Related papers: The Observer Class Hypothesis
Interpretations of quantum theory have traditionally assumed a "Galilean" observer, a bare "point of view" implemented physically by a quantum system. This paper investigates the consequences of replacing such an…
Even when completely and consistently formulated, a fundamental theory of physics and cosmological boundary conditions may not give unambiguous and unique predictions for the universe we observe; indeed inflation, string/M theory, and…
If the universe expands exponentially without end, ``ordinary observers'' like ourselves may be vastly outnumbered by ``Boltzmann's brains,'' transient observers who briefly flicker into existence as a result of quantum or thermal…
The information in an individual finite object (like a binary string) is commonly measured by its Kolmogorov complexity. One can divide that information into two parts: the information accounting for the useful regularity present in the…
Observational entropy is interpreted as the uncertainty an observer making measurements associates with a system. So far, properties that make such an interpretation possible rely on the assumption of ideal projective measurements. We show…
After commenting briefly on the role of the typicality assumption in science, we advocate a phenomenological approach to the cosmological measure problem. Like any other theory, a measure should be simple, general, well-defined, and…
The theory of measurement is employed to elucidate the physical basis of general relativity. For measurements involving phenomena with intrinsic length or time scales, such scales must in general be negligible compared to the (translational…
[Abridged] Some cosmological theories propose that the observable universe is a small part of a much larger universe in which parameters describing the low-energy laws of physics vary from region to region. How can we reasonably assess a…
These lectures deal with the problem of inductive inference, that is, the problem of reasoning under conditions of incomplete information. Is there a general method for handling uncertainty? Or, at least, are there rules that could in…
The approach defines information process from probabilistic observation, emerging microprocess,qubit, encoding bits, evolving macroprocess, and extends to Observer information self-organization, cognition, intelligence and understanding…
We consider probabilistic theories in which the most elementary system, a two-dimensional system, contains one bit of information. The bit is assumed to be contained in any complete set of mutually complementary measurements. The…
It is usually assumed that the quantum state is sufficient for deducing all probabilities for a system. This may be true when there is a single observer, but it is not true in a universe large enough that there are many copies of an…
Founding our analysis on the Geneva-Brussels approach to the foundations of physics, we provide a clarification and classification of the key concept of observation. An entity can be observed with or without a scope. In the second case, the…
We discuss the possibility that the inflationary paradigm, undoubtfully today's best framework to understand all the present cosmological data, may still have some viable challengers. The underlying idea for such discussions is that…
This paper presents and philosophically assesses three types of results on the observational equivalence of continuous-time measure-theoretic deterministic and indeterministic descriptions. The first results establish observational…
The probability distribution P from which the history of our universe is sampled represents a theory of everything or TOE. We assume P is formally describable. Since most (uncountably many) distributions are not, this imposes a strong…
We establish three impossibility results regarding our knowledge of the quantum state of the universe. Suppose the universal quantum state is a typical unit vector in a high-dimensional subspace $\mathscr{H}_0$ of Hilbert space…
According to our current conception of physics, any valid physical theory is supposed to describe the objective evolution of a unique external world. However, this condition is challenged by quantum theory, which suggests that physical…
No consensus seems to exist as to what constitutes a measurement which is still considered somewhat mysterious in many respects in quantum mechanics. At successive stages mathematical theory of measure, metrology and measurement theory…
In the theory of classical statistical inference one can derive a simple rule by which two or more observers may combine {\em independently} obtained states of knowledge together to form a new state of knowledge, which is the state which…