The article asks the same question in the last part, wondering whether it's just randomly selected. MWI proponents have always argued decoherence leads to the entire world being put into superposition as decoherence just spreads entanglement to the environment. The math never says entanglement destroys superposition beyond a certain point of complexity (many different entangled systems forming the environment).
The author does say the approach is a combination of Copenhagen and MWI, removing the outlandish parts of both. Seems to preserve the randomness of the former though.
> MWI proponents have always argued decoherence leads to the entire world being put into superposition as decoherence just spreads entanglement to the environment.
Well, duh. It's not like classic objects actually exist, or the classical/quantum divide: everything is quantum, including the "observers". The "classical observer" is a crude approximation that breaks down to a pointy enough question. Just like shorting the perfect battery (with zero internal resistance) with a perfect wire (with zero external resistance) — this scenario is not an approximation of any possible real scenario so it's paradoxicality (infinite current!) is irrelevant.
Random is a very interesting concept. In relation to nature we seem to use "random" as anything we can't or are currently unable to model.
To call something random doesn't mean it's impossible to model, in fact all sorts of natural facts seemed random one day before being covered by a model. One very relatable example example is the motion of stars in the the night sky, which seemed random for ages, until the Copernican revolution.
The fact we have access to random() function in programming seems to trip many people. random() is a particular model implementation of random, but stuff in nature isn't random().
My point is, using "just random" to do work in any scientific explanation is a clutch.
In science randomness is usually used to abstract over a large number of possible paths that result in some outcome without having to reason individually about any specific path or all such paths.
It does not have to mean something inherently non-deterministic or something that can't be modelled, although it certainly is the case that if something is inherently non-deterministic then it would necessarily have to be modelled randomly. Modelling things as a random process is very useful even in cases where the underlying phenomenon has a fully understood and deterministic model; a simple example of this would be chess. It's an entirely deterministic game with perfect information that is fully understood, but nevertheless all the best chess engines model positions probabilistically and use randomness as part of their search.
There's disagreement on this. You seem to just be saying that brute facts or brute contingencies don't exist, but I suspect most scientists would disagree with that.
The use of "random" as explanation or characterization in science has certainly spanned everything from "we don't know", to "there is inherent indivisible physical randomness".
And I would agree, in the latter case it is a crutch. A postulate that something gets decided by no mechanisms whatsoever (randomness obeying a distribution still leaves the unexplained "choice").
It is remarkable that people still suggest the latter, when the theory, both in theory and experiment, doesn't require a physical choice at all (even if we experience a choice, that experience is explained without the universe making a choice).
I'm not sure that's true. Randomness has a well-defined meaning for me: unable to be computed by a finite program. The vast majority of real numbers are thus composed of truly random digits. Suppose the universe has a constant that is a real number. The overwhelmingly vast majority of real numbers are non-computable and cannot be described by a finite descrition of any kind. Thus, if the universe were simply sampling numbers from this real constant (or simply the answer to the math is this real constant as it is undergoing some dynamics), then the numbers would appear random because the true underlying constant is non-computable, and thus appears random.
There is no possible finite way to describe if this were the case or not.
It is not incomplete to say that something does not require explanation, nor is it saying it's "magic". It is a cost that your model might incur, that's it.
In this paper a plurality of physicists stated that they felt that the initial conditions of the universe are brute facts that warrant no further explanation. This is not "our model doesn't yet account for it", it's "there is no explanation to be given".
A model is incomplete if it doesn't explain something.
That doesn't make a model wrong. All models we have are partial explanations.
But that doesn't make it rational to claim that an incomplete model is complete. Or to treat unexplained specifics as inherently "just so", without cause or reason (i.e. magic), and we must just accept them as unexplainable instead of pursuing them with further inquiry.
> A model is incomplete if it doesn't explain something.
I've just explained that this is not strictly true. I don't know what else to say. Brute contingencies, by definition, do not require explanation. I then gave you a paper where scientists largely believe in brute contingencies.
I think if you want to know more you can look into this. Just look for topics about brute facts and brute contingencies.
If you want to deny that brute contingencies are possible, by all means. That's a totally valid view. Just understand that it's probably not the majority view among scientists and that you aren't necessarily "right" (just as those who hold to brute contingencies aren't necessarily "right").
Constraint without an actual constraint? I am not denying it, it denies itself. It isn’t coherent.
Things are what they are because of constraints. Which is more general, and assumes less, than appeals to causes.
Constraints need not be prior. They can can be simultaneous, i.e. co-constraints. And they can be internal to the whole, i.e. all of reality can be a co-constrained structure without external constraint.
An ultimate law of conservation is a strong candidate for a self-constrained reality. All versions of forms existing that neither locally create nor destroy. And since all possible forms within that exist, no choices made universally and there are no conserving forms it excludes. A coherent, infinite, unique, zero information structure. (Uniqueness is inherent to a zero information structure. Non-uniqueness necessitates choice.)
But claiming that some things just are, with no structural necessity, is an appeal to magic. A specific, with no actual constraint matching the specificity isn’t coherent.
You don’t get something for nothing. There is no outside of reality to provide that.
Any “outside” just means that total reality was not being included in the analysis.
I am not saying we can practically figure everything out. Or that there may not be questions, that given the limited resources/laws of our universe may not be answerable from our position, even theoretically. There may be questions we can’t answer. But nothing specific “appears” with some magical independence from the rest of reality.
That is the non-taulogy of it “just is”.
It would also make reality as a whole irrational. Not even a structure that obeys a conservation law. Because it would have specifics that had no reason.
Look, I really don't care to explain this. You can reject brute contingencies, as I said. If you want to do so, great. Just don't pretend that it's indefensible, your view doesn't even align with the majority of scientists.
None of your conclusions actually follow from this, which you would be welcome to explore on your own. You can learn why conservation can be held as true while also allowing for brute contingencies. As the leading cosmologists I've cited do.
No, it's not magic. You just don't know what you're talking about. Only you can fix that.
Thanks for you patience. I wrote way too much. And have re-read what you wrote and the article.
> It is not incomplete to say that something does not require explanation
> Values of physical constants of nature
> the most popular choice was that the constants are considered
brute facts and thus require no exotic explanation
So yes, I deny the coherence of the concept of "brute facts".
If something is determined, something determined it. Some mechanism, constraint, context, structure, ... Perhaps we don't have the right word or connotations, but something.
A specific from a choice is a specific relation. That relation exists, as exemplified by our encountering the specific. Our experience of coming across the specific is not extricable from that specific's consistent connection to the rest of reality. That consistency has some basis, or there would be inconsistency.
A "maintaining" mechanism for an arbitrary consistency doesn't work, because that just pushes the choice of the specific that is maintained into the maintainer, which makes it more than a maintainer.
I can believe in things we will never be able to explain, as a result of observability limitations imposed on us by local physics. Eternal ignorance for any reason is always a practical possibility.
I can believe in undetermined things, which appear with each possibility, where we only experience one, because in the product of possibilities each plays out separately.
That would be the closest I could come to a "brute fact". Because it is in fact completely determined. The specific was not uniquely chosen, because the specific is not unique. Information is conserved, no explanation of each specific is needed. Even though each specific will behave as unique, across each possibility respectively, because differing specifics interact with a disjoint relation. The disjoint relation is the operating condition creating a localization of choice.
People invent ways to explain away persistence ignorance, instead accepting it, like a fractal attractor, over and over. The psychological need to resolve the dissonance, when encountering challenges to investigation that are potentially insurmountable. And then some "way" of sweeping away the lack of explanation gets translated into a proposed lack of reasons, and given a name and connotations. But never an explanation or reason for itself. It is always faith based. The existence or principle of brute facts, must remain meta-brute facts themselves. All untestable.
Scientists can "believe" that is a valid viewpoint. But inherently cannot every demonstrate any evidence for it.
The same reasoning, with different connotations and contexts, is rejected over and over by scientists. Mystical or religious connotations doom those different "versions". But stated in a sciency way, the same situation becomes palatable to some or many. But it doesn't become more coherent by virtue of being the "physics" version of "explanation" by acceptance of non-explanation.
> So yes, I deny the coherence of the concept of "brute facts".
Cool, that is fine. I deny lots of things as well. It's a position you can hold.
> If something is determined, something determined it.
That's fine but you'll likely find yourself in an infinite regress. That's a cost you'll have to take on under your theory.
> People invent ways to explain away our ignorance of the reasons behind things, instead of accepting the reality of ignorance, almost like an attractor fractal pattern, over and over.
That's not what's happening here. These concepts are pretty rigorously discussed and debated, it's certainly not a "cop out" - it's a metaphysical cost to your world view that you have to justify.
> Scientists can "believe" that is a valid viewpoint. But inherently cannot every demonstrate any evidence for it.
You've already said that you don't believe all things can be proven via evidence, so that's fine.
But it's incorrect to say that there is no evidence for the position. There are many arguments to support the view of brute facts or brute contingencies. One example is that it seems to not accept them would lead to infinite regress, which many people have reasons to reject as well. These are well evidenced positions, that is why so many scientists believe in them.
This has nothing to do with religion or mysticism. There is nothing about this that requires "magic". Many of our most advanced cosmological models support this view. You are just not aware of this, and so it sounds like magic, but it isn't. If you think it is then I would just suggest that you learn more about it, there are many scientists and philosophers writing on the topic and I'm sure quite a few youtube videos on the topic.
Zero information constraints: Specifics only as fully determined, full coverage of undetermined specifics, conservation of information. These axioms, unlike most, impose a lack of external information not just as a desirable property, but harness them as a tautological universal constraint. Unlike most axioms, which are imposed information themselves.
The "constraint" that a complete description of reality doesn't require external information, isn't a brute contingent, it is a tautology. One that can be leveraged as an axiom we get for free.
It has many forms. One is, nothing can be created (no external source), or destroyed (no external dump), so any local structures can be transformed, but must be conserved in some way. Transforms must be reversible. We now have the necessity for a law of conservation as a "for-free" requirement, as a result of no external information/interaction.
Local zero information constraints:
No specific exists, except those that are completely determined. Anything else would require external information. This is a law of fully determined intersection.
Anything not completely specified, must exist in all its disjoint alternatives. This is a law of fully exhausted union.
Think of the exhaustive superpositions (unions) over all possible conserving interactions (intersections) in quantum mechanics. A real "local physics" example of this principle.
Cancellation is caused by conservation. Duals that can be generated must be reducible. And it is cancellation of duals that create the non-trivial distributions that superposition and entanglement produce, out of otherwise a neutral exhaustion of possibilities. Instead of noise or uniformity, we get structure.
This all comes from "no external information or interaction".
It turns out, that tautology is far from a trivial constraint. I believe there will only be one structure that will meet that requirement. And its uniqueness will be another manifestation of no external information, no external choice. Uniqueness doesn't require choice.
In fact it is a very active constraint. Try to come up with a form in which everything is either determined, or exhaustively covered, and always locally conserved (i.e. all transforms are fully and exactly reversible). It will be a challenge! Exactly what we want. But you can fit a lot of our current physics in as consistent pieces. Like quantum mechanics. And historically, we have understood the universe better every time we have generalized or unified laws of conservation.
Superposition is simply conservation of information across disjoint conserving intersections. It doesn't collapse, because that would require external or created or "just is" information. Which besides being incoherent (in my opinion), would throw away the only "free axioms" we have as an explanation for why any structure exists at all. Conservation, closure, uniqueness.
I'm confused because you seem to be using the term tautology totally incorrectly. Your post is very confusing for this reason, because you're very clearly just appealing to a brute contingent fact, if not now multiple brute contingent facts.
edit: Okay, I think I am sort of getting what you're saying about tautologies but it's wrong. Either way, I don't think it matters much. You can just deny brute facts, I have no problem with that. I'm just saying you shouldn't assert that brute facts don't exist as if that's the standard position.
Any theory or model of reality, must take into account all of reality. It cannot depend on, or interact with, or export anything to, anything external. As that would not be a model of reality.
Yes, but nothing else that you've said follows from that. For example,
> One is, nothing can be created (no external source), or destroyed (no external dump), so any local structures can be transformed, but must be conserved in some way.
This is not a tautology, it is a metaphysical claim.
No, a model of reality cannot import something from anywhere else. Whatever is within reality, can only be determined by reality.
Nor can anything in reality, be exported outside of reality.
Reality is the one thing, the only thing, that cannot depend on anything undetermined or unchosen by itself.
The fact that reality must account for both itself, and any of its specifics, with no other domain to draw from, is a higher level of demand than for any other theory. That demand is a hard and unique constraint. A tautological constraint that is therefore usable as an axiom.
I mean, these are all just metaphysical claims. It also doesn't seem to address brute facts, which would be within reality, so it seems sort of pointless. It also doesn't seem to address infinite regresses.
Even if I grant your "axiom", which is just that "reality exclusively contains reality", nothing interesting follows from that for this conversation.
If there is only one such structure, if it is unique, then the question of its existence goes away. What would existence mean?
We would just know there was a unique self-consistent all consistent form covering structure. And that any form within that structure, with a sophisticating self-sensing self-interpretive ability, would experience its own existence.
Existence would then mean, part of the unique self-consistent, zero-information, independent of any externality, structure.
A perceived existence as a result of a unique tautological structure, not a result of any external composition.
And the phrase "I think therefore I am", would be tautological in both senses. As evidence. But also, as the actual meaning of existence. Given a self-aware form within a tautology, its perception of existence is the nature of existence.
Reality was always going to be something that forms structures, that are somehow inevitable, the only possibility, not something selected or manufactured by something else.
I mean, again, these are just claims and, once again, another brute fact.
> Reality was always going to be something that includes structure, that is somehow inevitable, the only possibility, not something selected or manufactured by something else.
This is a brute fact. I mean, literally it just is.
It doesn’t. Decoherence is the technical step in the Everett picture defining what a “classical branch” even is and explaining how the state vector branches. Every claim that “Decoherence” somehow offers a distinct interpretation to Everett is pure confusion.
