From: Glenn Morton (glennmorton@entouch.net)
Date: Wed Jul 09 2003 - 19:30:05 EDT
I can accept and fully agree with the idea that actually nothing is ever
proven in science. All that is done is manipulate the probability. For me,
if this experiment, which I do believe will be attemped in the next 25
years, succeeds, the probability for an MWH will go way up. Even so, if
Deutsch succeeds, the popular culture will elevate MWH to a new icon of
science. In any event, whether proven, not proven or only probable, a
successful test will mean we Christians will have to deal with the issue.
Like it or not. And that is why I don't think we can ignore the issue. My
money is that it will succeed only based upon the fact that very few
scientific things Christians have said couldn't be so, actually ended up
that way. We seem to always back the wrong scientific horse.
-----Original Message-----
From: Don Winterstein [mailto:dfwinterstein@msn.com]
Sent: Wednesday, July 09, 2003 4:19 AM
To: asa; Glenn Morton
Subject: Re: MWH experimental test
Glenn wrote:
>...Conclusion. If we perform a calculation using more than the particles
in our Hubble volume, in a time shorter than the age of the universe, where
are those calculations being done? Particles had to be manipulated but there
aren't enough of them. It seems to me that if you want to avoid the MWH,
you have to answer that question. Do you have an answer?
So what you seem to be implying is that Deutsch's test is absolutely
foolproof, it will absolutely establish whether or not MWs exist. My long
experience as a student of science and as a practicing scientist tells me,
even though I don't know much about Deutsch's work, and don't have an answer
to your question, that this is simply too much to swallow: The most
astonishing claim in all of science is going to be confirmed from an
inference about a result obtained on a quantum computer.
A point of my previous post was that we can tentatively evaluate certain
claims on the basis of experience even without digging very deeply into the
details of those claims. This is where "gut feeling"--intuition based on
experience--comes in. For example, if someone claimed to have invented a
perpetual motion machine, no one with scientific training would take him
seriously unless he could demonstrate his claim conclusively. Similarly, if
someone claims that there are multiple worlds, in order to be taken
seriously by those who do not already favor the idea he must have really
conclusive proof, not just evidence from an indirect inference.
As I tried to point out before, theorists are almost always able to come
up with alternatives to any given explanation. I would not be able to come
up with a good alternative explanation of Deutsch's anticipated result,
because I'm not well-versed in the relevant fields and I'm not motivated at
this point to become so. But there are others who are well-versed, and I am
confident that at least one of them will be able to come up with a
reasonable alternative explanation of Deutsch's anticipated result that does
not require the existence of multiple worlds. In fact, Richard McGough
already may be able to do so. I'm sorry you did not hear him out more
carefully. (It's apparent that both of you are fairly high-strung and lack
patience for communication on topics where there are several points of
disagreement.)
As I see it, the most Deutsch can hope for from his experiment is to
establish that MWs are somewhat more likely than before to be real. This
will happen if he gets his hoped-for result, and no good alternative
explanations appear that don't require multiple worlds. He certainly is not
proposing anything like a direct measure of MWs. If he made a direct
measure of MWs and could demonstrate that he'd done it, then I'd believe.
I'm not going to believe on the basis of an inference that may ultimately
prove to be unfounded, and no one else should, either. The claim is far too
astonishing for that.
Don
----- Original Message -----
From: Glenn Morton
To: Don Winterstein ; Asa
Sent: Tuesday, July 08, 2003 4:25 AM
Subject: RE: MWH experimental test
Hi Don, Your use of gut feel was different than below. A gut feel in
science leads to insight after which the person goes and uses scientific
methodology to say why the gut feel is correct or incorrect. One doesn't
simply leave it there.
I have spent a lifetime fighting mistaken scientific ideas of YECs. The
one thing they do with a high degree of probability is that when one goes to
the work to put out data, evidence and carefully reasoned argumentation,
they simply turn and say, "I don't believe it". No reason is given other
than that they have faith. Frankly the thing that got me about your 'gut
feel' was that it simply didn't address the argument at all. It simply said,
I don't believe it.
Now that is your right, but one can't claim that it is a very reasoned
line of argumentation. If there is something wrong with Deutsch, I would
like to hear it. But gut feels don't further that goal very much. And what I
know about computing tells me (my gut feel if you will but with a lline of
logic) that Deutsch is onto something.
Fact: information is a property of matter. You simply can't point to
disembodied information.
Fact: computation processes information.
Fact: this requires the manipulation of particles. One simply can't
point to disembodied calculation either. that is, calculations which don't
use matter. (or matter-energy)
Conclusion. If we perform a calculation using more than the particles in
our Hubble volume, in a time shorter than the age of the universe, where are
those calculations being done? Particles had to be manipulated but there
aren't enough of them. It seems to me that if you want to avoid the MWH,
you have to answer that question. Do you have an answer?
-----Original Message-----
From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu]On
Behalf Of Don Winterstein
Sent: Tuesday, July 08, 2003 4:01 AM
To: Asa; Glenn Morton
Subject: Re: MWH experimental test
Glenn Morton wrote:
>...'Gut feels' are
irrelevant in science....
Albert Einstein would disagree most vehemently. His essays on science
are replete with references to intuition and its role in leading scientists
to good theories and bypassing ones likely to be a waste of time.
"Intuition" is just a sophisticated word for "gut feel." By no stretch am I
saying that gut feels can't be wrong, but in fact they've always been
important in science. They're how scientists often get started on
breakthroughs.
IMHO you're giving way too much credence to people who claim that this
or that single observation will prove the existence of MWs. Physics has
come up with lots of astonishing results, but the most astonishing claim
ever has to be this one asserting the existence of MWs. It's OK to
entertain notions of MWs, but no one should put faith in such astonishing
claims without extraordinarily good and straightforward evidence.
Everything I've read about that "MWH experimental test" suggests that, if
the quantum computer really works as expected, supporters are going to say,
"How else could this have happened except through MWs?" Well, "how else"
questions always explicitly beg the question; they never prove anything. If
it comes to that, sooner or later some bright theorist will tell us exactly
how else. That's my gut feeling. I'd never say "the test won't work." I
will say that, if the test works, the result probably won't mean what
Deutsch says it will mean.
If one could prove that a given outcome absolutely could not have
happened except through MWs, then that outcome would of course establish the
existence of MWs. Unfortunately science has never yet been able to come up
with that kind of absolute proof. It would require theory that is
absolutely true, and no such theory yet exists.
Therefore it's totally inappropriate at this stage IMO to get worked
up about this MWH experimental test, partly because the test is not testing
for MWs, it's testing someone's inference about MWs; and MWs are so
astonishing that we need better evidence for them than something purely
inferential. To accept such inferential evidence as hard proof would be to
put far too much confidence in the opinions of a few theorists.
Their inference may be unjustified, and I'm not obliged to say why it
may be (i.e., that's not my area of competence; and even if it were, I might
not be the best person to critique the inference), other than to point out
that human inferences are often mistaken. QM experiments have no track
record in establishing the existence of MWs. In other areas of physics we
trust predictions because of track record. I confidently expect particle
physicists to find the Higgs boson, because the standard model has been
extraordinarily successful in predicting the existence and properties of
real particles. I have no reason to think any quantum computer experiment
will establish the existence of MWs. In the first case there is a very
successful track record with lots of supporting evidence, in the second case
there is no track record and as of now no supporting evidence. In the first
case the expected results are far from astonishing, in the second case the
reality of MWs would be astonishing in the extreme and hence not believable
without truly exceptional evidence.
What if MWs become widely accepted as real among scientists even
without convincing proof? Well, the absence or irrelevance of God, without
convincing proof, is already widely accepted among scientists. We don't
have to follow the crowd. (The rest of the world wouldn't follow such
scientists either, as the existence of the flourishing YEC community
attests.) What we believe doesn't have to be what the majority of
scientists believes. Such majority can be dead wrong.
Don
----- Original Message -----
From: Glenn Morton
To: Asa
Sent: Monday, July 07, 2003 4:22 AM
Subject: RE: MWH experimental test
I never cease to be amazed that people ignore what is written. I
present a
means of testing MWH and this is the reaction:
Don wrote:
>Nothing they say is ever worth losing sleep over
>unless it can be directly tested, and my gut tells me no one is
ever going
>to figure out how to test directly for multiple worlds. So I
regard
>discussions of MWs as a form of entertainment.
Richard wrote:
>But seriously folks ... the argument that quantum computers require
"real"
>resources in alternate universes seems to be an empty and
untestable claim.
This is not serious scientific discussion or even criticism. 'Gut
feels' are
irrelevant in science, and ignoring suggestions which have passed
peer
review and been published (for which I gave entre to the literature
in the
post) seems to be hiding one's head. Calling it mere entertainment
is
reminiscent of Copernicus putting in his book that his view was
merely a
calculating technique. Once again, I would challenge both of you to
take on
Deutsch's claim which I believe is in "Quantum Theory, the
Church-Turing
Principle and the Universal Quantum Computer,' Proceedings of the
Royal
Society of London A 400(1985), pp 97-117, and then get your
refutations
published. It is a cheap out to claim that this idea is wrong when
you are
unwilling to do the work to show why it is wrong and get it
published.
Without a doubt one might find something wrong with Deutsch's test,
but just
saying a 'gut feel' or claiming that it is untestable, seems highly
unscientific. The scientific thing is to explain exactly why that
test won't
work. If you actually read what I quoted from Brown's book the
experiment
gives a different result for the 2 different views of quantum. That
means it
is TESTABLE. Deutsch's article does have the computer world
thinking about
these things. And regardless of whether or not we christians want
to deal
with the implications, theologically, they are there.
1. IF MWH, then hell is full of an infinity of unsaved vs the 1
saved
individual. It means that God saves everybody with a plan to
condemn the
vast, vast majority to hell.
2. Why evangelize. This is the same issue one runs into with
predestination.
If you are predestined, what is the point. the problem, in my view
becomes
more accute under MWH
3. If MWH, then is that the best way God can ensure what happens in
the
future?
4. There must be universes where God's predictions fail, i.e. where
Jesus
didn't come.
5. Are there universes where Jesus married?
6. Are there universes where Jesus sinned?
7. Would such a situation falsify christianity?
There are lots of theological implications. And claims that this
can't be
tested, in spite of my pointing you to where the idea is published,
seems to
imply that evidence and data don't count here, just gut feel and
claims.
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