Fwd: Which universe are we in?

From: Tim May <tcmay.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Tue, 9 Jul 2002 09:56:06 -0700

Apologies.

I accidentally sent this last night to another mailing list. Here it is.

--Tim

Begin forwarded message:
>
> On Monday, July 8, 2002, at 07:43 PM, Stephen Paul King wrote:
>
>> Dear Tim,
>>
>> Are you tacitly assuming some kind of communication between
>> observers
>> when you make the claim of a "convergence"? Adsent said communications,
>> could we show that the convergence would still obtain? Have you ever
>> seen
>> any discussion of the notion of cyclic or periodic gossiping in Comp
>> Sci?
>>
>>
>
> No, I was arguing that while the future may be multi-worlded,
> everything we know about science (evidence, archaeology,
> measurements, ...) points to a _single_ past.
>
> For example, a single past world line for me, for you, for Hal, for
> Chaucer, for Einstein.
>
> Now we may not know what this world line is very accurately, but as we
> look at more closely, e.g., by examining the photographs someone may
> have taken, or their diaries, or whatever, the more we home in on what
> that world line was. We never look closely and see two or three or N
> different histories, we just see a higher fidelity view of what we must
> assume is the One True Past.
>
> I don't doubt that Hal gets the sense that many potential Hals could
> have resulted in the current Hal...an interesting notion. But
> everything does in fact point to a One True Past which various
> measurements get closer and closer to, and which no measurements
> contradict.
>
> This is what I meant by "convergence." Homing in, getting closer,
> sharpening the image, filling in the details.
>
> As for "tacitly assuming some kind of communication between observers,"
> I am _explicitly_ saying that observers get together and compare
> notes...and they find no contradictions, if they are honest observers.
>
> Hal may have meant something different, perhaps.
>
>
> --Tim May
>
> --Tim May
> (.sig for Everything list background)
> Corralitos, CA. Born in 1951. Retired from Intel in 1986.
> Current main interest: category and topos theory, math, quantum
> reality, cosmology.
> Background: physics, Intel, crypto, Cypherpunks
>
>
Received on Tue Jul 09 2002 - 09:58:12 PDT