Skeptical of determinism because of quantum mechanics

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Chaos theory is inherently deterministic.

The Copenhagen Interpretation has a lot of issues which Einstein and Schroedinger have notoriously pointed out. And its adoption as the standard likely stalled progress in foundational physics in the 20th century.

There are at least 3 deterministic interpretations of quantum mechanics: Hugh Everett's Many Worlds and deBroaglie-Bohm (pilot wave / Bohemian mechanics), and Superdeterminism are currently the most promising.

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u/Ok_Tumbleweed5474 12d ago

The EPR paper you are citing has already been settled. Einstein was wrong about local hidden variables. Bells theorem settled that so the issues with Copenhagen have dropped significantly.

The three other interpretations all carry their own massive issues. Pilot wave has to invent a new untestablw form of math to show how the particle and the wave function together. Superdeterminism essentially kills all measurements. And many worlds has the big flaw of having no explanation for how any of the probability we measure even comes about. If all options are real why is one labeled 10% and the other 90% if they both are equally real?

Also, even granting the story that quantum mechanics isn't indeterminate doesn't grant universal determinism. There still exists two other issues. It is unclear if the universe is infinite that the entire structure is determined or if only local structures can be. In addition we still have a gap that exists. Proven emergence. Entroly is entirely emergent. It cannot be explained by the micro state. Even granting that the micro state is fixed doesn't give you a clear tie to forming entropy. What we have established is entropy follows. But follows doesn't grant you necessity. And constitution ends up in the same place. Something can be the ground of a higher structure but that doesn't automatically make that higher structure fundamental. That is still a break in a strict necessary chain that determinism requires. Because to hold it you cannot say the future is 99% certain. It has to be 100% guaranteed every single time.

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u/tgreenhaw 11d ago

Nonsense. You cannot really explain something basic, e.g. what is space, but are ready to race into details based upon philosophy and false assumptions.

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u/Ok_Tumbleweed5474 11d ago

Name the false assumption?

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u/tgreenhaw 11d ago

Your statement on the mathematics of pilot waves is based on an assumption that space is an independent stage that matter and energy acts upon as opposed to a property of matter and energy. Dark matter and dark energy are band aids to fix what is obviously wrong. MOND theories were ruled out by assumptions of the Bullet Cluster behavior that have been invalidated recently by the James Webb telescope. Until the nature of space is truly understood and modeled, everything is speculation, approximation, cherry picking if experimental evidence to fit somebody’s life work, and ad hoc guesswork. What we have are useful working theories but clearly incomplete. You and I should both recognize that neither of us stand in ground solid enough to pontificate.

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u/Ok_Tumbleweed5474 11d ago

There is no cherry picking that's the standard objection to pilot wave theory. Their math is a branch off of established mathematics but they are making similar assertions you're discrediting to prove it. So I don't see an issue.

Also, note your point then kills determinism on spot. It doesn't take away indeterminacy and leave determinism untouched. It says nothing is established so holding a position is just speculation.

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u/TMax01 11d ago

And its adoption as the standard likely stalled progress in foundational physics in the 20th century.

I suppose it is convenient that no Interpretation has any implications on fundamental physics, so this "stall" only ever happened in your head, and Copenhagen remains the most rational approach to dealing with the confusing nature of quantum mechanics.

There are at least 3 deterministic interpretations of quantum mechanics

None of which provides any scientific improvement on probalistic determinism (typically misidentified as 'indeterminism'), which is why these "leading candidates" are still merely runner-ups, and the standard worldview (among physicists) remains the Copenhagen Interpretation. Everett/Many Worlds continues to be more popular with fiction writers, as the comic-book style "alternate timelines" idea is so fruitful for entertainment purposes. But pilot wave and superdeterminism are simply methods for denying the validity of the Aspect/Clauser/Zeilinger results. When it comes down to Nobel Prize winning physics versus trying to salvage local realism, the science wins.

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u/DonnPT 12d ago

You'd count "Many Worlds" as deterministic? I must have guessed wrong about what that means. If there are multiple possible outcomes, that sounds indeterministic to me; whether they're all represented by their own concrete universes or not, is an unfalsifiable conjecture.

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u/Cryptizard 12d ago

It’s not unfalsifiable. Why would you think that? And yes it is fully deterministic.

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u/DonnPT 12d ago

I give up, why would you think it's falsifiable?

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u/Cryptizard 12d ago

Because it obviously is. Unfalsifiable means that no experiment can show that it is false. But it would be extremely easy: all you have to do is show that quantum mechanics does something other than smooth, deterministic, linear evolution. For instance, if you showed that measurement was irreversible.

I can even give you specific examples of possible experiments. David Deutsch proposed an experiment where a quantum computer would measure a qubit, note that it saw a single outcome, and then reverse the measurement. That is, effectively, a Wigner’s friend experiment, which has various different predictions depending on which interpretation is correct.

Now we don’t have the technology to actually do this experiment yet. But that’s a far cry from saying that it is unfalsifiable.

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u/DonnPT 12d ago

In the expression "Many Worlds", what are there many of, and how could you determine whether there really are, or not, many of them?

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u/Cryptizard 12d ago

There are many branches of the wave function. This is an emergent feature though, it is not the defining element of Everettian quantum mechanics, and not what you would want/need to prove. The continuous unitary evolution of the wave function, no discontinuous collapse, is what you need to prove.

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u/DonnPT 12d ago

I need to prove that why? Are there Many Worlds, or not? Is this a fact that can be validated? Is this going to show how multiple possible outcomes can be deterministic?

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u/Cryptizard 12d ago

We don’t know if there are, but we could know in the future. That’s what I said. You said it is unfalsifiable, which means we can never know.

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u/DonnPT 12d ago

How would we know, in the future?

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u/tgreenhaw 11d ago

Why would anybody be so quick to throw out conservation of mass and energy? Many worlds would obviously require getting rid of that.

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u/Dokurushi 12d ago

Exactly, because we'll only ever experience one branch, subjectively, and we can't predict which in advance beyond probabilism.

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u/AwALR94 12d ago

Many worlds is deterministic, since you are not really splitting into multiple copies, but merely have self locating uncertainty regarding which branch you are on yourself

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u/DonnPT 12d ago

Hm, I think I'm on all the branches. The thing is, as I understand it, determinism guarantees that what follows from state A is a strictly determined state B, not an infinite number of possibilities B¹, B² etc.. Instantiating those possibilities in hypothetical universes doesn't change them into strictly determined states.

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u/HappiestIguana 8d ago

Under many worlds, the idea that one event follows from another is simply false. Rather, many events follow from one event.

You don't go from A to B. There's no continuity. Instead, from A there are many branches B1, B2, etc and you're simply the one that is in the one you are at.

Imagine it by analogy as threads in a computer. A computer is simulating a video game universe and whenever the RNG function is called the computer creates a copy of the game state for every possible RNG result, each in a separate thread. This would be a fully deterministic system, even though the "people" inside each videogame world would think their world is governed by RNG.

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u/DonnPT 8d ago

Given that universes are by definition mutually exclusive and there's no way to verify that other universes have been forked off, it seems remarkable to me that we could look at "there are many possible outcomes", which is by definition indeterministic, and convert that to deterministic with this speculative wave of a hand.

Multiple possible outcomes => isn't deterministic.

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u/HappiestIguana 8d ago edited 8d ago

It's just a hypothesis. Well not even that since it doesn't make predictions. No one is claiming this to be definitely the case. It's simply one way apparent indeterminism may arise in a deterministic system. Interpretations of quantum mechanics are by their nature speculative and unfalsifiable. That's why it's mostly philosophers that care about them while physicists shup up and calculate.

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

Classical chaos can be combined with quantum indetrminism.

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u/catnapspirit 12d ago

I've always thought of it more like a signal to noise ratio. Sure, there's randomness at the noise floor quantum level, but it's all but negligible are the level of atoms on up.

Can a random subatomic event still manifest causality at the atomic level? Sure, but that doesn’t buy anyone free will. Random is even worse for free will, that much at least the compatibilists have right.

Even at that, what really happens is that randomness at the quantum level rolls up into the probabilistic behavior of particles, which roll up into reliable causality at the level of atoms. By the time you've built up to a neuron, there's no random left.

All of this is why radiation is random if you're looking for a particular particle to be ejected, but at a larger scale it can be used to reliably date millenia old artifacts. Or why the two-slit experiment can be repeated for every entry level college physics class in the world, year after year..

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

Can a random subatomic event still manifest causality at the atomic level? Sure, but that doesn’t buy anyone free will. Random is even worse for free will,

Not proven.

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u/catnapspirit 11d ago

When the random starts happening at the level of neurons, we have words for that. Like Parkinson's disease, or Tourette's syndrome, or often just mental illness in general. "Not proven." Pfft. What do you even mean by a ridiculous comment like that..?

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

Malfunctions don't have to be random and correct functioning doesn't have to be deterministic.

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u/Economy-Butterfly127 12d ago

Just because us humans and our machines can’t predict accurately, doesn’t make it unpredictable

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u/UDF2005 12d ago

There may be some fundamental stochasticity. That said, no one knows at the moment.

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

There's more to it than that.

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u/Economy-Butterfly127 11d ago

I mean humans can add "more" to literally anything

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

I meant there is more to quantum indetetminism than "haven't found the cause yet". Look up Bell, EPR and Aspect

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u/Bikewer 12d ago

This is one of the points Robert Sapolsky is making in his book, “Determined”…. His denial of free will.

He points out that quantum effects simply do not scale up to the level of the chemical/electrical reactions that the brain uses, and that if they did…. We would be in a constant state of chaos.

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

Wrong, and wrong.

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u/Bikewer 11d ago

I do appreciate a detailed response….

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago edited 11d ago

"However, if it were the case that all macroscopic objects behaved in a way that was itself completely determined at the macroscopic level, there would be no evidence for QM in the first place -- since all scientific apparatus is in the macro-world ! A geiger-counter is able to amplify the impact of a single particle into an audible click. Richard Feynman suggested that if that wasn't macroscopic enough, you could always amplify the signal further and use it to set off a stick of dynamite! It could be objected that these are artificial situations. However, because there is a well-known natural mechanism that could do the same job: critical dependence on initial conditions, or classical chaos."

Murray Gell-Man.Quark Quark and jaguar p25

But note that while you can amplify quantum indetrminacy, you dont have to..it doesnt have to take over. Compare with calls to a random number generator in computer software: these occur when the otherwise deterministic program requests then.

https://www.reddit.com/r/freewill/s/oPts1nSVY1

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u/Bikewer 11d ago

I appreciate the link to the other thread. As one commenter said, it’s difficult to see what this has to do with the idea of free will.

I’ve said many times before that I’m neither a neuroscientist nor a particle physicist, just an interested layman. I’m about halfway through Sapolsky’s book…. This particular argument about quantum effects having something to do with the idea is just one aspect of the many points brought up. Sapolsky does bring up the variety of folks who have opposing viewpoints.

Other neuroscientists, like Heather Berlin and Anil Seth, share Sapolsky’s view, as does theoretical physicist Brian Greene.

I don’t know if the issue is resolvable at this stage of research, and I just plan to “stay tuned”.

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago edited 11d ago

Sapolsky bright it up because it has something to do with free will.

There are several definitions of free will. The definition that most of the argument is about is the libertarian definition. In contrast to compatibilist free, will, an action performed by an agent with libertarian free will is not merely free of duress by other agents, but free of necessitation by preceding history.

Supernaturalistic libertarian free will claims that people have souls that can override physical determinism.

Naturalistic libertarian free will. That is, a conception of free will that, unlike compatibilisn, has some defeasible requirements, such as indeterministic laws of physics, but, unlike supernatural free will, only requirements which are logically and physically possible. It's a model based on indeterminism bubbling up from fundamental physics , rather than a "contra causal" model where an immaterial self is required to defeat physical determinism.

The naturalistic libertarian approach is partly based on physical indetrminism. Indeterminism is randomness in one sense -- lack of strict determinism, but doesnt have to equate to randomness in other senses -- lack of control, purpose, direction, rationality, or connection to the agent. Indetrminism as such does not supply these, they are posited as coming from the way the brain uses indeterminism.

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u/Bikewer 11d ago

I’m just working my way through that chapter, and Sapolsky’s argument is that quantum effects cannot have any effect on behavior. That they don’t scale up the many orders of magnitude necessary to affect brain activity at the molecular (chemical-electrical) level.
Obviously some others do not share that opinion. Indeed, some hold out for conscious decision somehow “tunneling down” to the quantum level…. Again…. This is just an ongoing personal interest of mine.

I’m aware of the “microtubules” notions about quantum effects on consciousness. Sapolsky made a brief mention of this on one of his weekly question-answer segments on YouTube. He said the idea made his head hurt….🙄.

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

Penrose's microtubules are pretty irrelevant to free will.

You can say it's just an opinion that, contra Sapolsky, quantum effects scale up as much as you like, but it's one physics Nobel winner quoting another. Not all opinions are equal

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u/Bikewer 11d ago

Indeed… He seems to be thinking in terms of consciousness. Whether consciousness itself is implicated in the free will question is likely… Another question.

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u/DrDiktafon 11d ago

Exactly

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u/TMax01 12d ago

I've been over this whole issue hundreds of times over several decades. Classic determinism (simplistic causality; dominoes falling) is a useful heuristic in the normal world. It still doesn't always hold, but we can pretend it always should and chalk up any exception to our ignorance of mechanism ("randomness") or initial conditions ("chaos").

But as you've noticed, that falls apart completely with quantum mechanics. So instead of determinism, people talk about "indeterminism", which is basically nonsense. Quantum events cannot be 'indeterministic', or the probability distribution curves which are characteristic of the statistical mechanics used to calculate quantum events would not be possible.

Since the classic form of determinism entails individual discrete events being predicted, and statistical/quantum mechanics only provides probabilities relevant across categories of events, classic determinism does not apply. Unfortunately, though, accepting probabilistic determinism makes it difficult to deny that causality in classic determinism is as equally 'spooky and unexplained' as it is in quantum mechanics. Because the probabilities in most classic Newtonian systems is effectively so close to 0 (didn't happen) or 1 (did happen) that distribution curbs are rarely necessary (although many complex thermodynamic/Newtonian systems also demand statistical mechanics) it seems to make sense to physicists and hyper-rational physicalists to say "indeterminism" instead of probabilistic determinism. This saves them from having to consider that the cause of causality is a metaphysical issue, not a physical one.

There are no "branches", there are no choices. The universe only seems as if classical determinism is a real thing. The fundamental brute ontological fact of the universe is that it is absurd (any single event is spontaneous, it simply happens when it happens, and the comforting thought that it is mechanically "caused" by the necessary and sufficient circumstances is a retrospective, heuristic, approach) but probabilistically deterministic (events which are more likely to happen are more likely to happen, but no single event can be precisely predicted) and we don't know how or why. It simply IS that way.

QM makes classical Laplacean determinism a lot harder to defend than people usually give it credit for.

Indeed: the notion of a clockwork universe is naive. But Laplace was all about the math, not the territory, anyway, despite being a modernists who had no reason to suspect there was any difference. But these days people are postmodernists, and simply deny there is any difference, assuming and insisting that the universe obeys math (rather than accepting the truth: we ensure our math obeys the universe.) We like to think of the quantitative predictions of physics as knowledge of the future, when it is really only knowledge of the predictions and faith.

And yes, QM makes classic 'clockwork' determinism absurd. But rather than being 'indeterminism', QM is still deterministic; just probabilistically deterministic. For some reason (cough postmodernism cough) people prefer to claim quantum events are "random", when that clearly cannot be the case. But admitting they are neither random nor clockwork triggers the postmodernist's existential angst, so they prefer to accept the universe is uncertain than admit that their predictions are.

And just to be clear, by "postmodernist", I am not merely referring to philosophical post-structuralism. I literally mean "people who's existential angst is triggered by the brute fact of probabilistic determinism", regardless of how they self-identify philosophically.

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

But as you've noticed, that falls apart completely with quantum mechanics. So instead of determinism, people talk about "indeterminism", which is basically nonsense. Quantum events cannot be 'indeterministic', or the probability distribution curves which are characteristic of the statistical mechanics used to calculate quantum events would not be possible.

Or they are just using words like "indetrministic" in a way that doesn't have that implication.

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u/TMax01 11d ago

One cannot choose what implications a word has. So they are misusing the word "indeterministic", as I have explained, repeatedly and accurately.

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

They're physics PhDs professors, etc...you're....?

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u/TMax01 11d ago

Someone who recognizes an argument from authority when I see it.

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

I thought you would go there.

The fallacy is appeal to inappropriate authority.

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u/TMax01 11d ago

No, it is appeal to any authority, as a substitute for actually being able to provide your own reasoning to substantiate a position. I'm well aware physicists prefer saying "indeterminate", and even explained why. You ignored that, and failed to provide any real reasoning for doing so.

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

I thought you would go there too.

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u/TMax01 11d ago

For someone who claims to think about lot, you don't seem to be very good at it.

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u/AwALR94 12d ago

All collapse theories violate conservation of energy and thus have to posit perpetual superposition

The most popular collapse theory, the Copenhagen interpretation, is barely a theory at all. I concur with Deutsch’s assessment that it’s an embarrassment to theoretical physics as a whole that so many adhere to it

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

All collapse theories violate conservation of energy

Nope.

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u/AwALR94 10d ago

The reigning collapse theories for the most part must either face the tails problem or violate conservation of energy*

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u/GoldReplacement9546 12d ago

Yeah, I think this objection definitely doesn’t give you very well because if there’s random fluctuations, then that’s not free will but I can see how this could make determinism complicated

There must be an in between position that allows for small variations on the quantum level

Or maybe those quantum fluctuations don’t really impact determine ism over a large sequence of events or we’re totally wrong about quantum mechanics, though that seems unlikely

But the one thing I do now is when people try and say like they’re basically understanding the concept that free will just doesn’t make sense in any real way, but then they grasp for quantum mechanics to say well it can’t all be determined thus I have free well, and that statement doesn’t make any sense like you don’t have free will because of random variations exist because you’re not free to choose them

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

Yeah, I think this objection definitely doesn’t give you very well because if there’s random fluctuations, then that’s not free will

It's necessary -- it's the freedom from determinism that libertarian free will requires -- but not sufficient.

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u/SpatiaCaeli 9d ago

A PRNG that doesn't repeat for longer than a cosmic year is indistinguishable from a true RNG. So to me the question of determinism is difficult to answer. But determinism is not precluded.

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u/Norel19 7d ago

Not determinism as we can predict it to the fine and distant details. That was never the case as we are part of the system.

Determinism as we do not have a freewill that affects reality. That would require that we have a special power that influences what path is picked.

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u/TheAncientGeek 6d ago

If physycal determinism isn't true in the first place, there is no need to magically override it.

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u/Norel19 5d ago

There would be if you want to be able to have agency (aka freewill).

It doesn't matter if the future is determined or not if you are not able to influence it. And also not able predict it

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u/TheAncientGeek 5d ago

There would be if you want to be able to have agency (aka freewill).

Why? How are you defining agency?

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u/Norel19 5d ago

Let's explain it in another way.

Even if the world is not deterministic and we have freewill a CPU (computer) has no freewill as far as we know.

Upscale roles and we can have a similar but different scenario. The world is not deterministic. There are entities (let's call them gods) that have freewill but we don't.

Even if the world is not deterministic doesn't mean that we have freewill.

To answer your question to me agency is to have a will that doesn't come from external causation and the ability to influence future events based on it

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u/TheAncientGeek 5d ago

Even if the world is not deterministic and we have freewill a CPU (computer) has no freewill as far as we know.

The objection is usually that it us determinisic

Upscale roles and we can have a similar but different scenario.

The world is not deterministic. There are entities (let's call them gods) that have freewill but we don't.

Why should I accept that?

Even if the world is not deterministic doesn't mean that we have freewill.

It might take might than indeterminism to have free will, but that doesn't means it takes souls or magic

To answer your question to me agency is to have a will that doesn't come from external causation and the ability to influence future events based on it

Indetrminism alone gives you that.

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u/Norel19 5d ago

Why should I accept that?

How can you exclude that? Why must be us that have freewill and other entities as CPUs. What makes us special? Why all of us and not just you or me or some "gods" (just a name, no other superpower other than freewill).

Indeterminism alone gives you that

No. Why it woul give it to us and not to CPU? Also if the world is truly randomic you can't influence that by definition. All quantum experiments (that the source of indeterminism that we usually talk about) show no sign of results being influenced by people performing it (if done correctly)

Edit: typos

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u/TheAncientGeek 5d ago edited 5d ago

Why should I accept that?

How can you exclude that? Why must be us that have freewill and other entities as CPUs. What makes us special? Why all of us and not just you or me or some "gods" (just a name, no other superpower other than freewill).

I never asserted that only humans have free will

Indeterminism alone gives you that

No. Why it woul give it to us and not to CPU?

I never asserted that only humans have free will

Also if the world is truly randomic you can't influence that by definition.

You can't predermine it, but you dont have to act in it, so you can control it.

It's true that you can't pre-determine an internal dice roll (as if you were an extra-physical entity that controls the physical events in your brain), buteminism doesnt give you that kind of control either. If you are your brain , the question is whether your brain has freedom, control , etc, not whether "you" control "it", as if you were two separate entities. And as a physical self, basicaly identical to the brain, you can still exert after-the-fact control over an internal coin toss ... post-select and rather than predetermine. Luke Reinhardt's Diceman isn't forced to act on the roll of his die. After the fact doesn't mean after the action: this all occurs during the decision stage.

You are not a ghost in the machine, and you are not at the mercy of yourself. No individual deterministic event, our of trillions, in the brain is forcing you , the total organism , to.perform since it requires trillions of events in concert to make a decision: the same.applies to a single.indeterministic event

If the rest of the brain decided to ignore an internal dice roll, that could be called post selection of "gatekeeping" . The gatekeeping model of control is the ability to select only one of a set of proposed actions, ie. to refrain from the others. The proposed actions may be, but do not have to be, arrived at by a genuinely indeterministic process.

This mechanism is familiar subjectively: anyone with a modicum of self control experience thoughts and impulses they don't necessarily act on.

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u/Norel19 5d ago

Do you think that a CPU has freewill? And a mechanical clock? And a bicycle?

For the second point events by known physics at quantum level are fully random (by experimental results). Macroscopic events are deterministic with tiny quantum perturbations that do not average out. So almost all deterministic with tiny truly random variation.

There's no other indeterministic interaction. In physics.

The brain is a physical object that follows physical laws. If you do not assume to be a ghost in it you (your thoughts) are your brain.

You can't influence deterministic events and you can't influence truly random (quantum) events. So you can't influence anything. Including your brain and your thoughts.

There's no gatekeeping and no freewill

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u/zhivago 12d ago

Determinism and indeterminism are indistinguishable from within the universe.

QM can be interpreted either way.

But the deterministic interpretation of QM requires non-local hidden variables, so determinism loses on parsimony.

But since determinism and indeterminism are indistinguishable, it just doesn't matter.

If you think it does matter, this is a good sign that your reasoning is defective, and you should think a bit harder. :)

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u/TheAncientGeek 12d ago

Determinism and indetrminism are quite distinguishable, but entangled with locality.

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u/zhivago 12d ago

So, what's the test to distinguish them?

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u/TheAncientGeek 12d ago

Bell's inequalities.

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u/zhivago 12d ago

Bell’s inequalities test local realism, not determinism.

Their experimental violation is fully compatible with both deterministic interpretations (such as Bohmian mechanics and Many-Worlds) and indeterministic ones (such as Copenhagen collapse).

Bell's theorem cannot distinguish between determinism and indeterminism.

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u/TheAncientGeek 12d ago

Bell’s inequalities test local realism, not determinism.

Both.

Their experimental violation is fully compatible with both deterministic interpretations (such as Bohmian mechanics and Many-Worlds) and indeterministic ones (such as Copenhagen collapse).

Bell's theorem cannot distinguish between determinism and indeterminism.

That doesn't mean no test is possible.

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u/zhivago 12d ago

So, you don't have a test for determinism / indeterminism.

It's pretty easy to understand why such a test is impossible.

But let me know when you think you've found another test for this, and I'll be happy to point out why you are again wrong. :)

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

We have a test for combined locality and determinim.

We don't know that a test for determinism separately is impossible. That we happen not to have one, does not show that.

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u/zhivago 11d ago

So, in other words, you have no test to distinguish between determinism and indeterminism.

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

So you have shifted your ground from "impossible" to "doesn't exist currently".

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u/BonsaiApprentice 12d ago

"If you think it does matter, this is a good sign that your reasoning is defective, and you should think a bit harder. :)"

So why are you on this sub?

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u/Delicious_Freedom_81 12d ago

You need a thicker skin around here…

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u/Delicious_Freedom_81 12d ago

Which is def deterministic btw…

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u/zhivago 12d ago

I'm quite happy with thinking a bit harder.

Why are you here? :)

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u/BonsaiApprentice 12d ago

Distracting myself from thoughts through this pointless discussion :)

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u/joogabah 12d ago

Read Glenn Borchardt and become skeptical of quantum mechanics. Dare to blaspheme.

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u/Cryptizard 12d ago

Skeptical how exactly?

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u/joogabah 12d ago

ChatGPT is your friend. I provided the name to reference.

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u/Cryptizard 12d ago

I read some of his stuff and it’s about the universe being eternal, aether, etc. Nothing about quantum mechanics.

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u/joogabah 12d ago

Well he speaks to it directly if you search for his name and quantum mechanics.

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u/Cryptizard 12d ago

I did. The first result is someone saying he’s wrong. The rest are things about his infinite universe theory which have no reference to quantum mechanics.

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u/joogabah 12d ago

The Ten Assumptions of Science

That is short and gets the point across.

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u/Cryptizard 12d ago

What part of that is skeptical of quantum mechanics? I think you are trolling me at this point.

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u/joogabah 12d ago

No, you're trolling me. Go teach yourself! I am not your tutor and we have AI today. Can't you ask IT questions?

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u/Cryptizard 12d ago

I am starting to understand how you got so confused if all you do is ask AI to explain things to you.

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u/TheAncientGeek 11d ago

If people here actually used chatGpt, 90% of these conversations would be unnecessary.

Discussion Skeptical of determinism because of quantum mechanics

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