The Search For Solutions

[peter]

Back in the late seventies/early eighties a science historian called Horace Freeland Judson wrote a beautifully illustrated book of the above title which outlined the development of scientific methodology with chapters on subjects such as model use in science, pattern recognition etc, to illustrate 'how science is done'. At the end of the book he finished with a short section on what he saw as the geatest challenges facing science at that point. Alas I lost the book in the 'great book destruction' of 1997, but I suspect [in fact I know] that some of the areas he outlined, still feature on the list of today. I'm going to have a stab at a similar list and see if you guys have any additions or observations to make.

1. The search for a GUT. [On Judsons list]. Just how close are we really to reconciling the mutually exclusive nature of the General Theory of Relativity on the one hand, and the Quantum Theory on the other? Back in the eighties it was a 'grail' that seemed almost mythical in it's elusiveness, but since then we have had string theories, M-theories and probably mant others, each of which in their own way would appear to be a major advance in the direction of a unified field theory. But it never seems to happen. Each time, it seems to receed, horizon like, into the distance. Are we really ever going to get there, or are Quantum and Relativity going to have to be overturned first?

2. The Mind/Conciousness/Brain relationship. We all know that great steps have been made in this area in the last two decades. We understand more about brain function and what can go wrong withit than ever before and we now have tools that can probe and record down at even the cellular level. But massive work remains and even given the huge input of effort and finance, it seems that many years will pass before we have a clear understanding of just why, in three bounds of tissue, each of us partakes in the gratest acievement of 15 billion years of Universal evolution.

3. AI. In the space of the three or so decades since Judson wrote his book we have seen computers reduce in size form that of a wardrobe to that of a paperback novel. Your gamestation now has more computing power than was available to NASSA when it sent three men to the moon and brought them back in safety, and the internet has increased the speed of acess to information and the levels of communication between peoples beyond all comprehension. But the final [?] hurdle remains. The Act of Creation. To create a thinking entity, that is conciouss, aware and receptive to the needs of it's Creators. Certainly this relates to the issues raised above pertaining to mind and brain. But this will be a replication in silicon and steel, not a replacement. As such it represents a different search, a different hurdle to overcome.

4. Chaos. Do we get this yet? Has maths yet arrived at the point where complex systems can be analysed and predicted with the same precision as simple ones [the sucess rate of my local weather forcasting service would tend to indicate otherwise]. This again was an area touched on by Judson in his final summery and I'm sure the increased computational power available to us must have made big inroads into our understanding of chaotic systems - but I'm thinking we're not there quite yet. The financial crisis of the last few years would tend to imply we don't yet quite get the effect of a butterfly flapping it's wings in Shanghai!

5. Climate change, Mankinds role in it and how much of a game-changer is it. This has got to be the big one hasn't it? We need to know the answers to this conundrum and we need to know them fast. The advice and information coming out of the scientific community on this subject is so contradictory, so ambiguous, so incoherent, that Joe Public does not know what to do to save his life [almost litterally]. If he adopts a 'green' life-style, restrains his travel, recycles and re-uses, he sees others forging ahead, undoing any little good his contribution could make. If he makes the decision to 'do his bit' to reduce his carbon footprint, he hears that China and India and many other developing nations are undermining the effort to the point where it becomes irelavent, and he sees an expert [who truly believes he also is in the right] telling him that it's all hogwash - not happening, not to do with man and not of significance. Who to believe. Who To Believe!

6. Why are there no Chemistry related challenges here?

[TheFallen]

Let me answer your question #6, Peter, as to why there are no chemistry-related challenges by means of a quotation from a party at least once relevant to the discussion in hand:-

Physics is the only real science. The rest are just stamp collecting.

Heh.

[Vraith]

Let me answer your question #6, Peter, as to why there are no chemistry-related challenges by means of a quotation from a party at least once relevant to the discussion in hand:-

Physics is the only real science. The rest are just stamp collecting.

Heh.

Heh...a friend of mine [math/physics dude...go figure] used to say variations of that all the time...the first sentence always the same, the second a different punchline.

On chaos, peter: we can, and have, gotten generally/statistically better. I'd bet whatever amount you wish that your weather forecasts, though still problematic, are far more accurate than they were even 10 or 15 years ago, let alone 30.

But results will never be perfect/precise...even "simple" ones will remain imprecise/insoluble. [[like the 3-body problem...there is no general solution, though there are certain particular/families of solutions]]

The math can't/won't eliminate chaos. But it can, and already does in many ways, frame/describe and reform it into tools conceptual and material that are useful, powerful, and valuable.
Particular example: combat aircraft are designed to take advantage of chaos to improve performance [like maneuverability]...part of the trade-off for that is that they are inherently highly unstable...nearly impossible to fly without computer-assistance.
[[I couldn't begin to guess the number of different things that use it to advantage at this point.]]

[peter]

re The weather forecasting V. - certainly true. I'd say we've gone from a reliable forecast two days in advance to maybe four even five days, so yes - there's definite signs of improvement there.

Oddly, it occured to me last night, even though I'm a pretty broadly read fellow [by my local standards at least], and even though I was able to type the above post without recourse to any research as such, I could not begin to do the same for any areas outside of science/maths. Why is this? surely the 'search for solutions' must have 'big' questions that remain unanswered in philosophy, in the arts, history? What are they? Can anyone complete the list?

[Vraith]

Why is this? surely the 'search for solutions' must have 'big' questions that remain unanswered in philosophy, in the arts, history? What are they? Can anyone complete the list?

On "Why is this?" I have a couple speculations. And I have high [perhaps unjustified] confidence they are pieces of an answer.
First, those questions have been displaced/subordinated by the kinds of things you listed.

One reason for that is that there are so many answers coming out of those areas you listed, and that knowledge is so powerfully, practically, and visibly useful and effective.

Another is that, in so many ways, we'd reached the limits of what we could know/do with those questions. Until we have more information.

We will come back to them. Because the sciences provide some of that information.
For instance: What is Beauty?
That depends, in part, for us, on things mathematically describable.
We've known that for a very long time.
But it also depends on things social/psychological. We're moving ahead on that...but still a long way to go. In an aggregate/statistical/whole population way we're getting pretty good...as good as we are with weather, or even a bit better. But in the individual/particular case...far less successful.
But bio/neuro-sciences is part of Beauty, too. We're beginning to connect/describe how mathematical relations [for example symmetry and asymmetry] participate in our perception of Beauty.
And how that perception changes over time and with experiences.[individual and now and social/cultural and historical]
And aspects that are constant no matter those factors.

Because math participates in Art, and Beauty.
Precision and Representation do, as well.
[[and mathematica is a factor that enables precision and representation.]]
BUT: Math is perfect. And most people...and I mean a huge most...abhor perfection.

Anyway...most of the questions [what is Knowledge? How do we KNOW?] we, as a race, will probably come back to.

Some, we might not ever have to, depending. For instance "What causes poverty?" is a larger question than many people think, and more philosophical than folk might suppose. BUT: I think it is possible that the philosophical question might never need an answer. Because technology will make it disappear. To the extent that those born, say, 150 years from now will look up "poverty" in their dictionchip and find the entry begins: Poverty [archaic]--

I expect questions about "Why are we here?" "What is our Purpose" will come back [and the transform began a long time ago]. Science info will, eventually, turn the longing/desperate nature of it into an achievable, practical, meaningful "No, really. I know all this shit, I got all this shit, I can DO all this shit...what reason/purpose should I make?"

I think the philosphical/artistic/etc. things have always been cyclical/in feedback with the others. [and there is always some of both going on...every chemistry experiment is, in part, asking "How do we KNOW?" and every painting, in some way asking "What is the nature of light?"]

[peter]

Yes absolutely - Of course you are right V. The question of 'why is the world ordered the way it is?' is one that links into philosophy, anthropology, sociology, politics - you name it? It's a question that is 'too big' in many ways, and that in itself is worth thinking on.

Will that not be the acme of reductionism, when aesthetics becomes science [and sad in it's own way]?

[Quick edit; just realised, in doing so will not science become aesthetics too - so mabe not so sad after all {glass half full approach }]

[Vraith]

Will that not be the acme of reductionism, when aesthetics becomes science [and sad in it's own way]?

[Quick edit; just realised, in doing so will not science become aesthetics too - so mabe not so sad after all {glass half full approach }]

NO, oh no on the first...that's why I kept saying 'part" in the various parts.
See...much of music has inherent mathematical relations [there is a story that part of pythagorus' work with triangles was directly connected with tuning stringed instruments...] BUT much of the interest and appeal is related to breaking the calculations. A certain dissonance/insolubility [or even "incorrect" solutions/resolutions.] makes it better.
But I don't think science/fact knowledge will comprehensively contain the solutions to Art and other open human questions.
It's more like...we had plowed all the fields and harvested all the crops we could. But now we're developing new land...
Which enables [eventually, I think] something more like the second you said. Which I like.

[peter]

Thats a very interesting post V., not least because of the words

I don't think science/fact knowledge will comprehensively contain the solution to Art

This is exactly my position, just not going quite as far [though perhaps you do, but just do not say so here]. I think there are more areas in life where science will fail to 'provide all the answers' [love to name but one], and I see it as [in some ways at least] somewhat stifling that science, instead of being seen as a particular activity designed to solve a particular set of problems in a particular way, has been come to be seen as the only way, and more so - the way that will provide all the answers to all the questions we can ask. Somehow I doubt that Richard Dawkins would allow the quote about art to stand uncontested - and he would be in the company of the large percentage of practicing scientists as well.

Yes - I fully get the observations re the introduction of a small imperfection, a dissonance into Art to enhance it, to bring it above the level of sugar; To take a mundane example [and one close to my heart] we can see the effect of this quite simply in the beautiful [for me] female face. The perfect symetry of many hollywood actresses faces lends them great beauty - but the ones that truly stand out are the ones that have a tinge of something just a little amiss, something adrift, in the proportions or color or whatever. These faces stand out and aceive a higher degree of aesthetic apeal alltogether.

[Vraith]

Thats a very interesting post V., not least because of the words

I don't think science/fact knowledge will comprehensively contain the solution to Art

This is exactly my position, just not going quite as far [though perhaps you do, but just do not say so here]. I think there are more areas in life where science will fail to 'provide all the answers' [love to name but one],

Yea, I just said Art...but most of the big/philosophical areas are the same.
I think I've said this before, but:
I think there will be, at some point [and not all that far away] a "physics of love."
But...at the very least these things will remain:
The meaning of it. Cuz meaning is not a property. Meaning is an Interstate, eternally under construction both ahead of you and behind.

The living of it.

Knowing the physics of love doesn't reduce/limit it.
I would argue that that knowledge enhances the freedom TOO, the capacity FOR, and the potential OF, living/loving.

[peter]

knowledge enhances the freedom TOO, the capacity FOR, and the potential OF, living/loving.[/color]

Will meditate on this over the course of today while unloading 7 tons of stock by hand .

[Zarathustra]

1. The search for a GUT. [On Judsons list]. Just how close are we really to reconciling the mutually exclusive nature of the General Theory of Relativity on the one hand, and the Quantum Theory on the other? Back in the eighties it was a 'grail' that seemed almost mythical in it's elusiveness, but since then we have had string theories, M-theories and probably mant others, each of which in their own way would appear to be a major advance in the direction of a unified field theory. But it never seems to happen. Each time, it seems to receed, horizon like, into the distance. Are we really ever going to get there, or are Quantum and Relativity going to have to be overturned first?

I just finished Michio Kaku's book, PHYSICS OF THE IMPOSSIBLE. Being less densely packed with mind-blowing, page-turning revelations, it took me a little longer than the last one. However, it gradually started paying off once I got past force fields and robots, into more exotic fields of exploration.

In the epilogue, one of the last things he talks about are the experiments we're getting ready to do (2015, 2025) that move us forward on your question above. In 2015, the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) will be launched in space. It and its successor, the Big Bang Observer, will be able to detect gravity waves from nearly the entire observable universe. They will be sensitive enough to test several theories that deal with the "pre-Big Bang" era, including versions of string theory.

There are also a number of labs investigating higher dimensions by looking for deviations in Newton's inverse square law, which would exist if our universe has higher dimensions, confirming predictions of string theory.

[peter]

Interesting use of terms there Z re 'pre-Big Bang' era. I think I know what you are getting at, but Hawking once gave an description of this 'conundrum' that I found illuminating. He said that as the Universe is looked at further and further back right up to the first milliseconds after it's formation by the BB, it's space-time dimensions [and other stuff IIRC] become more and more interwoven [unsorted if you like] to the point where their nature is nothing like that of their latter state. As with the transition from belief that the earth is flat to the understanding that it is a sphere, where the question of 'what happens if you fall off the edge?' simply dissapears, so does the question of 'what happened prior to the Big Bang' as a result of the above. I guess what he is saying is that in the first instances of the Universes existance, time is not what we recognise it to be now and thus the same questions do not apply.

[Z - if it's not too intrusive, I would like to get a book to you that I know would blow you away. I've battered on about this one 'The Beginning of Infinity' by David Deutsch, many times in these pages. I wonder if you have an adress that you would be comfortable with me sending the book to. If so pm it over to me; if not, no sweat - this is the internet and I do understand peoples reservations about what information they disclose, but try to acess a copy anyway. If you like Kaku then Deutsch is a no brainer!]

[Zarathustra]

I appreciate the offer, but if it's good I'll just purchase a copy myself. I've been wondering what to read next, and I like supporting people who make a living enlightening us.

I think that Kaku literally means things that happened to cause the BB. Whether or not you want to think of that as "prior," is up to you. But it's definitely outside of time. It's testing a theory beyond the universe, into the states that led to its creation.

I realize people might consider this to be impossible, but humans have been wrong on this type of assumption many times. As Kaku points out in his book, Auguste Comte (in 1825) thought that we'd never know the compositions of stars, or the true nature matter. He thought math could never explain biology or chemistry, or that studying the heavens could have any impact on human affairs. People thought that atoms were theoretical conveniences, which could never be tested because they weren't observable.

However, we keep learning that "impossible" is more a limitation of our imagination than reality's limits. Much of science is already done indirectly (e.g. evidence for black holes). Likewise, there are indirect ways to probe beyond our universe's beginning, because if the results of certain experiments turn out one way, then we'll know that the conditions which led our universe would have to have certain characteristics. We won't know everything certain, but we'll be able to eliminate possibilities (of great significance).

The answers to these questions will also determine whether or not time travel is possible, if causality can be ever be violated, and if the rules of the universe remain constant. We're about to discover some incredible things in the next decade, once we get these satellites up.

Other interesting things I've learned in this book: dark energy (like dark matter ... except pushing the galaxies away from each other), negative matter (not anti-matter ... it floats up in gravity!) and its counterpart, negative energy.

I've also learned that it's currently accepted that a "temporally backwards wave" in Maxwell's equations is not merely a mathematical oddity, but a real phenomenon. A component of light that comes to us from the future.

[peter]

I was mightily impressed with Kaku's 'Future of the Mind' and clearly 'Physics of the Impossible' is another read that is going to be well worth the time.

Deutsch is another author who has much to say on this subject; in the work I mention above he is scathing of the 'shrug off' attitude of some scientists in respect of paralell universes and branching timelines etc [ie that they are beyond our reach forever and a day and are thus not worth cosideration]. He see's such a position exactly as you describe, as no better than saying 'God created everything - end off...', and purely a result of the restricting limitations of a constrained imagination. He literally says there is no such thing as 'impossible' [and backs it up with sound reasoning] and that given time and effort science can solve any problem it sets it's mind to. He even goes so far as to outlining how information might in fact be accessable from the alternate realities created by the timeline splitting alternative of quantum theory. I'm massively in favor of this possitive approach, which Kaku clearly has in spades as well.

I have read [quite possibly within these very pages] of some of the extraordinary things you speak of at the end of your post. V., I think, spoke of a sort of opposit universe on the other side of the speed of light where momentum and entropy etc are exactly reversed so that [anti]energy[?] must be put into systems in order to stop them from naturally 'gravitating' toward the light speed barrier! How would that work!

[Hashi Lebwohl]

Other interesting things I've learned in this book: dark energy (like dark matter ... except pushing the galaxies away from each other), negative matter (not anti-matter ... it floats up in gravity!) and its counterpart, negative energy.

I've also learned that it's currently accepted that a "temporally backwards wave" in Maxwell's equations is not merely a mathematical oddity, but a real phenomenon. A component of light that comes to us from the future.

Does he happen to mention Tesla's hypothetical "negative resistor", a component in an electrical circuit which draws energy from the universe around itself and puts the energy into the circuit? As far as I recall he seemed convinced that such a device was possible but never managed to build one for himself.

Of course, I need to get these books for myself and read them.

[Zarathustra]

Other interesting things I've learned in this book: dark energy (like dark matter ... except pushing the galaxies away from each other), negative matter (not anti-matter ... it floats up in gravity!) and its counterpart, negative energy.

I've also learned that it's currently accepted that a "temporally backwards wave" in Maxwell's equations is not merely a mathematical oddity, but a real phenomenon. A component of light that comes to us from the future.

Does he happen to mention Tesla's hypothetical "negative resistor", a component in an electrical circuit which draws energy from the universe around itself and puts the energy into the circuit? As far as I recall he seemed convinced that such a device was possible but never managed to build one for himself.

Of course, I need to get these books for myself and read them.

Oh yeah, he mentions Tesla. It's only about two pages worth, but it's the very thing you mention above. This "zero-point energy" (energy from the vacuum) is the "dark energy," I mentioned, and the object of Tesla's failed search.

Kaku writes:

When scientists analyze the data from satellites currently orbiting the Earth, such as the WMAP satellite, they have come to the astounding conclusion that fully 73 percent of the universe is made of "dark energy," the energy of a pure vacuum. This means that the greatest reservoir of energy in the entire universe is the vacuum that separates the galaxies in the universe. (This dark energy is so colossal that it is pushing the galaxies away from teach other, and may eveneutally rip the universe apart in a Big Freeze.)

...

[T]he consevation of energy arises from deep, cosmological reasons. Any violation of these laws would necessarily mean a profound shift in our understanding of the evolution of the universe. And the mystery of dark energy is forcing physicists to confront theis question head-on.

This was in the chapter for perpetual motion machines, which Kaku classifies as a Class III impossibility, the highest in his classification. Class I would be things we can't currently do, but are perfectly consistent with the laws of physics and would mostly be a technical issue to create, perhaps in this century or the next (force fields, invisibility, etc.). Class II would be things at the very edge of our understanding, which don't strictly violate the laws of physics, but involve things that are less certain, and may only be possible in the next millennia (like time travel, traversing worm holes, etc.). Class III are things that violate the known laws of physics, such that if they turn out possible at all, they'd overturn our understanding of the universe.

What's surprising is Class III is the smallest category! Most of the things we can dream up might actually be possible, even teleportation and psychokinesis. Only precognition and perpetual motion machines are in the Class III section of the book.

[peter]

Thomas Kuhn in his book 'The Structure of Scientific Revolutions' [IIRC] outlined his ideas of the bulk of scientists at any given time working within the accepted scientific domas of the day, the paradigm I think he called it, and that as more and more dicrepancies arise within that paradigm it becomes less and less sustainable until all of a sudden - bang - the paradigm is overturned by the emergence of a new one in which the discrepancies of the previous are accounted for. This sudden 'about change' he describes as a scientific revolution - in other words a fundamental reorganisation of our beliefs as to how the world works or a 'paradigm shift'.

If we looked at the current state of affairs in respect of out 'big theories' [read quantum, relativity etc], is there any sense that we get that such discrepancies are arising to the extent where we may yet see a funamental paradigm shift in one of these areas?

[Zarathustra]

Kuhn's book is great. I haven't read that since college (philosophy of science class).

No, I don't believe we're close to a paradigm shift. Quantum mechanics had yet another victory recently with the Higgs boson discovery. The Standard Model is now complete. If the Higgs boson had been shown not to exist, that would have been a serious problem necessitating rethinking the Standard Model.

As Kaku writes in THE PHYSICS OF THE IMPOSSIBLE:

To me it is truly remarkable that on a single sheet of paper one can write down the laws that govern all known physical phenomena, covering forty-three orders of magnitude, from the farthest reaches of the cosmos over 10 billion light-years away to the microworld of quarks and neutrinos. On that sheet of paper would be just two equations, Einstein's theory of gravity and the Standard Model.

He compares the elusive "Theory of Everything" to the north pole on early navigation maps--a blank spot that is slowly shrinking as our maps get better and better, all of them pointing to that missing knowledge.

He does end the book saying that we're at the beginning of a new physics, but that sounds more like a poetic way to say that we still have lots of things to discover.

For a paradigm shift, you'd need anamolies that can't be explained by current theories. Perhaps some of the concepts in the Class II or Class III impossibilities would qualify for that, like dark energy and negative energy. But current theories are so successful, there’s not really a sense of crisis in science right now.

[Vraith]

For a paradigm shift, you'd need anamolies that can't be explained by current theories. Perhaps some of the concepts in the Class II or Class III impossibilities would qualify for that, like dark energy and negative energy. But current theories are so successful, there’s not really a sense of crisis in science right now.

Hmm...I swing both ways on this.
One thing paradigm shifts depend on/are caused by is anomalies...but not ONLY anomalies. Those pop up and are resolved without any shift because of misunderstandings/corrections...and it is directly related to what I'll call "depth of field." Pre-quantum had some anomalous stuff, sure...but it ALSO had almost nothing left unsolved/unsolvable within that frame. [relative "nothing left"].
Quantum is showing some...hell, quite a large number...of gaps, holes, dilemmas, anomalies, EVEN WHILE it is still revealing new things, providing new predictions/solutions.

But dark matter/energy...so much we don't know yet. At the same time, there are certain things about both that MUST be true, whatever else is or is not. For instance, whatever ELSE is true of dark matter which we can't yet know/predict it MUST interact with gravity according to what we do know. But what if it DOESN't??
It is possible [considering some of the instrumentation/observation capacities coming online quite soon] we could find out Quantum is massively flawed AND YET generate massive quantities of data and inventions and devices for hundreds of years by continuing to use it.
A total physics shift...and nothing like it for anyone else right away.

I mean...relativity and quantum supplanted over a century ago but people still come up with cool shit based on the previous. And almost anybody with even slightly above average brainpower could understand that previous period.
Quantum hasn't done all that much...so far...in mass/common life. In part cuz it takes well above average brains and a shitload more study to "get" it in essential ways.
I suspect the "dark" variations and a number of other quirks ARE paradigmatic. And it will happen fairly soon. But only about 3 people alive at any given moment will have broad and deep understanding. The rest of the smart people will be building miraculous devices with that old, disproven quantum junk.
[[though I'm not convinced quantum is wrong in the same way that the previous were wrong]]

[Zarathustra]

Vraith, what holes are in QM?

But dark matter/energy...so much we don't know yet. At the same time, there are certain things about both that MUST be true, whatever else is or is not. For instance, whatever ELSE is true of dark matter which we can't yet know/predict it MUST interact with gravity according to what we do know. But what if it DOESN't??

Well, dark matter is supposed to be producing the extra gravity we see in the rotation of galaxies, which would be spinning too fast to retain their current shapes if not for "missing matter" which we can't see. So something has to be producing the gravitic effect, if not dark matter.

It is possible [considering some of the instrumentation/observation capacities coming online quite soon] we could find out Quantum is massively flawed AND YET generate massive quantities of data and inventions and devices for hundreds of years by continuing to use it.

We won’t find that QM is “massively flawed.” If it were, all the technology which is built upon it (most of the tech of the modern age) wouldn’t work. I’m not even sure it could be subtly flawed, since it’s been proven to a greater degree of accuracy than any other theory in history. If anything, it might be reinterpretted by something like string theory, so that the “messy” Standard Model with its alphabet soup of particles and anti-particles would be the lowest vibration on the string.

Quantum hasn't done all that much...so far...in mass/common life. In part cuz it takes well above average brains and a shitload more study to "get" it in essential ways.

I'm not sure what you mean here. As I've said, QM is responsible for most of the modern tech we currently have. It hasn't done all that much?

From Wikipedia:

Applications of quantum mechanics include the laser, the transistor, the electron microscope, and magnetic resonance imaging. A special class of quantum mechanical applications is related to macroscopic quantum phenomena such as superfluid helium and superconductors. The study of semiconductors led to the invention of the diode and the transistor, which are indispensable for modern electronics.

In even the simple light switch, quantum tunnelling is absolutely vital, as otherwise the electrons in the electric current could not penetrate the potential barrier made up of a layer of oxide. Flash memory chips found in USB drives also use quantum tunnelling, to erase their memory cells.[38]

The diode, the transistor, the laser, semiconductors ... modern electronics would be impossible without QM. Hell, all of chemistry is based on QM.