The halting problem revisited

[Dirk Bruere at NeoPax]

How about: if a theory leads to conclusions that are not verfifyable by (or
even contradictory to) "common sense" ( Myself ) - it means the theory is
useless (hence parallel world assumption is useless - hence there are either
a) other sentences more useful "falling out" from QM or b) QM is useless
).


My point is that if "parallel world" theory cannot get rid of "the noise" in
"this world" it is of no use to me. There is no difference between
uncertainty of
a) which world I am in
b) the cat was dead or not a couple of hours in the past

The real problem coming is that theories are just data compression
algorithms, and science looks for the most efficient. AIs may well do a
far better job of creating them, but they won't be "human friendly"
explanations of "whats going on".

 

[Dirk Bruere at NeoPax]

Are you talking about how FTL from arbitrary reference frames in
general relativity is equivalent to a "go back in time" machine? Yes.
I'm fully aware. If that's what you meant, then you really ought to
have provided the context of general relativity.

The context only needs to be local and hence SR suffices.

Obviously, both the theories of general relativity and quantum
mechanics are incorrect in each others's domain of utility. No modern
quantum theory is consistent with modern general relativity. If I am
correct about what you meant to say, then I think that you are wrong.
It's my understanding that the "local true random" and "non-local
determinalistic" interpretations of modern quantum mechanics are /
both/ inconsistent with general relativity, contrary to your
insinuation just now that "local true random" is closer to a Theory Of
Everything.

Either way, way off topic segue.

One or both are going to fail at some point.
Maybe the answer will be determined by macroscopic QM superposition
experiments ie find out *exactly* how QM turns into classical physics.

 

[Dirk Bruere at NeoPax]

Your English is just fine. This discussion isn't at that high a level.

Well, if it's too simple for you I can up the complexity and throw in
some maths.
Would that help?

 

[Lew]

Well, if it's too simple for you I can up the complexity and throw in
some maths.
Would that help?

Please just provide the Java example for it. Otherwise, get a room.

 

[Dirk Bruere at NeoPax]

Please just provide the Java example for it. Otherwise, get a room.

Not very nice being talked down to, is it?

 

[Lew]

Not very nice being talked down to, is it?

What?

I'm just asking you to get back on topic. This is a Java newsgroup.
What are you on about?

 

[Dirk Bruere at NeoPax]

What?

I'm just asking you to get back on topic. This is a Java newsgroup.
What are you on about?

The tone of your replies.
You seem a little peeved when out of your depth knowledge-wise.
I also note you seemed happy enough to join in this thread until your
ignorance was put on display.
Try to be more polite and less condescending in future.

 

[Lawrence D'Oliveiro]

Actually, QM randomness is a symptom of indexical uncertainty about
which exact universe you're in out of many that look identical up to a
certain point in time and then diverge, more or less.

The “multiple universes†interpretation doesn’t really explain anything. How
does it deal with entanglement, for example?

 

[Lawrence D'Oliveiro]

I think you will find that paradox has a way of canceling itself out

The point is that you cannot deduce anything from a paradox without assuming
that logic still holds.

 

[Lew]

The tone of your replies.
You seem a little peeved when out of your depth knowledge-wise.
I also note you seemed happy enough to join in this thread until your
ignorance was put on display.
Try to be more polite and less condescending in future.

Yes, O Almighty God.

 

[Lew]

Unless QM is nonlinear somewhere, in which case it might allow communications
across parallel worlds. And that would mean a whole heap of "supernatural"
style problems and phenomena

This all very fascinating and all, and I'm sure you are proud of how much of a
genius you're making yourself seem and all, but could we please talk about,
oh, I don't know, Java - seeing as how this is a Java newsgroup and all?

I hate to disrupt your little egofest and all, but really,
comp.lang.*java*.programmer, hm-k?

Thank you, dear.

 

[Lew]

I think you will find that paradox has a way of canceling itself out

Not if you sustain it. I dwell in paradox.

 

[javax.swing.JSnarker]

How about: if a theory leads to conclusions that are not verfifyable by (or
even contradictory to) "common sense" ( Myself ) - it means the theory is
useless (hence parallel world assumption is useless - hence there are either
a) other sentences more useful "falling out" from QM or b) QM is useless
).

But there is no parallel world "assumption". There is a parallel world
*conclusion* from the Schroedinger equations, *absent* a *collapse*
assumption.

And there is no evidence for the need for a collapse assumption.

Ockham's Razor applies to the complexity of the theory's *hypotheses*,
not its *conclusions*.

In fact, the general preferred theory for phenomenon X should be:

* Of those that do not make already-falsified predictions
* Of those that explain the most already-observed phenomena
* Of those with the fewest hypotheses
* The one with the greatest number of consequences

The first point eliminates outright-wrong theories.

The second prefers the theories that predict not only X but as many
other phenomena as possible -- so, Maxwell's electromagnetism to
separate theories of electricity and magnetism, and quantum
electrodynamics to either. Essentially, the ones with greatest
explanatory power regarding what we already know.

The third is Ockham's razor.

The fourth prefers, among equally-simple theories, the one that will
have the greatest predictive power regarding what we still *don't* know.
In particular, it's probably the easiest to falsify, because the more
yet-untested consequences the theory has, the more opportunities the
universe (or an experimenter) has to prove it wrong.

Whereupon it gets eliminated by the first point in the list above, the
is replaced by its first runner-up in the competition.

My point is that if "parallel world" theory cannot get rid of "the noise" in
"this world" it is of no use to me. There is no difference between
uncertainty of
a) which world I am in
b) the cat was dead or not a couple of hours in the past

Funnily enough, there is. In case a), but not in case b), you can
potentially create interference patterns in cat alive-or-dead-ness.

But I think don't really follow and I am not capable of discussing it
further. It may be because:
a) my English is not good enough to comprehend such advanced discussions
b) I don't have enought background - do you have some pointers that would
introduce me to the concepts you're talking about?

http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/The_Quantum_Physics_Sequence

 

[javax.swing.JSnarker]

This is a Java newsgroup.

It's an interesting tangent and anyone who doesn't agree can killfile
this thread. This isn't a very high traffic group.

Snarky-boy won't have anything useful anyway.

In the immortal words of the tholenbot, "What does your classic
unsubstantiated and erroneous claim have to do with Java, Lew?"

Indeed, this quantum stuff might be used to implement super-fast
computers some day, and maybe someone will port the JVM to one.

You understand it better than those trying to argue with you.

Another "classic unsubstantiated and erroneous claim".

 

[Dirk Bruere at NeoPax]

But there is no parallel world "assumption". There is a parallel world
*conclusion* from the Schroedinger equations, *absent* a *collapse*
assumption.

And there is no evidence for the need for a collapse assumption.

Ockham's Razor applies to the complexity of the theory's *hypotheses*,
not its *conclusions*.

In fact, the general preferred theory for phenomenon X should be:

* Of those that do not make already-falsified predictions
* Of those that explain the most already-observed phenomena
* Of those with the fewest hypotheses
* The one with the greatest number of consequences

The first point eliminates outright-wrong theories.

The second prefers the theories that predict not only X but as many
other phenomena as possible -- so, Maxwell's electromagnetism to
separate theories of electricity and magnetism, and quantum
electrodynamics to either. Essentially, the ones with greatest
explanatory power regarding what we already know.

The third is Ockham's razor.

The fourth prefers, among equally-simple theories, the one that will
have the greatest predictive power regarding what we still *don't* know.
In particular, it's probably the easiest to falsify, because the more
yet-untested consequences the theory has, the more opportunities the
universe (or an experimenter) has to prove it wrong.

Whereupon it gets eliminated by the first point in the list above, the
is replaced by its first runner-up in the competition.


Funnily enough, there is. In case a), but not in case b), you can
potentially create interference patterns in cat alive-or-dead-ness.


http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/The_Quantum_Physics_Sequence

MWI subjectively verifiable by suicide

 

[javax.swing.JSnarker]

I think the whole problem of modern physics is that it has gone up
alleyways populated with the untestable.

Interesting you should say that.

The various collapse postulates that have been proposed are, in
principle, testable, but so far no-one has found any evidence for collapse.

So, MWI wins by default, since it avoids making a hypothesis that is
difficult to test and for which no evidence exists.

If you posit just the Schroedinger wave equation (well-tested and
basically proven to govern subatomic phenomena) MWI falls out
automatically. Only if you posit an additional hypothesis, a collapse
mechanism, do you NOT have MWI.

It is the testability of that additional hypothesis that is perhaps in
question here. The wave equation itself has been very well tested by now.

The most notorious example is String Theory. For all the testable
scientific predictions it makes it might as well be a branch of theology.

Er, not quite. All variants of string theory have in-principle-testable
consequences at very high energies. Of course, we're nowhere near having
particle accelerators that can probe that region -- yet. In the
meantime, there may be consequences detectable in deep space, since
those energies were reached during the universe's birth.

But one prediction of (most) string theories is supersymmetry, and
supersymmetry should probably result in certain new, heavy particles
being found by the LHC soon. If the LHC finds new particles with
particular properties it would prove supersymmetry and give a boost to
the odds that a superstring theory is correct; on the other hand, if
this doesn't happen after a while of running the LHC, it casts serious
doubt on superstrings (and the non-super string theories have their own
problems).

 

[javax.swing.JSnarker]

The “multiple universes†interpretation doesn’t really explain anything. How
does it deal with entanglement, for example?

Entanglement is just correlation across universes.

If we have an ensemble of universes in half of which electron A is
spin-up and electron B is spin-down and in the other half of which
electron A is spin-down and electron B is spin-up, if an observer in the
ensemble examines their local copy of electron A, then B, or vice versa,
they will see opposite spins every time. On the other hand until they
examine one or the other, they don't know which half of the ensemble
they're in and so whichever they test first appears to be spin-up or
spin-down completely at random.