Chaos

From: Devin Harris <harrisdev.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Sun, 11 Jul 1999 16:08:58 -0700

GS Levy wrote:

> I would like to add that on purely philosophical grounds I can only
conceive
> of an absolute infinitely large MW, larger than all of Cantor's
infinities --
> because any other size would have to be arbitrary and therefore have a
reason
> to be so. And this limited MW would end up being just one instance of
many
> other MW in a larger MMW.
>
> So which is it? Is the MW finite or infinite?...

I agree that it isn't really a question of finite or infinite, rather
how infinite is the MWs.

I fully understand and agree with your point about anything less being
an arbitrary condition. I think I was between ten and twelve when I
first concluded the universe must be infinite based upon the principle
that nature would not allow part of what is possible to exist. At the
time I put it, if one world managed to cheat its way past nothingness,
all else that is possible would also find the same way out.

Again, the question of how infinite is the Universe that contains MWs.
Or said otherwise, how vast or how ruled is the possible world, assuming
all possibilities exist? In contrast to the seemingly necessary
conclusion that all possibilities is a radical infinitude, one that is
both incomprehensible and chaotic (what we would refer to as chaotic) is
the sensibility and consistency of our own world (to us) throughout the
passage of time.

Considered first there is the set of all possible MWs consistent with
the forces and laws of nature responsible for shaping the cosmos, and I
assume all are consistent with the Big Bang origin. This is a small set
compared to a radical group of, for example, different origins, which
are imaginable to some degree. A far greater set would include all
possibilities that depart from our forces of nature, which may or may
not be imaginable. And here I question whether this line can be crossed.
Does the possible realm actually cross this line?

If what is properly true physically or mathematically; if what is our
reality can be different in some other way of existing, such would
require that it is possible for our laws to break down. So if what is
real here for us is not real elsewhere, if such irreconcilable worlds
exist, then that set would be far greater and even seems to be the
ultimate set, if not simply defined as chaos. And within that chaos we
can imagine our world. Presently most who expect chaos justify the
consistency and structure of our space-time by imagining our reality is
closed, somehow cut-off from the greater chaos, for whatever reason, the
most reasonable proposal being the anthropic principle. But there is a
mistake being made, because we so innately expect a radical infinity to
be indefinite.

There is actually no way to escape a radical influence of the deemed
chaos. If we imagine a far larger set of worlds than those that are
somehow closed and internally consistent and so rational, which are
rational up till any given moment, but then suddenly decay, the closed
is one possibility compared to the temporarily closed. The exclusion of
those worlds as not the most possible for our future at any given moment
places us in an arbitrarily configured system, which has to have a
reason for being so, a reason that would not be consistent with the
cosmology of a radical infinitude or chaos.

I am even to the point now that I disbelieve the meaning of the word
chaos, in the same context that I recognize the meaning of non-existence
is an anomaly, since there is no such state or possible meaning for the
word to represent, and because of a more complex theory of my own that
what we call disorder is actually a different kind of order, so that
there is actually two kinds of order in nature, making the order of one
the disorder of the other.

But before I lose anyone, my concluding point is my own conclusion that
what is possible is far more definitive than we all expect. One idea is
that the possible realm is satisfied by being all possible states,
rather than all possible systems, and that systems are secondary
substratum, not more than but contained within, like potentiality, but
actual. For example, in binary, there are two possible states. We can
write a billion computer programs with those two states, or an infinite
number, and we can imagine them all running simultaneously, but the
ensemble of all possible programs does not include more than what is
possible from the two undistorted original elementary states. The
radical infinity of what is possible, in this case, includes 0 and 1.
Everything else is inside.

As scientists are now getting serious about MWs, perhaps the expectation
of simplicity and fundamentals is being overlooked, similar to how
thinking has always evolved, from chaos to clarity.

Devin Harris
Received on Sun Jul 11 1999 - 16:13:27 PDT