I’m a chemist; we actually have to use quantum physics on a routine basis. The main reason many-worlds never got traction is that it doesn’t make a testable prediction. Most physicists realize that making a model of reality that predicts experiment (as far as possible) is, well, science; BSing about what the implications are is more of a late night and beer thing.
In other words, if the model implies that there may be other worlds, but they can’t conceivably be detected, then who cares?
One last thing: there’s some pretty good evidence of nonlocal physics these days. It’s inconsistent with general relativity, but no biggie. We already knew that general relativity and quantum physics were incompatible. The current situation in physics (for the last 30 years or so) is considerable confusion at the level of fundamental theory, but extremely robust models for every actual physical situation that we can probe. The robustness of the models is exactly what has halted progress.
The main reason many-worlds never got traction is that it doesn’t make a testable prediction.
I am not sure that it is possible to interpret this sentence without admitting to what amounts to Eliezer’s position. In other words, for this to be either right or wrong, Eliezer has to be right.
This sentence is most plausibly unpacked as assuming that the Copenhagen Interpretation and MWI are consistent with all findings, and that pride of place is naturally given to the first interpretation that makes predictions no other interpretation has. Science may not be wrong to, in general and as a heuristic, only accept new theories that make better predictions than the old. After all, even creationism or magic faerieism can be molded to be consistent with all known observations, whatever they are.
Eliezer simply asserts that MWI is simpler. He appeals to the Occam’s razor heuristic, not the “new testable predictions” one, as reason for the reader to accept MWI. (If you caught it, MWI is making a prediction—that no quantum superposition will be too small to cause a result interpreted as a collapse under CI—but that’s relatively small potatoes, since MWI is succeeding where CI is agnostic. However, that testable position isn’t the point here, the non-socially scientific criteria of theoretical simplicity is.)
Eliezer says: MWI is better that CI under Occam’s razor. You say: scientists care about subsequent theories having superior testable positions, not their being simpler under Occam’s razor.
Eliezer may reply: OK, there is good reason for science to work like that, since theoretically more complicated theories can always be just as predictive as previously discovered simpler ones by cheating and stealing their results, plus adding complexity, while never being more predictive. However, there is good reason to believe in the theoretically superior theory. (Perhaps he might add: also if you look closely CI is doing the cheating by looking at MWI to see when to declare a superposition.)
Ultimately, you have failed to dispute that MWI is simpler or that it is superior, and your offering a sociological explanation (CI’s coming before MWI) for why CI may be more broadly accepted despite theoretical inferiority does not engage Eliezer’s points in opposition, it shows the strength of one particular argument that assumes his point: CI is accepted only because it came before MWI.
One last thing: there’s some pretty good evidence of nonlocal physics these days. It’s inconsistent with general relativity, but no biggie.
What are you referring to? The kind of non-locality exhibited in the EPR paradox is consistent with special relativity—or at least there’s an elegant way of looking at this in which it is consistent. So are you talking about something totally different? Something incompatible with GR but not SR? Or both?
I’m a chemist; we actually have to use quantum physics on a routine basis. The main reason many-worlds never got traction is that it doesn’t make a testable prediction. Most physicists realize that making a model of reality that predicts experiment (as far as possible) is, well, science; BSing about what the implications are is more of a late night and beer thing.
In other words, if the model implies that there may be other worlds, but they can’t conceivably be detected, then who cares?
One last thing: there’s some pretty good evidence of nonlocal physics these days. It’s inconsistent with general relativity, but no biggie. We already knew that general relativity and quantum physics were incompatible. The current situation in physics (for the last 30 years or so) is considerable confusion at the level of fundamental theory, but extremely robust models for every actual physical situation that we can probe. The robustness of the models is exactly what has halted progress.
I am not sure that it is possible to interpret this sentence without admitting to what amounts to Eliezer’s position. In other words, for this to be either right or wrong, Eliezer has to be right.
This sentence is most plausibly unpacked as assuming that the Copenhagen Interpretation and MWI are consistent with all findings, and that pride of place is naturally given to the first interpretation that makes predictions no other interpretation has. Science may not be wrong to, in general and as a heuristic, only accept new theories that make better predictions than the old. After all, even creationism or magic faerieism can be molded to be consistent with all known observations, whatever they are.
Eliezer simply asserts that MWI is simpler. He appeals to the Occam’s razor heuristic, not the “new testable predictions” one, as reason for the reader to accept MWI. (If you caught it, MWI is making a prediction—that no quantum superposition will be too small to cause a result interpreted as a collapse under CI—but that’s relatively small potatoes, since MWI is succeeding where CI is agnostic. However, that testable position isn’t the point here, the non-socially scientific criteria of theoretical simplicity is.)
Eliezer says: MWI is better that CI under Occam’s razor. You say: scientists care about subsequent theories having superior testable positions, not their being simpler under Occam’s razor.
Eliezer may reply: OK, there is good reason for science to work like that, since theoretically more complicated theories can always be just as predictive as previously discovered simpler ones by cheating and stealing their results, plus adding complexity, while never being more predictive. However, there is good reason to believe in the theoretically superior theory. (Perhaps he might add: also if you look closely CI is doing the cheating by looking at MWI to see when to declare a superposition.)
Ultimately, you have failed to dispute that MWI is simpler or that it is superior, and your offering a sociological explanation (CI’s coming before MWI) for why CI may be more broadly accepted despite theoretical inferiority does not engage Eliezer’s points in opposition, it shows the strength of one particular argument that assumes his point: CI is accepted only because it came before MWI.
What are you referring to? The kind of non-locality exhibited in the EPR paradox is consistent with special relativity—or at least there’s an elegant way of looking at this in which it is consistent. So are you talking about something totally different? Something incompatible with GR but not SR? Or both?
If resources (including mental ones) are being spent fighting for a less plausible theory, isn’t that enough?