7 ms·

I only have an amateur interest in physics, so I'm sorry if this sounds dumb, but I often think about what if we've reached as far as we can go within the curre

by adtac 4y ago

I only have an amateur interest in physics, so I'm sorry if this sounds dumb, but I often think about what if we've reached as far as we can go within the current framework of physics? This is more meta-science than actual science, but what if we made some decisions very early in the development of physics and mathematics and we need to revisit those?

mhh__ 4y ago
There is still huge amounts of work to do in the less fundamental aspects of physics.
tejohnso 4y ago
Perhaps one such decision is that matter is fundamental. There are increasingly substantial cases being made that this is now holding us back in physics, and that we need to consider that consciousness is fundamental, and matter is only a consequence of it. See, for example Hoffman's The Case Against Reality.
- onionisafruit 4y ago
  What does fundamental mean in this case?
  - alex_sf 4y ago
    Nothing. It’s pseudoscientific nonsense.
  - denton-scratch 4y ago
    I'm not a physicist; but the GP mentioned consciousness as an alternative to matter as the fundamental "substance". Well, I've come across that idea before; in certain kinds of Buddhism, consciousness is considered fundamental, the senses are created by consciousness, and the material world is projected by consciousness through the senses. Well, this was explained to me in the context of a particular type of tantric Buddhism; but actually the basic idea is common across most mainstream Buddhism. Most schools teach that the universe is cyclical, and is completely destroyed at the end of an era, before being recreated ex-nihilo. The creation process is started with the appearance of Brahma, who then hallucinates the rest of the universe into existence. So in that model, it is consciousness, not matter that is fundamental, because the material world cannot come into existence without consciousness.
    - karthikk 4y ago
      it is a reversal of "I think, therefore I am" -> "I am, therefore I think" (slight nitpick, the idea(consciousness is fundamental, creation is cyclical) goes back much earlier than buddhism and is part of advaita vedanta.)
      - denton-scratch 4y ago
        > slight nitpick I'm aware that the cyclical universe is from the vedas; a lot of what passes for Buddhist metaphysics is pre-Buddhist. The Buddha didn't care much for metaphysical pronouncements; he was more a meditation teacher than a cosmologist. So I didn't mean to claim that these ideas were Buddhist in origin; I just learned of them from Buddhists.
    - catchclose8919 4y ago
      ...so you're just using "Brahma" to refer to the computer that is running the simulation that is the universe. And when the simulation becomes aware of its own condition, it becomes conscious? This is just rephrasing of the symulation hypothesis in mystical terms and is just as useless as the symulation hypothesis itself (regardless if it's "true" or not). There's some valuable deeper stuff in hindu and buddhist philosophies, but this set of ideas isn't it (neither valuable nor actually deep, just "exotic" sounding to an extent).
      - denton-scratch 4y ago
        > ...so you're just using "Brahma" to refer to the computer that is running the simulation that is the universe. That "Brahma" isn't a computer; the model doesn't suggest that the universe is a simulation. You seem to have wedged in an interpretation that is fundamentally materialist, which sort of misses the point; according to this model, consciousness is fundamental. That is what was being discussed. I agree that it's "mystical" to postulate that consciousness is fundamental; but it's equally mystical to assume that matter is fundamental. In the Buddhist tradition where I learned this, the Brahma story was just that - a myth. But they treated the "consciousness is fundamental" thing as a core teaching, they elaborated it, and the practices grew out of that view. The tradition was a practice tradition; they shunned metaphysical speculation, and "philosophy" was generally treated as another technique for breaking-down conceptual thought. This wasn't something you were supposed to believe, or reason about; it was presented as a way of seeing the world (a "view") that was useful in Buddhist practice. In the same tradition, we were taught that all views are provisional. I was just answering the OP's question about what "fundamental" means in this context. I am not advocating for the view that consciousness is fundamental. I happen to take the view that consciousness exists, and is not an emergent phenomenon; but I don't have a philosophical system built around that idea. It's just that I can't see how the subjective experience of consciousness can emerge from what amounts to a system of levers and gears.
- robertlagrant 4y ago
  How do you define "increasingly substantial"?
- otabdeveloper4 4y ago
  There is no such thing as "consciousness". There is, however, free will. Information complexity is a real and measurable physical quantity, and unlike all others it doesn't obey conservation laws. The sigularity that happens when information complexity is out of control is colloqually called "free will". (Someday maybe we'll be able to map information complexity the same way we now map cosmic background radiation. Now that would be a sight to behold!)
rightbyte 4y ago
My feeling is that a big part of the physics field is trying to see patterns in noise and equipement artifacts.
- nl 4y ago
  This is untrue.
  - guynamedloren 4y ago
    I think the idea here is that it happens unintentionally, unknowingly.
    - nl 4y ago
      Except it doesn't.
- have_faith 4y ago
  Very large efforts are made to predict noise floors within data, prevent it, account for it, average over it with multiple tests, etc.
  - a9h74j 4y ago
    Indeed, AFAIK part of the progress, even while their are no discoveries being made, is in having a better-calibrated detector. In part, better statistics yield better calibration.
Agamus 4y ago
I think this is correct. My sense is that the assumption of _individuation_ is at the core of logic, which then infects all rational thinking. (We add the predicates to "things", and then forget that we added them!) If there are no individual things, as quantum field theory seems to suggest, what are numbers counting? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNVQfWC_evg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNVQfWC_evg http://www.katabane.com/mt/ontology.html http://www.katabane.com/mt/ontology.html
- JieJie 4y ago
  What a great video. Thanks! Professor Tong specifically talks about the subject of this article (LHC coming up with bupkis), but five years ago. Seems like he may be being vindicated a little here.
brnaftr361 4y ago
If the pattern Kuhn shows in The Structure of a Scientific Revolution holds, one might presume at some time a crisis will emerge which will influence the development of higher resolution tools and techniques and with them more evidence. The "nightmare" seems like exactly what is outlined as a predictable error in the model - it'll be interesting to see what happens.
- hobs 4y ago
  I don't think that's what the book says, just that solving problems with the new framework is what makes it popular enough with the next generation. More specificity or higher resolution is not implied, though it can happen after the paradigm has shifted as a new set of niches are waiting to be explored and filled.
  - brnaftr361 4y ago
    I do believe that's precisely what it says: science adopts a new paradigm with a comprehensive view which predicts most cases, at some point the threshold is reached through normal science where a model falls apart, failing to predict given effects, and probity for answers surrounding that requires new tools (or techniques), which are developed to study the "unpredicted" effects mentioned above and a more comprehensive understanding is developed. At this point there may be a challenge to the paradigm, which yes, may be overturned upon favorable comportment. See phlogiston. If we fairly assume that measurements are multidimensional and thus techniques to observe new dimensions can be conferred to have increased resolution... But I'd absolutely concede that I may have misread. But I do believe Kuhn was fairly explicit in detailing this process. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
    - pdabbadabba 4y ago
      I think your reading is about right, though I'm not sure about your application of it to the current situation. The "crisis" being discussed today in physics is quite different from the ones Kuhn describes--in some ways it is the opposite situation. For Kuhn, as you note, the crisis comes when existing theoretical models prove completely inadequate to make sense of new data, so the old model has to be largely thrown out and a new paradigm built in its place. Today's crisis in physics (if that's what it is) seems to be that, even though our existing model seems incomplete for theoretical reasons (lack of harmonization between models, for example), it continues to fit all the empirical data we have been able to generate. Really, we are hoping to stumble upon a new paradigm, but we can't seem to make it happen.
Certhas 4y ago
That's not the problem we face though. Consider the following: For all terrestrial phenomena that we have observe so far we have a theory of everything. In order to put matter into a state where it behaves in such a way that you can tell the difference between two competing theories that describe the world, you have to build the LHC. Anything less than that and the theories all are perfectly good at describing what we see. I think there is a tendency to misunderstand LHC and it's high energies as somehow being "brute force". High energy really just means small structures. It's better to think of it as the worlds best microscope. LIGO is the worlds best ruler. So we're measuring the world and it's matter to an unfathomable precision and we do not see meaningful divergence between theory and experiment. We know there is more out there, but it's not stuff we can study on earth. That's the single biggest problem.
- survirtual 4y ago
  Let’s build a particle accelerator on the moon. Make it go around the circumference of the entire moon.
  - XorNot 4y ago
    For the effort it would be easier to build one around the Earth. Double it up as a driveable highway, rail and electrical infrastructure (and then you can use solar power sold on a global market where one side is always in daylight).
    - AnimalMuppet 4y ago
      Um... doesn't it produce synchrotron radiation while operating? I'm not sure that you want to be driving on that...
      - hanniabu 4y ago
        Good ol' corporate lobbying will make that a non-issue
  - forgotpwd16 4y ago
Sharlin 4y ago
We have found a set of (relatively simple) rules that match (a large part of) reality so well that no matter what we do, we don't seem to be able to get any results that would indicate the rules are wrong or even slightly inaccurate. However, we are almost certain they are wrong, or at least incomplete – but given how well they model reality it would be astonishing if it turned out that we're on a totally wrong track and the actual rules are completely different.

by adtac 4y ago

mhh__ 4y ago

There is still huge amounts of work to do in the less fundamental aspects of physics.

tejohnso 4y ago

Perhaps one such decision is that matter is fundamental. There are increasingly substantial cases being made that this is now holding us back in physics, and that we need to consider that consciousness is fundamental, and matter is only a consequence of it. See, for example Hoffman's The Case Against Reality.

onionisafruit 4y ago
What does fundamental mean in this case?
- alex_sf 4y ago
  Nothing. It’s pseudoscientific nonsense.
- denton-scratch 4y ago
  I'm not a physicist; but the GP mentioned consciousness as an alternative to matter as the fundamental "substance". Well, I've come across that idea before; in certain kinds of Buddhism, consciousness is considered fundamental, the senses are created by consciousness, and the material world is projected by consciousness through the senses. Well, this was explained to me in the context of a particular type of tantric Buddhism; but actually the basic idea is common across most mainstream Buddhism. Most schools teach that the universe is cyclical, and is completely destroyed at the end of an era, before being recreated ex-nihilo. The creation process is started with the appearance of Brahma, who then hallucinates the rest of the universe into existence. So in that model, it is consciousness, not matter that is fundamental, because the material world cannot come into existence without consciousness.
  - karthikk 4y ago
    it is a reversal of "I think, therefore I am" -> "I am, therefore I think" (slight nitpick, the idea(consciousness is fundamental, creation is cyclical) goes back much earlier than buddhism and is part of advaita vedanta.)
    - denton-scratch 4y ago
      > slight nitpick I'm aware that the cyclical universe is from the vedas; a lot of what passes for Buddhist metaphysics is pre-Buddhist. The Buddha didn't care much for metaphysical pronouncements; he was more a meditation teacher than a cosmologist. So I didn't mean to claim that these ideas were Buddhist in origin; I just learned of them from Buddhists.
  - catchclose8919 4y ago
    ...so you're just using "Brahma" to refer to the computer that is running the simulation that is the universe. And when the simulation becomes aware of its own condition, it becomes conscious? This is just rephrasing of the symulation hypothesis in mystical terms and is just as useless as the symulation hypothesis itself (regardless if it's "true" or not). There's some valuable deeper stuff in hindu and buddhist philosophies, but this set of ideas isn't it (neither valuable nor actually deep, just "exotic" sounding to an extent).
    - denton-scratch 4y ago
      > ...so you're just using "Brahma" to refer to the computer that is running the simulation that is the universe. That "Brahma" isn't a computer; the model doesn't suggest that the universe is a simulation. You seem to have wedged in an interpretation that is fundamentally materialist, which sort of misses the point; according to this model, consciousness is fundamental. That is what was being discussed. I agree that it's "mystical" to postulate that consciousness is fundamental; but it's equally mystical to assume that matter is fundamental. In the Buddhist tradition where I learned this, the Brahma story was just that - a myth. But they treated the "consciousness is fundamental" thing as a core teaching, they elaborated it, and the practices grew out of that view. The tradition was a practice tradition; they shunned metaphysical speculation, and "philosophy" was generally treated as another technique for breaking-down conceptual thought. This wasn't something you were supposed to believe, or reason about; it was presented as a way of seeing the world (a "view") that was useful in Buddhist practice. In the same tradition, we were taught that all views are provisional. I was just answering the OP's question about what "fundamental" means in this context. I am not advocating for the view that consciousness is fundamental. I happen to take the view that consciousness exists, and is not an emergent phenomenon; but I don't have a philosophical system built around that idea. It's just that I can't see how the subjective experience of consciousness can emerge from what amounts to a system of levers and gears.
robertlagrant 4y ago
How do you define "increasingly substantial"?
otabdeveloper4 4y ago
There is no such thing as "consciousness". There is, however, free will. Information complexity is a real and measurable physical quantity, and unlike all others it doesn't obey conservation laws. The sigularity that happens when information complexity is out of control is colloqually called "free will". (Someday maybe we'll be able to map information complexity the same way we now map cosmic background radiation. Now that would be a sight to behold!)

rightbyte 4y ago

My feeling is that a big part of the physics field is trying to see patterns in noise and equipement artifacts.

nl 4y ago
This is untrue.
- guynamedloren 4y ago
  I think the idea here is that it happens unintentionally, unknowingly.
  - nl 4y ago
    Except it doesn't.
have_faith 4y ago
Very large efforts are made to predict noise floors within data, prevent it, account for it, average over it with multiple tests, etc.
- a9h74j 4y ago
  Indeed, AFAIK part of the progress, even while their are no discoveries being made, is in having a better-calibrated detector. In part, better statistics yield better calibration.

Agamus 4y ago

I think this is correct. My sense is that the assumption of _individuation_ is at the core of logic, which then infects all rational thinking. (We add the predicates to "things", and then forget that we added them!) If there are no individual things, as quantum field theory seems to suggest, what are numbers counting? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNVQfWC_evg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNVQfWC_evg http://www.katabane.com/mt/ontology.html http://www.katabane.com/mt/ontology.html

JieJie 4y ago
What a great video. Thanks! Professor Tong specifically talks about the subject of this article (LHC coming up with bupkis), but five years ago. Seems like he may be being vindicated a little here.

brnaftr361 4y ago

If the pattern Kuhn shows in The Structure of a Scientific Revolution holds, one might presume at some time a crisis will emerge which will influence the development of higher resolution tools and techniques and with them more evidence. The "nightmare" seems like exactly what is outlined as a predictable error in the model - it'll be interesting to see what happens.

hobs 4y ago
I don't think that's what the book says, just that solving problems with the new framework is what makes it popular enough with the next generation. More specificity or higher resolution is not implied, though it can happen after the paradigm has shifted as a new set of niches are waiting to be explored and filled.
- brnaftr361 4y ago
  I do believe that's precisely what it says: science adopts a new paradigm with a comprehensive view which predicts most cases, at some point the threshold is reached through normal science where a model falls apart, failing to predict given effects, and probity for answers surrounding that requires new tools (or techniques), which are developed to study the "unpredicted" effects mentioned above and a more comprehensive understanding is developed. At this point there may be a challenge to the paradigm, which yes, may be overturned upon favorable comportment. See phlogiston. If we fairly assume that measurements are multidimensional and thus techniques to observe new dimensions can be conferred to have increased resolution... But I'd absolutely concede that I may have misread. But I do believe Kuhn was fairly explicit in detailing this process. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
  - pdabbadabba 4y ago
    I think your reading is about right, though I'm not sure about your application of it to the current situation. The "crisis" being discussed today in physics is quite different from the ones Kuhn describes--in some ways it is the opposite situation. For Kuhn, as you note, the crisis comes when existing theoretical models prove completely inadequate to make sense of new data, so the old model has to be largely thrown out and a new paradigm built in its place. Today's crisis in physics (if that's what it is) seems to be that, even though our existing model seems incomplete for theoretical reasons (lack of harmonization between models, for example), it continues to fit all the empirical data we have been able to generate. Really, we are hoping to stumble upon a new paradigm, but we can't seem to make it happen.

Certhas 4y ago

That's not the problem we face though. Consider the following: For all terrestrial phenomena that we have observe so far we have a theory of everything. In order to put matter into a state where it behaves in such a way that you can tell the difference between two competing theories that describe the world, you have to build the LHC. Anything less than that and the theories all are perfectly good at describing what we see. I think there is a tendency to misunderstand LHC and it's high energies as somehow being "brute force". High energy really just means small structures. It's better to think of it as the worlds best microscope. LIGO is the worlds best ruler. So we're measuring the world and it's matter to an unfathomable precision and we do not see meaningful divergence between theory and experiment. We know there is more out there, but it's not stuff we can study on earth. That's the single biggest problem.

survirtual 4y ago
Let’s build a particle accelerator on the moon. Make it go around the circumference of the entire moon.
- XorNot 4y ago
  For the effort it would be easier to build one around the Earth. Double it up as a driveable highway, rail and electrical infrastructure (and then you can use solar power sold on a global market where one side is always in daylight).
  - AnimalMuppet 4y ago
    Um... doesn't it produce synchrotron radiation while operating? I'm not sure that you want to be driving on that...
    - hanniabu 4y ago
      Good ol' corporate lobbying will make that a non-issue
- forgotpwd16 4y ago

Sharlin 4y ago

We have found a set of (relatively simple) rules that match (a large part of) reality so well that no matter what we do, we don't seem to be able to get any results that would indicate the rules are wrong or even slightly inaccurate. However, we are almost certain they are wrong, or at least incomplete – but given how well they model reality it would be astonishing if it turned out that we're on a totally wrong track and the actual rules are completely different.