Buddy Philosophy on Digital Physics

Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen

Publication (Outlet/Website): The Good Men Project

Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2023/12/01

According to some semi-reputable sources gathered in a listing here, Rick G. Rosner may have among America’s, North America’s, and the world’s highest measured IQs at or above 190 (S.D. 15)/196 (S.D. 16) based on several high range test performances created by Christopher Harding, Jason Betts, Paul Cooijmans, and Ronald Hoeflin. He earned 12 years of college credit in less than a year and graduated with the equivalent of 8 majors. He has received 8 Writers Guild Awards and Emmy nominations, and was titled 2013 North American Genius of the Year by The World Genius Directorywith the main “Genius” listing here.

He has written for Remote Control, Crank Yankers, The Man Show, The Emmys, The Grammys, and Jimmy Kimmel Live!. He worked as a bouncer, a nude art model, a roller-skating waiter, and a stripper. In a television commercial, Domino’s Pizza named him the “World’s Smartest Man.” The commercial was taken off the air after Subway sandwiches issued a cease-and-desist. He was named “Best Bouncer” in the Denver Area, Colorado, by Westwood Magazine.

Rosner spent much of the late Disco Era as an undercover high school student. In addition, he spent 25 years as a bar bouncer and American fake ID-catcher, and 25+ years as a stripper, and nearly 30 years as a writer for more than 2,500 hours of network television. Errol Morris featured Rosner in the interview series entitled First Person, where some of this history was covered by Morris. He came in second, or lost, on Jeopardy!, sued Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? over a flawed question and lost the lawsuit. He won one game and lost one game on Are You Smarter Than a Drunk Person? (He was drunk). Finally, he spent 37+ years working on a time-invariant variation of the Big Bang Theory.

Currently, Rosner sits tweeting in a bathrobe (winter) or a towel (summer). He lives in Los Angeles, California with his wife, dog, and goldfish. He and his wife have a daughter. You can send him money or questions at LanceVersusRick@Gmail.Com, or a direct message via Twitter, or find him on LinkedIn, or see him on YouTube.

Scott Douglas Jacobsen: I’ve been pondering the concept of metaphysics for quite some time. You’ve been thinking about this even longer than I have. Together, we’ve developed the idea of potentially reintegrating metaphysics with physics. Ancient Greek philosophers, especially those from the Ionian school, were deeply engaged in metaphysics. They didn’t have the physics that we have now.

Rick Rosner: You don’t necessarily need to, but nowadays, you can engage in metaphysics with a better chance of accuracy. The more you know about the universe and the closer you are to an accurate picture of it, the more likely your metaphysical ideas won’t be wildly off. Unless your metaphysics is either so vague it can describe anything, or so profound it remains relevant regardless of the universe’s accurate portrayal.

Jacobsen: Right, so we’re discussing the practical utility of metaphysics in providing a valid and sound description of the universe.

Rosner: Yes, and it’s worth mentioning that physicists, and maybe scientists in general, but especially physicists, often say that all science eventually boils down to physics. Biology, chemistry, they all reduce to physical interactions. When they become more complex, they turn into chemistry, and even more complex, biology, and eventually even the social sciences. However, people still specialize in biology, chemistry, and the social sciences because it’s efficient. You don’t need to deconstruct everything to basic physics all the time, although sometimes, delving into quantum physics helps explain new phenomena in biology and chemistry.

Jacobsen: Sean Carroll talks about poetic naturalism, where we can scientifically discuss love in many ways. However, we still use poetic and literary language, like “I love you,” to describe human experience, understanding that it’s founded on scientific reality. It’s about considering different levels of analysis and description, from folk psychology and interpersonal reactions to physics. Essentially, it’s all interconnected.

Rosner: Exactly, and our world has enough flexibility to allow these different levels of order and complexity. For example, my friend Chris is attempting to map every single feedback loop in biology within the human body. These feedback loops exist at various levels of complexity relative to basic physics, and he believes most are yet to be discovered.

Jacobsen: This is similar to Dmitri Mendeleev with the periodic table. He started simply, with many gaps, which were filled in over time. Chris could be initiating a similar process for feedback loops in biology.

Rosner: When we talk about metaphysics, we’re discussing the principles of existence, which overlaps with physics. It’s about what can exist and, by extension, what cannot. Quantum mechanics, especially, aids this discussion. It’s essentially the math and physics of things that barely exist, dealing with incomplete information. It describes how things behave when not fully characterized, like the position and velocity of an electron.

Jacobsen: However, I wouldn’t classify the math of quantum mechanics as metaphysical. It’s more about the math of existence.

Rosner: True, but there’s still a metaphysical aspect because it models what existence fundamentally is. You would think metaphysics should lead to more stringent and precise science. However, it seems we can use the solid science of quantum mechanics to inform our understanding of metaphysics.

Jacobsen: That’s counterintuitive, considering the history of metaphysics, which hasn’t been great at arriving at precise, sound views of the world.

Rosner: It’s akin to the struggle in defining consciousness or the history of theology. There are myriad interpretations, often leading to wrong or contradictory answers.

Jacobsen: In Western tradition, we’ve seen centuries of speculative metaphysics. In contrast, the last five hundred years have shown gradual refinement in understanding the universe through physics, chemistry, biology, and psychology. While some mysteries may be eternal, others are merely hard problems awaiting solutions.

Rosner: Quantum mechanics, being about a century old, has seen various attempts at applying its principles to other contexts, often incorrectly. Yet, you can use these principles in different ways, such as in predicting traffic behavior or in sports analytics. There’s a strong connection between quantum math and Bayesian probability, both frameworks characterizing uncertainty.

Jacobsen: So, when we talk about ‘frameworks,’ we’re referring to these structures or descriptions of the universe. However, these are not the universe itself. They are tools we’ve developed to create accurate maps of reality. But they remain maps, not the terrain.

Rosner: The language we use evolved because it was useful. Language and thought products aim to predict and act. Therefore, every word and its associated characterization is subject to fuzziness. Some words, like ‘apple,’ are fairly specific, but still encompass a range of variation and imprecision.

Jacobsen: Consider the notion of the soul, which historically justified inhumane treatment of animals. Our experience feels unified, but for a long time, the assumption was that a spirit or soul underpinned it, leading us in wrong directions.

Rosner: Let’s pause on the soul concept. The soul, as some see it, is an essence of oneself, transcending details and memories. It’s the core of who you are. However, I see the soul more as an informational substrate, somewhat independent of individual cognition.

Jacobsen: Extending that idea, one’s impact on themselves, others, and the environment during and after their life can be seen as an extended sense of the soul. It’s an extended self, essentially.

Rosner: An analogy between information and the universe is that the universe consists of space and matter. We think about the material bodies, but the space itself, curved around, forms an underlying structure determined by matter distribution. This curved space that contains everything is akin to what a soul might be – an underlying landscape determined by the aggregate of everything that’s happened.

Jacobsen: So, our descriptions of the universe, while useful, are just tools for understanding. They don’t capture the intrinsic operations of the universe.

Rosner: Language evolved to help us survive, so it’s efficient in that sense. But every word and sentence is subject to fuzziness and imprecision. This is especially true for terms in metaphysics.

Jacobsen: Hence, the danger in assumptions like the soul, which can lead to misguided beliefs and actions.

Rosner: The soul, as an informational aggregate resulting from everything that’s happened, is an unspecific underlying structure. It’s shaped by the overall curvature and dynamics of the universe.

Jacobsen: We’ll need to pause here and come back to this discussion later.

Rosner: Sure, let’s continue later.

—

Rick Rosner: We’re fortunate in that regard. It involves the concept of selling that idea.

Scott Douglas Jacobsen: Absolutely. This discussion is primarily within our IC context, a limited scope where we share common ground. It’s more for our benefit than for others. My understanding is when people reference the physical, they are talking about the material. I perceive the physical as a subset of the material, which in turn is a subset of the natural. In an IC context, the natural is a subset of the informational. Essentially, information is fundamental. Take two different time states; the difference between them signifies a change of state, measurable in the amount of information that differs. Additionally, the intrinsic information required for each state is crucial. The soul can be conceptualized as an informational construct, especially when considering the idea of an extended self. It’s an informational construct extending beyond standard cognition but remains completely natural and devoid of any mystical elements. This perspective brings us back to the discussion on metaphysics and the concept of the soul in a universe that operates quantum mechanically, which is fundamentally incomplete and lacks complete self-knowledge.

Rosner: Perhaps we haven’t concluded our discussion about the soul.

Jacobsen: Maybe not. Let’s explore the idea of the soul as a continually changing, incomplete construct.

Rosner: If we consider the soul as a cumulative landscape shaped by specific informational events, memories, and knowledge, it’s clear that this landscape requires a complete history of your experiences. To argue that it’s a general landscape, one might suggest that you could fully characterize your soul with all the information in your mental universe. However, this isn’t practical. For the soul to be a conceptually useful tool, it should be an abridged version of all the information that contributes to its formation. For instance, when considering babies, we often use simple descriptors like ‘happy baby’ or ‘cranky baby,’ which summarize a complex set of information about each child. This abridgement is what makes the concept of the soul practical. We should be able to characterize an individual’s essence using much less information than what went into forming their personality.

Jacobsen: Extending this idea to the soul as a natural entity, it suggests that souls can overlap. My extended self overlaps with yours to some extent. We might consider first-order and second-order souls or subsets of the soul.

Rosner: This concept is somewhat echoed in certain religions, like Judaism, which posits that people continue to live in the memories of those who remember them.

Jacobsen: I was thinking along those lines. It aligns with a secular Judaist perspective.

Rosner: However, it’s quite unsatisfying. Compared to traditional promises of an eternal afterlife or infinite oblivion, it seems lackluster.

Jacobsen: Yet, it’s more satisfying than the notion of complete oblivion.

Rosner: It feels closer to oblivion than to infinity. But if we could somehow externalize consciousness, allowing it to exist independently of the brain, we could develop a more satisfying concept of living on. Today, we leave more behind, like digital recordings and social media posts, but it’s not quite the same. If we could replicate consciousness and share it, then the idea of living on through our thoughts becomes more compelling.

Jacobsen: The ‘nuggets of consciousness’ you mentioned are productions, not consciousness itself. This would be a secondary extension of the soul.

Rosner: Zuckerberg once mentioned wanting Facebook to be telepathic in the future. If that means exporting feelings so others can experience them as their own, it opens up new possibilities. Sharing consciousness in this way would be a significant advancement.

Jacobsen: However, this ‘exportation’ would be different from actual consciousness. It would be more of a recreation of the secondary aspects of the soul.

Rosner: If we could open the ‘black box’ of consciousness, allowing shared subjective experiences, it could lead to a more profound understanding of consciousness. It might require a long process of shared experiences to merge consciousnesses effectively.

Jacobsen: Transplanting a complete map of consciousness to a different context would be akin to copy-pasting, lacking the necessary associations for optimal functioning.

Rosner: This is an area that requires new technologies and mathematics. Yet, there can be well-defined distinctions between first and second-order aspects of the soul in an informational context.

Jacobsen: The first-order aspect of the soul is akin to the mind, while the second-order aspect extends beyond, influenced by our interactions with others and the world.

Rosner: We’ve touched upon various aspects of the soul. Essentially, we’ve been attempting to characterize it in informational terms, which aligns with our discussions on metaphysics.

Jacobsen: Right. The universe’s incomplete knowledge about itself makes the soul an inherently dynamic and changing construct. A perfect metaphysics would likely equate to perfect physics, blurring the line between the two.

Rosner: One argument is to discard metaphysics as it’s often muddied by less rigorous philosophies. Another argument suggests that well-founded metaphysical statements are essentially physical, tied to the universe’s principles.

Jacobsen: Metaphysics got cleaner with the advent of proper science. Historically, metaphysical thinking was dominant, often tied to religious and mystical beliefs. Modern science has gradually reduced the space for ‘God of the gaps’ and metaphysical speculation.

Rosner: In summary, metaphysics has been historically linked with imprecise philosophies, but there are arguments for a set of general principles about the world that could be termed metaphysical. Alternatively, well-founded metaphysical statements could be seen as physical, connected to the universe’s principles.

Jacobsen: Lastly, the soul as an informational construct with first and second-order properties is a derivative concept from these discussions.

Rosner: Exactly. We’ve explored the soul from various angles, suggesting that it can be understood as an underlying informational landscape shaped by a person’s history and experiences.

Jacobsen: In conclusion, our exploration of the soul and metaphysics leads us to consider the evolving nature of these concepts in light of our growing understanding of the universe and consciousness.

Rosner: Precisely. The end.

Jacobsen: The end.

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In-Sight Publishing by Scott Douglas Jacobsen is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Based on a work at www.in-sightpublishing.com.

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