Max Tegmark - Physics of the Observer
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- čas přidán 8. 10. 2017
- Does the concept of observation have deep relevance in fundamental physics? What about in quantum physics where some kind of observation seems to be needed to transform “wave function” probabilities into actual events?
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This whole 'observer consciousness' question has been around for decades. It was initially discounted, even ridiculed, by mainstream physicists. Still, it did not go away. As I read history, the resistance against it arose from the atheism of so many physicists. They couldn't accept that human beings might be slightly more than mere animals. They may still be right, but it bears remembering that, a century after Bohr, the conscious observer has not been eliminated from this science.
I don't know how experiments might be created, but I would sure like to know if insect observations can collapse the wave function. Then raptors with their outstanding eyesight. Then perhaps dolphins. In any case, the observer/measurement question remains a mystery. I look forward to its full explanation, whenever that comes.
Well, if it's a mystery, then it's not quite part of the science (and thus needn't be eliminated from it). In my view, where mysteries start, science ends and is replaced with poetry. Nothing wrong with that - one needs mystery to drive poetry, to drive the science in turn. Just gotta be mindful that what you're asking and what you're getting, are tightly coupled to the amount and quality of measurements made in a given context.
Tegmark seems to be one of the "woo"-est whitecollars out there, but I like him, because his body language, and natural language as well, I think, are telling you rather straight that "yeah, chill, dude, i'm selling you some poetry here, not actual science". Many entertainers (obviously better actors than Tegmark) lack this sense of basic manners.
czcams.com/video/GzCvlFRISIM/video.html - Tegmark draws a pretty cute sketch of a model here, that seems to rely on The Measure of those informational aspects, apparently implying that "well if you've got these measures high, it's consciousness. If they're low, it's not consciousness." Now that's world class woo, in a positive sense, as it hints that this particular bit of woo might actually become testable at some point.
In this vid here, Tegmark says that he thinks that a rock is not sufficiently conscious to collapse wave functions, "you need something more". "How much more," I ask. What is the "absolute minimum amount of consciousness to do the thing"? Assuming that I agree with the requirement of "something more" (which I don't), here's how I'd go about considering it, applying a hearty amount of woo myself:
In computational complexity theory, there's this notion that an algorithm can't analyze itself (predict results, computational costs, etc), because for an algorithm to analyze an algorithm, it must contain that algorithm, plus some additional parts that do the analysis ("understanding," if you will), otherwise it's just the original algorithm doing its original work. Obviously, there's a galaxy-wide gap between quantum mechanics and computational complexity theory, but the magic meme of "something more" triggered this comparison for me.
Looking at it this way, it seems intuitive, that IF an observer requires "consciousness" to "do the thing," it requires two capablities (measures of informational aspects): the ability to simulate the wave function correctly, and to understand it - ie. to produce at least some meaningful data about the resulting particle. Ultra-minimally, to collapse an electron's spin, we'd need another electron to simulate it (ie entangle with it), and some third paricle that will implement the so-called "understanding" by interacting with the second one... But wait, if we don't measure the third one, the entire system is still uncollapsed.
Hmm, perhaps there is some point to the paradox that "if John opens the box, sees the cat, and doesn't tell Mary whether it is alive or dead, then John is in the superposition of seeing a dead cat and seeing a live cat. As far as Mary is concerned, John wasn't conscious enough, I suppose. Even, John perceives himself as collapsed with the cat, but he sees the uninformed Mary who is still entangled with a John in a superposition... So in order for any wave function ever to be really truly, collapsed, there would need to be a super observer that observed that wave function collapse AND communicated that information to every observer ever, otherwise there would exist an observer observing that "nope, still superposition." A silent god is no god - any uninformed worshipper is still faced with a god in the superposition of existing and not existing. And if such a super observer existed, it'd be 50/50 if humans actually possess consciousness...
Your hope of seeing experiments with ants, raptors and dolphins, is moot, I'm afraid - you'd still need to entangle with the animal, putting your own consciousness into the system, to know the result. And you'd end up with a model equivalent to that which we already have with a dumb sensor on the left slit. By my reckoning, considering consciousness for observers is a logical fallacy. The only way to cut your own consciousness out of the system, would be to guarantee that you don't interact with it, and so guaranteeing that you can never know the answer. If ever you know the answer, you needed to interact with something that interacted with something, ..., etc, with the system. And then it always could've been You or some dumb particle in the chain that did the collapse.
So, if consciousness is required to turn waves into particles, and You want to measure it, you'd need to define consciousness as "an informational capability that only You can be proven to possess."
Turned out to be quite the rant, but let's call it prose, not poetry, as I'm not driving for new science here, but rather, against. I hope some bits were enjoyable, still.
P.S. the second that anyone with half a brain hears you use fighting words like "ridicule" and "mainstream science," they'll instantly discount you as a moron, and Never Change Their Mind, even if you turn out to be right later. That wave don't uncollapse, buddy. (Possibly) luckily for you, if there is no super observer, many others will remain handily superpositioned ;)
@@kristjanpeil ... Taking last first, please note that I ridiculed no one. I was merely reporting it as a non-journalist casual observer of events.
I disagree that mystery is not part of science. When there are masters and doctoral candidates looking for theses, advising professors tend to have a list of mysteries which they hope or expect can be turned into hard science in the masters or doctoral process.
It must be clear by now that we know only a small percentage of what we seek to learn, the rest, for now, being a mystery. The striving to uncover the hidden answers seems essential, even foundational to science. I agree that my picture of science is "big picture", and this is likely not what you were referring to.
I understood before you described the difficulty, in testing inon-human observation and its effect, if any, on the collapse of the wave function. I cannot agree that this will never be found. I see nearly boundless determination and creativity in this field today.
I did not address every point you made in your very lengthy reply. I did only what my focus and energy allowed.
Eyesight not required to collapse wave function, nor is consciousness.
@@cbskwkdnslwhanznamdm2849 ... As I understand the current evidence, your statement represents belief but not proof.
Robert Lawrence Kuhn is my hero
This channel & content is truly truly fascinating. Thank you Dr Kuhn.
We all have to thank this channel with all these interviews with people who really have something to say as opposed all this bullshit on youtube
Robert asks questions and Max answers different ones.
Rob asks what constituted an observer in the early Universe,
so Max explains why we find ourselves living in a Universe that's 13.5 billion years old.
Half the (good) questions went unanswered.
So one guy was asking bullshit and the other guy was giving bullshit answers. :-)
Seems like they were both talking about different things and couldn't come to an understanding of what the question is
Sure, and i think i know why. But won't say it in this channel
@nils4545 Tegmark does not seem like an exceptional thinker. He seems like another wacky physicist who might be competent but also has a lot of absurd, non-starting ideas. Observation does NOT refer to interaction, that's a popularized quantum bullshit meme. Consciousness is unecessary to a physics discussion. Awareness/aka consciousness is a biological product with a cognitive mechanism. You don't need physics, or even really absolutely need neurology, to attempt to discuss the mechanics of cognition. Cognition is a thorny thing to try to imagine. Cognition is the capacity to imagine. What we might call 'conscious' as in waking consciousness, is when you connect sense to a cognitive agent. Only biological things are cognitive agents. A.I. is NOT a cognitive agent, or any kind of agent. The field of A.I. the cesspool of word-choices that contribute to a widespread delusion that A.I. has any intelligence. It has zero.
@@eltouristoduo what does observation refer to if not interaction?
@@eltouristoduo You clearly don't understand what's going on here.
The whole reason Tegmark isn't answering his question is precisely because consciousness isn't relevant to a discussion about individual particle interactions. However, consciousness is very relevant to a physics discussion.
The reason that consciousness is very relevant to a physics discussion is because I am conscious, and this universe is my observed universe. You might think this is silly, but this is very real, you can measure it, and I have measured it. It also makes perfect sense and is the only possibility. It's a very obvious tautology.
This is what he's talking about when Tegmark is discussing consciousness and the observer. He's talking about measuring a discrepancy between what we would expect probabilities to be and what we measure them to be -- on the large scale. The difference is precisely because probabilities in the universe I observe are (obviously) conditioned on my observations. For instance, I will never observe my own death (unless you define death weirdly as something I can observe, but don't do that). So, forever, I will continue observing, and as time passes you should increase your belief that the world you live in is conditioned on my existence.
When he's talking about dark energy predictions, he's talking about precisely these kinds of observations. We're getting the "right answer" when we assume more and more things which are true about me. I live in a galaxy, I am conscious, and so on. This is just the anthropic principle -- the recognition that the only universe I can ever interact with is the universe I observe -- plus the mathematical multiverse (which, again, is obvious and the only possibility).
@@talonward2494 The idea that world we live in is somehow ‘conditioned’ at a subatomic level is mind boggling.
Does a conscious observation change the tense from future to present to past?
The word "conscious" is an adjective, describing the state of a person. In daily life we get by when we use the term and we all seem to know whether we are conscious of something or not. No mystery there. However when we turn it into a noun, "consciousness" we reify the term that is to say treat it (consciousness) as a object, a thing, that now takes on the appearance of having some sort of mysterious existence independent of the person or being it was originally used describe. It is 'the hard problem' simply because we have removed our selves from it and now embark in a fruitless search to recover it. This of course cannot be done. Seems to be the problem is with grammar and syntax.
Right on!
Nonsense, the adjective doesn't solve anything. Being conscious is no less mysterious than being in a state of consciousness.
@@cube2fox that's not what he's saying. It's going from activity/process to thing that's at issue
@@kvaka009 That's not an issue. A process is no less mysterious than a thing.
@@cube2fox a process has different ontological features than a thing does. If you think that a magnetic field is a thing you will (mis)understand it differently than if you think of it as a process. This argument is not new. Whiteheads process and reality, as well a Nietzsches point about will, Cassirer substance and function. Thinking about emergent phenomena as emergence of things rather than processes will take you to two very different ontological models.
That was awesome
What did the universe look like before anyone or anything was doing any looking? The truth is we don't know and can't know. There's no reason to assume it would look then as it looks to us now. Humans and other animals have particular sensoria that shape what they experience in particular ways. Existence w/o observers may have no detectable form whatsoever. In fact, w/o observers, the entire universe could have been held in superposition, an open vector of potential energy. Things in wavelength systems but have no form that can be observed. It takes an observer to "collapse" the wave-function of near-infinite possibilities into locatable photons or sub-atomic particles of matter-energy. There is nothing to observe until they are observers to participate in the reality of form, space, and time.
It would look the same. The universe is not a narcissist. It doesn't care if somebody is looking at it or not.
When there are no conscious observers, Max Tegelmark rides a bike loudly bursting hard rock and sniffs cocain. But I like this guy nevertheless.
Skirting around that consciousness can be fundamental and causal.
Is there an observer (subconscious) beyond the four dimensions of space and time?
The wave function collapses with “intent”, and intent resides in consciousness. Therefore, consciousness is the raision d’être for the universe to exist.
Does mathematics need to be developed by a conscious observer, since mathematics is used in conscious observation to describe physical reality? What can develop mathematics for conscious observation?
The observer is a living individual, and he (or his representation) is observe and describe the nature.
can animals trigger the observer effect?
Max Tegmark seems to flirt with the Wheeler school. But he can't push himself to jump onto it.
Can time be an observer?
Maybe Quantum Physics is simply time variant ?
Does anyone else find it funny that most the people commenting seem to have come to a conclusion on the subject?
It is hilarious in fact. I think science should be done by committee in youtube comments. This is where all the genius experts hang out after all.
@@kvaka009 Whoooosh
Collapsing the inquiry function…🤔
The observer is conscious, it’s a living, breathing human being and only they will know who they are, because anyone outside the consciousness of the observer would never be able to comprehend it!
Experience is just a common word [EXPRESSION] for appropriation.
Information is ontological
What does that mean ?
Kevin Fairweather
It doesn't mean anything, he is just stringing words together that he doesn't understand. What he probably meant to say was that information has a fundamental ontology, which simply means that information has a reality in the world rather than just being an abstract concept.
A materialist would say that only material has a fundamental ontology and everything else is emergent, but some people argue that information has a fundamental ontology and material emerges from information.
Ontology is informational (Wheeler).
Information can occur only in consciousness
Isn’t essentially the same thing as a tree falling in a forest? Don’t you also think that this is how Trump weasels is way out of every situation. Things happen but he’s not quite aware of it?
Dude had a few beers before the talk fersure"
This video takes us further from truth.
Perhaps causality is irrelevant
Max got muddled explaining the role of an observer in QM. In any explanation of reality observer also need to be explained as part of the reality.
But ultimately you must also explain how the observer is able to give an explanation of themselves as well. And whether it is, in a sense, a complete explanation.
Why does no one want to believe the obvious? - that the universe itself is conscious and it brings about reality as it desires. This is what Problacists believe (see Problacism.com).
The universe IS conscious! Because I am conscious, and I am the universe. In fact, the universe I observe is the universe observable by me, and I only know about myself through my observations, so the definition of me is only well-defined up to my observable universe. This means there is a natural bijection between observers and observed universes, which encompasses everything I could ever interact with, including you. So, you could claim the universe inherits consciousness via the canonical mapping =D
The Observer is Not physical,
so, the 'Physics of the Observer', is the Object of observation, the Observation-Tool's, Senses, and the Observation,
it is all Motion.
All Stuff/Physics is Motion, the Physical Reality is a Motion-Ocean.
Here's the answer to that:Professor Andrew Truscott has proven with the delayed choice experiment that one's observation can behave retroactively.
What does that mean "observation can behave retroactively"?
I'm the observer. I have measured this empirically.
Thank goodness you will almost surely not believe me. I really don't want to spend eternity in a highly reliable death machine that kills me unless the operator gets what they want. And I almost surely won't because futures where I continuously survive a death mechanism because what the operator wanted happened to occur have very rapidly diminishing density from my current priors.
But, you know, it would be kind of nice to start a cultural trend of worshipping the oldest known conscious entity. Works out pretty well if you think you're the observer too. And I bet you do. I mean, ask yourself, "Am I observing?" I bet you'll think yes.
At 3:37 the host definitively explains what the term observer represents and the other guy is too wrapped up in what he feels and believes regarding how consciousness should fit in the discussion that he completely misrepresents the theory. This discussion is pointless.
painfull to watch 6:15
Is Max drunk in this video? He seems particularly unable to explain himself clearly.
How confused, Observer is the Almighty
MIT should hire better people.
you can't stump the Trump
Max Tegmark, giving nauseating stereotypical answers that are straight out of any Quantum book from the 70's.
If I want Soundbites, I'd listen to the mildly more digestable Degrasse-Tyson
You're a low IQ reject, stop embarrassing yourself.
And God is the consciousness that we are looking for...we simply don't know how to describe God...and we are looking at God's particles but not able to see God's consciousness...yet.
There is no proof of God
can you prove that?
What evidence is there for God? None of it passes any scientific test.
Well do we have a test that would be suitable? That's part of the problem.
Do we have any tests that prove there are multiple universes or show how gravity really works?
What if they're wrong and the LHC actually breaks something on the QM level that results in blowing us all up and creating a super black hole?
That would really suck, don't you think?
Multiple Universes have solid scientific hypothesis. There is none for God. How do you know if God is a Hindu God, or Zeus, or Allah?