The Revelation Problem - speculations, misgivings

[mothwentbad]

It may be that the only possible statement of what the laws of the universe are is the universe itself - perhaps no strict subset can possibly represent the complete theory of everything for the whole. Maybe there's an intrinsic problem of choosing what to lie about and oversimplify, and so nothing can ever be said about anything without lying.

Comments

[st_rev]

There's strong evidence that the laws are epsilon-close to invariant under a fairly large symmetry group. So it's not a subset you want to look at, but a quotient.

[mothwentbad]

Then to make a revelation, there has to be some reason for choosing one quotient instead of another.

[st_rev]

What's a revelation?

[mothwentbad]

I think it's a purple monkey dishwasher.

Or maybe a choice of quotient, and a choice of notation. Or something!

Mostly, it doesn't make sense.

You say such interesting things sometimes

[bec_87rb]

It may be that the only possible statement of what the laws of the universe are is the universe itself - perhaps no strict subset can possibly represent the complete theory of everything for the whole. Maybe there's an intrinsic problem of choosing what to lie about and oversimplify, and so nothing can ever be said about anything without lyingI have had similar thoughts, usually during boring meetings. Any simple elegant formulation of Everything is reductive; per force, it takes a slice, a POV on Everything. I really think is it a limitation of the human mind - in-built and probably immutable - that it can only hold a few elements in active consciousness at a time, so it tends to favor the simple elegant formulation. Not because they are better, but because we can get our tiny heads around them

Re: You say such interesting things sometimes

[mothwentbad]

I don't think it's necessary to say that there's an act of hiding things or protecting us or anything like that going on. The phenomenon of subsets of the system converging on some approximate representation of the laws can be expected, but what you can't expect is for the programmers at Blizzard to "tell" the Zerglings what they are.

Re: You say such interesting things sometimes

[bec_87rb]

I really like the idea of subsets of the system converging to some approximate model, some Rules of Universal Thumb. I like the bottom-up-ness of it, as oppose to the implied top-downess of traditional science.

Re: You say such interesting things sometimes

[mothwentbad]

Well, I'm not so sure that it's an inevitable a priori rule, but we seem to be headed that way for the moment. But it's not all puppies and Star Trek yet.

Nothing is omitted. Everything is represented.

[jhvilas]

I have a feeling that if the universe were somehow representable in a smaller format, it would have already collapsed upon that smaller representation. Also, if smaller representations were possible, then they could be spit out, and would probably be off somewhere breeding, or at least sporulating. Of course, one or the other of the above is perhaps already happening; I have no way to prove the matter. But what's the use of calling something a universe if you can't treat it that way?

BTW, revelation sucks, but I'll take a revelation over not knowing any day.

Re: Nothing is omitted. Everything is represented.

[mothwentbad]

But if I know what I'm talking about above (big qualifier), then wishing for revelation just doesn't even make sense. It's like wishing for sploog arf zoomba dabba doo and 4=7.

Re: Nothing is omitted. Everything is represented.

[bec_87rb]

So you have never had a religious revelation?

Re: Nothing is omitted. Everything is represented.

[mothwentbad]

Nope.