Nubulous comments on Great post on Reddit about accepting atheism - Less Wrong

14 Post author: cousin_it 30 August 2009 08:56PM

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Comment author: Nubulous 01 September 2009 05:29:23AM 1 point [-]

I had assumed that microscopic reversibility and a large set of measurements were all that was required. Could you explain where my assumption is wrong ?

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 01 September 2009 07:28:44AM *  3 points [-]

Quantum mechanics (in any interpretation, not just many-worlds) makes this impossible even in principle; the necessary information can't be retrieved, and may not even be present in any one quantum outcome. Even under classical mechanics, you need exact measurements of essentially the whole universe, including photons on their way to infinity, meaning that you need sensors and computers that are larger than and outside of the universe.