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blululu 20 minutes ago [-]
This is an interesting piece and it is kind of an outstanding puzzle, but I feel like it was also indicative of the zeitgeist. The 60s were a more optimistic time for physics. We had succeeded in Quantum Electrodynamics, Quantum Chromodynamics were underway. The standard model was being developed. To say nothing of the radical success of earlier advances applying fundamental insights to industry. We had not yet spent 40 years trying to develop a theory of quantum gravity. Or gotten into the immense computational challenges of solid state physics. We are now sifting through a huge number theories which all describe the universe reasonably well. To a reasonable approximation anything can be modeled mathematically and it can be modeled in multiple ways. But that doesn't really tell us too much. Plenty of mathematical frameworks could be described as universal function approximators. And an SVM and a Transformer NN can, in principle, both model language to an arbitrary degree of accuracy. One is computationally tractable and achieves good results. But it feels realistic to say that that neither model captures to actual structure of language as it is generated in the human brain. This is all to say that this essay might be reading too much into the success of various mathematical models.
chanakya 1 hours ago [-]
It's just that the universe is ordered, and math is the study of order.
wisemanwillhear 28 minutes ago [-]
But why? Why are the rules of the universe consistent? What orders them? These are some of the most baffling questions in philosophy. This is even more of mystery if you take non-theist interpretation of the universe. If all possible universes (including ones with changing rules) are equally probable, then what are the odds that we would be in both a universe with simple rules such that the elegant mathematical models referred to the in the paper have such predictive power and the rule are not changing over time. This is one of those papers that is massively under appreciated by people who do not study philosophy.
ks2048 1 hours ago [-]
Never seemed unreasonable to me - math is “rule-based” and so is nature. The later is perhaps mysterious, but Occom’s Razor makes it more likely than lawless.
lapcat 3 hours ago [-]
(1960)
eointierney 1 hours ago [-]
Timeless
sixtyj 3 hours ago [-]
Nine pages without subheadlines, long lines of text with heavy paragraphs.
Could someone be so kind and make tldr; version? Please.
tim333 3 hours ago [-]
It's that it's surprising physical behavior fits with mathematical equations so well.
My guess is it's because the universe is maths in some sense.
eointierney 1 hours ago [-]
Max Tegmark is chatting elsewhere
eointierney 3 hours ago [-]
Math good, strangely effective, much science, reality deeply weird, needs more stochastic approximation of real valued functions.
Could someone be so kind and make tldr; version? Please.
My guess is it's because the universe is maths in some sense.
Edit: em dashes available on request