Friam

The fundamental theory of physics

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Jochen Fromm-5

The fundamental theory of physics

What do you think of Stephen Wolfram's latest findings? It is always interesting to see what he is doing IMHO

https://writings.stephenwolfram.com/2020/04/finally-we-may-have-a-path-to-the-fundamental-theory-of-physics-and-its-beautiful/

-J.

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Marcus G. Daniels

Re: The fundamental theory of physics

Wasn’t John Baez doing this stuff in the late 90s?

From: Friam <[hidden email]> on behalf of Jochen Fromm <[hidden email]>
Reply-To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Date: Wednesday, April 15, 2020 at 11:37 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: [FRIAM] The fundamental theory of physics

What do you think of Stephen Wolfram's latest findings? It is always interesting to see what he is doing IMHO

https://writings.stephenwolfram.com/2020/04/finally-we-may-have-a-path-to-the-fundamental-theory-of-physics-and-its-beautiful/

-J.

Frank Wimberly-2

Re: The fundamental theory of physics

I know John Baez. John Baez is a friend of mine.

See if anyone recognizes that allusion.

Seriously, Hywel White, Barry MacKichan, Jon Zingale and I read Baez's book "Gauge Fields, Knots and Gravity" a year or two ago. He begins in the first section by showing why one forms (and higher order forms) and manifolds are better than vector fields for doing physics. It's because they work in higher dimensions better. Then in the second section he develops the math of gauge fields bundles and connections. In the third section he develops models of gravitation using semi-Riemannian geometry.

I understood 90% of the first section 50% of the second and 20% of the third. I understood the math much better than the relationship of it to physics. Hywel probably would say the opposite. I'll let Jon and Barry speak for themselves.

Frank

On Wed, Apr 15, 2020 at 12:38 PM Marcus Daniels <[hidden email]> wrote:

Wasn’t John Baez doing this stuff in the late 90s?

From: Friam <[hidden email]> on behalf of Jochen Fromm <[hidden email]>
Reply-To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Date: Wednesday, April 15, 2020 at 11:37 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: [FRIAM] The fundamental theory of physics

What do you think of Stephen Wolfram's latest findings? It is always interesting to see what he is doing IMHO

https://writings.stephenwolfram.com/2020/04/finally-we-may-have-a-path-to-the-fundamental-theory-of-physics-and-its-beautiful/

-J.

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Frank Wimberly
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Santa Fe, NM 87505
505 670-9918

Jochen Fromm-5

Re: The fundamental theory of physics

In reply to this post by Marcus G. Daniels

I don't know, possibly. What Stephen and his team seem to be doing is to take some form of graph or hypergraph, and then they apply transformations to it in an iterative loop. The result gets more and more complex.

We know that some IFSs and L-Systems produce beautiful results through repeated iterations, but beauty alone is not a guarantee for a good theory. It looks interesting, but I am not sure if it really is the path to a fundamental theory :-/

-J.

-------- Original message --------

From: Marcus Daniels <[hidden email]>

Date: 4/15/20 20:39 (GMT+01:00)

To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>

Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The fundamental theory of physics

Wasn’t John Baez doing this stuff in the late 90s?

What do you think of Stephen Wolfram's latest findings? It is always interesting to see what he is doing IMHO

https://writings.stephenwolfram.com/2020/04/finally-we-may-have-a-path-to-the-fundamental-theory-of-physics-and-its-beautiful/

-J.

gepr

Re: The fundamental theory of physics

In reply to this post by Marcus G. Daniels

Can you point to what you think Baez was doing that seems similar to what Wolfram's doing?

On 4/15/20 11:38 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
> Wasn’t John Baez doing this stuff in the late 90s?

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Marcus G. Daniels

Re: The fundamental theory of physics

https://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/9905087

On 4/15/20, 1:46 PM, "Friam on behalf of uǝlƃ ☣" <[hidden email] on behalf of [hidden email]> wrote:

Can you point to what you think Baez was doing that seems similar to what Wolfram's doing?

On 4/15/20 11:38 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
> Wasn’t John Baez doing this stuff in the late 90s?

--
☣ uǝlƃ

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gepr

Re: The fundamental theory of physics

Very cool. I'd (incompetently, obviously) guess the difference would be that Wolfram's trying to construct the universe, whereas Baez was trying to describe it. Both involve time/iteration. But my lunch period is over and I have to work. 8^(

On 4/15/20 1:47 PM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
> https://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/9905087
>
> On 4/15/20, 1:46 PM, "Friam on behalf of uǝlƃ ☣" <[hidden email] on behalf of [hidden email]> wrote:
>
> Can you point to what you think Baez was doing that seems similar to what Wolfram's doing?
>
> On 4/15/20 11:38 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
> > Wasn’t John Baez doing this stuff in the late 90s?

--
☣ uǝlƃ

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Stephen Guerin-5

Re: The fundamental theory of physics

In reply to this post by Marcus G. Daniels

Here's a nice lecture by Carlo Rovelli on his development of Spin Foams with Lee Smolin. Great to see the intro to his lecture by Penrose:

https://livestream.com/oxuni/rovelli/videos/199493556

At time 41:33, you can check out how space is defined as the volume around a vertex. Steve Smith and some others have heard me wax incoherently about the potential that spacetime is the dual graph of the spin networks in much the same way a voronoi is a dual to a delaunay graph.

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On Wed, Apr 15, 2020 at 2:47 PM Marcus Daniels <[hidden email]> wrote:

https://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/9905087

On 4/15/20, 1:46 PM, "Friam on behalf of uǝlƃ ☣" <[hidden email] on behalf of [hidden email]> wrote:

Can you point to what you think Baez was doing that seems similar to what Wolfram's doing?

On 4/15/20 11:38 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
> Wasn’t John Baez doing this stuff in the late 90s?

--
☣ uǝlƃ

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Pieter Steenekamp

Re: The fundamental theory of physics

In reply to this post by Jochen Fromm-5

I need to study it more to give my opinion on it, but some general comments:

a) I expect the mainstream physics community will reject it. As a start I noticed Sabine Hossenfelder retweeted a "bullshit"-tweet about it.

b) I'm a big fan of Stephen Wolfram and in general have confidence in his work. But, of course, good people also make honest mistakes.

On Wed, 15 Apr 2020 at 20:37, Jochen Fromm <[hidden email]> wrote:

What do you think of Stephen Wolfram's latest findings? It is always interesting to see what he is doing IMHO
https://writings.stephenwolfram.com/2020/04/finally-we-may-have-a-path-to-the-fundamental-theory-of-physics-and-its-beautiful/

-J.

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Jochen Fromm-5

Re: The fundamental theory of physics

Compared to Sabine Hossenfelder I prefer the approach from Stephen Wolfram. I must admit I don't like the book from Sabine ("Lost in math") at all. She only argues we have not made a breakthrough for decades which is rather obvious. Stephen at least tries to make such a breakthrough. Sabine does not.

What I like about Stephen's approach is that he really tries to find the fundamental theory of physics, no matter how hard it may be or how many iterations it requires. There is boldness in his "Let's go & find the fundamental theory!" approach. I like his boldness, optimism and perseverance.

-J.

-------- Original message --------

From: Pieter Steenekamp <[hidden email]>

Date: 4/16/20 06:32 (GMT+01:00)

To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>

Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The fundamental theory of physics

I need to study it more to give my opinion on it, but some general comments:

a) I expect the mainstream physics community will reject it. As a start I noticed Sabine Hossenfelder retweeted a "bullshit"-tweet about it.

b) I'm a big fan of Stephen Wolfram and in general have confidence in his work. But, of course, good people also make honest mistakes.

On Wed, 15 Apr 2020 at 20:37, Jochen Fromm <[hidden email]> wrote:

What do you think of Stephen Wolfram's latest findings? It is always interesting to see what he is doing IMHO
https://writings.stephenwolfram.com/2020/04/finally-we-may-have-a-path-to-the-fundamental-theory-of-physics-and-its-beautiful/

-J.

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Marcus G. Daniels

Re: The fundamental theory of physics

In reply to this post by Pieter Steenekamp

Ha, probably the best move Stephen Wolfram ever made was become alienated from the complexity club. Had he been toiling in relative obscurity, he would have never created Mathematica, and he'd be sort-of-famous but not rich.

From: Friam <[hidden email]> on behalf of Jochen Fromm <[hidden email]>
Sent: Thursday, April 16, 2020 11:31 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The fundamental theory of physics

-J.

-------- Original message --------

From: Pieter Steenekamp <[hidden email]>

Date: 4/16/20 06:32 (GMT+01:00)

To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>

Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The fundamental theory of physics

I need to study it more to give my opinion on it, but some general comments:

a) I expect the mainstream physics community will reject it. As a start I noticed Sabine Hossenfelder retweeted a "bullshit"-tweet about it.

b) I'm a big fan of Stephen Wolfram and in general have confidence in his work. But, of course, good people also make honest mistakes.

On Wed, 15 Apr 2020 at 20:37, Jochen Fromm <[hidden email]> wrote:

What do you think of Stephen Wolfram's latest findings? It is always interesting to see what he is doing IMHO

https://writings.stephenwolfram.com/2020/04/finally-we-may-have-a-path-to-the-fundamental-theory-of-physics-and-its-beautiful/

-J.

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thompnickson2

Re: The fundamental theory of physics

Marcus,

Thanks for sending the Feynman letter.

Having started my day cursing the Feynman Cult, I am, on the basis of that letter alone, prepared to join it.

Cranky Nick

Nicholas Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology

Clark University

[hidden email]

https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/

From: Friam <[hidden email]> On Behalf Of Marcus Daniels
Sent: Thursday, April 16, 2020 12:08 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The fundamental theory of physics

-J.

-------- Original message --------

From: Pieter Steenekamp <[hidden email]>

Date: 4/16/20 06:32 (GMT+01:00)

To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>

Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The fundamental theory of physics

I need to study it more to give my opinion on it, but some general comments:

a) I expect the mainstream physics community will reject it. As a start I noticed Sabine Hossenfelder retweeted a "bullshit"-tweet about it.

b) I'm a big fan of Stephen Wolfram and in general have confidence in his work. But, of course, good people also make honest mistakes.

On Wed, 15 Apr 2020 at 20:37, Jochen Fromm <[hidden email]> wrote:

What do you think of Stephen Wolfram's latest findings? It is always interesting to see what he is doing IMHO
https://writings.stephenwolfram.com/2020/04/finally-we-may-have-a-path-to-the-fundamental-theory-of-physics-and-its-beautiful/

-J.

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gepr

Re: The fundamental theory of physics

In reply to this post by Pieter Steenekamp

Thanks for the pointer to Sabine's retweet. The Quantum Bullshit Detector (https://twitter.com/BullshitQuantum) looks interesting. Already I've found an interesting rat hole to crawl down: https://twitter.com/jmchow/status/1242600531199234049

It highlights an important gray area bounded by trolling, contrarianism, and self-policing.

On 4/15/20 9:30 PM, Pieter Steenekamp wrote:
> a) I expect the mainstream physics community will reject it. As a start I noticed Sabine Hossenfelder retweeted a "bullshit"-tweet about it.

--
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