RE: Equivalence

From: Lee Corbin <lcorbin.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Sat, 4 Jun 2005 10:24:11 -0700

Sorry, but I don't have much of an idea of what is being discussed
in this thread. Could you try to enlighten me?

Rmiller originally wrote

> Equivalence
> If the individual exists simultaneously across a many-world manifold, then
> how can one even define a "copy?"

Well, I would say this (i.e., those words mean the following to me):

Are you asking what the *meaning* of copy is in this context? That is,
are you suggesting that from a physics standpoint, if we have two
identical (or nearly identical) quantum states at different points
of the multiverse, then how can *one* of them be picked out as a
copy of the *other*? I agree it seems reflexive; that is, if A is
a copy of B, then B is a copy of A. But I don't see the significance
of where this is leading.

1. An *exact* copy (which I think you are talking about) could in
   principle be obtained from a machine that made an exact molecular
   replicant of one. Let us further stipulate that one's *exact*
   environment (say out to a few light-seconds) is also duplicated.
   Then the person has two copies both having identical experiences.
   In fact, I would use this to help *define* what is meant by existing
   "simultaneously" across a many-world manifold.


> If the words match at some points and differ at others, then the
> personality would at a maximum, do likewise---though this is not
> necessary---or, for some perhaps, not even likely.

What? What do you mean by "the words match"? Do you mean that if
each copy happens to be speaking?

> It's been long established that the inner world we navigate is an
> abstraction of the "real thing"---even if the real world only consists of
> one version. If it consists of several versions, blended into one another,
> then how can we differentiate between them?

By the "inner world" being an abstraction of the "real thing", I guess
that you mean our perception of 3 space around us is not an identical
map of the 3 space around us. Is that right? But how could the
real world be one version? Or do you mean one instance from a set
of identical versions?

> From a mathematical POV, 200
> worlds that are absolute copies of themselves, are equivalent to one world.

Yes, it is a convention of set theory that the set {1, 2, 3, 1, 4, 5}
really has only five elements, not six. But a good number of us here
suppose that just as in probability and measure theory, a single point
can be associated with either a high or low probability.

But one is free to observe, say, N electrons all in the same state. We
persist in regarding these as separate electrons, and I don't think
that there is anything wrong with that. It does depend on how you look
at it (is there only one electron in the universe? Feynman and Wheeler
suppose that there was in one paper).

> If these worlds differ minutely in areas *not encountered or interacted
> with by the percipient (individual), then again we have one percipient, one
> world-equivalent...

I just couldn't follow any more of what you are saying.

Thanks for any clarification,

Lee
Received on Sat Jun 04 2005 - 13:26:51 PDT