Comment author: Raemon 19 December 2011 03:08:19PM 12 points [-]

Okay, let it be known that I learned my lesson about vague, uninformative one-word comments. I liked the post/article and wanted to express it stronger than an upvote, but couldn't think of anything else to say at the time.

Comment author: argumzio 19 December 2011 10:48:21PM 1 point [-]

LW is an exercise in knowing your audience. Best of luck.

In response to comment by argumzio on How Many Worlds?
Comment author: VincentYu 16 December 2011 06:44:33AM *  0 points [-]

I am responding to Argumzio's comment in several separate replies. This is my first reply.


I don't need to justify what is common knowledge. Take note of Tegmark, if you and the other down-voters care to.

I assume that you are referring to Tegmark's ideas on his multiverse hierarchy and his ultimate ensemble. If I am incorrect, correct me, and point out which of Tegmark's ideas you are trying to use. Tegmark's speculative ideas are certainly common knowledge within the physics community. They also fail to justify your claim that MWI implies an omniverse.

Your definition of the omniverse and your subsequent uses of this concept does not clearly indicate whether you mean a Level III multiverse or a Level IV multiverse in Tegmark's terminology, so I will provide rebuttals to both cases. I shall be referring to Tegmark's most recent elaborations of his multiverse hierarchy in arXiv:0905.1283v1 (2009).

  1. Suppose that you wish to claim that your omniverse is equivalent to a Level III multiverse. Then you have trouble because Tegmark counts at most a countably infinite number of worlds. In particular, Tegmark states that

    At the quantum level, there are 10 to the universes with temperatures below kelvins. That is a vast number, but a finite one.

    Tegmark's calculations for this are in Footnote 5 on p. 4. The obvious extension of this calculation (by scaling the temperature) shows that there is a finite number of universes below any temperature. This implies a countable number of universes even if we grant an unbounded temperature, because we can easily get a bijection with a subset of by enumerating the universes below any arbitrary temperature.

    So this does not work.

  2. Suppose that you wish to claim that your omniverse is equivalent to a Level IV multiverse. Then I fail to see where Tegmark claims that MWI implies an omniverse. On the contrary, Tegmark is careful to distinguish between a Level III multiverse (MWI) and a Level IV multiverse.

    Furthermore, it is not clear to me how Tegmark's Level IV multiverse can be equivalent to your omniverse. Tegmark defines the Level IV multiverse as one in which

    mathematical existence and physical existence are equivalent, so that all mathematical structures exist physically as well.

    This is not equivalent to your definition of the omniverse, where

    the omniverse is that state of affairs in which all possibilities are realized. Hence, that any event should obtain therein is an absolute certainty.

    Tegmark makes no mention of events occurring within the Level IV multiverse, while the context within which you defined the omniverse mentions only "events", not mathematical structures. Nota bene that Tegmark does mention quantum events occurring, but only in the Level III multiverse, which I have already concluded is different from your omniverse.


I no longer believe that you are throwing names of well-known physicists in good faith. Thrice you have done this:

  1. Then you obviously aren't familiar with MWI. Even Penrose and Hawking agree that QM applied to the universe implies MWI.

  2. I guess you could read on the topic, if you're interested. I've already suggested at least two (namely, Hawking and Penrose). Do I really have to do all the work? I need to eat and making a living.

  3. I don't need to justify what is common knowledge. Take note of Tegmark, if you and the other down-voters care to.

Not once have you provided any reference to go with the names. Of the single reference that you gave in this thread, to The Road to Reality, it was erroneous justification for the word 'omniverse' being recognized in mainstream physics.

I welcome any refusal to give arguments that have already been given elsewhere. But if you are going to name names, then provide references. I should not have to say "I assume that you are referring to Tegmark's ideas on [...]"; I should instead be able to say "I agree with section A in Tegmark (2009), but..."


[...], if you and the other down-voters care to.

For what it's worth, I never downvote replies to my comments; I recognize that this disincentivizes replies. However, I have indeed downvoted your root comment and your replies to Prase.

In response to comment by VincentYu on How Many Worlds?
Comment author: argumzio 16 December 2011 06:44:37PM *  1 point [-]

Well, I certainly consider this my last reply, because 1) I grow weary of this straightforward enough topic, 2) respondents have hitherto been enthralled in a childish, eristically motivated game of serving a slapdash of trivial, illogical, and baseless complaints one after another, 3) my posts have been consistently down-voted, which I find highly annoying, and 4) my grasp of the subject – and general familiarity with (and understanding of) the connections between the concepts omniverse (from omnium=multiverse), MW, QM, probability states, and the infinitary conclusion that is obtained by noting the (well-established) opinion that we live in an inflationary universe (that may well be eternally inflationary) – has no need of a "well-reasoned" or even "pursuasive" (an interesting way to move the goal posts, I might add) justification, insofar as there is a body of literature out there that suggests the pertinence and correctness of the answer I provided (which I never said was the true, in-your-face-clear-as-day answer).

(FYI: another source, of which I was previously unaware, that raises some of the key points I have is Brian Greene's The Hidden Reality, p. 181 onward. It does so in a largely jargon-free, not-so-overly-technical manner, so I suppose that should be a relief to LWers.)

In response to comment by argumzio on How Many Worlds?
Comment author: VincentYu 16 December 2011 12:26:46AM *  0 points [-]

If The Road to Reality (from which the term omniverse, or "omnium", originally sprung) is not "mainstream", then pray tell what is.

First, words and phrases become recognized in mainstream physics when they become widely used in publications, not when one well-known physicist uses them. There are 15 results on Google Scholar for a search of 'omniverse' within physics, and of those results, none has been cited more than three times.

Second, even within The Road to Reality - for which I have the first edition as an ebook - the word 'omnium' appears only six times in 1094 pages, where they appear within six consecutive pages (p. 784-9) in a single chapter (ch. 29). The index gives only one page reference (p. 783) for this word.

ETA: You disregarded my claim that "you implicitly imply in your root comment that MWI implies the existence of an omniverse [...] but provide no justification for this." This was a main point.


This is a technical aspect of the discussion, and is not contradictory. The point should be clear if one considers the possibility of flipping 100 heads in a row on a fair two-sided coin. For all intents and purposes, the probability is 0, but that it may happen is not in the least prevented or negated were we to consider an infinite ("long run") flipping of coins. Pretty straightforward and not contradictory.

I was taking what you wrote literally, because you remarked at least twice ([1], [2]) that you dislike the lack of technical sophistication in discussions here, from which I concluded that you must mean what you write when you use technical terms. Under this assumption of literal meaning, I contend that there is a contradiction in the two statements that you wrote.

I have nothing further to add to this line of discussion.


Had I devoted the energy to a full-length discussion of the topic, this probably wouldn't be an issue, but (in general) it should be clear that the number of such worlds (or universes) should be uncountably infinite, not countably infinite. That is, the cardinality would be on the order of Aleph-1, at the very least. And I seriously doubt that had any bearing on prase's original point.

But this is the main point in contention! Recall that your answer to Smk's question ("How many worlds?") is

Uncountably many.

Prase and I pointed out that some of your subsequent reasoning and justification for this answer are unclear or incorrect. An argument for your answer is what I would like to see. You state that this is "clear", but again, one of the main purposes of this comment thread is to establish whether your answer is correct or not!


I guess you could read on the topic, if you're interested. I've already suggested at least two (namely, Hawking and Penrose). Do I really have to do all the work? I need to eat and making a living.

I am reasonably well-read in Hawking's and Penrose's texts in popular science. (I assume you are not referring to their original contributions to physics because other physicists are better known for their contributions to MWI.) I still cannot parse your first phrase ("taking the universe as a QM event"). I think I understand what you mean by your second phrase ("QM applied to the universe"). Is the first phrase supposed to have to same meaning as the second phrase?


There is no "tone" here. That is a mind-projection fallacy. If anyone liberated of mammalian instinct can read what I say without imputing emotional overtones thereto, then it should be obvious that my points consist in reasoned discourse without torrents of bluster at all. It's almost as if you people wish to say, "yeah, we can see you holding that 9mm, just waiting to bust a cap, and the foam dripping from your mouth". It's really rather cute.

Then I must remind you that all commenters on Less Wrong are human, with the exception of Clippy. One of the purposes of this comment thread is to establish which claims are correct. If your arguments are correct, then you have nothing to lose by being more persuasive, and I claim that your tone was overly aggressive and not persuasive for most purposes.

In response to comment by VincentYu on How Many Worlds?
Comment author: argumzio 16 December 2011 03:28:38AM -1 points [-]

You disregarded my claim that "you implicitly imply in your root comment that MWI implies the existence of an omniverse [...] but provide no justification for this." This was a main point.

I don't need to justify what is common knowledge. Take note of Tegmark, if you and the other down-voters care to.

Under this assumption of literal meaning, I contend that there is a contradiction in the two statements that you wrote.

Wow, so you really think your strawman is sufficient as grounds for objection to what I've claimed as correct? I didn't require sophistication of others here. That's pure nonsense. But by all means, try to impute meaning into my posts where it wasn't.

An argument for your answer is what I would like to see. You state that this is "clear", but again, one of the main purposes of this comment thread is to establish whether your answer is correct or not!

I have. It is quite clear. And the only objections I've seen consist in mere definitional confusions on the part of the "objectors" or who don't seem to demonstrate an understanding of the claims I made, but instead contend that I'm merely being "hostile" and not persuasive enough.

Is the first phrase supposed to have to same meaning as the second phrase?

Not necessarily the same "meaning" but more or less the same pragmatic thrust.

If your arguments are correct, then you have nothing to lose by being more persuasive, and I claim that your tone was overly aggressive and not persuasive for most purposes.

You make an interesting, and fallacious, claim, and continue to hide behind smoke and mirrors by suggesting that I haven't answered your so-called objections.

Going back to your last post:

It is the opposite, where the probabilities are equal, which requires specific preparations...

What exactly is "it"? I'm referring to the universe, not the cat's being dead or alive. What exactly is the relevance of the probabilities being equal, in any case? Does that even impinge on anything I've said, or even anything anyone else has said? Not obviously so.

Comment author: VincentYu 16 December 2011 12:54:07AM 1 point [-]

Uncountably many is the correct answer, and yet it's one of the down-voted posts. In another thread, my posts were also down-voted, despite their well-reasoned bases.

Prase and I contend in the other thread that Argumzio's comments are not well-reasoned.

Comment author: argumzio 16 December 2011 03:18:38AM 1 point [-]

And wrongly contend at that.

Comment author: eugman 15 December 2011 08:02:12PM 3 points [-]

My dominant hand, the right. Specifically the pointer finger. Sometimes, if my right hand is occupied, it will happen with my left hand. However, I usually get upset if it does, because it feels like I'm messing something up. I hate how bizarre this sounds, but it's as if my hands are speaking in homophones and the left hand has a slower, deeper pitch, so the word/gesture has a different meaning when coming from the left hand.

Comment author: argumzio 15 December 2011 09:17:19PM 3 points [-]

Interesting. I thought it would be. The left-hemisphere (controlling the right hand) is inhibitory of right-hemispheric activity, and so it would seem you've found a way for your left to counteract negative thinking patterns (which are typical of right-hemispheric thought).

In response to comment by argumzio on How Many Worlds?
Comment author: magfrump 15 December 2011 08:51:36PM 1 point [-]

The way I would phrase this is lowering your expectations of the community's willingness to wade through jargon and derogatory language. It isn't that people won't understand, it's that they won't want to read the comment.

In response to comment by magfrump on How Many Worlds?
Comment author: argumzio 15 December 2011 09:12:44PM *  -2 points [-]

Point specifically to that which is "derogatory" in the initial post. I don't participate in LW to get upvoted, anyway, since that is merely a marker of groupthink (or correlates in assigning yay or boo ascriptions to a particular post for mere classical conditioning to take place). I didn't use any jargon except the term "omniverse" which anyone equipped with Google could look up themselves. I suppose when writing comments on LW, in special cases (as in a technical topic), one must hold the hand of the reader, lest they become enraged by subtleties and novel syntactical arrangements of words.

Comment author: erratio 05 December 2011 02:11:03PM 7 points [-]

Enjoyable shivers down the back of the spine

First I heard that it might not be universal was someone's comment here a few days ago. Not sure if it's a mental or physical difference though.

Comment author: argumzio 15 December 2011 07:41:35PM *  1 point [-]

I experience this during intense aesthetic events as in music, literature, or cinema. It is delightful.

Comment author: argumzio 15 December 2011 07:29:25PM 3 points [-]

The other effect is that it seems to function as some sort of intra-brain communication.

This is not so surprising. Intra-brain conflicts are well-established neuro-psychological phenomena, primarily on account of the presence of two hemispheres being thinly connected by axon fibres. There is a degree of modularity in the brain, because each hemisphere tends to work within its own sphere as a general rule.

I am curious to know: which hand/finger generally exhibits these non-verbal cues for you to recognize and label particular thoughts consciously?

Comment author: wedrifid 15 December 2011 06:47:35AM 4 points [-]

The behavior isn't negative, but the perception of it is, therefore I'm unjustified in being quite disgusted by it?

I express disgust with specific instances of voting. I downvote generalised defiance and "I'm going to leave" bluster. It's not a big deal - I just prefer that people don't make comments like that and so I downvote them.

And suggesting that someone is a troll is by far the most bathetic exercise of non-rational discourse. But, go ahead, down-vote this, too, if you feel better by it.

The specific comment contained trollspeak - you are not a troll.

Comment author: argumzio 15 December 2011 06:52:13AM 1 point [-]

I express disgust with specific instances of voting.

Okay, I see your point. But the way the voting system is set up, it generalizes across one's presence on the website, hence "karma".

To be clear, I wasn't being "defiant". I asked a very specific question, expecting specific input, not a down-vote and being told (in a "put up or shut up" fashion) that I am just wrong. Well, LW is looking less inviting as a place for truly "rational discourse". But I digress.

"I'm going to leave" bluster.

I thought it was clear that if the question was answered in the affirmative (with clear reasoning), then it would be reasonable for someone to leave such a forum. I stand by that, too, because it would be a waste of my time to put thought into posts and to have them down-voted out of existence. It is wise for a community (if that's what it is) to consider its own nature from a meta-stand point. Is LW a treasure trove of instances of "fooling oneself"? A case study leads to many others.

Comment author: wedrifid 15 December 2011 06:29:01AM 6 points [-]

Is LW supposed to be a popularity contest, where gang affiliation is measured in the "karma" one has gained by not stepping on the toes of those who might down-vote (whatever that means) something they either dislike or don't comprehend (and don't want to admit they don't comprehend)?

I can assure you that stepping on toes doesn't interfere with karma gain all that much.

Comment author: argumzio 15 December 2011 06:33:43AM 4 points [-]

That sounds believable. My post has already been down-voted. Why? Who knows.

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