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Err... is Wolfram now taking credit for this idea, which began circulating back in 2009? http://www.nature.com/news/the-quantum-source-of-space-time-... Because I don't see his name in the citations...
Original credit for a discrete nature of the universe belongs to Democritus.
Err... is Wolfram now taking credit for this idea, which began circulating back in 2009? http://www.nature.com/news/the-quantum-source-of-space-time-... Because I don't see his name in the citations...
I don't think that's the same idea, but he's got a chapter on the network universe idea in his book that was publshed in 2002. Original credit for a discrete nature of the universe belongs to Democritus.
Hmm, upon a second read I think you're right.
One of the key distinguishing factors is the aforementioned Nature article actually cites hints of a real scientific theory based on established physics, while Wolfram's self-aggrandizing ramblings haven't actually led to any real discoveries... :)
Maybe a physicist could help me out: the idea here of treating space as a simple discrete network, and particles just being emergent behavior sounds very interesting. But doesn't this violate Bell's Theorem, that no local hidden variables could completely explain quantum mechanics?
I am not a physicist, but Wolfram covers this. "Because there’s a theorem (Bell’s Theorem) that says that unless there’s instantaneous non-local propagation of information, no such “hidden variables” model can reproduce the quantum mechanical results that are observed experimentally." Wolfram's continues by saying he is allowing instantaneous non-local propogation because network nodes have no coordinates; coordinate…
www.scottaaronson.com/papers/nks.ps
Maybe a physicist could help me out: the idea here of treating space as a simple discrete network, and particles just being emergent behavior sounds very interesting. But doesn't this violate Bell's Theorem, that no local hidden variables could completely explain quantum mechanics?
I found this incredibly hard to read, due to Wolfram's constant need to self-aggrandize. The entire tone of the piece is, "I discovered this, then I discovered that". In reality, most of his "revelations" were discussed by others long before he arrived on set.
It's written in the first person, and he's describing the findings. How else should he have written it?
It's tragic really. A New Kind of Science is full of brilliant ideas but the narcissism that drips from every page ruins it and probably prevents some of these ideas from getting the reception they deserve.
In the beginning was a graph, more like diamond than graphite. Every node in this graph was tetravalent: connected by four edges to four other nodes. By a count of edges, the shortest path from any node back to itself was a loop six edges long. Every node belonged to twenty-four such loops, as well as forty-eight loops eight edges long, and four hundred eighty that were ten edges long. The edges had no length or shap…
Please tell me that last act made your think of Cellular Automata too!
What a crackpot. He links to his own book, which is a non-mathematical, non-technical book.
There is no mathematics in the linked material, so it's impossible to see whether he is correct, in fact it's impossible to see what he means at all!
Nobody has seen this mythical derivation he did in the 90s.
Amazing how someone brilliant who used to do real science fell into crackpottery like this.