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Will_Newsome comments on Stupid Questions Open Thread - Less Wrong Discussion

42 Post author: Costanza 29 December 2011 11:23PM

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Comment author: [deleted] 30 December 2011 12:29:00AM 15 points [-]

Well, hmmm. I wonder if this qualifies as "stupid".

Could someone help me summarize the evidence for MWI in the quantum physics sequence? I tried once, and only came up with 1) the fact that collapse postulates are "not nice" (i.e., nonlinear, nonlocal, and so on) and 2) the fact of decoherence. However, the following quote from Many Worlds, One Best Guess (emphasis added):

The debate should already be over. It should have been over fifty years ago. The state of evidence is too lopsided to justify further argument. There is no balance in this issue. There is no rational controversy to teach. The laws of probability theory are laws, not suggestions; there is no flexibility in the best guess given this evidence. Our children will look back at the fact that we were STILL ARGUING about this in the early 21st-century, and correctly deduce that we were nuts.

Is there other evidence as well, then? 1) seems depressingly weak, and as for 2)...

As was mentioned in Decoherence is Falsifiable and Testable, and brought up in the comments, the existence of so-called "microscopic decoherence" (which we have evidence for) is independent from so-called "macroscopic decoherence" (which -- as far as I know, and I would like to be wrong about this -- we do not have empirical evidence for). Macroscopic decoherence seems to imply MWI, but the evidence given in the decoherence subsequence deals only with microscopic decoherence.

I would rather not have this devolve into a debate on MWI and friends -- EY above to the contrary, I don't think we can classify that question as a "stupid" one. I'm focused entirely in EY's argument for MWI and possible improvements that can be made to it.

Comment author: Will_Newsome 30 December 2011 03:26:31AM *  5 points [-]

(There are two different argument sets here: 1) against random collapse, and 2) for MWI specifically. It's important to keep these distinct.)

Comment author: [deleted] 30 December 2011 03:30:52AM *  0 points [-]

Unless I'm missing something, EY argues that evidence against random collapse is evidence for MWI. See that long analogy on Maxwell's equations with angels mediating the electromagnetic force.

Comment author: Will_Newsome 30 December 2011 03:35:54AM 2 points [-]

It's also evidence for a bunch of other interpretations though, right? I meant "for MWI specifically"; I'll edit my comment to be clearer.

Comment author: [deleted] 30 December 2011 03:40:33AM 1 point [-]

I agree, which is one of the reasons why I feel 1) alone isn't enough to substantiate "There is no rational controversy to teach" and etc.