Why Donald Hoffman is wrong: Spacetime is not an illusion | Sean Carroll and Lex Fridman
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- čas přidán 24. 04. 2024
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Sean Carroll is a theoretical physicist, author, and host of Mindscape podcast.
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Full podcast episode: czcams.com/video/tdv7r2JSokI/video.html
Lex Fridman podcast channel: czcams.com/users/lexfridman
Guest bio: Sean Carroll is a theoretical physicist, author, and host of Mindscape podcast.
Lex, Space time does not exist. Its based upon bad science that gravity (mass) bends light. it does not, as they ignored\forgot about refraction. Eddington 1919 (Solar eclipse) experiment observered a star light be deflected close to the Sun. But the sun has a plasmasphere which causes refraction. From the original 1919 plates you can see glowing plasma right below the star.
Same deal with Einstein Rings. The lensing galaxy is full of gas & plasma, and its obviously refraction. Another nail is that for any observation of an einstein ring, its always limited to just one or two electromagnetic bands (ie Radio, MW, IR, visible), If it was gravitational lensing we would observe the lensing effect across all EM bands.
Final nail in the coffin is that there are no lensing effects for stars orbiting close to Sagittarias-A (Milky way central black hole). We can see stars whipping around it, but no lensing effects.
if mass gravity does not bend light, there is no such think as space-time.
Donald Hoffman hypothesizes that the reality we experience is a “headset” reality with rules… but those rules are like the rules in a video game. They are observable, consistent, predictable and repeatable BUT still an illusion and NOT fundamental reality. Nothing Sean Carroll said in this clip genuinely challenged or even acknowledged his hypothesis🤷🏻
Of course not, he is a not up for pseudo science.
@@ogoshikimura5621 If your saying Donald Hoffman is pseudo
Science it means you’ve spent zero time looking into him… but still go out of your way to comment on him. That’s very incurious & unrigorous of you… like pseudo-science
Its actually easy to hypothesise different kind of possible structures of reality, but as in many case, Hoffmans idea is still an hypothesis, not more at this point. No evidence even there is a will.
@@ogoshikimura5621Sorry, pseudo-science is a term which is typically thrown around by Scientism and cargo-cult science. Philosophy of science has largely moved past Popper, and Kuhn showed that there are many paradigms of science that are just as valid as "normal science".
@@marxxthespot that’s not the case, but a very interesting reaction on your end.
they both completely missed the point Donald was trying to make , Donald during his podcast was always emphasising on the importance of theory of evolution in the development of human consciousness, and how it completely shaped the way we perceive reality , what Donald meant by illusion is how evolution completely biased and covered what reality actually is , all what evolution tries to do is to cherry pick what humans need to survive from our surroundings . Those are the abstract layers Donald was talking about . Science is never considered absolutely correct, but it always has been relatively true , like he mentioned in this video the example of Newton's laws of gravity and general relativity , they both make relatively true predictions,but we never consider them as absolute final answers
We knew it without clown hoffman. He asserts other things that are globally beyond common sense. For example that reality doesn't exist. That your consciousness is not about neurons. He directly says that his brain has no neurons. He says that after your heart stops, life will continue because everything is a so-called "headset."
And all of this things it's stupidity. But you're always writing that "you can't understand his idea, his main point".
You think that we're idiots including Sean Carroll. We're all unable to understand something. But actually we understand his nonsense very well. And Sean was very polite. Because your hoffman is an idiot and clown.
I agree completely. But our whole notion of evolution (even universal) relies on some kind of "natural" selection. I can't figure out how consciousness, as a nonmaterial entity or event can possibly evolve. I'd love a response. thanks.
@@priscillabethable I highly recommend you watching "Kurzgesagt - In a Nutshell "' video on The Origin of Consciousness, it'll explain to you how consciousness evolved from a simple form ,to the complex form as we know it today
the fact that GR and QM aren't fundamental reveals that time itself is an abstraction that helps us navigate this finite spacetime as it proceeds into existence. a peculiar flashlight that shines in all 5 senses.
It used to be that people who believed in things like fundamental physical principles, or platonic solids, were considered idealists.
I'm not sure what you think an ideal is, if physical principles and laws aren't ideals, and mathematics isn't an ideal!
This is the problem with this new kind of mathematical realism. It's completely indistinguishable from idealism, in practice.
From my perspective, the world of mathematics is entirely ideals.
Science is a little more complicated. In this discipline ideals are exposed to observation and experimentation to be verified.
The real part of science is in the measurement. We took our theories and ideas and differentiated prediction from experimentation.
The best result a scientist can hope for is not a perfect description of reality. It's an inability to differentiate between theory and experiment, despite all attempts.
This is how we justify the claim that it's real!
All the best measurements contain uncertainty.
Perhaps counter intuitively,, it's the presence of indeterminacy that's proof something real happened.
This indeterminacy is what captures the idea that we can't differentiate between theory and reality.
It's what defines indeterminacy in a deterministic universe, described by deterministic mathematics.
A dice roll is modeled as 6 potential outcomes because we can't differentiate between the real outcome and the theoretical outcome with the limited information given.
It was never going to be easy differentiating between theory and reality. It's why it's been a standing question since Plato. It would require a theory of everything to solve. We're not there yet, and I think there's good reason to believe such a theory wouldn't be as good at producing testable predictions as one would hope.
He is completely missing the point of Donald Hoffman’s ideas.
Thanks for explaining.
Exactly
I agree.
No, he is being polite. Hoffman is mostly ridiculous, there’s is no need to expand on it.
@@kcmark3 LOL 😂
Our senses betray us too often to consider what we can perceive, measure and quantify only as the "gospel."
I go to the shop. Is that an illusion? To know if this is an illusion or not you need to know who is I. Am I that body that goes to the shop, from A to B.? Am I consciousness, aware of going to the shop? I know that I am aware of going to the shop, my body functions in such a complex way that it makes it possible to go to the shop ,but of that I am not aware of at all and definitely have no control over apart from the thought I want to go to the shop.
So if I’m only consciousness , aware of what happens, that means my thoughts, my body and my surroundings then I live constantly in the moment and space and time do not exist. If I step out of that choice-less awareness and I start thinking there time and space come in to existence.
“We were speaking of belief. Beliefs and conditioning. Whole belief possibly could be said to be the result of some conditioning. Thus, the study of history is simply the study of one system of beliefs deposing another, and so on and so on and so on. A psychologically tested belief of our time is that the central nervous system, which feeds its impulses directly to the brain: the conscious and subconscious, is unable to discern between the real and the vividly imagined experience. If there is a difference, and most of us believe there is, am I being clear? For to examine these concepts requires tremendous energy and discipline.”
- Jack Nicholson
The disagreement about "space time" and "illusion" is based in this case on what is meant by illusion. They should have started the conversation by clearly defining what they mean by illusion in this context.
How can someone characterize an argument as nonsensical, refuse to elaborate in any way, and maintain his dignity?
Stop attacking Donald Hoffman
His stance of certain Atheism is the limiting factor in his ability to debate Hoffman. I would love to see them debate on this show.
That's because his certainty is only based on empiricism and the highest level of epistemology, thus far known to man.
Hoffman is bringing in a non-quantifiable entity (that cannot be an academic variable) the metaphysical.
Just because you want something to be true doesn't make it true
@@readynowforever3676this doesn’t address the hard problem
@@deadhardy Well, I’m actually hoping that you reveal to me, a legitimate “hard problem” ?
The hard problem is stupidity created by philosophers. Philosophy is verbage, not science.
It doesn't seem that Carroll answers the question, or perhaps he doesn't understand Hoffman. Hoffman apparently believes that we use the "interface" (spacetime and physical objects, events, etc.) well to navigate the "phenomenal world" that we occupy. It allows us to predict quite adequately the best road to fitness, but not to TRUTH.
What Hoffman writes is that the "interface world" is a projection of our own consciousnesses, not a cosmos of independently existing entities. The icons do not give us ultimate TRUTH about the world, there is no progression toward TRUTH via the interface. The language changes that Carroll points out are simply part of the attempt to understand the projections, and to predict what is happening in the phenomenal world. Hoffman believes the TRUTH cannot be reached by inspection of the icons--instead one must look to all the "'mistakes" we make in describing the features of the phenomena, etc. His position is very Kantian, where what is witnessed is determined by the categories of the understanding or our perceptual biases and positions. Of course evolution was not part of Kant's interpretation; but like Hoffman. he believed that the noumena--the ultimate cause of the phenomenal experience were unknowable. I still don't understand what entities Hoffman believes Universal Evolution works on.
I'm quite enchanted by Hoffman's ideas because he recognizes that it is equally possible that mind gives rise to "matter" (icons) as that matter (brain) gives rise to mind.
both are equally mysterious.
'
It depends how entropy works in a Black Hole Singularity. If the second law is “broken” or works in the way leading to complexity. Then so much life, and complexity exists inside, that people would think it’s demons.
The notion of entropy and black hole singularities offers a fascinating interplay between order, chaos, and complexity. Entropy, often described as a measure of disorder, has a key role in understanding how systems evolve and dissipate energy. In the context of black holes, the second law of thermodynamics, which states that entropy tends to increase, is intriguing due to the unique properties of black holes and their singularities.
A black hole's event horizon acts like a one-way boundary, beyond which nothing, not even light, can escape. As matter and energy are pulled into the black hole, they contribute to its entropy. This process is partly quantified by the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy, indicating that a black hole's entropy is proportional to the area of its event horizon. This suggests that black holes could have an enormous entropy, given their vast surface area relative to their size.
However, within a black hole's singularity, conventional laws of physics break down, including our understanding of entropy. If the second law of thermodynamics doesn't apply or behaves differently within a singularity, it opens up possibilities for how complexity might arise. This conceptual shift invites speculation about what could exist inside a singularity where our current models are inadequate.
The idea of complex structures within a singularity is evocative. If entropy behaves unusually, leading to complex systems, this could manifest in unpredictable and perhaps chaotic forms. Theories that consider black holes as environments where conventional laws don't hold might envision them as realms of extraordinary complexity. This might range from highly organized structures to entirely new physics, potentially leading to something resembling a vibrant, dynamic ecosystem.
From this perspective, the mention of "demons" could be metaphorical, indicating entities or processes far beyond our comprehension. The intensity of the black hole's gravity and energy could result in extreme, intricate phenomena that seem otherworldly or even malevolent by human standards. The complexity within might mirror the chaos, turbulence, and energy usually associated with mythological or religious imagery.
Overall, the uncertainty surrounding black hole singularities offers a fertile ground for exploring the boundaries of science and imagination. It challenges our current understanding and leaves room for intriguing, albeit speculative, interpretations of what might occur in these enigmatic regions of the universe.
Every child knows what Time-space is,
but No one have been able to explain 'space-time',
Hoffman, Penrose and other understand,
that it's Not worth to get trapped in this lack
of Logic.
Stuff-side of Life, is not only a illusion,
it is a Real Illusion, based on Eternal Laws and
Principles.
So Life have a Life-side and Stuff-side.
Stuff-side is a Motion-Ocean, our Sensing is Motion,
our Sensing-Organs is Motion, the Sensed is Motion.
The Contrast-Principle and Perspective-Principle
makes Feeling into Sensing.
Empty Space= Space-less Space, is the Being
behind the Living, the Creator,
Space is Part of Creation.
Isn't he responding to a strawman of Hoffman's ideas presented to him by the interviewer?
In order for Hoffman to have his hypothesis taken seriously, we need a way to falsify it.
There is a reason no advocates of Hoffman's ideas want to offer that. They want to be taken seriously without offering enough precision to the idea to earn such.
Your comment is solid evidence you haven’t looked into Donald Hoffman’s work. Intuitively it seems unverifiable. Factually, he’s producing work that can and is being scrutinized and tested
@@marxxthespot offer the way to falsify it brotha, or grandstand and feel cool while offering nothing of substance.
For what reason do they need to be falsifiable in order to be "taken seriously"? Philosophy of science has largely moved beyond Karl Popper's notions of 'falsification'. There are plenty of well respected theories in science which make unfalsifiable claims.
@@Archeidos-Arcana name one seriously considered theory in science that has 0 falsifiable claims.
The whole point of a hypothesis becoming theory is that is stood the test of falsification, so science seems pretty set on the requirement of falsification to have an idea be taken seriously
@@ryanprice9841 When we are dealing with the kind of topic that Hoffman is dealing with -- we are dealing, in part with metaphysics. We are dealing with natural metaphysical constraints that have more to do with the 'nature of Being', as opposed to something of 'mundane existence' within phenomenality.
Should supersymmetry be rejected from consideration, for example -- because it may very well end up being impossible to definitively falsify?
Again, we are scratching against the constraints of understanding -- rigid empiricism need not apply here and hasn't for at least the past few decades. Your impulse would make sense in some more mundane areas of the empirical sciences, but in this area it just seems misplaced.
Lex and Sean both misrepresented what Hoffman is saying. Sean should have Donald on his podcast. I would love to watch thay
dignity is in the eye of the beholder….its all relative bro…or quantum! who the fuck knows
This guy is the Tucker Carlson of smart people
When Chuck Norris wakes up, we cease to exist. Spacetime is exactly as Chuck perceives it.
Please be respectful in the comments. San Carroll is a respectable physicist. I don’t agree with some of his ideas, but I do believe that this is good criticism on Dr Hoffman’s theory. Sometimes we are quick to attack a person if doesn’t completely agree with the person we support. We must be reasonable.
Hoffman has no theory. The nonsense that he produces is difficult to call even hypothesis.
@@VolodymyrPankov I agree with Hoffman to a certain point. I do believe that evolution doesn’t necessarily give us the ability to experience the world as it really is. But I struggle to believe his claim that the whole universe is an illusion due to the evolutionary process.
@@alexanderlopez-dt9ty "I do believe that evolution doesn't necessarily give us the ability to experience the world as it really is."
The problem with this claim is that it's something like manipulation. In the sense that who ever said that the sense of selection which so-called "evolution" to experience the world like it really is... What we understand by the statement "world like it really is"? The sense of biological selection that we are part of: surviving, adaptation, reproduction, dominance. We're primates who evolved from monkeys. We're different but similar. Actually we're experiencing the world differently. Because your brain and my brain are different by different characteristics.
Hoffman asserting that reality is an illusion. He is a believer in so-called panpsychism which is the idea created by philosophers that consciousness is something fundamental. Hoffman believing that after death he will continue to live because consciousness is a fundamental thing and it's a religious idea. Hoffman asserts that the universe and reality doesn't exist but instead reality generates your fundamental consciousness. He asserts that we have no neurons. He literally says that even his hand is an illusion. Everything doesn't exist. He is denying everything.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
And actually he created nothing new. He made up from different philosophical ideas. All of these ideas were created by philosophers before delusional hoffman was born. But philosophy is verbage, not science.
@@VolodymyrPankov I agree with you. Forgive me, I didn’t express myself right. I don’t buy Hoffmans views about the universe being an illusion. And yes, I had the same problem with him when he stated that not even his brain was real. I also dislike the fact that he has appeared with characters like Deepak Chopra. On the consciousness dilemma, I tend to lean towards the idea that consciousness is not fundamental. I also had problems with him about that. But, I also don’t discard all the arguments for a fundamental consciousness. I am open minded. I don’t think that Hoffman says that you need religion in order to have a fundamental consciousness. He has said this before. I am not trying to defend him.
Now, on your first paragraph. Forgive because I don’t think that I was able to understand what you were arguing for. Are you saying that reality is subjective? That’s it’s different for every creature? I not disagreeing, I just don’t understand. Can you please elaborate?
I'm really surprised to hear something like this in the 21st century. Donald points out that reality is something we "create" in our minds (which is quite obvious). Sean, in simple words, says that "if there is cause and effect, it means that reality is real". Well, so computer games are real, too.
Donald's point is experience is real for us, but the structure behind it is oversimplified.
Bro, if Sean is missing the point of Hoffman’s theory THIS much, I’m not gonna take him seriously about most things. Kind of embarrassing. Maybe he wants the attention?? 🤣
This guy has absolutely no idea what Hoffman is arguing. I don’t think he actually has the capacity to understand it.
Science explains how, religion explains why. It's only recently we've conflated the two and now look to science to answer both.
Religion explain nothing
Is Hoffman saying that there is NO evolutionary value to accurate models of reality? That is nonsense, there is plenty of data that organisms benefit from accurate models of their environment. Or is he saying that there are other factors in fitness besides accurate models? That is true. Or is he saying that any model of reality (including his) is completely false? That is self-contradictory.
Why does this comment have no likes?
@@FPSIreland2 The internet selects for shock value and engagement, not for truth... Hence the popularity of Hoffman and Trump...
No, he is saying there is no reality without the subject.
In consequence not one model can be considered complete or true because the subject forms part of the model. And Godels incompleteness theorem confirms this.
@@yoerikbaudaer2403 No reality without which subject? Is he a solipsist? So many subjects have come and gone, and reality continues. I know that Hoffman erroneously believes the universe had consciousness even before there was life on any planet. The issue with modeling reality is not just about having a consistent model. The model has various levels of accuracy and various levels of simplicity, and these two are sometimes in a tradeoff relationship. So there is a meaning of "truth" here, having to do with model accuracy (which could potentially be mathematically formalized) vis a vis the physical world (assumed to exist, even without a subject, but which subjects can model). This has very little to do with Godel's theorem, which is about consistency of mathematical systems and provability or unprovability of statements about the natural numbers. Truth in this second meaning is not about model accuracy vis a vis the real world. It's about whether a statement about natural numbers has no counterexamples. Godel's first theorem says such statements exist that also can't be proven (derived from the consistent axioms).
@@iuvalclejan this is maybe what they made you understand about Godels theorem but it ha a far deeper applicable meaning then what you describe.
It says , Any consistent formal system F within which a certain amount of elementary arithmetic can be carried out is incomplete; i.e., there are statements of the language of F which can neither be proved nor disproved in F.
This can applied to any system, of which the subject through language is part of.
A model is made by a subject through language. This objective based reality which you talk about does not exist.
You say that Hoffmann claims that there was consciousness before there was life on the planet is erroneous. How do you defend if something is right or wrong if you don’t know what that something is. Science has not the slightest idea what consciousness is, only speculation.
The observer has an absolute importance in the appearance of reality. This is demonstrated in the double slit experiment. Form comes in to existence when there is an observer. Without observer there is no form. So there is an underlying absolute reality in the same way as all objects are made of atoms.
About the search of Science for consciousness will be forever unfruitful as long as science limits itself to its current way and tools of doing science. The search for consciousness is the eye that is searching for who is looking.
Oh boy 😩
Our objective reality is the reality of denying god.
Whoooooosh
Sean Carroll is my least favorite of the "celebrity scientists" -- and that's saying a lot because Neil deGrasse Tyson exists.
Science is *not* settled, so maybe back off the smug certainty that your ideas are right and others are wrong.
Well said
The amount of clowns, believers in nonsense terrifying me.
Ala Thomas Kuhn, proponents of the dominant paradigm of science (i.e "normal science") will typically resort to smugness, condescension, ostracization against things which threaten the existing paradigm. The more vehement they get, the more it shows that their philosophical foothold is being lost. It's effectively the equivalent of the Catholic Church burning folks at the stake. Awhile back, if you Googled "Hoffman" -- you'd find a variety of entries labeling him a 'pseudoscientist' -- pretty good example of how the tides may be shifting in the popular culture, imo.
This guy is a joke. 😂 I would have loved to hear a well thought out rebuttal to Hoffman's position that "Space Time is not fundermental". But the guy didn't have one
Hoffman has no position. He has only dementia.
I don’t care what Hoffman says. It’s useless to accept what the supposed “actual structure of reality” is if there is no way whatsoever to observe/measure/grasp it with our physiology. The whole point of physics is to provide MODELS for reality that are USEFUL. With the language we use, the discrete distinct objects we define in our universe, find models which describe reality. Nothing more; there is no ontology to physics, only pragmatism. Therefore, Hoffman’s results cannot ever cross the boundaries of analytical philosophy. It is the flying spaghettimonster in the room that may or may not exist, and thus it is nonsensical to study.
This would only so for the materialist. The one who explains love as a series of chemical reactions or sound as a mechanical vibration believing this would make a deaf person know what sound is. Models do not reveal reality and Gödel showed this.
@@yoerikbaudaer2403 Gödel did not show this at all. completely false statement. The question about whether models do or don’t show reality is down to philosophy and requires a formal definition of the word “reality”.
@@Ruktiet I explain what reality means. The described is reality, the description is not reality.
Based on that statement Gödel theorem says models or never complete or true because of the subjects who makes ir. A model is established on artificial basis and can never be proven true or untrue.
It's all in the word definitions. If you say something is a belief, you are stating an opinion without evidence, not an empirical fact. I can choose to "believe" that lizards created the universe. But I cannot state that as fact.
Hoffman makes claims that don't conform to evidence.
Peppering your arguments with intuition and induction isn't providing evidence.
Carroll correctly points out that how we define something as true is whether it fits (and therefore predicts) reality.
Hoffman is just spouting spooky woo woo that's indistinguishable in the mode of argument from claims about the supernatural. People think such claims are deep, in reality they're not even superficial.
Hoffman said that he has no neurons. It amused me, because considering the nonsense he is producing I think that he really has troubles with neurons...