On Mon, Jan 13, 2025 at 11:02 AM Brent Meeker <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Sunday, January 12, 2025 at 5:10:53 AM UTC+1 Brent Meeker wrote: > > On 1/11/2025 6:13 AM, PGC wrote: > > That's something you keep assuming. I’m not here to defend Many-Worlds or > any particular ontology. I defend nothing. Rather, I’m struck by the > curious fact that insisting on “nothing extra” in quantum mechanics—like > ordering one’s bourbon neat—can mean quietly negating a host of other > flavors that were right there on the menu. Yes, the Born rule is a triumph, > and I fully recognize its power for quantum computing, materials science, > lasers, and more. Still, there’s a subtlety: that “neat” approach—while > perfectly valid pragmatically—relegates all those wavefunction branches to > the realm of “not real.” It looks minimal but actually demands a long list > of invisible exclusions. > > In fact infinitely many that have already been preemptorily ruled out > because they don't satisfy Schroedinger's equation. The reason this is > called the "Everything List" is because the originators wanted to discuss > theories like Max Tegmark's and Bruno Marchal's that *everything*, in > some sense happens and each of us is only a thread of it. Both have argued > that this is "simpler" because no additional assumptions are needed to > exclude all the things we don't see, they are just on different threads. > > > You can convince yourself of explaining the list's raison d'etre to me if > it makes you feel better with the straw man because Many-Worlds never says > “all conceivable worlds exist.” It says, rather, that all the outcomes > allowed by the wavefunction’s unitary evolution (i.e., by Schrödinger’s > equation) are realized in some branch. > > Exactly. My point is you're reverting back from the original list's > founders to a "Few Worlds" and calling it "Many Worlds" because you've > rejected the more comprehensive idea. If you believed the arguments you > make for MWI as simpler you would apply them consistently and arrive at Wei > Dai and Bruno's ideas. That's where they came from. > I have always thought that the argument from simplicity was deeply flawed. What is simple for one person is probably a Rube Goldber contraption for someone else. Bruce -- 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]. To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/CAFxXSLQSNNLPR85XWcNxZav7O_K%3DYCwbKWfXH5P6om7Gro2pcg%40mail.gmail.com.
