> On 21 Oct 2019, at 02:55, Bruce Kellett <[email protected]> wrote: > > On Mon, Oct 21, 2019 at 11:35 AM 'Brent Meeker' via Everything List > <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> > wrote: > On 10/20/2019 4:58 PM, Alan Grayson wrote: >> I thought you might say this. OK, then what function does decoherence have >> in possibly solving the apparent paradox of a cat alive and dead >> simultaneously. TIA, AG > > It doesn't necessarily solve "that problem". Rather it shows why you can > never detect such a state, assuming you buy Zurek's idea of envariance. One > way to look at it is it's the answer to Heisenberg's question: Where is the > cut between the quantum and the classical? Once envriance has acted, then > the result is classical, i.e. you can ignore the other possibilities and > renormalize the wave function. > > And if Bruno adds "But the superposition never vanishes", I would ask him to > show me one situation in which this makes any difference at all. FAPP means > "For All Practical Purposes". If something has no practical purpose, what > actual use is it to physics? And we are doing physics here, after all. > Metaphysics is "all in your mind", and I can have different things in my mind > but still do physics.
We are trying here to get a coherent picture of reality, whatever it can be. Without adding some strong non-mechanist axiom in your theory of mind, physics fails to predict that you will feel like seeing an eclipse when it predict that there will be an eclipse, as you have an infinity of computational continuations in arithmetic. Physics works very well with an highly non mechanist theory of mind, but then we have to abandon Darwinism, molecular biology, and even quantum mechanics without collapse. With collapse, you have to explain the non-mechanist theory of mind that you are using, if you want a theory of everything. There is no problem with FAPP, but when interested in the search of a reality, that simply does not work. Advantage of mechanism: it explains, in testable way the origin of both quanta and the qualia in a coherent manner. The only difficulty is technical, and perhaps “religious”, as some people are attached to their metaphysical conception of matter. With mechanism, the appearance of matter is explained entirely by elementary arithmetic. As you seem to disbelieve in the mechanist theory of mind, there is no problem with your approach, even less if you limit yourself to the study of local predictions FAPP. But from a fundamental science, that does not work. Bruno > > Bruce > > -- > 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] > <mailto:[email protected]>. > To view this discussion on the web visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/CAFxXSLSYr1a6jWO5TQ-MzH-pvev_fv5%2B2_57GUitwi0OK3xvgQ%40mail.gmail.com > > <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/CAFxXSLSYr1a6jWO5TQ-MzH-pvev_fv5%2B2_57GUitwi0OK3xvgQ%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>. -- 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 view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/3BE3D1E6-A4FA-4253-9109-FE66A469966C%40ulb.ac.be.
