On 30 Dec 2013, at 22:33, meekerdb wrote:
On 12/30/2013 1:23 PM, LizR wrote:
On 31 December 2013 07:40, meekerdb <meeke...@verizon.net> wrote:
On 12/30/2013 1:56 AM, LizR wrote:
On 30 December 2013 20:53, Stephen Paul King <stephe...@provensecure.com
> wrote:
Hi LizR,
Round and round we go... This sentence "It emerges because
instants are connected to each other in a way that makes there
appear to be smooth change between them." does not explain
anything. I have read just about every book and paper that
attempts to explain time away. All fail on this point. None offer
any reason for the illusion of change to be there in the first
place. If we point to a sequence (of numbers, events, states,
whatever) we still need to explain how that particular sequence is
the one that just "happened". No, it could not "Happen".
A good way to visualise a block universe is like the frames of a
movie stacked on top of each other. The books, papers etc you read
are not attempting to "explain time away" - they are attempting to
explain how time arises from the relevant equations. (Actually, I
suspect that you are betraying a personal
bias against the idea by using that
phrase, so I may be wasting my typing fingers here! But anyway...)
You are asking what connects the frames together. The answer is
the laws of physics. In the Newtonian and Relativistic views this
is what the laws of physics are - equations which describe how
things change over time. They describe a block universe.
Asking why one sequence of events "just happened" is assuming
there has to be an external time in which one sequence is
selected, or evolves, or otherwise occurs. In "classical"
relativity this question is answered by saying that the block
universe is the only possible outcome of the laws of physics,
assumed to be deterministic. So we have a Laplace's demon type
answer. Quantum theory, in the form of the MWI gives a broader
answer by allowing all events allowed by the probabalistic laws of
physics to occur. A block multiverse has no need to evolve or
select a sequence of events, because all sequences compatible with
the laws of physics occur.
But QM requires initial conditions too. Do you propose a
multiverse in which all possible (logically non-contradictory)
initial conditions obtain?
That is the logical conclusion if one starts from some sort of
"theory of nothing" - to specify all possible starting conditions
requires less information than any specific ones. Max Tegmark
suggests that the universe is ONLY the relevant "mathematical
structure" and doesn't require any extra information, which implies
all possible starting conditions and their outcomes are latent in
the equations.... (somehow.... A visit from Smaug may be required,
but I suspect not.)
Well, that's my take on it, at least. Does that sound (at all)
reasonable?
But then the explanation for *this* is that it's just a random one
we happen to exist in. I don't see that as any better than saying
that somethings happen at random and they led to here.
Ok, but that does not apply to computationalism. Tegmark is missing
the comp mind-body problem, the FPI, etc. Even if it makes sense to
say that "we are in a mathematical structure", that "mathematical
structure" must be extracted from the FPI on the sigma_1 sentences.
Bruno
Brent
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