Is Space Digital?

[immortal]

I read this interesting article on Scientific American from the RSS feed of my blog.

 

 

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=is-space-digital

 

Can any physicist give me a picture of how the results of that experiment is going the change the way we think about what fundamental reality is and what will be the consequences or the new physics and possibilities that is going to emerge if space is indeed found to be digital?

 

I read the article and the comments and I am not really getting any picture at all and it has confused me even more.

 

Thanks.

Edited March 14, 2012 by immortal

[Aman shah]

Digital representation is made by analog physical circuits which gives 0 and 1 output for a particular input signal (0 or 1)and is made by particular way of manupulating signals by circuits using transistors, diodes,etc.Our life is not manipulated in this particular similar way!Our life is manipulated by logical reasons in each step.Whereas,circuits are made to use mathematical logic by designing the circuits according to our needs, so the chances of space being digital in nature is not much,only 0.00000001 percent chance.Space is physics,a material energy mix.This topic is more suitable as speculations in physics,I think so.

But I don't deny that that our mind is also made of similar circuits.

0 is for low and 1 is for high voltage.In computers chips,the letters and alphabets are printed in micro or nano 3D formats on chips and so we can see those letters on screen,basically they are read by tiny lasers.

Edited March 14, 2012 by Aman shah

[immortal]

Digital representation is made by analog physical circuits which gives 0 and 1 output for a particular input signal (0 or 1)and is made by particular way of manupulating signals by circuits using transistors, diodes,etc.Our life is not manipulated in this particular similar way!Our life is manipulated by logical reasons in each step.Whereas,circuits are made to use mathematical logic by designing the circuits according to our needs, so the chances of space being digital in nature is not much,only 0.00000001 percent chance.Space is physics,a material energy mix.This topic is more suitable as speculations in physics,I think so.

But I don't deny that that our mind is also made of similar circuits.

0 is for low and 1 is for high voltage.In computers chips,the letters and alphabets are printed in micro or nano 3D formats on chips and so we can see those letters on screen,basically they are read by tiny lasers.

 

In quantum physics everything is quantized or discrete(digital), I don't know on what basis you are saying its improbable.

 

Anyways I don't want any personal speculations or your own theories in this thread, I've already heard enough of that, I just want to hear what is the consensus by the current physicist community on this one. How feasible is such an idea? Does it have the potential to solve the puzzles in physics?

[Aman shah]

I am only telling what's real according to me and most people.Everyone has the right to post what they think!Have a nice day and enjoy and get knowledge from the forum discussion!Thanks,good luck if you are doing Research in this field.

[immortal]

Everyone has the right to post what they think.

 

If you have a new theory or an idea you have every right to start a separate thread in the speculation forum but you cannot do that in this thread.

[DrRocket]

I read this interesting article on Scientific American from the RSS feed of my blog.

 

 

http://www.scientifi...s-space-digital

 

Can any physicist give me a picture of how the results of that experiment is going the change the way we think about what fundamental reality is and what will be the consequences or the new physics and possibilities that is going to emerge if space is indeed found to be digital?

 

I read the article and the comments and I am not really getting any picture at all and it has confused me even more.

 

Thanks.

 

There have been a number of attempts to model space as discrete. They have not panned out.

 

There is still ongoing research involving other approaches to model space as discrete. They may eventually bear fruit, but they have not done so yet.

 

Since there is not viable theory that is based on discrete space, there is no sensible to forsee what might result from a future theory that is based on such a picture of space. I doubt that this lack of clarity will be much of a barrie to those who purvey speculation as science in the popular literature. Ask Michio Kaku if rank speculation is what you seek.

Edited March 14, 2012 by DrRocket

[immortal]

There have been a number of attempts to model space as discrete. They have not panned out.

 

There is still ongoing research involving other approaches to model space as discrete. They may eventually bear fruit, but they have not done so yet.

 

Since there is not viable theory that is based on discrete space, there is no sensible to forsee what might result from a future theory that is based on such a picture of space. I doubt that this lack of clarity will be much of a barrie to those who purvey speculation as science in the popular literature. Ask Michio Kaku if rank speculation is what you seek.

 

In the mean time, yesterday I did further reading on this topic.

 

Is this something to do with the Holographic principle?

 

 

 

In the above article P.C.W Davies talks about the status of the Laws of Physics and the "the unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in the physical sciences" as it was said by Wigner.

 

The traditional approach to view the laws of physics and matter is kind of like this.

 

A. Laws of Physics --> matter --> Information.

 

Here mathematics is viewed as "platonic forms existing in their own realm" and space-time is ontological.

 

According to the Holographic principle, information is ontological and it is the basis of the universe.

 

C. Information --> Laws of Physics --> Matter.

 

So he goes on to say that with this approach the universe is self sufficient and self consistent because "universe computes with in the universe". What we call mathematics is nothing but information processing with in the cosmological system and hence the notion of mathematics exists in their own platonic realms is not required.

 

This leads to an ontological problem of Information as to "what those bits are" and space-time originates as complex computational states and I don't know how this fits with the geometry of space-time.

 

In the experiment they say that they are going to measure two signals from two interferometers and if all noise is eliminated and if they find that both the signals appear encoded or same then that will be the indication that 'space=time is digital' and again I don't see just by observing some correlations with signals how can you conclude that "universe computes with in the universe".

 

Is the universe computable or non-computable? If it is computable then How can we see the truth value of Godel's statements while turing machines fail to do so.

 

Thank You.

[DrRocket]

In the mean time, yesterday I did further reading on this topic.

 

Is this something to do with the Holographic principle?

 

 

 

In the above article P.C.W Davies talks about the status of the Laws of Physics and the "the unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in the physical sciences" as it was said by Wigner.

 

The traditional approach to view the laws of physics and matter is kind of like this.

 

A. Laws of Physics --> matter --> Information.

 

Here mathematics is viewed as "platonic forms existing in their own realm" and space-time is ontological.

 

According to the Holographic principle, information is ontological and it is the basis of the universe.

 

C. Information --> Laws of Physics --> Matter.

 

So he goes on to say that with this approach the universe is self sufficient and self consistent because "universe computes with in the universe". What we call mathematics is nothing but information processing with in the cosmological system and hence the notion of mathematics exists in their own platonic realms is not required.

 

This leads to an ontological problem of Information as to "what those bits are" and space-time originates as complex computational states and I don't know how this fits with the geometry of space-time.

 

In the experiment they say that they are going to measure two signals from two interferometers and if all noise is eliminated and if they find that both the signals appear encoded or same then that will be the indication that 'space=time is digital' and again I don't see just by observing some correlations with signals how can you conclude that "universe computes with in the universe".

 

Is the universe computable or non-computable? If it is computable then How can we see the truth value of Godel's statements while turing machines fail to do so.

 

Thank You.

 

I think you can safely ignore most things from Davies.

[immortal]

I think you can safely ignore most things from Davies.

 

Thanks! I'll remember that. Being a layman I don't know how to judge his arguments. I'll wait for the theory and the results to get a clear picture.

[victorjhon]

I have no idea but i am searching about it.

[Ben Banana]

If space were digital, it might be as cool as if "taco-stand" was asynchronous. That would be pretty cool, right?

Edited May 21, 2012 by Ben Bowen