Yes, you're right. Still I think my argument holds. The production of
the rifle, bullet and geiger counter system plus the geiger counter
operation should produce more than enough entropy to compensate for
the atom not decaying.
On Thu, Apr 17, 2008 at 1:45 PM, Michael Rosefield
<rosyatrandom.domain.name.hidden> wrote:
> It's not so much the input of energy, it's the production of more entropy
> where the energy is taken from.
>
>
>
> On 17/04/2008, Telmo Menezes <telmo.domain.name.hidden> wrote:
> >
> > I would like to argue that in setting this experiment, energy is being
> > expended to prevent the increase in entropy, albeit not in an obvious
> > way.
> >
> > It is a trivial observation that systems may be devised that prevent
> > increases in entropy by paying energy costs. One example is an ice
> > cube in the freezer.
> >
> > In the case of this experiment, and assuming MWI, we are creating a
> > scenario where the atomic decay is not possible from the
> > experimenter's perspective. However, the experimenter is setting a
> > system that includes the rifle and the geiger counter. Both these
> > devices need energy to operate. Maybe it's just a convoluted version
> > of the ice cube in the freezer?
> >
> > Best regards,
> > Telmo Menezes.
> >
> > On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 12:18 AM, nichomachus
> >
> > <Steven.Payne.Long.domain.name.hidden> wrote:
> > >
> >
> > > In the description of the quantum immortality gedanken experiment, a
> > > physicist rigs an automatic rifle to a geiger counter to fire into him
> > > upon the detection of an atomic decay event from a bit of radioactive
> > > material. If the many worlds hypothesis is true, the self-awareness of
> > > the physicist will continue to find himself alive after any length of
> > > time in front of his gun, since there exist parallel worlds where the
> > > decay does not occur.
> > >
> > > On a microscopic scale this is analogous to the observing a reality in
> > > which the second law of thermodynamics does not hold. for example,
> > > since there is a non-zero probability that molecular interactions will
> > > result in a decrease in entropy in a particular sealed volume under
> > > observation, there exist histories in which this must be observed.
> > >
> > > This is never observed. Therefore the MWI is shown to be false.
> > > >
> > >
> >
> >
> > > >
> >
>
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Received on Thu Apr 17 2008 - 09:02:56 PDT