Many-world interpretation of QM

[Eugene I]

The proponents of MWI claim that it resolves all paradoxes of QM. While it does resolve some of them (such as non-locality), it does not resolve all of them.

There are still a number of problems with MWI:

- It is unfalsifiable

- It does not solve the measurement problem. It simply replaced the "WF collapse" with the "world branching", the latter being as mysterious as the former and requiring an additional axiom to the Schrodinger equation to postulate the "branching" that mysteriously happens for no reason every time a "measurement" (or they call it "decoherence") happens. What is so special about decoherence that causes the world to split? Also, decoherence is a continuous process while the split is the discrete one. At which point there is "enough" amount of decoherence to cause the world to split?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kF6USB2I1iU

- In cases of quantum systems with a continuum of states the world branches into a continuum of uncountably infinite number of worlds (for example at every event of electron detection in the two-slits experiment), because the number of quantum states is uncountably infinite.    

Also:

https://www.quantamagazine.org/why-the-many-worlds-interpretation-of-quantum-mechanics-has-many-problems-20181018/

[David Samson]

Here's a big reason why I don't like the many worlds conjecture. If you take the number of fundamental particles in the universe (betweem 10 to the 78th power & 82nd power) & the basic increment of time during which a fundamental particle can have an interaction (for the sake of argument 1x per nanosecond) & the estimated lifetime of (this) universe (10 to the 27th power ns) then the number of Universes (!!!) would be on the order of 10 to the 105th power FACTORIAL!

That is a number (of universes) so large as to be meaningless.

[Rigpa]

Not to mention it's materialist garbage fantasy. 

[Sci Patel]

If you have to invent an undetectable exponential explosion of universes to account for the wave function collapse of a single particle...probably time get some fresh air...

[Rigpa]

Sci! 😂

[Rigpa]

[Ben Iscatus]

Not to mention it's materialist garbage fantasy. 

:))

[Dave Wheeler]

"Not to mention it's materialist garbage fantasy."

Yep!

[Danny]

Funnily enough, that's largely what the critic of Kastrup on his thread was arguing in favour of. According to this Quantum Physicist Redditor, MWI is the 'best interpretation of QM' and if you don't agree with him or his favourite physicalist physicist, Sean Carroll, you 'simply haven't studied/don't understand Quantum Physics'.

I had no idea about these flaws, or even the fact that it's unfalsifiable.

I don't trust Carroll anyways. He comes across as very condescending and arrogant, and he's admitted apparently in interviews that he's not interested in researching any evidence that consciousness isn't produced by the brain, e.g. NDEs and terminal lucidity. Confirmation Bias anyone?

[David Samson]

Actually, factorial is much much worse than exponential - it grows much faster

https://math.stackexchange.com/questions/351815/do-factorials-really-grow-faster-than-exponential-functions

10 to the 105th! is an absolutely ridiculous number that dwarves 10 to the 105th by many, many orders of magnitude (& according to the many universes theory is growing much, much larger all the time.)

Keep in mind that this number that is so large as to be meaningless is not the number of particles -  IT IS THE NUMBER OF ENTIRE UNIVERSES!

[Eugene I]

the number of Universes (!!!) would be on the order of 10 to the 105th power FACTORIAL!

Apparently the proponents of MWI have no problem with that: 

DeWitt (1970): "This universe is constantly splitting into a stupendous number of branches, all resulting from measurement-like interactions between its myriad of 3 components. Moreover, every quantum transition taking place on every star, in every galaxy, in every corner of the universe is splitting our local world on earth into myriads of copies of itself"

Actually, the Everett's own interpretation was different from DeWitt's: it's not the universe that splits at each decoherence event, but rather it is the states of the observer that split (consciousness split), while the universe always exists in form of a huge blobject WF with enormous number of quantum states. Yet, the Everett's interpretation still requires an additional axiom to the Schrodinger equation to explain the split of the consciousness/observer. 

A good overview here:

https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1801/1801.08587.pdf

But many physicist don't even bother with QM interpretations simply because they consider the QM incomplete due to its incompatibility with relativity. From this perspective the QM is a temporary theoretical framework to be later replaced with more appropriate framework. So, why bother with interpretations of a model that is known to be inaccurate and temporary and doomed to be replaced with a different model?  

[Brad Walker]

MWI seems solipsistic. According to it, magically one path of me experiences for each encountered sentient being one path of virtually infinite; everything I experience is "my world". Without a theory of continuity of consciousness, it seems the actual one of you I extrapolate from the actual one of me is virtually improbable to be the path that I encounter. Why aren't the virtual infinitude of you p-zombies?

[Brad Walker]

MWI and the Boltzmann brain-dominated Multiverse are malfunctioning reductio ad absurdums of the Copernican principle and anthropicism/atheism, respectively. The latter has hope of mathematical progress.

[J Finch]

It raises an interesting question, just where is the present experience located in time? Each decoherence perhaps, I don't know. As ever, physicists are divided on the issue

[Brad Walker]

If conscious observation does drive collapse somehow, it's the basis for a perfect sentience detector usable for any species.

[Sci Patel]

Rigpa - been meaning to ask if this is a Rigpa original?

[Brad Walker]

Does the MWI magnify the fine-tuning problem? A universe with virtually infinite parallel worlds seems rarer than ones without.

[Rigpa]

Sci,

Sadly that comic is not my doing. Hilariously nonetheless!