing devices), and 'outside' of those generated realities the external material reality.
Dollars on the table are part of the external reality. The perception of the reward is part of the generated 'reality' that will have an effect on things like motivation, anxiety, via dopamine and cortisol release. The mind affecting the body (via the endocrine system) though the body is also part of the material reality. I expect the effect of the potential reward will effect individual participants by different amounts, and maybe in different ways, according to their individual psychology.E.g. Maybe seasoned gamblers will respond differently to non gamblers.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 04:55 GMT
The word 'mind' seems insufficient. It can refer to brain function but also to products of that brain function; thoughts, ideas, sensations including vision, imagination including visualization and emotion. The brain, its micro and macro-structure that enables it to function are part of material reality. The experienced products of the brain function are parts of the internal, generated 'reality'. So it may be helpful to differentiate'mind(brain functioning)'and 'mind(generated products)'. Those descriptions can be abbreviated. Not all brain function is mind, only that experienced. Thoughts and other processing that is not experienced could be described as the subconscious mind, not just mind (as that would be unclear.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 06:51 GMT
I meant by this "However, there will be some ending with wrong vegetable, if enough trials are conducted...", sooner or later a momentary lapse of concentration will coincide with the act of taking out the vegetable. It could be listening to internal dialogue unrelated to the task or paying attention to visualization/ daydreaming or just 'zoning out/going blank'. Which are different from distraction by stimuli of external origin. It can happen in an environment free of external distraction. The person with the wrong vegetable is then going to have an "I did not mean to do that "or "why did I do that" moment :)
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 20:31 GMT
Hi Ian, there are some thoughts in the preceding posts that I thought might be of interest. I have worked out why the freedom is more with just carrots. Though the freedom to choose between kinds of veg. is less, the choice of individual type has increased to two from just one.Just saying the freedom has increased was unclear to me.
The name of the phenomenon I was describing is 'absentmindedness' (being absentminded.) Ironic that I had forgotten the word.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 29, 2019 @ 21:06 GMT
Ian, I think absentmindedness will be less frequent under laboratory conditions. As participants will be particularly focused on the task. Perhaps it can be induced by giving the participants a mental task to carry out at the same time. such as memorizing a long set of directions to somewhere, or remembering the spatial arrangement of a large set of objects. External distraction and internal pre occupation with it could be taking a telephone call and taking a message while doing the veg. choice task.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 30, 2019 @ 17:01 GMT
Yes, there will definitely be cases where things we choose don't actually lead to the right outcome (or, rather, the outcome we expected). We just expect in the overwhelming majority of instances that they do. So, yes, there is a case for absentmindedness. But my model does account for that.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Aug. 31, 2019 @ 03:53 GMT
Ian, it is something that has an effect on probability of chosen outcome being actualized, in real life. Also some people are more prone to absentmindedness than others. Although not part of your model I think it is relevant as you are taking a statistical approach. If you used a population of dementia patients the rate of free will going awry because of absentmindedness would be higher. Indicating less free will, as they are, as a population, less able to complete the action necessary to actualize their choices.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Sep. 1, 2019 @ 01:59 GMT
Hmm. Is that necessarily a bad thing? Do dementia patients really have the same level of free will as the rest of us? It's a question worth at least considering.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Sep. 1, 2019 @ 10:32 GMT
Hi Ian, is what necessarily a bad thing? Loosing one's short term memory is surely not good, I'd say it's bad. Is memory not being a part of your model a bad thing? No because you have to start somewhere, and it's something that could possibly be included, if you wanted to. later on. There are lots of ways in which the actualization of choice can be prevented. Locked in syndrome must be the worst. Even-so, an amazing feat of will is
The DIving Bell and the Butterfly "paralyzed with what is known as locked-in syndrome, with the only exception of some movement in his head and eyes." "The entire book was written by [Jean-Dominique] Bauby blinking his left eyelid, which took ten months (four hours a day)." "200,000 blinks to write and an average word took approximately two minutes."Wikipedia
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Anonymous wrote on Aug. 27, 2019 @ 18:56 GMT
Ian,
I think its clear enough that you are tackling an operational rather than foundational question. And I have long appreciated your observance of proper scientific method.
Just a quick thought. Whether at the foundational, or fundamental application level, there always seems to be an expectation of underlying perfection in all theorizing. Yet daily in the mundane macroworld there exists a practical limit on information transfer and/or loss which is peculiarly arbitrary by locale. Despite the advertised expectation of great savings by going digital, the cost of transcription from hardcopy to digital archive of records (like building permit applications, etc.) has resulted in an immeasurable loss of historical data.
Which beggs the question; does the universe actually have an arbitrary, operational practical limit on information transfer? And how could that be quantified? best jrc
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Aug. 27, 2019 @ 23:43 GMT
Thanks, and great question! This is something I have thought about but I don't think I'm any closer to an answer than I was several years ago. It seems that if the universe is finite then it would stand to reason the answer is 'yes'. But then maybe not?
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 15:24 GMT
Hello to both of you,
We Don't know about this finite universe.In my small theory,yes I consider a finite universal sphere in optimisation evolution.Beyond this physicality I consider an infinite eneternal consciousness.That is why I consider a central cosmological sphere where this entity,pure Energy,infinite sends informations implying our geometries,topologies,matters.I beleive that aether is so gravitational.The big philosophical difference with strings and this 1D main field is that this aether is coded and imply particles giving waves.I beleive that particles and aether give these waves,not the opposite. Now how to consider this infinity? Inside this physicality appearing with our constants,numbers,others and about too this link with this infinity,this pure Energy,conscious without spacetime,matters,geometries,shapes.We can just have intuitive assumptions,it's so above our understanding.
Regards
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Robert H McEachern replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 17:42 GMT
JRC:
"there always seems to be an expectation of underlying perfection in all theorizing"
"does the universe actually have an arbitrary, operational practical limit on information transfer?"
Those two issues are directly related via the Shannon Capacity theorem, but there is nothing arbitrary about it.
Consider the issue of "perfection" in Bell's theorem: if the particles being measured in the experiments are not perfectly identical, as required by the fundamental premise of the theorem, then the theorem does not apply, to reality. In "reduction to an absurdity", one demonstrates the falsity of a premise, by deriving an absurd conclusion from it. That is exactly what Bell's theorem accomplishes; it concludes that reality is absurd, based upon a dubious, idealistic premise, of infinite mathematical-perfection in the "identical" nature of the particles that must be measured, in order for the conclusion to be valid. However, it has been demonstrated, that if one merely measures particle-pairs that are only "fraternal twins", rather than Bell's assumed "identical twins", the same weird, experimental correlations will be reproduced, without any of the absurdities. This happens, precisely because the "information transfer" is restricted to a single-bit. See my
Dialog with Tim Maudlin for some further insights.
Rob McEachern
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 00:29 GMT
How long will physicists continue to waste their time, and other people’s money, by looking for an equations-and-numbers solution to the problem issues of life, consciousness and free will? They’ve ended up believing in magic and miracles e.g. consciousness and free will is believed to have miraculously “emerged” from something that is representable by equations and numbers.
This magical thinking has reached a low point with physicists suggesting that consciousness, intelligence and even free will can miraculously “emerge” from circuit boards.
You need IF/THEN algorithms to represent the consciousness, intelligence and free will of living things, and even some of the quantum behaviours of particles. You need algorithms to represent the behaviour of physicists and mathematicians when they perform their mathematical calculations: mathematics is not a Platonic entity: mathematics relies on the performance of algorithmic steps.
There exists a natural and necessary algorithmic aspect to the world.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 09:25 GMT
Hi Lorraine,
I can understand your reasoning. That said can we affirm that algorythms are the solution to all explainations. We have codes Inside our particles and these codes topological,geometrical,of matters are not really algorythms but codes beyond our understanding. Of course we have these informations permitting the sortings,superimposings,synchronizations of evolution but what is really this puzzle,we Don't know well.We are limited Simply even if we evolve and think that we are Evolved,no we aren't,we are still youngs at this universal scale.For these informations and codes permitting our emergent properties,probably,maybe,we can play still with these spherical volumes,spheres and the pixels in the surfaces.Probably it's like that too that we can understand the quantum computing with spherical knots.Algorythms are a human invention and permit this computing of course,we enter algorythms and the computer acts Simply.Universe is more complicated than this.Regards
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 14:35 GMT
Steve,
Algorithms, equations and numbers are merely symbolic representations of something about the way the natural world was already working long before human beings came on the scene. We did not cause the natural world to work that way.
We did not so much invent mathematics and algorithms: we have merely used symbols to represent the type of world that we have found: equations and numbers represent information
relationships; algorithms represent how information
situations are handled.
Equations symbolically represent numeric outcomes that are decided by relationships between variables. But equations can’t handle situations like a tiger approaching. Algorithms are a symbolic representation of the way situations are handled i.e. by analysing the numeric values of multiple variables to arrive at numeric outcomes.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 29, 2019 @ 20:05 GMT
Lorraine,
Thanks for explaining your point of vue, I see better how you see generally.I understand your symbols , I agree that we utilise these laws,axioms,equations,....due to fact that it exists a more foundmental universal axiom philosophically speaking, I am curious,do you beleive in a kind of God,an infinite Eternal consciousness utilising informations coded to create our reality? if yes,so can you explain me what is this mechanic above our understanding,what is its essence? what are its laws,what are the foundamental mathematical and physical objects? if I ask this,it's just because your analyses about symbols need a deeper analyse arriving at origin of things implying this reality and its determinism.
Regards
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 29, 2019 @ 23:26 GMT
Steve,
please see my answer below.
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John R. Cox wrote on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 19:57 GMT
Hello Rob,
You make a good argument at the foundational level, apart from the (let me call it) interface with 'free will' in the context of Ian's exercise. But here I have to side with Ian on the matter of a presumed perfect universe because in a perfect universe your argument would hold, but we can only approach the foundational level from the less than perfect macro experimental level in which the human propensity to dismiss what we deem as non-essential in setting parameters is what operationally passes as free will. I quite agree with the premise that information is limited to one bit, and experimentally we might set a parameter that the subject 'bit' is an experimentally refined threshold limit quantity of energy (within strict qualification of experiment protocols). So that is where our own personal peculiarities freely exercised, is the arbiter. And we still can only choose one paradigm over the other as to whether the universe always operates infallibly in all ways.
Sorry to not log in, pardon this extraneous thread. And Hello, Steve, I just don't go into that realm, I get confused easily enough where I'm at! goodwill to all, jrc
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Robert H McEachern replied on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 21:20 GMT
You neglect the fact that in Shannon's conception, unlike in physics, a bit of information, must be perfect by definition: it is only that fraction of data, that is a priori known, how to be perfectly reproduced/measured (with no errors), that ever counts as information, in the first place. Thus, "information" is not concerned at all, with the number of physical states existing within some entity, but only with the number that can actually be perfectly detected, under the given circumstances; and thereby cause perfectly reproducible behaviors to occur. Hence, freewill exists, precisely in those circumstances, in which there is insufficient information available (due to unknowable initial conditions), to ever result in perfectly reproducible (fully deterministic) behaviors. That is the "loophole" in determinism, that freewill slips through.
In other words, "information" is entirely concerned with that tiny subset of "reality", that actually is, in a very specific sense, perfect. The fact that most of the cosmos is not perfect in that sense, is irrelevant to the fact that some of it really is - or can be made to be. This (the ability of information to enable reproducible behaviors [AKA cause and effect]) is what "emergence" emerges from - starting with just a single bit - the quantum.
Rob McEachern
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John R. Cox wrote on Aug. 28, 2019 @ 23:33 GMT
Thanks Robert,
Those are excellent points, and I can agree with both your posts. I don't want to go too far afield of Ian's general theme but think that it is appropriate to point out the absurdity of Bell's assumption of identical particle pairs. Its one thing to propose that all particles of any distinct specie at inception, have a common mathematical identity. But that doesn't mean that they are either perfectly stable or that the identity isn't itself a physical condition of compromise between rest energy and space. Part of that identity might be a priori known and be unerringly (perfectly) reproducible, and that's what counts a la Shannon and experiment both. And experiment is measurement. jrc
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Aug. 29, 2019 @ 01:36 GMT
Clearly, one of the basic problems for physics is that equations and numbers can’t handle situations: you need algorithms to handle situations.
I.e. the idea that any set of equations and numbers is complete and sufficient to represent and explain the world is basically flawed.
Physics needs to explain where (what we represent as) algorithms came from: clearly (what we represent as) algorithms is fundamental to the world.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 29, 2019 @ 20:32 GMT
Lorraine,
It's logic ,we know so few still,we have so many secrets to discover at all scales,we are in fact Simply youngs considering the evolution,we know a so small part of general puzzle. It's not possible to know several things,we can just know the effects,and surfaces of foundamentals.Even if we think that we know a lot,it's not true,we have just invented ,proved some maths,physics and sciences.You say that algorythms are foundamentals ,but how can you be sure and what is the proof that this is the only Truth?
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 29, 2019 @ 20:44 GMT
Because the algorythms are just a set of instructions creating results. You cannot just consider these algorythms, it lacks Something of physics. Do you consider codes,instructions in strings or spacetime ? what are the physicality of foundamental objects? Do you consider points and fields, or a main field implying our reality and its properties creating these algorythms and so implying the matters,geometries,topologies?
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 29, 2019 @ 23:25 GMT
Steve,
Re "what are the physicality of foundamental objects?":
When you look at the world as a system, the world is a system representable by algorithms, equations and numbers. Equations and numbers alone don't constitute a system: any system requires algorithms to drive it. Physics makes the mistake of thinking that equations and numbers constitutes a viable system, but equations and numbers don’t constitute a viable system.
I would think that matter are the drivers of the system, where the behaviour of matter is representable as the algorithms that drive the system.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 30, 2019 @ 13:20 GMT
Lorraine,
Yes I can understand what you tell, but you have not answered about what is the cause of these algorythms,the origin, what, who creates this and what is their foundamental nature. Why we have these informations and entropy in resume. We need causes to our laws, algorythms, axioms,...
Regards
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 30, 2019 @ 21:55 GMT
Hi Steve,
If people have free will, i.e. if people can make a genuine difference to the world, then people can have genuinely contributed to climate change and the loss of plant and animal species.
This means that people have literally created new number assignment relationships for variables but, of course, most number outcomes for variables are due to law of nature relationships. This in turn means that matter is creative of relationships. This creative aspect is only symbolically representable algorithmically.
This is the world in which we have found ourselves: it is impossible to give absolute definitions of matter or natural relationships or natural algorithms: we can only represent them symbolically.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 31, 2019 @ 09:44 GMT
Hi Lorraine,
I understand still.We utilise symbols to explain our universal laws.These équations,axioms,others are the language of this universe,but like I said we know so few still about this universe at all scales.We evolve.We Don't know what are our foundamental mathematical and physical objects,I consider series finite of spherical volumes,spheres,coded implying our reality,but like all works,it's an assumption.Never I will be able to see this planck scale and several steps before.That's why we try with partitions,harmonical to find the road towards these main codes and why they imply our properties.But we are limited,we have wonderful mathematical and physical Tools like the geometrical algebras or others,but unfortunally we are limited.The universe with its Numbers,matters,geometries,topologies,energy transformations show us roads but these roads are so difficult and complex.We cannot affirm when we arrive at some levels of analyses.I am curious :) Lorraine,the question that I asked is philosophical,what is the cause of all this puzzle for you,I d be happy if you explain me how you see the generality philosophically speaking,do you consider a kind of Creator to all this ? Regards
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 31, 2019 @ 15:07 GMT
Steve,
As you said: “We Don't know what are our foundamental mathematical and physical objects” and “we are limited” and “We cannot affirm when we arrive at some levels of analyses”.
But IF we say that people have genuine free will (i.e. IF we say that people have genuinely played a part in causing climate change), THEN free will necessarily has a particular structure: matter inputs/creates new relationships in the world.
This is a democratic view where everything plays a part in ruling the world: it is the exact opposite of the command and control view where a god (or equivalently, laws of nature) despotically rule the world.
You could even say that this view is a more balanced feminine view of the world, while the physicists’ view is a more despotic masculine view of the world.
But this democratic view is very threatening to the very deeply held “religious” views of physicists.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Aug. 31, 2019 @ 18:22 GMT
Dear Lorraine,
I follow your reasoning. About climate change, It is not due to freewill but due to many parameters globally speaking. Freewill is limited for me and of course creates in its sphere of action some relationships and interactions.About these laws of nature,they are deterministic but are not an absolute commandment.The religions for me are human inventions maybe invented by groups of intelligent persons to decrease the bad evil side of the human nature.For me it's just Simply that.That said in studying the sciences,we find a kind of general logic,a kind of necessary chief orchestra creating the main codes,informations. The sciences Community is divided ,a part considers this infinite Eternal consciousness if I can say and the others no,they Don't consider it. In my model of spherisation,I consider this infinity like if this Eternal consciousness created a physicality in optimisation improvement evolution. I beleive strongly that we need this main cause to our reality.We Don't know what it is, but the generality shows the truths.We can have faith and in the same time respect our pure universal determinism and its evolution. About this femine view and masculine view lol I can recognise that masculine hormons govern this planet but a good new Lorraine is that we evolve and so there is hope :)
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Lorraine Ford replied on Aug. 31, 2019 @ 22:21 GMT
P.S.
I forgot to mention: My view of matter having free will is very close to, or the same as, quantum Bayesianism (QBism), see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_Bayesianism .
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 1, 2019 @ 08:36 GMT
Ok Lorraine,I know this Theorem of Bayes about probabilities,statistics,and the relevant links for artificial intelligence.All becomes probabilities of comportments,but these probabilities need to understand different parameters like the education,the genetic,the social environments,the encodings of informations,.....In fact all this becomes so complex and we must be prudent about the conclusions .Imagine that all parameters aren't taken into account juridically speaking for example or about the judgements.We must be very prudent with this AI.How too to compute the Vanity for example,can an AI have this comportment? no in logic,there are many différences betwen AI and biological consciousness.Probabilities must be utilised with the biggest wisdom.
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Anonymous wrote on Aug. 30, 2019 @ 01:05 GMT
And algorithms were embedded in mathematics before they were known as algorithms. The algebraic result is the generalization that obtains from analysis of variations of algorithmic application to a variety of similar observations and experiments. Just as Newton compiled volumes of differential equations on a catalogue of different values of parameters to arrive at an algebraic result that can be applied as a "physical law", so did Maxwell, and his results were further condensed with topology to produce the set of equations in current use. Those algebraic results which look like "numbers and equations" are considered physical laws because they can be applied to all cases of that type of phenomenon and the algorithms will permutate from the extrapolation of values of the variables. The Algebraic equations (or inequalities) embody not just the algorithms you do know, but all those you have not yet identified. That is not generally emphasized in baccalaureate studies and is conspicuously absent in most popular accounts of recent scientific discovery , but should become readily apparent to any serious effort to learn conventions, and understand what scientific method involves and how the bewildering cornucopia of today's modern physics could possible have come about. The only 'driver' missing in an algebraic expression of physical law, is the specified values of parametric variables which you must obtain from measurement to apply in calculation. F = ma, is not the same thing as A = bc, just the same operational form. F = ma is dynamic.
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John R. Cox wrote on Aug. 30, 2019 @ 15:10 GMT
Lorraine,
It is your own conclusion that the logical implication of all physics is that the physics view is that there is an underlying universal randomness to nature. Some would agree and run with it. But at present, the best analysis at Cern says that we still can't say one way or another. And most physicists accept that conclusion. The game goes on.
So the only argument for how you propose things be done, is for you to produce algorithms of your own and explain how they work. For anyone else to do the math to prove your contention would require they stop doing what they are doing and focus their attention on you to try to figure out what you are talking about, and then do the math for you. What do you think the probability is of that happening? :-) jrc
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John R. Cox wrote on Aug. 30, 2019 @ 18:51 GMT
Ian,
Not too surprisingly on this forum, people will drag you into the weeds of their own pet paradigm and away from your behavioral approach to exercise of free will, and the qualifications thereof.
I've encountered Robert McEachern on a number of topics, and have gradually gained some appreciation for his championing Shannon, though I haven't yet made a reading of Shannon. I do however see how there would be a good fit with your self appointed task of filtering the muddy waters of nth order behavior in the macro-realm of 'free will'. Because Shannon's definition of information being only that which can be made unerringly reproducible, is essentially what we base observation on even within quantum uncertainty constraints. And It at least would provide a benchmark to survey the uncertain field of human behavior to protract measures.
All this is a bit off my beaten track. I grew up with free will being an self-evident inalienable right that my parents' generation fought a world-wide war to preserve, and imbued with the sense of dual responsibility freedom put on me and how my behavior could impact its preservation. So that's how I personally measure it. best wishes jrc
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Steve Dufourny wrote on Aug. 31, 2019 @ 11:09 GMT
Hi Ian,
I read well several works about this freewill and the Random. I Don't agree personally about the fact that freewill,random are the essence at this foundamental universal level. In fact we must rank all this,the free will ,random and the superdeterminism.The different steps,levels where appear the determinism or random must be ranked but not generalised . Like I see it like the consciousness ,the free will is an emergent property due to evolution and brains and in function of environments and so interactions like locomotion,nutrition,reproduction,....The choice is function of so many parameters that it becomes relevant to rank it too. The superdeterminism for me is the main chief orchestra,random is just a sphere of comportments.I liked in this sphere of freewill and random your analyse with the zeta function,could you explain me why this function of Riemann with primes,the zéros ,is it to rank the free will? because the distribution of primes is harmonical and dterministic. Have you inserted in these maths,functions of random and free will ? but how do you consider genetic,evolution,education,psychology,environments,interact
ions,...to explain this freewill like foundamental?
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 1, 2019 @ 08:15 GMT
Hi all,Ian how must I ask my question? in french? Can I have details about your zeta function being important? Have you some maths or a paper ? that needs details and explainations,mathematical.If you Don't want to answer,just post a link.Thanks
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Sep. 1, 2019 @ 01:43 GMT
The physics’ view, as espoused by Ian Durham and the other physicists at the recent FQXi conference, is that the world is a closed system in which “free will”/ “agency” is a system-generated pseudo-input to the system. In this view of the world, absolutely everything is system generated, including people, pseudo-free will and climate change.
But genuine free will is where people make a genuine, i.e. non-system-generated, input to the world.
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Blogger Ian Durham replied on Sep. 1, 2019 @ 02:09 GMT
Please see my comments above on the thread where you ask me to define free will.
What I object to the most about your posts is that you are assigning beliefs to me and others (notably George Ellis) that we do not have.
You can object to our findings (provided you do not misrepresent them). You can object to our methods (again, provided you do not misrepresent them). You can even object to the culture surrounding physics as a field. But please do not falsely represent my beliefs.
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John R. Cox wrote on Sep. 1, 2019 @ 13:14 GMT
OOPS, I posted a comment to Georgina about memory but somehow put it on the Downward Causation page. And darned if I can remember what I was doing. An odd thing, it is a real time example on topic. How often does that sort of thing happen? averaging over averages. jrc
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Georgina Woodward replied on Sep. 1, 2019 @ 21:46 GMT
Yes John, a very timely example of absentmindedness affecting the outcome of a decision. I think you will agree that functional forgetting of information that is no longer relevant or important is different from dysfunctional forgetting because the brain is not able to function as a healthy brain does. Of course the dysfunctional forgetting of someone with Alzheimer's disease is far more disabling than the occasional absentmindedness of a healthy brain, distracted by internal or external factors.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Sep. 2, 2019 @ 01:12 GMT
Meaning factors of internal or external origin. Internal origin could, for example, be recall of a memory.External origin, for example, could be a loud startling noise.
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John R. Cox wrote on Sep. 1, 2019 @ 17:52 GMT
Ian and Lorraine,
if I may plaicate things a bit...
I don't think many would argue that physics today doesn't carry the legacy of of its evolutionary progress. Absolute determinism was the paradigm of the Newtonian age, and dynamics were observed as a 'time added' measurement. All measurement was treated on an arbitrary background of instantaneous observation. And its undoubtedly true that we continue to operate with a residual of that sense of observation both in formal physics but also in our daily lives. We reduce the complexity to the moment.
But the revolution a century ago both with Relativity and Quantum Mechanics discarded that static view of predetermined absolutism. In quantum mechanics we only observe the result of something happening (however arbitrary the measurement scheme), we wouldn't observe anything if something weren't happening. In Relativity no measurement can be made instantaneously.
That has fundamentally changed the physics landscape. And it goes without much elaboration that in the process of learning we have to start somewhere and that entails beginning with a truncated concept. So we invariably evolve some misconceptions as we progress and must continually revisit our beginnings and reassess our prejudices. Its more a learning tree than simple curve. I can't count the foolish things I've said or thought. Life goes on. OObla-di OObla-da, and I do seriously think we can only begin to understand what is in another's mind. good-day, I should mow the lawn. :-) jrc
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John R. Cox wrote on Sep. 2, 2019 @ 04:07 GMT
Georgi,
I got the correct topic this time, its late but I thought it proper to acknowledge your post(s). We're on the same page there. I had thought about that 7 limit when reading your dialogue with Ian (and then the Downward Causation topic was an Ian Blog too, so you can see the sequence where I dropped the element of returning to this page). To address the idea of Free Will from a scientific rather than philosophical perspective must rely heavily on Clinical Psychology. And even then there is a lot of hair-splitting. Personally, and as a matter of scientific method appropriate to the parameters Ian lays out as the limits of his exercise (theory is too soon a word), I see no point in carrying conjecture beyond psychological bounds. When it comes to splitting hairs, Occam's Razor works best. Free Will is a concept of sentient consciousness, not one of simple self awareness. If we didn't have the capacity to think about what we are thinking about... we wouldn't conceive of such a thing as free will. Its a matter of volition, Proactive intent with an expectation of result. And if it were something that evolves from The Pesky Particle recurring since the early days of science fiction then its not Free Will but determinism to a practical absolute extent. How could it be Both?
'course, I'm an old dog. And its late. jrc
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Georgina Woodward wrote on Sep. 2, 2019 @ 22:17 GMT
"Personally, and as a matter of scientific method appropriate to the parameters Ian lays out as the limits of his exercise (theory is too soon a word), I see no point in carrying conjecture beyond psychological bounds."J.R.Cox. I understand that there have to be limits to what will be done. There is a question though outside of psychology. Is action that is the result of human error, leading to the opposite outcome from the choice or desired outcome, as much free will as a the correct action to actualize the choice or desire? If just considering behaviour, then they are not differentiated. Yet human error that causes a plane to crash accidentally would not be generally considered an expression of free will. (Human error e.g. due to: fatigue, drug use, absentmindedness by internal or external sources of distraction, or ill health.)
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John R. Cox wrote on Sep. 2, 2019 @ 23:53 GMT
Georgi,
I get your point, I'll just quote my Intro Psych prof introducing himself to the class (beaucoup moon ago) he said, "I know you all have interesting stories that you can relate in emotional terms, but that is not what psychology is about. Psychology is the study of mental processes and how those processes give rise to behavior. And how by observing those behaviors systematically we can identify each process apart from others."
All those items you suggested are subject to studies in various branches of psychology and are brought together in Clinical Psychology; observation, experiment, testing and correlation of data. That's why its called 'clinical'.
For example when it comes to signal processing and output in tandem with observing systems, did you know that the common poop problem pigeon has monochromatic vision with the exception that it can also detect orange separately? Caged birds often are taken on search and rescue flights because their attention towards a tiny spot of orange life jacket will direct the observation of human observers with binoculars whom would have missed it. Non-invasive tests constructed to simply identify responses to stimuli discovered the orange anomaly of pigeon vision.
Much of psychology has to do with clarifying and qualifying what can be used as information. Much in Behavior Science and Psychiatry has to do with recognition and choice. Its a vast cross disciplinary field. Mass marketers exploit it to the exclusion of principle and sanity, in a very real sense, they already not only measure free will, they subvert it. :-) jrc
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Georgina Woodward replied on Sep. 3, 2019 @ 02:25 GMT
Domesticated or Feral: rock dove/ rock pigeon/ common pigeon. I did not know about their eyesight in regard to orange. I do know their fine attention to detail has been used to spot cancer in prepared tissue samples. " Once trained, the pigeons’ average diagnostic accuracy reached an impressive 85 percent. But when a “flock sourcing” approach was taken, in which the most common answer among all subjects was used, group accuracy climbed to a staggering 99 percent, or what would be expected from a pathologist. "Using pigeons to diagnose cancer, Scientific American, Bret Stetka Dec. 1, 2015
I agree the different kinds of human error fall into subjects studied by psychology. However re.human error and free will, is free will just about behavior or is intention important? Law says yes, does/should science?
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Georgina Woodward replied on Sep. 3, 2019 @ 05:48 GMT
When I said should science? I was thinking about how freewill is to be represented, and is behaviour adequate.
Furthermore, the law discriminates between acts that are careless/ negligent, acts that are reckless/ done despite 'foreseeable'/not unlikely negative consequences and willful acts/full intention to cause the outcome. The 3 categories pertain to different states of mind, inattention, disregard of risk and full intention. I expect the brain activity (. spanning initiation to completion of the act) could be distinguished, and possibly also neurotransmitter levels, ( but I don't know that as a fact.)
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John Brodix Merryman wrote on Sep. 2, 2019 @ 23:56 GMT
Ian,
One way to consider the problem is to review our perception of time.
As mobile organisms, necessitating a sequential process of perception and having built cultures and civilizations out of the collected narratives, we are naturally schooled to the notion of time as the point of the present moving past to future. Physics effectively codifies this as measures of duration, even...
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Ian,
One way to consider the problem is to review our perception of time.
As mobile organisms, necessitating a sequential process of perception and having built cultures and civilizations out of the collected narratives, we are naturally schooled to the notion of time as the point of the present moving past to future. Physics effectively codifies this as measures of duration, even if they question the underlaying dynamic.
The reality is that change turns future to past. Potential, actual, residual. Tomorrow becomes yesterday, because the earth turns. Duration is this physical state, as events form and dissolve. Time is an effect, like temperature, pressure, color, etc.
There is no "dimension" of time, because the past is consumed by the present, in order to inform it. Aka, causality and conservation of energy.
Energy is "conserved," because there is no physical past for it to recede into, or physical future from which it arrives, as it is the changing configuration of this dynamic which creates time.
Different clocks can run at different rates, simply because they are separate actions. Think frequencies, or metabolism.
Time is asymmetric, because what is being measured, action, is inertial. The earth only turns one direction. The relative order of a system, entropy, is not what is being measured and is irrelevant.
So, the process goes past to future, while the patterns generated go future to past. Verbs are process, nouns are patterns. Consciousness goes past to future, while thoughts go future to past. Lives go birth to death, being in the future to being in the past, while life shuffles onto the next generation, shedding the old. Products go start to finish, while the production line goes the other way, consuming material and expelling product.
The feedback is that the patterns define and direct the process. Thoughts steer our actions, as the success of a product affects what the production line produces. Motor and steering.
The premise of determinism is that the laws of nature are not suggestions, so cause leads to effect. The problem is that as there is only this physical present, so events have to occur, in order to be determined.
Given that much of the input into any event arrives at the speed of light, the input cannot be known beforehand, so neither can the output. Unless one posits some state or being beyond the subjective, yet our efforts to reduce reality to some final, ultimate state keep going in circles, as any reductionistic node exists in some larger network. Even Big Bang cosmology finds itself in a network of multiverses and dark forces, so there doesn't seem to be any total pattern underlaying the process. As it is the processes bubbling up, the vacuum fluctuations, which create the patterns.
The fallacy of free will is that if our choices were free of cause, then they would be equally free of effect and the principle of will is to affect. To be part of nature's selection process.
While many of our reactions can occur faster than the executive function of cognitive thought can work, that is because we exist in a reality where much occurs quickly and so our reactions are similarly evolved. So the function of cognition is not about the reaction, but the reflection, in order that our future reactions are better informed.
As Alan Watts put it; The wake doesn't steer the boat, the boat creates the wake.
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John R. Cox wrote on Sep. 3, 2019 @ 13:59 GMT
Georgi,
Very good points, I emphatically associate free will with intent. And of course there are valid arguments in math and numerous other fields which are pertinent to measurement and qualification, which Ian himself has explored. To clarify, when I stated that we needn't carry conjecture beyond psychological bounds I meant in terms of Ian's stated focus of measurement in terms of behavior.
Yeah, he is a Quant (among other things) and this is a physics forum, but I don't think it would be reasonable to incorporate a conjecture of something like... free will being a leakage from a parallel universe because a multiverse might be somebody's favorite speculation. That sort of thing.
As a personal matter of free will, I've got some serious rust remediation to finish up on my li'l ol' truck and I've been taking a break for the last couple weeks. I'll be kicking myself if I don't crawl back under it before the weather changes, and around here that will be soon. Can't afford to loose it, its a '91 but I've got it doing 26mpg. I typically use less than 10 gallons of gas per month. Where I live I've watched environmental impacts accelerate for half a century. People are hooked on consumerism. Its scary. best jrc
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Sep. 3, 2019 @ 22:23 GMT
According to physics, the only causal factors in the world are laws of nature and randomness. According to physics, dogs, birds, trees and people do not make their own laws: i.e. according to physics, dogs, birds, trees and people do not have free will to cause their own outcomes.
According to physics, every outcome for every particle, atom and molecule is caused by nothing but laws of nature and randomness:
Every particle, atom and molecule outcome in people is caused by nothing but laws of nature and randomness, and every particle, atom and molecule outcome in the weather is caused by nothing but laws of nature and randomness.
According to physics, dogs barking, birds singing, trees flowering, people’s actions, and the weather are all caused by nothing but laws of nature and randomness.
According to physics, people’s actions can have no more effect on the weather than dogs barking, birds singing, or trees flowering.
According to physics, people’s actions can have no more effect on climate change than dogs barking, birds singing, or trees flowering.
According to physics, climate change cannot be caused by dogs barking, birds singing, trees flowering, or people’s actions: according to physics, climate change can only be caused by nothing but laws of nature and randomness.
Isn’t it time that physics fessed up?
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 4, 2019 @ 15:34 GMT
Lol Lorraine, in fact you are a phenomen, I laugh alone due to your post. About your words, the laws of nature in totality after all are above our understanding,we just know a small part of universal puzzle and its correlated mathematical,physical,sciences Laws. Randomness is just a function not really universal,I d say local and rare.Freewill dépends of many parameters when we consider biology,physics,maths,chemistry in brains. There is not randomness considering these particles implying mass,fields,waves,properties encoded due to evolution and complexification of consciousness,mass too generally speaking. Codes encode informations,codes each instant in logic on the Arrow of time and its evolution. It implies naturally that of course the main biological codes and the superdeterminism of our physics and its laws is more important and foundmental than this randomness. We encode even more easily this determinism than the freewill,because even this free will can be deterministic.Regards
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 4, 2019 @ 21:21 GMT
lol Steve,
You always seem to say the same thing about every issue, including the free will issue: it’s unsolvable, “above our understanding,we just know a small part of universal puzzle”.
A good start would be to define free will, model free will and work from there, and that is what I have continually done. I notice that most people, including you, Ian Durham, Georgina, and others that have commented on this blog page, talk about “free will”, but don’t seem to have a clear idea of what they are talking about. Your mixed-up and confused claim about “free” will is that “free will can be deterministic”. lol
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 07:34 GMT
Hi Lorraine,
Well, we have all our personality and all we observe differently,and so all we have different ideas. I repeat sometimes Indeed because I beleive that it's important,I am persuaded about the spherical volumes,spheres and their motions,rotations,oscillations giving our properties.Nobody can formalise the free will,we cannot really because the complexity is too much important,but we can find several mathemtical roads to insert it with determinism in the équations like Ian ,Tegmark ,they try to create this AI and try with algorythms to explain it,it's not easy and their works are respectable.Nobody can generalise this determinism and freewill considering the main codes.But we can with many parameters ,genetic,mass,properties,fields,waves,education,psychology,e
nvironments,...create a road of understanding and logic. Ian works about freewill and randomness,even if I see differently generally and philosophically about main causes,I can recognise his skillings in the generality of his-ideas.Don't repeat the same critics but try to converge and critic with others ideas superimposed for example. Spherically yours Jedi of the Sphere :)
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 07:46 GMT
I d be happy Lorraine to see your resume about this freewill,so explain its generality with équations,mathematical Added .If you understand this free will better than others,so convice us with concrete équations,thanks :)
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 13:59 GMT
Steve,
You have decided that: "Nobody can formalise the free will,we cannot really because the complexity is too much important...Nobody can generalise this determinism and freewill considering the main codes." Seemingly, you've stymied yourself because you think understanding is not possible; you seem to think everything is "above our understanding". lol
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 14:45 GMT
Lorraine,
Don't misinterpret my words,I just tell that we are limited considering the main codes of our quantum series for example,we Don't know the main codes,the origin,the same at cosmological scale,we are limited,of course we have Evolved with our sciences and each day we add new truths at all this puzzle in maths,and physics but we must accept our limits.Don't confound the main codes with what we know. I Don't think that all is above our understanding,just that we must accept our limits Simply.I can make a difference between a hypothesis and a proved law,axiom,equation.In my theory of spherisation, I have many hypothesis and a philosophy of this model with sphères,spherical volumes and theirgmotions,rotations,oscillations….And like I said we are limited generally,and several unknowns are above our understanding.You can define these unknowns you? like this infinity,or the main-codes-in particles?Or why we exist,why we think,why we observe,evolve,are in interactions,....Let's accept too that we know a small part of this universal puzzle,and with small I am nice.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 15:12 GMT
You know Lorraine, about this freewill, I beleive that Simply it's a result of our brains in function of many parameters to take into account. Between us,I have ranked animals,vegetals,minerals,particles,maths,Chemistry,biology,
it's even in seeing the evolution of human brains in a page of biology that I have had my small humble eureka about this spherisation of this universal sphere considering the evolution.I am passionated by evolution.I have studied different works too like Darwin and others,do you know the works of Lamarck about the will, if a giraff for example has a long neck,so it's due to an encoding of will in the genetic,because this giraff would a longer neck to reach leaves higher in trees.So I can understand the will and freewill and the encodings in our quantum series,biological.So Indeed we can formalise mathematically a kind of free will,will and correlated with encodings,but we cannot explain it like foundamental in the main codes.We encode due to evolution in surfaces and with informations of interactions but it's very complex like puzzle,we must I am repeating accept our limits.
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John R. Cox wrote on Sep. 4, 2019 @ 15:10 GMT
Ian,
Thanks for a thought provoking 'cross-over' exercise. The contrast of what we commonly take for granted as Free Will in a democratic society, and the expectation from generations of evolving democratic tradition, come face to face with with the outstanding abstract questions in math and science. Some of the dialogue, here, has recalled ideas from past rumination and offered new (to me)...
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Ian,
Thanks for a thought provoking 'cross-over' exercise. The contrast of what we commonly take for granted as Free Will in a democratic society, and the expectation from generations of evolving democratic tradition, come face to face with with the outstanding abstract questions in math and science. Some of the dialogue, here, has recalled ideas from past rumination and offered new (to me) ideas or perspectives. Its been kind of fun.
I reach a saturation point in any intellectual pursuit, and have to step back and let things digest and assimilate or I 'spin-out' reaching for yet another chord to bundle it up. And I've been slacking on some mundane practical matters of readiness for winter. I know come mid-November that brillant dark cloudline at sunset will spark a primal fear that its going to get killing cold and I'm not as ready as I should be.
As a parting thought, I believe that many whom have studied math or wrestled down an idea mathematically seeking a solution to a specific goal, have discovered that when you finally find the proper arrangement of terms expressing the set parameters; the relationships of the math functions literally come alive. In the mind's eye you can see it unfold like a blossom and each petal though similarly distinct bespeaks the full wholistic form of that blossom. It is so entirely unexpected that you can't share the experience, you can only come to recognize that others through study and dogged pursuit have had that experience. Many extoll Euler's Identity, and I can recognize enough from my experience that looking at the power of those terms, if I were to dig into the nitty-gritty of the supporting mathematical arguments and wrestle it down that I would find what many say of it; that it possesses a life of its own. It doesn't 'take on' a life of its own, its inherent in the relationships. But not to be conflated with Free Will, its a continuous function. But if we can know that such relationships exist in how we reasonably attempt to measure space, time, motion; than at some higher order that wholly unexpected experience might perhaps inevitably vest itself in what we imagine as Free Will.
Thanks, All. Bye for a while. John Cox
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Sep. 4, 2019 @ 22:46 GMT
I notice that Steve, Ian, Georgina and others talk about “free will”, but don’t seem to have a clear idea of what they are talking about.
Without daring to make at least an initial verbal
definition of what you are talking about, a type of model of free will to work from, you can’t begin to analyse whether it is a valid model or not. And then you go endlessly round and round in circles like Georgina talking about carrots and peppers etc. You need to work from a definition of free will and see where that leads you:
the words “free will” are not enough if nobody is even capable of concisely defining in words what they personally mean by the words “free will”.
I’m saying that a living thing has free will if it has: “the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate”[1]. I’m saying that “necessity” is the deterministic laws of nature. So if outcomes are thought of as being representable by a set of variables and associated numbers, a free will outcome will: 1) have at least one number that was not determined by the deterministic laws of nature; and 2) the living thing
caused that “anomalous” number outcome.
1. https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/free_will (Oxford dictionary).
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 4, 2019 @ 23:01 GMT
Lorraine,
Yet if will were actually free of such causes, wouldn't it be equally free of effects? Which would seem to go against the very notion of will, to affect.
The problem seems to be that we project onto the future deterministic principles, which do not take into account that the total input, including the judgements of people, cannot be known before an event has occurred. If the input cannot be known, neither can the output. We assume an objectivity that is theological and monotheological at that.
The problem is working from faulty assumptions, such as that time is a dimension along which events exist.
The past doesn't even exist, as it is necessarily consumed by the present, in order to inform it, aka, causality.
The fact is that every moment is a configuration of the energy of the universe and as it changes, enormous amounts of information are constantly being erased/written over. So the only determinant of whether an event will occur, is if it does occur, even though we can never even have that clear, reductionist, objective vision of it, as it is occurring. We are part of nature's selection process.
Is it any wonder the discussion goes in endless circles?
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 4, 2019 @ 23:54 GMT
John,
Put up or shut up. Define what you mean by "free will".
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 00:16 GMT
To further that thought;
What is the basis of determinism? Causality. Yet causality only occurs as the present.
The argument is that if we could know the position and momentum of everything, we could predict the behavior of the system forever. Yet what if "everything" is infinite? We have a cosmology which presumes the entire universe is a singular node, but like any node, it...
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To further that thought;
What is the basis of determinism? Causality. Yet causality only occurs as the present.
The argument is that if we could know the position and momentum of everything, we could predict the behavior of the system forever. Yet what if "everything" is infinite? We have a cosmology which presumes the entire universe is a singular node, but like any node, it exists in some larger network, so now we have the multiverse, as a network. Not to mention the various dark forces as patches between prediction and observation, since this cosmology is too important to be falsified.
Then the fact that every part of us is presumably part of this larger system, so it is our desires and our judgements, of the heart and the head, are part of the computation occurring as this present.
How much of our logic is the shadow of a God that has started to fade? For instance, a spiritual absolute would necessarily be the essence of sentience, from which we rise, not an ideal of wisdom and judgement, from which we fell. The problem of conflating the absolute with the ideal is it tends toward narcissism, since we think our views and beliefs are/should be universal, rather than unique.
Math, for instance, sees itself as some platonic ideal, yet as abstraction, it is only map, not territory, since it is abstracted/distilled/reducted from the larger territory. For instance, epicycles were really brilliant math, but lousy physics, as no map can ever fully encompass an infinite universe.
This physical present is far deeper and more complex than the little narratives we try explaining it with, but that is how our minds function. We are mobile organisms, with a sequential thought process, in order to navigate. Then use information gathered to predict what might occur. Unfortunately situations change and the beliefs we built up over lives and generations doesn't always apply and we get eaten. The old peels away and we have to start over again.
Time is not a dimension, it is a process.
Process goes past to future, while the patterns generated go future toast. Consciousness goes past to future, while thoughts go future to past. Lives go birth to death, while life moves onto the next generation, shedding the old.
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 00:21 GMT
To be free of causal input.
That our actions are not a function of determining the best course of action that the situation imposes on us, but simply acting spontaneously.
The presumption of determinism being that as cause leads to effect, initial causes set the course of action forever. So the argument for free will is that we are not simply a subject of fate.
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 00:35 GMT
The logical problem being that our will, the desires bubbling up through us, mediated by our judgement, is to determine, to create effect. We are part of the computation, that determines.
As Alan Watts put it; The wake doesn't steer the boat, the boat creates the wake.
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 04:11 GMT
The conundrum of determinism:
Does the universe determine our freedom and social responsibility or does our freedom and social responsibility determine the universe?
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Georgina Woodward replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 09:27 GMT
Lorraine, you missed the point if you thought what i was writing was just about vegetables or ants. It was about what factors are important or need thinking about, and maybe ought to be included, when representing freewill. Putting in the groundwork, so to speak.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 10:04 GMT
Hi all,
Lol Lorraine,so you seem persuaded that you encircle better the laws of nature and the real meaning of determinism,freewill,randomness,evoltion. Your conclusion tells us that necessity is the deterministic law of nature and that the freewill is a number in anomaly,or in the non deterministic sphere if I can say. Ok we follow your reasoning,but that needs a general analyse about the...
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Hi all,
Lol Lorraine,so you seem persuaded that you encircle better the laws of nature and the real meaning of determinism,freewill,randomness,evoltion. Your conclusion tells us that necessity is the deterministic law of nature and that the freewill is a number in anomaly,or in the non deterministic sphere if I can say. Ok we follow your reasoning,but that needs a general analyse about the philosophical point of vue. Let's be clear, what is the cause of this physicality? do you consider main codes,or a main 1D field or an other road? why we are in fact Simply? Why we observe,evolve,are in motions and oscillations? about freewill,it's just a result of evolution. The freewill for me considering the living conscious beings is too a result of evolution Under determinism Added with a sphere of freewill,but in fact we must correlate this freewill with our consciousness, our determinism showing the physicality more the consciousness implies that the thoughts are correlated. A conscious person understanding this universalism so have free will after a deterministic analyse Always on a deterministic road,hope you encircle these words.So our consciousness permit even determinsitic free will respecting the natural laws.The necessity like you said is not sufficient like cause of codes,encodings,evolutive informations.
You tell us "the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate”[1]. I’m saying that “necessity” is the deterministic laws of nature. So if outcomes are thought of as being representable by a set of variables and associated numbers, a free will outcome will: 1) have at least one number that was not determined by the deterministic laws of nature; and 2) the living thing caused that “anomalous” number outcome."
Develop what is the necessity and the conctraints for example in explaining the links with the evolution,the codes,the encodings with sortings,superimposings,synchronizations,and the links with the informations of our environments and the intrinsiC deterministic codes. The power of acting,me I want well,but it's not general and sufficient. Even with a number not determined about freewill.Explain us all the algorythmic method to arrive at this conclusion more the correlated équations.There you shall be understood better.Ian,Tegmark them utilise a general method with a specific mathematical road.Spherically yours Jedi of the Sphere :)
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 10:29 GMT
Steve,
Is time the narrative from past to future, or is it the process of interaction, by which future becomes past?
Potential is nearly infinite, which actual is a small fraction of that and the residual an even smaller fraction of that. In the course of this, we are driven by our desires, which are many and often contradictory, such as between short term and longer term goals. So it is the function of our judgement to sort among and referee them. Motor and steering. society manifests this dichotomy of desire and judgement through the political polarity of liberal and conservative. So morality is a function of selecting the more effective course of action, as good and bad are not some cosmic dual between the forces of righteousness and evil, but the basic biological binary of beneficial and detrimental.
The more basic issue of causal determination, is that the underlaying energy and dynamic driving this is in tension with the forms it manifests, so that it is both driving these forms and breaking them down. Think galaxies; energy radiating out, as form coalesces in. Cosmic convection cycles.
The question then becomes is whether this energy is fundamentally digital, or analog and the digitization is a function of it coalescing into form. As any effective computation is necessarily digital, an analog based driving element could only be computed statistically.
Various arguments for the analog nature;
https://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1344
http://wor
rydream.com/refs/Mead%20-%20American%20Spectator%20Interview
.html
There are further implications of this obviously, but leaving it to the issue of determinism.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 15:32 GMT
Thanks John, for attempting to define what you mean by “free will”. If you don’t mind me saying so, we actually need a much more precise type of definition if we/ physics is going to be able to analyse if a thing might exist or not.
We can’t be “free of causal input”; and we could only ever have a limited freedom anyway, to e.g. move our limbs left or right or our vocal cords. We are not free to transmogrify into a bird and fly away: that level of freedom would lead to a madhouse world. We live in a lawful world where it’s difficult to discern whether or not free will exists. But “determining the best course of action that the situation imposes on us” often
does require a one-off (i.e. free will) response: laws of nature do not “[determine] the best course of action” in a situation.
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 15:38 GMT
Lorraine,
I think the real issue is whether we are fated by causality from the beginning of time/our birth, or whether our conscious decision making process plays a fundamental role.
One argument for determinism is that our reactions often precede cognition, but much of life and reality does occur at the speed of light and so our reactions need to be pretty fast. Cognition, then is not so much a function of reaction, but reflection, in order that future reactions are better informed.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 19:07 GMT
Hi,John,happy to see you again.
The causal determination Indeed and Energy and dynamic Driving.But about digital or analog the universe probably utilises systems,mechanics more complex and complete than ours actually utilised.Computing is a human invention after all,universe seems more complicated.About past and future,could you develop?
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 21:57 GMT
Steve,
As intentional, mobile organisms, our experience of reality is as flashes of perception, which we are constantly sorting and judging. Essentially as a function of navigating this reality. We then learned to narrate our journeys and build civilizations out of the collected knowledge. So the narrative flow, from past to future, is fundamental to ourselves as individuals and as...
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Steve,
As intentional, mobile organisms, our experience of reality is as flashes of perception, which we are constantly sorting and judging. Essentially as a function of navigating this reality. We then learned to narrate our journeys and build civilizations out of the collected knowledge. So the narrative flow, from past to future, is fundamental to ourselves as individuals and as cultures. Physics essentially codifies this flow by treating time as measures of duration between events.
Yet what is actually happening is that there is only this dynamic physical state and its resulting changing configuration turns potential into actual and then residual. The future into the past. Tomorrow becomes yesterday, because the earth turns.
Physics, in its efforts to mathify time as a dimension, has twisted itself into knots.
For instance, the assumption has become that the events must be more real than the present, so "block time" is proposed, where all events exist out on this time dimension and our sense of the present is as subjective as our location in space.
Yet it really doesn't take much logic to understand that if energy is "conserved," it can't manifest all events, but only what are occurring. It is this energy transitioning from one event to the next that creates time and the resulting causation. The batter hitting the ball can't co-exist with the ball flying away and the batter running the bases, because the energy transitioned from the prior to the succeeding event. The past is effectively consumed by the present, in order to inform it.
Another problem physics has, is that since they assume time to be a dimension, there doesn't seem to be any reason why it goes one way, not either, much as one could go either way along a spatial dimension. So it is argued this asymmetry of time only arises with entropy. That systems become disordered over time.
Again, total nonsense. What is being measured as time will always be a particular action, from the earth turning, to atoms fluctuating. Such actions are inertial, given they are expressions of energy. The earth turns one direction, not both, or either. Similarly an atom fluctuating is an energetic expression, not just a platonic measurement. The order of a larger system, entropy, is not what is being measured and is irrelevant.
Another point physics makes is that measures of time can be subjective, say an atomic clock at sea level will run faster than one on a gps satellite. Well, duh. Different clocks can run at different rates simply because they are separate actions. Think frequencies, or metabolism. The human assumption is there must be some universal time and it is like some great discovery of it being subjective. Given that much of human history has been about getting everyone reading from the same script, dancing to the same tune, speaking the same language, using the same currency, it is no wonder we assume some universal sequence, but nature really doesn't work like that. There is rabbit time, turtle time, tree time, etc. Everything follows its own rhythms.
For a long time humanity developed very effective and elaborate maps of the movements of stars, but we didn't really understand the physics behind these maps, as we assumed the earth to be the center of the cosmos. Well, we still haven't figured out our perception of time has a similar problem.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 6, 2019 @ 12:02 GMT
Hi,
John, thanks for developing your ideas about this time. It's a beautiful general point of vue. Like I see it, I see this time correlated with an universal clock of duration and evolution. The rotating quantum and cosmological sphères maybe can help to better understand this time. Of course this time is relative,like our relativity,we know that we can rank evolution due to this special reltivity.And we know too that with our general relativity,gravity is seen differently,like this mass curves this space time.It's so a tool this relativity of ranking too.Now philosophically it becomes complex ,personally I consider an irreversible entropical Arrow of time at all scales.We d have a problem of mass equivalence considering evolution and encodings if we travel in time. About how the consciousness perceive this time,it's in function of this consciousness too,we live Inside an universal clock of evolution,irreversible the same for all.Now of course if we correlate with this infinity and eternity,philosophically speaking it can be interpreted differently. We know too with this relativity that we can decrease our internal clocks due to this Velocity of light.But it becomes philosophical still.
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 6, 2019 @ 16:08 GMT
...so, in the universe, is the outcome of earth spin as a result of a time precursor or is the outcome of time a result of the precursor of earth's spin?
We could use equator displacement instead of time since there are 0.29 equator miles per second and all time is equivalent to equator miles. Going 80 mph would be traveling at 7.7% of equator velocity and then time would no longer be a subject of perpetual philosophical arguments. Philosophers would instead argue about the earth rotation, which seems kind of silly.
Now to be sure, equator velocity would still have both fast atomic change as well as a very slow change of quantum phase decay. The two fundamental time dimensions would then be much more obvious since time is really all about change.
Free choice is likewise all about change and our neural action potentials are in the middle of the two very different kinds of changes. While free choice can affect the very fast atomic changes with neural action, free choice is still subject to the very slow quantum phase decay of the universe. Free choice changes the universe in ways that are not completely predictable but all change is subject to the very slow change of the universe.
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 6, 2019 @ 23:27 GMT
Steve, Steve,
I see time as an effect of activity, just like temperature. Think how deeply temperature is to our sense of reality, whether it's pleasant, or foul weather, burning one's finger, having a fever, blushing with embarrassment, warm fuzzy feeling of happiness, etc.
It is just that as mobile organisms, we perceive our reality as flashes of perception, because we have to navigate it. so all this information funnels into and through our mind, in order to save around in the space.
We could use ideal gas laws to correlate volume with temperature and pressure, so why don't we call them the 5th and 6th dimensions of space?
Simply that this cognitive sequence doesn't see outside of it's own biases very well and those most attuned to using their thought processes are even more blinded by this bias. I have found that young people can grasp time as an effect very naturally and easily, but older, more educated reject even trying to think it through, because it grinds the gears of their brains. As a cardiologist friend of mine once put it; "Stop it, you are hurting my head."
The brain has two hemispheres, the left, logical, linear cause and effect side is analogous to a clock/ruler, while the left, emotional, intuitive side is to a thermostat/barometer. All the squeezing and heating defining our life, rather than just the moving along a path.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 7, 2019 @ 17:39 GMT
John,
It's my favorite equation in thermo PV=nRT. But I have difficulties to accept this time like our temperature.It's not a reversible process in logic this time. The foundamental principles for animals are the locomotion,the nutrition,the reproduction, so we are Indeed like you said mobile organisms observing. Could you tell me more please John about these dimensions,5 and 6? How do you arrive at these dimensions? with geometrical algebras ? and with vectors and scalars ?how do you rank this time? is it correlated with pression,volume,temperature? have you already thought about this zero absolute balancing this heat ? like if we had codes between these two constants,the zero absolute and the planck temperature.But this time seems different.
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 7, 2019 @ 23:10 GMT
Temperature and pressure are simply both average particle velocities and and so are not very mysterious, just complex. Time as equator miles would be simply an expression of action just as particle velocity in terms of % of equator velocity and so also not mysterious...
Your favorite time of action is earth spin and so make time equivalent to earth spin...
Your cerebral brain does have two hemispheres, but your subconscious primitive brain just has one set of organs. Your subconscious primitive brain is actually what makes choices with the amygdala and that organ is at the root of free will.
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 7, 2019 @ 23:38 GMT
Steve,
We seem to be mis-communicating. My point about temperature and pressure, as other dimensions of space, is that they are VERY MUCH associated with volume!!!! Try thinking through either concept without reference to volume. So if time, measured as duration, can be correlated with ONE dimension of space, aka, distance, and then conflated with it, why are temperature and pressure not being conflated with Volume? Could it be that as mobile organisms, with a sequential process of perception, we might be somewhat more intellectually enthralled by this effect of dynamic change?
Just try thinking it through for a few minutes.
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 00:53 GMT
Steve Agnew,
Would then agree that time is a measure of activity and change? Such that this dynamic is a constant process of interaction and the resulting configurations coalesce and dissolve, future to past, as the process generates new forms, past to future?
Thus the present being the current configuration of this energy/dynamic/process?
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 04:03 GMT
I like it when you go technical on me...
Now you bring up volume, which of course is a spatial dimension and really has little to do with average particle velocity. When volume changes, energy stays constant adiabatically, but so what? Pressure and temperature go up and so on.
Time as equator miles means that there is only now, a memory of precursors, and a large but finite number of possible outcomes. Thus, we do not have to coalesce and dissolve future and past to generate new forms since Earth does all of that for us...
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 14:43 GMT
Steve,
We seem to be on agreement about time as an effect of a changing physical present.
So my point in bringing up temperature and volume is the correlation between duration and distance, that the premise of "spacetime" is based on, is similar.
The idea there is some "fabric of spacetime," where with sufficient mathematical faerie dust, we could time travel through...
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Steve,
We seem to be on agreement about time as an effect of a changing physical present.
So my point in bringing up temperature and volume is the correlation between duration and distance, that the premise of "spacetime" is based on, is similar.
The idea there is some "fabric of spacetime," where with sufficient mathematical faerie dust, we could time travel through wormholes, etc, is based on the fact that in an accelerated frame, measures of distance and duration are affected equally, so that the speed of light doesn't change/is Constant. Since nothing can exceed the speed of light, the combination of the speed of the frame and the activity in it stay within this limit, so not only can't light projected from this frame go faster than light outside the frame, but atomic activity is similarly slowed, thus mass and the ruler based on it, shrinks.
From this it has been concluded that space and time, or actually duration and distance, since one dimension of space is a line, that space and time are interchangeable.
Just as if the argument was that volume and temperature are interchangeable, since reduced volume means higher temperature.
The problem is they are assuming time narratively. That all the events are somehow more fundamental than the processes generating them. Thus they end up with "block time," where all events exist out on this time dimension and our perception of the present and the effect of change are the illusions.
As I keep trying to point out, but very few seem able to understand, if we view time as change turning future to past; Potential, actual, residual, this problem goes away, as time can then be understood as an effect of this activity, just like temperature.
For example, one of the issues brought up frequently is the asymmetry of time and how we can really only distinguish past from future is the increase in entropy. Yet if time is simply a measure of particular actions, such as the earth turning, then this asymmetry is based on the inertia of this activity. The earth only turns one direction. The order of the system, entropy, is not what is measured. It is a second order effect, like thermodynamics is an effect of temperature, pressure and the resulting atmospheric cycles.
Or that clock rates are different in different conditions, say gravitational effects. Which goes to the fact each of these clocks are separate actions and will run at whatever rate their conditions entail. Think frequencies, or metabolism.
Another issue is the simultaneity of the present is dismissed because different events can be observed in different order, from different locations, therefore all events must exist out on that time dimension.
Now if we consider time as emergent from activity, than the present is simply the current configuration of the energy and this point is no more consequential than seeing the moon as it was a moment ago, simultaneously with seeing stars as they were years ago. The fact is the only reality is the energy, the light striking our eyes, whatever information it contains, or how long it traveled in a relatively straight line.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 15:29 GMT
John,
you tell "The future into the past. Tomorrow becomes yesterday, because the earth turns."
I like the rotating sphères like you know,they are the basis of my theory of spherisation,that said I have difficulties to encircle your words.The earth turns Indeed and evolves like it has Always made.The Earth time is the earth time,a duration.So why do you see simultaneities with the future and past?
You tell"we could time travel through whormholes" first of all,these whormholes are hypothetical,they are just a play of maths from Black Holes.Furthermore this time considering heat and thermo is purelly irreversible.We cannot travel in time,we can utilise it relativelly,that is all.
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 16:24 GMT
Steve Dufourny,
We can agree that reality is cyclical, rather than linear.
The issue of the simultaneousness of the PRESENT has to do with the notion of the present as some dimensionless point between past and future, rather than the physical configuration of the "conserved" energy. Since the energy is by definition, in motion and dimensionlessness would entail a freeze framing of the motion, the two different descriptions of what time is are not interchangeable.
Given that much happens at the speed of light, the present can seem like it is dimensionless, from our human point of view.
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 18:15 GMT
"Now if we consider time as emergent from activity, than the present is simply the current configuration of the energy and this point is no more consequential than seeing the moon as it was a moment ago, simultaneously with seeing stars as they were years ago. The fact is the only reality is the energy, the light striking our eyes, whatever information it contains, or how long it traveled in a...
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"Now if we consider time as emergent from activity, than the present is simply the current configuration of the energy and this point is no more consequential than seeing the moon as it was a moment ago, simultaneously with seeing stars as they were years ago. The fact is the only reality is the energy, the light striking our eyes, whatever information it contains, or how long it traveled in a relatively straight line."
Everything you say is a result of the emergence of both time and space from matter and action. You use the term energy, but energy is equivalent to matter and that is what makes the speed of light independent of spacetime reference frames as well.
Matter and action are the two axioms from which space and time then emerge and that is why I like your time emerging from the matter action of Earth rotation. Interestingly, space also emerges from the matter action of earth rotation from earth's circumference and frequency or period or cycle of a day.
All quantum matter action occurs with a period or cycle and it is from those cycles that both time and space emerge. The third dimension in matter action is quantum phase and it is from those three primitive dimensions of matter, action and phase that the dimensions of space and time emerge. Quantum phase has no meaning in relativistic gravity.
You also mentioned worm holes, which are black holes with a bunch of made-up time and space. Since time and space have no meaning inside of a black hole, people simply make up whatever reality that they want to make up, like a worm hole.
However, in matter time, a black hole is simply the destiny of all matter in the cycle of universe decay. Black holes do not have space and time, but black holes do have matter, their action or spin, and the phase of that spin. This is called the holographic principle because all of the information of the black hole resides in its mass and the phase of its spinning surface.
While a black hole event horizon is the limit of space and time, a black hole is just a phase transition in matter time and represents the destiny of all matter from universe decay. Once the universe has completely decayed into a single super duper massive black hole, it is ready to cycle into an antiverse antimatter expansion for the next collapse that we call another universe.
Temperature and pressure are simply energies that are then equivalent to matter. The actions of raising temperature or pressure are simply gains in matter. If quantum phase decay is a factor in those matter actions, the action will be subject to superposition and entanglement. After quantum phase decays, the actions will be classical and subject only to relativistic gravity.
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 20:32 GMT
Steve,
Space is another issue. I realize it has been dismissed as an effect of measurement, but measurement of what?
Three dimensions really are just the xyz coordinate system and they are a mapping device. To say they are foundational to space is like saying latitude, longitude and altitude are foundational to the surface of this planet.
If you remove all physical...
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Steve,
Space is another issue. I realize it has been dismissed as an effect of measurement, but measurement of what?
Three dimensions really are just the xyz coordinate system and they are a mapping device. To say they are foundational to space is like saying latitude, longitude and altitude are foundational to the surface of this planet.
If you remove all physical properties from space, it still has the non-physical qualities of equilibrium and infinity. Infinity because there is nothing to bound it and equilibrium is implicit in GR, as the frame with the longest ruler and fastest clock is closest to the equilibrium of the vacuum. The un-moving space of absolute zero.
So space is the absolute and the infinite.
What fills space is energy/radiation and matter/form. Energy radiates out, potentially to infinity, while matter/form coalesces in, eventually to the absolute where everything effectively breaks down/cancels out and the energy radiates back out. That's why black holes are such a mystery, as there is nothing there. They are the eye of a cosmic storm. Whatever hasn't radiated back out, by the time it reaches the edge, is shot out the poles as quasars.
Our current cosmological model really isn't good science, because it can't be falsified. Whenever there is some gap between prediction and observation, they just add another enormous force of nature that is only apparent to this gap and everyone is happy. What if accountants could just write in a figure, when they find a gap in the books and call it Dark Money?
One of the first patches was when they discovered that everything is redshifted proportional to distance, such that the effect is that we appear to be at the center of this expansion. So they changed it from an expansion in space, to an expansion of space, because Spacetime!
Which totally ignores the essential premise of spacetime, that the speed of light is always measured as a Constant. If it is taking longer to cross, obviously it is not constant to intergalactic space.
So two metrics of space are being derived from the same intergalactic light. One based on the spectrum and one based on the speed. Given the expansion is still denominated by the speed, ie the universe is supposedly expanding relative to the speed of light, in order to be redshifted, the subconscious assumption remains that speed is the real metric.
One of the few arguments, actually the primary argument, i get against this point is that the speed is only measured locally, but the expansion is universal. Which is nonsense. It has to expand locally, in order to expand universally, ie, it has to expand in the same space as the light speed, yet not affect the light speed.
If this were truly relativistic "spacetime," wouldn't the speed of light have to increase, in order to remain constant, as space/distance expands/increases?
Now we are at the center of our point of view, so an optical effect might be worth looking into.
Consider the following;
https://fqxi.org/data/forum-attachments/2008CChris
tov_WaveMotion_45_154_EvolutionWavePackets.pdf
The evidence being that multi spectrum light "packets" do redshift over distance, as the higher spectrums dissipate faster than the lower ones.
Which then raises the issue of whether we are observing a wave front, or individual photons traveling billions of light years.
So consider Eric Stanley Reiter's argument for the "loading " theory of light;
https://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1344
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 04:45 GMT
Yes...space is indeed another issue...nevertheless, space is dilated just like time in relativistic spacetime. Note that all collisions, however, are just two dimensional in the plane of the collision and so space is definitely emerges from matter action.
You refer to space as absolute and infinite and I refer to matter actions as very numerous but finite and bounded by the matter action of the universe. This is the only way that I can make sense out of reality and this makes gravity and charge simply different manifestations of the same force as photon exchange.
The speed of light only has meaning in space and time and the speed of light simply emerges from the equivalence of mass and energy. In side of a black hole, the speed of light has no meaning but mass, action, and phase all have meanings inside of a black hole.
So just like you have proposed, the collapsing universe has growing force and this duality still confuses science. All of these conference talks tow the mainstream science paradigm, but I think that there is a completely different paradigm. Matter action is a very simple paradigm and measurements of matter decay and force growth will eventually prove it to be true, but science is still about three orders of magnitude away from measuring quantum phase decay.../
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 09:50 GMT
Hi Steve,John,
John, I see this time you know very objective at all scales even with c and the special relativity.I just see these photons like a coded fuel. This time is an emergent property of our physical laws. It's an irreversible parameter,a simple duration.I see a little bit like Steve Agnew, I just see it with determinism.All interactions of exchanges respect this duration.All encodings too.We cannot check this time,we can just decrease our internal clocks due to c ,but is it relevant knowing that we cannot return at our present?
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 10:31 GMT
Steve Agnew,
what are we measuring space, but distance? When the train moves away and the sound of the whistle is doppler shifted, it is not space expanding, but distance increasing. More units of the same metric. If you are going to say something is expanding, keep in mind the metric you are using to measure this expansion.
I don't consider myself a physicist, only a student of...
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Steve Agnew,
what are we measuring space, but distance? When the train moves away and the sound of the whistle is doppler shifted, it is not space expanding, but distance increasing. More units of the same metric. If you are going to say something is expanding, keep in mind the metric you are using to measure this expansion.
I don't consider myself a physicist, only a student of logic. So our measurements within galaxies argue for collapsing space, based on measurements of mass and gravity, while our measurements between galaxies show expanding space, based on measurements of radiation. So what we are really measuring is mass collapsing and radiation expanding. These two side of the dynamic are actually balanced. I first read this point in Hawking's; A Brief History of Time. He referred to it as, Omega=1. The first thought to pop into my head was that if the expansion is actually balanced by gravitational contraction, why would the overall universe be expanding. The only argument I've see for that is that inflation blew it up so big, that it only appears to be "flat," like the surface of the planet only appears flat from our point of view.
So what I think we are really seeing is a cosmic convection cycle, between energy and form. That energy naturally expands, think explosions, while form is a wave collapse and contracts, both coalescing energy and shedding it. Starting all the way out with photons forming out of fields, such that the missing mass of dark matter, that supposedly causes the excess gravitational attraction, is actually this wave collapse further out the spectrum from mass, so that "gravity" is not so much a property of mass, as that mass is the lower, denser end of this wave collapse, that is called gravity. So the reason we can't find any "gravitons" and that gravity is best modeled as a smooth geometric curvature, is that it is wave collapse of the energy, not a particular particle, or wave. Thus a cycle between expanding energy and coalescing form. Vacuum fluctuations magnified.
Steve Dufourny,
Keep in mind this determination only occurs in the physical present. We can't know all the input prior to an event. Causation yields determination.
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John Brodix Merryman replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 10:41 GMT
Keeping in mind the ultimate metric is the speed of light in a VACUUM!
What is that vacuum, if not empty space?
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 10:48 GMT
John,I can understand what you say. I read about this exapnsion,see that we can consider the Dark Energy like a simple anti gravitational spherical push.We shall have maybe a contraction in the future,so the volume changes and we have probably a maximum volume before the contraction. See too that we can consider a gravitational aether,like a superfluid coded ,I consider a finite serie of sphères where space disappears.See too that we cn consider this Dark matter ,if this matter exists so it is too encoded in nuclei,see the relevance if this matter is cold balancing our heat,thermo,electromagnetism. Why not a link even with our quntum gravitation.Causations like you told are deterministic. All the mechanics are Under a specific clock of evolution,irreversible after all.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 10:52 GMT
John,the vaccuum,space for me is a gravitational coded aether with these finite series of coded sphères.So we need to superimpose all this to our ordinary metric and photons. We haven't only photons like primordial essence at my humble opinion,this relativity,general and special are correct,just that we need to insert a new road considering these 3 main unknowns,DE,DM and quantum gravitation.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 11:00 GMT
Philosophically speaking, I consider an Eternal infinite consciousness beyond tis physicality ,it's without time,space,matters,it is an infinite pure Energy. This infinity creates an universe and for that,this eternity needs codes and informations,it sends so all this from a center,the central spherical biggest volume for me,that implies this aether ,gravitational coded playing with cold and heat. I am conscious that the sciences Community is divided,some think that God exists with determinism and others no.I accept their points of vue,I just see important to have a main cause to our codes of evolution.For me humbly,it's not possible to ponder general équations about matter and Energy without this infinite potential.Einstein said that God didn't play at dices,many thinkers had inserted this parameter,like Tesla,Schrodinger,Heisenberg,Newton,Galilei,Dirac,Einstein,P
lanck...and so more.We need to encircle this main cause,this eternity,infinity,conscious above our physicality.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 11:19 GMT
See too like we speak about this philosophical point of vue this difference with the 1D main field of strings. There is an enormous difference about waves particles duality and the real origin of our reality.I consider coded particles implying waves . It's not a field which give matters but the opposite,it's an important subtil difference.These spherical volumes,spheres considering this finite serie oscillate,are in-motions,rotations and so imply waves with this gravitational correlated aether,this vacuum like you said. After all we search the causations of our reality and we need codes and encodings.
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 10, 2019 @ 03:44 GMT
We do not measure space and time...we measure action and matter and interpret the action of matter as space and time.
Your favorite Earth spin is a perfect example of a matter action from which emerges both space and time. You as what is the speed light in a vacuum and then what is a vacuum in the first place.
An electron spin period defines time given the speed of light, which after all comes from 86,400 s for every day. Did you forget?
Thus, the speed of light has not meaning without the earth spinning, does it...And a vacuum is what defines empty space, but space is never really empty, is it...no matter what, there is a background of electromagnetic radiation as well as spontaneous particles and so a vacuum is only a practical limit, not a real limit.
But you already know that...It is matter, action, and phase that define space and time...
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 10, 2019 @ 09:45 GMT
Hi ,
Steve, it's well generalised Indeed,I agree that after all this spacetime is emergent and due to action of matters,phases.
About this space,vacuum,of course it's not really empty,I d say even that this vacuum is more than we can imagine.The fact to consider a gravitational aether seems relevant. Have you ideas about this aether ? do you consider a luminiferous one and why?
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 10, 2019 @ 10:00 GMT
This spacetime is a mathematical model correlated with this Minkowski spacetime. But we have just an extrapolation due to our special and general relativity considering only photons like essence of origins. All this is correct and relevant of course but we need to insert new parameters.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 10, 2019 @ 10:29 GMT
That becomes relevant in analysing this spacetime to consider a new road superimposed. I Don't beleive that in fact this photonic Minkowski spacetime is the main system of this Universe. So the interpretation of this space time with the cosmological constant and einstein fields équations is not the primordial foundmental,so that Don't give really the real geometry of our Universe,it's just a mechanic,photonic Inside a more foundamental logic,gravitational and spherical at my humble opinion. Even in changing this cosmological constant with >0 giving a desitter space,or =0 giving a flat Minkowski space in these einstein fields équations or anti desitter with
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 10, 2019 @ 14:44 GMT
Dear FQXi,Zeeya,I Don't understand,my edits have a problem, it Doesn't take all my text? I cannot even change the edits.That is why I have posted 2x,sorry,but it's odd. I Don't understand why my submited posts act like that.It's a problem that I have had today.Odd.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 10, 2019 @ 15:20 GMT
Dear Zeeya,I have seen the other blogs,they are ok.The problem is here,on this blog of Ian, just a small problem of selective algorythms on this Blog for my login:) the problem seems that I cannot change the edits or cancel,and the Number
of letters,words is limited.That is why my post above is not finished.Odd I have never had this .Friendly and regards
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Jason Mark Wolfe replied on Sep. 21, 2019 @ 01:51 GMT
How can there be any talk of determinism when the real world is built upon quantum mechanics and probabilities?
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Steve Agnew wrote on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 02:43 GMT
This has been a very stimulating discussion of free will and so I will use some of my free will to engage...
Ian Durham proposed a measure of free will as the distance, zeta, in a Mahalanobis phase space of possible outcomes from a precursor to the outcome of a free choice. His argument was then that a free choice is somehow inevitable and therefore would be a shortest zeta path in the...
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This has been a very stimulating discussion of free will and so I will use some of my free will to engage...
Ian Durham proposed a measure of free will as the distance, zeta, in a Mahalanobis phase space of possible outcomes from a precursor to the outcome of a free choice. His argument was then that a free choice is somehow inevitable and therefore would be a shortest zeta path in the multidimensional decision space of all possible outcomes. However, if a choice is truly inevitable based on zeta, then that choice would be determinate and not free after all.
One thing is very clear...it will be even more difficult to define free will than it will ever be to measure free will and so it is important to first define free will in order to ever hope to measure free will. If it is not clear exactly how we make free choices versus not free choices in the first place, measuring free choice would then be undefined as well.
However, if there were a determinate measure of the precursors to a choice like Durham’s scalar zeta, it is clear that that would not then be free choice since a predictable choice cannot ever be a free choice. There are only two ways out of the determinate conundrum of individual freedom and social responsibility; the noise of classical chaos and noise of quantum phase.
Neither the noise of classical chaos nor the noise of quantum phase have completely knowable precursors even though those precursors do exist for each in the causal universe. Unknowable precursors represent the mystery of consciousness and being and are things that we must simply accept. The universe is after all just the way that it is first of all. The precursors of free choice must be unknowable even though they do exist in the universe since free choice represents the balance between individual freedom and social responsibility.
The noise of classical chaos, Shannon noise, is what we call random action but the noise of classical chaos is actually not really random at all. In fact, the noise of classical chaos is in principle infinitely resolvable and therefore knowable with infinitely resolvable space and time. Therefore random noise is actually just the practical limit of knowable precursors. However, the noise of a quantum superposition outcome has a well-defined discrete limit and yet will still not have completely knowable precursors even though quantum choices can be very likely.
While classical choices all have knowable precursors, quantum choices do not since they are superpositions of precursors and outcomes and do not have infinitely resolvable precursors. The decay of quantum phase results in a real outcome and so even a real outcome does not have any precisely knowable precursors, just more likely precursors. Quantum phase decay is a consequence of the very slow intrinsic change in the universe. Quantum outcomes do have more likely precursors and our individual freedom and social responsibility mean that we cannot know the precursors of free choice with infinitely resolvable precision even though those precursors do exist in a causal universe.
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 02:48 GMT
...In other words, while we might believe that we are free and socially responsible, we cannot ever be completely certain about our individual freedom or about our social responsibility. This means that there is a discrete quantum limit to the knowledge that we may have about our individual freedom and so there are fundamental mysteries about the universe that we must simply accept as the way that...
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...In other words, while we might believe that we are free and socially responsible, we cannot ever be completely certain about our individual freedom or about our social responsibility. This means that there is a discrete quantum limit to the knowledge that we may have about our individual freedom and so there are fundamental mysteries about the universe that we must simply accept as the way that the universe is.
Thus, individual freedom exists in a balance with social responsibility as the fundamental duality of the free choice of the mystery of consciousness. Random choices are unpredictable just like free choices are unpredictable and so Durham argues along with many others that random choices are not free choices. Likewise, choices by instinct, Durham further argues, are also not free choices and so the classical reasoning of chaos imposes its infinitesimals and infinities upon our discrete causal quantum universe. Random action is just a convenient shortcut for the practical limit for knowledge of precursors and it is always ironic that in a causal universe things can ever happen for unknowable causes.
What classical physics really means by random is not that random things are fundamentally unknowable, but rather that random things are just practically unknowable. Classically, there is no limit to resolving uncertainty except just a practical limit since all action has infinitely divisible momentum along with infinitely divisible displacement. Thus random simply represents the practical limit to knowing the classical precursors of classical outcomes.
In fact, there is a classical practical limit to knowing Shannon noise, but that does not then mean that noise is truly random. In fact, computer algorithms simulate random noise quite well with determinate algorithms. Therefore, the universe really is not fundamentally random as Durham claims, but more like effectively random just like the determinate computer algorithms of noise are not fundamentally random. Classical Shannon noise is then what we call random but in a classical causal universe, each bit of Shannon noise does actually have knowable precursors in an infinity of divisibility.
Quantum phase noise is really very similar to classical Shannon noise, but quantum phase noise includes quantum phase and the phase decay of the universe. Quantum phase decay is the fundamental driver in the discrete causal universe and quantum phase decay is therefore not really random in the classical sense. Quantum phase noise is random in the quantum sense of superposition and correlation and the likelihood of Schumacher's qubits and von Neumann's density matrices. Unlike the unlimited divisibility and knowledge of Shannon's bits, qubits represent the discrete limit of knowledge in the quantum universe.
Free choice is of course an essential part of consciousness and we have a free choice between the selfishness of individual freedom and the compassion of social responsibility. The most direct measure of consciousness is how we act like other people and then how they act like we act. When we agree with other people about a conscious state, our subjective feeling becomes an objective shared feeling, but even very smart people like Durham can still disagree about the natures of consciousness and free will as well as individual freedom versus social responsibility.
An even more objective measure of consciousness is in the resonances of neural action potentials, an EEG spectrum. Although EEG resonances are objective measures of the conscious state, EEG’s do not necessarily measure the quality of any conscious state...at least not with present technology. In fact, every neural action potential network, even those of a mouse or even a house fly, show the resonances of some kind of limited consciousness. However, fundamental particles do not show neural resonances and therefore are not conscious. Measuring both waking and sleeping state EEG's of neural networks provides objective measures of awake conscious spectra versus the unconscious spectra of sleep as resonance frequencies and resonance widths.
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 02:55 GMT
The details of this neural model are
here. This is more of what I expected from Durham's paper and maybe he will indeed be more forthcoming. Durham should really use a morality choice instead of carrots and peppers since moral choices are strongly associated with free will.
A classical determinate argument supposes that a precursor EEG spectrum completely determines an outcome spectrum or choice, but that is clearly not the case. Rather, there are a large but finite number of possible outcome spectra that exist in superposition with any precursor spectrum as a moment of thought. Therefore free choice is not a Durham’s determinate scalar zeta but rather free choice is a complex zeta that includes phase and a phase decay along with uncertainty for our quantum choices. Since it is not possible to know our own quantum phase, it is also not possible to precisely know the precursors for our choices even though some precursors are more likely than others.
Our morality then arises from the decay of a superposition of the spectra of choice between the many but finite possible spectra of individual freedom and social responsibility. These spectra are all Jungian archetypes, some intrinsic and some that we learn from persuasion and imitation of others as we grow up and mature. While we can change how we feel about a choice by learning new archetypes, it is simply not possible to always know precisely why we feel the way that we do feel and that is the uncertain nature of free choice.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 15:51 GMT
Steve,
We are free to be "bad" as well as to be "good". Free will has absolutely nothing to do with morality: free will requires the ability to implement outcomes.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 5, 2019 @ 18:53 GMT
Hi Steve,Lorraine,
Lorraine,what you say is totally false. The consciiousness more sciences education show several foundamentals like evident.You cannot make considering the evolution the bad,the evil at the same level than the good.The consciousness evolving the good becomes more important and furthermore in the future the bad ,the evil is purelly dedicated to disappear in time space evolution optimisation complexification on this irreversible entropical Arrow of time.Freewill has Something to do with the morality and too universalism even and cosnciousness.The implement of outcomes like you tell is more than you can imagine Lorraine,be sure.
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 6, 2019 @ 05:17 GMT
It simply doesn't make sense to say that free will has absolutely nothing to do with morality. Our morality is in the free choices that we make. We implement outcomes simply by being even when we make no choices since outcomes follow precursors.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 6, 2019 @ 08:45 GMT
Hi Steve, I agree totally with your words.
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 7, 2019 @ 22:58 GMT
oaky, let's define free will with meaning...
'Please finish this sentence: "To me, free will means ____________".'
To me, free will means that the neural transition between a precursor thought to an outcome thought is not completely certain or knowable.
Consciousness derives from a causal and finite set of discrete thoughts. Although each outcome thought derives from a precursor thought, those precursor thoughts are not always completely knowable even though precursors can be very likely.
These arguments are based on quantum phase superposition and correlation, which of course is the nature of physical reality...
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 00:41 GMT
Thanks Steve for thinking this through!
You are saying that what we call "free will" can't be thought of as people deliberately
causing outcomes; you are in essence saying that the quantum randomness in certain types of living matter causes something that we describe as "free will".
In other words, you are saying that both people's actions/outcomes, and climate change are due to the inherent determinism and randomness of the system.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 01:32 GMT
P.S.
Is it the case that people can genuinely contribute to causing outcomes, e.g. moving their leg; OR
Is it the case that, when a person moves their leg, it is the inherent determinism and quantum randomness of the system driving a puppet matter?
You seem to be saying that people are not free to cause outcomes: instead, it is the determinism and randomness of the system that gives the appearance of free will.
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 03:55 GMT
People do deliberately cause outcomes, but that does not then mean that outcomes are determinate based on precursors. Morality is in doing things that balance individual freedom and social responsibility according to narratives that we learn as children and adults.
Each person then has a set of archetypes that are how they believe and how they perceive reality. There is no book of life that shows everything that we will do. Instead, we are free to choose between quite different outcomes because outcomes are in superposition with precursors.
There is no puppet master and we are not in a simulation like the Matrix. We are responsible for the actions that we freely choose because if we choose to move our leg, we might read our book of life and then change our mind at any time...
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 06:07 GMT
But Steve,
Clearly, what you call “morality” is just another deterministic and/or random outcome of the system, just like weather is an outcome of the system. These outcomes then become the inputs, which deterministic laws and quantum randomness convert into further outcomes.
You seemed to be saying that the only causal factors in the world, the only causes of
outcomes in the world are deterministic laws and quantum randomness:
you never mentioned people as causal factors in their own outcomes.
You seemed to be saying that, despite the superficial appearance of people being free to move left or right, people’s outcomes and actions were actually caused by nothing but deterministic laws and quantum randomness. Are you saying that, in addition to deterministic laws and quantum randomness, there are other causal factors in the world e.g. people?
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 17:26 GMT
I do believe in a causal universe where there is a precursor for every outcome. However, that does not then mean that we can know every precursor and if we cannot know every precursor, we cannot ever precisely predict an outcome. You reasoning here is very classical, but not quantum.
What you mean by random is that you cannot know the precursor for a random outcome, but why can you not know a particular precursor for a random outcome? There are after all computer algorithms that calculate random numbers to an arbitrary precision, but those random numbers are not really random.
In fact, classical randomness is Shannon noise and is not really mysterious or unknowable. In fact, by definition, we can know the precursors to classical noise to arbitrary precision because there is no limit to the divisibility of movement and momentum in space and time.
The other noise is quantum randomness but quantum phase noise is very different from classical noise. This is because quantum phase noise shows interference, superposition, and entanglement and there is a discrete limit to our knowledge. This is the uncertainty principle and it means that although quantum precursors do exist, we simply cannot precisely know them.
So our quantum thoughts give us free choice along with the responsibility of our choices, which is morality. People are free to move left or right as a result of free choice, but there is a very short time, a moment of thought, where that choice is a neural superposition of those possible outcomes. The quantum phase decay of that superposition occurs in the amygdala of our primitive brain is the process that we call free choice.
Although there was a precursor to the choice to move in a causal universe, we simply cannot ever precisely know that precursor since it existed as a superposition with the possible outcomes. Just like any quantum process, the outcome of a free choice can only be predicted with some uncertainty.
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 8, 2019 @ 19:56 GMT
I do enjoy these discussions, but I also realize that I get long winded and sometimes my points are obscure.
However, it just occurred to me that the computer algorithm for very good random numbers is arbitrarily precise and completely predictable and reproducible. So even though the algorithm just simulates random behavior, just like the Game of Life, we can still call it random.
However, if the computer algorithm used quantum qubits, it would also provide random numbers that were neither predictable nor reproducible. This is the very nature of free will and free choice...
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 14:27 GMT
Steve,
There are 2 issues:
1. How to model/describe free will; and
2. How to test a model (if possible).
You mainly discuss issues relating to how to test a model i.e. “if we cannot know every precursor, we cannot ever precisely predict an outcome” and random/pseudo-random number issues etc.
But for your actual model of free will you say that “quantum phase decay… is the process that we call free choice”. I.e. you seem to be saying that people’s free will is exactly the same as the inherent quantum randomness already present in the world, and every subsystem of the world, given precursor situations.
I.e. there seems to be nothing that differentiates people’s free choice from what happens in the world anyway. Is that what you are saying?
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Steve Agnew replied on Sep. 10, 2019 @ 03:34 GMT
I already said how to model and measure free will with the EEG spectra of moments of thought. You keep looking for the demon of determinism and simply will not accept the notion of quantum free will.
And then you bring up quantum randomness to explain everything...really? Where does randomness come from? Why do you believe in randomness?
What people choose by their free will is not determinate and even the people who make such choices do not know why they choose one morality over another. Science also has a very hard time with free will even though they act like they have free will. Go figure...
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 10, 2019 @ 13:07 GMT
Steve,
I really don't know how you came to THAT conclusion: I DO accept a version of "quantum free will"! Perhaps you don't like anyone questioning the details and implications of what you said? I am asking a serious question about your model of free will.
My question is:
Background to question:
For your actual model of free will you say that “quantum phase decay… is the process that we call free choice”. I.e. you seem to be saying that people’s free will is exactly the same as the "quantum randomness" already present in the world, and every subsystem of the world, given precursor situations.
Question:
I.e. there seems to be nothing that differentiates people’s free choice from what happens in the world anyway. Is there anything that differentiates people’s free choice from what happens in the world anyway?
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 12, 2019 @ 21:11 GMT
Steve,
You haven’t answered my question. So, I must assume that your model of free will cannot differentiate between: 1) the “quantum phase decay… that we call free choice” in human beings; and 2) quantum phase decay in the rest of the world. I agree with this: a quantum event is a quantum event, wherever and whenever it happens.
Given precursor situations, quantum outcomes might have a theoretically calculatable probability, but an observer can’t predict specific outcomes, so the outcomes appear to be “random”, and they appear to be caused by “the universe”.
So, the implication of your model seems to be that “the universe” causes what appears to be “free will” in human beings. But I would think that genuine free will would require that human beings themselves cause the outcomes: genuine free will requires that matter can (in effect) make mini-laws that determine aspects of outcomes. This is where my view of free will seems to differ from yours: I have a different view of the nature of matter.
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Sep. 6, 2019 @ 23:06 GMT
Oh great!
According to Steve Dufourny and Steve Agnew, evil dictators don't have free will: only finer and more upright types of people can have free will.
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Georgina Woodward replied on Sep. 7, 2019 @ 01:44 GMT
Psychopaths' Brains Show Differences in Structure and Function The link is to https://www.med.wisc.edu/news-and-events/2011/november/psych
opaths-brains-differences-structure-function/
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 7, 2019 @ 07:57 GMT
Hi,
Lorraine,there too you generalise a thing which cannot be generalised. If psychopaths exist,it's due to education,psychology,environments.Let's take this crazzy dictator of North Korea,he is Simply crazzy and it's due probably to his education. The freewill in the instant has Nothing to do with his choices so.The Vanity,the lack of universal knowledges,the education,the psychology….are parameters essential to encircle these sad comportments. If he had a second identical brother this psychopath from North Korea,and if this person had Evolved in an other country with others parameters he d be different Simply.The free will has Nothing to do with that.You cannot consider the bad,evil like the good equally.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 7, 2019 @ 12:54 GMT
Georgina, Steve,
Neither of you can even begin to define what you mean by "free will".
Neither of you can communicate to another person what you mean by "free will".
And yet you have an awful lot to say about "Brains Show Differences in Structure and Function", "education,psychology,environments". "The freewill in the instant has Nothing to do with his choices so".
Why don't you just stop for a minute and try to think what you mean by "free will"?
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 7, 2019 @ 13:42 GMT
Lorraine,if you tell it us, I have explained how I saw this freewill,will,consciousness. You Don't want to accept the points of vue.I have never said that I was a specialist of freewill,noboby can tell it even. In fact we discuss Simply about points of vue,ideas,works,papers like the ideas of Ian ,Tegmark or others. I have explained you that we cannot consider freewill like a foundamental at all scales ,I consider and prefer dterministic causes and this freewill is limited. The freewill in the instant too is function of many parameters. You have a brain and a consciousness,and you have an education and you have Evolved in a specific environment and you have an adn, you must see the difference between the choices correlated with this universe and the choices without logic and objectivity seeing the whole point of vue.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 7, 2019 @ 14:59 GMT
Steve,
Please finish this sentence: "To me, free will means ____________".
I very much doubt that you can explain what
you mean by the words "free will" when you say "freewill is limited" and "freewill ...is function of many parameters".
You use the words "free will", but you can't tell me what the words mean to you.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 7, 2019 @ 15:30 GMT
Lorraine,
I an not on this platform to explain what is freewill mathematically or physically. I have explained how I saw this freewill,consciounsess,evolution too,that is all. But you Don't accept the different points of vue of different persons here on FQXi.You know nobody has a general concrete answer for this freewill, we have many hypothesis Simply. At my knowledge you have not explained it really by an algorythms,or a methods specific with équations and a general analyse. I repeat still how I see this freewill without affirming a method ,I just speak.Freewill is a result of evolution due to brains,correlated with consciousness and the personality,this personality is function of many parameters which are social,education,environment and interactions,encodings,genetic,evolution,psychology,neurolog
y and others. If you Don't see that all this implies choices ,it's odd and too it's correlated with consciousness.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 7, 2019 @ 15:39 GMT
Of course I insist on the fact that this freewill is correlated with the consciousness and foundamental knowledges, the choices can tend to a kind of harmonical universalism,objective and logic.Freewill is not foundamental without this consciousness. You can try to compute the complexity of a sphere of unconsciousness,so there Indeed it's very odd about the choices which do not converge with the universal foundamental laws.Hope you encircle my humble reasoning.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 7, 2019 @ 15:52 GMT
It could be relevant to focus even considering this freewill on intuition too. It's maybe even more relevant than this freewill.Intuition seems important.
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Cy Bernetti wrote on Sep. 9, 2019 @ 14:37 GMT
One of these things is not like the others. That's all.
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Anonymous wrote on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 14:58 GMT
how Grimm,
(if c and h are constants, then time is constant too) is a false equivalence. An arbitrary mathematic artifact.
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 15:43 GMT
Anonymous,
Sorry, c is a change in one direction (say from P1 tot P2). The amount of change is identical (
h) and the velocity too (c). That means that the duration of the transfer from P1 to P2 is identical for every
h. Every change is one or a multiple of
h thus quantum time is a constant.
Try to figure out what it means if the units of a structure tessellate space. It means 100% synchronization of change. Aristotle (2500 years ago) understood the mathematical consequences of an underlying structure of units that cannot be divided any more (the unmoved mover).
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 16:00 GMT
in speaking of c and h,the real interest is to unify G,c and h in fact considering even this quantum gravitation,have you ideas about this quantum weakest force?
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 19:20 GMT
Steve Defourny,
Try to imagine a flat Higgs field everywhere in the universe (every scalar has the same magnitude). The electric field is a topological field and it changes constantly in a synchronous way. The only way the structure of the electric field can change is transferring topological deformation to one or more adjacent units of the structure. The result is a mathematical mechanism...
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Steve Defourny,
Try to imagine a flat Higgs field everywhere in the universe (every scalar has the same magnitude). The electric field is a topological field and it changes constantly in a synchronous way. The only way the structure of the electric field can change is transferring topological deformation to one or more adjacent units of the structure. The result is a mathematical mechanism that concentrates deformation (quanta). Above a certain amount of deformation one or more scalars of the Higgs field have to decrease their magnitude because of the synchronization of all the changes in the universe and this deformed volume becomes part of the electric field.
The result is rest mass (matter) and the vectorization of the scalars of the flat Higgs field around. All the vectors point towards the decreased scalars. In other words, the vectorization of vacuum space results in an instantaneous push force towards the rest mass. This is confirmed by experiments (Louis Rancourt and Philip Tattersall, “
Further experiments demonstrating the effect of light on gravitation; Applied Physics research, Vol. 7, no 4, 2015: http://dx.doi.org/10.5539/apr.v7n4p4).
In other words, the push force of the vectorized flat Higgs field represents Newtonian gravitation.
Unfortunately, not all the deformation of the electric field is jet concentrated into matter. Huge amounts of concentrated quanta “are waiting” to be transformed into matter but radiation from stars and magnetic disturbances prohibits the quanta to concentrate further. That means that some regions in space have a higher density of topological deformation than other regions in space. However, it is clear that “the force of concentration” of the electric field creates mass. Because mass is a local concentration of quanta (E = mc
2).
The concentration of quanta (mass) by the electric field and the Newtonian push force of gravitation share mostly the same center of concentration. The strange diagram of the mass of our Milky way (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milky_Way#/media/File:Rotatio
n_curve_(Milky_Way).JPG) is the result of the influence of Newtonian gravity and the force of concentration by the electric field. The effect of the force of concentration by the electric field we have named “Dark matter”. The blue line in the diagram shows that the origin cannot be only one gravitational force.
Now think about the electric field that concentrates topological deformation. Our universe is creating matter from the start thus an enormous amount of quanta (deformation) has been concentrated into matter. In other words, the amplitudes of the electric field (average deformation) are decreased during the evolution of our universe. E =
h v describe the energy of electromagnetic waves (v = frequency). The speed of light is a constant thus the wave length depends on the amount of energy. But if the amplitudes (energy) of the electric field are decreased during the evolution of our universe, electromagnetic waves from distant galaxies are red shifted. The further away the source of the light, the higher the red shift. In other words, the creation of mass and rest mass have an clear impact on the properties of the observable phenomena.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 14, 2019 @ 10:11 GMT
Hi Sydney, I liked your general point of vue about these parameters,the gravitation,the mass, the electric field. It is well seen. Now of course it's hypothetical to link this quantum gravitation and higgs field. We know that these higgs permit to explain maybe 10percent of our mass Added to others mechanisms. They give mass for our weak interactions,not the electromagnetism and photons, nor the...
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Hi Sydney, I liked your general point of vue about these parameters,the gravitation,the mass, the electric field. It is well seen. Now of course it's hypothetical to link this quantum gravitation and higgs field. We know that these higgs permit to explain maybe 10percent of our mass Added to others mechanisms. They give mass for our weak interactions,not the electromagnetism and photons, nor the nuclear forces. I Don't think that they can explain this Dark matter encoded too in nuclei in logic. The SUSY that said could permit to see more clear about this quantum gravitation which does not converge.We have a problem of force between mass of particles, this force is at 10exp-67Newton ,difficult so to insert the correct mathematical, geometrical, algebrical, topological mechanism. I beleive strongly that electromagnetism, electric fields are not the only one piece of this universal puzzle. We must superimpose a different mechanism to our standard model. Maybe we must insert this Dark matter and consider it in the cold Simply.We shall better understand our unknowns and the real secret of our ultimate reality. The antimatter,our ordinary matter,the dark matter,the quantum gravitation,our standard model have a deeper dterministic logic than our actual (which is correct)relativistic model with its photonic electromagnetic thermodynamical informations,and its codes and encodings, interactions of exchanges. Philosophically to explain more,I am doubting that this infinite Eternal consciousness creating this physicality has only created photonic informations like essence,ultim of our reality.We have a deeper gravitational explaination at my humble opinion. Personally I consider a gravitational aether,coded. So I consider Simply these photons for example like a fuel permitting our special and general relativity,our electromagnetism and our thermodynmics,bosons so are encoded and Under main gravitational codes. But this quantum gravitation does not seem to be bosonic. Even the gravitons in the theory of strings have not the same SPIN. All this needs improvements, superimposings to our standard mdel, it is correct,just not complete.Regards
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 14, 2019 @ 10:35 GMT
Sydney,the Lie Groups are very relevant considering their harmonical periodic essence,like this wonderful geomerical algebras the E8 exceptional group,the others Lie groups selected too are relevant to consider.The fractalisations become interesting and the rankings too.Now imagine that we consider the good partition with these geometrical algebras and that we insert finite coded series of...
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Sydney,the Lie Groups are very relevant considering their harmonical periodic essence,like this wonderful geomerical algebras the E8 exceptional group,the others Lie groups selected too are relevant to consider.The fractalisations become interesting and the rankings too.Now imagine that we consider the good partition with these geometrical algebras and that we insert finite coded series of sphères instead of points and strings.This serie can approach our finite cosmological serie of spherical volumes.See the complexity of this finite serie,now consider this gravitational aether playing with codes between 2 constants,the zero absolute(maybe correlated with dark matter and quantum gravitation even)and the planck temperature. Now imagine the distributions appearing with these Lie groups superimposed and imagine this finite serie where space disppears, because we Apply a specific serie,for exmple a central biggest volume number 1 and after we decrease these volumes and increase the number with primes for exmple,see the relevance bout this space disappearing.Now imagine in these geometrical algebras all the Lie groups superimposed and these sphères instead of points.See too all the parameters which can be considered and all the proportions,harmonical.The volumes,surfaces,motions,oscillations,momentum,rotations,sen
ses,angles,densities,and so more,see too the relevance of sphères when they turn,even their velocities of rotations are different in the poles and equators. We can so distribute the properties about heat,gravitation,electromagnetism.See too the relevance about the volumes,spherical and links about the universal finite serie,of sphères quant or cosmological. The center being the biggest volume,we have all the centers linked in this gravitational aether from the central cosmological sphere.It's there that this infinite Eternal consciousness sends the informations to create this physical reality.We need a center for all.Beyond this physcality it's without time,space,matters,it's only pure Energy,conscious.
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Lorraine Ford wrote on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 22:47 GMT
Sydney,
You say:
“reality is really strange to imagine. But I suppose that you can imagine that a field structure that can be described with the help of mathematics, can create “feelings and thoughts and knowledge” too. Some comments before I hinted that consciousness is related to the vectorized flat Higgs field (scalar field) and feelings to the electric field (topological field) ...” [1]
So can you try to clarify this? Are you claiming:
1) Emergence: feelings and thoughts and knowledge somehow emerge from the field (or the mathematics of the field); or
2) Creativity: the field (or the mathematics of the field) is an entity that “
can create “feelings and thoughts and knowledge” too”; or
3) Steady State: feelings and thoughts and knowledge always existed in a proto form as part of the field (or the mathematics of the field); or
4) something else?
……
1. Sydney Ernest Grimm replied on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 03:10 GMT, https://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/3319
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 22:49 GMT
(continued)
You say:
“Your conclusion that the climate change issue is created by the underlying field structure is 100% correct. However, if the underlying field structure will change in a way that the issue is no longer a problem for us, it will happen “in the future”. And we will be the “actors” that change our behavior. That’s determinism.” [1]
But when you describe human beings as “ “actors” ” , you seem to be saying that human beings are actors only in the ironic sense: what you really mean is the exact opposite, you are actually saying that human beings are the puppets of the field. Is this a correct interpretation of what you are saying?
You seem to be one of the few people brave enough and honest enough to admit that physics’ models of the world [2] say that climate change was not caused/contributed to by human beings.
1. Sydney Ernest Grimm replied on Sep. 13, 2019 @ 03:10 GMT, https://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/3319
2. With the exception of the QBist model.
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 14, 2019 @ 16:10 GMT
Lorraine,
Here is a link to an image of a structure where every unit has an identical magnitude of a property: black color (6%). Link = phia.home.xs4all.nl/G04.png.
If every unit can change its magnitude synchronized with all the other units around, it is possible to transfer some of the property of every element – black color – to the center. Result =...
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Lorraine,
Here is a link to an image of a structure where every unit has an identical magnitude of a property: black color (6%). Link = phia.home.xs4all.nl/G04.png.
If every unit can change its magnitude synchronized with all the other units around, it is possible to transfer some of the property of every element – black color – to the center. Result = phia.home.xs4all.nl/G05.png.
The difference between both images is the mechanism that transforms the first image into the second image (with the help of a large number of single transformations in between). A single transformation is the transfer of 1% black by every unit to one or more units around at the same moment. That’s why the magnitude of black color of most of the units is decreased while the magnitude of the black color at a couple of units in the center is increased. However, the magnitude of black color of all the units together haven’t changed (“law of conservation of energy”).
The concentration in the second image represents an observable phenomenon. In other words, the mechanism of the structure has created a particle.
Now your question is:
• Do the particle emerge from the units of the structure?
• Is the particle created by the units?
• Does the particle already exist as part of the structure?
• Is there an other reason for the existence of the particle?
If you think it over, you will conclude that every suggestion is plausible. It simply depends on your personal point of view which suggestion you like the most. Even the last suggestion because I can state that the particle exist because of the black color property of all the units.
Climate change...
An actor plays a role that is determined by the script and the producer. That’s why the actor is “the puppet” of the script and the producer. We are all actors and one of the results of our roles is pollution and climate change. But our roles are changing a bit. Some of us are opposing the “trend” and influence the other actors to change their role (no pollution and no climate change).
Actually there are no “guilty” actors, there is only change and we are part of it. Even a murderer isn’t “guilty”. He has not the properties to avoid the tragic situation. Human properties are distributed over the population. So if we eliminated all the murderers other people have to play their role in the near future…
Another situation. You are a scientist and other scientists write a letter to the Noble Committee and advise them to give you a Noble prize. But you are only an actor. Everything you have done was determined by the underlying system. The underlying system has created your capacities like intelligence and diligence. In other words, your Noble prize is meaningless because the whole non-local universe has created your “act” you will be honored for.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 15, 2019 @ 00:33 GMT
Sydney,
Re climate change:
I’m more on the side of the QBism model, but I entirely agree with you that the implications of all other physics’ models are exactly what you have said about climate change, murderers and the Nobel Prize. Many physicists and others try to deny this, but this is because they are incapable of facing the logical implications of their physics’ models: they are incapable of facing the harsh reality of what the models say. Their attempts to twist and turn and sugar-coat this harsh reality are completely laughable.
Re the “structure where every unit has an identical magnitude” etc:
What I would question is “the mechanism that transforms the first image into the second image”. I would say that this mechanism (seemingly representable as equations and/or algorithms) is a source of change in the system. And every change (representable as equations, algorithms and/or numbers) needs to be accounted for, and theoretically explained, as part of the system.
I don’t think that change can be assumed to be a property of the system: I think that all change has to be explained. If new equations, algorithms and/or numbers appear, then you have to say why they appeared: you can’t say that these things just happen.
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 15, 2019 @ 07:35 GMT
Lorraine,
You want to the bottom? ;-)
In physics “unification” – simplifying the concepts of the observed phenomena – is very important. But the phenomenological point of view makes it really hard to disentangle all the different concepts to get one concept about the underlying reality. Our present “state of the art” is the Standard model of elementary particles and...
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Lorraine,
You want to the bottom? ;-)
In physics “unification” – simplifying the concepts of the observed phenomena – is very important. But the phenomenological point of view makes it really hard to disentangle all the different concepts to get one concept about the underlying reality. Our present “state of the art” is the Standard model of elementary particles and forces.
The general concept of the Standard model is that reality is created by an underlying structure that is composed by the (basic) quantum fields. Personally I always add "basic" to the description because e.g. an electron field is a quantum field too but it is created by more elementary quantum fields. It is possible to simplify the basic/elementary quantum fields too. The most simplified (= unified) description is the existence of a deformed scalar field (the deformed scalars are the spatial units of the field like the schematic squares in the 2 drawings). The not deformed part of the deformed scalar field we know as Higgs field and the deformed part is known as electric field. All the other known fields are not basic fields (they don’t manifest always and everywhere in the universe).
A scalar is a volume that has the shape of a sphere. So if a scalar gets deformed it is constantly “trying” to restore the normal situation: “being a spherical volume”. But if a scalar is part of a scalar structure – all the scalars tessellate space – there are the other scalars around that prevent the single scalar to get its normal situation: “being a spherical volume”. That means that there is only one force in our universe: a never ending push force between all the individual – deformed – scalars.
I can construct a universe where all the deformed scalars have the same shape. The consequence is that theoretically our universe can transform to this static state. So nothing can change because there is 100% symmetry. However, if I calculate the relation between the not deformed part of the unit and the deformed part it shows that both proportions are ruled by irrational numbers (pi and the root of 2). That means there can not exist a state of 100% symmetry in our universe. There is always change and because the change is created by units with identical basic properties, time – the duration of change – is constant and all the changes in the universe are conserved (the law of conservation of energy). Actually our universe is a fractal and we are part of it.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 16, 2019 @ 00:26 GMT
Sydney,
But what is a fractal? A fractal is not just a pictorial outcome that appears out of nowhere. A fractal requires an algorithm, as well as an equation, to control the numbers. (And seemingly a fractal also requires a pre-existing observer who sees a quasi-pattern emerge from the system.)
Fractals require algorithms. The algorithm represents all the
hidden steps that the equation can’t do:
1) the algorithm controls the iterations, i.e. the sets of number changes, i.e. the algorithm “controls time”;
2) the algorithm inputs, processes, and outputs the numbers from the equation;
3) the algorithm “knows” what the numerical values are (its decisions are based on this “knowledge”), i.e. the algorithm
represents a consciousness;
4) the algorithm “decides”/ “chooses” what to do based on knowledge of the numerical values, i.e. the algorithm
represents a free will;
5) but the algorithm doesn’t see any pattern emerging in the whole system, only a pre-existing observer of the system can see the quasi-pattern.
Getting back to the real world/universe, I would suggest that one needs to add algorithms to the picture of the universe/system: one seems to need algorithms as well as equations and numbers, to represent the “most simplified (= unified) description” of the world.
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 16, 2019 @ 07:13 GMT
Lorraine,
A 3D fractal is a self-arranging (= dynamical) structure. It is only possible if every “point” of the structure have identical basic properties (like the LCD display of a PC monitor). Fractals are known in mathematics (especially 2 D fractals) because of the work of Benoit Mandelbrot (see Wikipedia).
Fractals exist in mathematics because of the fractal properties of our universe and not the opposite. Mathematics don’t exist independent from our universe. It is just a language and we use it to make “measurable” descriptions (e.g. using rulers). Algebra is the translation of geometry in symbols – numbers are symbols too – so this makes it easy to calculate. But nearly no one can imagine reality from an algebraic equation or algorithm (or binary code).
If consciousness is created by the underlying structure of our universe, mathematics cannot exist “outside” our universe. Human mathematics is the result of consciousness and represents relations between (local) configurations of our universe. Most of mathematics is about simplifying reality (exactly like physics).
The most unified description of our universe is just some text that describes the concept. Physics and mathematics is about concepts, our habitude to use mathematical notations is just culture. The ancient Greek philosophers wrote down there thoughts in poems. Maybe because it showed the “excellence” of the philosophers (just ego?). You don’t have to use mathematical notations to do mathematics. In general publications on the foundations of mathematics don’t hold much mathematical notations, it is about concepts (and argumentation to show the reliability).
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Steve Dufourny replied on Sep. 16, 2019 @ 14:42 GMT
Hi to both of you,
Sydney, I liked a lot your post about spherical volume,sphere. The scalars and vectors become relevant like too the deformations of these spheres. The Poincarré conjecture can be correlated. There are too it seems to me relevant convergences with the strings,branes,Mtheory considering the oscillations, waves,fields. The fractals so Indeed too are important ,like if we had an universal partition,precise,finite. An universal fractal, pesonally in my model a fractal of spherical volumes.
Lorraine,see too that these Numbers, algorythms, équations are Under this universal partition. All is coded, informations can converge with a quantum computing correlated with these spherical informations. Maybe it's the secret for this quantum computing even. See the possibilities with this universal spherical fractal.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 16, 2019 @ 21:44 GMT
Sydney,
So this is what I'm saying:
We can't assume that change is a just "property" of the system; we can't assume that change just happens; we can't fail to investigate what “change” is.
With any system, e.g. the universe, every movement, every number change has to have a reason. There is no such thing as a self-moving, "self-arranging" structure e.g. a fractal does not self-organise: we can break down the steps, and we know that there is an algorithm controlling it.
I'm NOT saying that there is an algorithm controlling the universe: there is no God-algorithm controlling the universe.
What I am saying is that algorithms can be used to REPRESENT the parts of the system that equations and numbers can’t represent.
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 17, 2019 @ 13:31 GMT
Lorraine,
I suppose that the word “self-arranging” has different meanings in the English language. From my point of view “self-arranging” means that there is no other cause from outside that determines all the changes of the structure of the universe. Thus every unit has identical basic properties and these properties are the cause behind the never ending changes within our universe.
Theoretical it is possible to calculate a certain volume that encloses a number of spatial units of our universe. Unfortunately, the changes are infinite small. A quantum is not the lowest amount of energy if we “observe” the system without measurements. Because Planck’s constant is directly related to observations, the mutual relations between phenomena.
Deforming a unit of the structure of our universe is always fluently. But the tessellation of the volume of the universe by the structure of the basic quantum fields creates the synchronization of change. The synchronization limits the change of the direction of change. The whole universe has to “wait” till all the units have “performed” the transfer of a part of their volume within their boundaries (topological deformation). Planck’s constant is the constant amount of deformation that is transferred by a unit without changing its direction of the transfer.
Unfortunately, it is a bit difficult to imagine (a bit too technical).
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 17, 2019 @ 22:32 GMT
I think see what you mean. You are saying that every unit has identical properties. One of the properties is that a unit causes number change (or other change). But the number change is limited by pre-existing quantum rules. So seemingly, you are saying that both the unit and the rules are needed to cause change.
But what do you mean by a “unit”? You seem to mean a matter-space unit.
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 18, 2019 @ 08:09 GMT
Lorraine,
In the textbooks (physics) you will find that space is homogeneous and isotropic. That means that the properties of space show to be
uniform in composition and
uniform in all orientations in relation to the phenomena in space. However, space itself must have a structure otherwise our macroscopic reality cannot exist.
But if space has a structure every...
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Lorraine,
In the textbooks (physics) you will find that space is homogeneous and isotropic. That means that the properties of space show to be
uniform in composition and
uniform in all orientations in relation to the phenomena in space. However, space itself must have a structure otherwise our macroscopic reality cannot exist.
But if space has a structure every “building-block” the structure is composed of, must have a volume and a boundary (surface area). So if space is homogeneous and isotropic every building-block (unit) must have the same basic properties. These properties are responsible for the existence of the known basic quantum fields.
I can make a cross section of a small volume of “empty” space (vacuum space). Image = phia.home.xs4all.nl/13.png. The circles are scalars (spheres) and the blue “background” is the electric field (topological field). Every unit – the boundary of every unit is not drawn – consist of one scalar and some deformed volume around (blue). I can draw one unit – 100% symmetrical so it is not real – and the image = phia.home.xs4all.nl/01.png.
The arrows in the first image show the direction of the deformation of every unit at that moment. The arrow is the resultant of all the influences on every unit (topological deformation) thus there are 12 arrows (vectors) within every scalar. This image – phia.home.xs4all.nl/03.png – shows the 12 vectors within the scalar of a 100% symmetrical unit.
Mass is the concentration of the deformation of the electric field (blue) and rest mass is the result of much more local deformation. Rest mass forces one or more scalars in the centre of the concentration of deformation to decrease. That means that decreased scalars are disconnected from the points of contact (EPR bridges) with all the other scalars around.
Now you can conclude that a matter-space unit cannot exist. Matter is a local concentration of deformation that is transferred from unit to unit. Only the structure of the basic quantum fields is “tangible reality”. Observable reality is created by the continuously changing local properties of these units. So in the end it’s all about (geometrical) mathematics and fractals are part of it.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 18, 2019 @ 22:20 GMT
Sydney,
I understand what you are saying. My point of view is that if “space itself must have a structure”, then there are rules for the structure, there are rules for https://phia.home.xs4all.nl/13.png, https://phia.home.xs4all.nl/01.png and https://phia.home.xs4all.nl/03.png.
If the universe/world is seen as a system, then there is a question about the source of the rules; and there is a question about how the world knows
these particular rules, as opposed to another set of rules. I assume that there is no external input to the system, so I would say that the system requires creative properties and knowledge properties.
Also, not just rules (representable as equations and/or algorithms), there is the question of numbers, and number change (or more correctly, the aspect of the system that we
represent as numbers and number change). So when you say “deformation” and “decrease”, my point of view is that you are talking about number change in a system, and I have to ask why a number should ever change.
Do you see number change as smooth and continuous or do you see number jumps?
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 19, 2019 @ 07:28 GMT
Lorraine,
Of course there are “rules”.
Every unit:
• has an identical and invariant volume.
• has an identical scalar mechanism (sphere forming mechanism).
• is deformable because all the units tessellate space.
That’s all. These properties are enough to create our universe. The images are constructed with the help of these simple rules.
The rules can be get with the help of reasoning; understanding the universal and general properties of our universe. Universal properties are physics laws and physics constants, general properties are physics principles (general behavior of the phenomena).
Some universal and general properties are:
• The uniform structure of space and time everywhere (homogeneous and isotropic);
• The continues changing of all the phenomena in the universe (dynamical universe);
• The equal proportions/properties of the smallest phenomena;
• The non-local nature of the universe.
• The cause behind the existence of distinct fields everywhere in the universe;
• The law of the conservation of energy;
• The constant speed of light;
• The existence of the Planck constant;
• The uncertainty principle of Heisenberg;
• The existence of zero point energy;
• The equivalence of mass and energy.
Phenomenological physics is about the relations between the phenomena and most physicists are convinced they can determine the rules with the help of the examination of the mutual relations. That’s the cause behind the stagnation in physics for nearly a century.
Numbers have no reality in our universe. Numbers are just the result of the human ability to categorize. Finding a general system to count not-identical phenomena (apples, etc.) with the help of the simplification of existing properties (yes/no choices).
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 19, 2019 @ 22:51 GMT
Sydney,
What I am trying to say is that, to represent the evolution of a system, human beings need to use equations, algorithms and numbers. This is what you have done to produce the PNG format images: you needed to use equations, algorithms and numbers to symbolically represent the evolution of the system, and to produce the pictorial outcomes.
It is necessary to use equations, algorithms and numbers to represent the evolving structure of the world. But there is a reasonable assumption that there is something genuine underlying the representations: it is reasonable to assume that the equations, algorithms and numbers
directly or indirectly represent something about the world that really exists.
The equations, algorithms and numbers don’t actually exist, but human beings deliberately use them to symbolically represent something that
does actually exist: surely, you can’t disagree with that?
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 20, 2019 @ 08:22 GMT
Lorraine,
Equations are part of the scientific communication. That means there must be convention about the concepts and the mathematical way to describe these concepts. For example set theory represents phenomenological reality. So if I want to express something that isn’t phenomenological reality I have to make fundamental changes to the existing set theory. And I have to publish about it otherwise everybody thinks that I am wrong if I use my own version of set theory in a publication about physics.
That’s why it is easier to focus upon the concepts and to describe the mathematical origin and consequences. Besides that it is theoretically impossible to simulate our universe. No serious scientist has the opinion it is possible. So I suppose we arrive "at the end of the line" about measuring free will.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 20, 2019 @ 23:07 GMT
But Sydney,
What are equations?
Mathematics is not about abstractly existing relationships between categories or variables. Mathematics requires work: without a lot of hidden, assumed and unacknowledged algorithmic steps, equations cannot function. These hidden and unacknowledged algorithmic steps are performed by computers and/or people. Computer programming has made clear that mathematics contains a lot of hidden, assumed and unacknowledged algorithmic steps.
You have not explained how a system consisting of nothing but equations can work. A system consisting of nothing but equations is a pseudo-system. In fact, you yourself needed to use algorithms and numbers, as well as equations, to represent an evolving system.
What I am trying to say is that a true working system, as opposed to a pseudo-system, requires algorithms and numbers, as well as equations.
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Jason Mark Wolfe replied on Sep. 21, 2019 @ 00:12 GMT
The natural universe is also based upon several physics constants whose relative size, one versus another, can have a significant impact upon the stability of chemistry and the periodic table. After all, the greatest achievement of this physical universe is the availability of stable Elements, without which none of use would be here to talk about it.
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 21, 2019 @ 02:35 GMT
Lorraine,
Let’s take an example: E= mc
2. It is an equation but it don’t describe an evolving universe because it is a static description of a relation between “free quanta” (E) and mass (m). To change mass into free quanta we have to add surface area (c
2) to every quantum of the mass.
If I want to transform the equation into a self-developing calculation (algorithm) I have to add an amount of energy to the energy or the mass if I have assigned real data to the equation. For example I add 1 quantum (Planck’s constant) to the energy (E). Actually I have created a simple loop. Theoretically I can create a black hole if I add enough energy over and over again.
Unfortunately, black holes are not created with the help of equations/algorithm. Black holes are the result of an enormous amount of energy that is created from everywhere around because of a mechanism of energy concentration. Thus if I want to simulate reality without simplifying I have to create the field structure that is responsible for the energy concentration. Of course this is impossible.
Not only because of the existence of relations between the units of the underlying structure of the basic quantum fields that are ruled by irrational numbers (infinities) but also because our universe is non-local. So I have to enlarge the volume of space in every direction to enormous proportions to get a realistic calculation/simulation.
There are about 9 x 10
43 units in 1 m
3 of space and
every unit surpasses about 6 x 10
23 quanta to the adjacent units of the field structure in 1 second. I suppose you will agree with me that a real simulation of reality is theoretically and technically impossible.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 22, 2019 @ 00:56 GMT
Sydney,
Yes, “a real simulation of reality is theoretically and technically impossible”. But nevertheless, physics attempts, or should attempt, to identify all the relevant factors that make the universe-system work. I think that the relevant factors are representable by equations, numbers and algorithms:
1. Equations. Physics already has a pretty good idea of the equations describing the behaviour of matter, though that is a work in progress. Equations, including differential equations, are relationships between categories (e.g. energy is a category). The categories are transposed relationships: the categories themselves don’t change.
2. Numbers. The numbers that are equated to the categories change: it is number change that needs to be explained. But presumably the numbers are not entities that change themselves; and seemingly the numbers “jump”.
3. Algorithms. The
cause of any number change in a system can only be represented algorithmically. Presumably, individual units of matter cause their own
individual number-jump changes in response to their own numeric situations. But any
cause can only be represented algorithmically. And presumably there are no pre-existing algorithms ruling the world.
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S.E. Grimm replied on Sep. 22, 2019 @ 09:01 GMT
Lorraine,
If I interpret your comment well, you are convinced that reality can be described in a reliable way with the help of numbers, equations and algorithms. Well, actually our universe is 100% geometrical dynamics so it is possible to create an quite accurate algebraic geometrical model. Of course I have done it myself but only to verify the concepts. It is not my aim to get a “universal formula”. Sometimes it is not useful to spend much time on research to get something that exists because of the present scientific culture.
P.S.
I am sorry, but I cannot answer your comments anymore. Tomorrow early in the morning I go on holiday for nearly a month (without laptop, etc.). So this is the end of our discussion about "free will". Thanks! ;-)
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Lorraine Ford replied on Sep. 22, 2019 @ 22:42 GMT
Thanks Sydney! Have a good holiday! :-)
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Jason Mark Wolfe wrote on Sep. 20, 2019 @ 12:12 GMT
You would think that quantum mechanics would be proof of free will.
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Jason Mark Wolfe replied on Sep. 21, 2019 @ 00:30 GMT
After all, states of a quantum system are calculated as probabilities. If a particle can only be predicted to be in a state, as a probability, doesn't that imply that the particle could have free will in determining what state it will be measured in, based on a probability?
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Steve Dufourny wrote on Oct. 21, 2019 @ 16:18 GMT
Hi Ian Durham,
Maybe still for the rankings and the links with this quantum conputing and qubits,freewill,determinism, we can consider these spherical volumes and spheres,and the oscillations,volumes,surfaces,motions,rotations,encodings,so
rtings,superimposings,synchronisations,the densities,....the geometrical algebras helping and even the Ricci flow more of course the education too,the genetic,the Environments,the psychology,this and that,the consciousness,the determinism,the sociology,the polities,the philosophy,the biology,the biochemistry,the Atomic physics,the economy,particles physics,the cell biology,this and that,the ecology too and its interactions and the evolution,
regards
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Steve Dufourny replied on Oct. 21, 2019 @ 17:17 GMT
If we correlate with the consciousness, can we consider that all is conscious at all scales,for me the consciousness is a result biological of evolution,so the particles and moleculs have not the freewill because they aren t conscious.That is why this evolution is essential to take into account.
but of course it is just my opinion,it is an assumption,several thinkers fractalise this conscious and tell that all is conscious,I just see differently considering it like correlated with the emergent biological Lifes because we must have these foundamentals,the locoMotion,the nutrition,the reproduction more this evolution and the encodings
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Carl S. Gurtman wrote on Apr. 2, 2020 @ 15:15 GMT
Just listened to Measuring Free Wii. Ian is as always, very interesting, but I would approach the question of free will from a different direction.
Ian notes that if we make a choice, of carrots, for example. Carrots will not change to something else in the period of time between choosing carrots, and getting one.
I would just ask; choosing between a carrot and a pepper, is my choice really free? Or, was there some summations of how the last carrot tasted, what I've read about carrots, and how the carrots look today, that result in my choice of carrots being not freely chosen, but completely determined.
As I listened to Ian's "dulcet tones", I didn't hear this aspect of choice discussed.
Carl Gurtman
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Lorraine Ford replied on Apr. 3, 2020 @ 22:32 GMT
Carl,
Instead of focusing on examples like carrots and peppers, we need to focus on the general case i.e. the structure of what is going on.
The structure of laws of nature is: relationships between variables. Free choice is always in response to a particular situation, where a situation is a particular set of numbers for the variables; the structure of free choice is: IF situation THEN response.
You can’t derive
IF situation THEN response from
relationships between variables.
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Lorraine Ford replied on Apr. 4, 2020 @ 22:13 GMT
Information about carrots, peppers, tweeting birds and roaring lions does not float around in the air. Living things need to analyse the light and sound waves that interact with their eyes and ears in order to establish what their surrounding situation is, i.e. in order to know if they are looking at a carrot or a pepper, or hearing a bird or a lion.
The laws of nature are rules about (e.g.) light and sound waves, but there are no special rules about carrots, peppers, birds or lions because the laws of nature do not discern differences between carrots, peppers, birds and lions. However, living things need to discern differences between carrots, peppers, birds and lions, and living things need to be able to act differently if there is a lion (as opposed to a bird) in the vicinity, or if the recipe calls for green peppers and there are only carrots in the fridge.
The deterministic laws of nature are no use at all when it comes to distinguishing carrots from peppers, or birds from lions. And the deterministic laws of nature are no use at all when it comes to acting in response to these differences. But living things need: 1) to be consciousness of differences in their surrounding situation; and 2) the ability to freely respond to these differences. The ability to analyse and respond to differences (representable as IF…THEN…) is necessarily a primitive aspect of the world because such abilities cannot have arisen from laws of nature (representable as mathematical equations).
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PRASAD RAMESH DIVATE wrote on Apr. 17, 2020 @ 11:53 GMT
I will give you one example
There is a sheep who is moving in a circular way and whose neck is bounded by a thread to a rod at the centre of circle the sheep can move freely but is bounded
This is his free will but still he is bounded by destiny!
I think there is hundred percent domination of destiny in sub concious state of mind and consciousness contains partly destiny and partly free will while superconcious contains full free will and is spontaneous!!
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Pavel Vadimovich Poluian replied on Apr. 26, 2020 @ 17:17 GMT
We have to state that the quantum field and the free will are hard to be studied together.
But, the field anyhow is matter that shows the properties of the possible states spaces.
Metaphorically we can call them associated mathematical spaces of a kind of complex nature. So, the electron orbit is a field of possibilities - the possible states metaphoric space which represents the property of the nature of a particle or object. If there is a holistic effect in the possible states levels on the quantum aspect, it could be great. But it is hard to figure out an experiment to start dealing with the stuff like that.
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Steve Dufourny replied on Apr. 26, 2020 @ 17:47 GMT
Hi To both of You,
All this is very complex. The free will seems a thing deterministic and non deterministic considering the human psychology, we have so many paramters to take into account if we can to create a kind of free will for an AI, it is even philosophically speaking a Deep problem correlated with this consciousness. The parameters are numerous, the genetic, the Environments, the sociology, the education, the philosophies, ideologies, the characters,....in fact it is even a thing evolving and able to change considering the choices possible, there are things wich don t change like the tastes or favortite things but it exists things wich can change in function of encodings of informations and Learnings , and even the consciousness improved can permit different choices, and points of vue. An AI is deterministic and under specific algorythms of comportments and it is different, they are not conscious in fact, we mimate comportments. These comportments even can be non deterministic in function of encodings and algorythms, this AI must be utilised by persons conscious because it can dangerous even. The humans them are totally different, it exists a Little bit of all and the complexity is more than complex. I have explained to Ian Durham that the personalities and so the free will and correlated choices can evolve in function of Learnings but also in function of an optimisation of this consciousness, maybe the ideal is to have an universal consciousness, a determinism in the intelliegence and so a free will correlted permitting the good choices when it is about universal questions. Let s take a simple example, a favorite music can be second if we prefer an other in the time but the determinism is different and does not chamge, that said the conscious can change, it becomes very complex.
Regards
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Steve Dufourny wrote on Apr. 26, 2020 @ 19:28 GMT
Dear Ian Durham , Let s take the Newcomb Paradox and this experiment of beleifs. And the problem is mainly philosophical for me and of course that divides the sciences Community about the choices, the predictions and the human comportments and so this free will. The theory of decisions so become very complex when we consider the determinism and the consciousness more all the other parameters correlated with the decisions and perceptions of our reality and so the conclusions taken. The freedom and thios determinism cannot be dissociated from this consciousness for me and the choices are correlated and like I said evolve. This paradox of Newcomb so becomes indeed intriguing but can we consider the game only and the predictions and strategies when we consider an universal consciousness and a pure correlated determinism? all is there. Without a consciousness, the predictions are different and so the dominances and the strategy loose its meaning when we are aware of a pure universal altruism without Vanity. This paradox looses its real meaning because the life is not a game simply even if I like Von Neuman, maybe after all the only one relevance is the point of equilibriuem like in the disuasion , so the strategy has no meaning because it ios not necessary to play. So the decisions are not relevant but it is just my opinion of course. All this to tell that the competion and this darwinism does not exist when the consciousness is a reality, the same for the games even if the business men don t agree, we don t play, we live and evolve and our consciousness also. Is it a paradox so when we consider this evolutive deterministic consciousness and pure altruism ? no .
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Steve Dufourny wrote on Apr. 26, 2020 @ 20:13 GMT
In continuing about the game, strategy, lack of consciousness and free will, we can tell that it exists a problem of consciousness for the persons liking to dominate or utilising strategies, they are limited for me, they probably have a problem of personality and education in function of their evolutive Environments and so a correlated psychology and adapted comportments. We are not here on Earth...
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In continuing about the game, strategy, lack of consciousness and free will, we can tell that it exists a problem of consciousness for the persons liking to dominate or utilising strategies, they are limited for me, they probably have a problem of personality and education in function of their evolutive Environments and so a correlated psychology and adapted comportments. We are not here on Earth to compete or show our hormons, or others, we are on Earth to evolve with a correlated consciousness. Now of course I am nice but not stupid I know the human nature and its complexity and I can adapt me quickly, I am not Jesus Christ I dont give my other face, I am not perfect, but I find very stupid to not be aware of this universal consciousness, we are not beasts and we have nothing to prove to nobody at my opinion, it is very complex in fact in this society and its actual step of evolution.
Darwin Like I said was false for me because he considered a limited space, the Earth only and limited interactions. The consciousness can permit to balance these interactions and so improve many things, we can open our humanity and Earth to this universe and all rational thinkers understand that we don t lack space , energy and matters, we lack simply of consciousness, universa, altruistic and logic respecting these universal laws.
In fact we have our primitive instincts and like we are still Youngs considering the evolution on Earth, we have these global problems mainly due to these primitive instincts. The Vanity, the frustration, the anger, the avidity, the hate, the jealousy, the competition,this and that are just due to a lack of consciousness simply , and also we have bad habits on Earth, we are divided, the global system is stupid with borders, the money, the arms and weapons, this and that, in fact we are simply Youngs and that explains mainly our global problems lacking of foundamentals , deterministic, universal . The wisdom maybe is to encircle this and find the adaptation but it is not easy
But can you explain this to all ? no unfortunally, a few number are aware of these truths and they are even angry and irritated when you explain these truths, still these hormons probably and the psychology in function of many parameters of life of persons, environmental, genetic, social, education, encoding of informations, this and that.
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