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Freeman Dyson Has Died
71–80 of 267 posts
Re: Freeman Dyson Has Died
#72“It is remarkable that mind enters into our awareness of nature on two separate levels. At the highest level, the level of human consciousness, our minds are somehow directly aware of the complicated flow of electrical and chemical patterns in our brains. At the lowest level, the level of single atoms and electrons, the mind of an observer is again involved in the description of events. Between lies the level of mole…
Sounds like Dyson believed in, or hoped for, free will, in that mind would affect the randomness that quantum physics involves. I think it would be great if it was so because the alternative would be that we are just machines. But I fear that the mind does not have that type of influence on it's fundamental parts...
Though I could be wrong, I believe his point was that consciousness - the mind - is the randomness underlying quantum physics.
Re: Freeman Dyson Has Died
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
the ridiculously hot summers in Australasia resulting in bushfires, famine and drought... seas taking over the cities are all demonstrable effects of climate change. Did he live in UK? Yea the winter was milder I guess.
> seas taking over the cities are all demonstrable effects of climate change The sea level raise has been approximately 3 inches from the 1993 level. That is much less than the change due to the tides.
and the city of Ur use to be right on the coast, but now it's way inland. The Ganges River use to lead right up to Red Fort and now it doesn't.
The location of certain geological features or bodies of water is a really poor indicator of environmental damage, because these things have changed constantly throughout time.
However the tons of plastic we dump into the oceans, the lakes of sludge outside of Chinese factory cities and the massive amounts of e-waste shipped every year to Africa where kids and adults extract metals and plastic in very unsafe conditions and smelters should be of great concern to everyone.
There is environmental disaster looming, and so much of it is much more radically evidence than CO2. We need to stop over-consumption. Consumerism and planned/negligent obsolescence is destroying this planet. Solving for the real problems will also reduce CO2, but focusing on CO2 is like trying to cure the sniffles when you're dying of the Flu.
Re: Freeman Dyson Has Died
#74I really feel like it's worth having this discussion: the black bar for Freeman Dyson, but not for Katherine Johnson who died earlier this week. At the time I thought it was likely because she wasn't _directly_ involved in computing and tried to write it off, but Freeman seems to be as related to the page as her. I bring it up because it really does speak to how a community decides who they want to include or not. Un…
The community doesn't decide who gets the black bar or not, and there are no published guidelines. AFAIK it's entirely the personal preference of the admins, or possibly just dang. Maybe Katherine Johnson just wasn't considered notable enough, or maybe the story just wasn't noticed. I wouldn't necessarily attribute it to sexism, though - there have been male obits that haven't gotten the black bar either.
The story was noticed, it was one of the top stories of the day and had similar comments
https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?geo=US&q=%2Fm%2F09r...
I know, I know, the mostly white people that make up classic HN don't really care about someone who's important to black people.
Sure there was a Best Picture nominated movie in large part about her story along with some of the people she worked with but you know not the HN's cup of tea not being about someone who lectured at Stanford or something.
But alas... I know I know, classic HN is going to take great exception to me insinuating they are anything less than the most racially aware people with "a ton of black friends" and “they don’t see color” (maybe even one of the few other black guys here will show up and represent them) and this comment will be buried.
Re: Freeman Dyson Has Died
#75Noted physicist slain by oldest foe, gravity: "Mia Dyson says her father, at the age of 96 still regularly went to his office at Princeton University. On Wednesday, on such a visit, she says he suffered a fall and died of his injuries Friday morning." TBIs and elder falling are a terrifying source of morbidity and mortality. So many old people start their terminal decline when they fall, for no particularly good reas…
I am not sure how long it'd take to become socially acceptable, but I would bet we could make robotic tails for the elderly to help with balancing... accelerometer, motors and a few counterweights, controller and battery.
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2019/08/26/business/tech/d...: “Devolution? Keio University team designs wearable robotic tail to help elderly keep their balance”
Re: Freeman Dyson Has Died
#76The obit refers to him as "Dr. Dyson". Did he ever get a doctorate?
edit: I'll leave this up for posterity, but the answer is no. The article explains the discrepancy.
Re: Freeman Dyson Has Died
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
That quote is mindblowing. I don't think I've ever heard an argument for free will on a sub-atomic level. It never crossed my mind that that was a position someone could conceivably hold. But it's weirdly comforting- it almost feels religious- and I'm now thinking about how that would affect emergence.
Conway (yep, that Conway) and Kochen elaborate on this in the Strong Free Will Theorem: https://www.ams.org/notices/200902/rtx090200226p.pdf
Isn't that a fundamental misunderstanding of the definition of "observer" in quantum physics? To "observe" is to cause a quantum system to interact in such a way that collapses probabilities. Whether there is a living observer is totally irrelevant.
Re: Freeman Dyson Has Died
#78“It is remarkable that mind enters into our awareness of nature on two separate levels. At the highest level, the level of human consciousness, our minds are somehow directly aware of the complicated flow of electrical and chemical patterns in our brains. At the lowest level, the level of single atoms and electrons, the mind of an observer is again involved in the description of events. Between lies the level of mole…
That quote is mindblowing. I don't think I've ever heard an argument for free will on a sub-atomic level. It never crossed my mind that that was a position someone could conceivably hold. But it's weirdly comforting- it almost feels religious- and I'm now thinking about how that would affect emergence.
I don't know where I first heard that view, but I've long thought it was the only one that was plausible - where else could free will come from? is it supposed to sneak into physics somehow at a higher level?
Re: Freeman Dyson Has Died
#79Noted physicist slain by oldest foe, gravity: "Mia Dyson says her father, at the age of 96 still regularly went to his office at Princeton University. On Wednesday, on such a visit, she says he suffered a fall and died of his injuries Friday morning." TBIs and elder falling are a terrifying source of morbidity and mortality. So many old people start their terminal decline when they fall, for no particularly good reas…
Or to look at it from a different angle, their fall is caused by their old age decline which in turn triggers their terminal decline. I've seen it throughout my family, once confined to bed at old age one's decline accelerates quickly. It's perhaps that the lack of movement that has some spiraling effect on their health. More and more people should not stop doing sports when they get older, they should do sports less…
Sports would be great, but simply getting out for a walk every day makes a huge difference.
Re: Freeman Dyson Has Died
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
Conway (yep, that Conway) and Kochen elaborate on this in the Strong Free Will Theorem: https://www.ams.org/notices/200902/rtx090200226p.pdf
Isn't that a fundamental misunderstanding of the definition of "observer" in quantum physics? To "observe" is to cause a quantum system to interact in such a way that collapses probabilities. Whether there is a living observer is totally irrelevant.
if I remember correctly, this paper specifically tries to prove that those are the same