Eternal return

[Eva]

Given that time is irreversible, and global entropy always increase:

1. In principle, sooner or later, every living system such as human being, or humanity will be annihilated? 

2. In principle, if system is annihilated then it is irreversible - a system with the same internal structure may be created, but it will not be the very same system, it may be (at most) perfectly isomorphic, but it will not share the same identity?

So, for example, if I die, and hypothetically, in the distant future, an exact copy of my body will be made than it will be an exact copy of my body and consciousness, but not my current identity, so my consciousness will not reappear after my death like from deep sleep.


I would like to ask you - in your opinion, my two above conclusions are correct?



I'm sorry for bothering you with this question, I have encountered statements that every situation, and every particular life, return endlessly because the time is infinite, but the number of possibile configurations of atoms is finite. This idea is terrible. I don't want repeat my life forever :(

Some people also talk about "eternal return" in the context of 4D block universe theory where every situation is timless.

P.S.


I've previously made a similar topic in context of Peter Rowlands "Zero-totality"
works but it did not appeared after sending :(

[Cosmin Visan]

Time is a quale in consciousness.

[Russell Standish]

On Fri, Jun 21, 2019 at 09:27:49AM -0700, Eva wrote:
> Given that time is irreversible, and global entropy always increase:
>
> 1. In principle, sooner or later, every living system such as human being, or humanity will be annihilated? 
>
> 2. In principle, if system is annihilated then it is irreversible - a system with the same internal structure may be created, but it will not be the very same system, it may be (at most) perfectly isomorphic, but it will not share the same identity?
>
> So, for example, if I die, and hypothetically, in the distant future, an exact copy of my body will be made than it will be an exact copy of my body and consciousness, but not my current identity, so my consciousness will not reappear after my death like from deep sleep.
>
>
> I would like to ask you - in your opinion, my two above conclusions are correct?
>

If functionalism were true (a popular position here, and implied by
computationalism), then the exact copy (even near enough copy) will be
identical to you, and your conclusion would be incorrect. If this new
copy follows a slightly different path (perhaps because of a sightly
different environment, or just instrinsic randomness), then your life
continues.

Of course this means an eternal return. But it is nothing to fear - you
will not experience your life over again - each time you will
experience you life as having been lived once, albeit most likely immortally.



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Visiting Senior Research Fellow hpc...@hpcoders.com.au
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[Cosmin Visan]

Have a look at my paper "The Problem of the Self" for some of your wonders: https://philpeople.org/profiles/cosmin-visan

[Lawrence Crowell]

There is Poincare recurrence, where for N distinct quantum states or units of phase space volume occupied the recurrence time is on the order of T = 10^Ndt, for dt the increment of time fundamental to state changes. This might mean dt is the Planck unit of time 10^{-43}sec This is then a huge time if one considers the observable universe with 10^{80} particles, and so this time is 10^{10^{80}}dt. But this is not all, for we may have to consider quantum recurrence time that would be 10^T or 10^{10^{10^{80}}}dt, which curiously is the lower bound on the stability of the de Sitter vacuum. 

To make things a bit more bizarre, if space is flat and infinite R^3 then there will be regions out there with duplicates of you. With the equivalence of space and time the closest should be around 10^{10^{80}}dx for dx the elementary unit of distance most identified as the Planck length 10^{-33}cm. So duplicates of this local world and ourselves may not just be a recurrence in time, but in space as well.

LC

[Brent Meeker]

On 6/21/2019 9:27 AM, Eva wrote:
> Given that time is irreversible, and global entropy always increase:
>
> 1. In principle, sooner or later, every living system such as human being, or humanity will be annihilated?
>
> 2. In principle, if system is annihilated then it is irreversible - a system with the same internal structure may be created, but it will not be the very same system, it may be (at most) perfectly isomorphic, but it will not share the same identity?

Atoms of the same kind are identical.  So if, for example, your body was
recreated, atom for atom, it would as identical as you are identical to
the Eva of a few minutes ago.

>
> So, for example, if I die, and hypothetically, in the distant future, an exact copy of my body will be made than it will be an exact copy of my body and consciousness, but not my current identity, so my consciousness will not reappear after my death like from deep sleep.

It would have your current identity, because it would have your current
memories.  However these would be inconsistent with it's existence in
the far future...so it would be mismatched to reality.

>
>
> I would like to ask you - in your opinion, my two above conclusions are correct?
>
>
>
> I'm sorry for bothering you with this question, I have encountered statements that every situation, and every particular life, return endlessly because the time is infinite, but the number of possibile configurations of atoms is finite. This idea is terrible. I don't want repeat my life forever :(

Nietzsche's eternal return contemplated everything, not just you,
repeating.  But in that case how could it be known to be a repetition. 
It would the same the unique "return" by the identity of
indiscernibles.  Anyway, Nietzsche just meant it as thought experiment
to test your evaluation of your life.

Brent

[spudb...@aol.com]

Yeah, Frank Tipler proposed this more seriously, and Sabine Hossenfelder, more recently., speculatively, via quantum mechanics. Many trans-humanists hate this proposal because, hey, no continuity. Years ago, philosopher, Robert Nozick proposed a pragmatic, closest continuer hypothesis. Basically, In the US we say jokingly, "close enough for government work." 

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[Bruno Marchal]

> On 21 Jun 2019, at 18:27, Eva <evalor...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Given that time is irreversible, and global entropy always increase:
>
> 1. In principle, sooner or later, every living system such as human being, or humanity will be annihilated?

This is false when you assume that the brain or the body is Turing emulable. We are not human living in a physical universe and dreaming about numbers, in that case, but numbers “living” in arithmetic, dreaming being humans in a physical universe.

>
> 2. In principle, if system is annihilated then it is irreversible - a system with the same internal structure may be created, but it will not be the very same system, it may be (at most) perfectly isomorphic, but it will not share the same identity?

Which confirms that you assume some non-mechanist theory of mind. With mechanism, you have infinitely many body/representation in arithmetic, and the physical is “only” a stable statistical appearance.

>
> So, for example, if I die, and hypothetically, in the distant future, an exact copy of my body will be made than it will be an exact copy of my body and consciousness, but not my current identity, so my consciousness will not reappear after my death like from deep sleep.
>
>
> I would like to ask you - in your opinion, my two above conclusions are correct?

You assume a physical universe which would have a primitive ontological status, and this is incoherent with mechanism, but coherent with your quasi explicit non mechanist assumption. But I would say that today, the evidences add up for mechanism, and there is no evidence at all for non mechanism, nor for a physical ontological universe (just a bad habit since Aristotle).

Bruno

>
>
>
> I'm sorry for bothering you with this question, I have encountered statements that every situation, and every particular life, return endlessly because the time is infinite, but the number of possibile configurations of atoms is finite. This idea is terrible. I don't want repeat my life forever :(
>
> Some people also talk about "eternal return" in the context of 4D block universe theory where every situation is timless.
>
> P.S.
>
>
> I've previously made a similar topic in context of Peter Rowlands "Zero-totality"
> works but it did not appeared after sending :(
>

> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group.

> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-li...@googlegroups.com.

[John Clark]

On Mon, Jun 24, 2019 at 1:51 AM spudboy100 via Everything List <everyth...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

>Yeah, Frank Tipler proposed this more seriously,

In his book The Science Of Immortality Tipler made it clear he didn't think Eternal Return, even if it existed, was any sort of immortality. He said that if you're in the same state of mind then subjectively doing the same thing an infinite number of times is indistinguishable from doing it only once. Tipler thought that true immortality would require a universe capable of producing a infinite (and not just astronomically large) number of calculations.  And I think Tiplrt was right about that although method he proposed for the universe to do that involved the Big Crunch which we now know will not happen. But maybe the Big Rip is compatible with infinite calculations. 

 

> Many trans-humanists hate this proposal because, hey, no continuity.

Although the external world may jump around discontinuously  subjectively consciousness is always continuous. And when it comes to consciousness subjectivity is all that counts.

John K Clark

 

[Eva]

Russell Standish

> Of course this means an eternal return.
But it is nothing to fear - you
will not experience your life over
again

Ok, but if my life is a nightmare (for example) then, there is something to worry about.

Lawrence Crowell

> To make things a bit more bizarre, if
space is flat and infinite R^3 then
there will be regions out there with
duplicates of you.

Even if it is fact of our reality I don't feel the pain, when duplicate of me, has a wounded finger. She is not me, and duplicate of me in future, will not be me either. Do you agree?

By the way, if I understand you correctly, you equate time and space, so probably you have different views on these issues than Dr. Peter Rowlands - he
claims that time is radically different from space, absolutely continuous and irreversible. I'm not suggesting that this view is better than yours - I'm just saying :)

Brent

> It would the same the unique "return"
by the identity of indiscernibles.

This principle is not so obvious for everybody - for example on this article:
https://golem.ph.utexas.edu/category/2015/02/concepts_of_sameness_part_4.html

mathematician Dr. John Baez presents some objections regarding identity of indiscernibles.

Spudb

> Yeah, Frank Tipler proposed this more

seriously, and Sabine Hossenfelder,
more recently., speculatively, via
quantum mechanics.

Great :) I can't find it. Could you put a link please?

[Philip Thrift]

On Sunday, June 23, 2019 at 8:41:54 AM UTC-5, Eva wrote:

In the genre of theoretical physics having to do with

mirrorverse/biverse |

big bounce - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bounce

we are just in one directed arc of an  infinite cycle.

So there could be many other another approximate yous.

@philipthrift

[Lawrence Crowell]

Don't laugh, but big rip might indeed be the case. The de Sitter vacuum might be more unstable than previously thought. Also the CMB data gives a Hubble parameter H = 68km/s-Mpc while galactic red shift, some .5 by or more after the CMB surface of last scatter, gives 74km/s-Mpc. The vacuum energy density might indeed be increasing or not entirely stable. When the idea of phantom energy and big rip came out I thought it was preposterous, but with observational data and theory suggesting instability of the dS vacuum big rip is a distinct possibility.

LC

 

 

[Lawrence Crowell]

On Tuesday, June 25, 2019 at 7:01:39 AM UTC-5, Eva wrote:

Russell Standish

> Of course this means an eternal return.
  But it is nothing to fear - you
  will not experience your life over
  again

Ok, but if my life is a nightmare (for example) then, there is something to worry about.

Lawrence Crowell

> To make things a bit more bizarre, if
  space is flat and infinite R^3 then
  there will be regions out there with
  duplicates of you.

Even if it is fact of our reality I don't feel the pain, when duplicate of me, has a wounded finger. She is not me, and duplicate of me in future, will not be me either. Do you agree?

By the way, if I understand you correctly, you equate time and space, so probably you have different views on these issues than Dr. Peter Rowlands - he
claims that time is radically different from space, absolutely continuous and irreversible. I'm not suggesting that this view is better than yours - I'm just saying :)

I met Peter Rowlands at a conference over 10 years ago. He had some interesting ideas involving QCD. I am not sure about his ideas here about space vs time. Space and time differ largely in their metric signature. With the dynamics of spacetime vacua the electric and magnetic field analogues are spatial, and if there are sources of the gravitational field then the gravi-electric field can also be timelike. This occurs with static gravitational fields such as a star or planet.

LC

[Eva]

Lawrence Crowell

I love his ideas, they deliver answers to many fundamental questions - why there is something rather than nothing, why Mathematics is so much effective in Physics, what is consciousness etc.

Let me quote a passage about time from his article:

[quote]

"Similarly, space and time are fundamentally different, and not just mathematically, as real and imaginary quantities. The root cause is that time is continuous and space is not. Time’s continuity has many consequences. It means that time is irreversible. To reverse time, we would have to create a discontinuity, a zero-point, and it would no longer be continuous. Time also is not an observable in quantum mechanics, because observables must be discrete. And it is always treated as the independent variable; we write dx / dt, not dt / dx.

The absolute continuity of time is important in the explanation of the paradox of Zeno in which Achilles never catches the tortoise, however fast he runs, if he gives it a start, and the same is true of other paradoxes of a similar nature. Various authors have seen that the problem lies in the assumption that one can divide time into observational units like space. Whitrow, for example,3 writes that: ‘One can, therefore, conclude that the idea of the infinite divisibility of time must be rejected, or … one must recognize that it is … a logical fiction.’ Motion is ‘impossible if time (and, correlatively, space) is divisible ad infinitum’. And Coveney and Highfield4 propose that: ‘Either one can seek to deny the notion of ‘becoming’, in which case time assumes essentially space-like properties; or one must reject the assumption that time, like space, is infinitely divisible into ever smaller portions.’ Perhaps because of the many historical efforts to link space and time in a more than mathematical sense, such authors seem to be reluctant to draw the logical conclusion that the paradox, like many others, really is a result of making things that are fundamentally unlike have the same properties. Space is ‘infinitely divisible into ever smaller portions’; time is not divisible at all. What we call ‘divisions of time’ are not observed through time at all.

Again, all normal physical equations are time-reversible, but time is not. We know this from the second law of thermodynamics." [/quote]


https://www.google.com/amp/s/bsahely.com/2018/06/17/are-there-alternatives-to-our-present-theories-of-physical-reality-by-peter-rowlands/amp/

[Philip Thrift]

On Tuesday, June 25, 2019 at 1:56:40 PM UTC-5, Eva wrote:

https://www.google.com/amp/s/bsahely.com/2018/06/17/are-there-alternatives-to-our-present-theories-of-physical-reality-by-peter-rowlands/amp/

[ points to https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/0912/0912.3433.pdf ]

which seems like muddle to me.

@philipthrift

[Lawrence Crowell]

On Tuesday, June 25, 2019 at 1:56:40 PM UTC-5, Eva wrote:

I looked at the paper Philip referenced. He is big on quaternions. He was interested in a quaternion approach to QCD.

 https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/0912/0912.3433.pdf 

There is a quaternion form of time reversal. I am not sure about his claim that space is discrete and time not.  Spatial and temporal coordinates are interchangeable with Lorentz transformations. A transformation between something that is continuous and another that is discrete would require a sort of incredible "fine tuning." The Fermi and Integral spacecrafts also found that a wide range of spectra arrived from burstars billions of light years away arrived at the same time. If space were discrete, say made of Planck scale cells then a photon with momentum p = ħk would have a propagator G(k, 0) ~ 1/[4π(k^2 - ℓ^{-2})] for ℓ the scale of the discreteness of space. This would mean photons with different wavelengths would have different phase velocities and there was be some dispersion. That is not experimentally found.

He is appealing to entropic time to argue there is not reversal of time with respect to quantum mechanics. The problem is this is two domains of physics. Quantum information and entropy is constant for transformations and evolution of pure states. The relationship between quantum time and entropic time is not entirely known. 

LC

[Samiya Illias]

Eva, 

Interesting questions, and you have already received some interesting answers. I would like to add the following questions: 

Given the pre-human physics that we assume existed, what possibilities were there for humans and other living organisms to appear? 

How do we know for certain our current existence is not a consequence of some prior existence? 

So long as the heavens and earth lasts, will not the basic composition of us last, and possibly come together again in some distant future, perhaps in some alternate form of biochemistry? 

Please consider this: 

https://signsandscience.blogspot.com/2018/04/allah-fatir-of-skies-and-earth.html 

And they say, "Is it when we are bones and crumbled particles, will we surely (be) resurrected (as) a creation new."

Say, "Be stones or iron.

Or a creation of what (is) great in your breasts." Then they will say, "Who will restore us?" Say, "He Who فَطَرَ you (the) first time." Then they will shake at you their heads and they say, "When (will) it (be)?" Say, "Perhaps that (it) will be soon."

(On) the Day He will call you and you will respond with His Praise, and you will think, not you had remained except a little (while).

[Al-Quran 17:49-52]

I think eternal is a word that only applies to God. 

Some creations may be immortal in some phase of their existence, but will still be limited by the existence of where they exist in. 

[smitra]

Entropy, (ir)reversibility etc. are concepts that only appear in an
effective description where you have integrated out the microscopic
dynamics of the system to obtain effective laws of physics in terms of
only macroscopic quantities. In addition to the macroscopic quantities a
few statistical quantities like entropy, temperature etc. will then
appear, they take into account the statistical effect of the microscopic
degrees of freedom. The description is then valid under the assumption
of thermal equilibrium (or local thermal equilibrium).

The exact laws of physics do conserve information, so the present state
of the universe will simply continue to exist until eternity. Time
evolution only scrambles the present state, but all the information in
it will still be in there. E.g. 100 years from now, the present moment
you are experiencing right now will exist physically in a sphere with a
radius of 100 lightyears. Now, other observers in that sphere will cause
that state to effectively collapse from their point of view, so your
present moment won't in practice be accessible to them. However, from
your point of view (as you exist right now) this doesn't matter, because
they will exist in a superposition (entangled with the rest of the
universe) of all possible measurement outcomes, which is then simply the
time evolved state without collapse which preserves information.

This then means that your present moment right now is an eternal,
timeless physical quantity. So, you can just as well take the view that
you already exist in the year 2119 in a scrambled form, distributed over
a sphere with a radius of 100 lightyears and you then subjectively
experience the 100 year old world of 2019 which also exists in a
scrambled form.

Saibal

[Bruno Marchal]

> On 26 Jun 2019, at 14:22, smitra <smi...@zonnet.nl> wrote:
>
> Entropy, (ir)reversibility etc. are concepts that only appear in an effective description where you have integrated out the microscopic dynamics of the system to obtain effective laws of physics in terms of only macroscopic quantities. In addition to the macroscopic quantities a few statistical quantities like entropy, temperature etc. will then appear, they take into account the statistical effect of the microscopic degrees of freedom. The description is then valid under the assumption of thermal equilibrium (or local thermal equilibrium).
>
> The exact laws of physics do conserve information, so the present state of the universe will simply continue to exist until eternity. Time evolution only scrambles the present state, but all the information in it will still be in there. E.g. 100 years from now, the present moment you are experiencing right now will exist physically in a sphere with a radius of 100 lightyears. Now, other observers in that sphere will cause that state to effectively collapse from their point of view, so your present moment won't in practice be accessible to them. However, from your point of view (as you exist right now) this doesn't matter, because they will exist in a superposition (entangled with the rest of the universe) of all possible measurement outcomes, which is then simply the time evolved state without collapse which preserves information.
>
> This then means that your present moment right now is an eternal, timeless physical quantity. So, you can just as well take the view that you already exist in the year 2119 in a scrambled form, distributed over a sphere with a radius of 100 lightyears and you then subjectively experience the 100 year old world of 2019 which also exists in a scrambled form.

OK, assuming there is some physical universe. (Which can be seen as a façon de parler here).

With digital indexical mechanism, all your past and futures states are supported by the true sigma_1 sentences (aka computations), which is out of the category of time and space. Those categories belongs to the indexical “average” view of the machine/number.

If an ontological universe could filtrated the computations in arithmetic, it would mean that some ontological matter is at play in the consciousness phenomenon, and we could no more say “yes” to the doctor in virtue of the digital mechanism hypothesis, we need to add some oracle non recoverable by neither a computation, nor by the first person indeterminacy on all computations.

Mechanism is incompatible with both set theoretical based physicalism, but also with Digital Physicalism. We cannot even add the “invisible horse”, because again, we can’t ask the doctors to keep those invisible horse playing their role when asking him/her to duplicate our brains and truncated them digitally.

The key point, but well known since Gôdel and Turing, if not Post, is that the notion of computation is purely mathematical, despite being based on some philosophical thesis: the Church-Turing thesis (which is necessary to make mathematical sense of “machine”).

Church-Turing’s theses imply quasi-directly incompleteness which imposes the believable, knowable and observable modes of the machines, and the fact that they obey different logics, which “naturally” confusing.

Bruno

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