BTW David M ... I read Shimon Malin, not blogged any comments yet. It was good to read the words of "someone else involved first hand" in this popularized area of science, though I have to say from the quantum side I didn't find a lot new, other than an excellent lead in to Whitehead's "process view" ... (a couple of other recent reads there to review too.)
I'm convinced the Dirac thread will lead to some fundamental new understandings - the BCS Quantum Computation people seem to think so too - Strong AI - consciousness as computation angle. Shimon Malin would be a good read for anyone wanting to get into an enlightened (alt-Copenhagen) view of QM. That said, I found some of his illustrative examples (the conversations between the fictional couple) were a bit simplistic, though I wouldn't agree with Krimel, that this truth vs clarity is a problematic trade-off. The truth will always be unclear in the language (and culture) of previous metaphors for truth. Occupational hazard - whilst not being an excuse for lack of clarity, naturally. Ian On 5/8/07, David M <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Krim > > See comments > > > [David M] > > Cause is the wrong word and not the point I am trying to make. > > Future event is also the wrong concept, as events are actual and present > > and I'd not suggest any future pre-existence. > > > > Rather I am pointing out that in processes that have tendencies of outcome > > rather than certainties of outcome, there is implied in such a process a > > set > > of possible states, only one of which will become actual, and therefore > > what > > becomes actual is limited by the possibilities available. Beyond these lie > > the impossible, but within what is possible a choice has to be made, it is > > called the collapse of the wave function by physicists, where as Dirac > > says 'nature makes a choice', at the human level we just say we make our > > existential > > choice. > > > > [Krimel] > > Sometimes I thing you and I are grappling with the same concepts, we just > > can not agree on the vocabulary to capture them. History does tend to have > > some kind of inertia. So for example we have confidence that the sun will > > rise. But tomorrow's sunrise is not a factor in allowing us to conclude > > that > > it will happen. It is the string of past sunrises that gives us confidence > > in tomorrow. We have confidence in the occurrence of future events because > > of their consistence in the past. It is the past that lets us construct > > the > > future. > > DM: Yes, but I hope to improve your concepts as they are too narrow for my > liking. > > > > > As for Dirac's quote, don't you think that many of these quotes from > > physicist are often given in an attempt to simplify their subject for > > general consumption? I mean I love them too and am fond of quoting them > > but > > aren't they often constructed so as to sacrifice clarity for truth? > > > > DM: No because I am borrowing this quote & idea from the physicist Shimon > Malin > who knew Dirac. > > > > moq_discuss mailing list > Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. > http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org > Archives: > http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ > http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/ > moq_discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
