Dawkins vs Sartre/ existentialism vs biological determinism

roosh · 11-05-2020 11:20am

Fourier wrote: »

Pauli and some others (I believe Kochen himself did) taught and/or think something along this line. There's certainly strong similarities between QM and some Buddhist philosophy which is why many of the early writers on QM drew upon it, but I don't think we know enough yet to classify things tightly enough to know if this is true or not.

Interesting idea though.

Have you read Kahneman's Thinking, fast and slow? In it, he talks about the mind as having two systems, system 1 and system 2. These are just broad terms for the sake of discussion.

System 1 is our more intuitive system, it's the one that acts in a split second to give an answer to a problem. Through repeated exposure to situations, intuition can be built up. In my own words, it might be possible to think of it in terms of the model that we build up through our experiences. When we meet a situation, our system 1 provides an intuitive answer/reaction based on our pre-exiting models. An example he gives is:

Thinking, fast and slow" wrote:

For an example, here is a simple puzzle. Do not try to solve it but listen to your intuition:

A bat and ball cost $1.10.
The bat costs one dollar more than the ball.
How much does the ball cost?

Now, someone like yourself might be well accustomed to questions of this nature and can spot the answer pretty quickly. But for many (if not most) people an intuitive answer pops into the head. It is usually the wrong answer.

In this context, Kahneman talks about system two as the fact checker. It's that part of the mind that doesn't respond with the intuitive answer but recognises that an intuitive answer has arisen and then questions it.

System 1 would be entirely deterministic but system 2 would not appear to be. I'm wondering if this could be a way to think of it, with regard to QM.

A separate question, but related to some of the issues we've discussed. I'm not looking to get into the minutiae of QFT but am I right in thinking that QFT is not compatible with the Block Universe interpretation of relativity? Or is there something in QFT* that makes it compatible with the BU?

*If there is something in QFT, I'm not looking to get into it here, I'm just curious as to whether there is something.

Fourier · 11-05-2020 3:08pm

People mean various things by "The Block Universe", but I think there's a very common variant which is probably the one you are talking about. It that case no QFT is not really compatible with it.

People will often say QM has deterministic interpretations that might be compatible with it like Bohmian Mechanics, but they share some of the same issues as superdeterminism (fine tuning) and often have more of their own (not replicating most of quantum theory).

roosh · 02-11-2020 11:49am

I recently saw this video by theoretical physicist Sabine Hossenfelder entitled, "You don't have free will, but don't worry."

It prompted me to re-watch and re-read a few different resources on the question of free will in quantum mechanics. This video entitled "Quantum Physics & Free Will - Bell's Theorem, Determinism, Causality, Non-Locality, Realism" outlines how the experimentally observed violations of Bell's theorem means that one of the key assumptions of Bell's theorem must be given up, namely:
1. Locality
2. Realism
3. Local Realism
4. Free Will

I also re-read some material from Bell himself and others. I want to lay out my interpretation here but, as always, I am open to correction.

In the book, John S. Bell on the Foundations of Quantum Mechanics (by Bell, Gottfried, and Veltman), the section, an Exchange on Local Beables - J.S. Bell - Free Variables and Local Causality (p.103), references some statements from Bell (in reverse order from which they appear)

"It has ben assumed that the settings of instruments are in some sense free variables...."
For me this means that the values of such variables have implications only in their future light cones. They are in no sense a record of, and do not give information about, what has gone before.

Roughly speaking it is supposed that an experimenter is quite free to choose among the various possibilities offered by his equipment. But it might be that this apparent freedom is illusory. Perhaps experimental parameters and experimental results are both consequences, or partially so, of some common hidden mechanism. Then the apparent non-locality could be simulated.

From Howard Wiseman

The issue is whether the settings in one laboratory are uncorrelated with variables (hidden or otherwise) in the other. If they are correlated, then the experiment violates the assumptions of Bell’s theorem, opening the free-choice loophole, so called because of how it can be closed: the only things correlated with free choices are their effects, so (by Einstein’s principle) settings that are freely chosen late enough would be uncorrelated with the other variables, as desired.

Physics: Bell’s theorem still reverberates

From the Conway-Kochen paper: Free Will theorem

replacing the human choice by a pseudo–random number generator does not allow us to dispense with the Free Will assumption since free will is used in choosing this generator! The necessity for the Free Will assumption is evident, since a determined determinist could maintain that the experimenters were forced to choose the computer programs they did because these were predetermined at the dawn of time.

Conway-Kochen Free Will paper

Taken together, these statements would seem to reiterate what Fourier has been saying, that quantum mechanics necessitates free will. However, it appears as though free will is just an assumption.

The first quote from Bell says that the settings of measurement instruments are assumed to be free variables; which he says means they only have implications in their future light cones. The second quote suggests that free will is supposed for the sake of the theorem. The quote from Wiseman makes this more explicit and explains precisely why free will needs to be assumed. It is assumed because free will is a fairly unique concept and perhaps the only [supposed] phenomenon which isn't correlated with its cause, for the very reason that free will cannot be caused, otherwise it wouldn't be free.

Without invoking the notion of free will, the settings in one laboratory would be correlated with variables (hidden or otherwise) in the other (by way of a common cause further back their chains of causality), and this would violate the assumptions of Bell’s theorem and, as Bell put it, the apparent non-locality could be simulated.

The quote from the Conway-Kochen Free Will theorem paper makes the same point Fourier had been making, that we can't eliminate free will because it must be used somewhere along the line. However, the paper goes on to say that the free will assumption is a necessity in Bell's theorem because without it we are, and I paraphrase, left with determinism. The paper doesn't use the term superdeterminism here, but it sounds as though, in the absence of free will, as Fourier has been saying, we are left with superdeterminism.

So, instead of quantum mechanics demonstrating that free will must exist, it would appear that it demonstrates that it must exist if we a priori assume that it does exist i.e. if we employ circular reasoning.

Fourier · 03-11-2020 9:21pm

Bell's theorem must be given up, namely:
1. Locality
2. Realism
3. Local Realism
4. Free Will

This is probably a typo, point three should be "no retrocausality". But yes those are the assumptions of Bell's theorem.

However, it appears as though free will is just an assumption.

So, instead of quantum mechanics demonstrating that free will must exist, it would appear that it demonstrates that it must exist if we a priori assume that it does exist i.e. if we employ circular reasoning.

I think this is where you are getting stuck by using purely abstract philosophical reasoning and not looking at it scientifically (and of course not aware of recent research. Not that that is your fault).

Bell's theorem shows to explain correlations in a Bell/Aspect type experiment you have to get rid of one of the following:
1. Locality
2. Realism
3. No retrocausality
4. Free Will

Quantum Theory is a theory in which 1,3,4 are true and 2 is not. This theory is then scientifically confirmed. Nobody has built a successful theory that dumps 1,3 or 4. Thus scientific experiments seem to support the truth of 1,3,4 and the falsity of 2.

It's like electromagnetism says a field with the following properties exists and that would have these consequences. You check the consequences and they match those predicted by electromagnetic theory. Thus there is support for the world being like EM says.

However there has been work since Bell showing that essentially no theory dropping 1,3 or 4 could actually work with current experimental evidence and thus the falsity of 2 not only matches evidence but is the only internally consistent option in light of the evidence.

Also you must understand there is a difference between what Bell's theorem assumes and what Quantum Theory assumes. Quantum Theory does not assume Free Will but has it as a theorem.

Bell's theorem shows a theory must drop one of those four conditions, but that doesn't really mean they have to be assumptions of that theory. It shows that the theory cannot have all four of these conditions as consequences of its axioms, whatever they might be. Quantum Theory's axioms don't mention Free Will, it's a consequence of them. Locality is also a consequence, as is the absence of retrocausality. Realism is not a consequence of the axioms and thus it evades Bell's theorem by only having three out of the four as consequences.

roosh · 04-11-2020 11:22am

Thank you Fourier, I think I see the general point you're making, but I still have a few gaps in my understanding.

Fourier wrote: »

Also you must understand there is a difference between what Bell's theorem assumes and what Quantum Theory assumes. Quantum Theory does not assume Free Will but has it as a theorem.

My reading of the statements of Bell and others (some of whom I've referenced here), seems to suggest that the correlations observed in experiments i.e. the correlations which violate Bell's inequality, would be readily explained if the assumption of free will were dropped.

I thought you yourself stated that if the assumption of free will were dropped, then we would be left with Superdeterminism. This appeared to be unpalatable because it appears to require some form of conspiracy. Am I correct in that?

You said that there has been work done since Bell, but before getting to that I just wanted to check my understanding of Bell's theorem:

My reading of the statements of Bell and others (some of whom I've referenced here) gave me the impression that dropping the assumption of free will violates the assumption that the measurement settings and the observed outcomes of experiments are statistically independent. Without the asumption of free will, these variables would actually be correlated (due to a common cause somewhere in the past light cone of both) and this would account for the observed correlations in experiments.

But, there has been work since Bell which doesn't take free will as an assumption, but rather takes it as a theorem? Is the work of Conway-Kochen and Conway-Kochen-Specher an example of that work that has free will as a theorem? Would you be able to point me to some of the others?

Fourier wrote: »

Quantum Theory is a theory in which 1,3,4 are true and 2 is not. This theory is then scientifically confirmed. Nobody has built a successful theory that dumps 1,3 or 4. Thus scientific experiments seem to support the truth of 1,3,4 and the falsity of 2.

When we say that realism is not true in Quantum Theory, I've heard that this means that the mathematics of the theory do not correspond to an underlying ontology, as opposed to saying that there is no underlying ontology whatsoever. Is that accurate?

Under this interpretation, the mathematics of QFT would be predictive, as opposed to descriptive; that is, they only give use probabilistic predictions of measurement outcomes but do not describe the state prior to those measurements. Is that how you interpret it also?

Fourier wrote: »

However there has been work since Bell showing that essentially no theory dropping 1,3 or 4 could actually work with current experimental evidence and thus the falsity of 2 not only matches evidence but is the only internally consistent option in light of the evidence.

Would you be able to recommend any literature on these? Even papers that would be "above my pay grade" - I still read them in the hope that something might go in

I'm also making slow progress on the mathematics front, so it would be no harm to just get continual exposure.

Fourier wrote: »

Bell's theorem shows a theory must drop one of those four conditions, but that doesn't really mean they have to be assumptions of that theory. It shows that the theory cannot have all four of these conditions as consequences of its axioms, whatever they might be. Quantum Theory's axioms don't mention Free Will, it's a consequence of them. Locality is also a consequence, as is the absence of retrocausality. Realism is not a consequence of the axioms and thus it evades Bell's theorem by only having three out of the four as consequences.

The following bit is just a longer form of what I wrote above, outlining my reading of Bell's statements about the theorem, and those of others, so you may or may not want to read it.

As mentioned, the statements of Bell and others seemed to suggest that dropping the assumption of free will gives us our explanation of the correlations observed in experiments because it would mean that the assumption of statistical independence would be violated.

It appears as though Bell invoked free will out of necessity, to maintain that assumption of statistical independence. The reason that appears to be given is that the measurement settings and the measurement outcomes would otherwise be correlated and this would explain the experimental observations.

The reason for invoking free will, as I read it, is because statistical independence of the measurement settings and measurement outcomes requires that the measurement settings, at least, be free variables.

My understanding of what Bell says is that this means, the measurement setting must only be correlated with events in their future light cone and not their past light cone.

This would normally be unusual, because events are usually correlated with their causes. This idea would mean that the measurement settings and the measurement outcomes would [normally] be correlated with everything in their past light cones and if we were to follow that chain of causality we would eventually find a common cause, which would violate the statistical independence of the two variables in question.

If this were the case, the observed correlations would have a straight forward explanation - they are correlated because of a common cause in their past light cones.

Free will is invoked to break this chain of causality because, the very definition of free will requires it to be uncaused and therefore, not correlated with anything in its past light cone.

Fourier · 04-11-2020 2:10pm

My reading of the statements of Bell and others (some of whom I've referenced here), seems to suggest that the correlations observed in experiments i.e. the correlations which violate Bell's inequality, would be readily explained if the assumption of free will were dropped.

Could potentially be explained. You'd still have to develop a working theory that actually does it. Today we know such a theory almost certainly cannot work and we have a working theory that violates another of the Bell's theorem assumptions.

My reading of the statements of Bell and others (some of whom I've referenced here) gave me the impression that dropping the assumption of free will violates the assumption that the measurement settings and the observed outcomes of experiments are statistically independent. Without the asumption of free will, these variables would actually be correlated (due to a common cause somewhere in the past light cone of both) and this would account for the observed correlations in experiments.

Might account for it. Again you'd have to actually have a working theory. It's just that Bell's theorem alone doesn't rule out that one day you might have such a theory. However there have been developments since then that make all but dropping realism much less likely.
And again there is the fact that the only experimentally confirmed working theory is one which drops realism.

But, there has been work since Bell which doesn't take free will as an assumption, but rather takes it as a theorem?

Quantum Theory doesn't have Free Will as an assumption. It's a theorem in Quantum Theory. Again there is a difference between what is an assumption in Bell's theorem (an attempt to constrain possible theories) and Quantum Mechanics (an actual theory).

When we say that realism is not true in Quantum Theory, I've heard that this means that the mathematics of the theory do not correspond to an underlying ontology, as opposed to saying that there is no underlying ontology whatsoever. Is that accurate?

Under this interpretation, the mathematics of QFT would be predictive, as opposed to descriptive; that is, they only give use probabilistic predictions of measurement outcomes but do not describe the state prior to those measurements. Is that how you interpret it also?

There is more to it than this, but for now this is a good description.

Would you be able to recommend any literature on these? Even papers that would be "above my pay grade"

They would be unreadable without knowing C*-algebras and advanced probability theory. The results are also spread over hundreds of papers with no easy to digest summary article. I can however answer questions of course and questions about a particular issue might have a single (almost certainly still unreadable) reference that sums them up.

It appears as though Bell invoked free will out of necessity, to maintain that assumption of statistical independence.
This would normally be unusual, because events are usually correlated with their causes

The assumption in Bell's theorem is that the measurement settings are not correlated with the entangled pair preparation. The type of statistical independence assumed here by Bell is common to all of science so I wouldn't call it unusual, but I think you calling it that is just the result of a misunderstanding.

An example in medical trials would be giving one group the placebo and another the real drug. We assume that the placebos weren't given only to those who naturally recovered, i.e. the development of their condition is not correlated with the act of selecting them for the placebo. Say a computer program selected them, it would be pretty strange if there was a tight correlation between the current state of the virus say in their system and the seed for the RNG of the computer (often based off the boot time).

So you could potentially get around Bell's theorem by dropping this assumption. The placebo is only given to the people who naturally recover in every single trial that will ever be performed. The drug actually works, but the placebo is constantly being "accidentally" given to those who would have naturally beaten the virus creating the illusion that the drug is ineffective. Furthermore this illusion of inefficacy will continue forever. Those who would have naturally recovered will always be accidentally picked for all time. Regardless if the picking process is done by an RNG, a person, tea leaf patterns or whatever. Once you accept this though it's difficult to see how science itself works since all your conclusions are basically illusions.

I think a sticking point for you through out this is that you keep confusing superdeterminism with regular determinism. Superdeterminism is much much stronger and basically daft. However Bell's theorem shows that no other form of determinism will work if you want to keep realism and locality. A realist relativistic determinist world cannot replicate current experimental evidence. You have to drop realism or introduce nonlocality or introduce superdeterminism.

Since it is daft and there is no working theory and further results showing there basically never will be a working theory and since we have a working confirmed theory that drops realism, the conclusion the majority accept is that realism is false not the others.

roosh · 04-11-2020 3:54pm

Fourier wrote: »

Quantum Theory doesn't have Free Will as an assumption. It's a theorem in Quantum Theory. Again there is a difference between what is an assumption in Bell's theorem (an attempt to constrain possible theories) and Quantum Mechanics (an actual theory).

Thanks Fourier, I understand the distinction, I was just wondering if the Conway-Kochen[-Specher] Free Will theorem is what you were referring to, or if it is something else?

Fourier wrote: »

They would be unreadable without knowing C*-algebras and advanced probability theory. The results are also spread over hundreds of papers with no easy to digest summary article. I can however answer questions of course and questions about a particular issue might have a single (almost certainly still unreadable) reference that sums them up.

Ah fair enough. I'm a short way off that yet :pac:

Fourier wrote: »

I think a sticking point for you through out this is that you keep confusing superdeterminism with regular determinism. Superdeterminism is much much stronger and basically daft. However Bell's theorem shows that no other form of determinism will work if you want to keep realism and locality. A realist relativistic determinist world cannot replicate current experimental evidence. You have to drop realism or introduce nonlocality or introduce superdeterminism.

I think you are right about my understanding of Superdeterminism being a sticking point.

Reading what Sabine Hossenfelder writes about Superdeterminism

Where do these correlations ultimately come from? Well, they come from where everything ultimately comes from, that is from the initial state of the universe.

This makes it sound like, given the initial conditions of the Universe and simple determinism, the observed correlations would be explained.

Fourier wrote: »

There is more to it than this, but for now this is a good description.

If the mathematics only give us probabilistic predictions about experimental outcomes, that would mean that the mathematics doesn't tell us anything about the system prior to its interaction with the measurement device. Would that not mean that the theory is not a complete description of nature?

Fourier wrote: »

The assumption in Bell's theorem is that the measurement settings are not correlated with the entangled pair preparation. The type of statistical independence assumed here by Bell is common to all of science so I wouldn't call it unusual, but I think you calling it that is just the result of a misunderstanding.

Events are usually correlated with their causes, though, aren't they?

Fourier wrote: »

An example in medical trials would.....

Apologies, I read the example but I sometimes lose track of the connection with the experimental set up. I think you were using a similar example to Sabine Hossenfelder's previously, which I think makes a bit more intuitive sense:

Where do these correlations ultimately come from? Well, they come from where everything ultimately comes from, that is from the initial state of the universe. And that’s where most people walk off: They think that you need to precisely choose the initial conditions of the universe to arrange quanta in Anton Zeilinger’s brain just so that he’ll end up turning a knob left rather than right.

This to me, again, just seems like a consequence of determinism, given the initial conditions of the Universe.

A physicists "choice" of measurement settings is caused by prior conditions, and those are caused by the conditions prior to that, and so on back the line until we get to the big bang.

Fourier wrote: »

Since it is daft and there is no working theory and further results showing there basically never will be a working theory and since we have a working confirmed theory that drops realism, the conclusion the majority accept is that realism is false not the others.

I know I'm referencing Sabine Hossenfelder a lot, but she appears to be one of the only proponents of Superdeterminsm.

Besides sounding entirely nuts, it’s also a useless idea, because how the hell would you ever calculate anything with it? And if it’s unfalsifiable but useless, then indeed it isn’t science. So, frowning at superdeterminism is not entirely unjustified.

But that would be jumping to conclusions. How much detail you need to know about the initial state to make predictions depends on your model. And without writing down a model, there is really no way to tell whether it does or doesn’t live up to scientific methodology. It’s here where the trouble begins.

While philosophers on occasion discuss superdeterminism on a conceptual basis, there is little to no work on actual models. Besides me and my postdoc, I count Gerard ‘t Hooft and Tim Palmer.

Fourier · 04-11-2020 4:19pm

Thanks Fourier, I understand the distinction, I was just wondering if the Conway-Kochen[-Specher] Free Will theorem is what you were referring to, or if it is something else?

The Kochen-Conway theorem is also a result about constraining theories, not directly about quantum mechanics itself. The theorem within QM is so obvious when you know enough of the mathematics that it isn't really given a name. Non-Kolomogorovian probability theorem it is sometimes called in Russian, or various names with Kolomogorov in them in English when it is called out.

If the mathematics only give us probabilistic predictions about experimental outcomes, that would mean that the mathematics doesn't tell us anything about the system prior to its interaction with the measurement device. Would that not mean that the theory is not a complete description of nature?

Sort of. It's closer to there is no complete description of nature. No system of logic or language can encompass nature.

Let me make the rest simpler:

Events are usually correlated with their causes, though, aren't they?

Usually. That has little to do with what I said though. I was referring to the correlation of the measurement settings and the entangled pair preparation. The pair preparation does not cause the measurement settings so that events are correlated with their causes has little relevance.

As for what Sabine said, note that even as an advocate she points out that she has no actual model. So scientifically why would you even consider this option? She's also wrong. We already know a superdeterministic theory would need to be fine tuned and uncomputable.

Apologies, I read the example but I sometimes lose track of the connection with the experimental set up

It's not directly connected with the Bell test experimental set up, it's just an example of superdeterminism in another situation.

Superdeterminism is the statement that measurement choices are 100% correlated with the states of the objects you are testing. Science always assumes this is false.

Say somebody was sent to measure the Ph of a forest's soil and they went around the forest and stuck their Ph meter into say a thousand points of soil and measured an average of 6.6. Superdeterminism would be that literally only those thousand points had a Ph near 6. Every other point in the forest was Ph 3.2. The experimenter was fated to choose the wrong points in advance. Superdeterminism is that essentially scientific practice is fated to produce utterly incorrect illusions.

Saying everything comes from the Big Bang doesn't make this a natural or required conclusion. One can easily have a Big Bang with everything developing from it and everything strongly correlated with the Big Bang, but where the forester measuring 6.6 is because that's actually near the average pH of the forest soil not because he happened to pick exactly the wrong 1000 spots. Superdeterminism then requires this to be happening all the time with all measurements.

Let me be clear with what superdeterminism is saying with entangled pair measurements. It's saying these particles are not actually strongly correlated. The vast majority of particles produced under those scenarios do not have correlated spin angles. It's that humans are fated to measure only the 0.00000000....0001% that are on some of their angles and for even those not all of their spin angles are correlated but we are fated to always measure the wrong angles. This human measurement focused conspiracy is in no way a natural conclusion from simple determinism and the Big Bang.

roosh · 04-11-2020 5:07pm

Fourier wrote: »

The Kochen-Conway theorem is also a result about constraining theories, not directly about quantum mechanics itself. The theorem within QM is so obvious when you know enough of the mathematics that it isn't really given a name. Non-Kolomogorovian probability theorem it is sometimes called in Russian, or various names with Kolomogorov in them in English when it is called out.

Cool. Thanks Fourier.

Fourier wrote: »

Let me make the rest simpler:

Usually. That has little to do with what I said though. I was referring to the correlation of the measurement settings and the entangled pair preparation. The pair preparation does not cause the measurement settings so that events are correlated with their causes has little relevance.

My reading of what Bell and the others are saying however, isn't that the pair preparation causes the measurement settings, its whether or not they are correlated with them.

IF the two events are actually correlated, as Wiseman states, then the assumption of statistical independence underpinning the derivation of Bell's inequality is violated and so the observed correlations would be explained by way of this correlation.

If events are usually correlated with their causes, then the measurement settings are correlated with their causes, which are correlated with their causes, and so on back the line of causality, or with everything in their past light cones. The same is true for the pair preparation. If we follow these lines of causation far enough, we will eventually arrive at an event which is located in the intersection of the past light cones (of both the measurement settings and pair creation). This common cause would explain the observed correlations.

Bell appears to invoke free will as an assumption to maintain this assumption of statistical independence, because by its very definition, free will is not correlated with its cause because it must be uncaused - otherwise it isn't free.

The purpose of free will here appears to be to break the chain of causality in the past light cones of the two phenomena, to rule out the possibility of a common cause.

Free will is unusual in this sense because usually all events have causes and are correlated with those causes, but free will is uncaused - unlike any other event in the phenomenon or event in the Universe.

Fourier wrote: »

As for what Sabine said, note that even as an advocate she points out that she has no actual model. So scientifically why would you even consider this option? She's also wrong. We already know a superdeterministic theory would need to be fine tuned and uncomputable.

I did note it and I was sure to include it. She seems to suggest that there are no models because no one will work on them. It might be for good reason, but it seems as though dropping the assumption of free will could, according to Bell account for the experimental observations.

Fourier wrote: »

It's not directly connected with the Bell test experimental set up, it's just an example of superdeterminism in another situation.

Superdeterminism is the statement that measurement choices are 100% correlated with the states of the objects you are testing. Science always assumes this is false.

Say somebody was sent to measure the Ph of a forest's soil and they went around the forest and stuck their Ph meter into say a thousand points of soil and measured an average of 6.6. Superdeterminism would be that literally only those thousand points had a Ph near 6. Every other point in the forest was Ph 3.2. The experimenter was fated to choose the wrong points in advance. Superdeterminism is that essentially scientific practice is fated to produce utterly incorrect illusions.

Saying everything comes from the Big Bang doesn't make this a natural or required conclusion. One can easily have a Big Bang with everything developing from it and everything strongly correlated with the Big Bang, but where the forester measuring 6.6 is because that's actually near the average pH of the forest soil not because he happened to pick exactly the wrong 1000 spots. Superdeterminism then requires this to be happening all the time with all measurements.

Let me be clear with what superdeterminism is saying with entangled pair measurements. It's saying these particles are not actually strongly correlated. The vast majority of particles produced under those scenarios do not have correlated spin angles. It's that humans are fated to measure only the 0.00000000....0001% that are on some of their angles and for even those not all of their spin angles are correlated but we are fated to always measure the wrong angles. This human measurement focused conspiracy is in no way a natural conclusion from simple determinism and the Big Bang.

I appreciate the examples and I followed that one a bit easier. I'm just not certain that it is a correct characterisation.

I think your example from earlier in the thread might be more fruitful to explore. It is similar to the one Hossenfelder uses and that I've heard elsewhere, which suggests that superdeterminism conspires to have us choose experimental settings and conditions which return the indeterministic results of quantum mechanics when nature is in fact deterministic. As with the tree planter analogy, nature conspires to make us conduct experiments at certain times, in certain locations, and using certain settings, which give inaccurate results about the true nature of the Universe.

Is that a close representation of the conspiracy idea?

Fourier · 04-11-2020 5:25pm

My reading of what Bell and the others are saying however, isn't that the pair preparation causes the measurement settings, its whether or not they are correlated with them

I think you are getting confused here with the flow of what is being said. I said they are correlated, you then said "things are usually correlated with what causes them" then I said basically "yeah they don't cause them". So I certainly don't think Bell and others are saying the pair preparation causes the measurement settings, I explicitly said the opposite.

Free will is unusual in this sense because usually all events have causes and are correlated with those causes, but free will is uncaused - unlike any other event in the phenomenon or event in the Universe

You have the assumption wrong basically.

Bell's theorem shows essentially that the correlations we see in experiments fail to match locality and realism. One way out is to drop realism, the other way out is to drop locality. However another way out is to say that what we measure is utterly wrong. That we are seeing the wrong things in experiments. Correlations due to the Big Bang won't cut it. That's what superdeterminism is about.

It might be for good reason, but it seems as though dropping the assumption of free will could, according to Bell account for the experimental observations

It could, though if that is Sabine's characterisation it is wrong (I can't be sure of what Sabine is actually saying and what is your misunderstanding. I don't mean that as an insult). Also why would we work on such models when we have a working theory that matches experiment. Scientifically there is no reason, it's just philosophical prejudice that realism has to be true/free choice has to wrong. Only one option on the list actually works, it seems pointless to most of us to go on and on about how the other options might work someday. Especially so when we now know they can't.

Bell was writing a while ago now. Today we know know the superdeterministic option won't work for various reasons. In Bell's day you see what you are saying might have been right. Maybe there was some common correlation from the Big Bang that would explain things without it being bizarre and conspiratorial. Now many including Bell doubted it could not be conspiratorial but there was no solid proof say. However today we know it would be conspiratorial and uncomputable (the conspiracy requires an infinite amount of information to be stored in each particle to enact it correctly and the Big Bang had to encode this information precisely).

Bell's theorem didn't prove these stronger results, but I assume you want to know the current state of play today not just exactly what Bell's theorem alone back in 1964 shows.

Just that it's important to remember some of your sources are a bit old and out of date.

I'm just not certain that it is a correct characterisation

It is. I can prove the relevant theorems. That's what they say. The human experimenter would be selecting a biased sample of measure zero in technical terms. Virtually all particles are not correlated enough in their angles and those that are are only correlated on a few. We are then fated to measure the few that are on the angles that are.

roosh · 04-11-2020 7:26pm

Fourier wrote: »

I think you are getting focused here with the flow of what is being said. I said they are correlated, you then said "things are usually correlated with what causes them" then I said basically "yeah they don't cause them". So I certainly don't think Bell and others are saying the pair preparation causes the measurement settings, I explicitly said the opposite.

Apologies, I mightn't have been too clear with that. Bell and the others definitely don't say that the pair preparation causes the measurement settings.

What they appear to say is that the inequality in Bell's theorem is derived, in part, from the assumption that they are uncorrelated. The suggestion appears to be that, if they were in fact correlated, then Bell's assumption of statistical independence would be violated.

Where the fact about events being correlated with their causes comes in is, that without something to break the chain of causality - from the setting of the measurement device with the events in its past light cone - the assumption of statistical independence would be violated.

It seems as though Bell invokes free will to break that chain of causality and maintain statistical independence.

Fourier wrote: »

Bell's theorem shows essentially that the correlations we see in experiments fail to match locality and realism. One way out is to drop realism, the other way out is to drop locality. However another way out is to say that what we measure is utterly wrong. That we are seeing the wrong things in experiments. Correlations due to the Big Bang won't cut it. That's what superdeterminism is about.

The apparent implication of what Bell and the others say, is that events are usually correlated with events in their past light cone.

If this is the case then the pair preparation and measurement settings are correlated with events in their past light cones. Eventually, those past light cones are going to intersect and there will be a common cause with which both are correlated. They seem to suggest that instead of doing away with locality and realism, to explain the violations of Bell's inequality, doing away with free will is a possible explanation because without it, statistical independence would be violated.

Fourier wrote: »

However today we know it would be conspiratorial and uncomputable (the conspiracy requires an infinite amount of information to be stored in each particle to enact it correctly and the Big Bang had to encode this information precisely).

I think you mentioned this before. Apologies, I've forgotten if you mentioned the name of a paper or anything like that?

Why would information need to be coded into each particle? How would information even be encoded? I'm picturing a chain of dominoes getting knocked over, where each one only needs to be knocked by the previous one and to knock the subsequence one. This doesn't seem like a lot of information would be required.

Fourier wrote: »

Bell's theorem didn't prove these stronger results, but I assume you want to know the current state of play today not just exactly what Bell's theorem alone back in 1964 shows.

Just that it's important to remember some of your sources are a bit old and out of date.

Absolutely, and I appreciate your taking the time to do that.

The violations of Bell's inequality is still an important result though, isn't it? These violations are essentially what is still being explained.

Fourier wrote: »

It is. I can prove the relevant theorems. That's what they say. The human experimenter would be selecting a biased sample of measure zero in technical terms. Virtually all particles are not correlated enough in their angles and those that are are only correlated on a few. We are then fated to measure the few that are on the angles that are.

Ah, I see. Thank you for that explanation.

I know you said that free will isn't one of the assumptions of those theorems, it is, as you have described, a consequence. Is realism an assumption of those theorems?

Fourier · 04-11-2020 7:42pm

The apparent implication of what Bell and the others say, is that events are usually correlated with events in their past light cone.

If this is the case then the pair preparation and measurement settings are correlated with events in their past light cones. Eventually, those past light cones are going to intersect and there will be a common cause with which both are correlated. They seem to suggest that instead of doing away with locality and realism, to explain the violations of Bell's inequality, doing away with free will is a possible explanation because without it, statistical independence would be violated.

Yes at the time it was a possible explanation as I've said a few times. Today it is not in light of stronger theorems.

I think you mentioned this before. Apologies, I've forgotten if you mentioned the name of a paper or anything like that?

Hardy's ontological baggage theorem. It has a few names.

Why would information need to be coded into each particle? How would information even be encoded? I'm picturing a chain of dominoes getting knocked over, where each one only needs to be knocked by the previous one and to knock the subsequence one. This doesn't seem like a lot of information would be required.

Such a picture won't work in light of these stronger theorems.

The violations of Bell's inequality is still an important result though, isn't it? These violations are essentially what is still being explained.

They are an important result, but we know more today. Bell derived a constraint on possible theories from the correlations of pairs of spin-1/2 particles. Today we have derived much stronger constraints from other scenarios.

I know you said that free will isn't one of the assumptions of those theorems, it is, as you have described a consequence. Those assumptions presumably don't include the assumption of realism though?

Realism is assumed. Free Will is not only not assumed in some of the theorems, but actually denied. There's a fairly strong theorem about Weak decays where it assumes that the experimenter is in fact "controlled" by some hidden parameter. It then shows such a theory couldn't replicate weak decays. Thus determinism of the kind you mean, i.e. everything following naturally via deterministic laws from the Big Bang is simply false, it's incompatible with Weak decays as just one example.

The vaguely possible determinism is superdeterminism. In it things are not a natural consequence of the Big Bang, but a giant infinitely detailed conspiracy loaded into each particle. We now know such a theory requires fine tuning and uncomputability which makes them ill-defined and basically equivalent to saying a demiurge controls reality.

Determinism is simply false.

roosh · 04-11-2020 8:43pm

Fourier wrote: »

Yes at the time it was a possible explanation as I've said a few times. Today it is not in light of stronger theorems.

Hardy's ontological baggage theorem. It has a few names.

Such a picture won't work in light of these stronger theorems.

They are an important result, but we know more today. Bell derived a constraint on possible theories from the correlations of pairs of spin-1/2 particles. Today we have derived much stronger constraints from other scenarios.

Realism is assumed. Free Will is not only not assumed in some of the theorems, but actually denied. There's a fairly strong theorem about Weak decays where it assumes that the experimenter is in fact "controlled" by some hidden parameter. It then shows such a theory couldn't replicate weak decays. Thus determinism of the kind you mean, i.e. everything following naturally via deterministic laws from the Big Bang is simply false, it's incompatible with Weak decays as just one example.

The vaguely possible determinism is superdeterminism. In it things are not a natural consequence of the Big Bang, but a giant infinitely detailed conspiracy loaded into each particle. We now know such a theory requires fine tuning and uncomputability which makes them ill-defined and basically equivalent to saying a demiurge controls reality.

Determinism is simply false.

Thanks for that Fourier.

roosh · 04-11-2020 9:08pm

Was there a name for the theorem/paper about the requirement that an infinite amount of information be encoded into particles again?

Fourier · 04-11-2020 9:22pm

roosh wrote: »

Was there a name for the theorem/paper about the requirement that an infinite amount of information be encoded into particles again?

Hardy's Ontological Baggage theorem:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1355219804000048

There are stronger results since, but it's the first one in this particular type of informational constraints.

roosh · 04-11-2020 10:56pm

Fourier wrote: »

Hardy's Ontological Baggage theorem:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1355219804000048

There are stronger results since, but it's the first one in this particular type of informational constraints.

Ah, apologies, I thought that Hardy's Ontological Baggage was pertained to a different question. Thanks for that.

A related question, but one I would imagine is probably not within the scope of the theorems - although I've been known to be wrong about these things

Are there any limits or indications on when we "get" free will? Do the sperm and the egg have free will or does it get switched on at some point in utero?

I know the Conway-Kochen Free Will theorem says that if humans have free will then so too do the particles being measured, but I wasn't sure if that was meant to be taken literally.

Fourier · 04-11-2020 11:47pm

Are there any limits or indications on when we "get" free will? Do the sperm and the egg have free will or does it get switched on at some point in utero?

I know the Conway-Kochen Free Will theorem says that if humans have free will then so too do the particles being measured, but I wasn't sure if that was meant to be taken literally.

Good question.

We don't know. Basically observers have free choice but it's very ambiguous as to who is an observer. Certainly adult humans are, but there's a big discussion beyond that.

This is Chris Fuchs on who might be an agent/observer:

It does not rule out attributing agency to dogs, euglenas, or artificial life. However, it does exclude a computer program that deterministically “chooses” an action from a look-up table

Just to give you an idea of the scope of options on the table.

roosh · 05-11-2020 10:33am

Fourier wrote: »

Good question.

We don't know. Basically observers have free choice but it's very ambiguous as to who is an observer. Certainly adult humans are, but there's a big discussion beyond that.

This is Chris Fuchs on who might be an agent/observer:

Just to give you an idea of the scope of options on the table.

Thanks Fourier.

Does the Conway-Kochen Free Will theorem apply here also? I've heard the result of the theorem being characterised as meaning that, if humans have free will then so to do the particles that are being measured. In the paper though, they make a further clarification:

more precisely, it is the universe that makes the free decision in the neighborhood of the particles.

Just spitballing here:

I'm wondering would free will* have to be a fundamental property of the Universe? You mentioned previously that [to paraphrase] it can't be an emergent property, in the sense of being produced by the matter of the brain. I think the idea of emergence itself probably precludes the idea of free will in any case, as it would necessitate that the will is caused by matter in the brain and therefore not free.

I'm thinking that there can't be a point in the process of human reproduction where free will gets "turned on" because this would seem to just be a statement about when emergence occurs.

*I'm using free will here as a placeholder for whatever free will ultimately is, in terms of what kind of substance** it is.

**Substance is also a placeholder

Fourier · 05-11-2020 1:47pm

The Kochen-Conway theorem is the earliest and simplest of a set of results that are sometimes known as Kolmogorov embedding or similar.

Unfortunately QM says very little about what's going on with the free choice/will since it's just a primitive in the theory. Many people have made the point that not being emergent is what you would expect for true Free Will.

So the Free Choice seems to be like the fundamental nature of the particles themselves. You know it's there from the theory but you can't really say much about it. It seems to be one of those things "beyond the Veil" to use d'Espagnat's terminology.

roosh · 05-11-2020 4:39pm

Fourier wrote: »

The Kochen-Conway theorem is the earliest and simplest of a set of results that are sometimes known as Kolmogorov embedding or similar.

Unfortunately QM says very little about what's going on with the free choice/will since it's just a primitive in the theory. Many people have made the point that not being emergent is what you would expect for true Free Will.

So the Free Choice seems to be like the fundamental nature of the particles themselves. You know it's there from the theory but you can't really say much about it. It seems to be one of those things "beyond the Veil" to use d'Espagnat's terminology.

Thanks Fourier, very insightful, as always.

roosh · 04-12-2020 10:19am

@Fourier, could free will be used to establish the existence of absolute motion?

One of the issues with the idea of absolute motion appears to be that there is no way of determining which body (if any is in a state of absolute motion) because of the symmetry of relative motion. Presumably the neural activity of an individual would mean that there is an asymmetry when it comes to relative motion, involving observers.

Say, two rockets at rest relative to each other suddenly start moving relative to each other. With all of the relevant information we could determine that it was the choice of one captain to turn on the thrusters say. Now, we still wouldn't be able to establish which of the two rockets was in a state of absolute motion, bcos both could have been in a state of free fall before the rockets were turned on. But, given the asymmetry in the situation and the fact that they have gone from relative rest to relative motion, could this allow us to deduce that one of them must be in a state of absolute motion?

Fourier · 06-12-2020 10:47pm

I've answered in the Chemistry, Physics & Maths forum.

Fathom · 07-12-2020 7:08pm

Yo Fourier and roosh. I continue to enjoy your discussion of this topic. Thanks.

roosh · 07-12-2020 7:11pm

Fathom wrote: »

Yo Fourier and roosh. I continue to enjoy your discussion of this topic. Thanks.

You can thank Fourier's patience mostly

roosh · 31-12-2020 1:59pm

@Fourier would you be able to recommend any other papers on Kolmogorov embedding? I know they will probably be above my paygrade but I usually try to read them anyway.

Fathom · 07-01-2021 11:03pm

Not my discipline. Shot in the dark... Misha Gromov and Larry Guth, Generalizations of the Kolmogorov–Barzdin embedding estimates, Duke Math Journal, Volume 161, Number 13 (2012), 2549-2603.

roosh · 11-01-2021 2:02pm

Fathom wrote: »

Not my discipline. Shot in the dark...

Misha Gromov and Larry Guth, Generalizations of the Kolmogorov–Barzdin embedding estimates, Duke Math Journal, Volume 161, Number 13 (2012), 2549-2603.

Thanks Fathom, I'll check it out. There'll be additional papers in the reference section I'd imagine.

roosh · 02-08-2021 1:15pm

Thinking more on the notion of free will and it's implications, based on discussions elsewhere, and a reading of 'Beyond the Dynamical Universe', it would seem to me that free will is incompatible with the relativity of simultaneity (RoS) which is a central idea in Einsteinian relativity. I'm inclined to think that anything other than the absolute simultaneity of a universal present moment would negate the idea of free will.

Absolute simultaneity effectively rests on the idea that there is a universal present moment, shared by all inhabitants of the universe. This was very much a feature of the Newtonian picture of the universe. Einsteinian relativity gave us the notion of the RoS, saying that there is no universal present moment with absolute simultaneity. A consequence of the RoS is the idea that the universe is ultimately a 4D geometrical structure where particles or objects form worldlines or worldtubes in 'Minkowski Spacetime'. This picture tells us that past, present, and future states of an object are all equally real and all co-exist in the overall structure of the universe.

This also applies to observers, meaning that the outcome of an observers 'free choice' is pre-determined. This is quite obviously in contradiction to the very notion of 'free will'. So, do we have to give up a key aspect of Einsteinian relativity, the RoS, in order to preserve free will?

Dawkins vs Sartre/ existentialism vs biological determinism

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