Ponderings of science, philosophy, history, society, and many other topics
This weekend, Sabine Hossenfelder did a video and post about the simulation hypothesis, the idea that we might be living in a computer simulation. She dismisses the notion that consciousness can't be a computational simulation, which I think is correct, but then settles on the idea that physics itself can't be simulated, because we have … Continue reading The right reason to doubt the simulation hypothesis
A couple of weeks ago, I shared Ars Technica's first article in a series on quantum mechanics that promised to be math and philosophy free. So far, the author, Miguel Morales, has stuck to that promise. Today he published the third installment. This one focuses on the size of particle, and why that's far from … Continue reading Ars Technica’s series on quantum mechanics: How big is a particle?
Philip Goff has an article in Scientific American, looking at one popular rational for the multiverse, the anthropic principle, or argument from fine tuning: We exist, and we are living creatures. It follows that the universe we live in must be compatible with the existence of life. However, as scientists have studied the fundamental principles … Continue reading Doubting fine tuning
Miguel Morales at Ars Technica is beginning a new introductory guide on quantum mechanics, one he promises won't require any math. If you've watched some of us wrangle over the implications of QM and wondered just what the heck we were so worked up about, this looks like it will be a good series for … Continue reading Ars Technica has a new series on quantum mechanics (no math)
Lately, I've been trying to gain a better understanding of quantum decoherence. This is the process of a quantum system in superposition interacting with the environment and, as a result, appearing to lose its quantum nature, notably by having interference between the elements of its superposition become undetectable. Decoherence is often used synonymously with the … Continue reading Mea culpa on quantum decoherence
Quantum physics has been on my mind again lately, somewhat triggered by a recent conversation with Wyrd Smythe on his blog. I've always known quantum nonlocality has nuances, but stuff I read this week revealed some wrinkles I wasn't aware of. (Well, I was aware of them, but wasn't aware they pertained to nonlocality.) A … Continue reading The nature of quantum nonlocality
When discussing eternalism and the block universe, the concept of "now" always ends up getting relegated to an aspect of our consciousness, not something "out there". "Now" seems to be the boundary between what we can remember and what we can only anticipate. But if, aside from entropy, the laws of physics are reversible and … Continue reading Why Do You Remember The Past But Not The Future?
The black hole information paradox has been receiving some attention lately. This is the fact that information, that is any pattern of matter, that falls into a black hole is completely crushed as it approaches the singularity, losing whatever differentiation it might have had before. This has long been recognized as a problem, because in … Continue reading A basic question on the black hole information paradox
Somewhat related to the previous post, I just saw this video from Matt O'Dowd discussing why the block universe is such a compelling concept. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EagNUvNfsUI&t=12s The second video in the series discusses the effect quantum mechanics might have on this concept. It reminds me why cosmologists seem to be more comfortable with the Many Worlds … Continue reading A PBS Space Time series on time and the block universe
Click through for source and bonus red button caption at smbc-comics.com. This SMBC gets at something that's often bothered me about the way many people talk about the block universe concept. The block universe is the idea that if the universe is fully deterministic, then its entire history from beginning to end exists in an … Continue reading The block universe is interesting, but not comforting
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