http://alittleteaalittlechat.wordpress.com/2013/07/18/the-many-worlds-of-hugh-ev... ( )

http://alittleteaalittlechat.wordpress.com/2013/07/18/the-many-worlds-of-hugh-ev... ( )

http://alittleteaalittlechat.wordpress.com/2013/07/18/the-many-worlds-of-hugh-ev... ( )

“This is the mystery: when we measure the position of an atomic particle we record it as existing in a definite place, not in all of the many places it occupies according to its smoothly evolving wave function. The emergence of a single position from the set of all physically possible positions is inescapable; it creates a logical discontinuity, a gap, a fissure, an interruption in the flow of the Schrödinger equation; it creates a problem.”

In “The Many Worlds of Hugh Everett III - Multiple Universes, Mutual Assured Destruction, and the Meltdown of a Nuclear Family” by Peter Byrne

I suspect that the reason why the Copenhagen and Many Worlds interpretations of QM are the most well-known is that they are the easiest to explain in classical terms, and therefore most accessible to those who have not already completed an undergraduate level course in QM. You can also find a discussion of the different interpretations in The Road to Reality, by Roger Penrose, but it is heavy going and not recommended unless you have a background in Physics (or Math) to degree-level. Essentially, Penrose discusses both the two interpretations above and three other interpretations: environmental decoherence, consistent histories and pilot wave; and comments on the strengths and weaknesses of each. He argues that none of them adequately solve the "measurement problem" and that there must be another, either so-far undiscovered or incompletely worked out, interpretation to be found. [This is a serious simplification of what Penrose writes in the book].

Oh, and the proof for other intelligent life in the universe is simple- physicists tell us that nature is a wave particle duality, with particles being something like placeholders for natural forces, that is particles are not individual, every like particle is identical to every other like particle. the wave function that underlies reality means that events are a result of colliding wave fronts, thus they can't occur only once, events can be rare, they cannot be unique- therefore if life occurred here it has to have occurred elsewhere as a logical certainty, nature doesn't do anything just once, there are unique locations there are no unique events. The only way for intelligent if to have occurred only here would be a supernatural explanation.

Is reality the result of colliding wave fronts or entangled fields, being these fields the ones that engender elemental particles which are everywhere, and therefore the entanglement producing life must be everywhere as well?

Not quite. It all depends on statistical probability. If the odds of a particle doing x is greater than the chances of it doing it in the lifetime of the universe, it may never do x. Me walking through a wall is a good example - all the particles in me and all the particles in wall would have to align so that none collide in the Very Long Time (for a particle or group of particles to remain in perfect alignment) it would take me to walk through the wall. The odds of that happening are greater than the lifetime of the universe (although it still could happen at any moment too...) When you're talking an almost infinite range of possibilities, but with a large, but still finite amount of matter/particles, there is plenty of room for unique events which might never repeat in the lifetime of the universe (or may repeat many times equally).

For any casual reader not familiar with the double-slit experiment, a laser beam is directed at a plate which is solid except for two parallel slits (for instance; there are many variants in the broader experimental realm). Then the light passing through the slits is observed on a screen behind the plate. These sorts of experiment yield much interesting (and initially much unexpected) data, and these data have helped to progress analysis of a variety of puzzles in physics.

So far, so good.

The problems arise when all sorts of speculations, far beyond the data, are developed into a quasi-religious dogma of reality, which can loosely be entitled the many-worlds interpretation (MWI) of quantum mechanics. Just at the level of this simple double-slit experiment, without exploring the wilder shores of MWI, the devotees of the interpretation believe that the light passing through the apparatus of whatever configuration diverges into a vast / infinite number of other universes. That is, for one given experiment - one universe, world, lab, workbench, laser, plate, screen - the output of that local experiment diverges into an infinite number of universes. One photon emitted by the laser diverges into an infinite number of universes at the point of emission from the laser, and diverges again when it passes through the slits, and even diverges again if you close one of the slits. And that the combination (the cross-product) of all of these sets of an infinite number of universes is also then real. Don't underestimate what they are claiming, an infinite number of universes is created at this point, each new universe populated with a universe-worth of matter and energy which (somehow and “somewhen” undefined by the MWI) simply appears from nowhere.

I would respectfully suggest that the MWI devotees have rather over-interpreted the data from a laser beam passing through a slitted plate.

A final coda:

“Among Everett’s basement papers were notes that he had made after the American Institute of Physics asked him to prioritize his top five scientific capabilities. At the bottom of the list, he put ‘servomechanisms.’ Followed by ‘operations research.’ Skill number three was ‘relativity and gravity.’ Two was ‘decision game theory.’ And at the top of the list, in pride of first place: ‘quantum mechanics.’”

In “The Many Worlds of Hugh Everett III - Multiple Universes, Mutual Assured Destruction, and the Meltdown of a Nuclear Family” by Peter Byrne

Bottom-line: I explained Everettian theory much better when I reviewed Adam Becker’s “What is Real - The Unfinished Quest for theMeaning of Quantum Physics”. I’m not “in the zone” today…so, this is all you get for now. I’m moving on to finish reading Wallace’s “Emergent Multiverse” now. ( )

My brain nearly melted reading this. The Many Worlds idea has been used in fiction for a long time, usually in science fiction. The concept is easy enough to portray- the universe splits and in the split-offs results diverge from the universe the characters originally occupied. A trope oft used. The physics and philosophy describing how such splitting could be possible is anything but easy to comprehend. It gets messy real fast. Attempts at clarification introduce even more messiness. Then head pains ensue.

Everett wrote his dissertation on branching universes in 1957. It was bold and audacious. Most physicists that saw it said- Good Grief! We have to deal with this crazy paper? No thanks! And it was mostly ignored for ten to fifteen years. But it wouldn't go away and kept picking up new adherents over time. More- Good Grief! We still have to deal with this? Nobody was able to kill it dead. The cosmologists found useful things there and it has been in play ever since with many additions and refinements.

Everett never published another paper on quantum mechanics. He avoided the fray for the rest of his life with only an exception or two. He went into operations research for the defense sector. There he was a Cold Warrior working with the equations of first strikes, second strikes, and the possible deaths of hundreds of millions of people. Grim stuff indeed. Everett loved it though. He treated life as a game and his life as a part of his beloved game theory. He was a hawk in the Cold War environs but a hedonist in his personal life. He and his wife became swingers. Later he started a travel business with his girlfriend. The Everetts never separated or divorced. Everett drank his lunch, was a chain smoker, and ate like there was no such thing as cholesterol.

His son and daughter were allowed free reign. There was no discipline. Because Everett's focus and immersion in his thoughts and his career there was also little attention paid to the children either. They were almost strangers. His daughter was alcoholic as was Hugh. She also had substance abuse problems and was suicidal. Hugh only made it to the age of fifty-two. He succombed to a heart attack. Liz, the daughter, didn't even live that long. She was thirty-nine when she overdosed. Hugh's wife died not long after from lung cancer. It was probably contracted from her husband's chain smoking.

This left Mark, the son, alone in the world at a fairly young age. He had escaped the family home by going to California and pursuing a music career. He formed The Eels, and did solo stuff also. Ten years after being left alone he started trying to make a bit of sense of his family. There was a BBC documentary focusing on his father, Parallel Worlds, Parallel Lives. He also wrote a memoir that was an Early Reviewer book on LibraryThing. It's called Things the Grandchildren Should Know.

This biography was a thorough examination of Everett's life and his professional accomplishments. He was far from a saint, probably not a devil; more of a smart average-Joe trying to muddle through life by avoiding parts of reality with the desensitizing effects of physical pleasure. ( )