“This is very strange. Consider that if humankind makes it another thousand years, we’ll probably have started to colonize other star systems. Those star systems will colonize other star systems and so on until we start expanding at nearly the speed of light, colonizing literally everything in sight. After a hundred thousand years or so we’ll have settled a big chunk of the galaxy, assuming we haven’t killed ourselves first or encountered someone else already living there.”
There are two assumption here that everybody in the rationalist/EA/AI alignment community seems to take for granted while they seems are least debatable (if not downright false) to me: 1) If we make it to another thousand years, we’ll probably have started to colonize other star systems. Well, it may turn out it’s a little bit more complicated to go to an other star system than to go to Mars—them being far and so on. Any colony outside of the solar system would necessarily have very limited economic ties with the Earth, since even information would need a few years to be transmitted (good luck managing your Alpha Centauri properties from Earth...) and material goods would be even worse. So the economic interest is not even clear in any non-paperclip maximiser scenario, and that’s assuming galaxy level colonisation is even possible physically (remember that if you are going fast, you will need to slow down, and that the faster you go the heavier you get).
2) “expanding at nearly the speed of light”. This seems downright implausible and ruled out by my understanding of current physic. Light goes fast, you know.
I think your analysis relies on the assumption that the Einsteinian speed limit is definite, which by current run of the mill physics, geometric unity is up in the air. So whether this is possible could be a break-point, but technological maturity could still break this barrier in forms of entanglement, for instance, granted this is not constrained by the ‘ultimate physics’ of the universe.
I’m not sure I understand exactly what you say, but given my understanding of current physics the speed of light is a hard barrier in the general relativistic framework, and one that is unlikely to be overturned, because any new theoretical physic should have relativity as a special case (just like Newtonian mechanic is a special case of relativity where you can consider v/c=0.
So, if I’m understanding this argument thread correctly (and I am in no means totally sure that I am) then you’ve basically argued against the speed of light as a hard barrier using quantum entanglement, all the way back around around to again accepting that, with our current understanding of physics, yes, it DOES seem to be a hard barrier to any type of successful interplanetary colonization beyond any species’ local solar system/star group?
If I’m correct in that generalization (base as it may be) then aren’t we essentially agreeing that the “Great Filer” this article is discussing is most likely as simple as “the speed of light{”? Because even if certain civilizations exist out there who have, over hundreds of thousands, or even millions of years, managed to expand or even simply not destroy themselves, then isn’t it logical to assume the reason we haven’t seen or heard any evidence of such is because that evidence still hasn’t reached us? Maybe never will, within the life span of our sun and solar system? And even if it did reach us from millions of light years away, maybe we simply cant recognize it in its diluted or/deteriorated state from its travel throughout the vastness of “space”?
I guess what I’m saying is, maybe we’re just underestimating how vast our universe is, and how sparsely distributed intelligent species may be throughout? Even if there are “a lot” of them out there, that doesn’t necessarily mean we would ever be aware of it. Or that they may ever be aware of us.
Feel free to point out my mistakes in logic/reasoning here. I’m simply here to learn. Thanks.
Right, you are correct, as the our current theoretical understanding puts it. It could still be the case that this speed limit is imposed, but the goal of reaching point B from point A is still actualized.
As far as I am aware entanglement does not violate Einstein’s rule, as no information is transmitted between entangled particles—you can not use entanglement to transmit information faster than light. So no “quantum teleportation” is possible (and anyway entanglement requires the actual particles to travel and they can not do this faster than light either).
Correct. It doesn’t violate the limit yet they communicate as though they were violating it. It achieves communication by different means scarcely understood. We can achieve accurate predictions using entanglement. Information can be currently be communicated through qubits in quantum computers.
What are you talking about ? What has quantum computing to do with faster than light travel ?
Entangled particle “communicate with each other instantly”, but the no-communication theorem is a well known result in quantum mechanic (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-communication_theorem) that shows that entanglement can not be used to transmit information (i.e. messages or matter) faster than light.
Thanks for linking this. Seems like I was arguing from an incorrect premise. What sources do you know of where I can learn/understand more about quantum theory?
An entangled quantum state is one which cannot be written as the tensor product of two pure states. Imagine I prepare two objects whose states are quantum-entangled; suppose they either both say ‘0’ or ‘1’, but they can’t disagree, and we don’t know beforehand. We each take an object and go our separate ways.
A day later, I decide to “measure” the state of my object. This basically just means I get to find out whether it says ‘0’ or ‘1’. I find out it says ‘0’. This allows me to deduce that when you measure your object, yours will also say ‘0’.
But this isn’t sending information ‘faster than light’ or ‘instantly’ or anything strange like that. The quantum superposition was between the |0⟩⊗|0⟩ and |1⟩⊗|1⟩ states, and when I measured the state of my object, I “found out” which world I was in. Then, I inferred what you would see if you peeked.
We can construct a classical example of a similar kind of “faster-than-light” inference. Consider a closed system of two objects of equal mass, which were earlier at rest together before spontaneously pushing off of each other (maybe we intervened to make this happen, whatever). We aren’t sure about their velocities, but when we learn the velocity v of one object, we immediately know that the velocity of the other is −v by conservation of momentum. Under these assumptions, the velocity of one object logically determines the velocity of the other object, but does not cause the other object to have the opposite velocity.
(I’m not a physicist, but if you want to learn the math of basic quantum theory, I recommend Nielsen and Chuang)
Interesting. It seems that although entanglement breaking the speed of light is technically untrue, we could make these inferences ‘as if’ they were quicker than the speed of light. Instead of measuring the differences between the states of the two items, we’re able to make that inference instantly. So although it’s not faster than the speed of light, our measurements operate as though they were.
I think my misunderstanding comes from the inability to put this operation into practice. But as per my original argument, if electrons were simply more concentrated waves which behave like particles, determining a full theory of everything that incorporates the quantum is possible. Computing power aside, having these roadblocks in place do not seem sufficient to keep our current theoretical knowledge as is. The most famous example was the conventional wisdom of the ether, which general relativity broke. Ignorance is bliss.
“This is very strange. Consider that if humankind makes it another thousand years, we’ll probably have started to colonize other star systems. Those star systems will colonize other star systems and so on until we start expanding at nearly the speed of light, colonizing literally everything in sight. After a hundred thousand years or so we’ll have settled a big chunk of the galaxy, assuming we haven’t killed ourselves first or encountered someone else already living there.”
There are two assumption here that everybody in the rationalist/EA/AI alignment community seems to take for granted while they seems are least debatable (if not downright false) to me:
1) If we make it to another thousand years, we’ll probably have started to colonize other star systems.
Well, it may turn out it’s a little bit more complicated to go to an other star system than to go to Mars—them being far and so on. Any colony outside of the solar system would necessarily have very limited economic ties with the Earth, since even information would need a few years to be transmitted (good luck managing your Alpha Centauri properties from Earth...) and material goods would be even worse. So the economic interest is not even clear in any non-paperclip maximiser scenario, and that’s assuming galaxy level colonisation is even possible physically (remember that if you are going fast, you will need to slow down, and that the faster you go the heavier you get).
2) “expanding at nearly the speed of light”. This seems downright implausible and ruled out by my understanding of current physic. Light goes fast, you know.
I think your analysis relies on the assumption that the Einsteinian speed limit is definite, which by current run of the mill physics, geometric unity is up in the air. So whether this is possible could be a break-point, but technological maturity could still break this barrier in forms of entanglement, for instance, granted this is not constrained by the ‘ultimate physics’ of the universe.
I’m not sure I understand exactly what you say, but given my understanding of current physics the speed of light is a hard barrier in the general relativistic framework, and one that is unlikely to be overturned, because any new theoretical physic should have relativity as a special case (just like Newtonian mechanic is a special case of relativity where you can consider v/c=0.
So, if I’m understanding this argument thread correctly (and I am in no means totally sure that I am) then you’ve basically argued against the speed of light as a hard barrier using quantum entanglement, all the way back around around to again accepting that, with our current understanding of physics, yes, it DOES seem to be a hard barrier to any type of successful interplanetary colonization beyond any species’ local solar system/star group?
If I’m correct in that generalization (base as it may be) then aren’t we essentially agreeing that the “Great Filer” this article is discussing is most likely as simple as “the speed of light{”? Because even if certain civilizations exist out there who have, over hundreds of thousands, or even millions of years, managed to expand or even simply not destroy themselves, then isn’t it logical to assume the reason we haven’t seen or heard any evidence of such is because that evidence still hasn’t reached us? Maybe never will, within the life span of our sun and solar system? And even if it did reach us from millions of light years away, maybe we simply cant recognize it in its diluted or/deteriorated state from its travel throughout the vastness of “space”?
I guess what I’m saying is, maybe we’re just underestimating how vast our universe is, and how sparsely distributed intelligent species may be throughout? Even if there are “a lot” of them out there, that doesn’t necessarily mean we would ever be aware of it. Or that they may ever be aware of us.
Feel free to point out my mistakes in logic/reasoning here. I’m simply here to learn. Thanks.
Right, you are correct, as the our current theoretical understanding puts it. It could still be the case that this speed limit is imposed, but the goal of reaching point B from point A is still actualized.
What Einstein Got Wrong About the Speed of Light | Time
As far as I am aware entanglement does not violate Einstein’s rule, as no information is transmitted between entangled particles—you can not use entanglement to transmit information faster than light. So no “quantum teleportation” is possible (and anyway entanglement requires the actual particles to travel and they can not do this faster than light either).
Correct. It doesn’t violate the limit yet they communicate as though they were violating it. It achieves communication by different means scarcely understood. We can achieve accurate predictions using entanglement. Information can be currently be communicated through qubits in quantum computers.
What are you talking about ? What has quantum computing to do with faster than light travel ?
Entangled particle “communicate with each other instantly”, but the no-communication theorem is a well known result in quantum mechanic (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-communication_theorem) that shows that entanglement can not be used to transmit information (i.e. messages or matter) faster than light.
Thanks for linking this. Seems like I was arguing from an incorrect premise. What sources do you know of where I can learn/understand more about quantum theory?
An entangled quantum state is one which cannot be written as the tensor product of two pure states. Imagine I prepare two objects whose states are quantum-entangled; suppose they either both say ‘0’ or ‘1’, but they can’t disagree, and we don’t know beforehand. We each take an object and go our separate ways.
A day later, I decide to “measure” the state of my object. This basically just means I get to find out whether it says ‘0’ or ‘1’. I find out it says ‘0’. This allows me to deduce that when you measure your object, yours will also say ‘0’.
But this isn’t sending information ‘faster than light’ or ‘instantly’ or anything strange like that. The quantum superposition was between the |0⟩⊗|0⟩ and |1⟩⊗|1⟩ states, and when I measured the state of my object, I “found out” which world I was in. Then, I inferred what you would see if you peeked.
We can construct a classical example of a similar kind of “faster-than-light” inference. Consider a closed system of two objects of equal mass, which were earlier at rest together before spontaneously pushing off of each other (maybe we intervened to make this happen, whatever). We aren’t sure about their velocities, but when we learn the velocity v of one object, we immediately know that the velocity of the other is −v by conservation of momentum. Under these assumptions, the velocity of one object logically determines the velocity of the other object, but does not cause the other object to have the opposite velocity.
(I’m not a physicist, but if you want to learn the math of basic quantum theory, I recommend Nielsen and Chuang)
Interesting. It seems that although entanglement breaking the speed of light is technically untrue, we could make these inferences ‘as if’ they were quicker than the speed of light. Instead of measuring the differences between the states of the two items, we’re able to make that inference instantly. So although it’s not faster than the speed of light, our measurements operate as though they were.
I think my misunderstanding comes from the inability to put this operation into practice. But as per my original argument, if electrons were simply more concentrated waves which behave like particles, determining a full theory of everything that incorporates the quantum is possible. Computing power aside, having these roadblocks in place do not seem sufficient to keep our current theoretical knowledge as is. The most famous example was the conventional wisdom of the ether, which general relativity broke. Ignorance is bliss.