Are we predictable? - GameCreators Forum

Author

Message

TheComet

18

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 18th Oct 2007

Location: I`m under ur bridge eating ur goatz.

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 15:30 Edited at: 19th Feb 2012 16:00

Link

This is very philosophical. Keep in mind there are no direct answers to the questions I'm about to pose.

My very much deterministic friend said to me once:

Quote: "If we knew all factors of the universe and all of the formulas of everything that exists at a given moment in time, we would be able to predict with 100% accuracy what will happen next."

What he says implies that we'd be able to calculate exactly what a human will do next, which leads to the conclusion that we do have a destiny and everything that we do has been "foretold". This scares me because I believe in free will and don't like the idea of having an already plotted out path in life.

Any arguments I throw at him are usually answered by:

Quote: "Our universe seems unpredictable because we just don't know all of the factors and formulas yet."

What are all of your thoughts on this subject? Is there a such thing as true randomness and chaos? Is it possible to calculate what we're going to do next?

TheComet

Timeplan : https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AmuAKJolqASndEVYOWMxb3l2OWV0UkV1anRSczZScHc

Back to top

Profile PM Email Website

Libervurto

20

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 30th Jun 2006

Location: On Toast

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 16:08

Link

I agree with your friend. I think you are predisposed to react in a certain way to influences in your life. Your experiences may change the way you think and may change you as a person but like your friend said, if we could understand how those things occur then would could predict it all.

We never make random choices, there is always a logic behind what we do, even if it doesn't make sense or isn't apparent. Therefore it can be predicted.

I don't see it as a horrible idea. You are simply living your life, making your choices. The only thing this confines you to is being yourself.

Another interesting idea is what if we DID know all these formulas and you were told exactly how your life would pan out? Would this influence you and cause a change in your destiny? Or would the machine be able to take its own revelation into account?

There is a new genome service that will soon be available on the NHS, they can tell you with extreme accuracy what illnesses your child will suffer from in its life time and what its life expectancy is. I can't remember the details but it seems very close to this idea.

Join DNG today! We are a game development team open to all. Visit our Headquarters to learn more.

Back to top

Profile PM Email

Zotoaster

21

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 20th Dec 2004

Location: Scotland

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 16:10

Link

I think Steven Pinker put it best. Our brains are computers, that intrinsically deterministic, in order for us to make good decisions. But this level of determinism is good enough for us to evaluate our options, and pick the best one, so we have something as good as free will anyway, but without breaking the laws of science.

I'm paraphrasing of course, but I wrote a similar argument when I took philosophy in high-school. Obviously our brain is in layers. From our earliest ancestors we have all the basic stuff, then we have our reptilian brain which gives us emotions, etc. These parts are pretty irrational and they are all about survival. But humans are unique in that they have a cerebral cortex and are able to make abstractions. Now we are capable of making essentially free choices, by virtue of a smart brain.

Are we predictable? Probably on the emotional side, yes. If we were extremely "rational" (say like a politician, or a lawyer), one could probably predict what you're going to do next given a set of circumstances, but that's the same way you predict what your opponent will do in chess should you make a move.

However, if we knew the exact starting conditions of the universe and had a complete understanding of all the physical laws at work, then maybe, but we'd have to let our universe run for 14 billion years before we even appeared in the simulation.

"everyone forgets a semi-colon sometimes." - Phaelax

Back to top

Profile PM Email

CoffeeGrunt

18

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 5th Oct 2007

Location: England

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 16:32

Link

I think that, you can never fully account for all the variables your brain makes in its decisions.

Think about it this way, your brain is running at full capacity to make a decision, so it can't add any more processing power to track how it's processing what it's processing.

But a more powerful computer would be able to analyse adn track all the variables it's running, while utilising its own to process and understand how it's working.

But given the fact that all brains are roughly the same processing power, one human can never fully comprehend every, minute detail the other human's brain takes into account. In that manner, true, flawless empathy can never exist.

Back to top

Profile PM Email

Quik

18

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 3rd Jul 2008

Location: Equestria!

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 16:34

Link

but you cannot determine ones mind, since it is an everchanging thing that, i believe, cannot be "solved" like the rubus cube thingy.

I definitly believe in free will

Like they say in the movies: "The future, always clouded it is. Always changing."

that was kind of a free quote form Yoda... he doesnt say it exactly like that, but somewhere along those lines

The result of origin.. Oh and ponies

Back to top

Profile PM

TheComet

18

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 18th Oct 2007

Location: I`m under ur bridge eating ur goatz.

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 16:40

Link

Quote: "You are simply living your life, making your choices."

Interesting comment. Doesn't knowing it all counter this though? Because you aren't really making choices, you are just following the path that has been pre-programmed into you no?

Quote: "Another interesting idea is what if we DID know all these formulas and you were told exactly how your life would pan out? Would this influence you and cause a change in your destiny? Or would the machine be able to take its own revelation into account?"

I suppose the equations would take into account that you were supposed to calculate what you're going to do next. But that would create a paradox... Maybe your destiny would change upon recalculation? There's an Anime series out there about a book that tells you what a person will do next. If you read your own destiny, it changes though. If anyone knows what that's called, I'd like to know

@ All

There are anomalies that can't be predicted to 100% accuracy though, Quantum theory being one of the prime examples. For instance, why isn't is possible to determine the position and velocity of an electron at the same time? If you determine one of the factors, the other one can't be determined.

Schrodingers cat is another example. The cat is alive and dead until observed. How does that plug into "knowing it all" when two impossible states exist at the same time?

TheComet

Timeplan : https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AmuAKJolqASndEVYOWMxb3l2OWV0UkV1anRSczZScHc

Back to top

Profile PM Email Website

HowDo

23

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 28th Nov 2002

Location: United Kingdom

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 16:50

Link

Quote: "Schrodingers cat is another example. The cat is alive and dead until observed. How does that plug into "knowing it all" when two impossible states exist at the same time?"

If you were to ask me how many state the above statment has I would say it 3, and 4 if you don't look.

Dark Physics makes any hot drink go cold.

Back to top

Profile PM

Indicium

18

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 26th May 2008

Location:

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 16:55

Link

I sort of believe in fate from a scientific point of view. At the start of the universe, every particle had a set energy, that energy is transfer and is now in our brains. Our brains are just a bunch of chemical reactions and electrical signals, these only occur if the electrons are in the right place at the right time, so the thoughts in our head were pretty much determined by where these reactions occur, which was decided at the start of time.

I've done a horrible job of explaining what I mean, but it makes perfect sense in my head.

Also, say somebody did write a computer simulation that simulated up to the present, and then into the future, the computer would have to simulate the simulation which would simulate the simulation within it, meaning the time it would take would be infinite and thus impossible to calculate. xD

Back to top

Profile PM

Seppuku Arts

Moderator

21

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 18th Aug 2004

Location: Cambridgeshire, England

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 17:12 Edited at: 19th Feb 2012 17:13

Link

It's predictable that Zotoaster would post in this thread, I'm pretty sure he's embraced philosophical threads before.

Plus it's predictable that I'd come in and make a pretty stupid comment.

But on a serious note, I think it really is a case of knowing every possible variable and for each person these variables are unique.

I wonder how you would predict whether or not I'm going to take a shower? The thought had just occurred to me because I'm feeling a little dirty and I just scratched my scalp. But there's variables out there that could lead me not to go and do it, maybe leaving it until later or tomorrow. One variable is that I need to do some coding, another is that I'm feeling a little apathetic...hence the lack of coding and the perusing of the forums. But am I self-conscious? Do I feel uncomfortable when dirty?

I think when understanding some of the variables you can make predictions, but with a margin of error.

However, to address 'destiny' and our destinies being 'foretold', I don't think that has to be necessary, although there are arguments to suggest so and some would place such destinies into the plans of their deity/deities. Another way of looking at it would be causality. One event triggers another and that triggers another and that everybody has led to where we are now through cause and effect, but instead of being as simple as 'object hits other object, other object moves' it's incredibly complex. Some take what's called the Cosmological Argument in that respect, that to begin the universe there's the uncaused causer. 'Destiny' I think is a romantic way of looking at it, but with determinism your choices are only affected by causation. It is the argument of the determinist that free will is just an illusion. There's also soft-determinism, which suggests that a person's actions have a level of free will, therefore less predictable. You could consider this quote from David Hume:

Quote: "A person’s action is free if, and only if, had the person wanted to do otherwise than the act, the person would have had the power to do otherwise than the act."

But then, I guess you could try to argue that what a person wants is already pre-determined by other variables. Unfortunately, there's too many variables for anybody to comprehend. Perhaps there exists some level of free will that gives our actions less predictability.

Wow, it's been a long time since I've thought about anything philosophical.

Back to top

Profile PM Website

Zotoaster

21

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 20th Dec 2004

Location: Scotland

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 17:21

Link

Quote: "It's predictable that Zotoaster would post in this thread, I'm pretty sure he's embraced philosophical threads before."

Philosophy is for cool people!

Here's a question. If you were to create a universe in your garage with the exact same laws and starting conditions as our own, would it do the same things as our universe has?

If so, we are on some level predictable. I mean that in the loosest sense, in that, we (as fallible, dumb humans) may not be able to predict these things, but we are nonetheless predictable.

If on the other hand different things happened, it would mean the universe itself is unpredictable, but our technology says otherwise.

I guess the distinction here is between things that are in theory predictable and things that we can predict. Quantum mechanics is predictable, but we can't predict what happens because observance changes the outcome. But it's still operating under the laws of QM. If everything else is predictable, why are we different?

"everyone forgets a semi-colon sometimes." - Phaelax

Back to top

Profile PM Email

KariSigurd

15

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 17th Mar 2011

Location:

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 17:54

Link

This is called determinism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Determinism

It's quite an interesting subject. Free will is a lie, all that jazz.

Back to top

Profile PM

Zotoaster

21

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 20th Dec 2004

Location: Scotland

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 17:59

Link

That's what we're discussing. It's not as simple as determinism vs. free will though. Hard determinists believe that free will is impossible, whereas soft determinists believe that determinism and free will are compatible, which is probably my stance.

As I said, the brain is a deterministic machine, but it has it's own interests in mind, and it can make choices to serve those interests. I would call these choices free will, but I would say the interests our choices try to accomplish are probably deterministic.

"everyone forgets a semi-colon sometimes." - Phaelax

Back to top

Profile PM Email

Lukas W

22

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 5th Sep 2003

Location: Sweden

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 18:12 Edited at: 19th Feb 2012 18:13

Link

If like your friend says, we knew everything there was to know about everything, then there would be no infinity. If there was no infinity; yes, I believe we could predict what would happen next.

However, If there would be such a thing as infinity, there would exist true randomness. If true randomness existed, it would mean we would have free will and nothing was pre-determined from start.

And I think the population of earth believe in such a thing as infinity exists

The Taffer (+TaffED)
A thief inspired game along with the mission editor (DBPro). [on hiatus]

Back to top

Profile PM Email

BatVink

Moderator

23

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 4th Apr 2003

Location: Gods own County, UK

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 18:24 Edited at: 19th Feb 2012 18:30

Link

Quote: "Our universe seems unpredictable because we just don't know all of the factors and formulas yet."

I'm afraid that he has just exposed a weakness of the human mind. A lazy mind tries to find patterns in randomness, because once a pattern is found, you no longer have to engage System 2 - the part of your mind that does the thinking. Patterns can be processed by System 1 - "intuition" and thus simple assumptions.

Quote: "We never make random choices, there is always a logic behind what we do"

Yes there is logic, but it is flawed logic on the same basis as above. When somebody asks you a question for example, you'll usually answer a different - easier - one without realising it. If I ask you if you plan to focus on coding a full game tomorrow, you'll probably answer me based on how you feel right now, because it's easier but you'll think you answered my question - flawed logic.

Of course the biggy when it comes to a predictable universe is the unpredictable. You don't know if the rubber your car tyres are made from is inherently flawed and ready to go bang, or if the wind will change direction and blow that bout of Spanish flu through your window. They are random events and you'll never find a pattern.

Work out which of the following series of coin flips is most likely, and you're closer to understanding the true random nature of our universe. Remember, you may flip a coin several times in your life to make a decision.

1. H-H-T-H-T-T-H-T
2. H-H-H-H-T-T-T-T
3. H-H-H-H-H-H-H-H

Quote: "If we were extremely "rational" (say like a politician, or a lawyer)"

Actually, they are as irrational and fallible as the rest of us! It was lawyers who put a nurse in prison because she worked in six hospitals where there had been unusual deaths. The statistical analysis shows that she was less likely to be the culprit, not more likely.

Politicians don't make rational decisions, they are often influenced by greed (whether it is money, power or otherwise) and don't understand statistical analysis. They aren't politicians because of their abilities, they are politicians because they want to be. I'll give you a good example, take a look at John Prescott, former UK deputy prime minister, and his Condensing Boiler farce.

You can pick other professions that should be rational, and pull them apart, such as Andrew Wakefield and the MMR jab scam, or supposedly intelligent NHS management and politicians with the MRSA debacle. All irrational decisions based on intuition (lazy thinking) over reasoning.

Back to top

Profile PM Email

Pincho Paxton

23

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 8th Dec 2002

Location:

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 18:34

Link

Quote: "Here's a question. If you were to create a universe in your garage with the exact same laws and starting conditions as our own, would it do the same things as our universe has?"

I suppose that this is the real question to the whole thread. I look at it this way.. Gravity, and time in the universe has always controlled the outcome of physics. When you look out into space, all of the planets are controlled by those physics. When you look further out, a Nebula is controlled by those physics....

... but when you look at Earth... it isn't controlled by those physics. We stand up against gravity, we throw a rock without the need for cause, and effect hitting the rock. We can destroy an entire planet for no reason...

... our first cause is time. So when Cause, and effect is referred to you only have to understand time to solve the quote in my reply...

...second effect is direction.. time creates flow with direction...

...so third effect is flow... the direction is the area of least resistance.

... the universe uses deterministic flow direction of time leading to gravity with a flow direction towards area of least resistance.

And this is where humans get their free will. The area of least resistance is not determined in humans. The area of least resistance starts with pressure. Two planets collide, the area of least resistance is the planet with the lowest force... determined...

...however, humans are pressure containers. The heart is a pressure valve for blood.. the flow of blood is determined by the heart pulses.. determined...

... the brain in (my theory) is also a pressure valve (yet to be proven). But the brain (in my theory) does not control blood flow, it controls time flow...

... our first cause is time...

... we control time flow....

... our first cause is time...

... we control time flow....

... our first cause is time...

... we control time flow....

... our first cause is time...

... we control time flow....

... our first cause is time...

... we control time flow....

... our first cause is time...

... we control time flow....

and so this loop is a none deterministic paradox.

Back to top

Profile PM Email Website

TheComet

18

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 18th Oct 2007

Location: I`m under ur bridge eating ur goatz.

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 18:39 Edited at: 19th Feb 2012 20:17

Link

It's not even a tenable argument; Look at a woman

If the universe were predictable, women wouldn't even be here.

Quote: "You don't know if the rubber your car tyres are made from is inherently flawed and ready to go bang, or if the wind will change direction and blow that bout of Spanish flu through your window. They are random events and you'll never find a pattern."

I don't know why I'm backing my friend's argument, but here it goes. If I knew all factors of the universe, I would be able to tell exactly where the atoms in that tyre are weak and thin, and can tell you exactly under what circumstances that tyre would explode. Again, if I knew all factors of all atoms in the universe, I would be able to tell when the wind changes direction.

Quote: "1. H-H-T-H-T-T-H-T
2. H-H-H-H-T-T-T-T
3. H-H-H-H-H-H-H-H"

In all cases the chance would be 1:2^8 = 1:256

TheComet

Timeplan : https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AmuAKJolqASndEVYOWMxb3l2OWV0UkV1anRSczZScHc

Back to top

Profile PM Email Website

Zotoaster

21

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 20th Dec 2004

Location: Scotland

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 18:45 Edited at: 19th Feb 2012 18:47

Link

Quote: "Actually, they are as irrational and fallible as the rest of us! It was lawyers who put a nurse in prison because she worked in six hospitals where there had been unusual deaths. The statistical analysis shows that she was less likely to be the culprit, not more likely.

Politicians don't make rational decisions, they are often influenced by greed (whether it is money, power or otherwise) and don't understand statistical analysis. They aren't politicians because of their abilities, they are politicians because they want to be. I'll give you a good example, take a look at John Prescott, former UK deputy prime minister, and his Condensing Boiler farce.

You can pick other professions that should be rational, and pull them apart, such as Andrew Wakefield and the MMR jab scam, or supposedly intelligent NHS management and politicians with the MRSA debacle. All irrational decisions based on intuition (lazy thinking) over reasoning."

I think I should have made it clear that I meant rational in the context of a form of game. Of course politicians are irrational as human beings (we all know this, lol), but I was meaning they are rational in that there is a game mechanic here, the circumstances make them quite predictable. That's why I made the allusion to chess - you may play a really greedy guy at chess, but there are rules to the game and you already know his basic interest, which is to win. As long as he knows the rules and his interest is in winning, he may be as irrational as he wants, he may even sacrifice his Queen, but if you don't move your King out of the way of his Bishop, I can predict that he will check-mate you, even though he's greedy and irrational.

Quote: "And this is where humans get their free will. The area of least resistance is not determined in humans. The area of least resistance starts with pressure."

There's a book called 'The Lucifer Effect' by Philip Zimbardo, and his thesis is that our decisions are essentially situational. Our decisions aren't entirely free, but to some extent dictated by the current circumstances (as well as intuition, memory, etc).

Quote: "... but when you look at Earth... it isn't controlled by those physics. We stand up against gravity, we throw a rock without the need for cause, and effect hitting the rock. We can destroy an entire planet for no reason..."

That's just silly. It's all controlled by physics. We may erect a building that seems to escape gravity, but it's still physics that's allowing for this to happen.

"everyone forgets a semi-colon sometimes." - Phaelax

Back to top

Profile PM Email

Pincho Paxton

23

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 8th Dec 2002

Location:

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 18:51

Link

It may sound silly until you understand time. We have X/Y/Z which is deterministic, but time is in the middle of X/Y/Z.. it's location determines X/Y/Z. So if a human brain controls the flow of time by reducing pressure in any direction, it controls X/Y/Z of thoughts from a distance. If you compare it to a Greyhound race, you want the Greyhounds to cross the finish line which is some distance from the traps, so the hare is chased, and the finish line was determined before the dogs were released from the traps. Our brain creates a finish line before time is released by reducing pressure anywhere in the brain's X/Y/Z.

Back to top

Profile PM Email Website

Zotoaster

21

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 20th Dec 2004

Location: Scotland

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 18:59 Edited at: 19th Feb 2012 19:00

Link

Quote: "We have X/Y/Z which is deterministic, but time is in the middle of X/Y/Z.. it's location determines X/Y/Z. So if a human brain controls the flow of time"

Not really sure where you're getting this. Time is a dimension, it's part of the space-time fabric, woven in with space. The flow of time is generally said to be entropy, which is the tendency for order to go into disorder, since there are more ways to be disordered than ordered.

How is time in the "middle" of XYZ?
How does time have a location?
How would it's "location" determine XYZ, and what does that even mean?
How does a human brain control the flow of time?

Confused.

"everyone forgets a semi-colon sometimes." - Phaelax

Back to top

Profile PM Email

Pincho Paxton

23

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 8th Dec 2002

Location:

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 19:08 Edited at: 19th Feb 2012 19:10

Link

The answer comes from the Bose Einstein condensate. If you take a look at one of the effects of reducing temperature to absolute zero you will see that all of the atoms merge into a central point. This central point is the location at which time flow was reduced to zero. To follow up from the Bose Einstein condensate I created my own computer model. I applied the same time reduction to atoms but more gradually, and I got snowflakes. Not just any snowflakes, but exact snowflake models which have all of the snowflake features. So time made atoms fall into a hexagonal structure, and it was based on Newtons Kissing problem. That surrounding particles have to distribute in a certain way around a same sized particles. Then to add even more evidence to this you have time dilation due to speed of moving bodies. If you put time at the centre of atoms, and add a flow from the centre of those atoms, then the force from applied acceleration reduces the flow of time due to the area of least resistance moving away from the centre of those atoms.

Back to top

Profile PM Email Website

Zotoaster

21

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 20th Dec 2004

Location: Scotland

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 19:13

Link

I don't think you actually answered any of my questions. I'm pretty well informed but I'm by no means a physicist. To me you could either sound like you're talking gibberish or I'm just not understanding what you're saying. Make it simple for us all dude!

"everyone forgets a semi-colon sometimes." - Phaelax

Back to top

Profile PM Email

Pincho Paxton

23

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 8th Dec 2002

Location:

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 19:19 Edited at: 19th Feb 2012 19:20

Link

Quote: "I don't think you actually answered any of my questions. I'm pretty well informed but I'm by no means a physicist. To me you could either sound like you're talking gibberish or I'm just not understanding what you're saying. Make it simple for us all dude!"

If an atom is a sphere, and its dimensions are made from X/Y/Z points, you still have a central point with no X/Y/Z. This is infinitely regressive, so presuming that there is a smallest scale to matter you have something in the middle of an atom. We call it the nucleus, and electrons don't collide with it. I call it time, and it's usually an outflow, so electrons can't collide with an outflow. This gives us the dimensions.. X/Y/Z/IN/OUT, and IN/OUT is time.

If we can control the IN/OUT flow, we can control time, and are not deterministic.

Back to top

Profile PM Email Website

Fallout

23

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 1st Sep 2002

Location: Basingstoke, England

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 19:25 Edited at: 19th Feb 2012 19:28

Link

I've considered this point before Mr Comet and I've come to the same conclusion as your friend. Physics is based on mathematical calculations which, if you could take into account every atom precisely, you could 100% accurately determine how everything would move, from simple machines to complex circuitry.

With regard to our brains, our thoughts and actions are determined by stimuli from our senses and then resulting chemical/electronic reactions in the brain, processed by an organic computer which also operates based on the laws of physics. I looked at it this way too, and from that I surmise, even if we think we have free will, what we choose and do is already determined by incredibly complex low level chemical/electronic/physical reactions.

At least, that's what I used to think, but now I'm not so sure. We all assume that at the lowest level, particles and sub-atomic particles all behave in a rigid way that follows rules, but we don't know that for sure. For all we know, if we ever uncover all the mysteries of dark matter and uber tiny impossible to detect sub-particles, we might discover that they don't obey rules. Maybe the lowest level particle, if such a thing exists, actually behaves in a truly random way. We just don't know if that's true or not.

If that is true, and there is an element of randomness right at the finest grains of the physical world, then that would filter right up into the things we can see and measure. So, while I get what your friend is saying, it hangs on the fact that at the lowest levels, things continue to behave predictably and obey rules, and I'm not convinced they do. There could be something unmeasurable at the core of everything.

Back to top

Profile PM

Zotoaster

21

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 20th Dec 2004

Location: Scotland

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 19:29 Edited at: 19th Feb 2012 19:31

Link

Quote: "If an atom is a sphere, and its dimensions are made from X/Y/Z points, you still have a central point with no X/Y/Z. This is infinitely regressive, so presuming that there is a smallest scale to matter you have something in the middle of an atom. We call it the nucleus, and electrons don't collide with it."

I think this is wrong. An atom isn't a sphere, it's a nucleus with an electron cloud hovering around it. The nucleus isn't even the smallest thing in the atom, it's built of quarks which are in turn built of strings. Electrons can actually collide with the nucleus due to quantum tunnelling, since the position of the electron is determined by the probability of it being there.

As for this bit:

Quote: " I call it time, and it's usually an outflow, so electrons can't collide with an outflow. This gives us the dimensions.. X/Y/Z/IN/OUT, and IN/OUT is time.

If we can control the IN/OUT flow, we can control time, and are not deterministic."

... I just don't follow any of it. You're not trolling are you?

Quote: "If that is true, and there is an element of randomness right at the finest grains of the physical world, then that would filter right up into the things we can see and measure."

I considered this. But then your computer would screw up for no reason. Then again, it happens! Haha

"everyone forgets a semi-colon sometimes." - Phaelax

Back to top

Profile PM Email

Pincho Paxton

23

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 8th Dec 2002

Location:

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 19:34 Edited at: 19th Feb 2012 19:35

Link

You are using the standard model, and I'm using my own model. So I don't need to relate to the things that you have posted. All I have to do is account for quarks, and leptons being in 6's, and Newton's Kissing problem accounts for that.

Back to top

Profile PM Email Website

Zotoaster

21

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 20th Dec 2004

Location: Scotland

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 19:36

Link

Quote: "You are using the standard model, and I'm using my own model. So I don't need to relate to the things that you have posted."

You, my friend, are truly unpredictable :p

"everyone forgets a semi-colon sometimes." - Phaelax

Back to top

Profile PM Email

zeroSlave

17

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 13th Jun 2009

Location: Springfield

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 19:42

Link

Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle

Quote: "In quantum mechanics, the Heisenberg uncertainty principle states a fundamental limit on the accuracy with which certain pairs of physical properties of a particle, such as position and momentum, can be simultaneously known. In layman's terms, the more precisely one property is measured, the less precisely the other can be controlled, determined, or known."

Just thought I'd throw that out there. I actually did some reading on it after watching a Stargate SG-1 episode.

Back to top

Profile PM Email

Fallout

23

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 1st Sep 2002

Location: Basingstoke, England

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 20:10

Link

Quote: "I considered this. But then your computer would screw up for no reason. Then again, it happens! Haha"

I get your point, but that's not true. Computers are designs with inaccuracies in mind. So voltages can fluctuate etc. and the results are still the same. It's like shooting a basketball at a hoop. It can come of any one of an infinite places on the ring, or off the backboard, and so long as it goes in, it's still a goal. Same goes for computers. So long as all the voltages are within the right ball park, it's all good!

Back to top

Profile PM

TheComet

18

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 18th Oct 2007

Location: I`m under ur bridge eating ur goatz.

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 20:21

Link

I'd just like to emphasise zeroSlave's point on Quantum mechanics, as that's the counter to this whole argument.

Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle

Why isn't anything in the quantum world 100% predictable?

TheComet

Timeplan : https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AmuAKJolqASndEVYOWMxb3l2OWV0UkV1anRSczZScHc

Back to top

Profile PM Email Website

Zotoaster

21

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 20th Dec 2004

Location: Scotland

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 21:28

Link

@Fallout,

Good point. Does the brain not have a similar system in place though? I hear that neurons only fire when they have a certain amount of input. Though, it is a big, evolved lump of jelly, it's bound to have some inaccuracies.

That being said, even if we did do things completely by random, I wouldn't exactly call that free will.

"everyone forgets a semi-colon sometimes." - Phaelax

Back to top

Profile PM Email

Pincho Paxton

23

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 8th Dec 2002

Location:

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 21:34 Edited at: 19th Feb 2012 21:36

Link

Quote: "Why isn't anything in the quantum world 100% predictable?"

And a quite quote from the link...

Quote: "...To measure space coordinates and instants of time, rigid measuring rods and clocks are required. On the other hand, to measure momenta and energies, devices are necessary with movable parts to absorb the impact of the test object and to indicate the size of its momentum. Paying regard to the fact that quantum mechanics is competent for dealing with the interaction of object and apparatus, it is seen that no arrangement is possible that will fulfill both requirements simultaneously...[1]"

IN/OUT covers both cases of rigid measurement, and momenta... X/Y/Z = 0... momenta = OUT (scale up).

Back to top

Profile PM Email Website

Fallout

23

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 1st Sep 2002

Location: Basingstoke, England

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 22:14

Link

Quote: "That being said, even if we did do things completely by random, I wouldn't exactly call that free will."

Good point too. Even if the chemical reactions and electrical impulses have a chance of being different through randomness, that's not us making that choice. So although things may not be predestined, I would agree they're out of our control .....

... bit of a headache all this.

Back to top

Profile PM

Quel

17

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 13th Mar 2009

Location:

Posted: 19th Feb 2012 22:19

Link

A person is / may become predictable to someone who knows this person for a long time.

People are very predictable, the more they are, the easier. Stupidity for some reason is stronger, so the bigger the group of people, the more sure that this group is heading to something bad.

This is why history brings big, sometimes global wars every ~60 years, and this is why it is absolutely sure humanity will make Earth an unhabitable place, the only question is: sooner or later.

As for the philosophical stuff, i can say that it is absolutely possible to see the (possible) future, but also an important thing, that this doesn't mean it is written or anything.

I say this because i had many many dreams of my fears, which could have become reality, but things fortunately didn't go that way. But i had two dreams, which featured very precise images and feelings about certain sceneries which a couple months later became reality.

I also tend to have deja vu kinda feelings every about two weeks, most of them are pretty generous "i have seen this before" kinda ones, but some of them come in an odd way, when suddenly a frame of a dream sometimes from even months earlier, totally forgotten in most cases... and that just suddenly pops into my mind, and then 5 seconds later i see that exact picture, of me experiencing something, or someone around me do the same thing as in my dream.

-Mental Hybrid: A unique heavy story based shoot'em ~40% (primary project)
-CoreFleet: An underground commander unit based RTS (canned) ~15%

Back to top

Profile PM

Kezzla

17

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 21st Aug 2008

Location: Where beer does flow and men chunder

Posted: 20th Feb 2012 06:25

Link

for some reason this topic reminds me of a story about a guy who bought one of those self driving robot vacuum cleaners to clean his house.(one with sensors that build an image of the room and its obstacles and moves accordingly)

he'd leave it on and go out. upon his return he would find that the vacuum cleaner was spinning around in circles in the center of the room. he'd reset it and it would behave as it should, moving until it hit an obstacle and then turning and moving etc.

a few more times he came home to the spinning robot, he even took it back and exchanged it for another, it did the same thing too.

frustrated he set up a camera to see exactly what happens at the moment it stops working correctly.

he later watched the footage to see his cat playing with the robot and completely screwing up its map system.

Sometimes I like to use words out of contents

Back to top

Profile PM

Zotoaster

21

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 20th Dec 2004

Location: Scotland

Posted: 20th Feb 2012 06:46

Link

Kezzla, that reminds me of another story I heard recently. When ants get lost, their "standard protocol" is just to follow other ants. Researchers found a 1200 foot ring of ants, all following each other in a big circle, for a few days.

"everyone forgets a semi-colon sometimes." - Phaelax

Back to top

Profile PM Email

Pincho Paxton

23

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 8th Dec 2002

Location:

Posted: 20th Feb 2012 12:29 Edited at: 20th Feb 2012 12:40

Link

I think that X/Y/Z is the confusion in itself. Like a simple question...

Q/ How far is it to London?
A/ Relative to myself it is 77 miles.

Making your X/Y/Z = 0,0,0

You have probably 3 origins instead of X/Y/Z. Origin to the Universe. Origin to entangled pairs, and origin to an observer.

If you create a DIM, and in each compartment of that DIM you use origins instead of X/Y/Z. So now you have relativity of time, relativity of space. Your entangled particles are for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. So entangled photons have location to the Universe, location to each other, but a missing location relative to an observer. So the observer, observes. This completes the DIM so that it now has all 3 Origins. The DIM is completed. Now we compare the properties of the DIM like PEEK, and POKE.. which I have been calling IN, and OUT. If we go back to X/Y/Z we still have to fill the DIM with either a 1 or a 0, so we still have IN, and OUT. A zero would be a hole, and a 1 would be a scale. I have found that by always using 6 as the scale you get a close approximation to the Universe. You can make almost anything from a scale of 6. For example the 360 deg of a circle were originally taken from a hexagon, and when you look at Newtons Kissing Problem, it creates an Icosahedron which is 12 particles around 1 particle. Now you have a DIM which isn't X/Y/Z it is a sort of fractal that obeys Newtons Laws. Location is a kind of bubble sort where you just can't poke two addresses at the same time else they XOR one another.

If everything has its own origin then Quantum Physics isn't strange, it is our measuring system that is strange.

This is the particle I got by just using the number 6 in a sort of DIM...

Back to top

Profile PM Email Website

HowDo

23

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 28th Nov 2002

Location: United Kingdom

Posted: 20th Feb 2012 12:37

Link

how would quantum physics fit into this question if need it could.

Q, How long in a piece of string?
A, Twice the length it is from the middle.

Dark Physics makes any hot drink go cold.

Back to top

Profile PM

Wolf

18

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 8th Nov 2007

Location: Luxemburg

Posted: 20th Feb 2012 15:28 Edited at: 20th Feb 2012 15:32

Link

Quote: ""If we knew all factors of the universe and all of the formulas of everything that exists at a given moment in time, we would be able to predict with 100% accuracy what will happen next.""

We wouldn't be able to. Its that simple. We are polar creatures so we think in black and white, good and bad, male or female, and associate everything with something we either saw or experienced before. Think about it. Whenever you try to explain something to someone you usually use metaphors to do so. We will only understand as much as we can.

Quote: "We never make random choices, there is always a logic behind what we do, even if it doesn't make sense or isn't apparent. Therefore it can be predicted.
"

This implies that you would need to know everything about a certain person. From birth (past lives in some believes) genetics, dreams, every single moment of his life to know how he/she reacts to a certain impulse. And that would be rather impossible. Also: In public we are hardly truly ourselves so we would also have the variable of "social mask" to add to the equasion.

I believe that our metaphysicians will discover, disprove and come up with fascinating questions this decade...just wait for it

Also: If you believe that time is not a linear concept, the entire question is irrelevant.

Quote: "Another interesting idea is what if we DID know all these formulas and you were told exactly how your life would pan out? Would this influence you and cause a change in your destiny? Or would the machine be able to take its own revelation into account?"

Who would we be if we could? Not the same humanity we are now so our lives would be completely different anyway.

-Wolf

Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes, art is knowing which ones to keep.

Back to top

Profile PM Email Website

Diggsey

20

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 24th Apr 2006

Location: On this web page.

Posted: 20th Feb 2012 17:58

Link

Free will is the ability for us to choose from a list of options any one we want. Just because the one we want may or may not be pre-determined doesn't mean we don't have free will.

[b]

Back to top

Profile PM Email Website

Pincho Paxton

23

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 8th Dec 2002

Location:

Posted: 21st Feb 2012 02:07

Link

Free Will is to have a Naked Blonde Model come up to you, asking you to go to bed with her, and saying no!

Back to top

Profile PM Email Website

Seppuku Arts

Moderator

21

Years of Service

User Offline

Joined: 18th Aug 2004

Location: Cambridgeshire, England

Posted: 21st Feb 2012 03:10

Link

Call me weird...but I probably would.

Back to top

Profile PM Website

Sorry your browser is not supported!

Geek Culture / Are we predictable?