Related papers: Prediction and typicality in multiverse cosmology
During the last centuries of human history, many questions was repeated in connection with the great problems of the existence and origin of human beings, and also of the Universe. The old questions of common sense and philosophy have not…
How special (or not) is the epoch we are living in? What is the appropriate reference class for embedding the observations made at the present time? How probable -- or else -- is anything we observe in the fulness of time? Contemporary…
We compute the expected value of the cosmological constant in our universe from the Causal Entropic Principle. Since observers must obey the laws of thermodynamics and causality, the principle asserts that physical parameters are most…
The peculiar value of $\theta$ is a challenge to the notion of an anthropic landscape. We briefly review the possibility that a suitable axion might arise from an anthropic requirement of dark matter. We then consider an alternative…
We revisit our 2013 claim [arXiv:1303.7476] that the Universe is the result of a conspiratorial plot, and find that it cannot be trusted, because even the belief in this conspiracy likely results from a conspiracy. On the basis of…
We show that most of cutoff measures of the multiverse violate some of the basic properties of probability theory when applied repeatedly to predict the results of local experiments. Starting from minimal assumptions, such as Markov…
Cosmology has come a long way from being based on a small number of observations to being a data-driven precision science. We discuss the questions "What is observable?", "What in the Universe is knowable?" and "What are the fundamental…
The problem of interpreting quantum theory on a large (e.g. cosmological) scale has been commonly conceived as a search for objective reality in a framework that is fundamentally probabilistic. The Everett programme attempts to evade the…
Recently a covariant entropy conjecture has been proposed for dynamical horizons. We apply this conjecture to concordance cosmological models, namely, those cosmological models filled with perfect fluids, in the presence of a positive…
In the modern quantum mechanics of cosmology observers are physical systems within the universe. They have no preferred role in the formulation of the theory nor in its predictions of third person probabilities of what occurs. However,…
[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…
The influence of recent detections of a finite vacuum energy ("cosmological constant") on our formulation of anthropic conjectures, particularly the so-called Final Anthropic Principle is investigated. It is shown that non-zero vacuum…
We suggest to combine the Anthropic Principle with Many-Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Theory. Realizing the multiplicity of worlds it provides an opportunity of explanation of some important events which are assumed to be extremely…
Problems with uniform probabilities on an infinite support show up in contemporary cosmology. This paper focuses on the context of inflation theory, where it complicates the assignment of a probability measure over pocket universes. The…
The anthropic principle implies that life can emerge and be sustained only in a narrow range of values of fundamental constants. Here we show that anthropic arguments can set powerful constraints on {\em transient} variations of the…
Human reasoning often involves working over limited information to arrive at probabilistic conclusions. In its simplest form, this involves making an inference that is not strictly entailed by a premise, but rather only likely given the…
We utilize anthropic reasoning to demonstrate that we are typical observers of our reference class under a self-sampling assumption by investigating the definition of what a civilization is. With reference to the conflict between such…
The ideas of aleatoric and epistemic uncertainty are widely used to reason about the probabilistic predictions of machine-learning models. We identify incoherence in existing discussions of these ideas and suggest this stems from the…
The anthropic explanation for the peculiarly small observed value of the cosmological constant $\Lambda_{\rm obs}$ argues that this value promotes the formation of stars, planets, and ultimately of observers such as ourselves. I show that a…
A central focus of data science is the transformation of empirical evidence into knowledge. As such, the key insights and scientific attitudes of deep thinkers like Fisher, Popper, and Tukey are expected to inspire exciting new advances in…