• In total there are 8 users online :: 0 registered, 0 hidden and 8 guests (based on users active over the past 60 minutes)
    Most users ever online was 789 on Tue Mar 19, 2024 5:08 am

Ch. 1 - The Mystery of Being

#89: Nov. - Dec. 2010 (Non-Fiction)
User avatar
Jim Watters
All Star Member
Posts: 132
Joined: Wed Jul 28, 2010 6:06 pm
13
Location: Tampa, FL
Has thanked: 41 times
Been thanked: 38 times
Gender:
Contact:
United States of America

Re: Ch. 1 - The Mystery of Being

Unread post

Thanks Dexter. Amazon.com has mixed reviews.
User avatar
Robert Tulip

2B - MOD & SILVER
BookTalk.org Hall of Fame
Posts: 6499
Joined: Tue Oct 04, 2005 9:16 pm
18
Location: Canberra
Has thanked: 2719 times
Been thanked: 2661 times
Contact:
Australia

Re: Ch. 1 - The Mystery of Being

Unread post

Dexter, thanks for sharing the Economist review. It highlights the difficulty of the relation between science and philosophy. I particularly noted the comment "The main novelty in “The Grand Design” is the authors’ application of a way of interpreting quantum mechanics, derived from the ideas of the late Richard Feynman, to the universe as a whole. According to this way of thinking, “the universe does not have just a single existence or history, but rather every possible version of the universe exists simultaneously.” The authors also assert that the world’s past did not unfold of its own accord, but that “we create history by our observation, rather than history creating us.” They say that these surprising ideas have passed every experimental test to which they have been put"

From common sense logic, both these ideas are utterly absurd. I regard it as a priori certain that we have one universe and that the past actually happened. I think that scientists can get so caught up in the implications of obscure findings from quantum mechanics that they fail to apply the common sense rule of whether their speculation is really possible.

A good discussion of The Grand Design is at bautforum.com - linked here.
User avatar
Dexter

1F - BRONZE CONTRIBUTOR
I dumpster dive for books!
Posts: 1787
Joined: Sun Oct 24, 2010 3:14 pm
13
Has thanked: 144 times
Been thanked: 712 times
United States of America

Re: Ch. 1 - The Mystery of Being

Unread post

Robert Tulip wrote: From common sense logic, both these ideas are utterly absurd. I regard it as a priori certain that we have one universe and that the past actually happened. I think that scientists can get so caught up in the implications of obscure findings from quantum mechanics that they fail to apply the common sense rule of whether their speculation is really possible.
I tend to agree with you, I just can't accept this multiverse idea and can't imagine there could be evidence that would convince me otherwise. On the other hand, if I was around in the 1920s I probably would have sided with Einstein against those crazy quantum theorists, so I have to accept that our intuitions are sometimes no damn good.
WONK
Almost Comfortable
Posts: 15
Joined: Mon Oct 25, 2010 3:08 pm
13
Been thanked: 10 times

Re: Ch. 1 - The Mystery of Being

Unread post

One problem some might be having is understanding where you are observing from. We are looking for the inside out and not the outside in. We exist so our universe has to have the properties needed for us to exist. The universe has to have a history and properties to produce what we are made of and where we live. This gives us the basic framework for everything else. This also is a limiting factor in what you look for.

For example: We consider life as carbon based. So we look for life that matches our carbon based existence. But for life all you need is a method of reproducing and storing information and that doesn't require only carbon.

The problem is that we need to think ourside of our own limitations. We know Quantum works and it has multiple histories, multiple possible futures, multiple... When you take this one step farther and consider a more classical framework such as people and planet size events, you find out that the logical framework from Quantum still works. The logic still works. This gives you multi-universes and multi-histories and futures. But, and this is a big but, we exist in this one so all of our direct interactions with the universe are limited to our existing. We can't jump out of our universe.

A way to consider this is a 2 dimensional universe and 2D creatures. They exist on a piece of paper. They can just travel and view things in 2D. You stick a pencil through the paper and the 2D creatures now have a hole in their universe. They can only see or interact with the hole and not the pencil. The pencil never existed to them. But those creatures could create a mathematical 3D world to explain how the hole in their universe was created and where it came from. We are at the point where we have found enough holes in our existence so we can mathematically start constructing where the holes came from and that is the multi-universes of Quantum.

The logic sounds strange but the logic does hold and will boil down to the limited universe that we exist in. It also explains the holes we couldn't explain using just a single universal model. We just have to get our heads outside our 2D limitations.
User avatar
Jim Watters
All Star Member
Posts: 132
Joined: Wed Jul 28, 2010 6:06 pm
13
Location: Tampa, FL
Has thanked: 41 times
Been thanked: 38 times
Gender:
Contact:
United States of America

Re: Ch. 1 - The Mystery of Being

Unread post

Welcome to BookTalk.org Wonk! Thanks for coming over. It's good to have another physicist\mathematician to get their views on these subjects.

I myself question whether quantum effects cause multiple universes every time an observation is made, instead quantum mechanics\field theory is the result of at least one extra dimension so small that we can't observe it. We may need another revolution in modern physics, in the way quantum theory is mathematically formulated and it's union with gravity.
WONK
Almost Comfortable
Posts: 15
Joined: Mon Oct 25, 2010 3:08 pm
13
Been thanked: 10 times

Re: Ch. 1 - The Mystery of Being

Unread post

You have to remember that Quantum follows a 'type' of averaging. In the double split experiments you get probabilities but the probabilities result in events that can be predicted and measured. It is possible to find the electron behind the screen but the probability is so slight you can usually neglect considering it and just look at the patterns on the front of the screen.

An observation can occur and create a change in a large scale environment but the resulting change might be such a large event as an ant is stepped on. The variety of changes is immense but the probabilities that a change causes anything significant is minor. Just like the averaging of possible histories in Quantum makes most histories cancel out the affect on large scales -- so it is not apparent but it is still there. It probably will take the observations of billions, or one at just the exact point, to create a change large enough to have a 'possible' reaction that can be found on a human scale.

There are a number of great stories that refer to these types of variations--see if you can find 'Thrice Upon a Time' by James P. Hogan. Crichton even used the topic--even if he messed it up a little.
User avatar
Interbane

1G - SILVER CONTRIBUTOR
BookTalk.org Hall of Fame
Posts: 7203
Joined: Sat Oct 09, 2004 12:59 am
19
Location: Da U.P.
Has thanked: 1105 times
Been thanked: 2166 times
United States of America

Re: Ch. 1 - The Mystery of Being

Unread post

We are looking for the inside out and not the outside in.
I like this. It doesn't quite capture the core of the problem, but then I don't think there are sufficient words to do that. The everyday perspective that our intuitions and imaginations pulls from is seemless, without these ruffles and alogical events that our physicists say exist. The problem is that once some of our hypotheses meet with success even though they lead to strange conclusions, we have less fear when coming up with new hypotheses with equal or greater strange conclusions. Not that they'd necessarily be wrong, but we're past the point of being guided by intuition.
There are a number of great stories that refer to these types of variations--see if you can find 'Thrice Upon a Time' by James P. Hogan. Crichton even used the topic--even if he messed it up a little.
What was Crichton's book? I've read them all, but that was when I was young. Perhaps before becoming (slightly) more familiar with the topic. I remember a ridiculous documentary called "What the Bleep do we Know Anyway?". My friend loved it, I told him he was a fool. Even if we could affect the quantum world by observation, we cannot control what the outcome would be, we only force the outcome to show itself. Whatever the outcome is, the proof is in the pudding. There are obviously parameters, even at the far reaches of probability, because I don't see no magic happening!
WONK
Almost Comfortable
Posts: 15
Joined: Mon Oct 25, 2010 3:08 pm
13
Been thanked: 10 times

Re: Ch. 1 - The Mystery of Being

Unread post

The Crichton book is the one about going back to historical France. The transporter works on the idea of not tranporting objects or people to the location or time in this universe but transporting to a parallel universe in the multi-universe. Crichton got too full of himself after Jurasic and started messing up the science too much (you have to play with it a little to write fiction but with too much it becomes just fantasy). Hogan covers the subject better and is the much better scientist. You might be surprised at how many scientists write SF. Even Hienlien wrote on multi-universe. You would be surprised how well entrenched the ideas are in both science and SF.

One of the problems here is that we are using English to examine the topic. Math is the best way to understand what is happening. With English you start sounding philosophical or even poetic because the formulae doesn't translate directly. But we also can't use math. String equations are nearly impossible for anyone without years of study and topology I just find confusing without the graphics and even then it takes study.

I disagree--there is magic. We just don't recognize it as such. Just consider Pi, Feigenbaum's no., golden ratio... Or we can switch to...
JulianTheApostate
Masters
Posts: 450
Joined: Sat Jul 23, 2005 12:28 am
18
Location: Sunnyvale, CA
Has thanked: 5 times
Been thanked: 41 times

Re: Ch. 1 - The Mystery of Being

Unread post

Jim Watters wrote: I was referring to path integrals in the Quantum Field Theory (second quantization) sense, not the simple formalizations of Quantum Mechanics of wave-particle duality (Schrödinger, Heisenberg, Dirac).

In quantum field theory, path integrals are essential. All of the Standard Model is based on path integrals, the most successful being Quantum Electrodynamics.
Actually, people made significant progress on quantum field theory before Feynman came up with path integrals. Once he suggested the idea, path integrals became essential tools for gaining insight into and performing calculations about quantum field theory.
JulianTheApostate
Masters
Posts: 450
Joined: Sat Jul 23, 2005 12:28 am
18
Location: Sunnyvale, CA
Has thanked: 5 times
Been thanked: 41 times

Re: Ch. 1 - The Mystery of Being

Unread post

Interbane wrote:
Philosophically, each mathematical structure provides a different perspective of the physical world.
So then, all three would be accurate in a way that depends on a single underlying principle, or two could in the future found to be less accurate than the third?
Since they're mathematically equivalent, they're equally accurate.

As a crude analogy, you can measure distances in miles or kilometers. Though there may be practical reasons to prefer one system over the other, you can't claim that either system presents a more accurate view of the world.
Post Reply

Return to “The Grand Design - by Stephen Hawking & Leonard Mlodinow”