Normal

Ok fine, one arbitrarily large construct for another.

The MWI specifically admits its own untestability. Multiple worlds do not interfere with each other, except at the scale of one electron interfering with itself (conveniently). If you are talking about quantum suicide, only one person would know the results, and only in the world he survives in.

bd-from-kg

Normal:

Not so. Not only does it not invoke an infinite number of universes, it doesn’t even, strictly speaking, invoke multiple universes, in spite of its name. It just postulates that the universe “branches” in such a way that the branches eventually (actually very quickly, but not immediately) “lose contact” with one another. But if you insist on calling branches of the universe that have no contact with one another “different universes”, I have no problem with that. What of it? The quark theory postulates that there are far more elementary particles than we thought, but this isn’t generally considered to count against it. What matters (in terms of Ockham’s Razor) is not the total number of entities postulated by a theory, but the number of different kinds of entities. The MWI, like the hypothesis that the Milky Way is just one galaxy in a multitude of galaxies, just postulates that there are very many entities of a kind we are already familiar with.
And the Copenhagen interpretation involves the concept that reality depends on what is observed, which seems ridiculous. It also violates local realism, although that doesn’t count against it since this violation seems to be inherent in QM itself. Still, if reality violates such fundamental intuitions as local realism (not to mention the intuitions that space and time, and matter and energy, are fundamentally distinct kinds of things) why should we be concerned that an interpretation involves waves “going back in time” ? Remember, the time spans involved are at the quantum level, and everything about the quantum level seems to violate our fundamental intuitions.

At this point you’re engaging in transparent sophistry. All three interpretations involve entities and hypotheses that cannot be directly verified. But that’s the nature of a scientific theory.

Unlike the “God hypothesis”, the basic motivation for all of these interpretations is to understand/interpret observed phenomena and make accurate predictions. Scientists, unlike theologians, understand that if two theories don’t make different predictions, the differences between them are pseudo-differences; that there’s no point in arguing about which one is “right”, because neither of them is more “right” than the other. It’s just a question of which conceptual framework one happens to be most comfortable with.

In fact, you’re the one who’s taking things on “faith”. You’re basing your argument on the assumption that the CI is “really true”. But no one ever knows whether a scientific theory is “really true”. The meaningful question is not whether a theory is “true”, but whether it generates accurate predictions. That’s why trying to draw metaphysical conclusions from a scientific theory is a fool’s game.

How can you possibly know that? Patterns and regularities are what we actually observe; cause/effect relationships are merely one way to interpret them. Other kinds of interpretations are possible, as QM demonstrates. Who are you to declare these other types of interpretation to be “out of court” from the get-go?

As Bentham might say, this is nonsense on stilts. We don’t have to know anything about a possible causal relationship between two strongly correlated phenomena to know that the correlation constitutes evidence. To repeat: if we observe that a certain cloud formation is followed by rain 99% of the time, the presence of this cloud formation is evidence that it’s going to rain. If you don’t understand this, you know nothing about science. If that isn’t evidence, there’s no such thing as evidence.

Yes, it could be. We’re talking about probabilities here, which is what we do all the time when we’re doing science (or just trying to muddle along in real life for that matter).

Since you apparently have no idea what “evidence” means, it’s not surprising that you should end up spouting total nonsense like this.
That’s true in a sense. A random variable with a standard deviation of 0.00000001 is just as “random”, theoretically speaking, as one with a standard deviation of 1,000,000,000. But if want to know where to look for that baseball, I’m in much better shape if the standard deviation of its position is .00000001 feet rather than 1,000,000,000 feet. There’s a sense in which I know a bit more about where the ball is in the first case than in the second.

Did I say something about an “apparently deterministic” system? I don’t remember doing so. But I think it’s reasonable to say that a system in which the standard deviations of the positions of the objects in it run in the range of .00000001 feet is more “orderly” than one in which they’re in the range of 1,000,000,000 feet. By paying attention I might be able to figure out where to find things in the first system, whereas I probably wouldn’t in the second. Isn’t that what “orderliness” is all about?
Say what? The fact that our best scientific theories yield very accurate predictions with great reliability shows that we don’t really know anything about the natural world? What are you smoking? Obviously we know something very important about the natural world. In a great many situations, we know with high accuracy and confidence what will happen next.

If you thought that science could tell us something more – something like the “real, ultimate nature of reality” - you were badly mistaken. No serious philosopher has believed this at least since Kant.

PJPSYCO

No, I do not have faith in spectroscopy. It just happens to be that spectroscopy is all that can be utilised to determine what you are saying is true. Spectroscopy is the only tool at ones disposal that can measure sub-atomic particles and their interactions. If you are claiming to have secondary knowledge to this. You need to say where you got it. As a note, Heisenburg used spectroscopy in his exeriment. It was primitive but it was spectroscopy.

Uncertainty does not imply randomness. It implies uncertainty. You are claiming that the particle comes out randomly. It however does not come out randomly it comes out in a diffraction patern (I said it forms lines on the paper - ie why does it form lines consistant with a diffraction patern). Our model just isn't good enough right now to determine which line the electron will go in. You claim that it is random that's a big step from uncertainty. The uncertainty in the HUP is actually just an error in precision.

HUP is stated that if we wish to locate any particle to within a distance, then we automatically introduce an uncertainty in the momentum of the particle that is given by the distance times the momentum greater than or equal to planks constant(6.6260755E-34Js).*

ex,
Yes I meant position or momentum can be measured.

*McQuarrie, Donald, Physical Chemistry A Molecular Approach, University Science Books, California 1997 p.24

ComestibleVenom

Originally posted by Normal


In the system of chess, there is no such rule as "guarding your flanks". Classically speaking, to guard one's flanks involves the protection of soft flesh along the sides of a military formation. But in the context of a chess world, it's just foolish to assume all of the old connotations should be brought into talk about flanks. It is equally foolish to project classical implications onto the modern usage of terms like causation.

Fundamental physical configurations can be a means of conceptualizing causation and so we can adapt the notion of causation to a quantum mechanical system. We don't presuppose just how it is that causation works. Thus, the structure/nature of causal influences is still under investigation


I totally agree.

The notion of causal influence is not monolothic, there are slippable elements within it. You are free (as I choose not to) to insist that causation should refer only to classical interactions.

However, given that this is not a definition that scientists confine themselves to, you cannot attack the validity of their work based upon the presupposition that they are using your own ideosynchratic definition!

The arrangement of matter and energy have a real, measurable, predictable relationship to how matter and energy will in the future be arranged. Thus, stochastic causation is an integral part

Once again, I have to insist that these fine grained mapping of Quantum Mechanical interactions onto a classical framework is simply misbegotten. It's as foolish as trying to map intentionality onto the universe - the mistake that leads to gods.

The state of a system at time 'zero' bears a systematic, statistically measurable relationship to the system at time 'one'. The elements of the system are bringing influences to bear which must be accounted for. These systematic influences on the evolution of the system are just the causal elements.

But you are quite wrong on this point. Energy is not just tranferred totally randomly. The configuration of the world has a systematic influence upon what happens to the energy. That is all that is required to defeat your objection.

This is a somewhat different topic, I think we should explicitly parse it as being an objection to the idea of inter-theoretic reduction.

If you are not objecting to the notion of inter-theoretic reduction, your point is moot: there is no incongruity between using heuristics. (simplifying certain elements of our theories to perform complex manipulations not otherwise possible.) . and the dictates of parsimony. Quite the contrary. In this case we use classical ideas about causation to think about the world without getting so confused in a highly complex (but far more accurate) quantum mechanical description.

I can't pick out the important components of social relationships in quantum mechanical language, can you? No, not even the best scientist could.

If you are, however, objecting to the notion of inter-theoretic reduction, you are faced with some untenable consequences.
It's like saying you can't REALLY make a rough square out of dots because at it's "base" there is no such thing as squares, only dots.

That's just wild. I have absolutely no idea how Quantum Psyics commits the gambler's fallacy.

Btw, I can easily think of systems where describable larger-scale order can arise from non-deterministic components. Quantum Mechanics is just one.

Fine then stop using them. Rocket scientists will still use newtonian mechanics even if you choose to spend your lifetime computing quantum mechanically what any highschool student can heuristically do in minutes.

ex-xian

This seems to a basic premise of your argument:

1) QM events are non-deterministic
2) Random events are non-deterministic
3) Therefore, QM events are random

This is an invalid argument form. I agree that QM is non-deterministic, but there are other things that can cause (if you'll pardon the word ) a non-deterministic system.

Probability. If we have a system where things are governed by probability, it is impossible to know exactly what will happen. In other words, the system is non-deterministic.

Coincidentally enough, QM is governed by the rules of probability. Not randomness, probablity. We can know generally where the electron will be before any mearsurements are made. If it were totally random, then we could never describe what was happening mathematically.

edited to correct typos

ComestibleVenom

Well said, I wish I could be so pithy.

tensorproduct

The problem with the word chaos is that it is completely different from randomness and non-deterministic. "Chaos" is a branch of physics that deals with systems that are governed by non-linear equations (i.e. second order O.D.E.s.) However quantum mechanics is governed by Schrodinger's equation, which is a linear first order O.D.E.. Therefore, using the word chaos to describe indeterminism in QM is a misnomer. As is using the word random as others have pointed out all ready.

Jobar

quote:
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Originally posted by Jobar

In Buddhism, the root cause of all suffering is thought to be clinging to things in the material world; refusing to let go and realize that all things change. Science does not cling to its ideas and theories when something better comes along; that is what makes science superior to religion.
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NonContradiction:
Hi Jobar:

You mention Buddhism as an example, but then you turn around and say "that is what makes science superior to religion." Shouldn't that read "that is what makes science superior to Buddhism?" All religions are not the same. It appears as though you are equivocating here since Buddhism and religion are not synonomous.

NC, interestingly enough, there are people here on II who deny that Buddhism is a religion, because it does not posit the existence of any God or Gods. However, that was not my point; I was pointing out that the intellectual flexibility of the scientific outlook is better than any strictly dogmatic religion. Normal tries to make it seem that we unbelievers make science our idol; I was attempting to show that this is untrue.

Normal, it's true that individual scientists have clung to theories they hold dear for some reason, long after most other scientists have moved on past it. There are today some few paleontologists who claim that the dinosaurs were rendered extinct by vulcanism, or disease, or some other cause; however the vast majority of scientists now accept that the impact of a giant meteor or comet was the cause. Scientists are human, and sometimes fail to live up to the ideals of scientific epistemology- but science as a system is always changing, as our search for knowledge brings forth new facts. Theistic religion almost always fights change- a consequence of believing in a perfect and hence unchanging God, I'd say.

ex-xian

I wanted to add this, that I posted in this thread in S&S.

I think the second sentece is the most important. Mathematics is infinitely better at describing QM than any other language. That's why I don't think someone can really grasp the concepts without an understanding of the math involved.

Shadowy Man

And yet it doesn't keep people from talking about it. How many people on this board who bring up the subject of quantum mechanics have actually taken a course in it?