Stephen Hawking's last paper: multiverses follow the laws of physics

[Onyx]

The weak anthropic principle - that the reason we, intelligent beings, exist is that the conditions are right. This essentially, in my mind, becomes a tautology. Why do we exist? Because the conditions are correct for our existence. Why are the conditions correct for our existence? Because if they weren't we wouldn't exist.

It's a scientific cul-de-sac. I believe we don't advance our scientific knowledge of our cosmic origins if you believe this.

I had always taken the weak anthropic principle to be a gentle reminder that our existence is not, necessarily, evidence of a conspiracy to produce intelligence or even of a good fortune. Get those stars out of your eyes, earthman: Of course you live where it is possible to have life.


Comedian Emo Phillips stated the basic problem well: "I was thinking the other day about just how amazing the human brain is and that how it is the most important organ in the body. And then I realized what was telling me that!"

I would hope fundamental questions about our cosmological origins would be worth asking without serving our self importantance.

 

[RJM Corbet]

But without labouring the point: both the anthropic principle and multiverse 'theories' are really just beliefs? Opinions?

 

[Onyx]

But without labouring the point: both the anthropic principle and multiverse 'theories' are really just beliefs? Opinions?

The weak anthropic principle is closer to an epistemological warning against a type of logical fallacy. Strong anthropic principle is any of number of belief systems about man's importance to existence.

The multiverse is a scientific theory that comes from physics, but it is essentially unprovable. But that doesn't mean it is just idle speculation any more than a theory about Napoleon's secret opinions might be - both are just not possible to test because you'd need to travel through time or between universes to do so. And that affects how seriously any physicist needs to concern themselves with the accuracy of a theory that can't be tested or even applied.

 

[RJM Corbet]

Or maybe the (weak) AP translates as: It IS because it IS? And the multiverse 'scientific theory' is bought TO physics as a vehicle to justify the AP? So we see the same idea from different angles.

Point is there's nothing approaching a shred of evidence? The fact some scientists believe something might be true doesn't make it science? Science is littered with broken theories/conjectures ...

 

[Onyx]

Or maybe the (weak) AP translates as: It IS because it IS? And the multiverse 'scientific theory' is bought TO physics as a vehicle to justify the AP? So we see the same idea from different angles.

Point is there's nothing approaching a shred of evidence? The fact some scientists believe something might be true doesn't make it science? Science is littered with broken theories/conjectures ...

You keep relating the anthropic principle back to the multiverse, and I really don't think the two have anything to do with each other.

 

[RJM Corbet]

You keep relating the anthropic principle back to the multiverse, and I really don't think the two have anything to do with each other.

And I can't understand how you fail to see that they're twins? I do accept that they MIGHT be true. Do you accept that they might not? It's the best compromise we can come to here, imo?

EDIT: Goodnight, brother Onyx. Good discussion

 

[Venusian Broon]

Fortean:

Fortean Phenomena

Charles Fort - Wikipedia

I had to Google it, lol ...
(Just don't tell Brian Cox, ok?)
Thanks VB

Cheers!



Fortean isn't really, at least in my mind, how that website describes it.

Here's a better 21st Century stance:

'(Charles Fort) was sceptical of scientific explanations, observing how scientists argued according to their own beliefs rather than the rules of evidence and that inconvenient data were ignored, suppressed, discredited or explained away. He criticised modern science for its reductionism, its attempts to define, divide and separate. Fort's dictum "One measures a circle beginning anywhere" expresses instead his philosophy of Continuity in which everything is in an intermediate and transient state between extremes...However, he cut at the very roots of credulity: "I conceive of nothing, in religion, science or philosophy, that is more than the proper thing to wear, for a while."'

However basically I think I'm attracted to "the stance of benevolent scepticism towards both the orthodox and the unorthodox."

So, putting into concrete terms. I don't think the Loch Ness Monster/String Theory/God exists, but I'm happy to listen and discuss evidence/theories/fancies that do propose their existence.

 

[Onyx]

And I can't understand how you fail to see that they're twins? I do accept that they MIGHT be true. Do you accept that they might not? It's the best compromise we can come to here, imo?

EDIT: Goodnight, brother Onyx. Good discussion

Because they don't actually overlap.

The AP relates to how the laws of physics in a given universe make it likely to produce life.

The Multiverse relates to how the laws of physics in our universe make it likely to bifurcate its own 'time stream'. But each of those time streams are going to have the same physics because they came from the same starting "big bang". The multiverse is arguably just one universe but with all the possible versions represented. And those possible versions are just those that are possible from the same starting point.

When the "other universes" of Strong AP are referred to, they are not the universes that are in our multiverse with the same physics, but other truly separate universes that don't share our physics at all. They may or may not also be multiverses of their own.

Strong AP refers to unrelated universes, not the branches in our multiverse that are more alike than different.

 

[dask]

Whew!

 

[RJM Corbet]

Because they don't actually overlap.

The AP relates to how the laws of physics in a given universe make it likely to produce life.

The Multiverse relates to how the laws of physics in our universe make it likely to bifurcate its own 'time stream'. But each of those time streams are going to have the same physics because they came from the same starting "big bang". The multiverse is arguably just one universe but with all the possible versions represented. And those possible versions are just those that are possible from the same starting point.

When the "other universes" of Strong AP are referred to, they are not the universes that are in our multiverse with the same physics, but other truly separate universes that don't share our physics at all. They may or may not also be multiverses of their own.

Strong AP refers to unrelated universes, not the branches in our multiverse that are more alike than different.

Yes, but your very first statement is: 'The AP relates how the laws of physics in a given universe makes it likely to produce life.'

ie: The initial assumption of the AP is that there are other universes with different conditions, whether bufurcating or entirely separate.

There's also the assumption that particular conditions 'make it likely to produce life', when in fact even in the most perfect conditions the likelihood of life occurring is an essentially astronomically impossible chance of zillions of trillions to one. Enormously UNlikely, in fact.

It is these hugely unlikely coincidences far greater than all atoms in the universe occurring not just one but in a string, to which I am referring, and which you are treating as just normal.everyday 'physics'?

 

[Onyx]

Yes, but your very first statement is: 'The AP relates how the laws of physics in a given universe makes it likely to produce life.'

ie: The initial assumption of the AP is that there are other universes with different conditions, whether bufurcating or entirely separate.

There's also the assumption that particular conditions 'make it likely to produce life', when in fact even in the most perfect conditions, the likelihood of life occurring is an essentially astronomically impossible chance of zillions of trillions to one. Enormously UNlikely, in fact.

It is these hugely unlikely coincidences far greater than all atoms in the universe occurring not just one but in a string, to which I am referring, and which you are treating as just normal.everyday 'physics'?

The "lesson" of the anthropic principle is that a life giving universe isn't a coincidence. And there is no "likelihood" to be judged from a single example.

String theory isn't likely or unlikely sounding. It is just another model of how physics functions, like relativity. How outlandish either sounds to human ears has nothing to do with whether it is accurate or not.

 

[RJM Corbet]

The "lesson" of the anthropic principle is that a life giving universe isn't a coincidence. And there is no "likelihood" to be judged from a single example.

String theory isn't likely or unlikely sounding. It is just another model of how physics functions, like relativity. How outlandish either sounds to human ears has nothing to do with whether it is accurate or not.

' ... a life giving universe isn't a coincidence.'

Given enough alternative universes?

Yes or No?

 

[Onyx]

' ... a life giving universe isn't a coincidence.'

Given enough alternative universes?

Yes or No?

No idea. What causes universes? Is it reasonable to presume more than one? Can something like a universe exist without being at least complicated enough to cause something like intelligent life? No way of knowing it's an "outside context problem". What's the likelihood of blue? How many times does nothing happen?

 

[RJM Corbet]

To me, that's like a naked Amazon Indian seeing a driverless car for the first time and assuming the thing just somehow assembled itself for no particular reason or purpose.

 

[Onyx]

To me, that's like a naked Amazon Indian seeing a driverless car for the first time and assuming the thing just somehow assembled itself for no particular reason or purpose.

What's "that"? And why would an Amazonian not assume that the car grew just like every other moving thing she's ever seen?

Overall, people are terrible at making assumptions about forces and processes that are outside their immediate experience, which is why it took so long for the earth to become round, for continents to drift and for baths to stop causing illness.

 

[RJM Corbet]

What's "that"? And why would an Amazonian not assume that the car grew just like every other moving thing she's ever seen?

Overall, people are terrible at making assumptions about forces and processes that are outside their immediate experience, which is why it took so long for the earth to become round, for continents to drift and for baths to stop causing illness.

But this is becoming circular. Baths, continents, flat earth all reached their end when science disproved them, although they may have encountered dogmatic resistance from fundamentalists.

The whole point here is that the AP IS NOT SCIENCE -- it's simply a belief and an opinion --and so the concept of other universes has to be proposed to support it. The 'multiverse' in this case being the one of separate bubble universes in an expanding 'motherverse' as previously discussed.

 

[Vertigo]

...
- The universe needs an intelligent observer to come into being. This is a 'cosmic Copenhagen interpretation' universe. The first observer caused the universe to 'Quantum mechanically collapse' from its imaginary status to a real state. I mentioned it in my post above about QM interpretations that there is still a lot of discussion about what an 'observer' and 'measurement' really mean so I think this suggestion is really just an artefact of a (likely) misunderstanding of QM.
...

I'd never really come across this idea until very recently in Greg Egan's book Distress, where this is essentially put forward as the core principle that the book is built around. Not sure how convinced I am by it though!

 

[Venusian Broon]

I'd never really come across this idea until very recently in Greg Egan's book Distress, where this is essentially put forward as the core principle that the book is built around. Not sure how convinced I am by it though!

I remember reading an article by Stephen Hawking that discussed something very similar, published in New Scientist decades ago. I assume this was possibly a layman's guide to a paper he had published on the subject!

I do think this Copenhagen interpretation idea survives because, I would (perhaps surprisingly) call it 'instinctive', at least once you've got your head around wavicles and decoherence part of it.

It's certainly much simpler to grasp 'intuitively' than all the hidden variable approaches which are mathematically very heavy, and it doesn't have the 'baggage' of huge numbers of universes being created that the many-worlds approach has.

 

[RJM Corbet]

I'd never really come across this idea until very recently in Greg Egan's book Distress, where this is essentially put forward as the core principle that the book is built around. Not sure how convinced I am by it though!

I remember reading an article by Stephen Hawking that discussed something very similar, published in New Scientist decades ago. I assume this was possibly a layman's guide to a paper he had published on the subject!

I do think this Copenhagen interpretation idea survives because, I would (perhaps surprisingly) call it 'instinctive', at least once you've got your head around wavicles and decoherence part of it.

It's certainly much simpler to grasp 'intuitively' than all the hidden variable approaches which are mathematically very heavy, and it doesn't have the 'baggage' of huge numbers of universes being created that the many-worlds approach has.

If a man talks alone in a forest, and his wife doesn't hear him, is he still wrong?

Sorry, just could not resist

 

[Onyx]

But this is becoming circular. Baths, continents, flat earth all reached their end when science disproved them, although they may have encountered dogmatic resistance from fundamentalists.

The whole point here is that the AP IS NOT SCIENCE -- it's simply a belief and an opinion --and so the concept of other universes has to be proposed to support it. The 'multiverse' in this case being the one of separate bubble universes in an expanding 'motherverse' as previously discussed.

Again, the quantum inspired "mulitverse" is NOT a product of the AP in any way. It would exists with or without the AP, which is a completely separate idea about a completely separate problem in science. They don't really bear any similarity and there is no connection.

The reason I mentioned flat earth is because you are trying to analyze whether string theory "makes sense", and I'm pointing out that the human brain isn't really built to make sense of even simpler physics, let alone multidimensional math that uses allusions like "strings" to offer a bone to laymen. Your sense of how right it sounds has no place in any discussion of whether it is a good theory or not.