Eric, Jochen, Uncle Tom Cobbley and all,
Please note comments below .
From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of ERIC P. CHARLES
Sent: Sunday, September 25, 2011 6:03 PM
To: Jochen Fromm
Cc: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Why Neutrinos are important
Jochen,
By my account... well, maybe an account I usurped form Nick... which there is no reason you should particularly care about, all explanations are metaphors.
[NST ==>] Well, there are some pretty nifty philosophers of science who take the same position (eg, Mary Brenda Hesse). They might be a reason to care about it.
I say that merely to note that my claim that you invoked a metaphor was not intended to make light of your claim in any way. I only meant to point out that the claim "the universe is evolving" must mean something like "the universe is like other things that I would characterize as 'evolving' ". Inquiry continuing from that point requires that we figure out how the claim "the universe is evolving" goes beyond the much less controversial claim "the universe is changing."
[NST ==>] I like this.
Nick,
Damn, I was afraid I was screwing that up. The claim that the world is evolving still seems problematic though.
[NST ==>] Oh yes. On my account, attribute evolution to something one has already to have organized it into taxanomic categories, and to see that those taxonomic categories have changed as they have descended through time (fossils and strata are important here), and to have an understanding of the changing environments that have occurred through time, AND finally to show that the organisms in the categories have been bent through time as they adjusted to each period. Evolution is adapted phylogeny. Attribution that something like a particle has evolved carries a very heavy burden indeed, given this very restrictive definition.
Do I have it right if I merely say that evolution is about fitting into the world better than the world has been fit in the past?
[NST ==>] Well, not quite, because that implies that the world itself has remained stable. Even when the physical world doesn’t change the biotic world is constantly changing and undermining the fit between some species and their circumstances. As we humans are doing to many species right now.
If so, then maybe my problem is that evolution requires two things (the thing doing the fitting and the thing fit into), and so "the universe is evolving" lacks an obvious counterpoint?
[NST ==>] Nothing that I have learned from this discussion so far has led me to believe that particles evolve.
It is something like the tiny awkwardness added to the organic evolution story if you take niche construction seriously, only much deeper.
[NST ==>] Well exactly. In fact if one thinks about niche construction too hard the whole notion of adaptation may disintegrate.
Nick
Eric
On Sun, Sep 25, 2011 04:14 PM, Jochen Fromm <[hidden email]> wrote:
Hi Eric,
It is not just a metaphor, the idea is that the universe is evolutionary at the deepest level, let us say the Planck scale. Space would replicate itself at each timestep, and time would be linked to the replication rate of the universe. Particles somehow emerge from spacetime in this replication process. I have not read the papers Marcus mentioned, maybe they contain some interesting hints.
Jochen
Sent from Android
"ERIC P. CHARLES" <[hidden email]> wrote:
Interesting ideas! I'm not sure what would have to be true for the evolution metaphor to make sense, however. Certainly the world is changing, but to say that particles are 'evolving' is a more narrow claim. As I understand the metaphor, at least two things would have to be true that I know next to nothing about (and would appreciate any insight the group could provide):
1) It would have to be the case that particles 'reproduce' themselves in some sense, so that a 'lineage' of some sort could be established.
2) Some particles would have to 'fit' the world better than others, by some externally verifiable criterion independent of their reproductive success.
Only then could we claim that the particles around today fit today's world better than the particles of long ago would have.
Again, this seems plausible to me, but I am not aware of any evidence.
Eric
On Sun, Sep 25, 2011 01:49 PM, "Jochen Fromm" <[hidden email]> wrote: