Related papers: Reality, No Matter How You Slice It

I argue that both digital and analog information are important in the foundations of quantum physics. If it is possible for information present in one system to become present in others without being erased in the original system I will say…

A fascinating and deep question about nature is what one would see if one could probe space and time at smaller and smaller distances. Already the 19th-century founders of modern geometry contemplated the possibility that a piece of empty…

Quantum theory describes our universe incredibly successfully. To our classically-inclined brains, however, it is a bizarre description that requires a re-imagining of what fundamental reality, or "ontology", could look like. This thesis…

John Wheeler advocated the principle that information is the foundation of physics and asked us to reformulate physics in terms of bits. The goal is to consider what we know already and work out a new mathematical theory in which space,…

We discuss a new realistic interpretation of quantum mechanics based on discontinuous motion of particles. The historical and logical basis of discontinuous motion of particles is given. It proves that if there exists only one kind of…

Recently, it has been argued [arXiv:1111.6597, arXiv:1005.5173] that different quantum states do necessarily correspond to different elements of reality, under the assumption that quantum mechanics is correct and that measurement settings…

After stating the measurement problem, physicists usually assume the problem to be coming from the measurement part. Since classical probabilities also collapse when updating information, there is nothing special about quantum state…

The key observation about quantum reality is that it often appears as if, at some moment, the probability of a quantum event becomes a definite outcome for us. A careful analysis suggests, however, that what we perceive as a definite state…

Much has been discussed in the philosophy of science about how we should understand the scientific enterprise. On the one hand, scientific realists believe that empirically adequate theories can be supplemented by interpretations that can…

Current theoretical physics suggests the flow of time is an illusion: the entire universe just is, with no special meaning attached to the present time. This paper points out that this view, in essence represented by usual space-time…

Landauer's principle claims that "Information is Physical." It is not surprising that its conceptual antithesis, Wheeler's "It from Bit," has been more popular among computer scientists --- in the form of the Church-Turing hypothesis: All…

Space and time are central concepts for understanding our World. They are important ingredients at the core of every scientific theory and subject of intense debate in philosophy. Albert Einstein's Special and General theories of Relativity…

Along with weaving together observations, experiments, and theoretical constructs into a coherent mesh of understanding of the world around us, physics over its past five centuries has continuously refined the base concepts on which the…

We argue that quantum mechanics makes sense without such controversial postulates as the wave function collapse, the quantum probability rule and the observable postulate. We only need the existence of a wave function as a representation of…

Many recent results suggest that quantum theory is about information, and that quantum theory is best understood as arising from principles concerning information and information processing. At the same time, by far the simplest version of…

Underlying any theory of physics is a layer of conceptual frames. They connect the mathematical structures used in theoretical models with physical phenomena, but they also constitute our fundamental assumptions about reality. Many of the…

What ontology does realism about the quantum state suggest? The main extant view in contemporary philosophy of physics is wave-function realism. We elaborate the sense in which wave-function realism does provide an ontological picture; and…

As time advances in our perceived real world, existing information is preserved and new information is added to history. All the information that may ever be encoded in history must be about some fundamental, unique, atemporal and…

This paper links the conjecture that the physical world is a virtual reality to the findings of modern physics. What is usually the subject of science fiction is here proposed as a scientific theory open to empirical evaluation. We know…

This paper examines the various arguments that have been put forward suggesting either that time does not exist, or that it exists but its flow is not real. I argue that (i) time both exists and flows; (ii) an Evolving Block Universe…