Programming the Universe (Humans)
by xeno6696 
, Sonoran Desert, Wednesday, January 06, 2010, 00:46 (5434 days ago)
As I'm almost done reading this fascinating layman's introduction to quantum computing, I think this is a good place to continue some of the discussion I began in the "Origins" thread. -Lloyd discusses that the problem with looking at the universe simply as a mechanical machine--the paradigm that has been in effect for nearly 300 years--leaves a vast problem of complexity. How does complexity arise? -His answer lies in modifying the paradigm: The Universe is a machine that processes information. So what, one might ask? -Chance has reared its head continually in this public forum, but no one has addressed the fact that Quantum science is 100% "chancy." Running the equations that describe the universe, random quantum fluctuations actually describe parts of the early universe that would eventually turn into matter.-[At this point I leave Seth Lloyd's book alone, though this thinking is based on his perspective.] I've touched briefly before about Chaos theory; it's a misnamed subset of physics and mathematics, but in essence what it describes is how very small perturbations are amplified over time until they are grossly complicated. The major success of this theory has been in giving us a mathematical language that accurately describes features of both life and nature that didn't exist with calculus alone. Chaos theory IS the butterfly effect--it was this theory that coined that highly popular term. -The answer to the chance question, is as I said at the outset--probably not a valid question. The reason is that because quantum phenomenon are resolutely chancy in nature, chance describes about damn near everything in our universe--in short, chance is a tautology as it underlines the very fabric of our universe. The reason that so many in the physical sciences end up atheists, I feel is because of this fact--a fact that has been confirmed by hundreds of thousands, if not millions of experiments over the past 100 years. (Quantum physics was hotly contested.) To an atheist, quantum theory is experimental evidence that the very fabric of our cosmos IS an expression of chance, and since this chance accurately describes the fabric of our cosmos, then all things were created "by chance." I put that in quotes, because the simplistic properties of the universe at the quantum level are actually somewhat deterministic. -Rest assured David--this does not challenge your faith beyond taking away a weapon from everyone on the field. Not for those of us that refuse to rest upon inference alone, at least! -[Back to Lloyd]
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\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"
\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"
Programming the Universe
by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Friday, January 08, 2010, 03:23 (5432 days ago) @ xeno6696
Monkeys and Typewriters.-According to Seth Lloyd, this argument from Boltzmann showed that it is statistically improbable for a monkey to type out Shakespeare completely at random. (He also points to an ongoing computational project that has successfully found the first 24 letters to Hamlet--completely at random.) -http://everything2.com/title/Monkey+Shakespeare+Simulator (defunct site, you'll have to use the wayback machine to find the original.) -What this principle underlies is a different statistical perspective than we're used to. When I first came to the forum, I challenged that the proper view of probability wasn't in operation on dhw's treatise. Here's why.-Quantum particles act as random programmers in the universe. Physical laws act as modifiers to these mini programs; the programs that produce garbage output are recycled into the quantity known as entropy. Laws of physics preserve information; information is infectious in physical systems; it transfers itself to all particles in the system. I know from computer science, it is possible to design a program that randomly generates other programs that do produce meaningful output; most of them are garbage, but you do get useful ones. Lloyd's point is that random quantum fluctuations act as programmers themselves; this is due to the fact that quantum particles are the only things in the universe with the power to *create* information. -As for the physical laws themselves, they are relationships between physical quantities; while David would argue that these are all fine-tuned, mathematically the only thing that changes among the different possibilities are the numbers--the underlying structures themselves are all identical. What generates the numbers are our quantum programmers and it is they who "decide" via the simple perturbations of 1, 0, and 0+1 what the final output will be. -A deeper question for you is "If the universe is complex, doesn't it have to be complex in order to generate it?"-If it is anything that I hope I can impart, it's this: Isn't the machine you're typing on incredibly complex? Isn't the screen you're viewing also complex? When my kids play a computer game, aren't the physics complex?-I'm going to answer, "No." Everything that you view is the result of 1's and 0's. The obvious answer here is that humans programmed the machine; this is true. But for something like the universe, there is no setup required for the physical laws--they simply exist. -In our universe, chance is a tautology, and the underlying physical laws are axioms; self-evident truths that *must* be true for our universe to be the way it is.
--
\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"
\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"