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Ask HN: Where are the properties of all cosmic objects stored?
Everyone talks about space and time when it comes to the universe - but what about memory/state? Where are the size, speed, position, composition etc of all cosmic objects and the universe as well as certain laws stored?
- Flankk 5y agoSize, speed, position, composition are physical properties of real objects. When you speak of memory, you're referring to either computers or memories in the brain, which are both virtual representations of real objects. If Bostrom's simulation argument is correct, then it stands to reason that some form of memory exists to store the "physical" representation. I find that people make the mistake of thinking you would need massive storage for this. You would only need some minimal representation of the world and the physical properties would be derived based on your observation. In other words, only render what is in your field of view. If you aren't looking at the atoms, then the atoms don't exist.
- techdragon 5y agoAs someone who’s opinion on the simulation hypothesis is “we are either a solipsistic allegory of the cave style input response simulation and everything is fake, or we are a physical simulation of the emergent results from basic energy/particles/waves constraint with the entire rules of physics known and unknown, anything between these two is unlikely otherwise you are either cheating or risk the subject discovering the simulation” With the solipsistic simulation everything is fake, don’t worry about it, the input to the visual cortex simulation doesn’t even need to be what we think it is, because as a fake simulation of a mind, not even a brain just a mind… in a virtual box I’m being told all this exists by right down to the latest results at CERN it makes sense because the entire set of inputs is wired for me to make sense of this reality. With a physical simulation however you can’t “forget” fundamental properties when simulating a universe of wave/particles. The atoms do “exist” when you aren’t looking at them otherwise how does the simulation know precisely what to show you when you look back? How does it know how those atoms are part of a ribosome, involved in an intricate quantum mechanical dance as they fold a protein and contribute to the growth of the plant on the shelf behind me. Unless your suggesting somehow we’re in some weird middle ground when the simulation is full of shortcuts like we program into gamers today to save cpu or memory and somehow we haven’t noticed while probing the intricate workings of the universe via particle accelerators and other cutting edge experimental physics.
- Flankk 5y agoAs I said, all kinds of shortcuts would be taken. Video games only render what is in your field of view. How do video games know precisely what to show you when you look back? The computer has all the physics equations and what you see is just a function of your field of view at that frame in time. So the microscopic world is not physically operating, it is simulated using some heuristics and upon observation the generated microbes are saved to memory. Outer space is empty. When we look out with the Hubble telescope, galaxies are procedurally generated and saved to memory. Once again, only the minimal visual representation is needed. The actual planets and asteroids would only be generated on observation, etc.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- perl4ever 5y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phase_space https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phase_space
- geeB 5y agoAny implementation of memory that's ever existed uses measurable physical quantities/states to represent information, not the other way around. Also, (in classical mechanics to keep it simple) it all comes down to position, momentum, and fields. E.g "size" and "composition" is determined by the positions of particles, etc. So in a way the answer to where those properties are stored is right there. If you don't think the universe can intrinsically have its own state, but it needs to be stored elsewhere, then there are a couple of issues. If this memory can only have the properties of the universe and no more, and can't be observed, it might as well not exist. If it has other possible states, then it's circular, and you'll need some memory one level up to store the state of the memory. So if you believe in nested simulations, I suppose your questions could be answered up to the "root" universe. Whether there is some "external" memory that actually stores all the state in the universe is at least for now pure metaphysics. Do you think anyone on Earth could possibly answer this question today?