Related papers: On the world cognizability
In order to relate the probabilistic predictions of quantum theory uniquely to measurement results, one has to conceive of an ensemble of identically prepared copies of the quantum system under study. Since the universe is the total domain…
Quantum mechanics, with its counterintuitive principles and probabilistic nature, has long been confined to the microscopic realm of atoms and photons. Yet, recent breakthroughs have pushed the boundaries of quantum behavior into the…
Although big bang cosmology effectively models even the most puzzling observational data, it offers no insight into why the cosmological expansion should occur at all. In this paper it is suggested that a finite Universe poses particular…
Microphysical laws are time reversible, but macrophysics, chemistry and biology are not. This chapter explores how this asymmetry (a classic example of a broken symmetry) arises due to the cosmological context, where a non-local Direction…
Quantum theory makes the most accurate empirical predictions and yet it lacks simple, comprehensible physical principles from which the theory can be uniquely derived. A broad class of probabilistic theories exist which all share some…
The possibility to describe the laws of the Universe in a computational way seems to be correlated to a principle that the density of information is bounded. This principle, that is dual to that of a finite velocity of information, has…
Our knowledge about the universe has increased tremendously in the last three decades or so --- thanks to the progress in observations --- but our understanding has improved very little. There are several fundamental questions about our…
Human consciousness has been a long-lasting mystery for centuries, while machine intelligence and consciousness is an arduous pursuit. Researchers have developed diverse theories for interpreting the consciousness phenomenon in human brains…
Consider a proposed model of the universe with $\hbar$ much greater than its well-known value of $10^{-34} Js$. In this model universe, very large objects can show quantum behaviors. In a scenario with large extra dimensions, $\hbar$ can…
The evolution of the human mind through natural selection mandates that our conscious experiences are causally potent in order to leave a tangible impact upon the surrounding physical world. Any attempt to construct a functional theory of…
A variety of physical unknowables are discussed. Provable lack of physical omniscience, omnipredictability and omnipotence is derived by reduction to problems which are known to be recursively unsolvable. "Chaotic" symbolic dynamical…
The descriptions of the quantum realm and the macroscopic classical world differ significantly not only in their mathematical formulations but also in their foundational concepts and philosophical consequences. When and how physical systems…
Most scientists would hold that science has not established that the cosmos is physically comprehensible - i.e. such that there is some as-yet undiscovered true physical theory of everything that is unified. This is an empirically…
The "measurement problem" of quantum mechanics, and the "hard problem" of cognitive science are the most profound open problems of the two research fields, and certainly among the deepest of all unsettled conundrums in contemporary science…
We start from classical general relativity coupled to matter fields. Each configuration variable and its conjugate momentum, as also space-time points, are raised to the status of matrices [equivalently operators]. These matrices obey a…
The causal structure of cognition can be simulated but not implemented computationally, just as the causal structure of a comet can be simulated but not implemented computationally. The only thing that allows us even to imagine otherwise is…
The major advances in physics have been through counterintuitive breakthroughs-- ideas that seemed to go against prevailing convictions. In the twentieth century the Special and General Theory of Relativity and Quantum Mechanics have…
We approach the question "What is Consciousness?" in a new way, not as Descartes' "systematic doubt", but as how organisms find their way in their world. Finding one's way involves finding possible uses of features of the world that might…
Our main purpose here is to study some qualitative aspects of space and time. These include the notion of space and time regarded as the containers of respectively bodies and events, the divisibility of space, and the unrepeatability of…
The basic problem posed by free will (FW) for physics appears to be not the \textit{physical} one of whether it is compatible with the laws of physics, but the \textit{logical} one of how to consistently define it, since it incorporates the…