Your critique of MWI as "bad taste" because of its proliferation of worlds is understandable, but for me, collapse is far stranger and less intuitive. Infinite branching, while seeming counterintuitive on the surface, feels consistent with the vastness suggested by math, particularly since I first encountered the real numbers and their uncountable infinity in High School. The idea that there are vastly more real numbers, even between 1 and 2, than natural numbers and that extensions of the set are efficacious tools in various domains, applied and theoretically, makess natural numbers and countable sets the rare exception.
Collapse, on the other hand, feels - yes this is personal taste - seem baroque and contrived. It assumes that the wavefunction, universal and deterministic, inexplicably "chooses" one outcome over others at the moment of measurement. This raises unsettling questions: Who or what triggers that collapse? How is this reconciled with spacelike separations? For me, this process seems far more arbitrary and less natural than the branching structure of MWI, which flows directly from the unitary evolution of the wavefunction. The funny thing is that I am always the guy accused of believing in "magic", when - with collapse - the wavefunction just suddenly disappears after we assume it exists. That feels like somebody pulling my leg, and why I prefer the infinities in MWI. No, I am not an expert in the field. Just a tourist with a notebook, enjoying everybody's contributions here for years, eager to learn, as I know nothing. Regarding your analogy with insects and their zig-zagging: in MWI every possible quantum event contributes to branching, and humans are no exception. There is no "cutoff" because the wavefunction applies universally to all systems. Again, this may seem counterintuitive and even extravagant, but it avoids the need for selective pruning and sudden vanishing of the wave function required by collapse theories, which to me feels more contrived. It feels like an awkward and artificial attempt to fit quantum behavior into classical intuition, demanding far more explanation than it provides. Therefore, I don't find the idea ugly. If it holds, the only ugliness is that I'm just a bit annoyed that I'm not in a branch where I'm making more money. A large set of those versions of "me" seem to be having more fun, which is hard to accept, but better than "woosh - wavefunction is gone, it never really was etc." On Tuesday, November 19, 2024 at 10:20:52 AM UTC+1 Alan Grayson wrote: > On Monday, November 18, 2024 at 7:38:22 PM UTC-7 PGC wrote: > > On Monday, November 18, 2024 at 11:37:16 PM UTC+1 Brent Meeker wrote: > > > > > On 11/18/2024 5:53 AM, John Clark wrote: > > ... > > > *The useful role that Many Worlds provides is that it doesn't need to > explain what a "measurement" or an "observer" is* > > LOL. You just wrote three paragraphs immediately above each of which > referred to "observed". So if it doesn't need an explanation it must be > obvious and have the same meaning as in the neo-Copenhagen interpretation, > NCI. MWI needs to explain how and when the worlds split, presumably due to > decoherence although I've not seen an explicit calculation of an instance > of the process. The same when and how is available to NCI if you think it > needs one. > > > I find myself seeking clarification regarding your statements, Brent. E.g. > about the absence of explicit calculations for the process of branching in > MWI. This surprises me, as the phenomenon of decoherence, as you well know, > has been extensively studied both theoretically and experimentally. The > literature is abundant with models demonstrating how interactions between > quantum systems and their environments suppress interference, leading to > the emergence of classical behavior. These calculations provide the > empirical foundation for many interpretations of quantum mechanics, > including MWI. > > If your critique is that these calculations do not explicitly prove the > branching described by MWI, I would consider that a valid philosophical > concern, but not necessarily a deficiency of the calculations themselves, > which are separate and agnostic regarding interpretation. In MWI, branching > is not an additional mechanism; rather, it is a natural interpretation of > decoherence. Each "world" corresponds to a term in the wavefunction that no > longer interferes with others due to environmental entanglement. This > framework aligns with the unitary dynamics of quantum mechanics, avoiding > the need for collapse mechanisms. > > While it is true that some explanations use terms like "observed," MWI > does not treat observation as a special ontological event. Instead, > observation is modeled as a unitary interaction between systems that > results in decoherence, creating branches of the wavefunction corresponding > to different outcomes. In this sense, "observation" in MWI is a descriptive > shorthand for the branching process and not an additional mechanism > requiring explanation. Your insistence that MWI needs to explain "how and > when worlds split" is strange to me; the splitting is continuous and > governed by the dynamics of decoherence. > > Decoherence calculations, as I understand them, apply equally to MWI and > other interpretations, such as the neo-Copenhagen interpretation (NCI). The > question, then, seems here, in this thread, to be whether one views the > wavefunction as a real entity describing multiple branches, as in MWI, or > as an epistemic tool requiring collapse, as in NCI. From my perspective, > MWI avoids introducing additional ad hoc elements, providing a simpler and > more frugal, low cost explanation of the same phenomena. > > If you find the connection between decoherence and MWI unsatisfactory, it > would be helpful to understand where you believe the explanatory gap lies. > Scholars like Zeh, Tegmark, and Wallace have elaborated on these > connections; and Schlosshauer’s reviews, in particular, provide an agnostic > mathematical context for decoherence —a context on which there seems to be > broad agreement in the field. And yet, I feel this is all obvious to you. > Your perspective on how these studies/literature might then fall short of > addressing your concerns would clarify. What am I missing, besides a > lifetime of more reading and the beans to sustain the same? > > IMO, fundamentally, for you the bottom line is "taste". Presumably, you > feel the MWI is in good taste so you affirm it. For me, it's the opposite. > MWI IMO is in bad taste, very bad taste. Have you ever watched how an ant > moves, or flying insects? They zig-zag, back and forth, sometimes in small > circles. Presumably, every slight change creates new worlds according to > the MWI, and copies of these insects come into being in these worlds. And > what about us humans? Are we also in these worlds? If not, where is the > cutoff? How does that come to be? It all seems totally ridiculous, indeed > UGLY. You write eloquently, with authority, very educated. Probably a > professor somwhere, at some prestigious university. So it baffles me how > you could arrive at, and support a theory which utterly fails the smell > test. But what could I know? After all, I'm just a simple country lawyer. AG > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. 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