OK, I'm finally recouped on sleep enough that I dare post. It'll probably still be light for the coming days though. It's been an extremely busy last few months. One thing that's been the talk of the blogs is Paul Davies new book, Cosmic Jackpot. He had an extended editorial in New Scientist last month and was interviewed on NPR's Science Friday last month as well. Now let me say in advance that I've not read Davies book, although it sounds intriguing. He's done a fair bit on the borders of theology and physics over the years but, judging from the NPR interview, he has a somewhat novel theory.
Let me first start with his criticism of the traditional view. That one has ideal laws of physics that then develop the universe. He, rightly in my view, sees this as a hold over of old theology traditions. You know, creation ex nihlo, where as mysterious God outside of the universe imposes laws and then, "poof," the universe exists. Science has, for the most part, got rid of God. But the ideal laws still end up fulfilling a lot of that need.
Now recently science has started to really get on the multiverse bandwagon. However, fairly understandably, many scientists are uncomfortable with this approach. It explains too much. That is there are so many possibilities that almost anything is possible. This makes scientists, who for centuries have had success tracking down "necessary" laws, quite uncomfortable.
What Davies proposes is that laws develop from within the universe. There is no "outside." Rather one ends up with a kind of feedback where the universe develops its laws. Further, Davies suggests that the mental is an intrinsic part of the universe.
Of course all of this ought sound somewhat familiar if you've read C. S. Peirce, since that was his view of the universe. There was mind inherent in the universe that developed. Further the universe developed in a near Darwinianistic fashion. (There's some difficulty calling it Darwinian since there isn't "reproduction" in the normal sense of the word) As it develops the universe becomes much more rational. So one ends up with a kind of odd hybrid between Hegel and Darwin.
Not having read the book, I can't say if this is what Davies is after. But it does sure sound intriguing.
I should note that I'm certainly not opposed to the multiverse. But I tend to see it as useful for different reasons.
Just to throw in a bit of a curve, physicist are begining to think that these laws are not as stable as once believed. They may in fact be in the process of changing. For example, the speed of light may have been different earlier in the creaton of the universe.
Rich
Hi Clark, happy to see that you started posting...
I'm highly skeptical of the idea that physical laws are 'evolving' (or really changing in any way). Though, I don't know anything about how this would work, it seems to me that metaphysically it makes most sense for the 'laws' to be invariant to 'translations' in space and time.
I say it makes sense to me, because if one sees the space and time as abstractions (and not as subsistent entities or subsistent properties), and if time and space as such abstractions appear in the physical laws, the invariance to translation might even a priori follow from the nature of measurement of those variables.
Namely, it is a contingent decision when measuring those abstractions if one will 'mark' the start of the measurement with 0, 1, or some other value. No matter what value is given to the start of the time period, or to the one end of the measured length, the measured space or time will have the same value.
So, if there to be any physical law which holds for the system and includes time and space measurements, it will carry this translational invariance simply because of this independence of the measurements on what number is assigned to the 'starting point'.
But if laws are invariant to translations in space and time, than it is hard to see in what sense they would 'change' relative to this time and space. So... anyway, the idea that laws might change, for these reasons doesn't seem very plausible to me.
On the other issue you mention, being an idealist, I do accept the seeing of the world as some kind of 'petrified intelligence' (I think it is Shelling phrase), i.e. as a realm of reason. And for sure one of the important notions in that realm of reason is the notion of 'becoming'. But I'm skeptical that the becoming appears as something over the view of physical world as being a process, and think that this becoming of the physical is already "included" in the physical laws as differential equations. Of course this is not to say that this becoming doesn't appear in 'higher-level' phenomena in some different ways.
If you threw God into the mix, this would come strait out of John A. Widtsoe...
Tanasije, I think in terms of terminology you're right. But scientific law doesn't really have much connection to the etymology anymore. (IMO)
I think it a fact that much of what we call law evolved or at least "froze out" during the early development of the universe as symmetries were broken. That's pretty mainstream cosmology and I think near fact.
The bigger issue is whether laws that were considered more fundamental fit this.
There is a way to think of most laws as manifestations of underlying symmetries. For instance you can derive pretty much all thermodynamics out of symmetry calculations. If this is so then I think Davies idea has a lot of merit. The big change is whether the two realms of fundamental physics (i.e. quantum theory and general relativity) also are like this or if it is just many constants and particles.
Hi Clark, you might be interested in my review of Davies' book. I agree that the "ideal laws of physics" view has problems, but I don't think a return to teleology (which is what DAvies is rooting for) can solve them. I like better Penrose's suggestion that a more advanced framework would eliminate the distinction between "dynamical laws" and "initial conditions" (which presently are, so to say, the Form and the Matter halfs of our description of the universe: the former rational and comprehensible, the latter contingent and empirical). I have no idea how to develop this more advanced framework, though.
Hey, thanks for that. I'd totally forgotten you'd reviewed it.
The whole issue of teleology is interesting. Some, like Cramer, are trying to prove that at least limited backwards causality are part and parcel of the universe. I halfway wonder if that doesn't naturally entail teleology. (Backwards causality is a big part of Davies view, from what I could gather. Although in the NPR interview at least he vastly overstates its place in physics.)
I was wondering what the mechanism is for this development or evolution of laws comes from (that is, with no reproduction occurring, although I guess I could conceive many "failed-universes" with this one surviving only because it's hit upon some nice physical laws). But it seems Alejandro is saying that Davies is going for something more like a pre-modern notion of purposeful development?? I'd be interested in hearing contemporary arguments (that don't invoke God) for establishing this kind of view....
Yeah, from the interviews I've listened to at least his view sounds remarkably like Stoicism.
Peirce's notion which also sounds quite similar is a bit harder to pin down. It's similar in some ways to neoPlatonism. But the underlying mechanism is chance + some things being intrinsically more "reasonable." So it's a kind of teleological aim, but more out of a kind of possibility rather than a true Platonic form or intent. More akin to how genetic algorithms can sometimes pick out real solutions.
So for Peirce, to the degree I dare say I understand this more controversial idea of his, sees symmetries constantly being broken and possibilities decreasing as each element of chance picks something out. It ends up being remarkably similar to the Schrodinger Wave Equation and the particular collapse of the wave function. Interestingly Peirce argues that chance and "mind" are two sides of the same event. That is chance is a kind of observation by part of the universe.
Anyway, I'll admit that's a part of Peirce's views that I have the hardest time buying, although it is interesting and attractive in some ways.
With regards to Davies though I think his endorsing of Huw Price's backwards causality ends up being key. That is whatever the universe ultimately evolves to has a causal relationship to early states. Peirce ends up defining God in some similar ways, although he adopts a much more traditional conception of time. So in a way Davies' adoption of the backwards causality interpretation of QM offers a more compelling ground for Peirce.
Of course a lot of people don't buy backwards causality in the least. But I suppose what you end up with is something like David Bohm's conception of order but with that order in the future effecting current events.
Interestingly someone off Peirce-L works with Davies and asked him about the Peirce connection.
Many people have pointed out the link between my ideas and those of Peirce, but I have not studied Peirce in depth. Clearly this is a serious omission.
He says that his ideas arise primarily out of John Wheeler's Participatory Universe idea. Basically a semi-idealist interpretation of QM. That is the observer is given such a prominent metaphysical role that it becomes meaningless to talk about matter without talking about consciousness.
These talks from the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics's seminar on "Evolving Laws" with Stuart Kauffman, Lee Smolin, Roberto Unger and others, may be of interest.
Sorry here is the link -- http://www.perimeterinstitute.ca/Events/Evolving_Laws/Audio/
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