Agree/Disagree!

[bascule]

Before we begin I'd like to provide a little background to facilitate this conversation. I am asking what everyone has hypothesized through the sum of their life experience (or if you haven't yet, what you would). This isn't a particularly scientific approach, to be sure, but I don't think we yet have enough data to really answer these questions...

 

Anyway, let's begin... agree/disagree! I'm numbering so you can agree or disagree on individual points. A one word answer is fine, and if you want to expound upon that, that's great too.

 

1. The probabilistic nature of QM is merely an artifact of the observational nature of our inquiry into its inner workings. Because all of our observations take place in the theater of a temporospatial "background" whose state is unprobable via direct observation, its behaviour to us appears random in certain aspects. This is the cause of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle.
    
   
2. When a background independent theory of the universe is constructed, it will be both deterministic (i.e. conforming in all ways to a definable set of mathematical operations) and discrete (i.e quantifiable in integral terms). For example, insofar as I understand it, Loop Quantum Gravity presupposes such a universe.
    
   
3. Given these qualities, the universe will be expressible as a Turing-complete algorithm, and we will discover that time is a mere artifact of the operational structure of the underlying algorithms (i.e. when the universe isn't "working" on "you," it's "working" on everything else.
    
   
4. If we were to further analyze the entropy data, and perhaps correlate it in temporospatial terms, higher level patterns would emerge which would give us clues into the higher level state. Princeton's Global Consciousness Project attempts to do just that, and has noticed some astounding correlations in entropy data collected from random event generators (dubbed "eggs") that use quantum tunneling or "thermal noise" to generate "truly" random numbers. For example, here is a graph of variance in the temporospatially correlated egg data surrounding the 9/11 terrorist attacks:
    
   
    
   These patterns would seem to suggest higher level deterministic machinery working in the "background" whose state can be probed and ascertained by enough analysis and correlation of seemingly-random quantum events.
   

 

Ed: Whoa, holy shit, I realized this transcends pseudoscience because I proposed a test! Go me, I think I'm learning how to pull myself out of the throwes of mere unscientific speculation...

[eon_rider]

1) I strongly agree. I think some of the strange things in Q.M are due to observation

(but that opinion is honestly subject to change as I learn more about Q.M.)

("this is the cause of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle."

Which interpretation are you referring to?)

 

2) I disagree at present.

 

3) I disagree. the universe is not expressible as a “universal turing machine”. The universe can’t be defined by some kind of mathematical algorithm

Also why would a turing machine be the best way to express the TOE of the universe? If that's what you are asking.

 

4) I disagree (as soon as one proposes a concept of some strange “higher level deterministic machinery" working in the "background" I can’t agree)

(er...but sure I could be wrong)

 

best

 

Eon.

 

PS. Just my 2 cents. That was fun.

[MetaFrizzics]

In my opinion, the reason for the philosophical muddle regarding several of your points is that modern physics is in denial about a very obvious fact of life:

 

(1) Physics is about dead things, and brainless machines. These are deterministic, although the physics is beyond us at the moment and we have to settle for QM probability interpretations.

 

(2) People and higher animals are motivated by restricted free will. I can't fly, but I can choose to go left or right and select restaurants on any basis, including a coin flip. Physics will never be able to explain 'causality' for these events.

 

(3) There is a God, but unfortunately, He is smarter than us by such a huge margin that it's child's play for Him to fool us into believing anything He fancies. So just the possibility of His existance, and the probability that He won't jump when we call means we cannot actually practise 'true' science with any confidence in our findings whatsoever.

[bascule]

1) I strongly agree.

 

Cool

 

2) I disagree at present.

 

Fair enough, but you have to postulate the former for the latter to make sense.

 

3) I disagree. the universe is not expressible as a “universal turing machine”. The universe can’t be defined by some kind of mathematical algorithm

Also why would a turing machine be the best way to express the TOE of the universe? If that's what you are asking.

 

I would contend that any algorithm which is both discrete and deterministic can be executed by a Universal Turing Machine. The question isn't whether the universe itself is a UTM, the question is whether or not the universe is Turing-complete.

 

4) I disagree (as soon as one proposes a concept of some strange “higher level deterministic machinery" working in the "background" I can’t agree)

(er...but sure I could be wrong)

 

I think the best comparison is to a strange attractor, trajectories inside of which seem to skip around randomly but which eventually form higher level patterns that are only recognizable after being plotted at length. I was merely trying to say that there is (or could be) a higher level deterministic pattern which we presently lack the mathematics to recognize or describe, except with the possibility of the Global Consciousness Project