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Someone might object and say something about the likelihood of various states. So then I have to explain what probability actually is.

The universe only happens one way. If I toss a penny, it lands either heads or tails. Let's say I toss a penny and catch it and I peek at it but I don't show you. I ask you what are the odds it is heads up? You say 50% and I say "Nope. The odds are 0%" because I cheated, I saw that it was tails up. So what were the odds _really_? Objectively? That is undefined. Probability isn't objective. It is not just about the universe, but about how much you know about that universe, and much more so about you than about what you think it is about. To keep this clear, I like to think of probability as the measure of your ignorance.

to be decided 1y ago

Probability might not be defined objectively in the specific case of your coin toss experiment. But the coin toss is a very high level experiment.

In respect to our shared material world (which is governed by low level physics), all of us have the exact same amount of ignorance (noone can observe the microstate of matter in a sufficient manner for it to make any difference in comparison to other observers) and therefore must assume the exact same probabilities of micro states, which does make these probabilities objective indeed in practice, doesn't it?

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Discussion

Mike Dilger ☑️ 1y ago

Functionally speaking, yes. Fundamentally I don't think so. Even though we know how to pull work out of a system via macrostate order and can't from mixed systems due to our microstate ignorance, I don't think that means that it is impossible for anything to have enough microstate knowledge to derive useful work from it.

I don't think it's something we are going to solve soon. It is almost as crazy of an idea as hoping for perpetual motion, time machines, or wormholes in space. I don't hope for it ... I just think we haven't proven that it is out of the realm of possibility.

to be decided 1y ago

> .. I don't think that means that it is impossible for anything to have enough microstate knowledge to derive useful work from it.

I obviously cannot fathom how this could ever be possible.

On the other hand, sometimes my mind takes this non natural sciences angle on things for a second and I just think: considering how crazy/curious/strange/weird/beautiful the mere fact that "things exist at all" is, it sure wouldn't be that much more crazy if things like wormholes or telepathy existed as well.