7 ms·

On the concept of motion

57 points by nsoonhui 5y ago

heisenzombie 5y ago
Does anyone defend this as being useful for anything? It reads like “angels dancing on the head of a pin” to me…
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- Smaug123 5y ago
  It's essentially a pitch for the Wolfram Physics Project. How useful is it to work through a system which has some probability $p$ of modelling the basic nature of the universe to some degree $d$? Reasonable people may reasonably differ on the answer depending on $p$ and $d$, and on the values of $p$ and $d$ in any given instance.
- TuringTest 5y ago
  > Does anyone defend this as being useful for anything? Extreme relativistic phenomena like "spooky action at a distance" or the Alcubierre's warp engine folding space may be intuitively easier to grasp if you think of space as a structure made of wobbly interacting elements approaching or receding from one another, rather than extreme deformations of abstract euclidean geometry or probabilistic waveforms. For example, time ticking at different rates in different places could be explained by a constant rate of causal propagation through regions with a different density of these elements. Or, alternatively, by causation propagating at different rates going slower through elements with very high energy. This can create two competing models, which could be tested experimentally to see which one is closer to reality. (This capability to ultimately being tested empirically is the main thing that differentiates theoretical physics from scholastic speculation; if not for that, both would be rationalistic masturbations to see how far you can push your logic models, without a way to put them to the test). For a scientific theory, "being easier to grasp intuitively" may be the basis for more rapid advances over the previous version based entirely on a complex formal notation.
  - heisenzombie 5y ago
    Ok I think we mostly agree, so… /is/ there anything in there that could be tested, even in principle? Or make any sort of prediction about anything observable? It all seemed quite vague to me…
    - yetihehe 5y ago
      You are looking at an idea which is pretty much starting to get defined as you watch it. Mathematicians are still trying to map all implications of this. Don't expect that everything is known already.
judofyr 5y ago
> We’ll be talking not about the actual model of space in our Physics Project, but instead about the cellular automaton systems I’ve studied for many years in which space is effectively predefined to consist of a rigid array of cells, each with a discrete value updated according to a local rule. And here we go again. I'm sorry, but when it comes to physics I'm not interested in beautiful pictures of mathematical models. Show me the real world! Show we experiments and show me how your model can predict the result. That's the baseline. Once you've been able to do that then we can talk about the beautiful mathematical structures which emerges.
- dr_dshiv 5y ago
  “When it comes to science, I’m not interested in math! Show me the real world!” What is more real, math or your eyes? Another argument — Copernicus’s model didn’t fit the data as well as Ptolemy’s epicycles. But the math was so elegant that it led to a better model.
  - strogonoff 5y ago
    It is a common fallacy that studying physical world, materials and time-space is somehow more “true” than math and philosophy. People seem to forget that all of the modern “hard science” came from philosophy, that the core assumption of causality pointing from the observed world to the observer (environment->neurons->thoughts) is unfalsifiable, that by digging deeper into material world we may well be studying pixels on a map as opposed to features of the true territory.
    - circlefavshape 5y ago
      It's not a fallacy, it's a philosophical position To me it's blindingly obvious that the physical world is reality, and that math/philosophy/etc are merely descriptions. Some people see it the other way around
      - whatshisface 5y ago
        Physics is a description, math is about what various assumptions imply, and it is independent of the universe because it's qualified by the assumptions made.
svilen_dobrev 5y ago
it's like an "object" (as in OOP) is just bunch of attributes.. (“conceivable (persistent) features” there) and it depends which subset one chooses - or can - see, and there might be very different resulting views.. also reminds me of levels in pirsig's MoQ: https://www.original.moq.org/forum/magnus/levelsundressed/TheLevelsUndressedindex.html https://www.original.moq.org/forum/magnus/levelsundressed/Th...
da25 5y ago
Umm, sorry, but what is he trying to say ? Can someone ELI5 for me/us.
- state_less 5y ago
  Motion is like seeing a bunch of pictures in sequence at 24 FPS. We call these movies. It gives the appearance of something moving to the observer, despite no movement existing between frames.
  - lostmsu 5y ago
    Funny thing is that in movies we also see sequences of pixels called pictures, that give appearance of solid objects to the observer despite nothing existing between those pixels to hold them together.
pnut 5y ago
I find this line of thinking deeply intriguing, but someone needs to restrict his practice of "putting" every other "word" in "double quotes". The text reads perfectly fine without that noise.
- imglorp 5y ago
  http://www.unnecessaryquotes.com/ http://www.unnecessaryquotes.com/
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

57 points by nsoonhui 5y ago

heisenzombie 5y ago

Does anyone defend this as being useful for anything? It reads like “angels dancing on the head of a pin” to me…

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
Smaug123 5y ago
It's essentially a pitch for the Wolfram Physics Project. How useful is it to work through a system which has some probability $p$ of modelling the basic nature of the universe to some degree $d$? Reasonable people may reasonably differ on the answer depending on $p$ and $d$, and on the values of $p$ and $d$ in any given instance.
TuringTest 5y ago
> Does anyone defend this as being useful for anything? Extreme relativistic phenomena like "spooky action at a distance" or the Alcubierre's warp engine folding space may be intuitively easier to grasp if you think of space as a structure made of wobbly interacting elements approaching or receding from one another, rather than extreme deformations of abstract euclidean geometry or probabilistic waveforms. For example, time ticking at different rates in different places could be explained by a constant rate of causal propagation through regions with a different density of these elements. Or, alternatively, by causation propagating at different rates going slower through elements with very high energy. This can create two competing models, which could be tested experimentally to see which one is closer to reality. (This capability to ultimately being tested empirically is the main thing that differentiates theoretical physics from scholastic speculation; if not for that, both would be rationalistic masturbations to see how far you can push your logic models, without a way to put them to the test). For a scientific theory, "being easier to grasp intuitively" may be the basis for more rapid advances over the previous version based entirely on a complex formal notation.
- heisenzombie 5y ago
  Ok I think we mostly agree, so… /is/ there anything in there that could be tested, even in principle? Or make any sort of prediction about anything observable? It all seemed quite vague to me…
  - yetihehe 5y ago
    You are looking at an idea which is pretty much starting to get defined as you watch it. Mathematicians are still trying to map all implications of this. Don't expect that everything is known already.

judofyr 5y ago

> We’ll be talking not about the actual model of space in our Physics Project, but instead about the cellular automaton systems I’ve studied for many years in which space is effectively predefined to consist of a rigid array of cells, each with a discrete value updated according to a local rule. And here we go again. I'm sorry, but when it comes to physics I'm not interested in beautiful pictures of mathematical models. Show me the real world! Show we experiments and show me how your model can predict the result. That's the baseline. Once you've been able to do that then we can talk about the beautiful mathematical structures which emerges.

dr_dshiv 5y ago
“When it comes to science, I’m not interested in math! Show me the real world!” What is more real, math or your eyes? Another argument — Copernicus’s model didn’t fit the data as well as Ptolemy’s epicycles. But the math was so elegant that it led to a better model.
- strogonoff 5y ago
  It is a common fallacy that studying physical world, materials and time-space is somehow more “true” than math and philosophy. People seem to forget that all of the modern “hard science” came from philosophy, that the core assumption of causality pointing from the observed world to the observer (environment->neurons->thoughts) is unfalsifiable, that by digging deeper into material world we may well be studying pixels on a map as opposed to features of the true territory.
  - circlefavshape 5y ago
    It's not a fallacy, it's a philosophical position To me it's blindingly obvious that the physical world is reality, and that math/philosophy/etc are merely descriptions. Some people see it the other way around
    - whatshisface 5y ago
      Physics is a description, math is about what various assumptions imply, and it is independent of the universe because it's qualified by the assumptions made.

svilen_dobrev 5y ago

it's like an "object" (as in OOP) is just bunch of attributes.. (“conceivable (persistent) features” there) and it depends which subset one chooses - or can - see, and there might be very different resulting views.. also reminds me of levels in pirsig's MoQ: https://www.original.moq.org/forum/magnus/levelsundressed/TheLevelsUndressedindex.html https://www.original.moq.org/forum/magnus/levelsundressed/Th...

da25 5y ago

Umm, sorry, but what is he trying to say ? Can someone ELI5 for me/us.

state_less 5y ago
Motion is like seeing a bunch of pictures in sequence at 24 FPS. We call these movies. It gives the appearance of something moving to the observer, despite no movement existing between frames.
- lostmsu 5y ago
  Funny thing is that in movies we also see sequences of pixels called pictures, that give appearance of solid objects to the observer despite nothing existing between those pixels to hold them together.

pnut 5y ago

I find this line of thinking deeply intriguing, but someone needs to restrict his practice of "putting" every other "word" in "double quotes". The text reads perfectly fine without that noise.

imglorp 5y ago
http://www.unnecessaryquotes.com/ http://www.unnecessaryquotes.com/

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]