4 ms·
I think, ultimately, there are only 3 possible explanations for the paradoxes of the quantum world. 1) superdeterminism (everything including our choices in qua
by DebtDeflation 3y ago
I think, ultimately, there are only 3 possible explanations for the paradoxes of the quantum world. 1) superdeterminism (everything including our choices in quantum experiments today were fully determined at the instant of the Big Bang), 2) something "outside" our observable reality acting as a global hidden variable (whether something like the bulk in brane cosmology or whatever is running the simulation in simulation theory) or 3) emergent spacetime (if space and time are emergent phenomena then locality and causation are not fundamental).
- digging 3y agoActually, how are 1 and 2 different? If 2 simply refers to another layer of reality, don't we still have to figure out if it's deterministic or not? I suppose if it has its own completely different (or slightly different[1]) physics, we'd be starting over, but we'd still work our way back to the question of top-level determinism eventually). [1] Referring to cosmological natural selection as a theory of the "fine-tuned" universe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmological_natural_selection https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmological_natural_selection (a fun favorite of mine but not looking likely)
- hermannj314 3y agoIt's simulations all the way down.
- DebtDeflation 3y agoFair point. I'm assuming that additional layer of reality is deterministic.
- hnthrowaway0328 3y agoI have been thinking about this. Definitely not a Physicist or even a Scientist, but how do we figure out the world that the simulation occurs? I think one lead we can have is that simulations are called simulations because they try to emulate the real world (the one simulations are running). By observing from inside the simulation what kind of input and reaction the "God" people has when we output something, we might be able to understand the "real" world better. It's like the "people" in the Sims game -- given they are of their own mind, they can figure out some rules of our world. But then how can we jump out of simulation to really really figure it out?
- mewpmewp2 3y agoWe probably need to develop AGI and more to be able to get closer to this.
- Filligree 3y agoMany-Worlds? Or does that fall under #2 for you?
- coderenegade 3y agoMany worlds is really just another form of determinism. If everything that can happen does, no one in any of the individual universes has free will.
- numinos1 3y agoUnless awareness is independent of the universe and traverses the branching worlds through observation and free will.
- amanaplanacanal 3y agoDoes that imply that I have free will and the rest of you all are zombies?
- GoblinSlayer 3y agoFree will is compatible with determinism. Also may worlds reproduces statistics of independent events, which is equivalent to hard indeterminism is you declare that choices are unitary.
- TheOtherHobbes 3y agoSuperdeterminism on its own doesn't explain why quantum phenomena are statistical, not deterministic. It seems strange that a superdeterministic universe constrains certain kinds of phenomena to statistical distributions for no obvious reason. Free choice is a completely different issue, and I'm not even sure it requires quantum theory. Clearly we have the illusion of free choice, but just as obviously our choices are very heavily constrained. In fact the constraints pretty much determine personality. And there's plenty of evidence from psychology that if you you have an accurate model of personality you can manipulate someone's choices without them being aware of it. So I'm not seeing what quantum theory adds to this. It seems to assume consciousness is quantum and works back from there. Which is a weak argument (IMO).