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Why Quantum Mechanics?

scottaaronson.blog

21–30 of 248 posts

Re: Why Quantum Mechanics?

#21
post #7

Given the infinite number of ways the universe could have been, it seems kind of a mathematical truth that whatever it ended up being was incredibly improbable to begin with. I would tend to say that unless it is logically necessary for the universe to be what it is, the question of why it is what it is necessarily lacks an answer. We should expect the universe to be improbable.

> I would tend to say that unless it is logically necessary for the universe to be what it is

Well that's what he's asking and what I was asking with the 3D question: is it logically necessary? Maybe it is. It seems like it could be in the case of 3D.

Re: Why Quantum Mechanics?

#22

If there's a loot box with a 50% chance of a cat in it, no game developer in their right mind would bother determining if there actually is a cat or not until someone checks.

So some kind of efficiency principle at work? The universe does seem optimized in certain ways that make it mathematical.

Re: Why Quantum Mechanics?

#23
post #11

Randomly found a link to this video on super determinism from his blog and found it super interesting. 100% agree, what is 'free will' anyways? A concept with no scientific definition. Why is it even used to explain anything in quantum mechanics? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytyjgIyegDI

I think the question of free will is even simpler. It doesn't come down to determinism vs indeterminism because either way it's not "you" making a decision. At the lowest level (neuron or whatever) when a decision is "made" it is either deterministic (determinism) or probabilistic (indeterminism) based on physics but either way, where is the "you" in the process? Only way free will makes sense is if something superna…

I thoroughly enjoy these discussions where someone wants to talk about a bat, a natural occurrence, and people immediately produce a man with a bat costume and start talking specifically about their construction, completely oblivious to the aforementioned bat.

Re: Why Quantum Mechanics?

#24
post #11

Randomly found a link to this video on super determinism from his blog and found it super interesting. 100% agree, what is 'free will' anyways? A concept with no scientific definition. Why is it even used to explain anything in quantum mechanics? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytyjgIyegDI

I strongly feel that the mystery of consciousness is somehow deeply tied into why we have things like QM and not classical physics.

If it was just classical physics, then you get yourself into the thinking that you can rewind time and all the "billiard balls" knock into each other the same way, which is why you order a soup and not a sandwich every single time on that day.

That eliminate free will. There is something about the uncertain nature of the universe at its fundamental levels that allows for consciousness to arise and actually does give us freedom to choose. Plugging in some parameters and letting the simulation run doesn't allow for this.

What is life if we are all truly just experiencing a "movie" and have no say in how it plays out? It's utterly meaningless and may as well not exist at all. And it raises very strange questions when we may not like the "movie" we are currently participating in. We have no ability to switch to another theatre?

What makes life "life" is consciousness and individual experiences.

Re: Why Quantum Mechanics?

#25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the question of free will is even simpler. It doesn't come down to determinism vs indeterminism because either way it's not "you" making a decision. At the lowest level (neuron or whatever) when a decision is "made" it is either deterministic (determinism) or probabilistic (indeterminism) based on physics but either way, where is the "you" in the process? Only way free will makes sense is if something superna…

> At the lowest level (neuron or whatever) when a decision is "made" it is either deterministic (determinism) or probabilistic (indeterminism) based on physics but either way, where is the "you" in the process? It's a matter of scale. At the highest level, of the individual, if you present them with two options, they will chose one of the options. At that level, the question is a trivial: yes, obviously they have "th…

It's not satisfying that it would be considered free will if the outcome is based on the result of a probabilistic random number generator but perhaps that's what they mean... As for moral responsibility, essential no, it cannot exist again unless supernatural is involved for the same reasons outlined above, there is no "you" making a decision, just a process. As for whether you should feel guilty... well again I am not able to make that decision... Either I do or I don't and it is predetermined or random :) So there is really not much to debate I don't think.

Re: Why Quantum Mechanics?

#26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the question of free will is even simpler. It doesn't come down to determinism vs indeterminism because either way it's not "you" making a decision. At the lowest level (neuron or whatever) when a decision is "made" it is either deterministic (determinism) or probabilistic (indeterminism) based on physics but either way, where is the "you" in the process? Only way free will makes sense is if something superna…

Physics is based on what can be measured objectively. In other words the probability could be an approximate description of a real (and perhaps knowable) yet un-objectively-measurable process. The idea "everything that is natural can only be everything we can objectively measure" should be problematic right? Of course whatever out there that is unmeasurable is rife with confusion, messiness, lies etc but that shouldn…

Yes you can never rule out the unknown, even the supernatural is in this category. Nevertheless it is just speculation until some evidence that it exists comes about. That being said, even if what I said is true, it does not really effect anything since we still live as if free will exists and I don't think we have the ability to choose differently :)

Re: Why Quantum Mechanics?

#27
post #24
post #11

Randomly found a link to this video on super determinism from his blog and found it super interesting. 100% agree, what is 'free will' anyways? A concept with no scientific definition. Why is it even used to explain anything in quantum mechanics? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytyjgIyegDI

I strongly feel that the mystery of consciousness is somehow deeply tied into why we have things like QM and not classical physics. If it was just classical physics, then you get yourself into the thinking that you can rewind time and all the "billiard balls" knock into each other the same way, which is why you order a soup and not a sandwich every single time on that day. That eliminate free will. There is something…

That's why physicists are so opposed to super determinism because like you say it would make life 'utterly meaningless' (I dont agree, a bit dramatic).

Super determinism is the unpopular answer that solves many problems in quantum mechanics and relativity.

It also makes a lot of sense if you think of the universe as pre-rendered, just like you would a CGI movie. Determine where all the particles land upfront throughout time and then play it back like a movie.

Life can still be fun even it is pre-rendered. Like a movie you don't know what's going to happen next anyways.

It could be like an atheist's version of God, taking in comfort in knowing whatever happens was going to happen anyways. Enjoy the ride.

Re: Why Quantum Mechanics?

#28
post #7

Given the infinite number of ways the universe could have been, it seems kind of a mathematical truth that whatever it ended up being was incredibly improbable to begin with. I would tend to say that unless it is logically necessary for the universe to be what it is, the question of why it is what it is necessarily lacks an answer. We should expect the universe to be improbable.

> I would tend to say that unless it is logically necessary for the universe to be what it is Well that's what he's asking and what I was asking with the 3D question: is it logically necessary? Maybe it is. It seems like it could be in the case of 3D.

That seems extremely unlikely to me. There are 1D and 2D cellular automata that are Turing complete and could arguably support life if they were scaled wide enough. Any virtual reality you can simulate on a computer could have been a physical reality. There isn't any requirement for it to have a spatial topology, there isn't any requirement for it to support life or any kind of complexity. Reality could have been a sprawling Mandelbrot fractal. Why not?

Re: Why Quantum Mechanics?

#29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the question of free will is even simpler. It doesn't come down to determinism vs indeterminism because either way it's not "you" making a decision. At the lowest level (neuron or whatever) when a decision is "made" it is either deterministic (determinism) or probabilistic (indeterminism) based on physics but either way, where is the "you" in the process? Only way free will makes sense is if something superna…

I thoroughly enjoy these discussions where someone wants to talk about a bat, a natural occurrence, and people immediately produce a man with a bat costume and start talking specifically about their construction, completely oblivious to the aforementioned bat.

I get your point, it is a vast simplification, perhaps inaccurate, it is possibly that more exists in nature that we don't yet understand that could make free will possible (even God) but is not much more than speculation or chimera.

Re: Why Quantum Mechanics?

#30
post #11

Randomly found a link to this video on super determinism from his blog and found it super interesting. 100% agree, what is 'free will' anyways? A concept with no scientific definition. Why is it even used to explain anything in quantum mechanics? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytyjgIyegDI

I think the question of free will is even simpler. It doesn't come down to determinism vs indeterminism because either way it's not "you" making a decision. At the lowest level (neuron or whatever) when a decision is "made" it is either deterministic (determinism) or probabilistic (indeterminism) based on physics but either way, where is the "you" in the process? Only way free will makes sense is if something superna…

It's not that easy, unfortunately. The problem lies in the relationship between a mind - the system of patterns of connections and processes that constitute whatever it is that allows a subjective experience to occur as an emergent property - and the external world. That singleton which has experience, and the infinite outside which it experiences.

Free will could be framed as unpredictable behavior arising from the emergent system itself, where the selection of one choice among many is deterministic, but otherwise indistinguishable from a non-deterministic system to any other mind. This is a plausible scenario that aligns with chaos theory and implies that every mind is a unique occurrence.

The firing of a single neuron can be triggered by quantum circumstances affecting the location and energy of a single calcium ion, and that single neuron can be responsible for radically different states in the meta-patterns that comprise a mind at any given point in time. Even software on silicon could be subject to bitrot, cosmic bit flips, and other fundamentally unpredictable changes. How such randomness affects the system plays into whether free will can exist in this sense.

The idea behind free will is that the mind has the ability to make choices independent of any influence except itself. It's highly probable that minds are entirely abstract, dependent on the physics of its substrate but existing as an emergent result of the particular arrangement of particles and energy in the substrate. If the choices made by a mind are indistinguishable from a hypothetically independent system not dependent on the physics of the substrate, it could be seen as "free will." Is definitely not the religious/supernatural Free Will, though.

If a mind is perfectly replicable - if you can perfectly simulate the state and ongoing experience of the mind bit for bit, - then you should be able to perfectly predict its behavior and state over time. It could be that such replication is mathematically possible but fundamentally intractable. Such a result would mean minds exhibit behavior indistinguishable from free will. It would mean that perfect knowledge of the state of the mind could never be known outside the mind itself - an extension of Heisenberg uncertainty - and simulations would be inaccurate.

The emergent, entirely abstract meta-system comprising the mind and its subjective experience could also be seen as the non-physical soul or spirit. That doesn't make room for the supernatural or magic in the universe. It might mean that divergence from prediction by the outside exists but is vanishingly small. It could also imply high probability of divergence if compute capacity needed for simulation grows exponentially over time and capacity of the mind being simulated. The answers will depend on exactly whatever "minds" turn out to be and the mathematics that govern the phenomena.

I personally think that radical divergence is likely, for no better reason than to think the universe is a much more interesting and weird place should that be true. It would mean that minds will forever be surprising, however much we increase computation and efficiency.

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