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Sitaram · Site Admin Joined: 14 Sep 2005 Posts: 1079

Date: Sat Sep 13, 2003 5:49 pm
Subject: Is Reality Analog or Digital?

http://sulekha.com/chpost.asp?for...ilosophy&show=0&cid=71962

(excerpts from URLs below):

We can easily establish an existence proof that a digital model of
physics is feasible, in that continuous equations can always be
expressed to any desired level of accuracy in the form of discrete
transformations on discrete changes in value. That is, after all, the
basis for the fundamental theorem of calculus."

This whole chicken/egg argument about which is more fundamental -
analog or digital operations, discrete or continuous functions - is
one of those philosophical questions that I don't think science can
answer because the problem isn't well defined. It's impossible to
imagine one without the other. Is space really "made" of pre-existing
points ? Or is a point an abstract limit representing a possible
localization in space ? One which may not even apply to our universe
if string theory is correct and there is a lower limit to the whole
notion of distance.

I think a more interesting question is whether the universe is, in
fact, computable. Can the linguistic constructs of science, whether
CA algorithms or differential equations or something else, really
simulate nature perfectly ?

David Deutsch made some very interesting observations about this
in "The Fabric of Reality" (another book full of very BIG ideas). He
claims that the universe incorporates a kind of Strong Turing
Principle that implies that any environment within it could be
perfectly simulated with an appropriate program running on a
physically realizable computer. With the proper man/machine
interface, no scientist would be able to perform any experiment in
such a virtual reality that could distinguish between the reality and
the illusion.

++++++++++++++++

The four philosophical questions of Kant are:

1. What can I know? (Answered by Metaphysics)

2. What ought I do? (Answered by Morality)

3. What may I hope? (Answered by Religion/Science)

4. What is Man? (If we can answer this one, we will know the answer
to the other three)

++++++++++++++++++

The uncertainty is Heisenberg's and not the particle's.

Yes we are all stardust... but is stardust only patterns of
information represented as energy and matter? I think so.

Fredkin is quoted by Robert Wright in the 1980s as saying "There are
three great philosophical questions. What is life? What is
consciousness and thinking and memory and all that? And how does the
Universe work?

Wolfram starts by describing the Universe as a large network of
nodes. The nodes do not exist in "space," but rather space, as we
perceive it, is an illusion created by the smooth transition of
phenomena through the network of nodes.

Einstein's General Relativity, which describes gravity as
perturbations in space itself, as if our three-dimensional world were
curved in some unseen fourth dimension, is also straightforward to
represent in this scheme.

If I ask the question, 'Who am I?' I could conclude that, perhaps I
am this stuff here, i.e., the ordered and chaotic collection of
molecules that comprise my body and brain.

However, the specific set of particles that comprise my body and
brain are completely different from the atoms and molecules than
comprised me only a short while (on the order of weeks) ago. We know
that most of our cells are turned over in a matter of weeks. Even
those that persist longer (e.g., neurons) nonetheless change their
component molecules in a matter of weeks.

So I am a completely different set of stuff than I was a month ago.
All that persists is the pattern of organization of that stuff. The
pattern changes also, but slowly and in a continuum from my past
self. From this perspective I am rather like the pattern that water
makes in a stream as it rushes past the rocks in its path. The actual
molecules (of water) change every millisecond, but the pattern
persists for hours or even years.

The genome has 6 billion bits, which is 800 million bytes, but there
is enormous repetition, e.g., the sequence "ALU" which is repeated
300,000 times. Applying compression to the redundancy, the genome is
approximately 23 million bytes compressed, of which about
half specifies the brain's starting conditions. The additional
complexity (in the mature brain) comes from the use of stochastic
(i.e., random within constraints) processes used to initially wire
specific areas of the brain, followed by years of self-organization
in response to the brain's interaction with its environment.

We cannot calculate the future ahead of schedule. If we could do so
accurately, we could hange the future and prove our calculations
wrong.

The biggest problem with "all is one" is that we can't directly talk
or consciously think about it. The very nature of language, used for
both, is to divide.

Even the phrase "all is one" implies its opposite. "All" implies a
collection of things.

We can only think and talk around the outskirts of that idea. The
only way to be immersed in the idea is to abandon language and
conscious thought.

Suppose the universe began with no rules whatsoever. I do not mean
that it was random, but that it literally had no rules. It was not
empty, or full of matter. It did not have zero dimensions or many
dimensions. It did not contain consciousness or a lack thereof. It
simply had no state whatsoever. I use the term "began" somewhat
loosely, since a beginning would itself imply the rule of
chronological time.

======================================

Sitaram writes:

Recently, a fascinating question attracted my attention.

Is it the case that we live in an analog world which gives the
illusion of being digital? Or do we live in a digital world which
gives the illusion of being analog? Or is it really the case that
the world is neither digital nor analog, but something entirely
different which we cannot even begin to imagine.

I began to meditate on these questions, and I have some notions of my
own. But before I begin to write my own thoughts, I want to use the
google search engine to see what others might have said on these
matters.

Having found these various posts, I will refrain from writing my own
thoughts on the matter until I have studied these posts, and perhaps
received some feedback from others.

Searching on "world digital or analog", I found only the following
URL:

http://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~kimdave/update13.html

This is a page from the site of a very smart fellow named Dave, who
has entitled his site StarkDavingMad

http://www.starkdavingmad.com/

(excerpt):

Is the world digital or analog? I'll cut to the chase and say that it
is both, and it depends greatly on how you look at the world. In a
microcosmic perspective, the world is digital. Everything is made of
distinct atoms that make elements that make molecules. I have a name,
a United States Social Security number, an employee ID number, a
driver's license number, a checking and savings account number,
several credit cards numbers, a home address, a work phone number, a
B. Dalton's Bookbuyer card number. Any combination of these pieces of
information can be used to identify me, at least by a computer. But
to people not using a digital means, I am something more than a
aggregation of data. I am Steve's roommate, my father's son, the
person who frustrates Helen to no end, the person who says hello to
Wendy almost daily on IM, the co-worker who always gives Tim a hard
time about coming in late. Today, I was the person who held the door
for the woman with children in each arm, I was the guy who cut off
that BMW325i on the 580W around 1:14pm. Quantify that digitally.

Take an apple. Nevermind what kind or the color. How do you know it's
an apple by just looking at it? You just know. Now, let's say it's a
nice, ripe, green, granny apple. To have a computer recognize it as
an apple, you have to tell it that this exact thing with this shape,
color, dimensions, and size is a green granny apple. Now, take a bite
out of it. Will the computer still recognize that it is still an
apple? No. Not macroscopically. The computer can get a sample of its
chemical breakdown and see that it is still an apple, but again,
that's taking it microscopically. Take the exact same apple but let's
say it's a macintosh instead. Will the computer recognize it? No. Not
unless you tell it it's an apple. The computer can make no
assumptions and can not take into account any "fuzzy logic" to
comprehend its innate "apple-ness". Such is the weakness and failure
in computers and the digital world.

Have you heard of the Human Genome Project? This is the world-wide
mission to map the human genes, breaking them down into their
individual proteins, amino acids, and chemical compounds. We're
talking about trillions of acids and terabits of information. We're
digitizing human life. We have already figured out which genes result
in certain genetic defects and weaknesses. We're heading for
genetically-engineered babies that are defect-free, have a higher
resistance to certain diseases and infections, and are that much
smarter, faster, stronger, taller. We're fighting against Darwin's
Theory of Evolution. As fair and exciting as this seems, we think
we're putting everyone on equal ground. Do we really know what we're
headed for? Yes, this could mean the end of disease and epidemic, for
those who can afford it. They will be the stronger of the species.
What will happen to race and ethnicity? Who will determine that we
need more Europeans because dammit, there are just too many South
Americans now.

(end of excerpt)

=========

Sitaram continues:

I was gratified to see that the above URL mentioned the Human Genome
project, which was one of the things which also came to my mind in
the question of digital vs. analog.

here is another URL on the topic

http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/dyson_ad/dyson_ad_index.html

(excerpt):

Life is defined as a material system that can acquire, store,
process, and use information to organize its activities. In this
broad view, the essence of life is information, but information is
not synonymous with life. To be alive, a system must not only hold
information but process and use it. It is the active use of
information, and not the passive storage, that constitutes life.

The two ways of processing information are analog and digital. An LP
record gives us music in analog form, a CD gives us music in digital
form. A slide-rule does multiplication and division in analog form,
an electronic calculator or computer does them in digital form. We
define analog-life as life that processes information in analog form,
digital-life as life that processes information in digital form. To
visualize digital-life, think of a transhuman inhabiting a computer.
To visualize analog-life, think of a Black Cloud. The next question
that arises is, are we humans analog or digital? We don't yet know
the answer to this question. The information in a human is mostly to
be found in two places, in our genes and in our brains. The
information in our genes is certainly digital, coded in the four-
level alphabet of DNA. The information in our brains is still a great
mystery. Nobody yet knows how the human memory works. It seems likely
that memories are recorded in variations of the strengths of synapses
connecting the billions of neurons in the brain with one another, but
we do not know how the strengths of synapses are varied. It could
well turn out that the processing of information in our brains is
partly digital and partly analog. If we are partly analog, the down-
loading of a human consciousness into a digital computer may involve
a certain loss of our finer feelings and qualities. That would not be
surprising. I certainly have no desire to try the experiment myself.

The superiority of analog-life is not so surprising if you are
familiar with the mathematical theory of computable numbers and
computable functions. Marian Pour-El and Ian Richards, two
mathematicians at the University of Minnesota, proved a theorem
twenty years ago that says, in a mathematically precise way, that
analog computers are more powerful than digital computers. They give
examples of numbers that are proved to be non-computable with digital
computers but are computable with a simple kind of analog computer.
The essential difference between analog and digital computers is that
an analog computer deals directly with continuous variables while a
digital computer deals only with discrete variables. Our modern
digital computers deal only with zeroes and ones. Their analog
computer is a classical field propagating though space and time and
obeying a linear wave equation. The classical electromagnetic field
obeying the Maxwell equations would do the job. Pour-El and Richards
show that the field can be focussed on a point in such a way that the
strength of the field at that point is not computable by any digital
computer, but it can be measured by a simple analog device. The
imaginary situation that they consider has nothing to do with
biological information. The Pour-El-Richards theorem does not prove
that analog-life will survive better in a cold universe. It only
makes this conclusion less surprising.

(end of excerpt)

========

Sitaram continues:

Here is a third URL, from an egroup on Nicheren Buddhism:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/irgosho/message/7728?source=1

(excerpt):

An evolutionary algorithm can start with randomly generated potential
solutions to a problem. The solutions are encoded in a digital
genetic code. We then have the solutions compete with each other in a
simulated evolutionary battle. The better solutions survive and
procreate in a simulated sexual reproduction in which offspring
solutions are created, drawing their genetic code (i.e.,encoded
solutions) from two parents. We can also introduce a rate of genetic
mutation. Various high-level parameters of this process, such as the
rate of mutation, the rate of offspring, etc., are appropriately
called "God parameters" and it is the job of the engineer designing
the evolutionary algorithm to set them to reasonably optimal values.
The process is run for many thousands of generations of simulated
evolution, and at the end of the process,
one is likely to find solutions that are of a distinctly higher order
than the starting conditions. The results of these evolutionary
(sometimes called genetic) algorithms can be elegant, beautiful, and
intelligent solutions to complex problems. They have been used, for
example, to create artistic designs, designs for artificial life
forms in artificial life experiments, as well as for a wide range of
practical assignments such as designing jet engines. Genetic
algorithms are one approach to "narrow" artificial intelligence, that
is, creating systems that can perform specific functions that used to
require the application of human intelligence.

The "Turing Machine," Alan Turing's theoretical conception of a
universal computer in 1950, provides only 7 very basic commands9, yet
can be organized to perform any possible computation. The existence
of a "Universal Turing Machine," which can simulate any
possible Turing Machine (that is described on its tape memory), is a
further demonstration of the universality (and simplicity) of
computation. In what is perhaps the most impressive analysis in his
book, Wolfram shows how a Turing Machine with only two states and
five possible colors can be a Universal Turing Machine. For forty
years, we've thought that a Universal Turing Machine had to be more
complex than this. Also impressive is Wolfram's demonstration that
Cellular Automaton Rule 110 is capable of universal computation
(given the right software).

The most controversial thesis in Wolfram's book is likely to be his
treatment of physics, in which he postulates that the Universe is a
big cellular-automaton computer. Wolfram is hypothesizing that there
is a digital basis to the apparently analog phenomena and formulas in
physics, and that we can model our understanding of physics as the
simple transformations of a cellular automaton.

Fredkin is quoted by Robert Wright in the 1980s as saying "There are
three great philosophical questions. What is life? What is
consciousness and thinking and memory and all that? And how does the
Universe work?

In commenting on Fredkin's theory of digital physics, Robert Wright
writes, "Fredkin . . . is talking about an interesting characteristic
of some computer programs, including many cellular automata: there is
no shortcut to finding out what they will lead to. This, indeed, is a
basic difference between the "analytical" approach associated with
traditional mathematics, including differential equations, and
the "computational" approach associated with algorithms. You can
predict a future state of a system susceptible to the analytic
approach without figuring out what
states it will occupy between now and then, but in the case of many
cellular automata, you must go through all the intermediate states to
find out what the end will be like: there is no way to know the
future except to watch it unfold. . . There is no way to know the
answer to some question any faster than what's going on. . . .
Fredkin believes that the Universe is very literally a computer and
that it is being used by someone, or something, to solve a problem.
It sounds like a good-news / bad-news joke: the good news is that our
lives have purpose; the bad news is that their purpose is to help
some remote hacker estimate pi to nine jillion decimal places."

Wolfram starts by describing the Universe as a large network of
nodes. The nodes do not exist in "space," but rather space, as we
perceive it, is an illusion created by the smooth transition of
phenomena through the network of nodes. One can easily imagine
building such a network to represent "na=EFve" (i.e., Newtonian)
physics by simply building a three-dimensional network to any desired
degree of granularity. Phenomena such as "particles" and "waves" that
appear to move through space would be represented by "cellular
gliders," which are patterns that are advanced through the network
for each cycle of computation. Fans of the game of "Life" (a popular
game based on cellular automata) will recognize the common phenomenon
of gliders, and the diversity of patterns that can move smoothly
through a cellular automaton network. The speed of light, then, is
the result of the clock speed of the celestial computer since gliders
can only advance one cell per cycle.

Einstein's General Relativity, which describes gravity as
perturbations in space itself, as if our three-dimensional world were
curved in some unseen fourth dimension, is also straightforward to
represent in this scheme. We can imagine a four-dimensional network
and represent apparent curvatures in space in the same way that one
represents normal curvatures in three-dimensional space.
Alternatively, the network can become denser in certain regions to
represent the equivalent of such curvature.

Wolfram writes that "If the Universe is a network, then it can in a
sense easily contain threads that continue to connect particles even
when the particles get far apart in terms of ordinary space." This
could provide an explanation for recent dramatic experiments showing
nonlocality of action in which two "quantum entangled" particles
appear to continue to act in concert with one another even though
separated by large distances. Einstein called this "spooky action at
a distance" and rejected it, although recent experiments appear to
confirm it.

Extending his discussion to philosophy, Wolfram "explains" the
apparent phenomenon of free will as decisions that are determined but
unpredictable. Since there is no way to predict the outcome of a
cellular process without actually running the process, and since no
simulator could possibly run faster than the Universe itself, there
is, therefore, no way to reliably predict human decisions. So even
though our decisions are determined, there is no way to predetermine
what these decisions will be. However, this is not a fully
satisfactory examination of the concept. This observation concerning
the lack of predictability can be made for the outcome of most
physical processes, e.g., where a piece of dust will fall onto the
ground. This view thereby equates human free will with the random
descent of a piece of dust. Indeed, that appears to be Wolfram's view
when he states that the process in the human brain
is "computationally equivalent" to those taking place in processes
such as fluid turbulence.

If I ask the question, 'Who am I?' I could conclude that, perhaps I
am this stuff here, i.e., the ordered and chaotic collection of
molecules that comprise my body and brain.

However, the specific set of particles that comprise my body and
brain are completely different from the atoms and molecules than
comprised me only a short while (on the order of weeks) ago. We know
that most of our cells are turned over in a matter of weeks. Even
those that persist longer (e.g., neurons) nonetheless change their
component molecules in a matter of weeks.

So I am a completely different set of stuff than I was a month ago.
All that persists is the pattern of organization of that stuff. The
pattern changes also, but slowly and in a continuum from my past
self. From this perspective I am rather like the pattern that water
makes in a stream as it rushes past the rocks in its path. The actual
molecules (of water) change every millisecond, but the pattern
persists for hours or even years.

It is our human nature to anthropomorphize the patterns we encounter.
This phenomenon has to do with the paradigm our brain uses to perform
pattern recognition, which is a method of "hypothesize and test." Our
brains hypothesize patterns from the images and sounds we encounter,
followed by a testing of these hypotheses, e.g., is that fleeting
image in the corner of my eye really a predator about to attack?
Sometimes we experience an unverifiable hypothesis that is created by
the inevitable accidental association of lower-level features.

Some of the phenomena in nature (e.g., clouds, coastlines) are
explained by repetitive simple processes such as cellular automata
and fractals, but intelligent patterns (e.g., the human brain)require
an evolutionary process (or, alternatively the reverse-engineering of
the results of such a process). Intelligence is the inspired product
of evolution, and is also, in my view, the most powerful "force" in
the world, ultimately transcending the powers of mindless natural
forces.

See the web site:

www.digitalphilosophy.org

including Ed Fredkin's essay "Introduction to Digital Philosophy."
Also, the National Science Foundation sponsored a workshop during the
Summer of 2001 titled "The Digital Perspective," which covered some
of the ideas discussed in Wolfram's book. The workshop included Ed
Fredkin Norman Margolus, Tom Toffoli, Charles Bennett, David
Finkelstein, Jerry Sussman, Tom Knight, and Physics Nobel Laureate
Gerard 't Hooft. The workshop proceedings will be published soon,
with Tom Toffoli as editor.

One other point.. the dichotomy of analog and digital mentioned in
Ray's review.. what if Wolfram is right about CA's and each CA is set
to it's original starting point based on an analog wave pattern and
the time it was created in the system. Could this explain the level
of randomness needed to "Accidentally" (at it's predetermined time
billions of years later) create inteligence? I firmly believe that
Ray is right in saying that "I" am a continuing pattern.. the
residual of what I was, incremented forward to it's next itteration.
If this is true (and I believe it is) then if we can extend our
bodies long enough to upload our "pattern" we will definately "Live"
forever.

Yes we are all stardust... but is stardust only patterns of
information represented as energy and matter? I think so.

If our brains/minds (patterns) can in fact be be "uploaded" to some
other machine/system, what a wonderous and strange facet of reality
that will present. As you stated, shortly before a person dies (i.e.,
pattern ceases to exist) it would imperative to "upload". Along a
similar line, since the pattern changes throughout the decades
(albeit possibly within somewhat restrictive "individual" person
constraints), couldn't several versions of patterns be uploaded, and
prior to death, a selection could be made as to the "best" one (e.g.,
age 30), and which will be the one that you wish to represent you in
perpetuity. Who would "own" your pattern? Would there be any
limitations of if and how how often your "pattern" could be
reproduced. What if somebody purposefully or accidentally deleted
your pattern(s) ("killed" you). These questions seem somewhat similar
to but even more significant than those being wrestled with by the
human genome ethicists.

As dessert is served, I bring up the secret-of-the-universe question.
Wolfram's theory that there is a single rule at the heart of
everything - a single simple algorithm that, in effect, generates all
the rules of physics and everything else - is bound to be one of his
most controversial claims, a theory that even some of his close
friends in physics aren't buying. Furthermore, Wolfram rubs our faces
in the dreary implications of his contention. Not only does a single
measly rule account for everything, but if one day we actually see
the rule, he predicts, we'll probably find it
unimpressive. "One might expect," he writes, "that in the end there
would be nothing special about the rule for our universe - just as
there has turned out to be nothing special about our position in the
solar system or the galaxy."

Reality, as you propose it, is hard to find. Relativity shows that
reality changes depending on your frame of reference. Godel assures
us that no theorem can be proven. Quantum Mechanics revels that
measuring things always changes them and therefore reality. "

What I mean by the word reality is not something that is hard to
experience -- but perhaps hard to understand. I just mean the
material universe, whatever it may *actually* be (energy, unknowable
in toto, etc.) People do tend to distance themselves from reailty
because they are thinking of their absolutely certian knowledge about
it, instead of simply going out and smelling a rose -- it is easy to
experience even if hard to understand.

In the book, I indeed begin with Godel, and point to JR Lucas'
demonstration that the implication of Godel's meta-mathematics in
mathematical logic is non-refutability of fallibility. There are
levels of abstraction from reality in our brains. Our perecptions are
(most probably, unrefutedly so far) neural outputs to stimulus to
something "out there". I do not believe fallibility has major
philosophical implications at the perception level (though
technically one has to simply have a conjecture that there is a
reality out there and have faith in that belief at least until and
unless it if refuted). There can be perceptual illusions,
mismeasurement, limitations of the senses, etc., but machines can
usually be designed to more accurately perceive, at least to some
degree of accuracy (let's leave QM out of it for now). From
perceptions we have words. When we perceive difference in reality --
any difference -- we assign words to to each
entity/attribute/process that were perceived as different. So
language evolves as we perceive ever finer differences. At the next
level of abstraction we have logic. Further out, we have mathematics,
and then meta-mathematics.

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