On Wed, Feb 19, 2014 at 03:42:48AM +0000, chris peck wrote: > >>how can facts exist that are not grounded in observation at some point? > > Russell and Liz are wandering around the countryside and Liz points at the > ground and says: > > "there's a gold coin buried right there." > > Russell says: > > "no there isn't" > > They both walk on without looking. And in the subsequent march of history no > - one ever looks. > > Surely, at least one unobserved fact was stated? Maybe even 2 if you are an > MWIer.
Nice example. I would say it is not a fact (in this universe). Of course, in the Multiverse, there will be observers of both facts, as well as worlds, like ours, in which it is not a fact (a superposition in other words). But I can see that someone like Deutsch would say that the Multiverse is decohered, and that there is a matter of fact about whether the coin is there, even if we don't know it. I just happen to disagree with Deutsch, and can think of no experiment to distinguish whether he's right or I'm right. -- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Prof Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile) Principal, High Performance Coders Visiting Professor of Mathematics [email protected] University of New South Wales http://www.hpcoders.com.au ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- 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 [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
