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Subatomic Darwinism
blamanj writes "In the beginning was Darwinism, then there arose Social Darwinism, now physicists are proposing Quantum Darwinism. According to the Nature article: "If, as quantum mechanics says, observing the world tends to change it, how is it that we can agree on anything at all? Why doesn't each person leave a slightly different version of the world for the next person to find?
Because, say the researchers, certain special states of a system are promoted above others by a quantum form of natural selection, which they call quantum darwinism. Information about these states proliferates and gets imprinted on the environment. So observers coming along and looking at the environment in order to get a picture of the world tend to see the same 'preferred' states."."
... religious Darwinism. IOW, beliefs evolve as previous beliefs are shown to be "unfit," i.e. disproven by observation.
... but, um, see, there's all this little stuff you scientists haven't quite figured out yet about the specifics, and sometimes you argue about it, and THAT'S ABSOLUTE PROOF OF THAT GOD EXISTS AND HE WANTS YOU TO DO EXACTLY AS _____ (insert your preferred version of a frequently mistranslated, politically loaded anthology of folktales here) SAYS!"
"The Earth is flat, because this passage from the Bible talks about God stopping the Sun directly overhead!"
"Um, no, actually, it's a sphere, and here's the proof."
"Okay, okay! But the celestial bodies are little lights in the sky, and perfect and unblemished, and the go around the Earth!"
"Um, no, actually, they've got all kinds of flaws and blemishes, and they all go around the Sun, and here's the proof."
"Oh, damn! But the Earth was created a few thousand years ago, as we can determine from Biblical genealogies!"
"Um, no, actually, it's been around for a lot longer than that, and here's the proof."
"Aaargh! But humans were specially created by God in His image, and are absolutely unique!"
"Um, no, actually, we look an awful lot like other apes, and that's really not a coincidence, and here's the proof."
"*whimper* All right, so the Earth is round, and it and all the other lumpy rocks revolve around the Sun, and it's all really old, and humans are a lot like apes
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
i.e. genetic algorithms.
GA's are used to maximize arbitrary functions by a mixture of random mutation and crossover between the solution candidates with better aptitude.
It's hot stuff, and it comes up with good solutions for analytically untractable problems.
So maybe a First Post really does matter then.
Wow.
The Blaster Master Fighting for Truth, Justice, and Evil Pie since 1979
Wait, "Interesting"? Okay, uh...I disagree with your disagreement! ::waits for "Insightful" mod:: :P
"You're older than you've ever been, and now you're even older."
Jerry
http://www.syslog.org/
(Below this, on the bumper, is a sticker that says "if you can read this, you are too close or you are trying to see my Darwin deck-lid emblem")
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
the fact that observation changes a system doesn't require everyone sees massively different things, so an explanation of things being not massively different seems unnecessary.
if there is a box containing a red pen and a blue pen and I "observe" it (e.g. shake it about), it will have a different configuration but will still be a box containing a red pen and a blue pen.
So observers coming along and looking at the environment in order to get a picture of the world tend to see the same 'preferred' states.
Techno-speak for "rose-tinted-glasses"?
Seriously though, thinking about it makes your brain hurt: Did the scientists working on this create the necessary state "they preferred" inadvertently in order to discover the state they wanted to see?
It's time to Revisualize the universe.
Software Wars
Is that some quantum states are more stable and are more likely to occur at any given moment than others?
I didn't realize this was new. Maybe the news is that they have a "proof" of this now?
What's next... "market darwinism" when the products people buy survive?
/me needs more eggnog
No. "Darwinism" is about replicators, i.e. organisms that reproduce and that compete for resources.
When used for "Social Darwinism", the word implies that societies reproduce and compete for resources. In many ways this is accurate. You could use "darwinism" to describe many kinds of replicating, competing natural systems.
But quantums...? WTF?
Until we have evidence that quantums are actually lifeforms, the word "Darwinism" is simply not valid.
Anyhow, and on a different note, quantum mechanics is easy. Here's Ites' Dummies Guide to Quantum Physics: matter and energy are made of wavelets, a string of energy. Wavelets look like particles when they're compressed by time or distance. Measuring a wavelet changes it. Wavelets do not breed and they do not compete for resources.
The table is not solid because it's an agreed reality. The table is solid because your hand cannot pass through it.
Sig for sale or rent. One previous user. Inquire within.
I'm not a physicist so you can shut me up at any time. But I thought the "observation changes the object" was only true because to observe you you have to toss energy at it and see what happens. Then the act of tossing the energy changed it. How does this mean that "looking at Buckinham Palace" would do anything ever? You just look at it. Being aware of an electron does not make it change. What you do to the electron to know it's there is what changes it. I suppose I don't really know, so I won't claim to.
Oh by the way if we all percieve that the reality of quantum physicists is to disappear, I think they would disappear... or at least make themselves disappear to prove their own points.
Just a boy doing unproffesional IT work that's way above his head.
So observers coming along and looking at the environment in order to get a picture of the world tend to see the same 'preferred' states.
Sounds a lot like Solipsism which is nothing new at all.
Solipsism is the belief that, because we can only verify our own experiences and no-one elses, only the self is real.
or to put that in Layman's terms: "Go away, you don't exist!"
Schrodinger's cat, it's going to be pissed.
It wasn't a troll until you looked at it. Nice going...
by Stephen Hawking:He goes on to talk about how time curves back on itself as it approaches zero (stuff I'll never understand). So, basically the Catholic Church has conceded the time since the Big Bang to Science, excepting the occasional divine meddling. Of course, such meddling would imply the Great One couldn't design a universe that ran according to The Plan without intervention - such impudence.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
How do they address this:
There's no way to know exactly how similar different people's perception of the same scenes is;
Quantum-level variations resulting from observation and whatever else are not likely to make a noticable difference in these scenes.
The idea that trees are tending to appear the same way because their particles find their way back to the same place after being displaced by observations isn't implausible, but without further establishing the potential for a contrary situation it seems like overkill!
Good thing they "mathematically proved" that they're right, heh heh.
I don't agree with that.
:)
You are choosing a non-objective reality, and there's nothing wrong with that.
The term "quantum darwinism" is really an unnecessary buzzword. There is a certain analogy about states which create many records of themselves surviving a robust pointer states where others are "selected against", but the analogy is really pretty limited and not very useful. It's better to stay away from using terms like darwinism for effect. I should note that I didn't see the word "quantum darwinism" in the title or abstract of either of the actual journal articles this news item references. For the lazy, the two papers in question seem to be this preprint and this article from the Nov 26 issue of Physical Review Letters.
This sounds like an interesting result and Zurek is a premenent figure in the field of quantum decoherence, but this looks like the tying up of some (important) details rather than the revolutionary developement the news article makes it out to be. Even as far back as the work of Everett we had an idea of why two observers who compared notes would always agree on the objective facts. In the many worlds interpretation, this comes down to the fact that if observer A measures system S, there will be many different possible results. So there will be many branches of the wavefunction with A observing each possible result. When observer B measures system S, he becomes entangled with S and A, and there are many possible outcomes, but in each branch of the wave function A and B agree on the outcome. Not sure if that clears anything up. :-) If you're talking about purely quantum systems, the same thing happens in the Copenhagen interpretation. The only tricky part is how to think about it when A and B are "classical observers". Still, I haven't read these papers yet and now I'm eager to.
"You call it a new way of thinking; I call it regression to ignorance!" -- Operation Ivy
I suspect that somewhere it went wrong. Modern physicists are much like the ancient astronomers.
These astronomers, believing that planetary orbits were circular, developed much arcane math and explanation as to why they couldn't completely account for the observed data. They could not imagine such a thing as an elliptical orbit.
Modern physicists, believing that wavelets acted a particular way under certain observation arrangements, developed much arcane math and explanation as to why they couldn't completely account for the observed data. They could not imagine such a thing as a (insert reason here).
I believe that somewhere along the way, a key piece of information may have been missed that would make all of this very simple. Lord knows, I could be wrong...
*whup* "Get along, little electrons. Heeyah!"
Sure glad we avoided that problem.
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This sounds very interesting, but is it just simply a strange twist on words? Mathematics can work out to many wonderful things, but the challenge is how and why the mathematics is applied. Methinks (and remembers as a physics undergrad) that conceptual theories such as quantum and relativity are very different from everyday life because they are special cases. Whereas in biology we learned that Darwin's theory of evolution was a general case.
Let me explain: Quantum mechanics takes place in the realm of the extremely super small. Einstein's relativity takes place in the realm of extremely large values of velocity. There is a disconnect there in reconciling these two theories, thus the epic hunt for TOE, The Theory of Everything. The Holy Grail of physics is to find this super theory that unites relativity, quantum mechanics, electricity and magnetism, gravity, mechanics. Although relativity is used in quantum for calculations, there are some contradictions in reconciling the two theories, thus Einstein's famous quote (during his hunt to reconcile relativity with quantum), "God does not play dice with the universe!"
It is my understanding that Darwinism, whether social, economic or of natural selection, takes place in all biological situations. Look around, and everyone will see that quantum mechanics is not something that happens around us! Do you see quantum wells on your computer screen? As you observe the movement of the train, does the Heisenberg uncertainty principle come into play? No! This uncertainty principle does not conflict with everyday life chiefly because it only applies to the special case of extremely small and extremely fast particles.
So this comparison, extension and exercise of extending quantum mechanics to Darwinian proportions appears to me to be more than anything a philosophical exercise.
The article is muddy and confusing, and makes a number of problematic claims, the most important of which is the claim that measurement changes the system measured. Within the orthodox (Copenhagen) interpretation of QM this is exactly the type of claim we want to avoid: prior to measurement, we can't say much about the system. We certainly can't say it "is" in any particular state or superposition--only that the outcomes of various possible experiments will follow the predicted probability distributions. To say the system "is" something prior to measurement is to load it with ontological baggage that just isn't justified.
The article also makes a hash of the relation between collapse and decoherence, which are quite different things. Decoherence theory doesn't explain collapse--it replaces it by making it unnecessary. I'm a bit out of date on this stuff, but as near as I can tell decoherence theory is treading down the path to many worlds, and it's still an open question as to whether it will be able to avoid the well-known problems that await its arrival.
--Tom
Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
Yes, Newtonian physics was ridiculously accurate, within the bounds of our ancestors' measurement precision. In fact, it was so accurate that we still use it today. When we looked closer, we found situations where it doesn't work so well, so we had to expand the theory to fit those situations. Specifically, we can't use Newtonian physics when there are extreme amounts of energy (relativity) or when the scale is extremely small (QM).
But that doesn't make Newtownian physics invalid; it's correct, as an approximation. The maths of relativity and QM do reduce to Newtownian math outside those extremeties.
To respond to your implication, no, this does not mean that QM is perfect. Just as we refined & expanded Newtownian physics, we may well have to refine & expand quantum mechanics. That's not a weakness, per se; QM still works almost everywhere we look. (The major exception is quantum gravity, the synthesis of relativity and QM; we don't have that figured out.) But QM still works astoundingly well. I can't imagine it will ever be shown wrong. Incomplete, sure, but not wrong.
Nobody has welcomed our Subatomic Darwinian Overlords yet!
And don't expect me to do it for you.
You never really know how close to the edge you can go until you fall off.
>
>You are choosing a non-objective reality, and there's nothing wrong with that.
Hey. Get your hands off his wave function. By posting your observation about him, you're collapsing it for me too!
Seriously people. If you haven't taken a Quantum Mechanics class of some sort (or had some other real, solid exposure to the mathematics behind it) then don't even attempt to talk about it. Basically, 100% of all attempts I have ever seen to explain QM "conceptually" are complete and utter $hite, and have virtually no relationship to what the math really says. As far as I can tell, there is no good way to conceptually describe quantum mechanics. There are no good analogies. There are gillions of mediocre analogies, but if you really try to understand QM by means of these analogies, you're screwed. Because the analogies work for a small part of QM, and then break down if you try to get at all outside their range. So don't try to extrapolate anything from a conceptual discussion of QM. Don't try to take anything from it other than face value, because you will get it wrong. And in many cases, (such as this one) you will not even get it right from face value.
Case in point: TFA talks a lot about observations. But they also talk about people looking at trees and buildings. You looking at something really doesn't constitute an observation (Quantum mechanically). The photon interacting with the tree (building, etc) is the observation. The photon entering you eye, interacting with your cornea, your lense, and finally your retina is another "observation." But you looking at a tree does not change the tree.
Go read the actual papers referenced by the article, these will actually contain science, and not some journalist's misunderstanding of it.
BTW- IANA physicist... yet. I am halfway through my third year of undergrad physics work. One of the classes I just finished was Intro to Quantum Mechanics I. Just to establish my credentials. If anyone who is a physicist with more education in the subject disagrees with what I have said, I would be glad to talk to him. But if you haven't had any QM class.... shut up. Please. Trust me, unless you have had exposure to infinite dimensional linear algebra and partial differential equations, you do not know what you are talking about.
SIGSEGV caught, terminating
wait... not that kind of sig.
There are a host of comments to the effect that Quantum Physics is ad hoc a la Ptolemaic epicycles, or that the research described is pseudo-science etc. First of all Quantum Physics is not ad hoc, nor does it have any relationship to Ptolemaic epicycles. It is grounded in well established axioms and which have proved themselves spectacularly successful in describing physical reality up to and including the physics of the semiconductor devices which commenters used to demonstrate their astounding ignorance and pride therein.
The problem modern physicists face is that the mathematics of Quantum Physics does not obviously lend itself to description in terms of everyday experience. Most people do not have every day experience with superpositions of states nor do they navigate their existence using that model which leads to a disconnect between the mathematics of Quantum Physics and "common sense". That doesn't make the math wrong, it merely indicates that we have adapted to living in a world in which quantum effects can be safely ignored, unless one is trying to make 0.6 micron scale transistors for Slashdotters to abuse.
The research in question actually goes a long way to explaining why it's OK to ignore the quantum nature of reality above certain scales. In short, among the states that a large ensemble of subatomic particles, like Buckingham Palace, can be in there are states which are relatively resistant to large perturbations by observation. Fortunately for the occupants of Buckingham Palace those states tend to describe a palace comoving with the Earth's surface in London, England, and not a palace hurtling towards the sun at a significant fraction of the speed of light. This is a brutally oversimplified plain English explanation of the results, which can only be precisely stated mathematically, and thus likely to lead to significant misunderstanding. Ironically, the research goes a long way to explaining why another reader and I can both agree on the form of the letters of this message.
Is the glass half-full or half-empty?
God, 1200 AD: "Big guy created the whole thing 5200 years ago."
God, 1800 AD: "Clever big guy created the whole thing 5800 years ago. And had to plunk some planets and set up an inverse square law for gravitation. And bury a bunch of weird lizard fossils to confuse us. Either that, or he's been doing some really weird tricks with biology that we're only beginning to guess at."
God, 1950 AD: "Really clever guy (way cleverer than us) created the whole thing out of, umm, something, we don't really know when, but it was a hell of a long time ago, and made particles that behaved like, umm, waves. It's weird and violates common sense, but we can use the math to make televisions. And BTW, now we know how the Sun works."
God, 2004 AD: "Supremely clever dude, existing completely outside of what we perceive as spacetime, may have tweaked an m-brane collision (the math for which only a few hundred of us on the planet can even begin to understand) that resulted in the setting of a few universal constants for the physics engine and the creation of a little bubble of spacetime. Sat back and watched the resulting fireworks for 13.8 billion years to see if sentient life would evolve in a little pocket of it and recognize Him."
Without taking a position either way on the existence or non-existence of God, I humbly submit that the more science we do, the smarter the "God of the Gaps" has to be.
There is an excellent novel by Australian Science Fiction author Greg Egan called Quarantine (Wikipedia entry/Amazon) on this subject. I cannot claim to understand even half the theories in there, but it is a fascinating read and a mindbender similar to what Stephenson's "Snow Crash" had to offer twelve years ago.
The observe effect at the micro level does not translate to the macro level being open to observer determination. The odd way the quantum level operates is used to justify all matter of nutty beliefs and ideas. Those who responded with some darwinian (at the quantum level yet) justification bordering on "consensus reality" should have their credentials as scientists lifted.