Re: [Fis] Consilience and Structure

Malcom and Stan,

   Malcom's preference to one-world view seems quite continental in the
spirit of Rafael instead of merely being analytical, and not quite
antagonistic to Stan's preference to many-worlds. Here is my excuse.

   If we are happy with applying the successful standard practice of quantum
mechanics to the physical universe at large, we may also have to assume
somebody who would sit outside of the universe and see what is going on in
the inside. According to the accepted user's manual, the universe may
transit from the possible to the actual every time the observer does the job
through the collapse of the wavefunction. However, there have been some
dissidents including Everett, DeWitt and Gell-Mann among others as charging
the idea outrageous.

   DeWitt's many-world interpretation must be one necessary consequence out
of dismissing the idea of the observer sitting outside of the universe as
unfounded. One remedy for the purpose would be to live with another
outrageous picture that our actual universe is just one of the many
alternatives when the inhabitants look into the past, while it constantly
serves as the source of branching off into many alternatives toward the
future. One sturdy problem with the many-world scenario is whether the
universe we experience as the incumbents has anything special compared with
all of the others already branched off. This question touches upon what is
the durable fundamental set of the elements constructing the actual
universe, that is , the choice of the preferred basis set in the physicist
jargon. No easy solution in sight, so far.

   At this point, Jerry's concern on chemical syntax may enter. Firstly,
quantum mechanics grounds itself upon the present progressive tense being
concurrent and punctuated with the present perfect tense. This stipulation
is entirely empirical. Secondly, chemistry as a material substrate of
biology is also empirical in bridging the present progressive and the
present perfect tense. Chemical reaction is about the process of updating
the reactants once registered in the present perfect tense again through
their resurrection in the movement in progressive. Chemistry practices
quantum mechanics so that the material record registered in the present
perfect tense may constantly be updated. One outcome would be to return
products in the downstream again back into reactants in the upstream, as
letting the whole reaction scheme circular.　Once the robust closure of
chemical reactions is formed, it could be settled also in the biological
organization.

   If the branching of one world off into many happens to generate a strange
world almost similar to the one branched off previously, that strange one
could be retained and entrapped in a closure. This would make our physical
universe quite biological. Still, another outrageous picture?

   Cheers,
   Koichiro
Received on Sun Nov 14 04:12:21 2004