Smolin's 1995 Landscape of Physical Law idea

[marcus]

It's interesting that Lee Smolin used the idea of an evolutionary Landscape of physical law back in 1995

http://arxiv.org/gr-qc/9505022

We just had that young quantum gravity researcher Leonardo Modesto at Marseille remove the Black Hole singularity so that spacetime extends thru the black hole to somewhere else ("Disappearance of the Black Hole Singularity in Quantum Gravity" http://arxiv.org/gr-qc/0407097 )

Smolin explicitly anticipated that kind of result in Quantum Gravity---eliminating classical GR's Black Hole glitch----in his 1994 paper
"The fate of black hole singularities and the parameters of the standard models of particle physics and cosmology"
http://arxiv.org/gr-qc/9404011
This 1994 already is describes the Landscape concept but doesn't apply the word "landscape" to it.

----from 1994 abstract---
The implications of a cosmological scenario which explains the values of the parameters of the standard models of elementary particle physics and cosmology are discussed. In this scenario these parameters are set by a process analogous to natural selection which follows naturally from the assumption that the singularities in black holes are removed by quantum effects leading to the creation of new expanding regions of the universe.
---quote---

In the 1995 paper the analogy is drawn between the genes of an organism and the parameters of physical law which generate the universe---the genes are to the organism as the fundamental constants and the laws of physics are to the universe----different values of the constants means a different universe.
In evolutionary Biology the ensemble of all possible sets of genes for an organism constitute a "Fitness Landscape" and this will have hills and valleys determined by a fitness function, with selection driving the gene pool to higher nearby levels of fitness (reproductive success).

Smolin draws the analogy explicitly (see e.g. page 33) and proposes a way the ensemble of possible sets of physical constants can be seen as a reproductive fitness Landscape.
the act of reproduction in this case being the formation of a black hole.

He is able to make a falsifiable prediction from this--which as of today still stands and has not been refuted

"... leads to a definite and testable prediction, which is that, Almost every small change in the parameters of the standard models of particle physics and cosmology will either result in a universe that has less black holes than our present universe, or leaves that number unchanged..."

Have to go, will get back to this later

 

[sol2]

Will have to look deeper as well.

Smolin Lee

Page 12
It is perhaps worth mentioning that the word “landscape” was chosen in [8, 9] to make the transition to the concept of fitness landscape, well known in evolutionary theory, more transparent.

[8] L. Smolin, On the fate of black hole singularities and the parameters of the standard model submitted to Physical Review D. gr-qc/9404011, CGPG-94/3-5 ; Cosmology as a problem in critical phenomena in the proceedings of the Guanajuato Conference on Complex systems and binary networks, (Springer,1995), eds. R. Lopez-Pena, R. Capovilla, R. Garcia-Pelayo, H. Waalebroeck and F. Zertuche. gr-qc/9505022; Experimental Signatures of Quantum Gravity in the Proceedings of the Fourth Drexel Conference on Quantum Nonintegrability, International Press, to appear, gr-qc/9503027.

[9] L. Smolin The Life of the Cosmos, 1997 from Oxford University Press (in the USA), Weidenfeld and Nicolson (in the United Kingdom) and Einaudi Editorici (in Italy.)

http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/hep-th/pdf/0407/0407213.pdf

 

[sol2]

I think we should refer back to Susskinds talk on Landscape as well for a clear perspective? Peter Woit's site would carry this.

Fitness landscapes are often conceived of as ranges of mountains. There exist local peaks (points from which all paths are downhill, i.e. to lower fitness) and valleys (regions from which most paths lead uphill). A fitness landscape with many local peaks surrounded by deep valleys is called rugged. If all genotypes have the same replication rate, on the other hand, a fitness landscape is said to be flat.

http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Fitness landscape

http://img.thefreedictionary.com/wiki/6/67/Fitness-landscape-cartoon.png

And for further reference on Landscape?

 

[setAI]

this might be of some value- when Susskind published an article on his Landscape idea for Edge.org- Lee Smolin responed in the Reality Club-[ http://www.edge.org/discourse/landscape.html ]and a rather heated debate insued between the two of them


___________________________

/:set\AI transmedia laboratories

http://setai-transmedia.com

 

[marcus]

I think we should refer back to Susskinds talk on Landscape as well for a clear perspective? Peter Woit's site would carry this...
[/URL]

that is correct. Susskind's first Landscape paper was February 2003, right after Kachru et al came out with the 10¹⁰⁰ string theory vacua.

http://arxiv.org/hep-th/0302219

The Anthropic Landscape of String Theory
Leonard Susskind
21 pages

"In this lecture I make some educated guesses, about the landscape of string theory vacua. Based on the recent work of a number of authors, it seems plausible that the lanscape is unimaginably large and diverse. Whether we like it or not, this is the kind of behavior that gives credence to the Anthropic Principle. I discuss the theoretical and conceptual issues that arise in developing a cosmology based on the diversity of environments implicit in string theory."

----------------
For String Theory, this paper is what put Landscape on the map. Let's get a broader historical context for it, however.

In 1995 Smolin used the concept of a fitness Landscape of all possible
Standard Models, and he did not then or later resort to anthropics. Instead he proposed an explanatory theory of physical law evolution and made a testable prediction. This prediction permits the new theory or scenario (which offers a possible explanation for why we are where we are in the Landscape) to be refuted. Smolin's theory can be falsified---which means that the theory is meaningful and part of the empirical scientific tradition.

whether or not it is right we do not know, it has not been invalidated as yet.

Smolin's chapter in the new Cambridge U. P. book elaborates on this
"Scientific Alternatives to the Anthropic Principle"
http://arxiv.org/hep-th/0407213
----------------
By way of contrast, in 2003 Susskind employed the Landscape image applied to the plethora or "discretuum" of string vacua which had been found by Kachru and others. He immediately proceeded to invoke the Anthropic Principle, a principle which has several versions.
Lively discussion ensued.
From this no testable prediction emerged which would allow either String Theory or the Anthropic Principle to be invalidated or otherwise falsified.
Doubts have arisen as to whether String Theory as practiced by Susskind and associates can actually be considered a part of science. these doubts were aired on sci.physics.research in 2003 in a long thread called "the string theory crack-up". Disatisfaction has been echoed by some eminent string theorists (Witten, Banks, Gross IIRC) who have been critical of
Susskind for resorting to Anthropism. the AP hoopla appears to have tended to divide and discredit rather than help matters.
-------------

In mid-June 2004 Susskind posted his latest paper on the Landscape:
"Naturalness and the Landscape"
http://arxiv.org/hep-ph/0406197
---exerpt---
"...During the last couple of years an entirely new paradigm has emerged from the ashes of a more traditional view of string theory. The basis of the new paradigm is the stupendous Landscape of sting theory vacua---especially the non-supersymmeteric vacua. These vacua appear to be so numerous that the word Discretuum is used to describe the spectrum of possible values of the cosmological constant..."
---end quote---

This paper was subsequently withdrawn from the arxiv, and is no longer generally available.

 

[marcus]

this might be of some value- when Susskind published an article on his Landscape idea for Edge.org- Lee Smolin responed in the Reality Club--- http://www.edge.org/discourse/landscape.html ...

SetAI that discussion is so great!

I think Smolin has been amazingly patient all things considered.

He came out in 1995 with this evolutionary landscape idea
with universes reproducing by blackholing near-copies of themselves.
So the universe that is most prolific of galaxies and stars and has the best parameters for making black holes wins out in the evolution game---or its genes do.

It is a testable idea. he has presented one or two astronomical observations that would shoot it down.

so it has empirical meaning---it makes predictions.

he actually came up with this in 1994, but in the first paper he didnt say the word Landscape. Anyway he has been waiting 10 years. And it is actually a decent idea that offers an explanation of why

1/137 is 1/137.036 or whatever
and why the
cosmological constant (expressed in Planck) is
10^-120 or so
and the other parameters of the Standard Models of cosmology and of particle physics

so I can understand if he sounds a bit impatient with these Landscape-come-lately Johnnies who when they finally get around to it make what looks like the wrong move and leap into the arms of the Anthropic Principal

My guess is that it will all get straightened out eventually and the new
smolin article, which is very plainly reasoned and non-mathematical, will help

Also the patching of the BH singularity by Modesto (and presumably others) will help. So Smolin evolutionary landscape will finally get a decent hearing--and be checked observationally.

 

[sol2]

In all fairness Marcus, we would have to know the limitations to make it falsifiable? If you agree with this then if you move in the direction presupposed with lorentz invariance,then we would have something to talk about in terms of supersymmetry?

I had been viewing some of Krasnovs simulations of the early universe in the past and to me something has made it ways into my mind about the sincerity of supersymmetry in regards to how we see this early universe resorting to "pearls and chains."

This then came to the ideas about http://wc0.worldcrossing.com/WebX?14@118.lroccxWyqad.0@.1ddf4a5f/57 and made me think of Glast here again.

If LQG is supported then the current models we have might have in regards to CMB might be in trouble. To me the current research supports early universe information gathering.

"

If GLAST detects violations of lorentz invariance in the form of
energy-dependent photons velocity, in agreement with theoretical
calculations, such observations and such agreement would strongly
support LQG. It would also represent a severe problem for
string/m-theory, as string theory in its current formulation
presupposes lorentz invariance is an exact symmetry of nature, valid
at all scales.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loop_quantum_gravity

 

[sol2]

I wnated to make sure I did not confuse the name of Andrey Krasnov with Kirrill Krasnov that Baez is related to in literature.

Why I wanted to add this here has to do with above posted, and how the intersection of photons held in regard to LQG's attempt at discribing the issues of Glast. from the SRian approach.

http://wc0.worldcrossing.com/WebX?14@92.YyIIcXeLrlD.0@.1ddf4a5f/57

I wanted to add this animation animation to help people recognzie the similarity that has made me aware of how this intersection is a vital recognition of how we can see the evolution of the early universe to now.

We talk about cosmic strings here in the animation as a way of seeing the consolidation of event and structure in that universe. What was important for me was to recognize how supersymmetry might arisen from brane realizations, and again, the moire effect was most strange if we had considered this "intersection," of the graviton, as if the photon was to travel through these waves.

I am still gathering my thoughts here.

 

[Ontoplankton]

Why should the number of black holes created decrease only under small parameter changes? Doesn't Smolin's theory predict that we're in a global optimum for black hole production?

 

[sol2]

Onto,

your post is a important question, so I do not want to detract from that... so I am using it for thinking out loud here.

Hawking Turok Theory

Think of inflation as being the dynamite that produced the big bang.
Our instanton is a sort of self-lighting fuse that ignites inflation.
To have our instanton, you have to have gravity, matter, space and time.
Take anyone ingredient away, and our instanton doesn't exist. But if
you have an instanton, it will instantly turn into an inflating, infinite
universe.

So in essence, Hawking and Turok proposed that the universe began from virtually nothing. The two physicists believe that the instanton does not exist "inside" of anything, nor was there anything existing "before" the instanton. The instanton was a combination of gravity, space, time, and matter packed into a rounded miniscule object. They believe the existence and subsequent actions of this object produced the big bang, and subsequently, the universe we live in today.

http://web.uvic.ca/~jtwong/Hawking-Turok.htm

So I think we need to undertand this place where beginnings and ends are really parts of the cyclical nature? The black hole, by removing the singularites does this. To me underlying this basis,a geometrical realization must come out front and center as we might see the Life Cylce of Energy and Matter in the cosmos.

But that's just me.

See Creation of Blackholes in the Colliders

 

[marcus]

Why should the number of black holes created decrease only under small parameter changes? Doesn't Smolin's theory predict that we're in a global optimum for black hole production?

this sounds like a helpful question

evolutionary models in biology tend to achieve local maxima
there is a landscape of genetic possibilities
and a fitness function analogous to height
and if you find yourself on the side of a mountain
then evolutionary pressures drive you up the mountain

(higher fitness bunches of genes, more grandchildren etc., win out over
lower fitness)

but to leap to an entirely different mountain would be a rare accident depending on a large amount of mutation---cant count on it happening

the process can only feel out local maxima and blindly grope its way up the slope that its on.

there is some discretion about what is meant by "small" changes----mathematicians can usually say and these are details to work out.

the way you tell whether or not you are at a local max (as the Smolin theory predicts with high probability we are) is you see if small changes can make things better, or if they always make things worse---fitness wise.

does that clarify it some, Onto?

 

[Ontoplankton]

I agree that his theory predicts we're at least in a local optimum; but the difference between evolutionary theory and Smolin's theory is that in Smolin's theory the process goes on forever, and if it's at all possible for the universe to mutate (by some preposterous luck) to an even higher peak, then this will happen at some point, and then the universes in the higher peak will exponentially swamp the others. The only way to avoid a global optimum is if that optimum is physically impossible (not just a rare accident, but completely impossible) to reach by any mutation or series of mutations whatsoever.

 

[selfAdjoint]

In the general fitness landscape picture of evolution, which Smolin modeled his theory upon, it is by no means a given that the highest peak will be attained. See the better popular books on the subject. Only the highest local fitness is guaranteed. If negative fitnesses lie between that and a higher peak, there may be no adaptive path from the local fitness peak to the global one.

 

[Ontoplankton]

I know, but as I said, Smolin's theory is different from evolution, in that it describes a process that goes on for an infinite time. If arbitrarily large mutations are physically possible (even though extremely unlikely), then if you wait long enough the system will jump to the highest peak and stay there. If arbitrarily large mutations aren't physically possible, there still only needs to be a chain of universes, each of which can have at least one black hole, within one mutation step away from each other, ending at the global optimum. After that happens, the global optimum exponentially swamps everything else (I think).

 

[marcus]

just curious, Onto, why do you think that Smolin's model assumes
an infinite regression back into the past?

I didnt yet find in his essay where he says that our series of black hole ancestors goes back indefinitely.

I would imagine that his prediction (about local maximum) would work also if one just assumes finite


naively, all one cares about is the prediction which says local maximum,

and a local can also be a global maximum

(every global maximum is also a local one)

all one cares is the prediction that we are probably at a local max
for black hole production
and if only that can be falsified by observation then we will have learned something namely that at least one of the postulates is wrong

---------anyway that's my take------
What I am wondering, and asking you, is where does it say
that the family tree of universes is infinite?
You say that is a feature of his model. Where did you see it?

 

[Ontoplankton]

I meant infinite into the future, not necessarily the past. It seems to me this works automatically, if there's always a universe that has 10^many children. (This gets into nasty probability issues: if you have an exponential tree of universes, with a fixed tiny-but-nonzero probability for any branch to die off, what's the chance that the tree goes on forever?)

And just to clarify: I agree that it would falsify Smolin's theory if we turned out not to be in a local maximum. However, I think it would also falsify Smolin's theory if we turned out to be in a local maximum, but not in a global maximum. If I can point to anywhere in the entire landscape and show that more black holes are produced there than here, then Smolin's theory has been falsified.

By the way, if Smolin is saying it all started with one or multiple seed universes that didn't come from any previous universe, I would like to know how he fits this into his theory (how were their parameters selected, for example?). Maybe I missed this in his anthropic principle paper; I only looked at it quickly.

 

[Ontoplankton]

(wrong calculation deleted)

 

[Mike2]

I would think that a cyclic universe with particular probabilities for life would be completely indistinquishable from a single iteration of big bang. For it would seem that no information about the previous iteration could survive the big crunch, and you could never know what iteration or cycle you were in. And with some probability that things could produce life on the first iteration, or first big bang, you could never say that this iteration is not the first.

 

[marcus]

I meant infinite into the future, not necessarily the past...

then the argument you gave earlier that we have to be at a global maximum breaks down

 

[marcus]

I would think that a cyclic universe with particular probabilities for life would be completely indistinquishable from a single iteration of big bang...

we are discussing Smolin's model----cyclic universe is not part of it.
let's focus on Smolin's model in this thread

(don't get me wrong. I like the picture you can get in Loop Quantum Cosmology of alternating expanding and contracting stages. with a smooth bounce instead of singularity---but we should have aseparate thread: it doesn't relate to this evolutionary picture)

 

[Ontoplankton]

then the argument you gave earlier that we have to be at a global maximum breaks down

Only if you arbitrarily pick out a point in time where most universes have had time to go to a local but not a global maximum. There's no reason to do this, as far as I see.

Instead of "point in time", I should actually say "generation number". Smolin's theory, if I understand it correctly, takes no account of the idea that some universes may produce black holes faster than others, so that more generations can be crammed in the same time interval.

This was my earlier point: it's really hard to figure out what "typical" and "almost all" means when there exists an infinite number of each type of universe (timelessly speaking). You can look at all universes that will ever exist, or all universes that exist in one very early generation, or all universes that exist in one later generation, or all universes that exist in one very late generation, or all universes that exist at some time coordinate (seen as sub-universes of the original universe; that's possible, right?). All these will give you a different answer to the question what sort of universe is the most common. In that respect, Smolin's theory isn't much better than anthropery, I think.

 

[Ontoplankton]

Are there good reasons to think we're not at a global optimum for black hole production, by the way? Is it possible to construct an even holier universe by making very large changes in the parameters? Or is this mostly just academic?

And another question: are there parameters for which an infinite number of black holes is produced in one universe, as time goes to infinity? If so, how do you decide between them?

 

[marcus]

... Smolin's theory isn't much better than anthropery, I think.

Smolin's theory produces a prediction (actually several)
Pulsars are observed all the time and often the mass can be calculated very accurately by observing the orbit with another star. If a neutron star above a certain mass (IIRC 1.6 solar) is observed then at least one premise
is shot down.

this is what he wants you to believe or disbelieve and explain why.

I do not know if Smolin believes or disbelieves in multiple universes or if he believes in this way of explaining some fundamental constants by evolution involving black hole babies. He is not trying to persuade me or anyone to believe or disbelieve this picture or this story. What he wants, if I understand, is for people to
OBSERVE AND TEST and shoot the theory down if possible. It's science and the game is to construct models with explanatory and predictive power and test them.

maybe someone can show me that if a 1.6 solarmass neutron star is found that this would not shoot down Smolin theory.
THAT would be a really serious criticism! to show that the theory does not predict all neutron stars be <1.6 and that it would not be falsified by finding one bigger.

 

[marcus]

... an even holier universe by making very large changes in the parameters?

...

I like the pun holier universe

I wish we had an expert in smolin theory. I wish we could clone Smolin and get him here to explain more and e.g. answer your question. this stuff is for me personally fairly new. I usually think about just one universe with standard Friedmann equations and standard mainstream cosmology perhaps with a little bojowald quantizing around the bang.

holy universe makes me think of my favorite music to sing which is the Sanctus of the latin mass
(screw the Church, always sing in Latin)
Sanctus sanctus sanctus domine deus sabbaoth
pleni sunt coeli et terra gloria tua
osanna...
holy holy holy lord of the laws of the physics
heaven and Earth are full of your glory
(sabbaoth originaly meant the army of angels but I
freely and pacifically translate it to be the fundamental constants and the laws)

 

[selfAdjoint]

"...the Army of inalterable Law."

 

[marcus]

"...the Army of unalterable Law."

GeorgeMeredith "Lucifer in Starlight"

"around the somethingorother track marched rank on rank
the army of unalterable law"

but also Thomas S. Eliot "Cousin Nancy"
echoing the elder as he often did

"Upon the glazen shelves kept watch
Matthew and Waldo, guardians of the faith,
The army of unalterable law."

as you frequently do, selfAdj, you have taught me something.
i had to go to google and'm glad I did
because---tho I'm not really such a great fan of TSE as
many others of the appropriate generation still
the word "glazen" is brilliant

"upon the glazen shelves kept watch" is the
masterstroke of a peerless parodist
it made the day

 

[selfAdjoint]

GeorgeMeredith "Lucifer in Starlight"

"around the somethingorother track marched rank on rank
the army of unalterable law"

but also Thomas S. Eliot "Cousin Nancy"
echoing the elder as he often did

"Upon the glazen shelves kept watch
Matthew and Waldo, guardians of the faith,
The army of unalterable law."

as you frequently do, selfAdj, you have taught me something.
i had to go to google and'm glad I did
because---tho I'm not really such a great fan of TSE as
many others of the appropriate generation still
the word "glazen" is brilliant

"upon the glazen shelves kept watch" is the
masterstroke of a peerless parodist
it made the day

Matthew and Waldo in Eliot's poem are of course Matthew Arnold and Ralph Waldo Emerson, conceived as tutelary busts on cousin Nancy's shelves, and representing with gentle mockery the forces of rational anti-christianity.
I guess none of this is really OT here on PF.

 

[marcus]

Whether OT means off-topic or old testament
here is the important thing:

Sanctus sanctus sanctus domine deus sabbaoth
pleni sunt coeli et terra gloria tua
osanna...

the funny thing is that I really love the idea of evolution
producing all these species of plants and animals which are
quite marvellous (some or even most of them) and the way
it strikes me, evolution does not detract or distract one bit
from the basic message of the Sanctus.

one can revere the world as best one understands it and if
that includes an evolutionary process so much the better

and now our boy Smolin has extended an evolutionary process to
the constants
like this wonderful number 1/137.036
and its train of variants depending on energy

the Man with the Beard did not select 1/137, in other words, but instead contrived to have it evolve
that's sweet (as Oppenheimer once said IIRC about some physics)
something about the world like the sweet spot on a tennis raquet

 

[marcus]

but hey, the law is alterable

she is as she is and the law is
merely a slide we project onto her
and we are just fish
but sometimes it fits pretty good

what did Emerson or Arnold OR TSEliot know?

think of the Dante of a smolinary universe:
la gloria di colui chi tutto muove
per l' Universo penetra i risplende
in una parte piu, e meno altrove...
(first canto of the paradiso, I think)

 

[sol2]

but hey, the law is alterable

she is as she is and the law is
merely a slide we project onto her
and we are just fish
but sometimes it fits pretty good

what did Emerson or Arnold OR TSEliot know?

think of the Dante of a smolinary universe:
la gloria di colui chi tutto muove
per l' Universo penetra i risplende
in una parte piu, e meno altrove...
(first canto of the paradiso, I think)

Dante's vision, might not of been really the layers to hell, but of the vision of what underlies the reality of being?

Because there is a vast energy system underlying reality, it does not mean that the early uiverse might have spoken to the "evil" that underlies existence, but maybe of the rejuvenatuon of the phoenix, where this cleasning , now becomes new possibilties.

This topologcal feature of hills and valleys describe for us peaks worth considering, not just in how we percieve something very hot, but of what can exist through it all, and still become a factor in our perceptions of reality?

How do Smolin, Susskind, Hawking deal with it?

What is the geometry that connects it all?

 

[selfAdjoint]

Sol, the power that penetrates the universe, in the verse Marcus quoted has nothing to do with hell, it is the ecstatic vision of heaven (in layers or "spheres") seen from the original eden atop the mountain of Purgatory. And Marcus' coupling that with the Gloria (doxology to Protestants) captures Smolin's conception as a hymn of praise, perhaps to the Natura Naturans of Spinoza, which so fascinated Einstein.

 

[marcus]

Sol, the power that penetrates the universe, in the verse Marcus quoted has nothing to do with hell, it is the ecstatic vision of heaven (in layers or "spheres") seen from the original eden atop the mountain of Purgatory. And Marcus' coupling that with the Gloria (doxology to Protestants) captures Smolin's conception as a hymn of praise, perhaps to the Natura Naturans of Spinoza, which so fascinated Einstein.

but don't blame Smolin
my pleasure at contemplating the universe is my own business

 

[marcus]

Oh, now i see sol.
I wondered why you were talking about hell all of a sudden!

Dante wrote some great love poetry and two other books besides
the Inferno. People should not all the time associate Dante with the Inferno.

some think the book called Paradiso is even better.

he had a vivid imagination and you name it he could describe it
so his heaven is just as heavenly as his hell is hellish

I was quoting from paradiso canto 1 IIRC

 

[sol2]

Sol, the power that penetrates the universe, in the verse Marcus quoted has nothing to do with hell, it is the ecstatic vision of heaven (in layers or "spheres") seen from the original eden atop the mountain of Purgatory.

Thanks...lots to learn

But if eden is atop the mountain of purgatory(hell?) we know there are higher dimensional possibilties? As I said previous, even in face of purgatory, the realization is that there are these possibilties(spheres or layers) seen from that mountain top. You see?

And Marcus' coupling that with the Gloria (doxology to Protestants) captures Smolin's conception as a hymn of praise, perhaps to the Natura Naturans of Spinoza, which so fascinated Einstein.

Marcus is quite creative

 

[marcus]

Susskind grumps about Smolin Anthropery paper

Leonard Susskind is not happy with Smolin's paper on
a Scientific Alternative to the Anthropic Principle

and today Susskind posted his criticisms of it

http://arxiv.org/hep-th/0407266

Cosmic Natural Selection
Leonard Susskind

Absract: "I make a number of comments about Smolin's theory of Cosmic Natural Selection."


We now wait to see what will happen next

 

[selfAdjoint]

Woit has a dismissive post about Susskind's paper on his blog. He and his commenters see it as more a symptom of intellectual bankruptcy than as real physics.

 

[marcus]

Woit has a dismissive post about Susskind's paper on his blog. He and his commenters see it as more a symptom of intellectual bankruptcy than as real physics.

somehow I expect Smolin to reply, maybe not to Susskind solely.
I suppose he might wait untll several of his points have been challenged by several people and then reply to several challenges. But I expect something more.
I haven't read the comments at Not Even Wrong yet, only the brief
mention by Woit of Susskind's posting.

hey selfAdjoint, as a man of general culture you are supposed to know that the doxology or "Gloria" of the standard latin mass is not the same as the "Sanctus"------it goes Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Benedictus, Agnus.
I had to find this all out in middle age and you got some instruction as a child so you should be up on it

 

[sol2]

Must be a "latin" religious thing

All I heard is reverberating echos, of yesteryears. A language taught, long since forgotten.

From a science point of view, was this how a lot of it was taught?

If this is the case then, the alchemists must have been a roque branch of a logical world in those mddle ages?

 

[marcus]

Thanks...lots to learn

But if eden is atop the mountain of purgatory(hell?)

no dammit sol, purgatory does not equal hell
Dante wrote a trilogy: hell,purgatory,heaven
they are all quite different

personally, you know, I am an atheist with no childhood intro to religion
(my parents were considerate and left me alone)

but humans, and particularly Westerners, have a thing about cosmology
---we get it from our best ancestors, the Jews and Greeks. And Dante is an example of a cosmology poem----it visualizes intensely and vividly the whole Shebang, the whole Cosmos.

this intense interest in the System of the world is bred into us and it is worth understanding it. It is not just in our Science it was there before.

In our blood almost, in greek thought, in the Latin Mass, in Dante, in the Ptolemaic minds of those who set fire to Giordano Bruno, in the passionate and obsessed Kepler who dreamed of the Platonic solids and the musical scale embodied in the planets, and a lot of these people calculated. Even Dante has very meticulous calculations---and describes a physics experiment with a candle and 3 mirrors in the paradiso, he is empirical in 1305.
Anyway these are our people and they didnt just fantasize, they ocassionally got out the old abacus or the pencil and paper.

so when I notice that some contemporary, Smolin, has envisioned a way to explain why 1/137 is what it is, and not 1/136, and he has envisioned this happening because of a budding multiverse and made empirical predictions he wants us to check----then I have to laugh because this is so traditionally Western. It is the old obsession with the cosmos, with the old Keplerian stubbornness that insists on calculating and insists that the numbers work out and match the observations. Oi veh Mama, they are at it again!

Sol, do you know how important 1/137 is? Do you realize what it means to have a credible explanation for why it is what it is? One says immediately, no this is crazy, Smolin must be wrong. he has some nerve! there must be some mistake. And the cosmological constant too----the 1.3E-123 number.
can he have an explantion of that too? And the ratio of Planck and proton mass 13E18? This is very Kepler. It is what we have civilizations for, that and for colonizing the galaxy too of course. hee hee

 

[sol2]

Sol, do you know how important 1/137 is? Do you realize what it means to have a credible explanation for why it is what it is? One says immediately, no this is crazy, Smolin must be wrong. he has some nerve! there must be some mistake. And the cosmological constant too----the 1.3E-123 number.
can he have an explantion of that too? And the ratio of Planck and proton mass 13E18? This is very Kepler. This is what we have civilizations for, and for colonizing the galaxy too of course. hee hee

Jeff spoke to this point, and so did Susskind.

Marcus I did read one of Dante's book and it was about a thousand pages(after thinking about it today the book was called Urantia and had nothing to do with Dante), but its obvious I didn't retain anything, but the ideas of dimensional significance. I am having trouble even remembering which book. Will have to take a trip back to the library and look.

More so than for Hell and Heaven, Dante has significant leeway in imagining and representing this realm of the Christian afterlife. While there is no specific reference to a place called "Purgatory" in the Bible, the concept took shape over the course of early Christianity and the Middle Ages on the basis of biblical support for what would later become Purgatory. (This concept has been a major point of doctrinal disagreement since the Protestant Reformation and Catholic Counter-Reformation.) Thus Judas Machabeus, honoring the custom of offering prayers for those who died in God's grace, proclaims that it is "a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins" (2 Mach. 12:46). The idea of trial by fire, another important conceptual component of Purgatory, figures prominently in the Bible: "Thou hast proved my heart," sings the psalmist, "and visited it by night, thou hast tried me by fire: and iniquity had not been found in me" (Psalm 16:3). John the Baptist, who baptizes in water, prophesies the greater power of Jesus, saying "[h]e shall baptize you in the Holy Ghost and fire" (Matt. 3:11). Based on these and other passages, medieval theologians introduced the idea of 'purging fires' as a way to imagine the purification of souls who died in God's grace but bore the stains and habits of sin. From the adjective purgatorius arose the noun Purgatorium as the concept of Purgatory received full theological legitimation in the mid- to late twelfth century (e.g., at the Second Council of Lyons in 1274).

http://danteworlds.laits.utexas.edu/purgatory/01antepurgatory.html

Marcus indeed I do realize how important it is. Let me give you a example.

The acceptance of Gr and moving it beyond the current dimensions is a case in point. A lot of people do not like this, so we see some similarities of being burned at the state, for radicalism

Smolin's support of http://superstringtheory.com/forum/relboard/messages20/50.html and VSL, and you spoke to that already.

His patron is/was Lee Smolin, which is why anyone took him seriously in the first place. Advice to folks with crank theories: don't waste your time posting here, go suck up to Witten or somebody. For additional evidence look at Lynds. His theory is one of those screwy philosophical redefine spacetime ones that would just be an average days catch on M-theory/Duality. But he got endorsements from John Wheeler, so he's famous.
http://superstringtheory.com/forum/relboard/messages20/54.html

Lubos talked about Granfathers in regards to Penrose, but here is another Grandfather, John Wheeler. Kip Thorne is very proud I am sure, to have such guidance.

LQG asks us to look at the interaction of photons from the early universe (Glast)while String asks us what interaction is possible through the field of gravitons?

This Marcus, goes to the heart of the logic. What existed in the beginning? Nothing?

 

[selfAdjoint]

somehow I expect Smolin to reply, maybe not to Susskind solely.
I suppose he might wait untll several of his points have been challenged by several people and then reply to several challenges. But I expect something more.
I haven't read the comments at Not Even Wrong yet, only the brief
mention by Woit of Susskind's posting.

hey selfAdjoint, as a man of general culture you are supposed to know that the doxology or "Gloria" of the standard latin mass is not the same as the "Sanctus"------it goes Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Benedictus, Agnus.
I had to find this all out in middle age and you got some instruction as a child so you should be up on it

As a child I attended a Protestant church, and we sang what they called the Doxology. It was almost identical to the Sanctus of the Mass. "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty.."

 

[jeff]

It's enough with the arts and humanities already. Checking out new posts which repeatedly turn out to have nothing to do with the topic of the thread - or with science even - is annoying and a waste of my time. Knock it off.

 

[marcus]

well maybe we should indulge jeff's desire to get back on topic

what I've been meaning to discuss is at the bottom of page 31 of the
Smolin paper:

"Thus, the hypothesis of cosmological natural selection explains the values of all the parameters that determine low energy physics and chemistry: the masses of the proton, neutron, electron and neutrino and the strengths of the strong, weak, and electromagnetic interactions..."

I would propose that we NOT argue about whether this is correct but try to assemble among ourselves a list of the dimensionless numbers that he is talking about.

Because he says electromagnetic interaction I gather he means 1/137.

Since he says mass of the proton I gather he means 13E18 or rather the reciprocal.

And the famous number 1836.

there are a handful of numbers he is talking about, that determine all of low energy physics and chemistry---maybe we should try to make these numbers common knowledge. these numbers are what Smolin imagines to be the "genes" of a world----and think may have been optimized for black hole making.

What is your short list of numbers?

I'm interested in the actual numbers, but only with limited accuracy.
For example let's just say 137, and not 137.036...
Let's maybe merge lists and winnow it down to get a collective list
and actually see what the genes of a world look like.

 

[sol2]

As for Jeff, we should not indulge him at all as it might feed his appetite

Okay Okay,

Back to work marcus and those numbers.

The result is that the standard model of elementary particle physics has more than 20 adjustable parameters. These include the masses of all the basic stable elementary particles: proton, neutron, electron, muon, neutrinos etc, as well as the basic coupling constants and mixing angles of the various interactions. These are not determined by any principle or mechanism we know; they must be specified by hand to bring the theory into agreement with experiment. The standard model of cosmology has similarly about fifteen parameters.

Two of the biggest mysteries of modern science are then how these 35 or so parameters are determined.

There are two especially puzzling aspects to these problems.

The first is the naturality problem. Many of these parameters, when expressed in terms of dimensionless ratios, are extremely tiny or extremely large numbers. In Planck units, the proton and neutron masses are around 10−19, the cosmological constant is 10−120, 7 the coupling constant for self-interactions of the field responsible for inflation cannot be
larger than 10−11 and so on.

http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/hep-th/pdf/0407/0407213.pdf

 

[marcus]

the reason I'm specifically asking for numbers (not dimensioned physical quantities like masses and energies) is because of what Smolin says on page 29:

------quote page 29-----
The methodology of natural selection, applied to multiverse theories, is described by three hypotheses:

1. A physical process produces a multiverse with long chains of descendents.

2. Let P be the space of dimensionless parameters of the standard models of physics and cosmology, and let the parameters be denoted by p. There is a fitness function F(p) on P which is equal to the average number of descendents of a universe with parameters p.

3. The dimensionless parameters p_new of each new universe differ, on average by a small random change from those of its immediate ancestor. Small here means with small with respect to the change that would be required to significantly change F(p).

Their conjunction leads to a predictive theory, because, using standard arguments from population biology, after many iterations from a large set of random starts, the population of universes, given by a distribution RHO(p), is peaked around local extrema of F(p).
----------end quote-------

Now some people (selfAdjoint, jeff, ...) know very well already that
by "dimensionless parameters" Smolin means out and out numbers that are the same whatver system of conventional units

but other people at PF may not have had that sink in. the parameters that really matter in the standard models of cosmology and physics are the ratios and these do not change whether you think feet or meters or pounds or Newtons or farads or coulombs or parsecs or lightyears. they have nothing to do with conventional human units they are nature's pure numbers. they are built in proportions in nature that are sort of intrinsic.

Like 1836 is the ratio of proton to electron mass. someone in andromeda galaxy could find the same number hidden in nature---he might write it in a different number notation---like binary or hexadecimal or whatever----but he would see that number 1836 if he looked at atoms.

And 13E18 is the ratio of Planck mass to proton mass. Same thing.

And what is 1/137?

anyone want to say, or shall I do that one?

we could get into these numbers---why do they determine the energy levels of the hydrogenatom and why do they determine what are the stable elements of the periodic table and what chemical reactions go and don't go. these numbers really are the world genes. its good to get familiar

 

[marcus]

As for Jeff, we should not indulge him at all as it might feed his appetite
...

sol2 you are in a high good humor this evening, I have never
known you so jovial

 

[sol2]

http://www.cerncourier.com/objects/2003/cerndesy1_4-03.jpg

The host of quarks, antiquarks and gluons inside a proton all have intrinsic spin, but their constant movement also creates orbital angular momentum. Understanding how these individual angular momenta together yield the total spin of the proton is still proving to be a challenge. (DESY Hamburg.)"

Marcus as I was reading something came to mind about the Mendeleev table of elements. What would seem amazing to me is that if any of these models, Smolin's or anyone elses for that matter, http://wc0.worldcrossing.com/WebX?14@59.WFutcbOosid.0@.1dde61c6/18 using these other means? This would be natural would it not?

I added to previous post

Stop me if I went off track here?

 

[sol2]

sol2 you are in a high good humor this evening, I have never
known you so jovial

Originally Posted by sol2
As for Jeff, we should not indulge him at all as it might feed his appetite

"+"​

I do not want to contribute to the psychological corruption(my behavior) for such hunger(his grokking) is calling for

 

[Ontoplankton]

http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/constants.html

 

[sol2]

John Baez

Most of these are masses, so clearly we need to understand how particles get their mass!

And yes, when it is all said and done...


Behind it all is surely an idea so simple, so beautiful, that when we grasp it - in a decade, a century, or a millennium - we will all say to each other, how could it have been otherwise? How could we have been so stupid for so long? - John Archibald Wheeler