5 ms·

Quantum Darwinism spotted in diamond spin

44 points by jonbaer 7y ago

tabtab 7y ago
I'm not clear if they found the mechanism of this alleged evolution, or merely found behavior that suggests evolution is taking place.
- thepaperone 7y ago
  >found the mechanism of this alleged evolution Quantum mechanics doesn't care about the mechanism t. "observer"
Strilanc 7y ago
Just another "X1 implies Y, X2 implies Y, X3 implies Y, ..., Xk implies Y; we observed Y; therefore X2" article about quantum interpretations.
- improv32 7y ago
  Is there anyway to assign a reasonable conditional probability to those Xk's and recover some useful science?
gumby 7y ago
The use of "darwinism" seems like another way of just saying "thermodynamics". I assume though that physicists are smarter than I, at least when it comes to physics, so can someone explain what else there might be to this than "local minima"?
yters 7y ago
What even is 'Darwinism'? Are diamonds reproducing and competing amongst themselves for scarce resources in a tragic Malthusian drama, leaving only the fit diamonds to survive? Is this how we account for the wide variety of diamond species that we see in the wild? Is this how the favored diamond races are preserved in their struggle for life?
- TaupeRanger 7y ago
  A general notion of "universal Darwinism" exists, whereby any system that implements variation, selection, and retention is said to exhibit "Darwinism".
  - yters 7y ago
    Ah I see. I now propose the theories of typing Darwinism, shopping Darwinism, snacking Darwinism, 'making up my mind' Darwinism, Darwinism Darwinism, 'picking my boogers' Darwinism, 'doing my homework' Darwinism, 'programming' Darwinism. We should come up with a Darwin award for all the different sorts of Darwin theories and the most Darwinian of them all.
    - r34 7y ago
      Actually many of those "darwinisms" can be classified under "cultural darwinism", so you are quite right :) I wrote my master thesis on "Stanislaw Lem's evolutionary view of development of technology" - just another darwinian view. The definition is so universal, that universal darwinism [1] is natural consequence (althought I'd prefer term "evolutionary", too). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Darwinism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Darwinism
    - dag11 7y ago
      What's the point you're trying to make here?
      - yters 7y ago
        If everything is 'Darwinism,' what's the point of the theory? What does it tell us? What explanatory power does it have? What possibilities does it exclude? Darwin's original theory was groundbreaking because it could explain how you can get a large variety of species from one or a few simple organisms. But, if all one has to do to have a brilliant insight is to prefix 'Darwinian' to any process of change, then it all seems exceedingly pointless. I can write an app where you give it a name, and it prefixes 'Darwinian' and now you have a brilliant insight. I can replace a whole host of researchers with a Python script. It just seems ridiculous.
xorand 7y ago
https://arxiv.org/abs/1809.10456 https://arxiv.org/abs/1809.10456
api 7y ago
Evolution is learning, so this implies that learning in some form is intrinsic to matter and that the quantum->classical transition represents some kind of learning process, which is absolutely fascinating. I also think it has implications for the question of life's origins and perhaps supports a super-gradualist hypothesis in which life as we call it is merely an extreme expression of certain universal characteristics of matter. This doesn't necessarily imply really extreme ideas like panpsychism (the idea that consciousness in some sense is ubiquitous), but it doesn't rule them out either.
- jerf 7y ago
  This is why they really shouldn't call it "Darwinism". I won't say it's completely certain you're wrong, but I think you're extracting way more meaning from the fuzzy term "Darwinism" than the mathematics of this concept justifies... like, waaaay more meaning. It's possible this might end up there, but only via a lot more steps. On its own terms this is like talking about how important wave function collapse is because it shows how the universe is biased towards consciousness or how it must have wanted life... it isn't necessarily possible to completely eliminate the possibility in the most rigorous sense, but there's just a hair's breadth separating those phrases from outright word salad.
aeternum 7y ago
Any Darwinian theory should clearly explain the mechanism for selection. The selection mechanism for quantum darwinism is usually said to be "those states that agree with classical mechanics". This seems like extreme circular reasoning when the goal of the theory is to explain why/how QM experiments result in classical observations.
labster 7y ago
Can quantum Darwinism be used in the blockchain as a engagement service?

44 points by jonbaer 7y ago

I'm not clear if they found the mechanism of this alleged evolution, or merely found behavior that suggests evolution is taking place.

thepaperone 7y ago
>found the mechanism of this alleged evolution Quantum mechanics doesn't care about the mechanism t. "observer"

Strilanc 7y ago

Just another "X1 implies Y, X2 implies Y, X3 implies Y, ..., Xk implies Y; we observed Y; therefore X2" article about quantum interpretations.

improv32 7y ago
Is there anyway to assign a reasonable conditional probability to those Xk's and recover some useful science?

gumby 7y ago

The use of "darwinism" seems like another way of just saying "thermodynamics". I assume though that physicists are smarter than I, at least when it comes to physics, so can someone explain what else there might be to this than "local minima"?

yters 7y ago

What even is 'Darwinism'? Are diamonds reproducing and competing amongst themselves for scarce resources in a tragic Malthusian drama, leaving only the fit diamonds to survive? Is this how we account for the wide variety of diamond species that we see in the wild? Is this how the favored diamond races are preserved in their struggle for life?

TaupeRanger 7y ago
A general notion of "universal Darwinism" exists, whereby any system that implements variation, selection, and retention is said to exhibit "Darwinism".
- yters 7y ago
  Ah I see. I now propose the theories of typing Darwinism, shopping Darwinism, snacking Darwinism, 'making up my mind' Darwinism, Darwinism Darwinism, 'picking my boogers' Darwinism, 'doing my homework' Darwinism, 'programming' Darwinism. We should come up with a Darwin award for all the different sorts of Darwin theories and the most Darwinian of them all.
  - r34 7y ago
    Actually many of those "darwinisms" can be classified under "cultural darwinism", so you are quite right :) I wrote my master thesis on "Stanislaw Lem's evolutionary view of development of technology" - just another darwinian view. The definition is so universal, that universal darwinism [1] is natural consequence (althought I'd prefer term "evolutionary", too). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Darwinism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Darwinism
  - dag11 7y ago
    What's the point you're trying to make here?
    - yters 7y ago
      If everything is 'Darwinism,' what's the point of the theory? What does it tell us? What explanatory power does it have? What possibilities does it exclude? Darwin's original theory was groundbreaking because it could explain how you can get a large variety of species from one or a few simple organisms. But, if all one has to do to have a brilliant insight is to prefix 'Darwinian' to any process of change, then it all seems exceedingly pointless. I can write an app where you give it a name, and it prefixes 'Darwinian' and now you have a brilliant insight. I can replace a whole host of researchers with a Python script. It just seems ridiculous.

xorand 7y ago

https://arxiv.org/abs/1809.10456 https://arxiv.org/abs/1809.10456

api 7y ago

Evolution is learning, so this implies that learning in some form is intrinsic to matter and that the quantum->classical transition represents some kind of learning process, which is absolutely fascinating. I also think it has implications for the question of life's origins and perhaps supports a super-gradualist hypothesis in which life as we call it is merely an extreme expression of certain universal characteristics of matter. This doesn't necessarily imply really extreme ideas like panpsychism (the idea that consciousness in some sense is ubiquitous), but it doesn't rule them out either.

jerf 7y ago
This is why they really shouldn't call it "Darwinism". I won't say it's completely certain you're wrong, but I think you're extracting way more meaning from the fuzzy term "Darwinism" than the mathematics of this concept justifies... like, waaaay more meaning. It's possible this might end up there, but only via a lot more steps. On its own terms this is like talking about how important wave function collapse is because it shows how the universe is biased towards consciousness or how it must have wanted life... it isn't necessarily possible to completely eliminate the possibility in the most rigorous sense, but there's just a hair's breadth separating those phrases from outright word salad.

aeternum 7y ago

Any Darwinian theory should clearly explain the mechanism for selection. The selection mechanism for quantum darwinism is usually said to be "those states that agree with classical mechanics". This seems like extreme circular reasoning when the goal of the theory is to explain why/how QM experiments result in classical observations.

labster 7y ago

Can quantum Darwinism be used in the blockchain as a engagement service?