Astrophysics

Is the universe a giant computation? (# 34)

A core idea in the previous 33 articles is that our universe is like a giant computation. Some of the ways of testing this idea involve modifying Newton’s law of gravity and seeing whether the new equation is a better predictor of the velocity of stars.

More indirect or circumstantial evidence is provided by research into other aspects of space and time. These include:

• Error-correcting codes
• Amplituhedron
• Generative Adversarial Networks and Deep Boltzmann machines
• Constructor Theory
• Sacred Geometry and geographical features on Earth
• Life
• Consciousness.

As discussed in Article 20 - What happens inside a black hole? - Professor Seth Lloyd has suggested that our universe could be a giant quantum computer; the history of our universe is, in effect, a huge and ongoing quantum computation. Similarly, in Decoding Reality, Vlatko Vedral suggests ‘we compress information into laws from which we construct our reality, and this reality then tells us how to further compress information’. (p 12)

This article briefly summarises the content in the next seven articles.

Error-Correcting Codes

According to Wikipedia:

In telecommunication, information theory, and coding theory, forward error correction or channel coding is a technique used for controlling errors in data transmission over unreliable or noisy communication channels. The central idea is the sender encodes the message in a redundant way, most often by using an error-correcting code.

Several cosmologists have concluded that something similar to an error-correcting code is built into the fabric of quantum space-time. For example, in 2014, three quantum gravity researchers discovered that the holographic emergence of space-time works just like a quantum error-correcting code. Physicist John Preskill at the California Institute of Technology suggests:

[E]ntanglement … hold[s] space together. If you want to weave space-time together out of little pieces, you have to entangle them in the right way. And the right way is to build a quantum error-correcting code.

Professor James Gates has identified error-correcting code in his string theory explanation of the universe which includes a concept called supersymmetry. He created some diagrams, called adrinkras, that are similar to Feynman diagrams which are the series of line drawings used to describe calculations in quantum electrodynamics. Adinkras are a precise mathematical description of calculations. Gates said:

… [Adinkras] have the attributes of ones and zeros in precisely the same way that computers use ones and zeros to send digital information. And in particular, [in] the kinds of codes we found … there’s a class of codes that allow your browsers to work in an accurate way. They’re called error-correcting codes. We found a rule for error-correcting codes in the equations of supersymmetry.

Amplituhedron

According to the magazine Quanta:

Physicists have discovered a jewel-like geometric object [The Amplituhedron] that dramatically simplifies calculations of particle interactions and challenges the notion that space and time are fundamental components of reality.

Particle interactions, the most basic events in nature, may be consequences of geometry. The amplituhedron is not built out of space-time and probabilities; these properties merely arise as consequences of the amplituhedron’s geometry. The usual picture of space and time, and particles moving around in them, is a construct.

In brief, the basic structure of our universe is more easily interpreted as emerging from geometry rather than the consequence of some pre-existing space-time framework.

Generative Adversarial Networks

A Deep Boltzmann machine is a type of neural network used in deep learning for modeling probabilistic distribution of data sets. Deep learning is a method used in machine learning. A Generative Adversarial Network (GAN) is an approach to generative modeling using deep learning methods. Generative modeling is an unsupervised learning task in machine learning that involves automatically discovering and learning the regularities or patterns in input data in such a way that the model can be used to generate or output new examples that plausibly could have been drawn from the original dataset. One type of Deep Boltzmann machine is a GAN.

As mentioned in Article 4 - Could there be a logical explanation for our universe? - cosmologists have discovered that a mathematical relationship, a correspondence, could exist between what happens in Anti-de Sitter (AdS) space-time and De-Sitter space-time which scientists believe is the type of space-time our universe is in. This relationship is called the AdS/CFT correspondence where the letters CFT stand for Conformal Field Theory.

Researchers have discovered that there is a relation between deep Boltzmann machines and the AdS/CFT correspondence. In brief, the standard AdS/CFT correspondence can be regarded as a deep Boltzmann machine. This discovery is consistent with the idea that the origin and evolution of our universe is part of a GAN discovering new patterns i.e. our universe is part of a mathematical process, a computation.

Constructor theory

Constructor Theory (CT) has been developed by David Deutsch who is one of the originators of the idea of a quantum computer. Deutsch argues CT is a meta-level theory; CT describes systems in terms of what is possible not what a system can do. What a system does is an emergent property. The laws of CT are all principles, which are obeyed by all other laws of physics. Principles, being laws about other laws, do not make direct assertions about the outcomes of measurements.

Deutsch does not take computation to be an a priori concept and does not seek necessary and sufficient conditions for a physical process to instantiate it. Deutsch conjectures there are objective regularities in nature: principles of physics. These can be expressed in terms of the tasks called ‘computations’ and the property called ‘information’. A task is a transformation of an input state of substrates to an output state of substrates; a construction task specifies only intrinsic attributes of its substrates, not extrinsic ones such as the name or location of a particular instance.

In the context of the ideas developed in these articles, an Efimov effect is a ‘task’. CT provides the context within which an Efimov effect happens. The existence of an Efimov effect means CT must be present in a black hole. Efimov effects can be compounded i.e. the additional complexity created by an Efimov effect means even more complexity as a result of Efimov effects building on each other. The core principles in CT relate to this compounding effect in complexity. The laws in physics that arise out of CT will be strategies to increase the complexity of content in a black hole with finite dimensions.

As the number of Efimov effects increases within the finite content of a black hole, the possibility arises that there will be insufficient content to ‘construct’ all the possible Efimov effects. As one of the principles of CT is allowing Efimov effects, CT must also include principles that accommodate increased complexity i.e. CT must not only have principles allowing Efimov effects but also laws that facilitate increases in complexity. CT must include principles that allow for the evolution of principles i.e. CT is an eternal process of seeking new ways of increasing complexity. Discovery of new ways to increase complexity is a consequence of mathematics; the process of establishing the foundations of mathematics does not require a designer.

In brief, CT based on a goal of continually increasing complexity is not only consistent with the idea that our universe is a computation but CT also appears to help explain many of the laws of physics in our universe.

Sacred Geometry

Many features in our universe seem to correspond to shapes in Sacred Geometry e.g. the shape of the universe and locations of the highest points on islands. While these features do not prove that our universe is an ongoing computation, these features would be consistent with the principle of least action.

The fact that we have discovered features in our universe that appear to be consistent with sacred geometry suggests the universe may have been designed so that we can discover how the universe works. We are not told how the universe works but we are given the means to make the necessary discoveries. Also, we need to work together to understand the workings of the universe.

Life

Scientists have not agreed on the origin of life. Most scientists believe that life arose out of a single event but they do not agree on why that event only happened once. Over the last ten years and based on general thermodynamic considerations, Professor Jeremy England has developed the hypothesis that life was inevitable.

The idea that life arose because of the second law of thermodynamics is consistent with the idea discussed in these articles that the second law is one of the ways of realizing the overarching objective of increasing complexity. The reality that created our universe may have adopted a set of principles as the basis for formulating the laws of our universe.

Our creator universe requires our universe to be inhabited by beings that can understand how our universe works. Nevertheless, once our creator universe has evolved a self-aware life form, the creation of a second, possibly competing, life form in the creator universe may be unnecessary from the point of view of establishing a process that continuously generates more complexity.

One of the constructor principles behind the creation of our universe could be to forbid the creation of a second competing life form. A singular event for the creation of life is consistent with our universe being an ongoing computation.

Consciousness

The hypothesis of our universe being an ongoing quantum computation raises the question of how might our brains function. In particular, what does such a hypothesis mean for our consciousness? Most neuroscientists believe that consciousness is located in the forebrain, particularly the cortex. Professor Mark Solms, however, using actual data from patients with brain damage has found that even when all relevant parts of the cortex are damaged, patients still have some sense of personal identity. He believes that consciousness is located in the brainstem and is to be associated with feelings. Furthermore, Solms argues that ‘what we perceive is a virtual reality constructed from the mind’s own building materials’.

While Solms’ explanation for the origin of consciousness is not consistent with the argument presented in these articles, his description of how the brain works is a useful model for describing what a brain might be like in a universe created by a reality that emerged out of geometry/mathematics. Solms’ ideas about perceiving a virtual reality and consciousness being about feelings could be consistent with many possible origins of consciousness. In other words, there is evidence based on actual brain research that is consistent with our universe being an ongoing quantum computation.

The question for this article is:

Is the evolution of our universe consistent with a computer simulation?

To view the headings of all the articles to be published in this series please click on https://michaeledalton.medium.com/orbiting-stars-and-origin-of-our-universe-338906930f51

To obtain a copy of the book ‘Orbiting Stars’ which contains the first drafts of all these articles, please visit https://www.amazon.com