What can we know of reality?

[modest]

Originally Posted by arkain101

Thanks for pointing out that specific misuse of words. You interpreted it exactly how I was trying to avoid. *shucks*. I edited the question, to this:

And what this says in other words is, how do we still have a bundle of mass and energy, that correlates to that of a planet in the "B" respect? (unknown light traveling from unknown source to here, so that it can be transformed into a mental projection)

Well, now I'm not sure what you're getting at. Energy and mass, like the planet, are map entities. The idea is that we do not have absolute knowledge of reality nor any access to the fundamental nature of reality. What we have are a set of beliefs and concepts built up over time from our perception of reality. And, perception itself always mediates between reality and 'us' so that any human concept such as energy or mass must be considered part of a map of reality and never part of the territory itself. Asking how we know there's a bundle of mass and energy out there making up the planet: we don't. It's not because the planet is far away and we have only observations with a telescope to understand the planet, but rather because the way we define reality is not reality itself.

Map?territory relation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

~modest

[AnssiH]

Originally Posted by arkain101

[I]Notes:
In this theory (you do call it a theory right?) based upon your fundamental equation, I've come to recognize a problem. At least, a problem that I have found when making this investigation on my own terms. I have produced a possible solution but I have yet to be bothered dive into heavy math to validate that solution.

...

"Whether we think of an object, like a planet, as known(A) -where in this respect it is projected to exist in a location-, or if we think of an object as a point of origin where unknown data -in higher concentration relative to other locations- makes its way to the observer "ready to be processed and mentally projected", the conclusions are essentially the same.

...

Plausible Question(this is specifically the question I am looking for you to answer)

So the question is, how can we successfully call it (transfer it to the catagory) an unknown without essentially causing its attritbutes (that do all these things: It refuses change due to its mass/inertia. It warps space-time around it according to relativity. Objects can crash into it. It reflects light.) to disapear?

(I want to make sure the question is absolutely clear so I am going to type it again with the bracket section removed and add to it a bit more detail.)

So the question is, how can we successfully call that zone an unknown without essentially causing its attritbutes to disapear. And what this says in other words is, how do we still have a bundle of mass and energy, that correlates to that of a planet in the "B" respect? ((unknown light traveling from unknown source to here, so that it can be transformed into a mental projection)

I think what you are trying to ask is, how can we expect to handle or investigate any aspect of the "unknown form" (can we just say noumena as per Kant?) when it is, indeed, fundamentally unknown. I.e., what are we able to say about it after removing all human definitions.

I'm guessing you recognized that, while you were forced to use words like "force" and "mass" and "energy", it wasn't really fair to refer to those concepts. Same goes for "zone", and your earlier description of "higher concentration" of "something".

If I'm reading you right, then yes, that is exactly the problem that the epistemological analysis is set to overcome. It is not set to handle the unknown itself (i.e. it is not about ontology), it is set to handle the impact, of the fact that noumena is unknown, to our worldviews (i.e. it is about epistemology)

Like Modest is implying, at this stage you are going to only bring in extra baggage if you try to "imagine" the noumena in any given form at all. You should not do that.

What we are concerned with is, what are the consequences of classifying patterns - any sorts of patterns - into a model that refers to those patterns in terms of some set of persistent entities. I.e. a model that supposes "such and such pattern means there is an electron there". or "such and such pattern means there is a cat sitting in a tree"

Don't try to imagine what the patterns "look like" or "are like", as you'd be immediately facing exactly the problem you are starting to recognize. Instead, concentrate on the fact that we can know something about the world models that are based on "patterns". We know, that the world models exhibit certain characteristics (the few specific symmetries to the labels of defined entities, regardless of what those defined entities may be, and how they may have been defined). All this while we still don't know anything about the reality behind the patterns!

I think, now that you are starting to see this problem, you should go back to when I started to respond to Rade, trying to explain exactly this issue (the issue referred to as "handling undefined ontological elements"). I think you should be able to understand exactly what I'm trying to communicate there.

Plausible Solution

My solution involves acknowledging a plausible mistake. That mistake is that we neglect to think under the terms and conditions of Einsteinian Relativity & Quantum Physics, and have resorted to the 'Naive-Newtonian-Cornerstone' , picture/idea/conception of reality.

You are not going to find a better view from relativity or quantum physics in this context really. Well, better, in the sense that it is more accurate predictionwise, i.e. it is "more valid" than the newtonian view, but it will not help you with the problem with ontology that you have uncovered.

Also, I'd be interested to know what made you think we have resorted to a newtonian view in terms of this problem? I understand many things I've said in my posts about dimensionality may have easily given you that impression, but I have to repeat that the talk about newtonian picture being valid is not something we have started with, it is the result of the analysis. And when I say "valid", I mean approximately valid way to represent the data, not absolutely valid, and definitely not ontologically valid. This analysis will never tell you what the the actual ontological reality is like, it only investigates the possibilities regarding valid worldviews. And they are always a mere representation of the terrain, as you can never find out any information about any real identity of anything.

However, if you do let go of the idea of ontological identity of objects, and think about the results of the analysis in terms of "how we come to classify unknown patterns into objects in our mind", it does imply something quite interesting about quantum strangeness, does it not? (read my comments about Bell experiments)

Finally, like Modest asked; "The question is: given something which is completely unknown, how do you build a useful map?". That is indeed the question, it is the question I had no answer for before understanding DD's work. My thoughts were just that evolution apparently has found a way to represent reality in a meaningful way (build a predictive model), and that each specific worldview could be seen as a self-coherent set of assumptions (hence the labeling "semantical worldview").

That would be essentially a "trial and error" solution (start making assumptions in self-coherent fashion, until they yield a meaningful and prediction-wise valid interpretation for the data).

But, the epistemological analysis is an explanation for how certain relationships are uncovered from the fact that the meaning of the patterns is unknown, and how those relationships amount to exactly the relationships that are commonly seen as "the relationships governing reality". Those relationships give you the means to assign identity to patterns in such way that reality is represented in self-coherent and simple fashion (simple as in, far simpler than seeing each recurring occurrence of any pattern as an entirely new object). And, the resulting definitions are objects that are seen to approximately obey newtonian mechanics, and more accurately, relativity and quantum mechanics, etc... I'm sure you get the idea if you carefully read my earlier posts.

-Anssi

[arkain101]

Thank you for the attention to the presentation of the problem.

First, Modest.

I did not change the question in order to acquire a different answer, I changed it because it was not stated as the way I expected a person would be thinking it, when recognizing the problem.

Now,
It appears that maybe you (the readers) interpreted that I was asking a question in the way that "I can't understand how to answer it", which I was not. I was recognizing a problem that seemed to me to be a common road block that people would run into.

See that I was not speaking for myself.

A person considers the following (the plausible problem):

Then, naturally the person might pose this question based on the obstacle they've considered is a plausible problem and requires furhter undestanding:

How can we successfully classify what we see as an object as an unknown without essentially causing all of its attritbutes to disapear?

Finally, I share 'my' solution to that obstacle one might consider a possible / plausible problem.

My solution involves acknowledging a plausible mistake in respect to "A" thinking. That mistake is that we neglect to think under the terms and conditions of Einsteinian Relativity & Quantum Physics, and have remained using the naturally evolved 'Naive-Newtonian-Cornerstone' picture/idea/conception of what epistemological reality really is (A).

example:

So in order for a person to progress passed this obstacle that they have considered that might be a problem (hence plausible problem), I believe it would serve to be useful, for them to ignore the natural visual comprehension (this is what I meant by newtonian view ie "persistent unchanging real objects"), and move into relativity and quantum acceptance in respect to "A". Doing this, I expect will essentially provide a more acceptable method for a mind to let go of ontological identity of objects. I find it is easier to transition to that idea, when you move into the acceptance of nature having detectable "strangeness", discovered in our epistemological experimenets. You both seem very educated, in relation to these kinds of physics, and might have not consider the fact that some readers, or students of this analysis?(i keep lacking the right word for here) are yet barely able to consider the transition from the epistemological newtonian reality to even the Einsteinian or Quantum.. As such, it would be expect that a student would suffer great difficulty to jump even further to the point where essentially you are telling them, everything you see, touch, and feel is in your head, you dont have projectors on your forhead projecting a hologram, its projecting in your head. :

quoting your submission of the same idea.

do let go of the idea of ontological identity of objects, and think about the results of the analysis in terms of "how we come to classify unknown patterns into objects in our mind

That is, letting go of what you are certain ontological reality is.


Anssih and Modest, you provided your explanations thankfully, but I don't suppose you meant to in terms of sharing an answer directed towards an audience (as I was trying to embody something of a journalist), as much as you directed it to me personally and where to go to find answers. via links. I was hoping for an response addressing this issue alone.

So, I will accept this as, fair enough, you have both linked/direct to places that help explain how to deal with "handling undefined ontological elements". However, I am unsatisfied in the sense that I have not received direct responses in the way that I can not really collect a remarkable set of clear and concise individual posts which I could print out or save in a folder, or what have you to keep on record to be used for future purposes.

In other words I wanted collect responses from other people, in their words.

[Doctordick]

Originally Posted by AnssiH

Hmmm, I think I see a pattern here, as in me and DD are trying to explain the issues from as coherent perspective as we manage, which only results to complaints saying that we are not really addressing your specific arguments... Well, I can assure you all that I'm trying to address your arguments as accurately as I can!

Thank you Anssi for your valiant attempts.

Well modest, I was very disappointed to read your response. I can only take it as an attempt to obfuscate matters in order to dismiss my work as “crackpottery”. But I will give you the benefit of the doubt and answer this post. If I get the same kind of response again, I will presume you have no interest in understanding what Anssi and I are talking about.

Originally Posted by modest

Your comment "If every object in the universe is a banana" shows a misunderstanding.

A misunderstanding of what? Unless you have edited your original post, you said, “By the way, I could use your argument to assert that it is always useful to have a worldview where every object in the universe is a banana.”

Originally Posted by modest

I cannot know the real nature of 'elements' in the universe. I'm representing them as a banana regardless of their real nature.

Then why did you use the term “banana” if not to simply obfuscate matters? Use of a common word which in fact, by convention, does indeed presume one knows the “real nature of the elements of the universe” (assumes the reader knows what a banana is), a direct contradiction of your current post. Why didn't you have the decency to use a less weighted term; like “element”. At least you might then avoid implying that you intended to bring with the word all the common baggage of definition.

Originally Posted by modest

I'm equally at a loss as to what Anssi means that any ontology is usefully expressed in 3D. I do not understand his explanation.

That is right, you have clearly made no attempt to understand that issue; instead, you want that issue explained in your paradigm where you presume dimensionality is a real characteristic of reality. It appears to me that you simply wish very much to simply remain blind to the fact that there might be another way to look at the issue.

Originally Posted by modest

"Assuming that whatever the real nature of the universe is..." is exactly what this quote does:

No it does not. What Anssi is trying to express is the fact that my attack begins with exactly the issue that one “cannot know the real nature of 'elements' in the universe”. That is not an assumption, it is an open minded attack on the problem of creating an explanation of something you “do not know the real nature of”. Apparently the very question you do not wish to face. I think Idsoftwaresteve put your position in a metaphor of excellent clarity.

Originally Posted by ldsoftwaresteve

All of the recent disagreements seem to me to be like the guy who is standing next to the pool looking for a reason not to jump in. And in this case, it's the math that needs to be looked at.

The water IS cold AND wet and my willy WILL shrivel. Look at the pretty puppy!

1... 2.... uh, where is my sunblock?

You just want to distract the discussion from the subject; no? Is that what this is all about?

Originally Posted by modest

If there is a valid explanation for how a 3D representation is useful and valid for *any* ontology then I've yet to see it. In asking to see it I've gotten nothing but the assumption repeated.

I am trying to make the issue clear in my thread, What I believe an explanation is! I notice that you have posted there. If the only reason you are there is to find some excuse not to look at the math then you are wasting both your time and mine. I hope that is not your intention. I also note that you have made no further post after I answered your last complaints. Or maybe you just need some sunblock?

Originally Posted by modest

Schrodinger's equation is just as valid in 4D as 3D.

If you followed my work, you would discover that a one dimensional view of the universe is sufficient to “understand” any conceivable universe; but before you can get there, you have to have a clear definition of “understanding”. So long as all you do is make attempts to muddy that issue, you can not expect to achieve understanding of what Anssi and I are talking about.

What the one dimensional picture lacks is some simple mathematical relationships which only begin to appear in a two dimensional view (where they are still quite limited). In a three dimensional view the available simple mathematical relationships (Newton's laws) become quite a bit more powerful. In fact, I would suggest that if your understanding is to be limited to the behavior of anthropomorphic objects (collections of elements sufficiently stable and sufficiently large to be regarded as anthropomorphic entities unto themselves) a three dimensional view is, in fact, “the simplest view generating easy predictions of behavior of most all objects both static and dynamic” which might impact the issue of your survival. Our brains stop there because there is little common necessity to go any further.

It certainly does not require “the universe” has explicit dimensionality. Your tesseract is just another banana. It is something defined in your world view from a logical perspective not an intuitive perspective. You have found no “realistic” application of the idea to real world objects for the very simple reason that your “real world” perception of the universe ceases at three dimensions. I have just given you a very good reason for that fact. Your world view is, in fact, created through a mechanism I call “squirrel thought” and cannot be checked by logic. If you want to understand that comment, you need to read my post Defining the nature of rational discussion.

The following quote is particularly appropriate

Originally Posted by Doctordick

Squirrel thought has its own strengths and weaknesses. Its strength lies in the astonishing number of factors which may be taken into account. Its weakness is the fact that the process can not be validated: i.e., there is no way to prove a squirrel decision is correct. Nevertheless, most of them will be good decisions. Why is that? The answer should be clear. Whatever the mechanisms are, by which those decisions are reached, they have been honed and polished through millions of years of survival; failure to make good "squirrel" decisions has been cleaned from the gene pool by the consequences of the bad decisions.

I still hope we are not at an impasse.

Originally Posted by arkain101

-please take the time to read through

I have read it but I won't comment about much because I find it, for the most part, totally off subject.

Originally Posted by arkain101

In this theory (you do call it a theory right?)

No, it is not a theory by any sense of the word. I carefully define what I mean by "an explanation" and "understanding an explanation" and then explicitly work out the detailed consequences of those definitions. It is essentially a proof, not a theory.

Originally Posted by arkain101

Basically we have two mutually exclusive realities.

No we don't. As far as I am concerned, I have put forth no commitment to any reality of any sort.

Originally Posted by arkain101

... is my solution invalid or valid in your opinion?

What you are expressing is "a belief" and "validity" is not an adjective applicable to a belief. (It is not a quality which can be assigned to a belief; if it can be assigned to an idea, the idea becomes a “fact” and not a “belief” .)

Originally Posted by AnssiH

Did you read what you quoted?

I doubt many people read much on any forum; they just want approbation of their personal beliefs (which they usually presume are facts).

Originally Posted by modest

What we have are a set of beliefs and concepts built up over time from our perception of reality.

Now that is absolutely correct; it is a fact people should not forget. But you should add that time and perceptions are also beliefs as is the concept of “reality” itself.

Originally Posted by arkain101

So, I will accept this as, fair enough, you have both linked/direct to places that help explain how to deal with "handling undefined ontological elements". However, I am unsatisfied in the sense that I have not received direct responses in the way that I can not really collect a remarkable set of clear and concise individual posts which I could print out or save in a folder, or what have you to keep on record to be used for future purposes.

Forums really are not conducive to such an attack. Opening posts are often intended to be such things but the threads are, for the most part, attempts to clarify those opening posts. Actual clarification will end up turning the opening post into a clear and concise expression of the issue: i.e., “understanding” is what is required and the only way to acquire understanding is to ask your own questions.

Have fun -- Dick

[arkain101]

I can't find any form of an attack.. lol

I've been following as much of the discussion as I can, DD. There are 36 pages of it. I agree it may stray from the OP in some ways, but I believe it (including my post) was intended to better understand things we can know.

I am trying to take the neccessary steps towards learning this whole subject related to your fundamental equation (which I can only guess at this point has theory extending off from it.), I don't know what to call "all of this (your topics, and equation)", other than a theory at this point.

No, it is not a theory by any sense of the word. I carefully define what I mean by "an explanation" and "understanding an explanation" and then explicitly work out the detailed consequences of those definitions. It is essentially a proof, not a theory.

Special Relativity can still be classified as a theory, even though it essentially has a lot of proof.

Unless you are talking only about "what we can know topic" than I suppose I follow what you say here in your quote.

Maybe you can help me this way then.

There seems to be several topics related to these matters. The ones I am aware of are.

http://hypography.com/forums/philoso...f-reality.html

http://hypography.com/forums/philoso...elativity.html

http://hypography.com/forums/philoso...nation-is.html

http://hypography.com/forums/philoso...ndamental.html

http://hypography.com/forums/philoso...component.html

http://hypography.com/forums/philoso...mensional.html

If there are more, and/or a recommended order to view these posts. I am interested.

[modest]

Originally Posted by AnssiH

Did you read what you quoted? The part where I say that DD's work (i.e. the epistemological analysis under discussion) is the explanation for exactly that issue.

Fair enough.

Originally Posted by AnssiH

That's sort of the point; that Schrödinger's Equation is valid regardless of dimensionality.

I think my trouble is the leap from 'a consistent (or internally consistent perhaps) explanation of unknown data' to what often seems characterized in this thread: 'a useful explanation for any given universe or any given reality'. If I accepted that DD's fundamental equation is indeed something that any consistent explanation of an unknown reality must follow then it would not immediately follow that any explanation derived from the fundamental equation would be a useful explanation for *any* realty. With the example I've been using:

If Newtonian mechanics in 2 dimensions is a useful and self-consistent explanation for some unknown data (or reality) then it should obey the fundamental equation. If Newtonian mechanics in 3 dimensions is a useful and self-consistent explanation for some unknown data (or reality) then it should obey the fundamental equation. It does not follow that deriving 2 dimensional Newtonian mechanics from the fundamental equation means that it will be a useful explanation for any given reality. It's a converse error.

Now, I may be right and I may be wrong about this. But, regardless, I find it troubling that in bringing up the question I've yet to see it resolved by anybody addressing the issue or explaining the analysis. In fact, I've been away from this thread for a couple days (been too busy) and I return to find I've developed some interesting motives in my absence:

Originally Posted by AnssiH

I wanted to point out exactly why that is, because I don't want you to think that "it simply cannot be possible to reach such conclusion", and use that as an excuse to not even look at the proof.

If you feel that you don't have time to invest to examine the proof, that's fine, but I don't think it is fair to claim "it is impossible" without looking at it.

Originally Posted by Doctordick

If the only reason you are there is to find some excuse not to look at the math then you are wasting both your time and mine.

How bizarre. Especially considering:

Originally Posted by Doctordick

Anssi and I are trying very hard not to make any assumptions of any kind.

You might get a better response from respondents if you didn't assume they have odd motivations for asking questions about your analysis.

Originally Posted by Doctordick

Well modest, I was very disappointed to read your response. I can only take it as an attempt to obfuscate matters in order to dismiss my work as “crackpottery”.

If you like. It's funny I've made an attempt over the last couple weeks to gain a better understanding of what you're doing here and I've been very careful not to judge how valid it is until understanding it better (I've actually explicitly said as much) and in return I get my motivations constantly questioned. I can't imagine what that gets you.

Originally Posted by Doctordick

A misunderstanding of what? Unless you have edited your original post, you said, “By the way, I could use your argument to assert that it is always useful to have a worldview where every object in the universe is a banana.”

Thank you for the opportunity to explain. I consider what I said:

Originally Posted by modest

By the way, I could use your argument to assert that it is always useful to have a worldview where every object in the universe is a banana.

To be fundamentally different from how you characterized what I said:

Originally Posted by Doctordick

If every object in the universe is a banana, what purpose is there to concern yourself with “non-banana elements”?

Your comment seems to miss the purpose of the analogy I made. I was certainly not asserting that every ontological element in the universe is a banana any more than Anssi was asserting that our universe is three dimensional. I was saying that the universe could be usefully represented with bananas while the underlying ontology is completely unknown just as Anssi was saying the universe could be usefully represented as 3D while the underlying ontology is unknown.

Clearly the difference (as Anssi has now pointed out) is that you have derived Schrödinger's equation in three-dimensional space with your equation while my banana-analogy has not been so derived. As such, the analogy is ill-made.

Originally Posted by Doctordick

Then why did you use the term “banana” if not to simply obfuscate matters? Use of a common word which in fact, by convention, does indeed presume one knows the “real nature of the elements of the universe” (assumes the reader knows what a banana is), a direct contradiction of your current post. Why didn't you have the decency to use a less weighted term; like “element”. At least you might then avoid implying that you intended to bring with the word all the common baggage of definition.

I see now. You assumed I chose an outrageous word and made an outrageous claim (about the universe being made of bananas) in order to mock what you guys were saying as outrageous. Whatever—I can only spend so much time allaying your assumptions about my motivations. I gain nothing from such a conversation, and I can't imagine what you gain by assuming the worst in what everyone says.

Originally Posted by Doctordick

That is right, you have clearly made no attempt to understand that issue; instead, you want that issue explained in your paradigm where you presume dimensionality is a real characteristic of reality.

Anssi assumed the same thing. If two people have absolutely equivalent worldviews (including the definition of a dimension) except that one worldview is 3D while the other is 4D then the worldviews are mutually exclusive and they cannot both be useful to the same reality. One person will deduce that 6 2D faces are required to bind an element while the other deduces that 24 are required. They can't both be right (if they share the same reality).

That is my current understanding and it does not "presume dimensionality is a real characteristic of reality" but rather presumes that both worldviews have an equivalent definition of a dimension.

Originally Posted by Doctordick

It appears to me that you simply wish very much to simply remain blind to the fact that there might be another way to look at the issue.

I believe it does appear that way to you. How very sad.

~modest

[Doctordick]

Originally Posted by modest

I believe it does appear that way to you. How very sad.

Yes it is sad. Real communication is often the hardest thing to achieve. Misunderstandings are the underlying source of almost all the problems in the world. I sincerely apologize for misinterpreting your responses.

The central misunderstanding here arises because you do not understand the derivation of my fundamental equation. That is very much my fault because the issue is not particularly simple (though it seems quite simple to me). I now understand a lot more about how what I say can be misinterpreted than I did twenty years ago and I am trying to start from scratch and create a presentation which will be clearer. That is the central purpose of my thread “What I believe an explanation is!” I was particularly distraught by (what appeared to be) your failure to respond to my last post there. Please forgive me.

Dick

[Doctordick]

Originally Posted by arkain101

I am trying to take the neccessary steps towards learning this whole subject related to your fundamental equation ... If there are more, and/or a recommended order to view these posts. I am interested.

My recommendation is that you do your best to follow the “What I believe an explanation is!” I intend to develop the whole thing there in as clear a manner as I can manage.

Have fun -- Dick

[AnssiH]

Hi guys, sorry I've been a bit busy...

Originally Posted by arkain101

Now,
It appears that maybe you (the readers) interpreted that I was asking a question in the way that "I can't understand how to answer it", which I was not. I was recognizing a problem that seemed to me to be a common road block that people would run into.

Oh I see, yes, I did misinterpret you there (and I was wondering what happened to you there ), sorry about that.

Anyway, yeah you may be right, it might be easier to see some aspects of this issue when you know about relativity and quantum mechanics and especially if you know about the different ontological interpretations of those theories. On the other hand, when people have invested a lot of time on understanding those theories, they are also more and more aligned to think in those terms and interpret some features of DD's work as merely semantical distortions on the standard ideas.

I think, some people just are more able to question their (hidden) beliefs and end up thinking more about how do they know anything.

At any rate, it certainly doesn't help that most mainstream science publications use really, really really bad language on a regular basis. It always seems to be whatever sounds cool, like "scientists suspect that reality is actually made out of tiny strings", as oppose to talking about how things can be modeled. From my perspective, that sort of language always sounds about as smart as "scientists suspect reality is actually made out of tiny doughnuts" you know exactly what I mean by this right? vibrating strings, doughnuts... are macroscopic behaviour first of all, and semantically defined second of all.

Or you know, "does dark matter exists". Well, define it as "substance that only has got gravitational effect but doesn't affect anything else", then yes you can say "it exists" with the exact same confidence as you can say "electrons exist", as, we see its effect every day.

On the other hand, define it as something that has got a gravitational effect, AND that you can go and give a hug to, then no, we don't yet know if it exists, as we have yet to give dark matter a hug.

OR, you can take a step back and redefine what "gravitation" means (as in TeVes and the variations of). Equally valid!

The mainstream publications always imply that it is the ontological form of reality that is under discussion, and at the same breath they imply that things like "occam's razor" yield us some answers... it's so tiring to me, honestly... :I

(And btw if they understood the epistemological issues involved, even to a slightest degree, then everybody would have been made explicitly aware a long time ago that relativistic simultaneity is a feature of a specific way of modeling the situation - just as an example - and we would have a lot less bickering in the world)

Anyway, sorry again I misread you, I was too hasty.

Oh, on the use of the word "theory", there's a good reason why DD's work really should not be classified as "theory". Like I said before:

Originally Posted by AnssiH

Very important to understand that we are not here theorizing "what reality is like" or "how reality behaves". Not a "theory", and not an argument about ontological reality at all.

What it is, it's an examination of tautologous relationships. If you accept "x", "y" follows.

What is significant is that "x" here is "the unavoidable characteristics of any self-coherent worldview", and "y" is Schrödinger's equation.

It's not a theory, the same way that "1 + 1 equals 2" is not classified as a "theory", in the sense that it does not amount to any argument about reality.

Schrödinger's Equation is reached through algebraic manipulation, so, it's validity rests on the validity of the mathematical tools used, like the validity of any exploration of tautologous relationships through algebra. It never really comes in contact with reality itself, and yet it explains why we see reality this way. That's sort of the point of the whole work, so, that's why DD is so adamant about not calling it a "theory", and I also think that it would only serve to confuse things.

-Anssi

[AnssiH]

While reading other responses, I thought this might be helpful:

Roadmap through this thread

This thread has been through a lot (a week from now will be its 2 year anniversary), and it's been essentially restarted couple of times, so, I guess I should have expected there to be a lot of confusion... I'll just point out what's happened by now.

First, this thread should be viewed as an expanded explanation of this page:
User:UniversalExplanation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

If you understand the issue, and if you know your math, that page is all you need to read, to end up to the "fundamental equation", which is simply a succint expression of those "general symmetry & self-coherence requirements" common to all valid probability functions. That equation is then serving as the starting point, to derive Schrödinger's Equation, among other things.

Posts #1 - #32
The OP started with discussion of the common "chicken vs egg" problem with ontology; "how do we get to know how to interpret sensory data without first knowing what reality is like?" to put it bluntly. That's went on for a while without anyone getting any wiser, apparently. That's the first time this thread died, and I think you can pretty much skip all of it. (Maybe skim through to see that it's pretty much the same complaints being repeated)

In the meantime, DD and I started talking about this same issue in a different thread in a different forum. There was yet another "is time an illusion" thread at Physics Forums, and it kind of got hijacked into a discussion of the actual meat of DD's work. The actual thread has started 3 years ago, and it is very long and has got a lot of unnecessary noise in it. Also, a lot of the discussion between me and DD involved me trying to learn the necessary math concepts (I had absolutely 0 math experience, and really needed a lot of help).

At any rate, post #33 links to the relevant posts about the actual deduction of the fundamental equation, and every tiny step is discussed in significat detail in those posts (albeit, there is also a lot of noise in between, and it should really be condensed)

The discussion from Physics Forums carried on to this thread, from post #34 onwards. Quite a bit of philosophical discussion, but also a lot of math, which is just me trying to learn the necessary concepts. Again, due to my lack of experience with math, pretty much all the algebraic steps have been laid down quite explicitly for anyone to follow, if necessary. I.e. we go through all of this in VERY detailed manner; if you are patient, you don't need to know any math as you can learn everything you need from this thread!

Actually the discussion moves over to the derivation of Schrödinger Equation, with the same significant detail, for anyone who wants to follow it.

While the discussion about the math steps was going on, people started talking about this thread at another "time" thread, and I gave a quick overview about what this thread is about, posting that as post #272

And at post #282 this thread dies again, and the math discussion continues over at a fresh thread dedicated to the derivation of Schrödinger:

That was the second time this thread died. But, it didn't stay dead, and post #283 was my attempt to explain what this is about to Rade.

And that discussion is still going on here.

EDIT: And btw, for anyone who actually knows their math, it is probably easier to follow DDs new attempt to explain it in the new thread.

-Anssi