Hi all :D

So scientists believe in parallel universes then.

Anyone familiar with the Chaos Theory will know that changes in the initial (boundary) conditions of a chaotic system will have very large effects on the system downstream. It's the concept of the butterfly batting its wings and causing a huge thunderstorm sometime later in time, someplace else maybe or maybe not. The idea is that a chaotic system is deterministic (there are physical rules that one can apply to solve it), however we cannot calculate what is going to happen after a certain time, t, simply because we cannot know the exact initial conditions of the system at t=0 (the slightest error in our readings of these initial conditions will give us the wrong result!)
Examples of chaotic systems are of course the earth's atmosphere - the biggest meteorological computer on earth can only give an accurate prediction of what the weather will be like in no more than a week's time. Now, of course the universe can also be considered a chaotic system in just the same way (i'm not suggesting it is one, merely that it could be one)
That means it is deterministic - what are the formulas that describe our universe i don't know either. The only thing i suspect is that, just as any other chaotic system, there are zillions of possible outcomes of the universe, and more are added to it every second. At any given time, our universe may follow any of zillion of possible paths. All these possibilities are usualy reffered to as potentialities and the one that becomes a "reality" is called an actuality.

Can you imagine the possibility of us all existing in this actuality - an actuality lying on top of a sea of potentialities? Or do you believe that maybe each potentiality is an actuality in a "parallel universe"? Or maybe you don't agree with anything i've said...! Feedback please! This has been occupying my mind for years...

PS: why call them parrallel? I think it's a bad idea. It only gives people a wrong preconception of what the universes' arrangement is in space (i.e. parrallel to each other!)

I have a very, very, very, very, very basic understanding of chaos theory. What you've said has solidified with words what I already know.

The governing rule of Quantum Physics is that anything possible can happen, improbable or probable, there are enough numbers, there is a big enough environment for anything possible to happen. I don't think paranormal universes are impossible, so why not? There are many things we have yet to discover....


Welcome to sciforums. May your stay here be an informative one.

Welcome to SciForums, anastasia!

why call them parrallel? I think it's a bad idea. It only gives people a wrong preconception of what the universes' arrangement is in space (i.e. parrallel to each other!)Yeah, the term parallel can be confusing. Strictly speaking "parallel universe" refers to another four-space imbedded in a five (or more) space along with ours. The spaces don't intersect so they are "parallel". But the definition intended is more along the lines of likeness or correspondence especially in time, tendency, or development, rather than physical placement (or, perhaps they are parallel physically as well!). What other word might we substitute here?

If you really want to be driven crazy, this is a good place to start:A Lazy Layman's Guide to Quantum Physics (http://www.higgo.com/quantum/laymans.htm). I've always been a believer in the fact that if a tree falls in the woods it makes a sound, and a cat is either alive or dead, whether or not it's in a box. However, this is not merely a philosophical question as far as quantum physics goes.

And the most important repercussion of chaos theory is that somewhere, sometime, someplace (outside this universe, of course), I could be dating Nev Campbell! sweeeeeeeeeeeet...

Peace.

Welcome to sciforums, anastasia.

Would you care to expand on this...

Pollux posted:
“The governing rule of Quantum Physics is that anything possible can happen, improbable or probable, there are enough numbers, there is a big enough environment for anything possible to happen. I don't think paranormal universes are impossible, so why not?”

(The hamster is in a pedantic mood this morning.)

In Quantum Physics “possible” has a probabilistic meaning that is different from the everyday usage of the term. Events may be “possible” but be so unlikely that not one event would be expected to happen in a trillion, trillion years. Even the “possible” is limited to events following from physical laws.

This hamster agrees, “There are many things we have yet to discover....”

Thank you for a very warm welcome :)
I think i'll really like it here...

Hey Wet1, what do you want me to expand on? I'd be glad to, i've been talking to myself about this for almost 2 years (...)

Sure ImaHamster, but it's still "possible", right? :D
There we go again down the path of wrong preconceptions caused by using everyday language in physics! Dont you guys think we should invent a new language, not just for the new but also for the old terms? I'm reading the "Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid" at the moment and it talks a lot about that.

And as for goofyfish, what makes you think nev campbell wouldnt go out with you in the first place?

eh, stop slappin' me alooond imahampstechl!

Glad we could help!

anastasia,

Take your pick and go where you will. I would hear a bit more...

(Three-inch critter looking up at Pollux and smugly wipin’ paws. Gotta keep these wild thinkers in line. No tellin’ where imagination might lead ‘em.)

Anastasia, Douglas Hofstadter has significantly influenced hamster thinking.

Originally posted by goofyfish
Strictly speaking "parallel universe" refers to another four-space imbedded in a five (or more) space along with ours. The spaces don't intersect so they are "parallel". But the definition intended is more along the lines of likeness or correspondence especially in time, tendency, or development, rather than physical placement (or, perhaps they are parallel physically as well!).

From what I know, Parallel universes do at some point intersect with at least one other, otherwise they would be a singularity and have no parallels.

(think of a timeline branching into parallel lines like limbs, branches and sticks on a tree. Where timeline after timeline can be "created". Although the points that intersect to cause "Creation", are just points of "alignment", because the timeline exists in reverse also.)

"Can you imagine the possibility of us all existing in this actuality - an actuality lying on top of a sea of potentialities? Or do you believe that maybe each potentiality is an actuality in a "parallel universe"?"

This idea is basically the "many- worlds" theory proposed by Hugh Everitt in the '50s, later updated by David Deutsch. It is a popular idea amongst today's cosmologists & may well be a necessary ingredient of any truly explicatory cosmology.
If the initial conditions were simply "random instability", with no limit to the capacity for change (ie potential energy supply) no particular cosmic history was preferentially "selected", thus the number of actual cosmic histories would logically be infinite - each sharing a common origin, and branching into ever greater diversity as the "multiverse" evolves.

Yes, stryder, you make SENSE.


Lifts heavy, iron boot above the hamster. Shadow falls over its smug little body.

If the initial conditions were simply "random instability", with no limit to the capacity for change (ie potential energy supply) no particular cosmic history was preferentially "selected", thus the number of actual cosmic histories would logically be infinite - each sharing a common origin, and branching into ever greater diversity as the "multiverse" evolves.

By initial conditions do you mean the very begining of the universe? Why would they have to be a "random instability"?
Think about the begining as having a set of static initial conditions ("universal" seems a good word for them!)
Now, the universe beeing a chaotic system is also a deterministic system - it can only follow a set of rules. It also has one set of initial conditions so it should follow one path - the actuality that we are living in right now!
If you take that approach then you can argue that the potentialities are then all the other possibilities that did not happen because the initial conditions were not the ones that would yield them. Potentialities are like the fake, imaginery Star Trek worlds, the worlds that could have existed but they don't because only one can and that is where we exist.

Yesterday as i was walking back home i crossed paths with three people on the same door. We had all come from different directions and we all left to different directions. These people carried their perception of the world with them as they walked to wherever they were going. And it dawned on me last night that the universe is a subjective matter that is different for every entity. No two entites can feel or understand or see or hear the universe in the same way because they are distinct entities. Check this out: these subjective universes will never cross each other, they will always remain "parallel" because two entities will never be the same. The person that's closest to me will never live in my universe even if he spent 24hs a day with me. How can he come into my brain and read my thoughts and see things through my eyes?

Welcome to sciforums, Cyril.

So what you put forth, anastasia, is that each parallel world is subjective to the reality of the individual observer. Or basically that the set is unlimited and dependant to the observer.

Just as a side note what happens when the observer no longer can observe? If instance, the observer goes off line to sleep or dies?

Anastasia, your last post exhibits clinical symptoms of Hofstadter over dosage. Stop reading Hofstadter right not. This instant. Not another word. (Didn’t you see the warning label?) Hofstadter books have been shown to warp minds. Excessive reading of these books may lead to the delusion of being a small furry critter wandering the Internet.

(Huh...what's that dark shadow?)

...the boot, you know, the light source is behind the boot:D

"By initial conditions do you mean the very begining of the universe? Why would they have to be a "random instability"?"

Anastasia, if you are beginning your cosmos with a "set of rules", an obvious question is -"where did those rules come from?" By beginning with a state of random instability, the rules arise explicably as "random deviations from randomness".

To understand what I mean by this, picture a dice with an infinite number of faces. The dice is unstable ("being shaken") & whatever number turns up is obviously a randomly-occurring departure from a prior state of infinite possibilities.

However, since there is no reason to place any limit on the degree of initial instability, it's logical to assume the dice is thrown an infinite number of times, thus all possible sets of "starting rules" (probability constraints) come into being. Thus this type of initial randomness represents a probabilistic symmetry which can only be broken if it's broken in every way it can be - unless one introduces some inexplicable rule limiting the possible outcomes.

Your idea of the "subjective universe" is similar to a version of the anthropic principle which I call the "strong personal anthropic principle" (spap). it applies to each individual observer & states "My existence in the cosmos is inevitable", for no other reason than that the cosmos is here defined in empirical terms as "that which I perceive". Clearly if the cosmos is "that which I perceive", I had to come along at some time to perceive it, or it would never exist....

Smart types will notice that one of the things "I perceive" (or at least can reliably infer from my perceptions) is that much of the cosmos was here before me, & that before I was conceived, the chances of me ever being born were actually remote, & more & more so the further we go back in time... so the SPAP leads me to conclude that this cosmic history is just part of a vast web of other histories, in most of which I am never born, but whose existence I can infer via such probability calculations.

Although the spap applies to each individual, this doesn't mean we are each confined to separate cosmic histories - if you can perceive other observers then they are ipso facto part of your history, & you of theirs. Inevitably, our personal experience of that history is subjective - eg if we are listening to a piece of music, the impressions going through our respective minds will be unique to ourselves, but we can readily agree we are hearing the same sounds in the same universe. :)

On the sound in a forest thing. Sound is defined as the vibration of particals (think thats what the teacher said). The harder question is dose it make a NOISE.

Why is that quantam physics? Shouldn't it be Philosophy?

Sorry i had more to say but i have forgotten it, will try to rember and post latter

That means it is deterministic - what are the formulas that describe our universe i don't know either.

I do. I wrote it down on a piece of paper when God told me...you know God, dont you? Over 90% people on this planet believe, he exists...he is the one who started the ball rolling. He said let there be light...that is the initial condition. Whether he said that after having lunch or dinner, we dont know...so unless we go back in time (time machine any one?) and ask him, we will never know (by the way why he is a he? does God have a gender...)...

And someday, if we create a very powerful computer to simulate the universe, do you think it will house a lot of little critters like us?...and when we turn off the juice, will their time just stop?...

And is there a difference in quantum physics and philosophy...if so why do you get a doctor in philosophy inside quantum physics...

And why we call weather Chaos...is it because we can not predict?...but if it is chaos, how come the rain falls from sky to the ground everytime and you get wet because you did not think it would rain...and how come under this chaos, plants and animals thrive? Civilizations rise with little critters like us?...Oh...you say from chaos comes order...well...if it is order then why it is or was chaos?...

Because, we dont know, can not know? Then what are we talking about here?....

Just some chaotic thoughts.... :D

Actually it is a fairly common interpretation of quantum mechanics to say that whenever there is a choice to be made on a quantum level that the universe splits into as many copies of itself as needed. This is the interpretation I favor because it gets rid of many paradoxes involved in the conventional interpretation.

For example in the standard theory a particle exists in a superposition of states (takes all possible paths) and then when a consious observer looks at the system it "chooses" one there is no real explanation as to the cause of the superposition of states. In the multiple universe interpretation the particle reaches a decision point the universes split but then remerge allowing us to see the superposition of states, then at some point (which I think has something to do with gravity but im no expert) the two universe cannot overlap anymore so they branch off.

Experiments have been proposed to determine which interpretation is correct but since they involve self-aware quantum computers they are a long way off if possible at all.

See Schrodinger's Kittens by John Gribbon or Ghost in the Atom by Paul Davies for more details. Both have good sections on the multiple universe interpretaiton.

Actually it is a fairly common interpretation of quantum mechanics to say that whenever there is a choice to be made on a quantum level that the universe splits into as many copies of itself as needed.

Ya, right!...since we can not visit those copies, we will never know if they exist...only have to take the word of some high priest of science...

I will stick to the God theory for the time being... atleast my head wont hurt just to think about it... :D

Are you saying that i made up a whole quantum interpretation and the titles of two books that don't exist because i cant show proof and you are willing to believe in god?

Exactly...interpretation and books...how original....:D :D :D

So,

Exactly how much do you know about quantum theory?

Only what is available through Google, government database and my postgrad courses in nuclear engineering/ material science.

Do I get a prize?

So why are you accusing me of making up the multiple universe interpretation then?

What planet you are from?...Do you have smilies ( :D ) on your planet?

Im from the planet Aslfhaslfha Hfalhflh.

Whats a smile?

I give up. Ask the other Albatrosses near by to translate for you....

Smiles means your joking

don't you read ANYTHING in free thoughts?:D

:D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D
this is a line of smiles